- the GOG/steam build is ready to go, if you don't care about mods.
- no manual updates are necessary, as long as you don't care about mods.
- you pretty much can't apply the tool manually, it's simply not meant to be used that way.
- it is possible to just use BMM, though this is really not recommended, unless there's absolutely no other way around. if you insist, make sure to load and activate SCP, this will make sure all the scripts are loaded.

to make it short, just play the GOG/steam build if you don't care about mods, and apply the tool if you do. anything else will almost inevitably lead to issues of some sort - the tool exists for the very purpose of people not having to mess around their SS2 installs manually, breaking them in a myriad of ways. one tool to rule them all, one tool to find them, one tool to bring them all and in NewDark bind them.

if you mean the old Randomizer, no, that one is definitely not compatible with Secmod or Alyamod. Alyamod should work with just the GOG/steam build coupled with the Blue Mod Manager, but Secmod intentionally takes advantage of the tool dml fix set - I think it should be possible to complete the game without them, but you will be reintroducing a couple of minor bugs into the game, if nothing else.

Are AlyaMod and Randomizer compatible with version 2.46?
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Was there ever any mod for "rebalancing" OSA builds? In the sense of making Psionic build "viable", like reducing prices of Psionic powers, increasing their powers or duration, etc. I tried playing an OSA build but I found myself resorting to weapons and melee because the Psionic stuff was so expensive to use. It wasn't until latter portion of the game that I was able to afford much of the Psi stuff and even then most of them seemed to be more or less "useless" by reading their description. I was expecting an OSA build to play like a Mage character in RPG, but I think that's my mistake for creating such false expectation.

Ah, yeah, it sounded like I asked about mixing these two, I was more asking if any of them will work with 2.46.
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Here's the thing, when you say terms like that, you're speaking greek to me, and I don't want to spend hours researching how to do this (I've already wasted hours before I decided to register here)
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I have the game. I have the mod files. What do I do now? I open Blue MM? That's it?
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I'm not interested in "fancy" graphics, I want to keep the game as original as possible, only changes in gameplay.

The "newbie guide" there is not clear about certain things:
- I downloaded a mod. Now, what do I do with it? I have to extract it?
Re:
- If so, I have to extract it into the game's directory or a separate directory altogether?
Re:
- Can/should I extract more than one mod to a single location?
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- Instead of using BlueModManager for mods and FM for "fan missions", is there a single launcher that takes care of everything?
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- Can I load "mods" and "fan missions" at the same time? How one goes about doing that? Example: AlyaMod + AnyFanMission
Re:

I downloaded NVscript, it has an OSM file inside of it. Where do I put it? The HTML file goes there too?
BModManager has to be extracted inside the game root folder?

Mod apparently is loading,
but after I go to the Skill training doors to start the game,
I can't move and there's this weird thing in the center of my screen.
https://i.imgur.com/Xdxqi4w.jpg
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The Alya mod name is listed on the menu, so I assume it is loaded properly?
https://i.imgur.com/Wi7mqK9.jpg
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I don't have any folder in the location /SS2/OSM

that weird thing is a selection wheel. you are not the first one to be weirded out by its weirdness.

not having the OSM folder is odd - are you sure you are running the latest GOG build? galaxy should install it, but not sure about the offline installers, they might be out of date. check SS2 community fixes.txt and see the last entry, should read 2.48 update1.

Can't move. Clearing and Rebinding keys will not work.

I have a clean GOG install from 2 hours ago.
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I posted the contents of my cam_mod.ini above, didn't you see?
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I cannot run SS2tool because it says it doesn't work on XP. I have only XP at the moment.
(in the SS2tool I have read the author telling people to "go to a Vista+ machine, update there and bring the files back to your computer". That is just insanity.
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One possible solution for this would be for you to putting the contents of the SS2 root directory inside a ZIP (except the DATA directory of course) and upload it somewhere like Dropbox. The resulting ZIP file should be around 20MB in size. Could you do that? There's something clearly wrong with my GOG install.
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24 hours gone by into this lunacy and still nothing. This is not the optimal way of doing this.

I have a clean GOG install from 2 hours ago.

I've reinstalled the game to check, I have the OSM folder, and no rogue exe. you sure you are installing via the galaxy client?

I posted the contents of my cam_mod.ini above, didn't you see?

not the part I've mentioned in my previous post.

I cannot run SS2tool because it says it doesn't work on XP. I have only XP at the moment.

ah, that explains things. yeah, if you are running xp nowadays, you need to be prepared for trouble.

One possible solution for this would be for you to putting the contents of the SS2 root directory inside a ZIP (except the DATA directory of course) and upload it somewhere like Dropbox. The resulting ZIP file should be around 20MB in size. Could you do that? There's something clearly wrong with my GOG install.

yeah, I'll probably just do that.

24 hours gone by into this lunacy and still nothing. This is not the optimal way of doing this.

well, no kidding. you however have a very special situation at hand.

well yeah, I've already mentioned that.

you still need those zipped contents or are you good with this? if you don't have the OSM folder, you will probably have to extract the latest NVscript to the AlyaMod folder (overwriting the old osm file). once that is done, you are probably ok to go, even with the game install looking a bit out of date for some reason (the game actually can take quite a bit of punishment before things start to break completely).


//checked the GOG offline installer (setup_system_shocktm_2_2.48_(31077).exe), it's ok, so I'm guessing you are using some out of date offline installer you have backed up some time ago?