Skyrim Crash to Desktop CTD (randomly in-game, already had turned off autosave)

[Slava17]

So I'm getting back into Skyrim, but the Special Edition doesn't run well on my computer, so I'm sticking with the old version.

 

I ran it with mostly minimum settings, though I had to turn up item and actor fade just a little bit so I can play it more comfortably. The game at that point would run fairly well, but drop to around 20fps in combat during the first big skirmish underground in the tutorial. The second skirmish the game force closed to desktop.

 

I had the problem before, and tried creating a new game once again and immediately disabling all autosaves. That helped before somewhat, but this time going through I still got the force crash in about the same place.

 

Then I took my search online, I tweaked a few of the file settings suggested by lowspecgamer on youtube, got a couple of performance mods he recommended, and the fps is much better. The game is better suited to my computer while still looking good. I was able to switch textures up to medium and still keep the fps around 30+ during combat, which is comfortable enough for me. (One day I'll hopefully get a nice gaming machine, but as of now that benchmark is fine for what I've got.)

 

After getting the mods, I was able to get past every part that I had crashed at before. I killed the bear and thought everything was going smoothly, then suddenly when the only characters on the screen were myself and Ralof, and my fps was 35, I got another crash to desktop. I feel like my system is handling the game perfectly fine now, and I have no idea why it keeps crashing.

 

Please help!

[iXenite]

Load order?

[Slava17]

What is load order?

[snelss0]

Your load order is your list of mods and what order they are in. Even though you may have downloaded a series of mods, what method you used to download them and what position they are in in relation to each other actually matters. I suggest you watch this video series if you want to do any modding. It takes you from beginner to average modder.

 

[ukunaka]

load order is the load order of your mods in the data files section, some mods dont work together but can be fixed by changing which loads first, others are completely incompatible

[Slava17]

Does an issue with load order cause crashes to desktop? If not, then I'll still take a look at the specifics, but I need the game to be playable in order to even use mods.

[Slava17]

The thing is, the crashes were happening before I added any mods. The mods helped me get further than I had before, though I can't rule out that it could have also been a time-based thing (I cleared the level much faster, having just barely gone through it).

 

Anybody know what could possibly cause it?

[snelss0]

Yes, bad load order of your mods is one of the bigger reasons you crash to desktop. Others are incompatibilities between mods, you are hitting memory caps, your memory is not allocating properly, enb files are not set up properly, you are missing master files and many other reasons.

 

Bethesda, while I'm sure they put a lot of effort into debugging, repetitively fails to make stable games. Skyrim is buggy as heck and can freeze and crash your game all by itself. Even though your mods may have helped, they could have caused a different style of crash than what you were experiencing before you installed them. We won't know until you post your mod load order. If you are using the program LOOT to help sort your mods, click the 3 dots in the top right and you can see in the dropdown "Copy Load order". Hit that and paste it here. That will let us know what mods you have and what order even your original skyrim files are in.

[iXenite]

At this point, I really suggest getting a better computer. It sounds like your PC simply shouldn't be trying to run this game. With that said, if your game is crashing without mods, then something is seriously wrong with your install. Even on my dated laptop Skyrim will not crash on startup. It won't play the game well at all, but it won't crash either. I'd consider deleting everything to do with Skyrim on your PC and start fresh and see what happens.

 

Also, here is a good budget rig you could build yourself if you're curious. Prices are in USD, no peripherals of any kind are included. Neither is an OS.

 

 

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI H110M Gaming Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($62.89 @ OutletPC)
Memory: GeIL EVO POTENZA 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($67.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: ADATA Premier SP550 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($39.98 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($48.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon RX 460 4GB WINDFORCE OC Video Card ($89.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Thermaltake Core V21 MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($38.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Corsair CXM 450W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($46.97 @ Newegg)
Total: $500.69
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-11-20 14:56 EST-0500

 

 

[Slava17]

I'm using nexus mod manager, and I can't figure out how to even find my load order. I tried installing LOOT, but it doesn't seem to be finding my mods, and it is crashing with almost every button I try pressing. Copying load order doesn't seem to work because I'm not sure the program is even registering that Skyrim is installed...