HOWTO: Sync Skyrim saves between devices

Some recommended options that are available for both PC and Linux/Deck include:

• Syncthing
• Warpinator

The easiest way to use one of these apps would be in either of these scenarios:

1. Playing multiple profiles on the same device
2. Playing on multiple devices

Read up on either of these two apps and see if either suits you.

With this approach, you’d most likely want to specify the directories you want to sync up. So for example, you might tell the app to keep the saves directory for “Tuxborn – Desktop” in sync with “Tuxborn – Desktop CS”.

Or, if you’re doing a multi-device scenario, “Tuxborn – Desktop” and “Tuxborn – Deck”. In this case, you’d also need to be sure and install the appropriate app on both devices, and give both installs permissions to talk to each other. Instructions on how to do this would depend on what app you choose to use.

If you already have an account on a cloud service such as Google Drive or Dropbox, and you have enough space to allow for it, you could utilize that account space for this purpose.

However, to make this work, you’d still need to:

1. Have a working Tuxborn install on both your computer and your Deck (or other handheld device)
2. Make sure you have clients for your cloud service on both your computer and device, and a dedicated directory already set up for that service.
3. Redirect your Tuxborn saves directory (or directories, in a multi-device scenario) to a directory managed by your cloud service. This would most effectively be done by using symbolic links.

For example, let’s say you want to play on your PC and your Deck, and you want to use the CS profiles on both places. And let’s say you have a Dropbox account and you want both profiles to save to a single directory on your Dropbox.

For this example I’m going to assume that:

1. Your Desktop install is located at C:\Games\Tuxborn
2. Your Deck install is located at /home/deck/Games/Tuxborn
3. Your Dropbox install on your computer is located at C:\users\yourusername\Dropbox
4. Your Dropbox install on your Deck is located at /home/deck/Dropbox

Note: all paths here are examples. Edit all of these paths appropriately based on your own computer and Deck!

In order to make Tuxborn save both the profiles you care about to a location on your Dropbox, you will need to do the following:

1. Create a subdirectory in your Dropbox directory to contain the Tuxborn saves, call it whatever you want. If you put spaces in the name, just be sure and use double quotes whenever you use its full path. For this example I will use TuxbornSaves.
2. On your computer, either in Explorer or the command line, go to: C:\Games\Tuxborn\profiles\Tuxborn – Desktop CS
3. You should see a “saves” directory there.
4. Check if your “saves” directory has any content in it. If it does, copy everything in that directory over into the directory you just made in your Dropbox.
5. Go back to your Desktop CS profile directory.
6. Now, rename that “saves” directory to something else. It doesn’t matter what, use “saves-old” or “saves-backup” or whatever works for you. Just don’t delete it, yet!
7. You’ll now want to do this next step either in the main Windows command line or in Windows PowerShell, whatever works for you. Use the mklink command to create a symbolic link called “saves” that points to your new Dropbox saves directory you just made. Syntax should look like this:

mklink /J saves "C:\users\yourusername\Dropbox\TuxbornSaves"

You will need to replace “yourusername” with whatever your Windows username is. And the entire path string should of course also properly reflect the location of your Dropbox saves directory, edit it as necessary. Note that I put double quotes around the whole path. You should also do so, if your path has spaces in it anywhere.

8. Next, get your Deck and boot it into Desktop mode.
9. If you don’t already have a Dropbox client installed, install one. If you already did that, make sure it syncs to pick up on the saves directory you made in Dropbox on your computer.
10. Open the Dolphin app and go to /home/deck/Games/Tuxborn/profiles/Tuxborn – Deck CS
11. Look for the “saves” directory and see if you have any content in it.
12. If you do, copy all content in that directory over into the subdirectory you made in Dropbox and which should already now exist on your Deck.
13. Go back to your Deck profile directory in Dolphin.
14. As you did on your computer, rename the “saves” directory to something else. It doesn’t matter what.
15. Now open up the Konsole app.
16. Use the “cd” command to get to your Tuxborn profile directory.
17. Use the ln command to make a symbolic link off to your Dropbox saves. This is just like you did on your computer, only using a different command. Syntax this time should look like this:

ln -s "/home/deck/Dropbox/TuxbornSaves" saves

Huge important note here: the ln command, even though it does the exact same thing as the mklink command in Windows, flips the order of the arguments! Make sure you use the correct argument order for the correct device!

Second important note: if you’re using a ROG Ally or some other handheld device that runs a version of Windows rather than a version of Linux as the Deck does, then you will want to use the Windows-based instructions on your handheld rather than the Deck-based instructions.

Once you’ve done all these steps, then you should finally have both of your Tuxborn installs saving out to your Dropbox directory. To validate that, do the following:

1. Make sure Dropbox is up to date on your computer, then launch Tuxborn.
2. When it loads and you reach the main menu, select the Load option.
3. You should see all existing saves, everything that you copied to the Dropbox directory you made for the saves.
4. Now close Tuxborn, and go to your Deck.
5. Again, make sure your Dropbox install there is up to date, and then launch Tuxborn.
6. Select the Load option on the main menu.
7. Again, you should see all existing saves, and all saves you saw on your computer should be here, too.

If you don’t want to rely on a third-party cloud solution for syncing your saves, then you still have options. They’d work very similarly to the cloud solution described in the previous section. But in this case, the main differences are:

1. You’re using command line tools that’ll do the syncing for you
2. You might also want a shell script you can kick off on demand that will sync your saves, prior to launching Tuxborn
3. You’ll still need to choose a directory to use to keep your saves in sync

How in-depth you need to get here depends on your play scenario.

If you’re playing on a single computer or device, and you just want the ability to use multiple profiles (say, the CS and non-CS profiles), then you will need to adapt the instructions I gave above in the Cloud section to use the directory of your choice. It can be any directory you want. The standard Skyrim saves directory Steam uses would even work for this! Because if you’re not actually changing devices, just profiles, all you need is to point both profiles at the same save location.

So PC users, use the mklink command I described above. Deck users, use the ln command.

Now, if you have a scenario where you want to play on a computer and a Deck, things get a little more complicated.

The most useful command line tool I can recommend for advanced users is rsync. This is available by default in the Deck’s command line. On Windows, you can install an rsync client, command line or GUI depending on your preferences. Or, if you want, you can just install the Windows Subsystem for Linux and get the entire Linux suite of commands that way, for whatever flavor of Linux you prefer. (This would in fact be my personal recommendation.)

I’m not going to describe how rsync works here; that’s outside the scope of this post. And I’m trusting that if you’re an advanced user already, you probably already know how rsync works, or at the very least, how to look up how rsync works!

In order for rsync to work between your computer and your Deck, then your computer and Deck need to be able to talk to each other. The best way I know of to do this is to set up your Deck so that you can SSH into it from your computer. I can recommend this guide on how to set that up, since this worked very well for me:

https://shendrick.net/Gaming/2022/05/30/sshonsteamdeck.html

I also recommend making SSH keys so that your computer and Deck are allowed to connect to each other without you having to specify a password. (Again, I’m not going to give instructions on how to do that here, as that’s outside the scope of this post, and I’m trusting that advanced users will know what SSH keys are!)

Once your computer and Deck are set up to talk to one other, then you can create shell scripts to kick off rsync on demand.

Windows-side, you could do this either in PowerShell or in the Windows Subsystem for Linux, depending on your preferences and what you’ve set up. I’d personally suggest the WSL and a shell script in that.

Deck-side, likewise, you can create a shell script to kick off rsync on demand.

Pick which side of the sync makes most sense for you to set up a shell script for. You won’t necessarily need a script on both sides of the flow, just as long as your computer and Deck can talk to each other, and you remember to kick off that script either just before you start playing, or as the very last thing you do after a play session.