How settlement budget calculated?

[tomomi1922]

SO how the heck does FO4 count item toward settlement budget? Do they count by ID? A simple box (the simplest polygon possible) and a full leaves tree (with lots of polygons) equally count as 1? Now I heard mod creators and also video reviews warn that mods like a bookshelf with lots of books (even packed as 1 item) may be costly toward settlement budget. Is this a myth or it is real? Or they actually pack in 1 book shelf and 20 books together with total of 21 counts? If they combine those meshes in Blender into 1 mesh with different texture/material, that counts as 1 object, right?

For game mechanic, I watched Oxhorn's video and he claimed that all the scrappable objects within your settlement ground also count toward budget. I surely hope dead enemies (and their left over weapons) do not count. Especially weapons, and dead bodies reduced to goo, they don't seem to go away. It kinda influences my policy to loot weapons in case they persist forever throughout the world (that stays in your save game).

What about power armor? What about persistent items like .... camping items (mod)? Camping items let you create bedrolls, tents, chairs, campfire to carry with you (kinda heavy) and you can setup camp by simply dropping them anywhere (and they don't disappear). If these don't count toward budget, I guess I am going to use camp's chairs as main chairs to populate my settlement, haha.

While at it, for settlement budget friendly, it is better to build a prefab (1 item) than building a small room (at least 1 foundation, 4 walls, a roof, a door) with 7 item count?

Edited May 20, 2017 by tomomi1922

[MightyZ0G]

personally I ignore the settlement budget by using mods to raise the limit. my pc isn't the greatest by a long way (i5 with 16GB RAM and geforce 750 Ti) and I haven't run into problems with too many objects, yet.

[Fonger]

personally I ignore the settlement budget by using mods to raise the limit.

strangely, haven't been able to get any settlement budget mod to work

[tomomi1922]

personally I ignore the settlement budget by using mods to raise the limit. my pc isn't the greatest by a long way (i5 with 16GB RAM and geforce 750 Ti) and I haven't run into problems with too many objects, yet.

Well, I have no problem doing that either. But it is good to understand about this budget and why Bethesda put it in at the first place. Do they just put a cap on settlement as a very weak and primitive measure against players trying to build out of hand and kill performance, or there is more to it?

 

It's not about logic or reason, but just the way the game design works. Like set time speed, default is 20. I used to set it to 8 and enjoyed a better day/night cycle. But too many people warned against it because ... FO4 was designed in a very broken way to follow the default time speed, and if time is not a default, a lot of quests get messed up. So with that in mind, I just leave my time alone at default. Same story with settlement budget .... is it just some stupidly primitive way for Bethesda to keep us in check, or there is a little more to it?

[TheSpaceShuttleChallenger]

As far as I or anyone I've met has seen, the build limit is just there to prevent people from overbuilding. That said, I'm on a five year old rig with some truly massive settlements (four or five times the normal size) and I've had no issues. My guess is that the build limit was made with console users in mind. Always the console users.

I couldn't get budget mods to work either. Fortunately, budget mods aren't necessary. You can use console to alter your build limit. Just open console, select the workshop workbench for your settlement, and type:

 getav 34a
getav 348

That tells you how many objects/polys you have in your settlement. Take those numbers and multiply them by a factor of your choice. Double or triple is probably sufficient for most cases. Then enter in console:

setav 34b <double or triple the value returned for 34a>
setav 349 <double or triple the value returned for 348>

It takes about one minute per settlement, doesn't require mods, and with this method, you get to decide how much you want to expand your build limit on a settlement-by-settlement basis, even setting different limits for different playthroughs.

Edited May 21, 2017 by TheSpaceShuttleChallenger

[SMB92]

Build limit seems to be based on poly count. I use DDproductions patch that ups it to 999999999 or something. You can find and edit this limit in xEdit i think the limit is 10000 in vanilla. I believe DD doesnt have the patch up anymore.

[tomomi1922]

As far as I or anyone I've met has seen, the build limit is just there to prevent people from overbuilding. That said, I'm on a five year old rig with some truly massive settlements (four or five times the normal size) and I've had no issues. My guess is that the build limit was made with console users in mind. Always the console users.

I couldn't get budget mods to work either. Fortunately, budget mods aren't necessary. You can use console to alter your build limit. Just open console, select the workshop workbench for your settlement, and type:

 

 getav 34a
getav 348

That tells you how many objects/polys you have in your settlement. Take those numbers and multiply them by a factor of your choice. Double or triple is probably sufficient for most cases. Then enter in console:

setav 34b <double or triple the value returned for 34a>
setav 349 <double or triple the value returned for 348>

It takes about one minute per settlement, doesn't require mods, and with this method, you get to decide how much you want to expand your build limit on a settlement-by-settlement basis, even setting different limits for different playthroughs.

Thanks so much. Your answer is clear and concise. It's even better I don't have to deal with mod because ... well ... console commands always win over a mod, at least for the ESP count. I have a tiny merged patch that I run in which I have to merge all the tiny ESP together to save some 20 esp counts.

 

So I was right, Bethesda actually counts polygons. A mannequin that mimics your nude body (especially female) is probably the highest polygon piece of of furniture in game. (This is a mod by DDProductions btw). 34a and 348 are 2 values that governs these counts? It would be nice to drop a piece of furniture and see how much the count goes up.

 

I am going have so much to do in game now :)

[SharraShimada]

The bugdet is also not the best way to determine the load.

For example: I run FO4 with a Geforce 450 GTS. Yeah its below the minimum specs, but at 1600*900 its playable.

When it comes to settlements, i can build whatever i want, if i keep an eye on 2 things: The vault-tech items produce heavy load. Especially when i build huge rooms with lots of single-tiles. (I wish there were 4x4 or even bigger tiles). And lighting is a huge framedropper. The vault-light-ceilings are a dont-use for me. Placing lights by hand in a reasonable fashion, and everything works smooth.

 

Long story cutting short: The budget is nonsense. You can "overbuild" settlements with just a dozen "wrong" items, but everything may be fine for your rig, if you know what it can handle.

[Madcat221]

As far as I or anyone I've met has seen, the build limit is just there to prevent people from overbuilding. That said, I'm on a five year old rig with some truly massive settlements (four or five times the normal size) and I've had no issues. My guess is that the build limit was made with console users in mind. Always the console users.

 

I couldn't get budget mods to work either. Fortunately, budget mods aren't necessary. You can use console to alter your build limit. Just open console, select the workshop workbench for your settlement, and type:

 getav 34a
getav 348

That tells you how many objects/polys you have in your settlement. Take those numbers and multiply them by a factor of your choice. Double or triple is probably sufficient for most cases. Then enter in console:

setav 34b <double or triple the value returned for 34a>
setav 349 <double or triple the value returned for 348>

It takes about one minute per settlement, doesn't require mods, and with this method, you get to decide how much you want to expand your build limit on a settlement-by-settlement basis, even setting different limits for different playthroughs.

ModAV, dagnabbit! Don't EVER use SetAV. You may have to do mental math to find out how much to add or subtract, but you don't break things like you do with SetAV.

[SharraShimada]

Good advise... setav most likeley will break something. Modav only changes values already present.