cramlow Posted December 10, 2009 Share Posted December 10, 2009 I was just wondering something as I'm endeavoring to determine why I'm getting CTD's. I've been adding mod's slowly, one at a time then testing them for no CTD's, keeping in mind the load order and this has been working for me. I've also been taking nifs and editing clothing, nothing more than coping one branch and pasting to another nif, or removing a branch, like a holster or belts loaded with pockets and pouches, adding undergarments where the NPC needs a little more coverage in certain areas. Even though coping and pasting of one branch to another nif, or the removal of a branch or two, appears to work in-game, can this cause CTDs? If so, how can I avoid this? Most of the time it seems to work and I see the changes in game. If this can be the cause of my sudden blessed CTDs, is there some enlightenment as the proper way to add, remove branches? I am NOT making any other changes and I save to over write the original file in its original location. Thanks for your wisdom! CMR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mechine Posted December 12, 2009 Share Posted December 12, 2009 There's a webinsized tutorial for FO3edit now. Works great. I just started using FO3edit without a tutorial though an messed up over an over until I figured it out, just like nifscope, or paintnet. The webinsized tutorial is so nice though I'm going to read it just to learn even more. I only bring it up, because you said you are adding mods in slow to avoid CTD. Which is kind of silly, because vanilla unmodded fallout 3 will CTD even with patches. What I do, is start with a good install, where it's in it's own folder on the hard drive like C:/bethesda rather than C:/programfiles/bethesda an such. Then run the patch, then install all the other poop FO3edit, FOMM, FOSE, GECK, GECK update, DLC's in there somewhere I get a good install which FOMM will launch Fallout by launch FOSE I get it running, then I read http://www.tweakguides.com/Fallout3_1.html the tweek guide an tweek the crap out of the fallout launcher settings, an even further in the fallout.ini located in documents/games/fallout 3 or something. You can pretty much follow the guide but you need to make good choices depending on you system, an then even test them. I like the RAOTW method, (random A**hole of the wastes) whereby you create a new charicter just to run around an try to make the system crash, or cause FPS stutter, you want to minimize these issues, mouse lag, an frame stutter, which are two different things. After you get that going good, which you should have an idea of the kinds of mods an what they do when you pick settings, like hey I'm going to use MMM so I might wana change a few things for performance reasons with 300 NPC's running around all killing each other. Anyhow, the best way wouldn't really be to do it slow, but do just install an make a few different attempts at a good fallout build, download an install an then play an remove, learning more each time. The best load orders I've had where great because they were simple, easy to do, the huge ones were a nightmare to fix. but as I'm going I might make another when I get the energy, keeping it simple is where it's at if you want to get the serious game time you need really bad, however you have had tons of gameplay you might want to make that killer load order of 250ish mods. Plan on two weeks fixing it though. The actual rules for load orders don't really apply anymore, they do if you're lazy an just want to download an play stuff. Most people though now are using the crap out of FO3edit to make the mods load in any order they want, as well as do whatever they want them to do. Which is mostly just spreadsheet type computer work. 75% of it is drag an drop... There has to be some kind of middle ground, though... So the tools that you should use at the very least, would be creating a merge patch via FO3edit Then even using the master update feature, hidden in FO3edit. Which cuts 25% or more of the CTD's The webinsized tutorial for FO3edit tells you how to do it, an there are a few different ways so I won't go into it. Master update is up to you, it does more than just make each mod a pusdo .esm though. Very last I make sure I have a good game start, when you exit V 101 only about 2,300 scripts are starting to run all at the same time, while the system is drawing the wasteland at the same time, so there are game starts that go well then others not, Once you get a good one, maybe 1 in 3, where nothing goes wrong it's not a bad idea to visit a small cell inside, with no npc's or really anything in it, an create your known good start point save game. Never quick save, or auto save, disable it, it promotes corupt save games, press ESC each time an create a new save then don't delete any of your save games until you're ready to delete them all, an start over. When trying to duplicate or get a diagnosis on a problem, maybe you need a RAOTW, start a new game an try to make it happen again. The known good save game helps too. I for one get a load order going an run with it. I won't add or remove any mods until I'm ready to start over by deleting the save games. You also need to create a new merge patch each time you add or remove or even move mods. The system cache can go corupt as well at any given time, not just when the computer has been on an running fallout 3 for hours. The only way to fix is to reboot the computer, but defrag your hard drives from time to time, an maybe find the prefetch folder in windows C:/windows/prefetch, something like that, anyway you find the folder, then open it an delete all the stuff inside, empty the recy bin mind you don't delete the prefetch folder, just the junk in it, then don't forget to delete your internet explorers cookies an temp internet files. But yeah if you figured out how to get the long games an you have been playing fallout 3 for a few hours now, then yeah you should probably save an then reboot the computer. Shiny orbs of doom..... Well, Whatever you did to a mesh/texture/nif ect, you have to do it before you actually create the ingame item form id (item) So if there is any CTD problems, for the most part when you pick the model in geck for this item you just created Geck will crash... Stuff that might make it past GECK, like say it's a pistol, an it's missing the hammer part, which is a animated part which falls an causes the firing pin to hit the bullet an go boom, well if that animated part isn't on there then you can create the item in GECK without it crashing, but later on in game it's probably going to crash. a tiny tiny part, which we don't even really see or pay any attention to, and yet, it would bring the whole system down. Other things like jacking up the firing rate on weapons, would cause a crash, If the system gets taxed from projectiles flying everwhere, at like 250 per second or something wild like that, then probably crash... idk You'll see a sharp drop in frame rate for items that are causing problems. Something not really related, is mipmaps... Mip maps, are just tiny versions of a texture, often embeded in a .dds The Bethesda way to do is is to create another texture seperate from the main texture which has the tiny version (mip maps) The player way to do it, is to embed the mip maps into the main texture. Say it's a high res 2048x2048 texture map, which is way too huge, way way way too huge... You really don't need anything over 1024x1024, but anyway let's say it's 2048x2048 though Okay so you have your distance factor, because it's a 3D game So you come up with the max distance, let's just say it's 500 Cut that in half to 250, a mip map is a already measured an drawn 1024x1024 map of the original 2048x2048 map Cut the 250 in half an you get 125, which would make the mip map a already predrawn 512x512 map. It's alot more complex than that, but the idea is been around for a while. It saves the system from having to waste resources figuring out what a item in a 3D enviroment looks when at different distances. The reason why I'm telling you this, is because it's possible for fools like me or the creators of FOOK for example to whoops forget to create mip maps or embed them inside the main texture, which cuts performance in half or more. Paintnet is free, an will directly edit .dds, avoiding conversion to an from .dds to edit textures plus it loads fast, an also will create/embed mip maps durring save. I've opened some textures I got which were 1.2Mb in size High res then just opened it an saved it without editing with paintnet, which cut the size in half, to 600Kb, upon seeing this I checked to see if they both looked the same, which they did... I reckon mip maps would be more important than anything else perfromance wise. Maybe second to forcing AA, override any application setting via the grapics card control panel, then picking any AA or AF, you know, with the default fallout 3 launcher options set with AA an AF off (performance) you can avoid having to use texture packs. The mesh stuff, is just practice with Nifscope or whatever. When you paste in a branch, it almost always gives it a random text string name which would be the name of the shape. Clothing is more difficult, as there are nodes which attach to the skeleton, to allow it to move as you walk an such. Weapons an stuff are pretty easy, we paste them into known good vanilla meshes to change the animations on the weapons, which are mostly hard coded into the nif or at least how the game engine views the nif. you have you main item, Combatshotgun:0 then a bunch of other animated parts or whatnot If I were adding in another main part like say it's a silencer I'd paste it an name it Combatshotgun:1 Combatshotgun:0Combatshotgun:2Combatshotgun:3Combatshotgun:4Combatshotgun:5 or as many as you like once you paste something in it automaticly will highlight that part in the block list (to the left) So if the block details is checked in view, then the block details (to the bottom) will show the automaticly highlighted item you just pasted in So to change or set the name (text string) all you do is right click the top entry in the block details (which just happens to be the name) then edit text string which brings up the interface for picking text strings (names) Normally I just pick one that is already in there, just scroll down an you'll see the normal names for stuff So in the case of the silencer, I'd pick Combatshotgun:0, then before I hit okay, I change it to Combatshotgun:1 Main items I paste into the main branch, or whatever is at the top of the block list, which pasting it there will give it it's own branch. If it's something animated, like say I want a weapon slide, which is made up of two parts, then instead of pasting at the top I move down to the slide sub-branch, an paste there, then change the name, so it's slide:0, an slide:1, but they are both below that sub-branch for slide. Even further, most weapons, have the main part pasted in on the main branch, so when I start moving branches an shapes around into known good meshes for fire rate an performance reasons, I'll start with the main item, like the body of the shotgun remove that sub-branch, then paste the new one on the top item in the block list, which puts it at the bottom like it was then I go up to the other parts, but don't remove the whole sub-branch like I did with the main part. On those I just click the render window which will highlight that part in the block list, which that part of the branch gets removed then like the two piece slide I paste the animated parts into the sub-branches for them, slide, hammer, trigger ect below each of those is the actual nitrishapes Slide blah blah blah Slide:0 The Slide:0 is the nitrishapes, anything below it is either hard coded or the texture or glow/reflective settings So when you paste something in it should just be the nitrishapes or whatever gets highlighted in the block list when you click it in the render window... When in doubt, all you do is open another known good mesh, like one that bethesda set up. I have to unpack vanilla meshes all the time just to have two meshes opened an make the one I made look like the vanilla one. Besides that, sometimes you make something which will crash the GECK an what you do to fix is open up the mesh with nifscope, then right click the parts in the render window, batch I think and pick update all tangent spaces, It's a spell I think it's also listed in the window tool bar. Then if you right click something, an pick mesh, you'll get a selection for triangulate, stripifiy which you triangulate, right click it again, which now it displays stripifiy, alternating these maybe 1-2 times, sometimes you can fix a hole in a mesh, but you always want to end on a stripifiy Some player made meshes won't open with nifscope... It crashes, I guess from the hacker crap the original creator did to make the item. But that being said, you don't see me out here trying to learn how to use blender, F that... Inside nifscope, you right click something in the render window, then texture, if you pick edit UV it's going to show the texture, an then all the verts that tell where on the shape to put the texture, you have to edit these, which isn't as hard as it looks after some practice, it brings up a window, an allows you to Ctrl Z (undo) all the stuff you mess up. The other tool in texture is the template, which all you do is find out what size your texture is 512 1024 2048 ect, then export the template at that size to the desktop or whatever, an bam you have a black an white an blue, template of how all those verts fit over the texture. Which what I do is select the white part outside the verts in the template with the magic wand (in paintnet) then delete that, then use the reskin tool, to change all remaining white, to black, brush that over the template which now I have the verts in black shapes with blue lines in them, I zoom in an change the reskin tool so that it reskins the blue to black, so now I have all black shapes, the area outside of them I deleted, so I fill that in with white, then use the magic wand to select an delete the black vert shapes, then recolor the remaining white to black or whatever, and I have a template which I can place over the texture either in layer mode, or just drop it right on top, which will only show the part of the texture which is going to be used. I've even used Green screen sort of to help, where the template is filled in green rather than black. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cramlow Posted December 14, 2009 Author Share Posted December 14, 2009 ;D Thanks Veteran for helping me man. I really really appreciate your reply! I'll use that knowledge for the best! Much luv man! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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