Save File size too Large?

[polearbair]

I'm running SE 1.5.97 with the "Best of Both Worlds" patcher

SO I've gotten pretty deep into my current playthrough when suddenly I hit this wall where my new saves are unloadable even by Resaver.

When I try to load it in resaver I get an Error dialog that says "Error while reading file <SaveName>.ess Incorrect length; read 1 bytes, expected 4"

As I look through the history of save in this playthrough I see that Save 1 was around 5,000KB and each save got progressively larger and larger until my current Loadable save which is 26,818 KB

Then any save I make after that results in a slightly smaller (26,554 KB) file that is unloadable.

Searching online I found a 3 year old thread on reddit at https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/rn43wq/new_saves_became_broken_and_cant_even_be_read_by/ where someone suggested "Set SaveGameMaxSize = true in EngineFixes.toml"

I tried that but it was no help.

I'm at my wits end here. I need a way to reduce my saves file size or a mod that can make skyrim write large saves correctly. One or the other I'd really rather not abandon this playthrough if I can help it.

[anjenthedog]

Fwiw, you also need to set another variable in EngineFixes.toml

MaxStdio = 8192

It's about a half dozen entries down from the top and is set to 2048 by default.

Dunno if that'll help or be another bust, but if you didn't have MaxStdio updated before, I'd set the other variable as prescribed, and also set this one too, then try again. Can't hurt...

 

[polearbair]

I'll give that a try. Thank you.

[anjenthedog]

PS> not sure that'll help with loading *existing "problematic" save files, as the wording implies that it fixes whatever the problem is by fixing the save operation, rather than the load operation. (could be wrong but that's how I read it), so I *think it means you have to save an existing openable file, at which point things *should work.

[polearbair]

Well, Of course, I picked up from where I left off with the last openable save. I delete the unloadable ones as soon as I discover them as they're useless.

But the new change to the enginefixes.toml (MaxStdio = 8192) didn't seem to help as it's still happening. As soon as my save file get's above 26,800 KB it's unloadable.

[anjenthedog]

Oh well. Worth a try anyway... must be something else then. Too many animations? A "rogue" mod?

[polearbair]

Well, I've been trying for a couple days now and I'm at my wits end. I think I have no choice but to give up on this playthrough and what's worse is it hardly seems worth starting a new game if I'm just going to run into the same problem again.