Grass & Antialiasing

[ZephyrLunaris]

Hey folks. So I went to start a new run the other day, and about 5 minutes out of Mitchell's house I noticed that when I looked in certain directions or moved a certain way, all the grass around me would freak out. Best way to describe it was that one second it looked like the grass had shadows, and another second, it didn't.

 

I scoured Google and tried a bunch of different settings in the NV launcher and the Nvidia Control Panel, but the only thing that got rid of the problem was completely disabling Antialiasing. Of course, this is more of an eyesore than the flickering grass. Would anyone happen to know any solution to this problem that lets me keep Antialiasing active?

Thanks.

[dubiousintent]

Please provide ALL the information requested in the wiki "How to ask for help" article. Don't forget to identify things that do not appear in the "load order", such as if you are using the FNV4GB Patch, NVSE and it's related plugins, texture replacements (specifically their larger image sizes: 1024x1024, etc.), and "post-processors" like ENB or SweetFX.

-Dubious-

[ZephyrLunaris]

Alright.

CPU: AMD FX-8350 8-Core, 4.0 ghz

GPU: G1 Gaming 1060, 6 GB

1920x1080 Monitor

8 GB RAM

795 GB free HD space

 

OS is Windows 10 Home, 64-bit. Game location is C:\steam\steamapps\common\Fallout New Vegas, Game version is 1.4.0.525 and all DLCs are installed. I use NMM version 0.65.2. LOOT, NVSE v5 and the 4gb patch are installed. I don't use any ENBs, and here's my load order.

 

 

FalloutNV.esm

DeadMoney.esm

HonestHearts.esm

OldWorldBlues.esm

LonesomeRoad.esm

GunRunnersArsenal.esm

YUP - Base Game + All DLC.esm

NVEC Bugfixes.esm

Project Nevada - Core.esm

Project Nevada - Rebalance.esp

SomeguySeries.esm

Interior Lighting Overhaul - Core.esm

Interior Lighting Overhaul - L38PS.esm

oHUD.esm

YUP - NPC Fixes (Base Game + All DLC).esp

Zan_Autopurge_SmartAgro_NV.esp

The Mod Configuration Menu.esp

DarNifiedUINV.esp

CASM with MCM.esp

Project Nevada - Dead Money.esp

Project Nevada - Honest Hearts.esp

Project Nevada - Old World Blues.esp

Project Nevada - Lonesome Road.esp

Project Nevada - Gun Runners' Arsenal.esp

BalancedSkillpoints_0.esp

Vurt's WFO.esp

.357 retex.esp

Better Burned Man.esp

WeaponModsExpanded.esp

WMX-DLCMerged.esp

GRA WRP Compatibility Patch.esp

WMX-ArenovalisTextures.esp

Ghoulified.esp

outsidebets.esp

rotfacetoriches.esp

avangraffscorned.esp

Pacersgambit.esp

NCR Ranger Helmet Neck Cover.esp

HZSmoothLight.esp

Delay DLC - DM + HH + OWB + LR + GRA.esp

MTB.esp

OldWorldBlues - Improved Transportalponder.esp

PortableCampsite.esp

Alternative Repairing.esp

Alternative Repairing - Honest Hearts.esp

Alternative Repairing - Lonesome Road.esp

Power Armor Training Perk.esp

LFox Bottle That Water.esp

Interior Lighting Overhaul - Ultimate Edition.esp

ILO - YUP Patch.esp

FNV Realistic Wasteland Lighting - All DLC.esp

 

 

Extras that don't appear in the load order are:

 

 

Improved Automatic Ironsight Animations V1.0

Weapons Animations Replacer

New Vegas - Enhanced Camera

Mobile Truck Base - Green

MTB - New Engine Sounds

6IXES Clutter Texture Pack

Book of Water

Bozar Retexture - 2k maps

Hi-Res Typewriter - 1k diffuse and normals.

HQ Dust Storm FX - 2048x2048 + Meshes

Improved LOD Noise - 2048x2048

LR Carbon Shadow Fix

MGs Neat Clutter Retextures - 2048x2048/1024x1024

NMCs Texture Pack - Small - 1024x1024/512x512

NMCs Texture Pack - NMC_Large_Texture_Pack_NV_Patches

PM's HD Ammo Boxes - 1k Diffuse, 512 Normals

PM's Med-Textures v1.0

Poco Bueno Texture Pack V5 - 2048x2048/1024x1024 + Skeleton Transparency Fix

Securitrons in CRT 1.0 + OWB

Weapon Retexture Project 1.95 + New 12.7mm SMG & GRA Patch

Wasteland Flora Overhaul v2.9b - Dead Version

User Interface Organizer

JIP LN NVSE Plugin

OneTweak

New Vegas Stutter Remover

New Vegas Anti-Crash

 

 

Verifying local files didn't fix the problem either. Also, if it helps any, here's a picture of the problem. In the scheme of things, it's a small problem, but it's extremely distracting when it's happening every few steps.

 

 

Edited September 20, 2018 by ZephyrLunaris

[dubiousintent]

Nothing definitive, but some suggestions.

 

Your hardware would not seem to be the problem. Having fiddled with configuration as you have, you now have a problem of "what is considered the current reference baseline"? Hope you have some idea of what settings were before you started changing them.

 

"Anti-aliasing" has to do with the jaggedness and "interpolation choice" between differences in color of adjacent pixels at the edges of images. It's not my first choice for resolving "shadow" issues. Shadows tend to be more a sunlight "shader" function, and in FO3 and FNV, all the shadow settings only affect large objects like Actor's shadows and even then not much. For small terrain features like grass, that's more a matter of the texture aspects like "specularity".

The list of "extra" mods not in the "load order" is very helpful; as this is more likely where this particular problem arises. "NMCs Texture Pack - NMC_Large_Texture_Pack_NV_Patches" has been superseded by "NMC New Vegas Patch for ALL Sized packs-43135-1-0". As you are using the NMC "Small" pack, suggest you make that switch.

Going from the grass appearance, your images are of what I would consider the "mid-ground", which means some might be "foreground" images and some "background" or "LOD". There is no clear cut dividing point anyone can point to, and the game engine chooses between them in the "mid" ground. So, my first concern is always: did you run FNVLODGen after installing your NMC, Poco Bueno, Wasteland Flora Overhaul (WFO) (etc.) texture mods? (Please see the 'Checklist Item #15 & 16' entries in the wiki "Fallout NV Mod Conflict Troubleshooting" guide regarding the need to run both TES4LL and FNVLODGen. Also recommend you read the 'LOD/VWD Texture Packs' section of the wiki "FNV General Mod Use Advice" article first.)

 

Did you then toggle "ArchiveInvalidation" in your mod manager after doing so?

The order in which you install LOD texture mods is important and the ones installed later overwrite the texture files which overlap in different packs. Given "WFO" is focused on "plant life", it should be installed after the others. But the "Dead" version I would expect to have little to no "shadow", as it implies little surface area to block sunlight. This suggests to me you are getting different versions of that grass texture at different moments based upon viewing angles. This can happen when more than one BSA file contains the same exact texture file name. The game engine doesn't deal with that situation well and sometimes grabs from one and then from the other. But it may also be the case when two files have very similar names but it can't find an exact match. The engine tries to "fall back" to the opposite "distance" version (e.g "name.nif" vs "name_far.nif").

Finally, you really need to use a "Merge Patch File" with that collection of mods. Please see the 'Third Rule: The Rule of One' and 'Merge Patch File' sections of the wiki "FNV General Mod Use Advice" article.

-Dubious-

[ZephyrLunaris]

Thanks for telling me about the update for NMCs patch. Installed that alongside FNVLODGen and did as you suggested but that didn't fix the problem. I've been keeping careful track of my game settings and reverting changes if they didn't have any effect, and on a whim I tweaked another couple of settings and disabling Ambient Occlusion in the Nvidia Control Panel finally fixed it.

 

I'll also look into making a merged patch later. Thanks again for your help.

Edited September 20, 2018 by ZephyrLunaris

[Radioactivelad]

The driver profile for NV/3 Ambient Occlusion has been buggy ever since they updated it to HBAO instead of SSAO years ago.

 

You can use Nvidia Inspector to change the AO profile though. The Wolfenstien profile works pretty well.