TechAngel85

Kevkas updated it to support Dragonborn!

It's been update to support 1.9 update.

All of the Unofficial Patches, as well as Bring Out Your Dead, have been updated to use the latest 1.9 update. Guess it's about time for me to update to 1.9...

I was googling and reading up on it and it's completely doable in exterior environments. Especially within cities and forts where the buildings and walls provide a line-of-site "barrier" to only render what is in view. This site is for a 3D program, but provide a nice before and after image to give you idea of how it works: https://docs.unity3d.com/Documentation/Manual/OcclusionCulling.html And this site explains how the occlusion planes work: https://geck.bethsoft.com/index.php/Occlusion_Culling Very interesting stuff. It would take a lot of work, but it's completely doable in more the just interiors. I asked the author if he has and plans on expanding to exteriors and he has stated that the exteriors are already optimized by default, but he would look at the cities to see if any improvements could be made.

I agree with your analysis, Z. It was originally created with low-end systems in mind and they will benefit the most from this mod. As such, most Baseline users will only see a slight performance increase; however, may notice the increased smoothness as I did. Every little bit helps though. The real question is where to put this mod. The only place in my mind, without adding a "performance" category is to put it in "Fixes", since it adds to the occlusion culling that is already in the game. Seems like Bethesda could have done the same thing SPO is doing to improve performance but chose not to for whatever reason. I don't know if it's even possible, but I wouldn't mind seeing so type of "outdoor" version of this mod.

They look good, but from the images they also look very dense which only a few spiders in the world create webs that dense (Funnel Web Spider is one).

Okay... testing is done, numbers are in, results are calculated. I ended up with only 8 of the original 11 locations as some location's numbers remained unchanged throughout the testing so I simply excluded them from the final results. Below in the spoiler is the raw data for those interested. But for those that just want a summary this is for you: Skyrim Project Optimization (SPO) is a fair candidate for STEP inclusion. Testing has shown that the mod does in fact provide a performance increase, although it is nothing dramatic as shown in some the screenshots on the mod's nexus page. The numbers show that with the mod enabled the average FPS and minimum FPS are higher than without it; though this increase was only 2-5 FPS on average. Although this might not seem like much, any time you can get the minimum and maximum FPS closer together the result will be smoother gameplay, and that's just what I noticed. As, Ithian mentioned above, there was a noticeable smoother gameplay with the mod enabled in the larger locations that I tested (Bards College, Dragonsreach, Jorrvaskr Living Quarters). Since I was testing, I decided not to stop with just the usual "STEP + Mod" testing. SPO's original design was for Realistic Lighting Overhaul running on lower-end systems. I didn't have a lower-end system laying around, but I did have the latest RLO release (which is a work of art, btw!). I also had my preferred ENB laying around so I tested both and the results were the same. An increase of 2-5 FPS with the mod enabled. So you get a small FPS boost and some added smoothness as well. What's not to like about SPO? Nothing in my book! Interestingly, if you'd like to look at the numbers below you'll see how RLO causes, on average, a 4 FPS drop. ...and we won't even talk about the performance hit from the ENB (average of 18 FPS drop).

Damn that! LOL! I'm not going to be testing every location that has been edited...don't have the time or willingness for that. So far on my list, I have 11 locations where testing will be done. I'll being benching vanilla FPS, STEP FPS (baseline), and then STEP with this mod FPS. That should give plenty of results to see if the mod actually helps in terms of performance.

I still fail to see the relevance of Newegg being commercial in the case of a sweepstakes besides it tying in to your third point. They're not selling anything with it and there is no purchase necessary to enter (no profit). They're in fact giving the stuff away (voluntary) ...most likely for a tax write-off, but that again has nothing to do with the users that enter. So first point is balanced from my point of view. Point two taken, and I sort of agree with you there. Newegg exists to make money. Although the sweepstakes the do not, as I pointed out above, make them any money and is a tax write-off for them; it can still be seen as promotional marketing for Newegg (though I don't view it as adverting, personally). Third point...I never said anything of the sort but I do see your point. General spamming/plugging of any company is most certainly not welcomed here on the STEP forums. However, I also don't view the sweepstakes posted as any sort of spam. None of them say anything about "buy from us" either so I don't specifically view them as advertising either. I suppose you can say it's a fine line being walked. The admins should probably discuss amongst yourselves if these should be allowed or not. If not, this thread can simply be dumped. :)

That just goes to show you how my mind works. :P For example: STEP adds WATER into the mod tables; thus STEP is promoting WATER and it's author, OpticShooter. However, we go a step farther and even encourage endorsing these mods and thus are encouraging others to promote the mod and author as well. Now, Newegg runs a sweepstakes and tosses in a HP Laptop into the bundle along with other brands. Thus, Newegg is promoting HP (along with the other brands), just like STEP promotes all the mods; however, Newegg is in no way asking you to "go endorse it too" like STEP encourages. Although, from a point of view it can be said that both STEP and Newegg only says to "endose" it if you like it...putting them back on even ground. So, looking at it from my perspective: Both promote equally. Both are free. Both require some sort of "sign up" for participation (newegg the form and STEP to register on the forum to "participate"...else you're just an onlooker). Both are safe. The only real difference that I see is the subject being promoted. One is promoted created works while the other promotes a brand/company. Now look what you did! You brought the Libra out in me. :P

Moderator Note:I merged the RLO thread from Skyrim Related in this one to keep it all together.

Things like this is why I never install updates until they have been out for a while.

The difference in my book is these that have been posted are legitimate. They don't spam you from entering, they're free to enter...all that is required is filling out the form, they're not selling you anything or trying to get you to buy anything. Yes, they may "promote" a product or brand by it being in the sweepstake, but that's no different than promoting a mod and it's author just by adding it to STEP...just the nature of how that works. I, personally, would never post anything of this nature that I wouldn't enter myself. I would also never post anything that would result in any harm whatsoever (selling of email, buy this or click this ad to enter, etc). This are just straight up, "fill in the form for your chance to win"; no surprises, no gimmicks. I'll take my "1 in 15million" chance over a "0 in 15million" because if you don't enter then you're for sure not going to win. You never know, luck might shine your way on day...

As soon as I get my STEP updated to 2.2.3, I'm going to install this mod and test; doing FPS benchmarking in several different interiors to determine how much of an improvement this mod makes.

I'll second that, Farlo! I'd probably re-sell most of it too. @Z, I have yet to receive spam from entering any contest that Newegg helped sponsored. I've enter countless sweepstakes and haven't gotten lucky yet. In fact, I'm still waiting on a drawing to win a life-size "Shepard" from a Mass Effect sweepstakes.

In all honesty, I don't see that happening any time soon. Since the wiki was opened up there has been minimal interest in helping to edit and create pages and/or new content. Few are interested in the dirty work. The mod testers is another thing though as creating the mod pages should be a part of their job. Perhaps a lack in knowledge on how to go about creating them is part of the issue?

For the first issue of the green waterfalls, if you are using the mod WATER, then I do believe the author does not recommend optimizing his files if you've done so. If you're wanting better performance there, I recommend restoring that mod to it's original state before optimization and then using his medium textures optional file. Just install the optional file over the original files (or install it after the main mod in your installation order in WB or MO).

Haelfix, you should not be able to do so, no. This is because of how Boris has written the code for ENBSeries later than v0.119. If anyone would read, it says it right there on Boris's Web site. There have been a few reports that you can set your drivers to "override" and still be able to use driver AA with ENB; however, the admin/moderator/tester's attempts to test this have failed. From this point out if you have questions like this, please test it yourself before running here asking or use the search feature of the forum. We've done the testing and our findings are inconclusive to some user's findings. So, test test test and report back with your own findings to help out. This thread has been completely hi-jacked from the original post. I'll be splitting it when I get on a better Internet connection...or if Torminater or another admin/mod can split it please do so. Mods, just split the off-topic posts and discussions to another thread so they can be continued to being discussed and so this thread can be refocused to its original intent. Thanks!

What wiki are you referring to? Certainly not ours....unless someone has made some changes since the last time I looked at them our wiki never says to use that combination. The Edge AA and SMAA can be stacked (used together) as far as I know. I've never tried it though. I also don't know how much VRAM it would save by using SMAA over other methods. I've never made those measurements before. Feel free to do so yourself though and report your findings.

Wait, so just to clarify, you CAN use driver/launcher AA with ENB .139?It's been hit and miss. It appears that some are able to; however, most (myself included) have not gotten it to work. It's possible that it's driver version related or something similar that is allowing this to work (when it shouldn't) on some systems. Trying it yourself and seeing if it works for you is the only way to know.

Edge AA via ENB provides a result in a similar fashion to FXAA. It is great from a performance standpoint, but comes with some blurriness. AA via launcher or forced through drivers will not work with any card (AMD or NVIDIA) when used with an ENB installed. This is a limitation in Windows and the DLL files used for both the game and ENB. This is the case with any version of ENBseries? So what do you use for AA? SMAA forced through the ENB? Are you sure that launcher/driver AA doesn't work with ENB? It looks like it does work to me. I'm forcing 4xSSAA from the launcher/drivers and it looks good to me. I have a suggestion. I think you should have a wiki page dedicated to only AA with ENB and you should explain all this. This is the case for any updated ENB using ENBSeries later than v0.119. Any ENB still using v0.119 can still used hardware AA. This can be added to the ENB Guide on the wiki. We should get back to the original question... Why isn't SMAA working for some users. For those user, please post exactly what you are using for SMAA and a screenshot of your Skyrim Directory would be helpful as well. ENB users should be following this guide: https://wiki.step-project.com/ENB_Choices#tab=SMAA Non-ENB users can still use the SMAA linked in the guide: https://mrhaandi.blogspot.com/p/injectsmaa.html

I personally like the old better. These things are outside, all year round. They should have a weathered and old look to them. These feel much too "new" and "clean". Not only that but there is a hard contrast to the pole next to it... (which is Lanterns of Skyrim). EDIT: Just for clarification... is the "old" vanilla or the mod that is currently in STEP, Legible Road Signs?

Edge AA via ENB provides a result in a similar fashion to FXAA. It is great from a performance standpoint, but comes with some blurriness. AA via launcher or forced through drivers will not work with any card (AMD or NVIDIA) when used with an ENB installed. This is a limitation in Windows and the DLL files used for both the game and ENB.

I haven't read or touched the guide since its overhaul. I'll try to get to it though after I'm done with my current project with torminater.

Dreadflopp, please double check posts before posting. Some of them are very confusing because you're mistakingly interchanging MSAA and SMAA. The launcher and INI is MSAA.