Any reasons for a CTD on weapon equip and drop?

[bjornk]

Okay, let me describe the problem in more detail here. I've been trying to combine the following weapon mods into one package.

 

Exciter HK MP5 Mini Pack (Adds several MP5 types)

Exciter Guns Mini Pack (Add several custom M4s and M16s)

 

I've managed to create a nice clean package and deleted one of the buggy weapons which had missing meshes (shows a red exclamation mark when equipped). Now, all MP5s work flawlessly and so do the 60% of M4/M16s, but some of the M4/M16s cause a CTD when equipped or dropped.

 

While in Pipboy, you can equip them, you can even mod them, but as soon as you tab out, you get a CTD. Also, if you drop them while in Pipboy, by right clicking on them, you also get a CTD.

 

Here's what I've done so far to find out the problem:

• I've compared these weapons to the similar ones that work in the same ESP, using FNVEdit and I don't really see any significant difference there.
• In FNVEdit, if I replace the weapon mesh file (just the file name) of a working weapon with a mesh file of buggy ones, the working weapon becomes buggy and again gives me CTDs when equipped.
• My instinct tells me that there's a mesh problem with these buggy weapons, but when I load up the mod in GECK they all look fine in previews.

So I've run out of ideas at the moment. Do you guys have any ideas about possible issues that may cause CTDs like these when equipping or dropping a weapon (or any other item)?

 

Edit: Here's the ESP, in case you want to check out.

 

 

(<- Required as a master, although you won't be able to use it without the meshes and textures of my other pack).

[Ark of Truth]

Sounds like a broken 1st person mesh and a broken world mesh if it CTD when doing that.

[bjornk]

Do you mean a broken .nif file by that? Indeed there's no 1st person mesh defined for neither of these weapons but most of them work somehow. How's that possible?

 

BTW, using the original ESP of that mod (the second one above) also gives me CTDs. Although, browsing through the comments of that mod, I don't really see too many complaints about CTDs, so it's more likely that the problem is on my end.

 

This is one of the guns that cause CTDs but looks fine on GECK.

 

 

[Ark of Truth]

Do you mean a broken .nif file by that? Indeed there's no 1st person mesh defined for neither of these weapons but most of them work somehow. How's that possible?

 

That would be the problem for the equipping CTD.

[bjornk]

Would a missing texture in a nif file somehow cause a CTD? I don't have any 3D software to check or fix a broken nif file but I may be able to figure out a way to edit it as a binary file.

What I still don't understand is how come they look fine in GECK?

EDIT:

Ugh! Just opened up the nif file of a faulty gun using a hex editor and saw this, around what seems like material definitions of a 3D software...

c:\exciter\fallout 3\mods\123\imp_m16a4b\data\textures\1am16a4b\glass.dds

Not that I'm sure that this is the cause of CTDs, but this is a file that doesn't exist on my computer.

[Ark of Truth]

Would a missing texture in a nif file somehow cause a CTD? I don't have any 3D software to check or fix a broken nif file but I may be able to figure out a way to edit it as a binary file.

 

What I still don't understand is how come they look fine in GECK?

 

It could do.

 

G.E.C.K doesn't load the game engine and all, it only loads a small engine for rendering purposes.

[bjornk]

And here's a another one, in an M16 this time. It also has a link to the same file:

 

c:\exciter\fallout 3\mods\123\imp_m16a4b\data\textures\1am16a4b\glass.dds

 

The ones that work don't seem to have any such link.

 

Edit: Other nif files seem to have similar links to non-existing files. 

 

[Ark of Truth]

There is a bug fix patch on the download pages. Did you install them?

[bjornk]

There is a bug fix patch on the download pages. Did you install them?

Yes, but that's just an ESP which probably only adds some burst fire scripts to weapons, as the assets used in weapons look just the same in the original ESP and the patch. I've deleted any such scripts in my mod as I don't use SelectFire.esm.

[bjornk]

Whatever the problem is, it's definitely related to the model (nif) files or their textures.

 

Attaching an ACOG scope to one of the weapons, which has 3 available attachments (i.e. weapon mods) in total, gives me a CTD, but the same weapon is perfectly usable with the other two attachments without getting a CTD. So I assume that there's an issue with all the meshes of that weapon that include an ACOG scope. Maybe there's a missing texture related to the ACOG part of the gun model, who knows. If a nif file can include some other kind of data (shader, refraction etc) maybe those are missing/erroneous too.

 

I have very little knowledge of 3D modelling programs so all I can do right now is to disable the weapon mods (attachments) that causing CTDs. Although I'd appreciate if someone with knowledge could have a look into these weapon models. They are pretty cool in my opinion. It's a shame that they don't work properly.

 

[bjornk]

Here's something strange I've just noticed. The guns I've removed the ACOG attachments now have no CTD issues when they get equipped, but now if I open up the pipboy while holding these guns I get a CTD. I absolutely have no idea what's going on this time. Maybe their meshes weren't the actual problem?