44 replies to this topic

[e1grey]

how's the investigation going? i've suffered this problem for hundreds of hours of gameplay.

 

Most answers I get explain it with weak PC and engine limitations. I just don't install any mods that cause the stutters. It's a bummer, but I guess I'll have to save up for a better PC to check this explanation, which might take a while.

 

I still don't understand how it works though. Why do vanilla characters not cause the stutters? Unique npcs only use unique face geometry and levelled lists, but share the textures and assets with vanilla characters; and they're stored in the same type of archives. I don't get it.

Edited by e1grey, 19 September 2018 - 12:38 PM.

[calscks]

how's the investigation going? i've suffered this problem for hundreds of hours of gameplay.

 
Most answers I get explain it with weak PC and engine limitations. I just don't install any mods that cause the stutters. It's a bummer, but I guess I'll have to save up for a better PC to check this explanation, which might take a while.
 
I still don't understand how it works though. Why do vanilla characters not cause the stutters? Unique npcs only use unique face geometry and levelled lists, but share the textures and assets with vanilla characters; and they're stored in the same type of archives. I don't get it.

honestly it'd be such a bulls*** excuse to simply dismiss the problem with "weak pc" because I'm running a 6700K OC, 16G OC RAM and an OC 1060 6GB but still ravaged by the problem. Engine's limitation sounds more likely...

most significantly one is the Lots More Settlers and Attackers mod which causes the highest amount of stutter. I have no idea if it's about just editing any NPC to cause stutter or simply just due to FO4Edit causing problem while editing NPCs with it. But I'll try to pack custom 4k body texture mods into ba2 first.

[e1grey]

 

 

how's the investigation going? i've suffered this problem for hundreds of hours of gameplay.

 
Most answers I get explain it with weak PC and engine limitations. I just don't install any mods that cause the stutters. It's a bummer, but I guess I'll have to save up for a better PC to check this explanation, which might take a while.
 
I still don't understand how it works though. Why do vanilla characters not cause the stutters? Unique npcs only use unique face geometry and levelled lists, but share the textures and assets with vanilla characters; and they're stored in the same type of archives. I don't get it.

honestly it'd be such a bulls*** excuse to simply dismiss the problem with "weak pc" because I'm running a 6700K OC, 16G OC RAM and an OC 1060 6GB but still ravaged by the problem. Engine's limitation sounds more likely...

most significantly one is the Lots More Settlers and Attackers mod which causes the highest amount of stutter. I have no idea if it's about just editing any NPC to cause stutter or simply just due to FO4Edit causing problem while editing NPCs with it. But I'll try to pack custom 4k body texture mods into ba2 first.

 

 

Yes, Lots More Settlers and Enemies causes the most stutters on my PC too. I'm thinking about trying Unique NPCs; the mod was completely redone in CK, and it says in the FAQ that performance is now close to vanilla game.

[e1grey]

Well, Uniques NPCs cause stutter too. Perhaps, the problem is indeed in my PC. I'll never know, I guess.

[calscks]

If you have a mod that causes this issue, it's a matter of going through all mod-added (or changed) NPC records with the CK, opening them, OKing them without changing anything, saving the plugin and packing up the resulting FaceGen files. A trained chimp could do it.

i tried this, but there isn't any resulting FaceGen files.

[e1grey]

Well, Uniques NPCs cause stutter too. Perhaps, the problem is indeed in my PC. I'll never know, I guess.

 

On second thought, no.

 

I installed Better Settlers a year and a half ago, and I had never had this type of issues with it until recently. Whenever I reinstalled all my mods, Better Settlers was an obligatory one in my load order - because it's good. On top of that, I upgraded my PC - added RAM and installed  the game (as well as all the mods) on an SSD. The game runs at 60 fps 98% of the time. I don't think my PC is the problem.

Any other weapon or clothing mods that are injected in NPCs' levelled lists cause no issues. I'm currently running around 15 such mods. So if vanilla characters use modded clothing, modded guns, items, etc., and it doesn't cause stutters, what does? The face and body presets? The bigger amounts of those presets? Does the engine take its time to think and decide which one to load? If so, why didn't it happen before?

[calscks]

i'm trying to recreate the plugin of Lots More Settlers and Enemies (not really re-create, but loading every NPC added by the mod in the CK and OK-ing them, fixing some body weights - almost all added NPCs in LMSE are slim as f) and reduce the load of NPC's leveled lists (this is mentioned in one of LMSE's post by a user regarding to excessive amount of items in each NPC leveled list). not sure if this will fix the issue since i haven't tested my custom-made plugin yet.

[Thirdstorm]

Man...

 

I wish I had stumbled on this before now!

 

Author is spot on.... Once you edit the NPC's appearance you break the Exported FaceGeometry, which is effectively "Precombines" for NPCs...

 

@e1grey,

The reason some mods impact more than others, or didn't cause stutters but now do is complicated, but in large part is due to the other burdens / stresses on your Fallout4 game engine, but computational and texture load.....

It's like having a poorly sorted load order? Suddenly the exact same set of mods causes stutters and CTDs, all because of extra conflict resolution and burden..

[calscks]

Man...

 

I wish I had stumbled on this before now!

 

Author is spot on.... Once you edit the NPC's appearance you break the Exported FaceGeometry, which is effectively "Precombines" for NPCs...

 

@e1grey,

The reason some mods impact more than others, or didn't cause stutters but now do is complicated, but in large part is due to the other burdens / stresses on your Fallout4 game engine, but computational and texture load.....

It's like having a poorly sorted load order? Suddenly the exact same set of mods causes stutters and CTDs, all because of extra conflict resolution and burden..

what about those with custom exported facegeoms, such as found in Lots More Settlers and Enemies? shouldn't it not cause stuttering since facegeoms are exported for each edited/custom npcs yet LMSE is still suffering from severe lag.

 

i also wonder if I should export facegeoms for mods that edit npcs.

[e1grey]

Man...

 

I wish I had stumbled on this before now!

 

Author is spot on.... Once you edit the NPC's appearance you break the Exported FaceGeometry, which is effectively "Precombines" for NPCs...

 

@e1grey,

The reason some mods impact more than others, or didn't cause stutters but now do is complicated, but in large part is due to the other burdens / stresses on your Fallout4 game engine, but computational and texture load.....

It's like having a poorly sorted load order? Suddenly the exact same set of mods causes stutters and CTDs, all because of extra conflict resolution and burden..

I sorted my load order according to the page here: https://www.nexusmod.../mods/10844/?=1 (it's from 2016 old though). I followed the recommendations, and FPS did improve noticeably but not considerably. It didn't cure or reduce the stutters. I understand that modding is always a risk and some issues might not be solved or even explained unless actively investigated by competent people. Levelled list integration mods have added enough variety for me, so I'm going to live without better settlers until I get a new PC, or until a solution is found.