Persistant CTD in Game Menus / Save Bloat

[MarkusFox]

Issue #1:

CTD's happening when I try to open the Journal, System Menu (for saves), Item, or Magic menus with a fairly heavily used character that's been played for close to 200 hours.

 

Expected result:

Normal gameplay is expected. The menus need to work as designed.

 

Actual Result:

Hit tab, fine. Go to Map, fine. Go to Skills, also fine. Open Items, Magic, Journal, or the escape key...CTD. CTD also happens when opening containers or talking to merchants.

 

Details:

I had to dig for an older save for my character after getting a massive save bloat when I installed Dragonborn (a bloat so big it made the file unplayable due to infinite loading screen). The older save works until I open one of the above menus. At first I thought it was SkyUI, but that was ruled out (despite vanilla menus working just peachy so far) through external testing by another player.

 

I've got a suspicion that this has affected other saves too. The load order for the affected save is as follows in the spoiler button. I've found that even if I trimmed mods down to just vanilla and texture mods, the CTD's persist on my machine. Likely due to mods not removing their scripts correctly. Now since the character in question plays crash-free on another player's PC it can't be from scripts stored in the save.

 

The Papyrus Logs show pages upon pages of repeating Errors for critterDragonFly.psc involving the UnregisterForUpdateGameTime, Disable, GetParentCell and UnregisterForUpdate function calls.

 

 

Missing Masters for: Save 419 - M'ora Dragonsreach 198.24.49.ess
xx AdditionalMusicProject.esp
xx fcteResurrection.esp
xx Harvest More Food & Ingredients.esp
xx Invulnerable Horses.esp

Masters for: Save 419 - M'ora Dragonsreach 198.24.49.ess
00 Skyrim.esm
01 Update.esm
02 Dawnguard.esm
03 HearthFires.esm
04 Dragonborn.esm
05 ClimatesOfTamriel.esm
06 RaceCompatibility.esm
07 ClimatesOfTamriel-Dawnguard-Patch.esp
08 colored constellations.esp
09 glowing arrows v2.1.esp
0A higherlevelenemies.esp
0B improvedskillbooks.esp
0C werewolvesofskyrim.esp
0D kainarmor.esp
0E siamese khajiit.esp
0F followerwander2.esp
10 minemapmarkers.esp
11 Bashed Patch, 0.esp
12 adrianneaveniccifix.esp
13 prvti_heavyarmory_dawnguard.esp
14 Kjoor.esp
15 TenmarCottage.esp
16 DwemmerDormitory.esp
17 AchieveThat.esp
18 AetheriumSwordsnArmor.esp
19 Dr_Bandolier.esp
1A Bucklers-Complete.esp
1B Cloaks.esp
1C dagi_raht_race.esp
1D iHUD.esp
1E Portable Campsite.esp
1F Predator Vision.esp
20 RaceMenu.esp
21 RaceMenuPlugin.esp
22 1nivWICCloaks.esp [Version 2.1b]
23 MISELF_Dragons.esp
24 dwarvenrifle.esp
25 DwarvenRiflesEnglish.esp
26 WetandCold.esp
27 ToL_Core_by_Brevi.esp [Version 1.5]
28 Skyrim Shadow Striping Fix.esp
29 backpackfrankdema.esp
2A SabreFurBag.esp
2B Headbomb's Better Sorting - Ammo.esp
2C Headbomb's Better Sorting - Books.esp
2D Headbomb's Better Sorting - Food (Normal Weight).esp
2E Headbomb's Better Sorting - Ingredients.esp
2F Headbomb's Better Sorting - Miscellaneous.esp
30 Headbomb's Better Sorting - Potions (Normal Weight).esp
31 Headbomb's Better Sorting - Soul Gems (PseudoVanilla).esp
32 OpenFaceHelmets.esp
33 SkyUI.esp

 

 

Issue #2:

Save Bloat after installing Dragonborn.

 

Expected Result:

A playable save file.

 

Actual Result:

My Lets Play character who had about 200 hours of time on it had its save file increase from 12 MB to 36.7MB in the space of half an hour.

 

Details:

I thought nothing of it as I had just installed Dragonborn and was continuing my Lets Play from where I left off in a dwarven ruin (The Aetherium Forge quest). During play I noticed brief intermittent freezes lasting from 2 to 5 seconds. They continued up to when I went to Solstheim and reached the Temple of Miraak. I saved inside the temple. Came back later and found the save wouldn't load, it was stuck in an infinite loading screen. Then I went to Wyre Smash and checked the save file more directly. Instead of being the typical 12 MB, it was instead 37.6 MB. In less than 30 minutes of play the save bloated by 24 megs AND became unplayable. Reverting to older saves for the character only got my menu CTD's as described in Issue #1.

 

Common Papyrus errors for the bloated file are as follows:

warning: Could not find type cluxLightAdjust_PlaceAtMe in the type table in save

warning: Could not find type sceniccarriagescarriagesystemscript in the type table in save

warning: Function Critter..disableAndDelete in stack frame 1 in stack <number> differs from the in-game resource files - using version from save

 

Of these messages, the last one takes up a good 70% of the log. The ones related to scenic carriages exists even after I disabled the mod from Breezehome through the Scenic Carriages Book (and disabled the mod in NMM). And I have no idea what the deal with Claralux is, I tried it out once and was "meh" so I thus uninstalled it months ago.

 

 

The load order on the bloated save is in this spoiler:

 

Missing Masters for: Save 406 - M'ora Temple of Miraak 203.43.12.ess
xx AdditionalMusicProject.esp
xx fcteResurrection.esp
xx Harvest More Food & Ingredients.esp
xx Invulnerable Horses.esp

Masters for: Save 406 - M'ora Temple of Miraak 203.43.12.ess
00 Skyrim.esm
01 Update.esm
02 Dawnguard.esm
03 HearthFires.esm
04 Dragonborn.esm
05 ClimatesOfTamriel.esm
06 RaceCompatibility.esm
07 ClimatesOfTamriel-Dawnguard-Patch.esp
08 colored constellations.esp
09 glowing arrows v2.1.esp
0A higherlevelenemies.esp
0B improvedskillbooks.esp
0C werewolvesofskyrim.esp
0D kainarmor.esp
0E siamese khajiit.esp
0F followerwander2.esp
10 minemapmarkers.esp
11 Bashed Patch, 0.esp
12 adrianneaveniccifix.esp
13 prvti_heavyarmory_dawnguard.esp
14 Kjoor.esp
15 TenmarCottage.esp
16 DwemmerDormitory.esp
17 AchieveThat.esp
18 AetheriumSwordsnArmor.esp
19 Dr_Bandolier.esp
1A Bucklers-Complete.esp
1B Cloaks.esp
1C dagi_raht_race.esp
1D iHUD.esp
1E Portable Campsite.esp
1F Predator Vision.esp
20 RaceMenu.esp
21 RaceMenuPlugin.esp
22 1nivWICCloaks.esp [Version 2.1b]
23 MISELF_Dragons.esp
24 dwarvenrifle.esp
25 DwarvenRiflesEnglish.esp
26 WetandCold.esp
27 ToL_Core_by_Brevi.esp [Version 1.5]
28 Skyrim Shadow Striping Fix.esp
29 backpackfrankdema.esp
2A SabreFurBag.esp
2B Headbomb's Better Sorting - Ammo.esp
2C Headbomb's Better Sorting - Books.esp
2D Headbomb's Better Sorting - Food (Normal Weight).esp
2E Headbomb's Better Sorting - Ingredients.esp
2F Headbomb's Better Sorting - Miscellaneous.esp
30 Headbomb's Better Sorting - Potions (Normal Weight).esp
31 Headbomb's Better Sorting - Soul Gems (PseudoVanilla).esp
32 OpenFaceHelmets.esp
33 SkyUI.esp

At this point the only thing I have to go on is the repeating errors in the papyrus logs saying a mod is misbehaving. So I'm scratching my head for ideas. Bad enough I might shelve the let's play character because of the CTDs and the bloat issue. Replaying 52 levels worth of content is not my idea of fun.

 

 

Edited February 16, 2013 by MarkusFox

[nrot]

Since you reported CTD during interaction with containers and merchants, my guess is that it might be a leveled list issue (at least in part) with Headbomb's mod and Dragonborn. It doesn't look like you are running Sharlikran's compatibility patch for Better Sorting, and it might be worth a try to see if it helps resolve the issue. You can find his patches here:

 

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/26230

[MarkusFox]

Since you reported CTD during interaction with containers and merchants, my guess is that it might be a leveled list issue (at least in part) with Headbomb's mod and Dragonborn. It doesn't look like you are running Sharlikran's compatibility patch for Better Sorting, and it might be worth a try to see if it helps resolve the issue. You can find his patches here:

 

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/26230

Oh, I do use that. In fact the patch itself replaces Headbomb's espo files (NMM asks me if I want to upgrade, and if I say no, it asks for conformation of overwrite) using its own with the exact same names. Also its not just containers and merchants, its the Items/Magic/Journal/System menus as well. So pressing Esc/J/Tab+A/Tab+A trips the CTD too.

 

So...If it likes to crash in the Journal or System menus too, would that still point the blame at Headbomb's mod?

 

Edit: I just noticed in NMM that Headbomb's mod wasn't activated but Shrilankan's patch was. Maybe that is what kept breaking that save file? Or something in addition to this.

Edited February 16, 2013 by MarkusFox

[nrot]

 

Since you reported CTD during interaction with containers and merchants, my guess is that it might be a leveled list issue (at least in part) with Headbomb's mod and Dragonborn. It doesn't look like you are running Sharlikran's compatibility patch for Better Sorting, and it might be worth a try to see if it helps resolve the issue. You can find his patches here:

 

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/26230

Oh, I do use that. In fact the patch itself replaces Headbomb's espo files (NMM asks me if I want to upgrade, and if I say no, it asks for conformation of overwrite) using its own with the exact same names. Also its not just containers and merchants, its the Items/Magic/Journal/System menus as well. So pressing Esc/J/Tab+A/Tab+A trips the CTD too.

 

So...If it likes to crash in the Journal or System menus too, would that still point the blame at Headbomb's mod?

 

Edit: I just noticed in NMM that Headbomb's mod wasn't activated but Shrilankan's patch was. Maybe that is what kept breaking that save file? Or something in addition to this.

 

If that's the case then I doubt Better Sorting is the culprit. What actually seems more likely to be causing the CTD (I should have noticed sooner) is papyrus going bonkers with writing error to the logs. If the logs are growing to such extreme sizes so quickly, it may be stressing either your hardware and/or the game engine. Have you tried disabling logging and seeing if things improve?

 

On a side note, I don't want to give you any misleading impressions. I'm far from an expert on this myself, just throwing out ideas based upon my limited knowledge and experience so far. Hopefully, someone more knowledgeable than I am can chime in for you and give a bit more insight. I still think the logging issue is the prime suspect, however.

[nrot]

Another thing I should mention, is if the worse case scenario comes to pass and the save(s) are beyond recovery, this mod could be a big time saver for you:

 

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/14152 (Leveler's Tower Mod)

 

Just in case you weren't aware of its existence. I haven't used it myself, but it seems like a good 'plan B' if nothing else works.

[MarkusFox]

One of the affected saves for the CTD issue will load now, though it still will CTD at a random point. Doesn't have to be just menus anymore, it could CTD when walking around or after a load screen (but before the fade-in to the new cell). These I accepted as normal for Skyrim since they happen a lot.

 

I am still needing to test my Lets Play character for some stability by loading its backup save and trying to run it through some menu checks and craft something to increase a skill level, as I noticed one problem was that after gaining skill boosts from a quests in another save that had this problem, it would freeze when I hit Tab or CTD.

 

I have tested two saves so far out of four. Technically I have five but I haven't touched save #5 since Feb 6th which was BEFORE i activated Dragonborn. So I'm sure that one's fine and dandy.

 

Will post back with updates. Responses and theories are still welcome on what caused this to begin with.

 

And I've disabled Papyrus logging for now. To see how it goes. One thing that nagged me though. Since I play in Windowed Mode, is it normal for loading screens to "freeze" and change the game's window title to "Skyrim (Not Responding)"? This seems to happen whenever a loading screen would take more than 10 seconds to do its job.

[fiewiel]

The not responding part can appear if game loads a ton of mods into memory. Its not normal if it happens everytime.

The animation freezes in loading screens are normal. Not sure whats the cause of this, but it just happens from time to time.

[MarkusFox]

The not responding part can appear if game loads a ton of mods into memory. Its not normal if it happens everytime.

The animation freezes in loading screens are normal. Not sure whats the cause of this, but it just happens from time to time.

 

Not every time. For example if I'm moving from Breezehome to Whiterun or Whiterun to breezehome or Bannered Mare to Whiterun, the load screens tend to handle it quickly. Usually because the cell is still in memory.

 

But sometimes, usually in exteriors, it can and typically will "freeze" as above like this for 15 seconds to a full minute (the animation freezes, the window appends "Not Responding" to the title). I accepted this as normal for my load order, especially since I've had Climates of Tamriel for a while. And 47 mods isn't a ton, is it? Excluding the official DLCs that is.

[fiewiel]

Depends on the mods. If you run 40 texture mods your game will load a long time.

I dont think that CoT raises load times significantly.

[MarkusFox]

Depends on the mods. If you run 40 texture mods your game will load a long time.

I dont think that CoT raises load times significantly.

 

Texture mods. Well I used to run Brown Mountains & Rocks along with Quality World Map... But I stopped using them in an attempt to keep things fairly stable with my 3.25 GB limit (until I can get more memory).

 

The only active texture mods are a follows:

UNP Body 2.2 (2.4 causes a CTD in Helgen during Unbound)

Fitness Body

Glowing Ore Veins (I love this. Don't have to worry about passing one because they no longer blend into the rocks)

And I think...Glowing Arrows. If that's a texture mod? Just makes the arrowhead and fin glow with a colored light depending on the type of the arrow. Orange for Steel and Orcish for example, blue for Daedric.

And maybe SkyUI counts, but its a UI replacer, not a texture pack.

And finally UNP Female Armors and the Heavy Armory mod (to give light/heavy counterparts to the vanilla armors on top of new weapons like spears and halberds).

 

But now I have an idea why it takes longer than I am comfortable with sometimes. Gotts solve the bloat now. Just not right for a file to go from 12 MB to 36.7 MB in 30 minutes. And fine-tune the CTDs to see what mod(s) are needing to be run through filters to remove their conflicts. :) They've become a tad less frequent now as above with the Papyrus logging disabled, but they still happen.