Caladons Guide to ESL Files

Creating and Installing Installing ESL mod files Guide:

ESL files have one major advantage over ESP files and that is that they do not contribute to the dreaded 255 limit for mods that the ESP files are subject to. They also have disadvantages such as they are limited to 4000 record id's, and can have issues with your load order. So choosing what mods to make ESL can be critical.

The best candidates for conversion to the ESL format is any single mod that uses only its own assets i.e. Armor Mods, or other stand-alone type mods that you don't have to worry about the load order overwriting other mod assets.

If you are going to convert a mod to ESL that you already have installed in a current game, be aware it is just like removing and reinstalling the mod, for armor or weapon mods this means you will need to reacquire the armor parts or the weapons. When you Load your save for the first time after activating a converted ESL, you will get the Missing modname.esp error.

Converting ESP to ESL

To convert an ESP mod to ESL just launch the Creation Kit, Loading Fallout4.esm and set the mod ESP to active. It is a good Idea to compact the ID's by going to File - Compact Active File Form IDs. then Click File - Convert Active File to Light Master. if the ESP still has too many ID's, it will generate an error and it will not create the ESL. That mod is too large to be converted to ESL. If you do not get an error the new ESL file will be in your Fallout 4\Data folder.

Activating Custom ESL files

There are two ways to Activate the ESL

1. You can manually edit the Users\Owner\Appdata\Local\Fallout 4\Plugins.txt and just change the modname.esp  to modname.esl  ( Note the " * " asterisk as Fallout 4.exe looks for this to know this mod is active also this file is set to Read-Only so you will need to set this to writable before you can edit it. )

2. If you are using NMM 0 63. 17 you can just launch or reload NMM and the new ESL will be listed after any other ESL files you may have. just check the ESL version and uncheck the ESP version in the Load Order.

If you are installing a mod that comes with an optional ESL file, you will need to download and install the ESP version first to place all the

assets ( textures, meshes, etc ) then activate the ESL as noted above.

Update: Note that if you are manually editing your Plugins.txt file that the ESM and the CC ESL files will NOT be listed, as Fallout4.exe can

detect them as they are flagged as Masters.

Converting an ESL back to ESP

You can convert an ESL to ESP by loading the ESL up in the Creation Kit and then just save it and give it a new name with the ESP extension. I see the ESL as simply an optional replace