Question about the "disable" console command.

[Evravon86]

Just curious because I've been using it quite a bit. When you use the "disable" console command, what, exactly, does it do? I can clearly see it removes the object from the game, but is it just hidden? Does the object still load when you enter the area, but it's invisible and transparent? Just curious because I have been using this console command a lot, lately. In the Starlight Drive In, I used disable on all the skeletal bodies lying around everywhere, as well as those metal things that were supposed to be connected to the ground, but instead have been uprooted and are getting kicked around by my settlers.

I also had an issue with Bobbi No-Nose's terminal. No matter what I did, I couldn't access it. I tried it from every side, crouched, exited the area, reloaded my save, everything. It would not let me use her terminal. I'd hit E to access it, it would stop everything for a moment, then nothing would happen and I could move again. So what I did was, I went down onto her first floor, looked up her terminal's ID, used player.placeatme and teleported a new terminal down to me. It let me access this one. When I was done, I didn't want a computer and chair floating in the middle of the room, so I used "disable" on it. I was just wondering if it's going to interfere with my save later down the line.

[Pthalo]

Based on my experience with Skyrim, a disabled object is, in fact, removed entirely from the game world. I use this command differently in FO4 than you do however - I click on objects I have built and disable them, but keep their ID selected when I exit the console screen. This lets me place other objects in that spot, and then use enable to re-appear the disabled object. It lets me work around clipping issues without relying on a GECK-less mod to do so.

 

If I deselect the object, I have to look up its ID online and spawn an entirely new instance of it. This implies that the item is truly no longer in existence. Given how Bethesda games have master ID's for all objects in game, and then separate ID's for individual copies of that object, it stands to reason there would be no reason to keep an invisible record of the copies in the game world.

 

What I haven't tested is whether or not the game will check what's supposed to be in a map cell, and then spawn things accordingly. If you see skeletons you've previously deleted showing up again, a) lemme know, that's neat and b) that's probably your biggest problem.

Edited December 17, 2015 by Pthalo

[SkunkMonkey]

The disable command does not remove the item from your game data. If it did, the enable command would not work afterwords. If you truly want something gone after disabling it, use the markfordelete command. This will cause it to be ignored the next time a save file is written thereby removing it permanently.

[Pthalo]

Ooooh. I did not know that was a command, and that's a really obvious point. Sorry for the sort-of-wrong information then.

 

However: if the item is currently disabled, what information for it is being actively loaded? No polygons or skins, I imagine. Disabled objects don't register as IN-THE-WAY when I place other objects in their 'spot'. Is it just an item id and placement information stored as numbers somewhere?

 

Must... learn...

[SkunkMonkey]

Disabled entities are still loaded in memory, this way they can be enabled. The only difference is they aren't loaded into the worldspace when it's rendered.

[Pthalo]

Okay so you'd still be saving on effort made by your computer, then. Coolbeans.