Honest Hearts and Dead money don't work - CTD on entry

[volnaiskra]

I have about 80 hours into my game, and am on level 22. I get frequent CTDs, but as long as I save often, it's fine: something that crashed once usually doesn't crash again after a reload.

 

But Honest Hearts and Dead Money are different. I go to the Northern Passage, speak with Jed, and as soon as we're about the head off and the game starts loading the new DLC area, there's an abrupt CTD. It ALWAYS does a CTD (tried about 15 times using various saves etc.) - it simply won't let me enter the DLC. Same with dead money. I HAVE been able to successfully complete Old World Blues, and have successfully started playing through Lonesome road.

 

I've tried disabling all mods and trying to enter Honest Hearts in pure vanilla, and I've tried turning off all programs, virus checkers, etc. but to no avail.

 

I loved OWB, and would really like to play those other 2 DLCs. Help, please!!!! :D

 

EDIT: Ah, crap. I just realised that although it let me into Lonesome Road, it now won't let me back out- same constant CTDs whenever I try.

 

Is this problem with DLCs not working something that has come up before? And if so, does anyone know any solutions? About the only thing I can think of that I haven't tried is starting a fresh new game and seeing if they work then - although that's not really a viable solution since you need to be pretty levelled up to do most of these DLCs.

[n0t0ryczny]

Crashes upon entering a large new area are common. Lonesome Road holds a record I think. Do you use a lot of mods or large texture packs? Nevada Skies? Have you created a merged or bashed patch? Have you used NV Configator and set the preload size limit to 150 mb? Defragmented your HDD? Check your .ini files and ensure that AllowScriptedAutosave = 1.

 

Anyway, what worked for me in case of LR (HH worked flawlessly) was turning the graphics to minimum (small textures and every slider max to the right), crouching and looking down when entering Canyon Wreckage. Do not look up into the sky or around until you are sure the game has not crashed upon entering the Divide, wait for 10 seconds more and save. Twice. Just in case. Than quit and set your graphics as desired.

 

Now go back there and play. It should work fine.

[volnaiskra]

Dzięki, n0t0ryczny. Thanks heaps for your advice! But sadly, no dice :(

 

To go through your advice in detail:

mods & texture packs: yes, I use a lot of them, but deactivating all of them didn't seem to help

Nevada skies: no

merged or bashed patch: not sure what that is. I have used the community bugfix patch though (though deactivated that together with all my other mods when I tried running without mods)

NV configator 150mb: changed it, but no difference

defrag: yep, defragged it recently

allowScriptedAutosave: it was 0, so I set it to 1, but no difference

setting all settings to low and staring at the ground: Tried it, but no difference. Although the looking at the ground bit doesn't seem to apply in Honest Hearts and Dead Money because in both cases the camera automatically makes you look up just before you enter (up at Jed in HH and up at the ceiling when you faint in DM)

 

Another thing that is worthy to note is that when I get these CTDs, they hapen very quickly. When I get a 'normal' CTD elsewhere in the game, it usually loads for a few seconds, enters the new area and quickly crashes. But in this case (when I try to go enter the HH or DM areas), it loads for just 0.2 seconds or less and immediately crashes - barely enough time to even see the spinning roulette wheel. So, I have my doubts that the problem is related to it not being able to handle a new large area, because it doesn't even seem to load the new area up - it seems to crash before it's even tried.

[n0t0ryczny]

How long is your load order? If it's more than 70-80 files your CTDs will be much more frequent.

 

If you use large texture packs deactivating them would make you no good; to make them really a non-issue you would have to manually remove them from their folders, because loose files are always used if you have your ArchiveInvalidation turned on. I'm not saying that you have to delete them, just move them somewhere else. Large landscape and gigantic armor packs are the worst.

 

Download and set up FNVEdit and Wrye Bash from nexus. First polish up your load order, than create a bashed patch. Next thing is running FNVEdit and looking for conflicts unresolved by your newly created patch.

[volnaiskra]

If you use large texture packs deactivating them would make you no good; to make them really a non-issue you would have to manually remove them from their folders, because loose files are always used if you have your ArchiveInvalidation turned on.

Even if I use FOMOD to deactivate them? I was assuming that FOMOD automatically moves them to some other location when you deactivate them.

[ATTAKowl]

Im getting this problem as well, specifically with Dead Money. I CTD after the character faints in the BOS bunker, right when the load screen starts to display. Im going to watch this topic because I been playing a lot of Fallout this week and want the game to work. Also, I just recently got into adding mods to the game, its been very fun.I really dont want to reinstall everything again and play without mods. If you find a solution that works, will you post it here and describe in detail what fixed it for the dumber vault dwellers like me? :D

[scrivener07]

If you use large texture packs deactivating them would make you no good; to make them really a non-issue you would have to manually remove them from their folders, because loose files are always used if you have your ArchiveInvalidation turned on.

Even if I use FOMOD to deactivate them? I was assuming that FOMOD automatically moves them to some other location when you deactivate them.

 

correct. Wrye Flash also has a similar feature called BAIN. If you are using these installers they will (should) remove the files they originally installed to your data folder. Ill be watching this thread close because Im having the same issue as op.

[scrivener07]

I had the same issue and found a solution. HH doesnt like tweaked timescales or hardcore mode. So if you have Project Nevada, bashed patch or mod that tweaks the time scale turn it off until you get to zion. For some reason it also doesnt like hardcore mode to be on. Turning it off works fine but I cant turn it back on. Is there a way to turn it back on through console or other means? I dont care about the achievement. Hope this helps

 

btw these can be turned back on once you first arrive. another note is I left my timescale and hardcore mode on and Im allowed to use the coc command to travel to Zion without crash. There must be a bug somewhere in the northern passage area.

[volnaiskra]

Wow! Turning off hardcore mode did it! Once I did that, it let me into HH no worries - with all my mods installed and everything. I'm several hours into it, with no problems. Here's hoping it lets me get back to the Mojave without CTDs though. I haven't tried DM or LR.

 

another note is I left my timescale and hardcore mode on and Im allowed to use the coc command to travel to Zion without crash. There must be a bug somewhere in the northern passage area.

Could you explain how to use that coc command, for those (like me) who haven't really used the console before?

[scrivener07]

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_cell_ID

 

Start the console by hitting ~