Backported Extended ESL Support

A Skyrim Special Edition Script Extender plugin that adds support for the extended plugin (ESL) range introduced in game version 1.6.1130 to versions 1.5.97, 1.6.659, and anything in between.

Building

• CMake and vcpkg are expected to be set up beforehand. Visual Studio 2022 is recommended.
• <preset> is skse.
• <build_preset> is skse-release or skse-debug.

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/Nukem9/skyrimse-backported-esl-support.git
cmake --preset <preset>
cmake --build --preset <build_preset>

Installation

• For developers, edit CMakeUserEnvVars.json and set GAME_ROOT_DIRECTORY to Skyrim's root directory. The build script will automatically copy library files to the game folder.

• For manual SKSE installs, place BackportedESLSupport.dll in the corresponding Skyrim Special Edition\Data\SKSE\Plugins folder. An example path is: C:\steamapps\common\Skyrim Special Edition\Data\SKSE\Plugins\BackportedESLSupport.dll

Purpose

• On December 5, 2023, Bethesda released the Creations update for Skyrim Special Edition. Not only did this break compatibility with SKSE plugins, it also broke compatibility with regular plugins (.ESP, .ESL, .ESM) by incrementing their header versions from 1.70 to 1.71. Attempting to use a version 1.71 plugin on an old game build will likely crash. So why did they do this? To expand the maximum number of new records in an ESL from 2048 to 4096.

• This aims to fix the crash mentioned above by backporting compatibility for 1.71 headers.

Logs

• Diagnostic information is logged to BackportedESLSupport.log in Documents\My Games\Skyrim Special Edition\SKSE which lists any relevant plugins.

License

• GPLv3 with exceptions.
• Dependencies are under their respective licenses.