PC Lock Up and Other Issues?

[AtomicWVGirl]

Hello. I started Fallout 4 almost 3 weeks ago and fell in love with the game. I wanted to have a more immersive feel with it so my fiance introduced me to the mods here at the Nexus. I've modded various other games in the past but this is the first Bethesda game I've done this too. I've tried searching and read various faq/troubleshooting guides and have watched tutorial videos throughout Youtube for modding, particularly for sorting the load order, but I'm not getting any results to fix my issues, so I thought I would finally post them here.

 

The game is a clean install through Steam and was somewhat laggy at first. I turned all game settings to off/minimum and installed an All Bugs fix plus 2 fps fixes, which just seriously improved my gameplay. Then I slowly started selecting mods that I wanted to use for the game, and unfortunately slowly started getting tiny issues here and there, which have now become a bit worse.

 

My most recent issue, which only started yesterday and has only happened twice so far, is that suddenly my game freezes, completely locking up my pc in the process with no way to access task manager to force close the game. I have to use the pc's power button to shut it off, then restart it. This is something that's never happened before in the 3 weeks that I've been playing the game. So I'm wondering if it's a load order/mod or .ini issue?

 

Before the lock ups, I've had some minor freeze ups here and there that would last anywhere from a couple seconds to 15 or so seconds, but assumed it was due to a mod I installed, maybe the Housemaker mod since others have complained about it being buggy (for mine, the settlement menu takes forever to render icons most of the time and it freezes the game up for a few seconds at times).

 

Another issue I noticed within the last few days is that if I'm roaming around the Concord/Red Rocket/Sanctuary areas (especially when re-entering the Sanctuary area) I get a rendering issue with buildings, textures, objects, and even settlers/companions having vanished for a few minutes until things slowly render into place. Since this only started happening within the past few days and never occurred before, I'm just wondering if this is also a mod conflict or issue with a file somewhere?

 

I've been using NMM from the get go, installed Loot and F4SE two days ago, and then today just installed FO4Edit and Wyre Flash after checking out the Beginners sticky thread. I really didn't notice any changes or errors when using all those tools, so I'm assuming my load order and everything is actually ok? I just don't know what could be causing issues then.

 

Here is my pc information and my current load order from NMM. Please let me know if I need to provide any other information.

 

 

Load Order:

GameMode=Fallout4

Fallout4.esm=1
TrueStormsFO4.esm=1
Homemaker.esm=1
SpringCleaning.esm=1
Brawl Bug Fix.esp=1
SprintStutterRemover5Percent.esp=1
Loot Detector.esp=1
Realistic_conversations.esp=1
Protected Unique NPC's.esp=1
AA Better Companions - No Conflicts.esp=1
DogmeatNoOpeningDoors.esp=1
FlirtyCommonwealth.esp=1
EveryonesBestFriend.esp=1
PushAwayCompanions.esp=1
VisibleCompanionAffinity.esp=1
NickValentineRomance.esp=1
Pug.esp=1
CBBE.esp=1
The Eyes Of Beauty.esp=1
ANiceOakTree Hairs.esp=1
ANiceOakTreePicks.esp=1
AzarPonytailHairstyles.esp=1
Dynamic Music Overhaul.esp=1
More Where That Came From Diamond City.esp=1
OWR_OWT.esp=1
RadioSilence.esp=1
SC_ExpandedScrapList.esp=1
See You Sleep CW editon - Beta.esp=1
fog.esp=1
spacefiddle_Follower-Stealth-Distance-Fixes.esp=1
Bashed Patch, 0.esp=0

 

 

Edited July 12, 2018 by Sugarflower

[bbiller]

One thing I would definately check is what got put into that bash patch if anything (according to the list you have there it isn't active, but it is something that deserves a closer look). With as few mods as you have (you're under the 255 esm and esp limit, esl doesn't count btw), so no need for wyreflash to do anything yet. Key takeaway there: Make triple sure WyreFlash did not merge something and if it did, fix that.

 

If it did do something, re-install the affected mods through NMM though Nexus would rather you use Vortex now (NMM stopped being developed here some time ago, but is still available on GitHub somewhere with a more recent release). Once that's done find and remove the bash patch from NMM and the games list of mods in use (NMM should help with this as a search in the main mods list section of NMM should let you find it to uninstall it).

 

As to LOOT and sorting that load order, I've had limited luck there, but NMM will let you move things (there is a plugins tab and in that section you will see arrows for moving a selected mod up or down in the list, I would suggest check bethesda.net for the general load order guide, save that locally, export your load order to a text file and use notepad+ to help with altering the order (do note that lines with a # in front will be ignored on import by NMM, so you can use that to make headings for the sections from the guide to keep things straight). Once the order is how you want it import it back to NMM).

 

LOOT can be told some additional rules but that takes a bit to set up.

 

That Expanded Scrap List I would have at the bottom of the load order if possible and check for conflicts or a patch with regard to that and Spring Cleaning. Mods like those can have pieces that need to be as low as possible, though the core of Spring Cleaning is an ESM and those files go as high up as possible, with Spring Cleaning being the lowest of those. I use Spring Cleaning and Scrap Everything with the patch for Spring Cleaning and the Ultimate Scrap Everything Update patch myself, so that may be another way for you to scrap what you want (worth a look).

 

Hope that helps.

[AGreatWeight]

Download the latest version of NMM over on Github (fixes a number of issues that the now-unsupported version here on Nexus has) https://github.com/Nexus-Mods/Nexus-Mod-Manager/releases

[AtomicWVGirl]

Thank you both for the help. I'll check everything out and try your suggestions when I get home tonight.

 

Silly question, is it ok to place holotapes/etc mod settings into the workbench for storage after I've customized them? I'm picky with keeping a maintained inventory for my character and like to keep things tidy and sorted haha.

[AGreatWeight]

Quite likely it should be ok to do that once you've chosen the settings you want to use with them, although can't say for certain as I keep holotapes with mod settings in my inventory at all times during a playthrough.

 

There are two ways you can go about trying to narrow down which mod/s may be the culprit for the issues you're experiencing in-game.

 

One way is to (download and) use FO4Edit, load all your installed mods into it and look for any compatibility issues that it will identify if the mods you're using are conflicting with one another; not sure if you have any familiarity with FO4Edit, if your new to it I highly recommend you do your research & gain some familiarity before using it. Until then, as an alternative you could try the method below.

 

Another way is to click on the plugins tab in NMM (you'll see that all installed mods will show up with a tick next to them & they'll be arranged as per your load order) From the list, click on the tick for half of your mods, say the last 50% (this will disable/deactivate them & the tick will disappear from the small square box) Then load the game and see if the same issues persist, if it does then you've possibly narrowed it down to one of the mods among the 50% that are still activated; now disable half of those ones and repeat the process. Doing this makes it easier to narrow down & hone in on if a particular mod you have installed is the cause of the problem. As your the number of mods you have installed is relatively low, this shouldn't take you too long to do. If you're successful in finding one mod that is causing the issue, completely uninstall it from NMM, then reactivate all your other mods, and test your game once more.

 

An alternative to this that you could try is deactivate/disable every single mod you have installed, load Fallout4 and start a new game to see if the performance issues you mentioned occur.

 

***Make sure that you don't allow the game to overwrite the save you've loaded whilst you're testing, the easiest way to do that is instead of going to the menu and selecting quit, open the console (via the 'tilde' key) and type qqq then hit enter - this quits the game but doesn't autosave or overwrite the save you're using.***

 

If you end up going through all your installed mods and still can't identify which one is causing the issue, the only other options available to you would be to go to the mod page for each mod, check the description pages, comments pages, and bug report pages to see if any other users have mentioned similar issues, and if there are fixes available. It would also be worth your while to do so for the 'fixes' you mention that you installed. You didn't say what they were called, so I can't comment as to their usefulness etc. The only mod of that kind that I personally use is the UnofficialFallout4Patch; I highly recommend that you install and use that mod.

As a last resort, if nothing else works, uninstall every single mod, start a brand new unmodded game, play through to the point where you first exit Vault111, save your game there (and then make a back-up copy of that unmodded save as it will come in handy in the future when testing mods) and don't overwrite that particular savefile. From there, you can quit the game and go about the process of reinstalling all your mods, one at a time, and testing them in-game, before installing the next mod. Having a 'clean'/unmodded save file is the best practise to use, and installing numerous mods at once isn't recommended as it's too easy to lose track and make it harder for yourself to identify when a mod is conflicting or causing problems with the game etc. Good luck.

 

-edit-

Almost forgot, make sure that you have as few external background processes running whilst you play the game. For example, anti-malware/anti-virus software, Steam overlay, EVGA, Afterburner, Avast antivirus, EMET, D3D Overrider, Razer and Logitek utilities can negatively effect game performance whilst you play; basically anything that loads up after your OS has booted (excluding for example, Steam itself). From your system specs, you should be able to play the game fine at low settings. Make sure that your display/gpu drivers are up to date etc.