Footprints as a whole is a pretty expensive mod, in terms of both performance (FPS) and Papyrus. This will be a pretty long comment, but if you read the whole thing, it'll probably be worth it - if you are an end user who just installs their favorite mods. If you are a curator of modlists or a mod author yourself, this post won't contain anything that should surprise you.
So just as a start I want to inform that this not directed towards SPID For Footprints or it's mod author. I would comment this on the actual Footprints mod, but that mod has all forms of public communication disabled (which is honestly never a good sign, as even huge mods like Legacy of the Dragonborn offer public communication).
In my personal testing, Footprints accounted for 15% of all papyrus calls (out of 150,000 papyrus calls). I have not tested SPID For Footprints however, so take this comment with a grain of salt. Just know that if you are utilizing Footprints, you are likely offering a chunk of performance as payment. If you have a powerful PC, this payment will only be seen by the engine in the form of papyrus load. Heavy papyrus load is easily seen by delays in actions (such as attempting to interact with various objects and NPCs). If you are noticing any abnormal delays in dialogue, actions, broken AI behavior, etc and you have Footprints installed, I highly recommend reducing the number of footprints in the MCM.
And finally, this is not meant to scare users out of using Footprints. It is merely to inform users of the actual performance cost of the mod. There is a good chance that SPID For Footprints fixes the excessive script calls caused by Footprints. Additionally, script calls alone are not a bad thing, but they can lead to crashes, papyrus lag, stack dumps and even issues with your save if papyrus is overloaded, so users should take care not to load mods such as Footprints (or at least run footprints with a reduced number of active footprints via MCM) if they suspect their load order will be filled with mods that will collectively, heavily load papyrus. It doesn't take a conflict to cause papyrus lag, it can be caused simply by too many requests at once. Footprints runs in a constant loop with no delays (for obvious reasons), which is expensive.
Statistics for Footprints was gathered on a load order of nearly 2000 mods (over 900 plugins), utilizing Papyrus Profiler. Additionally, results may vary based on the configuration of the user (how many NPCs are allowed to create footprints) and how many NPCs are actively being monitored and given footprints. Simply reducing the number of footprints can greatly improve performance and reduce papyrus load.
The reason I have elected to post this here, is because a lot of users who experience issues with mods, may have mods such as Footprints, Nether's Follower Framework, and so on that are heavy on papyrus. There are nothing wrong with these mods and they are fantastic, but they are also expensive mods and cost a lot of your papyrus budget. Disabling mods that are heavy on papyrus such as these in large load orders can go a long way into troubleshooting if the mod you are experiencing an issue with has a bug or is broken, versus your papyrus simply being overloaded and preventing your mod from working properly.
Thank you for your comment. I try to be careful when choosing mods and this kind of information is very important, it's a shame it's not in the description of the original mod.
Would anyone be able to help me out with a little niche issue? I use a custom race mod that basically has feet like a sabre cat. How would I go about adding those footprints to my custom race? Any help would be much appreciated
Is it possible to make a Seasonal version of it? For example in Windhelm in my game there is no snow during summer but footsteps are still sound and look snowy
293 comments
So just as a start I want to inform that this not directed towards SPID For Footprints or it's mod author. I would comment this on the actual Footprints mod, but that mod has all forms of public communication disabled (which is honestly never a good sign, as even huge mods like Legacy of the Dragonborn offer public communication).
In my personal testing, Footprints accounted for 15% of all papyrus calls (out of 150,000 papyrus calls). I have not tested SPID For Footprints however, so take this comment with a grain of salt. Just know that if you are utilizing Footprints, you are likely offering a chunk of performance as payment. If you have a powerful PC, this payment will only be seen by the engine in the form of papyrus load. Heavy papyrus load is easily seen by delays in actions (such as attempting to interact with various objects and NPCs). If you are noticing any abnormal delays in dialogue, actions, broken AI behavior, etc and you have Footprints installed, I highly recommend reducing the number of footprints in the MCM.
And finally, this is not meant to scare users out of using Footprints. It is merely to inform users of the actual performance cost of the mod. There is a good chance that SPID For Footprints fixes the excessive script calls caused by Footprints. Additionally, script calls alone are not a bad thing, but they can lead to crashes, papyrus lag, stack dumps and even issues with your save if papyrus is overloaded, so users should take care not to load mods such as Footprints (or at least run footprints with a reduced number of active footprints via MCM) if they suspect their load order will be filled with mods that will collectively, heavily load papyrus. It doesn't take a conflict to cause papyrus lag, it can be caused simply by too many requests at once. Footprints runs in a constant loop with no delays (for obvious reasons), which is expensive.
Statistics for Footprints was gathered on a load order of nearly 2000 mods (over 900 plugins), utilizing Papyrus Profiler. Additionally, results may vary based on the configuration of the user (how many NPCs are allowed to create footprints) and how many NPCs are actively being monitored and given footprints. Simply reducing the number of footprints can greatly improve performance and reduce papyrus load.
The reason I have elected to post this here, is because a lot of users who experience issues with mods, may have mods such as Footprints, Nether's Follower Framework, and so on that are heavy on papyrus. There are nothing wrong with these mods and they are fantastic, but they are also expensive mods and cost a lot of your papyrus budget. Disabling mods that are heavy on papyrus such as these in large load orders can go a long way into troubleshooting if the mod you are experiencing an issue with has a bug or is broken, versus your papyrus simply being overloaded and preventing your mod from working properly.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/127948
took me ages to find out..
For example in Windhelm in my game there is no snow during summer but footsteps are still sound and look snowy