Vortex

Vortex

• github Project Page
• Nexusmods Page

Vortex Mod Manager (Vortex) is a mod manager for multiple games on Nexus Mods.

site-note: steamtinkerlaunch also has built-in support for Mod-Organizer 2, which does not have support for as many games but may work more reliably on Linux.

Note for Vortex 1.8.0

(See #792 for initial report where this was discovered)

Vortex 1.8.0 requires a build of Proton based on Wine 8.4 or higher, or a version of Wine with a patch that implements DiscardVirtualMemory (first appeared upstream in Wine 8.4). At the time of writing, Valve Proton and GE-Proton are not new enough to run Vortex 1.8.0. You will need a build of Proton-tkg based on Wine Master. You can install this in two ways:

• Manually, from the Wine-TKG-git CI (ensure you are on the Proton nopackage Arch Linux CI workflow)
• With ProtonUp-Qt in Advanced Mode, by downloading a build of "Proton-tkg (Wine Master)" (the default selection should work).

You can verify the version of Wine that your build is based on by running the Wine binary from the command line with --version. The path to this binary varies based on your flavour of Proton, but for Proton-tkg the path may be ~/.local/share/Steam/compatabilitytools.d/<tkg-folder-name>/files/bin/wine --version. Replace <tkg-folder-name> with the actual folder name, which will vary depending on the build you download. The build should be based on Wine 8.4 or above.

Once installed you can change the Vortex Proton version from the SteamTinkerLaunch Global Menu. If your new build is not showing up in the Global Menu, you can remove /dev/shm/steamtinkerlaunch and try again. This folder is also cleared on a reboot.

Features

Vortex is windows only, but steamtinkerlaunch tries to close this gap as good as possible by seamlessly integrating it using Wine/Proton without any configuration required.

All processes are zero-config and fully automated:

• download of the latest version
• installation into an own Wineprefix/Compatdata, using an automatically picked/downloaded DotNet compatible Wine/Proton version
• the Wineprefix/Compatdata path can be configured in Global Menu
• find all supported installed games from Steam
  • by autogenerating an own libraryfolders.vdf pointing to all real Steam Library Paths
  • by creating registry entries pointing to to game dirs (if required - most Bethesda games)
• create and update symlinks for all found game config directories of all found games in the SteamUser directory
• automatically add all found games into the Vortex settings and apply their download and staging folders
• create and update the nxm-protocol mime type for directly opening nxm with Vortex (renaming that from Mod-Organizer 2 when found)

Installation

Vortex can be installed via Command Line by using

• steamtinkerlaunch vortex install or steamtinkerlaunch vortex i(to only install it)

When starting Vortex via either available option and it is not installed yet, it is installed automatically and all above automations and applied automatically before it is started.

The Vortex Version to be installed is the latest stable by default, but alternatively the USEVORTEXPRERELEASE flag can be set in the Global Config to use the latest pre-release instead.

Vortex is installed into its own Wineprefix and required game directories are symlinked into it from the corresponding game Wineprefix

The the nxm-protocol mime type is automatically configured and updated for directly opening nxm with Vortex (renaming that from Mod-Organizer 2 when found)

Quick Start

• Drag a supported game into a (self created) "Vortex" Steam Collection & start the game (using steamtinkerlaunch of course)
• Command Line: steamtinkerlaunch vortex start or steamtinkerlaunch vortex s

Vortex Configuration Options

Most of the Vortex options can either be configured via the Vortex Extra Button from the Main Menu or from the Vortex Category Menu This category menu supports Gui-Columns!

Starting Vortex

Vortex can be used without any steamtinkerlaunch configuration and will work ootb without zero configuration.

There are multiple different ways to start Vortex:

Start Vortex using Steam Collection

Just create a "Vortex" Steam Collection and add your (Vortex compatible) game to it and start the game regularly. Vortex will start, with the selected game preconfigured and ready to mod. When you exit Vortex the selected game will start normally (with your mods).

Start Vortex using commandline:

see Command Line

Enable Vortex in the config:

Enable USEVORTEX in the Game Menu or directly in the Game Config

Vortex Game Gui

A Vortex Gui, where one can en-/disable Vortex for all supported and installed Games can be opened using the steamtinkerlaunch vortex games Command Line.

It is not possible from here to disable Vortex for Games which have it enabled via Steam Collection. In that case simply remove it regularly from the Steam Collection using the Steam Client.

Vortex Extra Button

Vortex Tray-Icon

steamtinkerlaunch Vortex gif

Vortex Stages

Vortex uses 2 main Deployment_Methods to enable Mods for the managed games. "Hardlink Deployment" and "Symlink Deployment". Symlink Deployment doesn't work under wine, so Hardlink is required (and automatically set for every game from steamtinkerlaunch, although it is default anyway) Those "Hardlinks" only work if the "Staging directory" is on the same partition as the game (yes the same physical partition, not the same "windows drive in wine). As Steam Library directories can be on multiple partitions a "Staging directory" is required for every one of them.

Automated (zeroconf) VORTEXSTAGELIST configuration

When you start a game steamtinkerlaunch will parse on which mount point it actually lies. Then it tests if it can create/write a "Vortex" directory in the root directory of the partition. If it fails to create a directory in the previous step, it tests next if it can create/write a "Vortex" directory directly in the "Steam Library" directory of the started game besides the "steamapps" directory.

The first succeeding directory will be added automatically to the VORTEXSTAGELIST list and will be used from now on as "Staging directory" automatically for all games lying on the same partition. So after you have started one "Vortex" game from each of your "Steam Library" partitions the VORTEXSTAGELIST variable is ready for all of your games. The only exception is the partition where your steam is installed ("/" or "/home" if you have an extra /home/partition). Here the default "Vortex Staging directory" is STLVORTEXDIR/staging instead.

Other additional paths can be added easily, just make suggestions. If you don't want that automation just set DISABLE_AUTOSTAGES to 1 and set them manually instead:

Script Extender

Several games (Skyrim, Fallout flavours) have many mods which depends on a special "Script Extender" program ("SE"). Unfortunately those "SE" programs don't work with default proton since some time. When steamtinkerlaunch detects one of those "SE exe" files in the game dir, a requester will pop up with the following options:

• start the regular game exe
• start the regular game exe and save the decision (so don't ask again)
• start the found "SE exe"
• start the found "SE exe" and save the decision (so don't ask again)

When choosing "SE exe" make sure the selected Proton Version can actually run the exe!

(The "don't ask again" option SELAUNCH can't be set in the Main Menu and must be removed manually from the Game Config -f.e. via Editor Menu

Troubleshooting

Vortex doesn't start? This can always happen (see #Additional-Vortex-Notes below)

For troubleshooting/reporting a bug you might want to do the following clean test:

1. rename ~/.config/steamtinkerlaunch # to make sure no changed configuration conflict
2. delete /dev/shm/steamtinkerlaunch recursively # to make sure temp files do not conflict
3. steamtinkerlaunch vortex start
4. wait, many things happen under the hood, so be patient. The more modable games are installed, the longer it takes. Watch the status windows. You might also want to read the steamtinkerlaunch wiki for vortex meanwhile (again)
5. either see vortex start or check/upload at least the just created steamtinkerlaunch.log in /dev/shm/steamtinkerlaunch/ (installDotNet.log might be interesting as well)

Additional Vortex Notes

• An initial Vortex installation from scratch can takes some time, without download a full installation and start from zero steamtinkerlaunch configuration to the vortex gui showing up should be below 2 minutes
• steamtinkerlaunch (atm?) doesn't have a status requester, so be patient and take care of the notifier popping up!
• I tested ~25 games and they worked ootb, feel free to open an issue for a not (automatically) working game if you think this is a steamtinkerlaunch bug. (Nehrim doesn't seem to work (yet))
• Vortex can stop working under linux/wine anytime after an update (as it already did before). Don't complain and rant when it doesn't work as expected (anymore) (as it happened already before with other Vortex-linux solutions), but try to help fixing the issue instead then (no offense, but imho linux already had better times regarding this!) !
• Vortex depends on dotnet48 see DotNet. Unlike Mod-Organizer 2, Vortex does not work with Mono instead, so Vortex is always used inside its own Wineprefix/Compatdata steamtinkerlaunch automatically/by default uses an own DotNet compatible Proton version for that pfx and also installs DotNet automatically.
• To simplify finding installed Vortex compatible, steamtinkerlaunch ships a gamelist (/usr/share/steamtinkerlaunch/misc/vortexgames.txt). This list needs to be updated of course for all games added in the future.