Help Removing an Immersion Killer : IV

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:10 pm

I'm certain this topic must be covered somewhere, but I can't seem to find the right terminology to find the solutions on the forum or google.

I'm running Oblivion with mods (I can list if it's helpful). And when I walk around, I find that Buildings and Trees will be nonexistent until I get up close. For example, I will be walking up a hill, I see about 4 big trees), I keep walking and then WHAM! a forest pops up out of nowhere.

What is controlling this rendering?
LOD Files?
Saved games coupled with new mods added after the save?
.INI settings?
Using Really AEVWD and/or TES4LODGen?

Any terms, tips or links would be appreciated. I've learned a lot about this game (I think), but still have a ways to go.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 11:49 pm

Just got to settings and set the turn up the distant on trees (although you should only do this if your pc is powerful)

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 4:38 pm

Increase the slider bars for said things in your Video Settings.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 3:56 pm

Thank you both for the quick reply. All sliders for distance as well as distant view, trees and buildings are on.
Sliders for Tree was at 100%, Grass was at 70% and all the others were 97% (when I try and adjust these to 100% then adjust back to their original settings I just listed).

Further information:
I am using Streamline (StreamPurging and StreamSaving Enabled only) and OSR (never played with the settings)

Basic System Overview:
Phenom 2 x4 945
Radeon 5850 1gig ram
4 gig system ram
Windows 7 64-bit

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 5:02 pm

You could try bumping up "uGridDistantTreeRange" in the Oblivion.ini to match "uGridDistantCount" if you have the graphics power to spare.

Or adjust them as equal and use Streamsight to cover the distance with fog as per the MHT file included with Streamline.

I'd recommend RAEVWD, but I don't think it actually covers trees, just buildings and statues and rocks and such.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 11:33 pm

Streamline is adjusting your distance settings, trying to keep your fps within the range defined in its settings. If you want more control over that, you'll have to change the settings.

gothemasticator

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 2:09 pm

He did say that he did not have Streamsmooth enabled.

Assuming he did it correctly, in the SL.ini, and made sure that those settings are being read in the game, that shouldn't be a problem.

And I'd be surprised if he wasn't getting more fluctuation than just 97%

Still, something to look into though.

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 1:50 am

did you make sure streamsmooth is disabled in-game? i seem to remember ini tweaks only affecting newly started games, and for older save files you need to adjust the settings yourself, because streamline doesn't auto-update itself once it's already working in game. hope that helped.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:32 pm

did you make sure streamsmooth is disabled in-game? i seem to remember ini tweaks only affecting newly started games, and for older save files you need to adjust the settings yourself, because streamline doesn't auto-update itself once it's already working in game. hope that helped.

I'm starting to think that is the case. I've disabled and enabled various things in the sl.ini file to try and get to stop. But I still notice it making adjustments. Streamline was one of the first programs I installed so it's more than likely its been with me since the beginning of my test game.
Is there a console command to confirm this? A way to disable in a current save game? All I see when I go to the console is that streamline initialized.

Current Streamline Settings that I thought would disable distance modifications:
set SLv.Purging to 1
set SLv.FPSsmoothing to 0
set SLv.Streamsaving to 1
set SLv.Streamsight to 0
set SLfpsmon.High to 60
set SLfpsmon.Low to 5
set SLv.maxVLOD to 100
set SLv.minVLOD to 100
set SLv.setDetail to 0
set SLv.setGrass to 0
set SLv.setTrees to 0
set SLv.setLightShadow to 0
set SLv.setObjects to 0
set SLv.setWater to 0

I can attempt a new game too, but I'm hoping to avoid it (I've started so many test games trying to get mods to work - slow learner :-P

)

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 6:36 pm

Hit Ctrl-Home while in game to bring up the Streamline menu.

You can change settings in there, or use the Special Actions menu to reload your settings from the ini file.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 3:19 pm

Hit Ctrl-Home while in game to bring up the Streamline menu.

You can change settings in there, or use the Special Actions menu to reload your settings from the ini file.

This. You need to re-initialize streamline's ini after you make any changes to it.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 2:22 pm

The Streamline thing helped, but only marginally. (Pretty cool tip though, I thought the CTRL+Home thing was more for debugging when I first read about it and then promptly forgot because I thought the .INI would make changes to current games as I did).

It still seems like the game is loading the cells far too late or the distance LOD isn't the same as the actual landscape (but should the Distance LOD be loading that close to the character anyway?)

Tried adjusting the uGridstoLoad setting from 5 to 7, that seemed to help, but there was still a gap noticed at the land and trees (but I didn't need to be nearly as close to it). when I attempted to set it to 11, I lost water and my FPS dropped like a rock. Leaning toward a different LOD that may have more detail (or better detail to performance ratio as compared to the setting of 11).

Here are three examples of what I'm experiencing just in case I'm being to hard on the game and expecting it to do something it can't.
First shot (labeled before) is what I see and then the second shot (labeled after) is what it looks like after the change and the distance my character was at the point it changes. Most of them seem like it shouldn't be such a jarring difference upon approach.
http://picasaweb.google.com/101418035673581110496/Temp?authkey=Gv1sRgCPX6q4WBwZ74wAE&feat=directlink

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:41 am

Don't change Ugridstoload. It's more related to AI and actors than anything else, it kills performance and it has some pretty funky bugs if set above five.

Try increasing the one I listed earlier, the tree range. By default, Oblivion will load land further than it will load trees which can cause the popup.

Also, the distant land is an approximation of the real land, so you can get floating trees.

If you have the performance to spare, give RAEVWD a try, if the tree range change doesn't make you happy.

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 1:37 am

Alright, moved the UGridtoLoad back to 5. The buildings now load as in the example pictures. When at 7, they load how I would expect them too.

I tried values of 50, 100 and 200 for the uGridDistantTreeRange and count - no improvement for the tree LOD (there was some, but not for an entire forest popping up). Did notice a lot of slow down at 200.

Loaded RAEVWD - I like it, and i think it fixed the mountain changing issue I showed in one of the examples (been a little hard to tell, I've been swarmed with 15 gore rats the past few attempts - MMM or OOO really doesn't want me to fix this).

Running out of ideas. Going to look at these settings next:
fLODMultTrees=
bLODPopTrees=
fTreeLODMax=
fTreeLODMin=
fTreeLODDefault=
bTreeTops=

Here is the list of mods installed thus far. It's from my Excel file to track the order I install things so some of the names may not be "official".
I also didn't know how to make the scrolling text, so I used the spoiler icon to keep all the mods from cluttering the screen for those just browsing.

Spoiler

Unofficial Oblivion Patch 3.2.0
Unofficial Shivering Isles Patch
Unofficial Official Mod Patch w/ Fix
Anvil House Fix
Qarls Texture Pack 3 Redimized
Qarls Texture Pack 3 Redimized Patch
PYFFI Optimized QTP3 Meshes ? Fixed
Qarls Texture Pack 3 Patch for use with Unofficial Oblivion Patch 3.2.0
Unofficial Oblivion Patch 3.2.4 Hotfix
Bomrets Texture Pack for Shivering Isles
Improved LandscapeLOD Textures
Koldorns LOD Noise Replacer
Optimized Distant Lands MAX
Optimized Distant Lands MAX UL compatibility patches
Windom Earle Oblivion Crash Prevention
Fast Exit
Streamline
Oblivion Script Optimization (SI version)
Operation Optimization
Oblivion Stutter Remover 4.1
Darnified UI
Book Jackets Oblivion
Book Jackets Shivering Isles
Book Jackets Knights of the Nine
Grimbots Spell Tomes
Diverse Grass
LowPolyTrees
Natural Environments w/ Fixes b Ryu
Beaming Sunglare
Enhanced Water v20 HDMI
Brumbecks Sky Pack
Better Gold
Better Looking Tools 1.2
Better Potion Bottles
Better Staff Textures
Better Summon Undead
Capes and Cloaks
Cyrodiil Terrian Map v25
Shivering Isles Terrain Map
Enhanced Cobwebs
HiRes Hay Bails
HiRes Staffs
Improved Amulets and Rings
Improved Argonian Facial Textures
Improved Doors and Flora
Improved Facial Textures
Improved Fruits and Vegetables
Improved Fruits Vegetables and Meats
Improved Signs
Improved SoulGems
Improved Tapestries and Physics
Improved Trees and Flora 1
Improved Trees and Flora 2
Visually Realistic Lava
Initial Glow
Intoxicant Improvement
Larger Orges and Trolls
New Azura's Star
Crosshair Reducers and Sneak Mover
Rainbows in Tamriel
Enhanced Vegetation
Improved Sky Textures
Rusty Items
Glittering Prizes
Better Horse Eyes
Kafeis Better Amulet Replacer
Kafeis Better Ring Replacer
Adonnays Elven Weaponry
Bag of Holding
All Natural
Alive Waters
More Immersive Sound Edited
Distant Chapel Bells
OBSE -Elys- Universal Silent Voice
Oblivion Stereo Sound Overhaul
Symphony of Violence
Audia Arcanum Sound Overhaul
Midas Magic Spells of Aurum
Clocks of Cyrodiil with Modded Clock Face Patch
Woodland Rangers Revised 1.5
MD Saddle Bags 3 RC1
Ruined Tails Tale
Akatosh Mount
Skeletons Crumble with loose Jaws
Bank of Cyrodiil
Complete Gardening
Enchanced Magic Effects
Cities Alive at Night
Slof's Dogs
Myths and Legends
Natures Arsenal
No Psychic Guards
MEAT
Mithril and Orcish Weapon Sets v2
Lamps of Oblivion
Vaults of Cyrodiil
Darker Dungeons
Koldorns Platinum Aurorans 2
Combat Archery 1.9.1
Arrow Effects
Leviathan Soulgems
Armamentarium Complete 1.35
OOO Patched from 1.33 to 1.34b5
MMM 3.73 by OMOD
Unique Landscape Compilation 1.5.2
Unique Landscape Compilation 1.5.2 Compatibility Patches
RAEVWD

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 8:08 pm

You've added the unique landscapes plugins which add a whole load of trees in places that would not previously have them. Have you ran http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=15781 This nifty utility updates your distant terrain to include new "far" nifs from mod added trees, RAEVWD or whatever. It sounds to me that trees in your game are "popping up" when they load - normally this would just be when the near meshes load, and replace the LOD billboards for the trees, but if the trees are mod placed you won't see the LOD billboards and it'll just look like the trees have "appeared". Hope this works for you

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 2:52 pm

You've added the unique landscapes plugins which add a whole load of trees in places that would not previously have them. Have you ran http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=15781 This nifty utility updates your distant terrain to include new "far" nifs from mod added trees, RAEVWD or whatever. It sounds to me that trees in your game are "popping up" when they load - normally this would just be when the near meshes load, and replace the LOD billboards for the trees, but if the trees are mod placed you won't see the LOD billboards and it'll just look like the trees have "appeared". Hope this works for you

Sweet! Thank you!
That took care of the biggest problem (the forest growing before my eyes).
The down side is now I'm feeling the FPS effects of RAEVWD (went from 30 - 40 to 10 - 20). Perhaps RAEVWD isn't really needed.
It also didn't affect some of the buildings I thought it would (The larger ruin in one of my example pictures), must be below a certain threshold.

So is TES4LODGen to be treated like a patching tool and other LOD improvements should be installed, or does the tool basically replace those LOD mods?

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 9:49 pm

TES4LODGen tells the game which items to show at a distance based on which items have distant meshes.

You still need the resources for it to work, which are the _far.nif and distant billboard items.

It has no effect with regards to distant terrain textures or meshes.

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:57 am

Alright, so the final solution I've come to (unless anyone else has any other suggestions).

- Use Modified LOD textures (in this case BTLOD at 2048 resolution and Qarls at 2048 resolution)
- Run TES4LODGen (corrects the forest issue I had)
- Set uGridtoLoad=9 (only did this because it was the only way to get buildings to load up on more open areas without looking like they formed from a mirage sadly it hurt my FPS from 40-60 to 20-30; Acceptable for my play style but would prefer setting 7)

It's too bad some of these modifications can't be applied specific to areas (i.e. city, plain, forest, dungeon).

Thanks to everyone who helped, now I get to mess up Bash Patches, PyFFI and a few extra mods I hadn't gotten to yet :-P

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 4:35 am

When you encounter areas with the NPCs and creatures bouncing straight up in the air over and over again, and you get stuck doing the same, it's the uGridstoLoad=9 that is causing it.

» Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:22 am

When you encounter areas with the NPCs and creatures bouncing straight up in the air over and over again, and you get stuck doing the same, it's the uGridstoLoad=9 that is causing it.

**curses the moon and stars**
Any other suggestions on getting buildings to load at the range uGridtoLoad=9 would? Or am I just going to have to svck it up.

» Mon Mar 14, 2011 7:23 pm

Sweet! Thank you!
That took care of the biggest problem (the forest growing before my eyes).

Glad to be of help!