Hello. Whenever I try to load mods that are not in the subfolders of the mod folder, such as downloads, fun, sport, or any others, through the mod list, /lm or /set mod, the game is unable to load the required mod. However, if, in the mod list, I enter the folder the mod is located in and load it directly from there, it works.
In singleplayer, the game sets the rules of classic.tbm, except for the name, which changes to the name of the not loaded mod. In multiplayer, it acts as if I do not have the mod, but /rt fixes the problem by downloading the mod to the mod folder, since the mods from there always load in both sp and mp. Whenever a copy of the mod is in the mod folder, I can load it from any subfolder. The problem also impacts replays, because they are not able to load the mod used in it.
It happened to me on versions 5.70, 5.74, 5.64, 5.72. No real order to those, randomly downgraded to see if it would fix the issue.
Since I am quite a user of /dl, it is a problem for me, but I worked around it by dropping the mods into the mod folder.
Is there any real fix, aside from playing the steam version, where this does not occur?

Hi, from your description it sounds like the issue may be related to your PC setup rather than the game itself.
What are the contents of the stderr.txt file after the game session when it fails to load mods? Does loading mods by their full path (e.g. /lm Combat/Training/katana.tbm) work correctly?

The only difference between the Steam and standalone versions on Windows are the usage of Steam API, so if Steam version works for you but standalone does not it might be an indication of incorrectly set permissions for your standalone installation folder.