Error code 516 SOLUTION

[El Pollo Loco]

Hi! First of all, I want to say I'm not taking all credit for this solution. I used information I've found from other people in other threads here, and did some more testing, and came up with reliable instructions and method to overcome the 516 save game error.

This error happens after trading with a merchant. It has something to do with the UI of barter/trade - I am on my second playthrough and never used trade once, but now some vendors started being at trade automatically, around same time the errors started.

Anyway, to overcome the error, you just have to trade with the vendor a second time, but there's another catch.

It seems that if you can get the vendor to remember you prefer barter, you do not get error.

If the vendor is always set to trade, it causes errors.

So, here are specifics from my testing:

Trade with Dammon trade : error
Trade with Dammon barter : error, does not remember to stay on barter if I open him again

Trade with Araj Oblodra: same

Trade with Bee general store guy on trade : error
Trade with Bee general store guy on barter : no errors, if I open him again, he remembers I prefer barter

TL;DR

Errors are due to trading with certain merchants. In every act, try to find a vendor that if you open trade UI, set to barter, and exit, you don't get errors. Use this merchant.
If you use a different merchant and get the error, you can go to the functioning merchant, barter with them, and the error will go away. So you just have to always come back to this one merchant.

In act 3, the Bee general store works for this. In other acts, I don't know, I did not do comprehensive testing of all merchants.

Hope this helps someone.

[Strato]

Something seen on reddit worked for me : open the trade widow, trade with the merchant in trade mode, then turn back to barter mode, close the window then ask him to trade again and check that it still on barter mode, if not put it back on barter and close again, then you should be able to save your game.

[El Pollo Loco]

Originally posted by Strato:

Something seen on reddit worked for me : open the trade widow, trade with the merchant in trade mode, then turn back to barter mode, close the window then ask him to trade again and check that it still on barter mode, if not put it back on barter and close again, then you should be able to save your game.

Yes you always need to end on barter to avoid the error, however, with some merchants it will not work. As I said in my example, Araj Oblodra in act 3 will always be on Trade when you open her, and always give you an error.
So you are right, if you find a merchant who will stay on barter if you put in on barter, that's the merchant you can use to avoid the errors for the whole act.
I will just remind again everyone, that if you get the error from a different merchant, you can always come back to the good merchant and they will get rid of the error for you.

[sarah]

I also had to go to do a different merchant to get it to work.

[Mira Mira on the Wall]

Thank you! This worked for me. I went in & switched to barter with rivington general store merchant then left. When I tried to save I got the error. I went back in it was on barter, I left again & hit quick save & it worked. Tried a few actual barters & they worked and saved. Thank You!

[VibesPNG]

I tried so so many different solutions and none of them worked until this one, thank you so much!

[dolby]

Well for people who have problems maybe this will help...: I think this bug only happens if you open the trade menu from dialogue screen by clicking on txt.... At least that's the case in my game.

Instead you should use the hand icon in the bottom left corner that should work as intended and you can save no matter what merchant you use... As long as you open the trade window with that hand icon in the bottom left!
The trade window stays on barter always if you use that icon, at least for me.

[derechtedovahkiin]

Originally posted by Σίσυφος:

Originally posted by Strato:

Something seen on reddit worked for me : open the trade widow, trade with the merchant in trade mode, then turn back to barter mode, close the window then ask him to trade again and check that it still on barter mode, if not put it back on barter and close again, then you should be able to save your game.

Yes you always need to end on barter to avoid the error, however, with some merchants it will not work. As I said in my example, Araj Oblodra in act 3 will always be on Trade when you open her, and always give you an error.
So you are right, if you find a merchant who will stay on barter if you put in on barter, that's the merchant you can use to avoid the errors for the whole act.
I will just remind again everyone, that if you get the error from a different merchant, you can always come back to the good merchant and they will get rid of the error for you.

Oh my god, thank you so much! Had the problem with that one dragonborn in Rivington and Boney was my saviour :D

[slow_cheetah]

Had no issues with saving until Patch 3.
Before Patch 3, all vendors opened with Barter (I don't know whether it's standard or game remembering that I only barter). Now, some vendors still open up Barter, others Trade.

Edit: Simply entering the trade menu on a Start-with-Trade vendor produces Error Code 516. I tried the alternate route of the trade icon with one of those, and lo and behold, the vendor started into Barter and didn't produce Error 516.

[Shadow♥]

There is a merchant in act 3 called stoney [the stone mephet] in the circus at wyrms crossing that works to fix the save issue if you use another merchant that causes you to not be able to save. i just go back to stoney at the circus after selling to other merchants or buying and he fixes my saving issue by just either selling or buying a small item from him. his screen automatically opens to barter. i think all the merchants that are opening to trade are bugged and cause the save issue. at least thats what i have been experiencing. if the merchant opens right to barter without any switching it to that they usually are good merchants that do not bug the saves. they do not cause the game to not be able to save after selling or buying.

[ToastyBreadStick]

Never had the issue until patch 3 too

[Vendaval Neo 4.0]

Originally posted by dolby:

Well for people who have problems maybe this will help...: I think this bug only happens if you open the trade menu from dialogue screen by clicking on txt.... At least that's the case in my game.

Instead you should use the hand icon in the bottom left corner that should work as intended and you can save no matter what merchant you use... As long as you open the trade window with that hand icon in the bottom left!
The trade window stays on barter always if you use that icon, at least for me.

Thiis solution truly works at least for me

[Strato]

Originally posted by Vendaval Neo 4.0:

Originally posted by dolby:

Well for people who have problems maybe this will help...: I think this bug only happens if you open the trade menu from dialogue screen by clicking on txt.... At least that's the case in my game.

Instead you should use the hand icon in the bottom left corner that should work as intended and you can save no matter what merchant you use... As long as you open the trade window with that hand icon in the bottom left!
The trade window stays on barter always if you use that icon, at least for me.

Thiis solution truly works at least for me

Yes I read about that too, didn't used it yet as the switch strategy worked for the moment.

Originally posted by Σίσυφος:

Originally posted by Strato:

Something seen on reddit worked for me : open the trade widow, trade with the merchant in trade mode, then turn back to barter mode, close the window then ask him to trade again and check that it still on barter mode, if not put it back on barter and close again, then you should be able to save your game.

Yes you always need to end on barter to avoid the error, however, with some merchants it will not work. As I said in my example, Araj Oblodra in act 3 will always be on Trade when you open her, and always give you an error.
So you are right, if you find a merchant who will stay on barter if you put in on barter, that's the merchant you can use to avoid the errors for the whole act.
I will just remind again everyone, that if you get the error from a different merchant, you can always come back to the good merchant and they will get rid of the error for you.

Good to know btw, the only solution I've found from the first bug was to disable my mods one by one, I found the one that I've thinks was triggering the bug, but now I know it's not really a modding problem as this happen to non modded games too. I was just adding info to your message, but you are right something is not working well since last update.

[Goon Kidd]

well yeah this barter ui trick does seem to work for me but is larian aware of this and are planning a hotfix?

[an.huang]

Is this bug caused by Mod?

[El Pollo Loco]

Originally posted by an.huang:

Is this bug caused by Mod?

No, it was not caused by mods at all. It was due to the patch released at the time, but has since been fixed I believe. At least, I haven't encountered this bug in weeks.

If you are experiencing it currently, it might be because of mod, I couldn't say.