CTD when loading (Even with previously working saves)

[posterso]

Hi Guys, it's my first time posting here.

I'm having a weird problem that i can't really solve.

I was doing a heavy modded (but stable, more or less) playthrough, just some really occasional crash.

Yesterday i accidentally started Skyrim with the Steam launcher and since then something broke i don't know anymore what to do.

Now, every time i try to load a save the game crashes 3-4 seconds after the load start. The weird thing is that it crashes on EVERY save of that character, even the ones i used before (that loaded without problems) that Steam accident.

If i start a new game everything seems to work fine, and i haven't added/removed mods during the playthrough.

(Load order should be fine)

I'd be very grateful if somebody could help me fix this.

 

(Sorry if there are some grammar errors)

 

[Psalam]

5 minutes ago, posterso said:

Hi Guys, it's my first time posting here.

I'm having a weird problem that i can't really solve.

I was doing a heavy modded (but stable, more or less) playthrough, just some really occasional crash.

Yesterday i accidentally started Skyrim with the Steam launcher and since then something broke i don't know anymore what to do.

Now, every time i try to load a save the game crashes 3-4 seconds after the load start. The weird thing is that it crashes on EVERY save of that character, even the ones i used before (that loaded without problems) that Steam accident.

If i start a new game everything seems to work fine, and i haven't added/removed mods during the playthrough.

(Load order should be fine)

I'd be very grateful if somebody could help me fix this.

 

(Sorry if there are some grammar errors)

 

I can make no promises but you might want to try a save cleaner like ReSaver (found as part of Fallrim Tools). Read the description. It's fairly simple and straightforward to use.

[donttouchmethere]

24 minutes ago, posterso said:

Yesterday i accidentally started Skyrim with the Steam launcher and since then something broke i don't know anymore what to do.

AAAHHHH!

I hate if that happens.

 

What could possible happen:

> launcher changed skyrim/skyrimpref.ini settings

• use beth.ini to get a working ini again
• if you have a backup of your ini use that
• if you are using ENBoost or an ENB check if the launcher has reactivated antialiasing => deactivate again for use with ENB
• if you have mods that added lines to the ini you might have to re-add those

> every esp that wasn't active will be alphabetically sorted at the end of your LO

• with wyre bash or fallrim tools you can check how your original LO was sorted and rebuild it

 

[Just Don't]

Sounds a lot like CTD due to too many animations. Do you happen to have a lot of anim registered in FNIS? Do you use FNIS XXL? There is always Animation Loading Fix (available on Nexus) to get all those thousands of animations into the game without a sweat. It doesn't make sense that it happens only after launching the game through Steam, but it reminds me of that particular cause for a recurrent CTD on existing saves when new games work fine.

[posterso]

Thank you for the answers;

 

14 hours ago, donttouchmethere said:

What could possible happen:

> launcher changed skyrim/skyrimpref.ini settings

• use beth.ini to get a working ini again
• if you have a backup of your ini use that
• if you are using ENBoost or an ENB check if the launcher has reactivated antialiasing => deactivate again for use with ENB
• if you have mods that added lines to the ini you might have to re-add those

> every esp that wasn't active will be alphabetically sorted at the end of your LO

• with wyre bash or fallrim tools you can check how your original LO was sorted and rebuild it

Yes, the ini files were back to the default ones, i've used Beth.ini to modify them with my settings. (Had no backup of the old ones unfortunately)

Then i used Fallrim to check the load order of the save and found out a couple of mods in different order, fixed them.

Full of hope i relaunched skyrim, load and... crash again. 

At this point i think some mod added some lines to the ini files that are now missing, the problem is finding the mods that did that.

 

Edit: Now even starting a new game makes the game crash. Great.

14 hours ago, dontknowdontcaredontask said:

Sounds a lot like CTD due to too many animations. Do you happen to have a lot of anim registered in FNIS? Do you use FNIS XXL? There is always Animation Loading Fix (available on Nexus) to get all those thousands of animations into the game without a sweat. It doesn't make sense that it happens only after launching the game through Steam, but it reminds me of that particular cause for a recurrent CTD on existing saves when new games work fine.

Fnis registers 6300 animations, i don't think they're too much. (I've added Animation Load Fix now)

And it shouldn't crash old working saves if i don't add/modify stuff... right?

[donttouchmethere]

2 hours ago, posterso said:

Yes, the ini files were back to the default ones

shit! ?

 

2 hours ago, posterso said:

i've used Beth.ini to modify them with my settings

Usually that would help already even on running games.

So that loader messes up more things ?‍♂️

 

2 hours ago, posterso said:

Then i used Fallrim to check the load order of the save and found out a couple of mods in different order, fixed them.

So I did too, but with mixed results.

Deactivated esp at the end of the LO can usually be ignored (in my case they where merged into the bashed patch).

But if the loader has moved other esp/esm, that's bad.

 

2 hours ago, posterso said:

Full of hope i relaunched skyrim, load and... crash again. 

I had the same issues, Sometimes I could rescue the LO, sometimes not.

Yes I have launched Skyrim a few times via Launcher if half asleep and out of energy drinks ?

 

2 hours ago, posterso said:

At this point i think some mod added some lines to the ini files that are now missing, the problem is finding the mods that did that.

That's a super important point, because if mods add lines to:

[Archive]
sResourceArchiveList=Skyrim - Misc.bsa, Skyrim - Shaders.bsa, Skyrim - Textures.bsa, Skyrim - Interface.bsa, Skyrim - Animations.bsa, Skyrim - Meshes.bsa, Skyrim - Sounds.bsa
sResourceArchiveList2=Skyrim - Voices.bsa, Skyrim - VoicesExtra.bsa

 

you will have to re-add them.

Missing lines in Archive will cause CTD.

On the other hand, mods that need extra lines there don't add them themselves. Usually you had to add them manually.

 

 

I could rescue 50% of games I messed up that way.

Just check:

> all launcher settings about antialiasing and anisotropic filtering need to be deactivated if you use any other way to control them (Enboost for example)

> beth.ini should be able to create settings that make your game playable (if that was an issue), also you can change antialiasing and anisotropic filtering there too

> there should be no missing lines in skyrim.ini [archive] for Skyrim and any mod that needs lines to be added there

> if you where able to rebuild you LO you could also run prophylactic bashed patch, other patchers and FNIS again

> if you added lines to skyrimpref.ini for a mod you might need to re-add them

 

That's all I can think of what the Launcher effects.

If there is more I wouldn't know ?‍♂️

 

(⚠️I just hope the launcher doesn't connect to steam -if the steam manager is online during start- and you now have to let it recheck your Skyrim installation, because it thinks your cleaned Skyrim installation is broken/ripped)

 

[coolfreaky]

you could try re-installing skse ( launching from steam can break it ) to restore skse folder files ( it will not harm any added files ) .

[posterso]

 

 

On 4/9/2020 at 1:44 PM, donttouchmethere said:

I could rescue 50% of games I messed up that way.

Just check:

> all launcher settings about antialiasing and anisotropic filtering need to be deactivated if you use any other way to control them (Enboost for example)

> beth.ini should be able to create settings that make your game playable (if that was an issue), also you can change antialiasing and anisotropic filtering there too

> there should be no missing lines in skyrim.ini [archive] for Skyrim and any mod that needs lines to be added there

> if you where able to rebuild you LO you could also run prophylactic bashed patch, other patchers and FNIS again

> if you added lines to skyrimpref.ini for a mod you might need to re-add them

Made some progress.

Re-checked Load order, rebashed, resetted ini files again.

 

On 4/9/2020 at 4:37 PM, coolfreaky said:

you could try re-installing skse ( launching from steam can break it ) to restore skse folder files ( it will not harm any added files ) .

Re-installed all skse files, and started Skyrim with skse_loader.

 

To my surprise, it worked.

It loaded the save, i then made some new manual saves teleporting in close locations and tried running around for a while.

Everything was working.

Closed the game, re-launched and back to square one, crash on all saves again. (New game seem to be working fine now, tried loading my save from a new game without success)

I then reinstalled AGAIN skse stuff, but this time the save didn't load.

What the hell.

 

 

I'll try to reinstall mods that might have something to do with this, if it doesn't work i'll have to do a painful total reinstall ?

 

 

EDIT: I think i've fixed it.

Give me some time to make sure it's stable and i'll write what i've done, it may come in handy for future visitors of this topic.

 

EDIT2: Can confirm, fixed it.

After re-polishing everything (load order, ini files, etc...) and changing the [Papyrus] setting fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS=XXX From 500 to 1500 the game started loading with success, i probably changed this setting before and forgot about it.

After launching the game with steam the 2 ini files were resetted, the load order was changed and some esp.s reactivated without reason.

But it wasn't over: sometimes the game would still crash on load on the most recent saves. (about 20% of times?)

I then changed in Papyrus the logging, trace and debug settings to generate the logs folder and trying to figure out what was causing these crashes, turns out i installed an older version of a mod instead of the newer one, as the Papyrus log was filled with warnings and errors of this mod.

After updating the mod Skyrim stopped crashing on load.

 

So it was not only Steam, but also me being dumb.

"But why did you start crashing only after the Steam thing?"

Not sure, probably the mod was causing issues only after a certain amound of time/saved stuff, i've just been lucky with the loads before. (More stuff saved/to load, more crash chance)

 

Still, thank you for all the help guys, they were really helpful to learn/understand more things

 

[coolfreaky]

you might need also to re-install (not sur) JContainer  3.... from nexus .

 

it might help a little bit if you provide the papyrus log   may be to have some clues (not guaranteed) .

 

and the load order just to be sure !