I'm experienced, not an idiot, and WTF is up with battle for Whiterun (even in bare bones vanilla)?

[Katy420]

So I've been playing Skyrim a long time, but mostly on the console. I bought it for PC first, and I love mods, so why would I ever play it on Xbox? Because in the PC version, the battle for Whiterun causes my FPS to drop to literally ONE. ONE PER SECOND. It's always been this way, since I bought it. At the time it first happened, the first thing I did was reinstall, to no avail. I assumed it was my hardware (which has been upgraded since then), so I just bought the console version and was happy for like 3 playthroughs. But I've always known mods make a whole new game, and wanted to get back into the PC version. So now I am, and working very hard to fix it, but nothing works.

 

The best I have ever been able to do is use console commands, or if I'm using a mod like CWO, the MCM debug menu, to skip the battle. It's this battle, specifically, that causes the issue. Problem is, if you're using any CW mod, not just CWO (which is notoriously twitchy), using console commands or the debug menu that way generally breaks the questline one way or the other, Skyrim doesn't like deserters. I can play the WHOOOOLE rest of the game, perfectly, except the one part I want to use overhaul mods on and fix.

 

Yes I have cleaned the Bethesda files. Yes I am sure I did it properly. No, I did not and would not tweak my .ini's unecessarily. No, I do not normally have performance issues in any other demanding scenes. Yes I have tried a fresh install (both vanilla and with mods including the unofficial patches). Yes I have tried it with no mods (EXACT same result). Yes I tried lowering my settings.

 

It's clearly not about my GPU/CPU combination. NOTHING could cause my game to run at literally ONE FPS, when its normal "lowest of lows" is 25-30. Nothing except Skyrim Sorcery! Except it's always a fresh game when I try, obvs.

 

If anyone's curious I have a pretty mediocre setup (stock HP 2.8 GHz processor, 8GB DRAM, GTX 550 Ti, 1 GB VRAM). But this performance spike isn't like a normal one. I NEVER have issues outside of this event, I know my machine's limits. I would like to say "it's fine in the other battles" but usually just getting OUT of the battle for Whiterun means I can't go any further in the quest. But even so, the performance is EXACTLY the same when I try to decrease the FOV, set the graphics to low, etc. NO improvement from lowering settings.

 

I've googled this and there are plenty of people (from 2+ years ago) with the same problem, but no fixes that I can see (just people trying to help maximize performance, assuming the game is overloaded by the extra rendering/etc in the scene, mostly common sense stuff).

 

Has anyone else heard of this, or have any suggestions that aren't about maximizing general performance? I would SURE love to play the civil war on the PC, finally.

Edited May 15, 2014 by Katy420

[Hyacathusarullistad]

I've never heard of anything close to that kind of performance drop.

 

The good news, though, is that in the years since those 2012 threads were made there have been some great advancements made regarding the game's usage of system resources. If you haven't already you should check out the Skyrim Startup Memory Editor (SSME), which essentially ups the amount of memory Skyrim has available at any given moment; as well as ENBoost, which optimises the way the game balances RAM and VRAM. Might help. Might not. It's worth a shot though.

 

Definitely try it with a vanilla civil war playthrough, though. As you say, the CWO mod is rather delicate and seems to fall apart rather easily even in otherwise stable load orders.

[FrankFH]

"stock HP 2.8 GHz processor"

 

you might want to share your real processor model, HP doesn't make processors

[Deleted5770650User]

IMO the experienced part here is debatable, but I don't want to get into that.

A processor model is needed to even try and figure this out.

Just saying that my CPU is a 2.8GHz it not very helpful. Is it a single core? is it a dual core? is it a tri core? is it a quad core? is a six core? I do not expect it to be a 3 4 or 6 from HP.

 

For me I know what part of that battle hurts performance the most, but right now I cant think of anyway to explain what it is.

The other thing that hurts my performance is that fact that I have a lot of mods installed and some times Skyrim cant load the files fast enough and I get meshes and textures acting weird.

[Katy420]

I've never heard of anything close to that kind of performance drop.

 

The good news, though, is that in the years since those 2012 threads were made there have been some great advancements made regarding the game's usage of system resources. If you haven't already you should check out the Skyrim Startup Memory Editor (SSME), which essentially ups the amount of memory Skyrim has available at any given moment; as well as ENBoost, which optimises the way the game balances RAM and VRAM. Might help. Might not. It's worth a shot though.

 

Definitely try it with a vanilla civil war playthrough, though. As you say, the CWO mod is rather delicate and seems to fall apart rather easily even in otherwise stable load orders.

I already use ENB and SSME : ( But there is no change in the drop between a low res vanilla textures run on low settings, with FOV sliders totally minimized (at that setting, you can't even really see anything beyond 10 feet away from your character, let alone the catapaults and whatnot), and high res textures and high settings that I normally run (with no problem). No difference between with my normal (fairly modest) load of mods, vs. no mods at all, vs. only with performance boosting mods and nothing else, vs. ANY combination of mods and settings. Literally NO difference, it doesn't go from like 1 to 5 when I tweak stuff, there is just nothing. I can see everything just fine if I run to the battle instead of fast travel, with no performance issues seeing the catapaults and soldiders from a distance, but at some point I cross an invisible line and it ALWAYS drops to one, (immediately, doesn't gradually fall to one as more things are rendered) regardless of any combination of graphics fixes I've tried. I don't think it's about graphics. But thanks for being decent anyways : )

 

IMO the experienced part here is debatable, but I don't want to get into that.

A processor model is needed to even try and figure this out.

Just saying that my CPU is a 2.8GHz it not very helpful. Is it a single core? is it a dual core? is it a tri core? is it a quad core? is a six core? I do not expect it to be a 3 4 or 6 from HP.

 

For me I know what part of that battle hurts performance the most, but right now I cant think of anyway to explain what it is.

The other thing that hurts my performance is that fact that I have a lot of mods installed and some times Skyrim cant load the files fast enough and I get meshes and textures acting weird.

The whole point of my thread is that the performance drop is SO extreme, and it's ONLY in one scene (there are plenty more graphically demanding sequences in the later game, which I handle fine), to suggest that my machine is probably not what's wrong with it-- hence the general stats. I only mention my card because it's specifically caused issues with mods like Hialgo, and some older games. Again, it is not like a normal performance spike. I know the battles are moderately demanding scenes and I can and have maximized my performance in every other part of the game. Again, I have tried this with ALL high res textures disabled, on a complete vanilla run, on LOW, and still had the EXACT same drop (to ONE). There is barely a computer out there that could not handle this game on LOW with low res textures, my *&^&* school LAPTOP can do that. And there is ZERO improvement from taking all of that pressure off. Which leads me to believe that's not the problem. If it wasn't the same on a vanilla run, I would say it's conflicting (gameplay) mods, acting weird but not quite causing a CTD. But it IS the same on a vanilla run.

 

I don't run a ton of graphical mods. In fact I run the LRPP (low res particle project). I have a few high res textures, none above 2k. But that, like the number of cores I'm using, seems to not matter. Thanks for trying to help, but your sarcasm is not needed and I'm not an idiot.

 

"stock HP 2.8 GHz processor"

 

you might want to share your real processor model, HP doesn't make processors

I should have added a comma, "Stock HP, 2.8 GHz processor". Meaning it's just an off the shelf desktop, not something I built (it wasn't my choice, I just got a free computer, OK?). All I've upgraded so far is the power supply and GPU (Which is an Nvidia, and has been known to cause issues with some mods/games because of their stupid Optimus crap-- that's why I DID mention its model). I know HP doesn't make processors.... Same thing I told that guy ^ about the sarcasm....

 

But as I just went into it seems like that isn't the problem. Normal performance stretching measures have worked wonders in how the game plays, I know I've done it right, THE WHOLE REST of the game is fine, better than it has any right to be on such a mediocre setup.

 

----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

If anyone has any suggestions that aren't about maximizing graphics performance, or has heard of this particular bug/issue before, that's really what I was looking for. Thanks for trying though guys : (

 

(I am so tired of troubleshooting, I am seriously about to just give up on the war and play without the whole damn questline, which is sad because I REALLY wanted to play it modded, it was so lame in the vanilla game)

Edited May 15, 2014 by Katy420

[camaro_69_327]

IMO the experienced part here is debatable, but I don't want to get into that.

A processor model is needed to even try and figure this out.

Just saying that my CPU is a 2.8GHz it not very helpful. Is it a single core? is it a dual core? is it a tri core? is it a quad core? is a six core? I do not expect it to be a 3 4 or 6 from HP.

 

For me I know what part of that battle hurts performance the most, but right now I cant think of anyway to explain what it is.

The other thing that hurts my performance is that fact that I have a lot of mods installed and some times Skyrim cant load the files fast enough and I get meshes and textures acting weird.

how about an HP with 16 cores?...lol....nearly 4 grand......>>https://h30094.www3.hp.com/product/sku/10464698

 

EDIT: to OP..have you tried >>" Skyrim Performance monitor" run that while doing the scene...see if anything is bottle necked?

Edited May 15, 2014 by camaro_69_327

[Deleted5770650User]

Ya I know about the 16 core amd server CPus, but I was stick to CPU that were aimed at end users. No I am not sure that there were 3 core CPUs so I threw that in there.

 

To me the OP is acting like s/he knows it all and wont consider trying what is suggested or adding the information that is asked for by people.

Not only that but Nvidia Optimus is for notebooks/laptops only and was not used in desktops.

OP as you don't seem willing to add your processor information I am going to assume as I have no other choice that is is a really old single core AMD and that is does not meet minimum system requirements.

[Katy420]

 

IMO the experienced part here is debatable, but I don't want to get into that.

A processor model is needed to even try and figure this out.

Just saying that my CPU is a 2.8GHz it not very helpful. Is it a single core? is it a dual core? is it a tri core? is it a quad core? is a six core? I do not expect it to be a 3 4 or 6 from HP.

 

For me I know what part of that battle hurts performance the most, but right now I cant think of anyway to explain what it is.

The other thing that hurts my performance is that fact that I have a lot of mods installed and some times Skyrim cant load the files fast enough and I get meshes and textures acting weird.

how about an HP with 16 cores?...lol....nearly 4 grand......>>https://h30094.www3.hp.com/product/sku/10464698

 

EDIT: to OP..have you tried >>" Skyrim Performance monitor" run that while doing the scene...see if anything is bottle necked?

 

 

 

Thank you so much! I don't usually use it because there just isn't any reason for me to, I'm not trying to run anything crazy and am not one of those people obsessed with FPS, like it HAS to be perfect 60 all the time. But as soon as I read that I was like "why haven't you already done this, idiot?" I will keep it for troubleshooting now! Thanks.

 

This helped me at least figure out what's going on! That's awesome! However what is not awesome is I have no idea how this could happen or how to fix it.

 

It seems when I cross the "invisible line" my GPU STOPS working altogether. ZERO, immediately. And my CPU usage is noticably lower. Going from using about 70-80% to ~50%-- right now I'm riding it a little hard with hi res textures and high settings. Everywhere else it's pretty reliably 70-80% though. (You would think when the GPU goes off the CPU would at least be the same if not increase?) Other than that everything is relatively constant.

 

And that was just now, meaning right now I am running mods (including ENB). But this happens with the exact same effect in a vanilla game, I'll have to play through it to confirm for sure but the results are the same so I assume it's doing the same thing with or without these mods. And it can't be my stupid card either, because this happened when I first bought the game years ago and I wasn't using the same one then (it wasn't even another nvidia). And I'd like to say again, this has ONLY EVER happened in the battle for whiterun, specifically.

 

Does anyone know what the hell that's about?

Edited May 15, 2014 by Katy420

[Katy420]

Ya I know about the 16 core amd server CPus, but I was stick to CPU that were aimed at end users. No I am not sure that there were 3 core CPUs so I threw that in there.

 

To me the OP is acting like s/he knows it all and wont consider trying what is suggested or adding the information that is asked for by people.

Not only that but Nvidia Optimus is for notebooks/laptops only and was not used in desktops.

OP as you don't seem willing to add your processor information I am going to assume as I have no other choice that is is a really old single core AMD and that is does not meet minimum system requirements.

 

That's what I thought too!! (Optimus was just some laptop GPU salespitch crap) Trust me, it's true. I couldn't run GTA reliably, buuut. Once I updated my drivers as reccomended for optimus users, it fixed that issue in that particular game. And again, with Hialgo for Skyrim, the optimus fix worked for me. The author told me it "sometimes" is in desktops, which was news to me. But again, every time I have issues, if I use an optimus fix it works. I have to assume it uses optimus.

 

I'm not buying another Nvidia card until I can be sure what I'm getting into, though. Seriously, I know you're convinced I'm an idiot but you are wrong sir.

 

Also kind of an a**hole. Sorry. But the processor is not the problem. Clearly. I RUN THE WHOLE GAME FINE. It's an issue with this one stage of this one quest, this one particular scene. I didn't refuse to take your advice, you didn't give me any. But the only advice that HAD been given to me was by another poster-- and I am ALREADY DOING THAT STUFF (using SSME and ENB). Not to mention I specifically said in my original post that I was looking for solutions other than graphics performance, and the first person to suggest something aside from that I DID take his advice, which was very helpful. I DO refuse your silly epeen-challenge about my machine, as if you KNOW my processor doesn't meet minimum specs, and I DO refuse your silly epeen-challenge as to my gender. Also that's an ironic thing to say, pretending you know something you don't, when you're complaining about NOT KNOWING my processor, while also complaining about me "acting like I know it all".

 

Try and be kind to your fellow humans.

Edited May 15, 2014 by Katy420

[BCbrad]

Not sure if this is the solution, but the Skyrim Memory Patch may be useful to you. I found it very helpful for me in areas with lots of npc's. Here is a good video for viewing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37xAMUQc1oY

Good luck!