Skyrim Revisited Pre-Release Feedback

[Aiyen]

First post and all, so hello everyone! 

Second off great work so far Neovalen, takes me back to when I was trying to make FCOM work with an ungodly amount of other mods in Oblivion! This guide has totally inspired me to get back into it, just with skyrim revisted now! 

 

So far I am sticking to the guide as is, well almost! I have added in the multicore entries in the ini´s since so far I have the best experience with them. I also only use the Ultra shadow settings since I do not really think the benefit is worth the cost. 

I also only have 2GB VRAM on my card so I have also reached the point where I need to do some optimizations. (Only running at 1680x1050) 

I only use 2k versions of everything expect better beast races so far, and the whiterun trellis. 

 

So far my testing scenario is to start in Helgen and follow the main quest up to the first dragon fight! As I understand it that provides a good test of both demanding outdoor areas, A big city, a large indoor dungeon with lots of scripts, and a dragon fight to end it all. 

 

I have a few persistent crashes that I am trying to fix. 

I can run through helgen with no problems even though my VRAM caps at 2k entering it, there is no visual degradation and only a slight drop in FPS so this is fine. 

(There is one small thing I would like to ask, every time Alduin uses his fire breath it leaves behind a flame texture that just burns forever, you take no dmg from going into it, but it just looks silly that its there for so long. I guess it is because of the fire and frost spell effect mod, but when I use magic the flames vanish in a timely manner so a bit puzzled by it.)

 

Normally I activate frostfall (Hardcore preset) and basic needs upon entering the keep. (If I activate frostfall in the carriage, it kills the horse thief.) 

 

The first almost persistant CTD I have is on the road to Riverwood, I follow past the stones and kill the wolves most of the time. But once it needs to load the Riverwood cells it crashes, and I guess this is because the system is just to taxed to handle the burst of data. I have ran with papyrus logs to see if it was anything script related but everything checks out there. 

 

If it does not crash 1 out of 4 times then I can enter Riverwood, but then the dog, and mudcrap will have no texture etc. but everything else will look okay. Also if I continue to Whiterun then the giant fighting the companions outside will also not have any texture. This leads to me think that AV might have alot to do with this since it is first and foremost its textures that gets affected.

 

If I just save before the Riverwood cells and go to menu and reload I can enter with no problems at all. Also if I do not load frostfall etc. then I can enter most of the time with only the AV texture problem. 

 

A funny side fact is that I tried to load up with climates of tamriel and Skyrealism ENB Cinematic with SSAO and SMAA, and the VRAM use was not changed noteably compared to when I run it without... which I find a bit puzzling. But all in all I think that I just need a little bit more optimization to get a bit more VRAM/RAM for the game engine to handle loading of complex cells. 

 

So now with the ranting done time for a few questions! 

 

Are there any other locations that would be a must for stability/performance testing in the game? I heard that the rift is a very intensive area for example. 

 

I am currently trying to optimize using ddsopt with the settings used in the vanilla texture optimization guide and the settings and ini file from STEP. I guess that this is the best way to do it? 

 

If that is the case then I will try to start with AV packages and then try to move on to only doing the normal maps of the big texture mods. 

[toshaka]

You are using the DDSopt settings from step right?

[Aiyen]

"You are using the DDSopt settings from step right?"

Yes I have so far only optimized the vanilla and DLC textures as per the guide and the step settings, and ini. Just wondering if those settings are a good starting point for all types of textures (normals etc.).  

[toshaka]

As far as I know yes.

Atleast thats why they made that guide for DDSopt.

Tho my question was meant at Neo, forgot to mention that *bash his head*

 

I have 2GB vram also, but I never CTD there tho.

I have some mods not installed compared to you.

I cap at 2GB alot too but almost have no CTD (yeah some wich are my fault only lol)

Try turning off autosave, that helped solve alot of CTD's for me.

I also had alot of trouble with racemenu, like some others had too.

No idea why that isnt with everyone tho.

[Aiyen]

No problem toshaka! :) 

 

Well I guess we got different computer setups, hence why we experience different things, but I think it is nice to have a few places with consistent CTD so that I can work out the chinks and optimizations from that. 

 

Also I just remembered that I removed the "punish your machine" part of Skyrim flora yesterday, and reduced to the 2k HDtrees instead of 4k. 

 

I have disabled all saves etc like the guide says. I do not recall any problems with the racemenu, if that was the case I guess some script or such would be visible in the papyrus logs ? 

 

One mod I have considered getting rid of was the more interactive objects... basically because I am tired of picking up wagons when I want stuff in it. Also I think it is very immersion breaking that you run about with a wagon in your backpack. 

[Neovalen]

I use the same settings in DDSOpt for all.

[Neovalen]

CTD prone areas(even in vanilla)... the ritual stone outside whiterun is my bane... seems 50/50 on a ctd there no matter what I do...

[Neovalen]

CTD prone areas(even in vanilla)... the ritual stone outside whiterun is my bane... seems 50/50 on a ctd there no matter what I do...

 

Doing a Google search apparently this has been a problem for years... not going to hold it against the build. (Search "Ritual Stone CTD").

[thalastwon]

Not Really HD Display Case is showing as redundant and unnecessary due to being overridden by Langley Wood Metal and Stone Textures Workshop. I'm not sure where to find the display case in game for comparison.

[walkman80]

Got my install done last night (whew!) and was having CTD due to VRAM limit (on 2GB cards, was hitting over that several occasions). I disabled TreesHD Punish and also went into the pref.ini and changed shadowmapresolution from 4096 to 2048. Started up a new game with Alternate Start (love this mod) and was playing for 1 hour straight with VRAM no higher than 1800mb. I'll be playing more today to see what happens. So far I'm really loving the guide set up, thanks so much Neo! Made Skyrim a new game for me. So awesome to start in a random wilderness as a camper with no items and just go exploring.

 

One question I do have: I never did a STEP install, I went straight to SR. Looking through the STEP 2.2.1 guide there is little to no mod editing/adjusting with TES5Edit or CK. How is that possible?

[walkman80]

Not Really HD Display Case is showing as redundant and unnecessary due to being overridden by Langley Wood Metal and Stone Textures Workshop. I'm not sure where to find the display case in game for comparison.

There is one in Dragonsreach near the Jarl's living quarters. That's the only one I've seen so far.

[Neovalen]

Not Really HD Display Case is showing as redundant and unnecessary due to being overridden by Langley Wood Metal and Stone Textures Workshop. I'm not sure where to find the display case in game for comparison.

There is one in Dragonsreach near the Jarl's living quarters. That's the only one I've seen so far.

 

There are many across the land of Skyrim but that's the easiest to find. I will check this out tonight myself.

[Neovalen]

Got my install done last night (whew!) and was having CTD due to VRAM limit (on 2GB cards, was hitting over that several occasions). I disabled TreesHD Punish and also went into the pref.ini and changed shadowmapresolution from 4096 to 2048. Started up a new game with Alternate Start (love this mod) and was playing for 1 hour straight with VRAM no higher than 1800mb. I'll be playing more today to see what happens. So far I'm really loving the guide set up, thanks so much Neo! Made Skyrim a new game for me. So awesome to start in a random wilderness as a camper with no items and just go exploring.

 

One question I do have: I never did a STEP install, I went straight to SR. Looking through the STEP 2.2.1 guide there is little to no mod editing/adjusting with TES5Edit or CK. How is that possible?

 

Its possible for simplicity's sake. In the end STEP will likely end up doing something similar to SR.

[Neovalen]

FNIS 3.5 released. Looks like a promising update... complete rebuild with Skyrim 1.8. If you had animation problems in the past try the new version.

[haelfix]

Regarding DSpSOB, it seems like it won't be updated for dragon born anytime soon, which is ashame since it seems like its just a question of adding the weapons and shields as explained in the tutorial.

 

It would be nice if someone could make it play nice with cloaks, backpacks etc.

 

Still it's IMO one of the best mods out there.