New to Modding, suffering random CTD's - Please help!

[grolschhorne]

Hi Guys,

 

As the title says I am fairly new to modding Skyrim and I have only had a little experience modding Oblivion, though as the game is much older I found lots of youtube videos that gave me step by step instructions to enhance the game without any real problems. When it came to Skyrim though, I thought that everything was going great until i started to play the game. I have been using Nexus Mod Manager as I felt that it has pretty much given me the confidence I needed to be able to mod my game to enhance the experience, and it has a very easy to use interface though I seem to be experiencing a lot of missing textures at varying times and sudden crash to desktops - usually when the game is loading a new cell (ie entering a building or fast travelling to a new location) and when I use the rest and sleep functions too. The problems seem to be completely random though, and I can play some days with next to no issues, but then on another day I am constantly crashing and never even get to leave my front door lol.

 

When it came to modding Skyrim I did watch some youtube videos to try and work out which mods were right for me, and did try a number of different ENB's and graphical options before eventually settling on my current one. I wanted the game to look as realistic as possible with no over the top colours or final fantasy style textures as I have always preferred realism over fantasy when it comes to immersive worlds.

 

When installing the mods I have tried to keep conflicts to a minimum and as such I have ended up removing mods such as the Ultimate Follower Overhaul in favour of the Amazing Follower Tweaks instead. To the best of my knowledge all of my mods should now be compatible, though I must admit I did feel at times like I was falling down the rabbit hole so to speak as when you install one mod, it inevitably leads to another mod to get the full experience and so on and so forth.

 

There were a few mods that I added but never seemed to work properly or at all, like the hearthfire multiple adoptions mod (never gave me the adoption choice after i adopted 2 children ) and the real shelter mod (seemed to stop all weather whilst I was in shelter rather than just blocking it, leading it to be sunny one second and stormy the next when passing under cover). So these mods were installed temporarily and then removed completely.

 

I have also used TES5edit to clean the games main files as suggested on multiple threads and by BOSSGui, and I have used Wryebash to create a bash patch too. I have also tried to install compatibility patches as per BOSS suggestions, though some had to be removed after they caused the game to stop working at all (such as for climates of Tamriel). I have attached text files of the NMM load order, and the BOSS recognised and Unrecognised plugins lists.

 

TL;DR - Basically I am just wondering if anyone can shed any light on why I am having such random CTD's and how I can possibly fix them? Any information would be greatly appreciated. I am about half way through the game and would like to try and keep the save if possible, but the random crashing is making the experience a bitter one.

 

Many Thanks

Grolschhorne

edit:-

It occurred to me that my PC specs might be relevant too, and so here is the PC that I am using for Skyrim.

Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit

AMD FX-8350 8 Core Black Edition 4GHz (16MB Tot. Cache)

Corsair H60 Cpu Cooler

16GB 1866mhz Corsair Vengeance pro memory

Asus Sabretooth 990Fx Motherboard

MSI NVidia GeForce GTX 770 4095Mb

Edited September 28, 2014 by grolschhorne

[gromulos]

paste your load order to www.pastebin.com and I will look at it, a lot of people won't open a txt file for various reason, including me

 

1) You need to run LOOT, Wrye Bash and TES5Edit, in that order

 

Loot is not 100% and if that is all you're using you're going to have many problems as you progress through your play through

 

1.5 ) with many mods loaded, you should be using 2 other programs ( Wrye Bash and TES5Edit ), when you run Wrye Bash if any checkmarks are not green, those mods are causing problems in your game, you make them turn green by dragging them up or down in your load order in wrye bash till they do turn green, ok that's one problem

 

2) with many mods loaded into your game you HAVE to have either a merged patch or bashed patch file, once again Wrye Bash is your friend because it will automatically make you a bashed patch file when it loads your mods. A bashed patch file makes all your weapon and armor and other mods play nice together, it also keeps track of leveled lists in the game and makes them work better together also. One other thing, make sure you enable ( check mark ) the bashed patch Wrye Bash makes, which should always be last in your load order unless you're using an ENB or the Reproccer. DO NOT USE A MERGED PATCH AND A BASHED PATCH AT THE SAME TIME, ONE OR THE OTHER.

 

3) TES5EDIT is used to do 2 things,

 

(A) verify that your load order is not missing any files that your mods need and

 

(B) verify that no primary files are being loaded after secondary files. When you run TES5EDIT it will throw up an error box and the error will be displayed at the bottom of the right pane / panel. All you have to do is read what it says and it will tell you exactly how to fix the problem in Wrye Bash. Yes, you can open Wrye Bash while TES5EDIT is open so you don't even have to write down what the error is :smile:

 

Please remember that while LOOT is a great program it is NOT 100 %

 

Let me know if you need any tutorial videos on how to use these, you shouldn't because they are pretty easy to use :smile:

 

all 3 file links are in my siggy below :smile:

 

EDIT: I went ahead and looked at your load order.txt, it looks like you need SKYui and also most likely SKSE, you need the SKSE to run SKYui and you need SKYui so that all your mods that have MCM menus will work properly, be turned on, and be configured, links below

 

SKYui - http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/3863/?

 

SKSE - http://skse.silverlock.org/

Edited September 28, 2014 by gromulos

[grolschhorne]

Hi Gromulus,

 

Thank you for taking the time to post!

 

As requested I have pasted all of the info into paste bin and the link is http://pastebin.com/HzqquMuq so for future reference it can all be found there too.

 

I have never heard of LOOT before and so I will download the program now and do as you say, though have already used Wryebash and so kind of know the basics on how to install and merge mods using it and the bash patch is indeed always at the bottom of my load order.

 

I am also already using Skyrim Script Extender v1.7.1, though I believe that this does not actually show in a load order as I installed it using the installer rather than as a Mod.

 

When downloading the mods I thought I had been pretty careful in picking those that did not need SKYUI, as to be honest I actually like the Skyrim UI as it is (despite a few bugs here and there) and didn't really want to revert to what looked like a more oblivion based UI system (just my first thoughts on screenshots of SKYUI). Of course that does not mean that I am not willing to of course try to see if that solves my issues, as I am sure that I would get used to the changes eventually and would be happier playing the game if I can stop the CTD's. Just out of curiosity, could you tell me please which mod's you believe require the use of SKYUI? I only ask as if they are non-essential then I may also consider simply removing them instead. (I'm not entirely sure what you mean by MCM menu's, sorry!)

 

Again, thank you for your assistance, and I will let you know how I get on once I have followed the steps that you have given.

 

Many Thanks

 

Grolschhorne

Edited September 28, 2014 by grolschhorne

[gromulos]

I don't know all of your mods but I can tell you that if ANY of them require SKYui, and you do not have it installed, that WILL crash your game. Install it and see what it finds, if it doesn't find anything you can always uninstall it afterwards :)

[grolschhorne]

Ok,

 

I have installed SkyUI (so far not a fan of the new interface but I'll live lol) and have ran LOOT saving the changes to the load order afterwards.

 

After running LOOT I have entered Nexus Mod Manager and moved Amazing Follower Tweaks to the bottom of the list, just above the BASHED patch. I have done this as the author has recommended to do so to prevent mod's clashing.

 

Then I ran Wryebash and all mods were green down the board, apart from the bashed patch which needed updated after installing SkyUI. After I rebuilt the patch, everything was green and good to go.

 

Finally I ran TESVedit and no errors were flagged to me so I assume that everything is ok.

 

I then ran Skyrim and to test whether I would still get the CTD's, I left my personal home at Heljarchen Hall and one into the world space I fast traveled to Markarth. So far so good, but then I fast travelled to another personal home back at Lakeview Manor and the game immediately crashed giving the windows error message "Skyrim is not responding". this is actually different as before the changes my CTD's were without message and just took me to the desktop, so now the warning (not that one is needed lol) is actually different.

 

Is there anything else that you think I should try to stop these annoying CTD's?

 

Again, any assistance would be very much appreciated!

 

Grolschhorne

 

I have uploaded my new load order to pastebin and the link is :-http://pastebin.com/MFqFryp6

[grolschhorne]

I don't know all of your mods but I can tell you that if ANY of them require SKYui, and you do not have it installed, that WILL crash your game. Install it and see what it finds, if it doesn't find anything you can always uninstall it afterwards :smile:

 

No worries, I just thought I would ask in case there was a known conflict that I was not aware of.

[bojanni]

You can use this mod to get the vanilla GUI back but keep the MCM menu: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/29440/?

 

Did you restart your computer after all you've done?

 

Do you have an skse.ini file with memory-edits: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/51038/?

 

Do you use a lot of HD texture-mods?

 

Crashes can occur because of memory issues (Skyrim has a 3.1GB limit). You can check memory usage using this tool: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/6491/?

Edited September 28, 2014 by bojanni

[grolschhorne]

 

You can use this mod to get the vanilla GUI back but keep the MCM menu: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/29440/?

 

Did you restart your computer after all you've done?

 

Do you have an skse.ini file with memory-edits: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/51038/?

 

Do you use a lot of HD texture-mods?

 

Crashes can occur because of memory issues (Skyrim has a 3.1GB limit). You can check memory usage using this tool: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/6491/?

 

 

Hi Bojanni,

 

Thank you for the link for the SkyUI Vanilla UI mod, that is most definitely appreciated and now installed ready for testing! And no I did not reboot my pc afterwards as to be honest it just didn't occur to me to do so, though now you have mentioned it I am kind of slapping myself for not thinking about it. I will reboot and give it another test in a moment, thanks for the heads up!

 

I also do use quite a few texture mods too, and others that I am not sure whether would count as texture mods (such as environmental graphics changes wind, snow etc). The models and textures tab on my NMM currently has 41 mod's in it, 37 of which are active. Though quite a few of those are in bundles, such as the Skyrim HD textures, aMidianborn Book of Silence and No more Ugly Bronze Shine. I suppose some are much more memory focused than others, and again I guess if I have to lose some then it wouldn't be the end of the earth to do so.

 

I will install the performance manager so it can be used in time for my next test, after I have rebooted the system.

 

Thanks again for your help guys, it makes trying to learn how to mod much easier than fumbling around in the dark. I really do appreciate the help!

 

Anyway, time to reboot and then I will retest and post my results!

 

edit:- I also didn't have an SKSE.ini present in my skryim\data\skse folder so have downloaded the one that you have linked and placed it there.

Edited September 28, 2014 by grolschhorne

[grolschhorne]

So I rebooted and tested the game using the performance manager, and sure enough my game crashed - this time as soon as I was about to enter the playing world. The max memory i used was 2.389MB and the vid memory was 2,428MB. Every time I tried to load the game though, the loading screen was just about to disappear and I would crash straight back to desktop.

 

I figured that this was due to one of the changes I had just made and it first off I moved the SKSE.ini out of my data\skse folder and onto my desktop, and then re-ran the program. The game was working again, wth the occasional CTD but at least it would allow me to play some. Does anyone know why the SKSE.ini would cause the game to crash every time?

 

I also installed the UI mod suggested by Bojanni for SkyUI to keep the vanilla menus and everything seems to work, but I get error messages whenever I enter a new menu such as the crafting panel or map, the error tells me to revert to the older version of the UI or re-install, which I have tried re-installing and I still get the same error message. I'm not sure why this would be, so I might just have to uninstall the vanilla patch and use the basic SkyUI and just get used to the changes.

 

If anyone can offer any advice as to what I should try next or why the SKSE.ini is not working, I am open to all suggestions!

[bojanni]

The solution for the errors with SkyUI away can be found in the description of the mod. The SKSE crash is strange. Which SKSE version are you running? Do you use SSME?