Double Windows on Winterhold College - Immersive College of Winterhold - DynDOLOD

[fattyzhouse]

Hello. I'll start this ramble with a BIG THANK YOU for all your work here and your willingness to answer most (if not all) of the questions we throw your way! I try to respond to everyone that leaves a question on the few mods that I've ported to SE as well. You walk amongst mere mortals, modkin ! I've been tinkering with DynDOLOD since it's release and there's no going back once you've seen the results in game. Major kudos for all of your efforts here, you holy cow you !

 

So, I was testing out a mod I'm working\porting on and I found myself traveling to the College of Winterhold. Once I arrived in Winterhold and made it to the bridge, I noticed a strange oddity right away. The exterior windows had a double of themselves. The windows that are supposed to be there are, just as they should be. The extra windows are just slightly set out in front of the proper ones. I'll drop a couple of pics below.

 

I'm pretty sure I have this narrowed down to something between ICOW and DynDOLOD. I've went about as far as I can with the knowledge I have about all of this, so I figured I'd drop a few lines here and see if you had any ideas of where to go looking next.

 

 

Here's what I've been trying to fix this oddity.. 

 

 - Disabled the DynDOLOD esp file and went in game to check it out.

 

Result - No double windows.

 

 - Removed Enlightened College of Winterhold. (It adds in some Winterhold banners right below most of the exterior windows. At this point I still had ICOW installed.) Re-ran DynDOLOD. Started a new game and ran back to Winterhold to check it out.

 

Result - Same double window oddity. 

 

 - Removed Immersive College of Winterhold. Re-ran DynDOLOD. Started a new game and ran back to Winterhold to check.

 

Result - No double windows.

 

 - Ran DynDOLOD without ICOW installed, then installed ICOW after I ran DynDOLOD.

 

Result - No double windows

 

 

Here's a few extra things I've tried looking for a clue..

 

 - I extracted the ICOW bsa just to see if there were any Winterhold exterior nif files being added in but I didn't see anything except for a few interior nifs.

 

 - I went digging around in xedit. ICOW and ECOW are the only two mods that I had installed that alter the exterior of the Winterhold College. The only thing that stood out to me in xedit that might have a hand in this (I'm reaching here) is in the Worldspace section of ICOW named CWISanctuaryWorld. There I found a 'WinterholdExtTower01.nif' being added in under the 'Temporary' section. Not sure if this nugget of info is relevant, but I figured it worth the mention. 

 

I guess that's about it. This isn't like, super critical in my world, so no worries or hurries in responding. I looked though the forum here and I didn't see anything like this being reported so I figured I'd reach out for some advice as to what to try next. I'll keep digging on my own, of course. If I find any more clues or if I remember something else, I'll come back and ramble some more.

 

Thanks again for being awesome, Sheson.

 

Cheers !

 

 

 EDIT - This is all from Skyrim Special Edition

 

Image 1

 

Image 2

Edited October 2, 2018 by fattyzhouse

[fattyzhouse]

Apparently I didn't look hard enough through this forum, because I found the 'Double Window' post here from last year. I don't seem to be having any other issues with any other windows that I can find. I'll run around in game soon and make sure that the college windows are the only ones. I also use RUSTIC Windows and the window glow option when running DynDOLOD. I'm not using ELFX, but I do run Relighting Skyrim and ELE. Another thing I should have noted is that I'm using the latest version of DynDOLOD. Version 2.44

[fattyzhouse]

Seems the edit button has disappeared, so I'll add one more post before I run off to Tamriel again for testing. I also just found the "I've done something weird with DynDOLOD and windows in Solitude world - They are not disabling and are doubled up" thread and I feel that solution is going to be what helps me out. (I swear I looked though the forum before posting. I just looked through it too fast) Apologies for adding yet another "Double Window" thread. LoL ! I'll come back later on with more info to wrap this lunacy up.

 

Cheers again, man !

[sheson]

Apparently you tested with new game already as suggest by the FAQ for "out of place LOD objects"

 

Double check everything looks fine in DynDOLOD SkyUI MCM.

 

Check for script errors in Papyrus Log.

 

Test with disabled large references and adjust DynDOLOD SkyUI MCM Large Reference Fix accordingly.

 

Get form ID of windows, look up in xEdit, check EditorID to find out for which plugin + form id the windows are added. Check which plugins overwrite that.

 

What version of DynDOLOD and ICW is used? No double windows here with 2.44 and just ICW 5.2. However I suggest to remove the unnecessary overwrites as reported in the log.

Edited October 2, 2018 by sheson

[fattyzhouse]

I got a little sidetracked with getting my son off to school. It's early morning where I am.  

 

Yessir. I'm using DynDOLOD v2.44 and ICOW v5.2, same as you.

 

Before the morning rush here, I was able to do a quick run around in game and so far the rest of the windows look o.k. I wasn't able to check ALL of the windows in game, but everywhere I did check they all looked fine. It would seem that my 'double windows' are only at the Winterhold College.

 

I also tried re-running DynDOLOD with ICOW installed but I unchecked the esp file when running TexGen and LODGen. That fixed all of the windows on the main central tower of the college. Image 2 above shows one of the tall windows from the main central tower. Unchecking the ICOW esp file seemed to 'fix' those windows. But the shorter towers (image 1 above) to the left and right of the gate as you enter the courtyard were still doubled.. Weird.

 

I'll come back later on after I do some more checking and testing. I'm going to run DynDOLOD again and get myself back to exactly how I was when I posted. That way I can go through and check my logs proper and find the definitive answer to what's giving me grief here. (Like I said, I got a bit sidetracked after I posted here..)

 

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction ! (I now owe you my second born ! Lol !) Once I've gone through the logs and double check everything, I'll wander back and report.

 

Thanks again, Sheson !

[fattyzhouse]

O.k. so, I found a few more double windows in game.. This got me to thinking real hard about what I've changed lately. I really haven't changed much at all in my load order in quite a while so I'm thinking surely I would have noticed these double windows by now. Then it hit me. When I updated to DynDOLOD v2.44, I did something new. I ticked the box labeled 'High', the setting for windows to react to sunlight. Up until now I've had it unchecked. I only checked it because the hint popped up explaining what that setting was for and I remembered ticking it back in Oldrim.

 

Now that I'm thinking about it, didn't you mention a while back to not check that box in Special Edition ? I might be mistaken, but it seems like I've read somewhere to leave it unchecked.

 

Anyway. Once I remembered that I had ticked that box, I reran Dyn again with 'High' unchecked and everything was right as rain again. The College windows, the double windows I found after I posted, all of them were perfect. Just to make super sure that this might be what I'd done differently, I reran Dyn yet again but with the 'High' box checked and the double windows were back. I then ran Dyn one more time with the box unchecked and sure enough, the windows were all perfect again. All of this was tested by starting a new game each time, so I'm pretty sure that the 'High' setting is what is disagreeing with my setup. (Or maybe not functioning proper in SE ?)

 

I think I'll leave it here for now, it's been a long day. I'll wait and see what you think about this new nugget of info before I continue testing and rambling.

 

Cheers, man

[sheson]

The Windows High option works perfectly fine with Skyrimn SE and DynDOLOD 2.43 or DynDOLOD 2.44 and using heir the matching DynDOLOD Resources SE here.

 

I posted suggestions and questions for trouble shooting the problem.

[fattyzhouse]

I won't take up anymore of your time, man. Thanks for the info and suggestions. 

[fattyzhouse]

Hey, man. I just wanted to drop back by to apologize for being short with my last response. And to let you know that I am pressing forward with your advice. I'm back to digging instead of speculating. Just wanted you to know that I'm not ignoring your advice and moving on to something else. So, your time spent on me won't go to waste. I already dug up the form id's of the 'winterholdexterior' pieces that the windows are embedded in and my next step is to go through xEdit and see what I can find. I will be seeing this through to a solution.

 

Thanks again, modkin

 

Cheers

[fattyzhouse]

Hello again, Dragon King. I wanted to come back and give up some more information since I've made quite a bit of progress. Nothing super definitive, but progress nonetheless.

I'll do my best to get straight to the point as to avoid rambling. :)

 

I've followed all of your advice. (All except the 'disable large reference and test' part.. I'm not exactly sure how to go about that, honestly..) 

 

-Everything in the DynDOLOD MCM seems to be fine.

 

-I enabled papyrus logging, but I'm not finding any errors from any script starting with 'sheson.' (I assume that's what I should be looking for there.) Nothing else that I can see in the papyrus log seems relevant to the issue at hand. 

 

-I checked the 'DynDOLOD_SSE_log.txt file and the only lines I could find that looked anywhere near relevant looked like this. (I'm only going to post a few lines instead of the entire section. I saved the logs this time in case I need to refer back to them.)

 

[00:02:38.318]         disabled NeverFade, replaced by static LOD for CollegeOfWinterholdImmersive.esp [REFR:000CA6DE] (places WinterholdExtRing01 [sTAT:00105564] in GRUP Cell Persistent Children of [CELL:00000D74] (in Tamriel "Skyrim" [WRLD:0000003C]) at 28,27)

 

There are several more lines just like that referencing different 'WinterholdExt' models. Models like 'WinterholdExtTower01.nif', 'WinterholdExtTowerRing01.nif', etc, etc..

 

Towards the end of the 'DynDOLOD_SSE_log.txt, under the part that says  

 

[00:13:14.427] Checking for plugins causing texture z-fighting flicker because of large references bugs.

 

I found a few lines like this 

 

[00:13:17.228] CollegeOfWinterholdImmersive.esp [REFR:000CA6EA] (places WinterholdExtTower01 [sTAT:00105569] in GRUP Cell Persistent Children of [CELL:00000D74] (in Tamriel "Skyrim" [WRLD:0000003C]) at 28,27) for no good reason. Remove overwrite from CollegeOfWinterholdImmersive.esp

 

Like before, the other lines like this reference different 'WinterholdExt' models. 

 

-I checked in the cache folder in the 'DynDOLOD_SSE_alt_textures_tamriel.txt' file for any overwrites and I didn't find any at all pertaining to this. (I'm assuming this is the file you were suggesting to find the overwrites in.)

 

-I located the form id's of the architecture pieces giving me the double windows (The windows giving me grief are all built in to architecture models.) and then loaded my entire load order in xEdit. The only mod that alters them in any way is Better Dynamic Snow. BDS only changes them to have BDS snow material instead of the vanilla one. The only mods I have installed that reference these models are Falskaar, ICOW, DynDOLOD, and Relighting Skyrim. (For what it's worth I took notes, so I can be specific as to which models are referenced by which mods. I also have the form id's of five of the models giving me grief if needed.)

 

-I scoured through my entire mod list looking for models that overwrite anything in the 'meshes\architecture\winterhold' folder and the only mod that adds to that location is ICOW. It adds in some 'winterholdtowerintwall' models only. ( I only checked for loose files. I didn't go so far as to extract any bsa's. I will though. :) )

 

-The only texture mods I use that effect windows for Winterhold are Noble Skyrim and RUSTIC Windows. 

 

I also found out that if I leave the area where I find these double windows, when I return they are normal.. (All except for the windows on the 'winterholdexttower01.nif' and the 'winterholdexttowerring01.nif'. Those windows stay doubled up no matter what I try. )

 

O.k so, after I dug all of that info up I decided to experiment again.. I found that if I use DyDOLOD v2.43 instead and tick the 'high' button, all of the windows are fine. No other changes except for reverting back to DynDOLOD v2.43. I've repeated this a couple of times (switching back and forth between v2.43 and v2.44, I mean.) so I can say for sure that I only encounter this with DynDOLOD v2.44. This is what prompted me to return and give you all of this info.

 

In other words, I still have no idea why DynDOLOD v2.44 gives me double windows but v2.43 works perfectly. Once I found myself at a loss again, I decided to come back and report.

 

If I'm missing something or if I've looked in the wrong place(s) for any of that information please give me hell about it and I'll dive back in. I don't really play Skyrim so much as just mod it, so I'm all for trying something else. (or being scolded for doing something wrong. :( )

 

Mega thanks once again for humoring me, man. If you knew how hard it was for me to get this far with Bethesda modding you'd know that it's nothing short of a miracle that I'm able to convey any of this to you. My formal education ended in the middle of the tenth grade and I've been winging it ever since ! 

 

Cheers yet again, man !

[sheson]

I've followed all of your advice. (All except the 'disable large reference and test' part.. I'm not exactly sure how to go about that, honestly..)

Set the Large Object Distance Slider in the game launcher to the very left. Or set uLargeRefLODGridSize=5 in SkyrimPrefs.INI. Go into an interior and uncheck Large References Fix on the DynDOLOD SkyUI MCM Main page.

 

I located the form id's of the architecture pieces giving me the double windows (The windows giving me grief are all built in to architecture models.) and then loaded my entire load order in xEdit. The only mod that alters them in any way is Better Dynamic Snow. BDS only changes them to have BDS snow material instead of the vanilla one. The only mods I have installed that reference these models are Falskaar, ICOW, DynDOLOD, and Relighting Skyrim. (For what it's worth I took notes, so I can be specific as to which models are referenced by which mods. I also have the form id's of five of the models giving me grief if needed.)

If windows build into the full models give you problems, then this is not a DynDOLOD problem as it does not change the full models of the college.

 

DynDOLOD Glow LOD Windows are meshes that only contains windows with no building parts. When doing Windows High, references are added for them into the DynDOLOD plugins. In this case the models are winterholdexttower01glow_lod_2.nif and winterholdexttowerring01glow_lod_1.nif. When the LOD model of their building shows, the Glow LOD Windows are supposed to show only.

 

If you look up the form ID of the floating windows they should point to these references in the DynDOLOD plugins. The EditorID of these references contains the plugin filename and form id for the reference of the building these windows belong to. For example Skyrimesm_0CA730_DynDOLOD_GLOWLOD

 

What plugin and which form id(s) is that? Is any other plugin than ICW changing those references for the original buildings? BDS changing the material of the base record should not matter as it does not change the the original model.

 

O.k so, after I dug all of that info up I decided to experiment again.. I found that if I use DyDOLOD v2.43 instead and tick the 'high' button, all of the windows are fine. No other changes except for reverting back to DynDOLOD v2.43. I've repeated this a couple of times (switching back and forth between v2.43 and v2.44, I mean.) so I can say for sure that I only encounter this with DynDOLOD v2.44. This is what prompted me to return and give you all of this info.

 

In other words, I still have no idea why DynDOLOD v2.44 gives me double windows but v2.43 works perfectly. Once I found myself at a loss again, I decided to come back and report.

This might be a save game update going wrong (always test with new game) or that not all Papyrus scripts from the matching DynDOLOD Resources SE version are used.

 

When you take a form id of floating window for a reference in a DynDOLOD plugin, remove the first two digits for the load order. For example 1013C62B -> 0013C62B, convert from hex to decimal, so in this example it would be 1295915.

 

Search this decimal number in the output skse\plugins\StorageUtilData\DynDOLOD_Tamriel_Objects.json and you should find a lines like

 

"1295914":["","1","1","1","","1295914","DynDOLOD.esp","-1","-1","1","1","WinterholdExtTower01:10","829162","Skyrim.esm"],

"1295915":["1","1","1","1","","1295915","DynDOLOD.esp","-1","-1","1","1","WinterholdExtTowerRing01:10","829232","Skyrim.esm"],

 

Do it for both generations, the 2.43 and the 2.44. They will have different form ids you need to convert to decimal. The 2.43 should be missing the "WinterholdExtTower01:10" / "WinterholdExtTowerRing01:10", but otherwise be the same?

 

In that regard, are only the windows of the two small towers floating, or is it also the large windows on the large main tower?

[fattyzhouse]

I'm going to attempt the quote thing..

 

 

 

Set the Large Object Distance Slider in the game launcher to the very left. Or set uLargeRefLODGridSize=5 in SkyrimPrefs.INI. Go into an interior and uncheck Large References Fix on the 

DynDOLOD SkyUI MCM Main page.

 

Thanks. Sounds simple enough. I'll try that and see what happens in just a bit.

 

 

 

If you look up the form ID of the floating windows they should point to these references in the 

DynDOLOD plugins. The EditorID of these references contains the plugin filename and form id for the reference of the building these windows belong to. For example Skyrimesm_0CA730_DynDOLOD_GLOWLOD

 

Yessir. Both models are referenced by the DynDOLOD plugins and nothing else.

 

 

 

What plugin and which form id(s) is that? Is any other plugin than ICW changing those references for the original buildings?

 

Those are the models that are giving me the double windows. They are all added in from the Skyrim.esm. No other plugin besides BDS makes any changes to them. No loose files overwriting the originals.

 

They are..

 

WinterholdExtTowerRing01.nif - Form ID 00105567 - BDS changes the snow material. Referenced by DynDOLOD and ICOW. 

 

WinterholExtTower01.nif - Form ID 0015569 - BDS changes the snow material. Referenced by DynDOLOD, Falskaar, and ICOW.

 

SFarmhouse01.nif - Form ID 000b11ac - Referenced by Falskaar only.

 

SFarmhouse02.nif - Form ID 000b11b8 - No changes or references from any plugin.

 

SFarmhouseSilo.nif - Form ID 0009936f - Referenced by Relighting Skyrim only.

 

 

 

This might be a save game update going wrong (always test with new game) or that not all Papyrus scripts from the matching 

DynDOLOD Resources SE version are used.

 

Everything I'm testing and reporting on has come about by starting a new game for each version of DynDOLOD. I have my saves separate so i know which saves come from v2.43 and which saves come from v2.44. That way when I switch between the versions for in game testing, I know that the saves match up to the version of DynDOLOD that they were started with.

 

Not sure how to check if all of the scripts are used..

 

 

 

Search this decimal number in the output 

skse\plugins\StorageUtilData\DynDOLOD_Tamriel_Objects.json and you should find a lines like

 

DynDOLOD_Tamriel_Objects.json from v2.44 does indeed show "WinterholdExtTower01:10" and "WinterholdExtTowerRing01:10". It names quite a few models this way. 

 

DynDOLOD_Tamriel_Objects.json from v2.43 doesn't show any of the model names like in the .json from v2.44, but I do find the 'decimal' of 'WinterholdExtTower01' and 'WinterholdExtTowerRing01' in both files. On the exact same lines, actually. So, yes, both files from both versions appear to be the same. 

 

 

 

 

In that regard, are only the windows of the two small towers floating, or is it also the large windows on the large main tower?

 

Here's where in game testing gets interesting..

 

Using DynDOLOD v2.43 everything works correct. The transition from LOD to full model works as it should and the windows are loaded in perfect. I can 'tcl' from the cliff across the way and do a walk around of the college and all of the windows are properly loaded. No doubles.

 

Using DynDOLOD v2.44 however, results are a bit erratic. I have a save where I'm right across from the college standing near the cliff. When I load the save, the windows around the 'WinterholdExtTowerRing01' are doubled up, but the 'WinterholdExtTower01' windows are correct. When I 'tcl' and walk over towards the college, the windows on the 'WinterholdExtTower01' double up when I make it to the backside of the college. When this happens, the windows on the 'WinterholdExtTowerRing01' models correct themselves. I can keep circling the college and this cycle repeats itself. 

 

I have a few things to do so i won't be able to get much testing done till later, but I'll load up the saves using Dyn v2.44 and see about disabling the Large Reference Fix and test.

 

Just in case it matters, I'm using skse64 v2.0.7 and Papyrus Util v3.4b for all of this. Not sure if that is relevant but I feel I should mention it just in case that's an issue.

 

Thanks yet again for helping me try to sort this out. It's much appreciated, man. Once I've managed to do some testing with the Large Reference fix disabled, I'll wander back though.

 

Cheers !

 

EDIT - Well, the quote thing almost worked.. Lol 

Edited October 5, 2018 by fattyzhouse

[sheson]

Loading a save is not the same as testing with a new game. For testing, start a new game with coc whiterun / windhelmexterior01 from main menu.

 

When testing such a new game with the LOD generated with DynDOLOD standalone 2.44, make sure that none of the files in the scripts folder form DynDOLOD Resources SE 2.44 are overwritten by anything.

 

Also just in case, check the Papyrus Log for errors when testing such a new game.

 

As explained in the readme, dynamic LOD uses trigger boxes that do not work when using tcl.

[fattyzhouse]

Gotcha. Man, I'll refrain from coming back with any more ramblings until sometime next week. You enjoy your weekend, you holy cow you. Thank you a million times over for humoring me ! 

 

I'm going to do myself a favor (and you) and re-read the funtastic manual again. I haven't read it since the very beginning of all this DynDOLOD greatness and I see now a refresher course is definitely in order. I'll RTFM later on and get back testing proper throughout the weekend. Thanks again, man ! 

[fattyzhouse]

Hello again, good sir ! Apologies for taking so long to return. I was going to drop by on the day that S.T.E.P went offline and report back. I was going to tell you how I had my issue narrowed down to the Large Reference Fix. When I tested with the Large Ref fix disabled, the windows were fine. 

 

The good news is, we no longer have to suffer thru my ramblings because whatever fixes you've made between version 2.44 and version 2.47 fixed this right up for me. I just finished testing out the latest version of DynDOLOD (2.47) and the windows are now perfect. Just wanted to drop in and let you know. 

 

Thanks once again for everything you do here, man ! Cheers, Sheson ! 

Edited November 7, 2018 by fattyzhouse

[sheson]

That's great to read. Thanks for letting us know.