This guide was written for Fallout 4 and may be only partially applicable to other games.
This guide covers merging your archives for Fallout 4 Creation Club content.
If you've reached the BA2 Limit, this can potentially cut down the number of archives significantly.
To check your current archive counts, use the Collective Modding Toolkit.
.ba2 file, short for Bethesda Archive 2. Combines multiple data files into a single file with optional compression..esm, .esl, or .esp file. Also referred to as a Plugin.
When the game starts and loads MyMod.esp, it tries to find these files and loads them if they exist:
MyMod - Main.ba2 MyMod - Textures.ba2 MyMod - Voices_en.ba2 MyMod - Voices_XX.ba2
The last one only if playing in a non-English mode, and XX varies with language.
BA2 file names don't have to match what's inside them (you could name an archive of textures MyMod - Main.ba2).
It also doesn't matter which module a BA2 is loaded with (but this does determine conflict winners!).
The only thing that matters is that the game can find them based on their file names.
.7z file extractor (I use NanaZip).WIP folder anywhere, containing General and Textures folders: WIP/ ├───General/ └───Textures/
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Fallout 4\Data\WIP folder.Textures folder.Back button or press Backspace to return to WIP.WIP and drag and drop them onto the General folder.General folder.BSArchPro.exe.Clear List at the top. General folder.Pack at the bottom.Fallout 4 (not the DDS option). - Main.ba2 in your WIP folder. Merged - Main.ba2.Clear List at the top.Textures folder.Pack at the bottom.Fallout 4 DDS. - Textures.ba2 in your WIP folder. Merged - Textures.ba2.OK to start the repacking process.There are two ways you can have the game load your BA2 files:
Either choice is fine; this is primarily a preference-based decision.
ccBGSFO4044-HellfirePowerArmor.esl, you would name them like this: