We have released a new version of the mod that is, more or less, a general cleanup. ENB transparency issues should be fixed for all options now and many of the texture received a few cleanup passes to slightly help their fidelity.
We have also reopened the BUGS section, so please report any issues you may come across.
Many many years ago when I tried this mod I was getting crashes I could replicate - when this first launched in SE as well I had this issue as well. I replicated it by spamming fire and ice spells on the ground to create many ground decals and over the course of 5 or so minutes I would eventually crash. I never looked into it more at that time however. Over the years looking back on it I believe I know what the issue was and have seen numerous people mentioning CTDs and of course many people saying its not a issue with the mod and there is no issue so this results in a lot of confusion.
I absolutely could be wrong* but I think this might explain it: By vanilla you only get a certain number of decals on the ground or surface - I am however willing to bet many if not all of you like myself use Enhanced Blood that makes great looking blood decals as a byproduct that mod also increase the decal threshold. This is not a problem really also that mod is simple in that its just a 2D blood splatter with just a normal map and diffuse really. But this mod is a very high resolution mod with glow maps diffuse and normal map and generates these decals on every impact within the grid not overlapping - so my theory is that this mod may tax the memory allocation which means for many people they would have no problem and for some with a PC that cant handle the memory bulk they get a CTD. If im right and you have crashes im willing to bet that if you were to half the resolution of the textures yourself or something that might resolve it for you OR simply just lowering the decal amount to a lower level maybe on par more with ultra vanilla settings or lower. This likely explains the back and forth in comments as well with a lot of confusion and means both parties were correct. Its not this mods fault its your settings and hardware but also in a way this mod strains those systems so you have to then address it at the mod level (lower res), or hardware level (better PC), or you have to address it at the system level (lower decal count).
in a effort to not bury good info below as well please use the mod here if you are using a ENB btw -
Thanks for this comment. I ended up checking my Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPrefs.ini files. A few of the decal settings were higher than likely optimal. Other settings were just outside the recommendations by STEP, which seems a good reference. I made a number of changes which helped to stabilize my game. I think attention to the decals and skin decals helped.
Decal number, lifetime, and distance are set by the game INIs. Are you saying that Enhanced Blood Textures SE increases the threshold or that it adds decals such that the threshold will always be reached sooner when using it?
I tried spamming decals using sparks and flames spells with this mod enabled but was unable to register any performance hit or CTD after several minutes. These decals should add to the VRAM working set, but that is always basically maxed out, and the GPU constantly swaps data in/out of memory as needed. I saw no increase in VRAM usage (as I expected). What you are saying does make sense, but it probably only applies to people that have very high decal count/lifetime/distance thresholds.
I recommend using BethINI to manage game INIs to prevent janky things from happening. This is what BethINI Pie 'ultra' preset gives me for decals:
Maybe I will try maxing some of this out to see what happens ...
Just "chiming in." Playing on a mid level, slightly older gamer laptop. (Asus TUF something.) Installed this mod, with "authors default settings" although there was a single file from ENB particles mod I chose to not override. (Fire impact glowmap I believe.)
Anyhow: Started in AP Helgen and proceded to run around the inn and the village leaving fire marks EVERYWHERE. No freezes, no CTD not even a stutter, just loads and loads of pretty scorch marks. (Kinda makes me wanna do a pyromancer playthrough.)
Now given, I did set up BethINI for what looks to be the best setting for my old laptop and using quite a few stabilizing and performance mods in the hopes of getting the least crashes. Buuuut, my point is, if it was a VRAM issue, I figured I would run into it, didn't though.
Not saying, it aint a VRAM issue or decal issue for some, just didn't affect me what so ever. *shrugs* So just adding it here for info, in case any of it helps. And thank you for updating your mod, all to many "forgotten" mods breaking my heart cause they no longer work, happy to see this one does.
xEdit 4.1.5 says "Can be turned into ESL by adding ESL flag in TES4 header" So it will be ESPFE (retains .esp extension and obeys .esp load order rules, but sits in FE memory space, like a .esl).
try starting a new game and check if your current save is corrupted try lowering the graphics level in the game try removing distortion using a mod Parallax Spell Impacts ( fixes for ENB's users )
300 comments
We have also reopened the BUGS section, so please report any issues you may come across.
I absolutely could be wrong* but I think this might explain it: By vanilla you only get a certain number of decals on the ground or surface - I am however willing to bet many if not all of you like myself use Enhanced Blood that makes great looking blood decals as a byproduct that mod also increase the decal threshold. This is not a problem really also that mod is simple in that its just a 2D blood splatter with just a normal map and diffuse really. But this mod is a very high resolution mod with glow maps diffuse and normal map and generates these decals on every impact within the grid not overlapping - so my theory is that this mod may tax the memory allocation which means for many people they would have no problem and for some with a PC that cant handle the memory bulk they get a CTD. If im right and you have crashes im willing to bet that if you were to half the resolution of the textures yourself or something that might resolve it for you OR simply just lowering the decal amount to a lower level maybe on par more with ultra vanilla settings or lower. This likely explains the back and forth in comments as well with a lot of confusion and means both parties were correct. Its not this mods fault its your settings and hardware but also in a way this mod strains those systems so you have to then address it at the mod level (lower res), or hardware level (better PC), or you have to address it at the system level (lower decal count).
in a effort to not bury good info below as well please use the mod here if you are using a ENB btw -
likely optimal. Other settings were just outside the recommendations by
STEP, which seems a good reference. I made a number of changes which
helped to stabilize my game. I think attention to the decals and skin
decals helped.
I tried spamming decals using sparks and flames spells with this mod enabled but was unable to register any performance hit or CTD after several minutes. These decals should add to the VRAM working set, but that is always basically maxed out, and the GPU constantly swaps data in/out of memory as needed. I saw no increase in VRAM usage (as I expected). What you are saying does make sense, but it probably only applies to people that have very high decal count/lifetime/distance thresholds.
I recommend using BethINI to manage game INIs to prevent janky things from happening. This is what BethINI Pie 'ultra' preset gives me for decals:
Maybe I will try maxing some of this out to see what happens ...
Playing on a mid level, slightly older gamer laptop. (Asus TUF something.)
Installed this mod, with "authors default settings" although there was a single file from ENB particles mod I chose to not override. (Fire impact glowmap I believe.)
Anyhow:
Started in AP Helgen and proceded to run around the inn and the village leaving fire marks EVERYWHERE.
No freezes, no CTD not even a stutter, just loads and loads of pretty scorch marks. (Kinda makes me wanna do a pyromancer playthrough.)
Now given, I did set up BethINI for what looks to be the best setting for my old laptop and using quite a few stabilizing and performance mods in the hopes of getting the least crashes.
Buuuut, my point is, if it was a VRAM issue, I figured I would run into it, didn't though.
Not saying, it aint a VRAM issue or decal issue for some, just didn't affect me what so ever. *shrugs*
So just adding it here for info, in case any of it helps.
And thank you for updating your mod, all to many "forgotten" mods breaking my heart cause they no longer work, happy to see this one does.
So it will be ESPFE (retains .esp extension and obeys .esp load order rules, but sits in FE memory space, like a .esl).
- fDecalLifetime =
- fDecalLOD0 =
Where should I place this in my file -> [XYZ]try lowering the graphics level in the game
try removing distortion using a mod Parallax Spell Impacts ( fixes for ENB's users )