game slows down, can't figure out why

[Anahera]

hi,

i bought hoi4, and i am having loads of fun with it. the issue is, it tends to go really slowly once the war starts. i just found it normal at the beginning, but by looking at gameplays on youtube and such i realized that in my game, the time goes on much slower than it is supposed to. in 1940 it proceeds at about 1 hour per second, and that is nearly unbearable. in late game it takes ages to move troops and to finish fights.

however, fps are perfectly stable and changing all possible graphic settings never had an impact. as far as my competence goes, my specs are well over the needed.

gtx 970,
16gb RAM ddr3
amd A8-5600k cpu

i also don't seem to have an absurd cpu usage while playing the game. i tried terminating every process that was not essential, and even modded the game to put a limit on expeditionary forces. none of this had any noticeable effect on the game. i also thought about my pc not using all the cores it has, so i checked that too. but that's the furthest i can go with my current knowledge

if someone has a clue on something that i am doing wrong, or maybe time to guide me through a bit of troubleshooting, i would really appreciate your help

thanks in advance

[Gakuen Babysitter]

It's been the same issue with other players, even the ones with specs minimum. It's likely because of the engine, I heard from other threads that it is an old one, and the other major reason is that AI nations tend to build large divisions, making games slow.

The easiest thing to solve this is to make sure you win wars as fast as possible. The alternative thing is to wait for the patch to fix the issue (which is kind of unlikely) or using mod such as Darkest Hour mod.

[Anahera]

thanks, i really could not figure the problem. what is up with darkest hour helping? does it somehow affects the engine?

[Gakuen Babysitter]

Originally posted by sycla:

thanks, i really could not figure the problem. what is up with darkest hour helping? does it somehow affects the engine?

It limits the AI's creation on divisions. Basically, the mod put limits on the AI so that they will not create divisions in large numbers. In vanilla and other mods (I think so, not sure on the other mods), usually the AI put divisions, and even those without equipment and manpower so the game bloated with so many divisions.

Here's one of the features that talks about the division:

-Limit the Division spam for both the player and the AI thus reducing the amount of lag in the mid and late game.

[Gakuen Babysitter]

It's basically a pain vanilla-wise, when the game reached 1940s, especially 1942. Soviet Union and Germany's divisions, also with Chinese Civil War if the war hasn't finished.

[Anahera]

yeah thanks it did help a bit. also deep undusting ram and gpu made a slight difference. it's not much but now it's playable

[AmySloth]

I had the same problem, and I find that this is a VERY common problem for people who have multi-core processors. Want to know why that's the problem? Because computers are by default on the setting where they only use ONE of the cores. You have to change the PC to use ALL of your cores. This fact alone isn't a problem for the first few years of the game, HOI4 can run fine using only one core for the first few years(as you found out). It's extremely fast for me, in fact. However, what slows up the game is the fact that SO MANY battles are going on at once and that overwhelms the one core you're using, and that's why it slows down once the war starts, because the AI likes to start a TON of battles at once, which causes strain on the processor(if you're only using 1 core).

So, to fix the issue, you need to tell your computer to utilize all of the cores. Here's how to do that in steps if you're using windows 10(this is only the steps for a Windows OS, but if you don't have windows 10, I can give you steps for another OS too, just ask. I'm just assuming you have Windows 10 since that is probably the most common OS now for gamers) :


1. Open the Start menu. Click the "Search programs and files" box at the bottom(where it says "Type here to search"), type "msconfig" and press "Enter." A new window titled "System Configuration" appears.

2. Click the "Boot" tab at the top of the window.

3. Click the "Advanced Options" button. A new window titled "BOOT Advanced Options" appears.

4. Click to place a check in the "Number of processors" box.

5. Click the drop-down menu below the box, and select a number. Note that you cannot select a number larger than the number of processor cores present in your computer.

6. Click "OK" twice, and restart the computer.

[Anahera]

Originally posted by Cooperative Individualist:

I had the same problem, and I find that this is a VERY common problem for people who have multi-core processors. Want to know why that's the problem? Because computers are by default on the setting where they only use ONE of the cores. You have to change the PC to use ALL of your cores. This fact alone isn't a problem for the first few years of the game, HOI4 can run fine using only one core for the first few years(as you found out). It's extremely fast for me, in fact. However, what slows up the game is the fact that SO MANY battles are going on at once and that overwhelms the one core you're using, and that's why it slows down once the war starts, because the AI likes to start a TON of battles at once, which causes strain on the processor(if you're only using 1 core).

So, to fix the issue, you need to tell your computer to utilize all of the cores. Here's how to do that in steps if you're using windows 10(this is only the steps for a Windows OS, but if you don't have windows 10, I can give you steps for another OS too, just ask. I'm just assuming you have Windows 10 since that is probably the most common OS now for gamers) :


1. Open the Start menu. Click the "Search programs and files" box at the bottom(where it says "Type here to search"), type "msconfig" and press "Enter." A new window titled "System Configuration" appears.

2. Click the "Boot" tab at the top of the window.

3. Click the "Advanced Options" button. A new window titled "BOOT Advanced Options" appears.

4. Click to place a check in the "Number of processors" box.

5. Click the drop-down menu below the box, and select a number. Note that you cannot select a number larger than the number of processor cores present in your computer.

6. Click "OK" twice, and restart the computer.

thanks, but that was already set on the maximum number of avialable cores. darkest hour and a new set of clean rams helped a bit. also formatting and removing some junkware by hand did help. i also manually checked all the ongoing processes that drained resources and terminated all the unnecessasry ones

[Armairoes]

Originally posted by Cooperative Individualist:

I had the same problem, and I find that this is a VERY common problem for people who have multi-core processors. Want to know why that's the problem? Because computers are by default on the setting where they only use ONE of the cores. You have to change the PC to use ALL of your cores. This fact alone isn't a problem for the first few years of the game, HOI4 can run fine using only one core for the first few years(as you found out). It's extremely fast for me, in fact. However, what slows up the game is the fact that SO MANY battles are going on at once and that overwhelms the one core you're using, and that's why it slows down once the war starts, because the AI likes to start a TON of battles at once, which causes strain on the processor(if you're only using 1 core).

So, to fix the issue, you need to tell your computer to utilize all of the cores. Here's how to do that in steps if you're using windows 10(this is only the steps for a Windows OS, but if you don't have windows 10, I can give you steps for another OS too, just ask. I'm just assuming you have Windows 10 since that is probably the most common OS now for gamers) :


1. Open the Start menu. Click the "Search programs and files" box at the bottom(where it says "Type here to search"), type "msconfig" and press "Enter." A new window titled "System Configuration" appears.

2. Click the "Boot" tab at the top of the window.

3. Click the "Advanced Options" button. A new window titled "BOOT Advanced Options" appears.

4. Click to place a check in the "Number of processors" box.

5. Click the drop-down menu below the box, and select a number. Note that you cannot select a number larger than the number of processor cores present in your computer.

6. Click "OK" twice, and restart the computer.

Excuse me, Cooperative Individualist reference to the (Number of Processors box).

If my processor box is only set to 1, can I increase it.
I ask this because I have 6 processors and I don't want to accidently break/damage my new computer.

I hope you respond.

Sincerely,

Atreyu