Mods crashing, game not loading, what am I doing wrong?

[ripple]

Like I said, the value of 'ugridstoload' is baked into the save games, so if you attempt to load a save game baked with a higher value after lowering the value in the ini file, the game will crash. To change the value 'mid-game' you would need to use the 'console method':

- launch game, load save game
- alt-tab to desktop
- edit ini file and change 'ugridstoload' from 7 to 5.
- alt-tab back into game
- open the console and type 'refreshini' (without the quotes)
- make a new save game, and exit Skyrim

After doing this, I advise deleting the ini files and letting the game generate new ones so the ini settings will all revert to stock values. Like I said, it's possible some people have the sort of setups where they can get away with 'ugridstoload=7', but you are experiencing persistent CTD issues right now, so it's fairly clear you may not be one of these people. The best course of action is to quash all the potential causes of CTDs, one by one. If you manage to stabilize your game, perhaps -after- that, you can experiment with 'ugridstoload=7' and see if you are able to maintain a stable game. Obviously, it would make no sense to try and see if you can maintain a stable game with 'ugridstoload=7' when your game is already unstable.

l2edshift's article is available from 'Deadly Dragons' mod page on the Nexus.

There's no need to think about starting a new game yet (I only mentioned it as a 'last resort'), unless you have uninstalled mods with papyrus scripting and orphan script data has been baked into the save game, and there is no indication of that (yet), unless you have uninstalled mods in the past for this play through and didn't mentioned it. In such instances, the papyrus log may help shed information. To enable papyrus logging, add the following to your skyrim.ini:

 

[Papyrus]
bEnableLogging=1
bEnableTrace=1
bLoadDebugInformation=1
 

Edited May 14, 2013 by ripple

[PlasmaR]

Ok, I followed your advice and it seems to have reset the game back to 5 UGrids. Though now that I've loaded up my save the game has become quite a lot more slow and sluggish (especially at first, it was all jerky, though it's settled down now, but definitely with lower framerates), I don't know if that's just because the game is trying to adjust to the change, or maybe because some of the mods I have work better with the ini tweaks I had (which are now gone).

 

Anyway, the game seems stable for the moment, but I'll try to play for a few hours and see if I encounter any more crashes. If the crashing was just caused by the 7 UGrids, do you think I could then reinstall the ASIS and Monster mods? Or do you not recommend them for basic some reason?

 

I'm currently just on the vanilla Ultra-High settings (which is what the game detects my PC is capable of), but I know that at least a few of the mods I have installed say they need some lines added or changed to work properly (like I think the Distant Terrain and Flora mods need some tweaks to the grass and tree parts in those files). You mentioned some "safe" tweaks that are around the forums, can you recommend any of those to me? Are the other tweaks listed in that Nvidia article safe? The ones like adding tree self shadowing, etc?

 

Oh, as for other mods I uninstalled, I mentioned I used to have the Convenient Horses mod, but it caused my game to crash at several points (don't know why), I followed all the instructions for uninstalling it in the mod's description page, which included deactivating the scripts in-game before deleting the mod. So I hope that there isn't any issues with that in the save game. If I can get it working properly though, I'd like to reinstall that mod maybe.

 

I changed the Papyrus logging lines in my ini file and played the game, but I haven't seen any messages or anything. Where are the logs supposed to appear?

 

Anyway, thanks for all the help so far.

[ripple]

No problem. You'll have to look around the forums for a bit to find some of the 'safe tweaks' (not to be confused with the non-performance related tweaks like increasing auto-save count, etc., which has no impact on the game performance or stability). I don't tweak my ini files anymore, so I don't keep track of the latest discussions and reports by people who have experimented with specific changes. I use to do a lot of ini tweaking because I had a 512mb GPU and needed to play around with the ini settings just to sustain playable framerates (especially the tweaks for memory usage). Since upgrading to a 2GB GPU, I've reverted to vanilla ini settings and have found the game to be much more stable as a result (I haven't seen a CTD in 4 months, running 180+ mods, but I also make my own custom compatibility patches). I think you'll agree that some minor FPS loss or putting up with minor graphic glitches like 'distant LOD pop-ins' is infinitely better than CTDs.

 

It would be great if all it takes to stabilize your game is reverting back to default ini settings, but I suspect there might be a few nagging issues that are contributing to your game instability, primarily because you had issues with 'Convenient Horses' (I never had problems with it, and have had the mod installed in my load order since I started adding mods). I'd recommend playing without ASIS and MoMo for a while (wait 31 days in an interior cell without NPC to force a worldspace cell reset). If the game is more stable than before, you can try adding them back and see what happens. Keep a 'pre-ASIS' save you can go back to just in case things take a down turn. You can also check and post your papyrus log, which can be found at:

 

"...Documents\My Games\Skyrim\Logs\Script\"

 

If everything works fine and your game is 'relatively stable' (let's say, no more than one random CTD per week), then you can disable the papyrus logging in the ini file (which should ideally be disabled unless you are bug tracking or troubleshooting random CTDs).

Edited May 15, 2013 by ripple

[PlasmaR]

Ok, I've been playing the game now perfectly stably for the whole day and it hasn't crashed at all. At first I just stuck to the vanilla settings, but then I tried the tweaked ones again and they seem to be working fine (game is much faster then on the vanilla settings), so I think we can safely conclude that it was purely the 7 UGrids that was causing the issues. I've even reinstalled the Monster mod and ASIS again (and a few other little mods) and they all seem to be working in a stable manner.

 

So thanks for all the help ripple!