Mods causing massive FPS drop?

[Fherrit]

Hi CE'ers

new to the game, but hit some frustration with the oddity of CE's construction system. So did some digging and found that one came highly recommended: Lesser Building Restriction, which also required Mod Controller. Then since I found the layout of the UI a bit unwelcome I installed Hosav's UI.

I'm fairly familiar with modding games, having done a lot via Skyrim, BG, and a few others and am familiar with how to do quite large mod libraries. So i considered having just these 3 to be next to nothing.

But when playing today with those 3 active, I'd go through periods where the FPS would drop to literally zero and the screen would be frozen in mid combat. Prior to installing these 3 mods, the game ran smooth as butter, only having issues after a very long play session which a logging out and back in solved for another large block of time. (memory leak?).

Having lurked on the Funcom forums, I see a *long* list of bugs is a regular thing with CE, up to this though, I hadn't encountered the majority of them (yes, dead/unconscious thralls fall "below the world" and the occassional pink glow to objects, but they're few and far between).

I'm wondering if there are settings in those three mods that I'm being remiss about that cause these FPS plunges and if so, what the recommended settings are.

[Xevyr]

Well, LBPR and ModControlPanel will certainly NOT cause any issues with your FPS.
Hosav's UI did have some FPS issues related to enemy healthbars etc, but from what I read in the latest patch notes those were fixed, but regardless it didn't cause that excessive FPS drop even when it had problems with it, so I'm not sure what's happening in your case.

Are you running the game above recommended specs?

As far as mods go, the number of them doesn't really influence anything here. Conan mods are built with the same unreal engine editor as the game and pretty much act as native content. However ofc certain mods can still be more performance intense than others obviously, it depends on what they do and how they do it.

There's no "magic number" though, so your reluctance is slightly unfounded. There might be 30 mods you can install without noticing the slightest drop in performance and then a certain one has a higher impact than the previous 30, so it will very much depend on their purpose and how they were made.

In any case, typically the largest hit on performance.. both server and client, usually comes from a lot of placeables / decorative items around your base.

[Fherrit]

Originally posted by Xevyr:

Well, LBPR and ModControlPanel will certainly NOT cause any issues with your FPS.
Hosav's UI did have some FPS issues related to enemy healthbars etc, but from what I read in the latest patch notes those were fixed, but regardless it didn't cause that excessive FPS drop even when it had problems with it, so I'm not sure what's happening in your case.

Are you running the game above recommended specs?

As far as mods go, the number of them doesn't really influence anything here. Conan mods are built with the same unreal engine editor as the game and pretty much act as native content. However ofc certain mods can still be more performance intense than others obviously, it depends on what they do and how they do it.

There's no "magic number" though, so your reluctance is slightly unfounded. There might be 30 mods you can install without noticing the slightest drop in performance and then a certain one has a higher impact than the previous 30, so it will very much depend on their purpose and how they were made.

In any case, typically the largest hit on performance.. both server and client, usually comes from a lot of placeables / decorative items around your base.

Thanks for replying Xevyr;
Your reply suggests whatever I think I may know about modding, I should set aside and give a more detailed account of things without prexisting assumptions learned from other games confusing matters.

When it comes to the gfx settings, I don't *think* I'm running the game at levels it can't handle, I have a RTX-3060 and a 43" 4k monitor, I haven't run into any issues with other games in my library suddenly turning into slide shows (Everspace for example, i had at max settings and no matter how busy things got, performance was butter smooth).

The settings I have active in the video tab are as follows:

Resolution: 3840x2160 (changed from a weird ultra wide setting)
Gamma: 2.20 - Default
Motion Blur: (no)-Default
Volumetric Fog: (yes)-Default
Vsynch: (yes)-Default
Vertical FOV: 70-(changed from 60)
Max FPS: 60-(changed from uncapped)
Graphics Quality: Auto-Default
Low End Laptop Mode: (no)-Default
View Distance: Ultra-Default
Post Processing: Ultra-Default
General Shadows: Medium (changed from Ultra, thought it would help but no change)
Effects Quality: Ultra-Default
Texture Quality: Ultra-Default
Foliage Quality: Ultra-Default
Anti-Aliasing: x6-Default

I've admittedly gotten on the lazy side when it comes to adjusting gfx settings, usually because the games do a pretty solid job of responding to the detected hardware. If I do adjust anything these days, I typically start with shadows and whatever issues I may be having are almost always solved by tuning that by itself.

I should note however, that I did run across Hodor's guide about how to run the game cooler and smoother that I acted on, wherein its suggested to disable fullscreen optimization.

Prior to posting here, I tested to see if any one mod was responsible, but regardless which mod was active, or where the character was in game, the same performance slap would happen frequently in combat (note: I did only 2 tests-one with only Hosav's, and one with Modcontrolpanel and NBPR together as NBPR says one has to have MCP for it to function).

However when i removed all 3 mods, performance returned as prior to attempting their use. The only thing I can imagine being a possible reason is perhaps how I installed them is faulty? I had a bit of a time figuring out how to install them, as any tutorials I found had a tendency to skip a step, or what was shown isn't what I'd see going through the same steps. Apologies for the lengthy details but I'm trying to be thorough.

I followed two posts instructing one how to install mods for the PC version of the game, most recent [forums.funcom.com] and the forum pinned [forums.funcom.com] dated 2021. I assume btw, that you're the same Xevyr who responded in that post?

At any rate, as per that guide, after the mods had downloaded and were in the \WorkshopDownloadScript\Steam\steamapps\workshop\content\440900. folder as stated by the guide, I did as instructed and copied them as is (I.E. I copied the folders containing the paks) and pasted the folders into into my E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods folder.

But when I launched the game and selected the tab of the launcher where one selects which mods to activate, the launcher saw the mods on the left side, but there was no indication how to activate them. The "..." buttons next to the listed mods didn't have a activate option, right clicking did nothing, and when I went to check them within the server settings, they were each listed as corrupt. More searching for tuts followed to determine what I was doing wrong but after several videos and forum posts, I came up empty.

At no point was there any instruction in any of the tuts that I found that said you have to drag the mods from the list on the left onto the activate fields on the right within the launcher. i discovered that totally by accident.

But even then, the mods didn't load into the game. Checking them from within the server settings showed them no longer as corrupt, but I noticed that their name wasn't the name of the mods, but the id numbers of the folders. So then I tried taking the pak files out of their folders and dropping them in the mod folder itself. To hopefully explain that a little better, before it looked like this:

E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1369743238
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1797359985
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1823412793

Where each of those numbers is the mod id folder id containing the pak file within. That's what was showing up when I went into the server settings to see what mods were active, and if I left the pak files inside those folders, the mods wouldn't go live.

But when i took the pak files themselves and put them into the mod folder to look like this:
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\UIMod_hosav.pak
etc,

now the mods showed up in the launcher on both sides, the server listed them by name and having a checkmark, and when I was in the game, they were active. I thought I had figured things out despite the gaps in instructions. That is right up to I started getting slammed with those tanked FPS moments that didn't matter where I was in the game, and most of the time happened during combat.

So given all that, is there something I missed or am doing wrong?

[GothikaGeist]

Originally posted by Fherrit:

Originally posted by Xevyr:

Well, LBPR and ModControlPanel will certainly NOT cause any issues with your FPS.
Hosav's UI did have some FPS issues related to enemy healthbars etc, but from what I read in the latest patch notes those were fixed, but regardless it didn't cause that excessive FPS drop even when it had problems with it, so I'm not sure what's happening in your case.

Are you running the game above recommended specs?

As far as mods go, the number of them doesn't really influence anything here. Conan mods are built with the same unreal engine editor as the game and pretty much act as native content. However ofc certain mods can still be more performance intense than others obviously, it depends on what they do and how they do it.

There's no "magic number" though, so your reluctance is slightly unfounded. There might be 30 mods you can install without noticing the slightest drop in performance and then a certain one has a higher impact than the previous 30, so it will very much depend on their purpose and how they were made.

In any case, typically the largest hit on performance.. both server and client, usually comes from a lot of placeables / decorative items around your base.

Thanks for replying Xevyr;
Your reply suggests whatever I think I may know about modding, I should set aside and give a more detailed account of things without prexisting assumptions learned from other games confusing matters.

When it comes to the gfx settings, I don't *think* I'm running the game at levels it can't handle, I have a RTX-3060 and a 43" 4k monitor, I haven't run into any issues with other games in my library suddenly turning into slide shows (Everspace for example, i had at max settings and no matter how busy things got, performance was butter smooth).

The settings I have active in the video tab are as follows:

Resolution: 3840x2160 (changed from a weird ultra wide setting)
Gamma: 2.20 - Default
Motion Blur: (no)-Default
Volumetric Fog: (yes)-Default
Vsynch: (yes)-Default
Vertical FOV: 70-(changed from 60)
Max FPS: 60-(changed from uncapped)
Graphics Quality: Auto-Default
Low End Laptop Mode: (no)-Default
View Distance: Ultra-Default
Post Processing: Ultra-Default
General Shadows: Medium (changed from Ultra, thought it would help but no change)
Effects Quality: Ultra-Default
Texture Quality: Ultra-Default
Foliage Quality: Ultra-Default
Anti-Aliasing: x6-Default

I've admittedly gotten on the lazy side when it comes to adjusting gfx settings, usually because the games do a pretty solid job of responding to the detected hardware. If I do adjust anything these days, I typically start with shadows and whatever issues I may be having are almost always solved by tuning that by itself.

I should note however, that I did run across Hodor's guide about how to run the game cooler and smoother that I acted on, wherein its suggested to disable fullscreen optimization.

Prior to posting here, I tested to see if any one mod was responsible, but regardless which mod was active, or where the character was in game, the same performance slap would happen frequently in combat (note: I did only 2 tests-one with only Hosav's, and one with Modcontrolpanel and NBPR together as NBPR says one has to have MCP for it to function).

However when i removed all 3 mods, performance returned as prior to attempting their use. The only thing I can imagine being a possible reason is perhaps how I installed them is faulty? I had a bit of a time figuring out how to install them, as any tutorials I found had a tendency to skip a step, or what was shown isn't what I'd see going through the same steps. Apologies for the lengthy details but I'm trying to be thorough.

I followed two posts instructing one how to install mods for the PC version of the game, most recent [forums.funcom.com] and the forum pinned [forums.funcom.com] dated 2021. I assume btw, that you're the same Xevyr who responded in that post?

At any rate, as per that guide, after the mods had downloaded and were in the \WorkshopDownloadScript\Steam\steamapps\workshop\content\440900. folder as stated by the guide, I did as instructed and copied them as is (I.E. I copied the folders containing the paks) and pasted the folders into into my E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods folder.

But when I launched the game and selected the tab of the launcher where one selects which mods to activate, the launcher saw the mods on the left side, but there was no indication how to activate them. The "..." buttons next to the listed mods didn't have a activate option, right clicking did nothing, and when I went to check them within the server settings, they were each listed as corrupt. More searching for tuts followed to determine what I was doing wrong but after several videos and forum posts, I came up empty.

At no point was there any instruction in any of the tuts that I found that said you have to drag the mods from the list on the left onto the activate fields on the right within the launcher. i discovered that totally by accident.

But even then, the mods didn't load into the game. Checking them from within the server settings showed them no longer as corrupt, but I noticed that their name wasn't the name of the mods, but the id numbers of the folders. So then I tried taking the pak files out of their folders and dropping them in the mod folder itself. To hopefully explain that a little better, before it looked like this:

E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1369743238
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1797359985
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\1823412793

Where each of those numbers is the mod id folder id containing the pak file within. That's what was showing up when I went into the server settings to see what mods were active, and if I left the pak files inside those folders, the mods wouldn't go live.

But when i took the pak files themselves and put them into the mod folder to look like this:
E:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\Conan Exiles\ConanSandbox\Mods\UIMod_hosav.pak
etc,

now the mods showed up in the launcher on both sides, the server listed them by name and having a checkmark, and when I was in the game, they were active. I thought I had figured things out despite the gaps in instructions. That is right up to I started getting slammed with those tanked FPS moments that didn't matter where I was in the game, and most of the time happened during combat.

So given all that, is there something I missed or am doing wrong?

I didn't read your entire post but I wanted to say one thing:
An RTX 3060 is gonna have a damn hard time running at 4K. Could be that you're running out of VRAM and the game proceeds to dump textures out of memory to make space.
One other thing, I found that having Max FPS set to uncapped leads to higher framerates overall. At least thats what it does for me on a GTX 1060 6GB @ 1080p.

[Xevyr]

Sort of the above, except for the uncapped frames - that's generally a bad idea though in this case it wouldn't change much as the system won't be able to produce many more frames in 4k

But yes, on a 3060 you're already at the limit to where it "might" run in 4k, add some fancy UI stuff to it, which in itself doesn't have a huge performance impact, but in your case when you don't have a sufficient overhead, every tiny bit will lower your frame rate noticeably.

Like I said in my initial post though, it's not LBPR or ModControlPanel as the first one has absolutely nothing to do with FPS, while the second one is a tiny settings UI that's only active when you access it via the hotkey. So it's most likely Hosav's, despite being improved a lot with the last update, even the tiny impact of it is exaggerated a bit on your system since you're pushing that 3060 trying to run 4k Ultra.

As for your mod installation stuff.... that's fine... your game can either load the mods... or it can not... there is no in-between state :P So regardless of how you achieved that if the mod is loaded and running, then it's obviously working.

I'd recommend you first of all try to lower the graphics just a bit.. the best improvement you'd probably get by running slightly under resolution without necessarily having to tweak other settings. Try that, see how it goes.. if you're happy with it then that's good.
If you're still struggling then you could try just without Hosav's UI, though I'm reluctant to recommend removing mods that are perfectly fine, being a mod creator myself. But maybe there's no need for that if the first option works out and you manage to tweak the settings to where it's working fine :)

[GothikaGeist]

Originally posted by Xevyr:

Sort of the above, except for the uncapped frames - that's generally a bad idea...

90% of the time I'm right with you on that. For some reason though capping my FPS to 60 using the in-game setting drops my fps to the mid 50s. Setting it to uncapped will let the game run above 60fps in the same spot. No idea why, every game has its quirks.

[Xevyr]

Well, if you're just using the framerate limiter and not the vertical-sync then that has absolutely no effect on it when it's below the set cap :P
Anything you perceive is most likely placebo :)

[GothikaGeist]

Originally posted by Xevyr:

Well, if you're just using the framerate limiter and not the vertical-sync then that has absolutely no effect on it when it's below the set cap :P
Anything you perceive is most likely placebo :)

To be fair I was using an the FPS tool included in Xbox Game Bar, rather than the one included with MSI Afterburner. There's a chance the readout was wonky.

[Fherrit]

Checking back in and have to apologize for absenteeism but that pesky 4 skull boss "Real LIfe" kept aggroing on me.

I fiddled around with some settings in part due to having seen incredible performance at 4k with other games, mostly older admittedly but a couple of new ones that have a lot of eye candy to the point where I had to dial down effects from being too "busy" (i.e. Everspace 2).

With respect to Xevyr whom I'm sure is more knowledgeable, I have found 3 things that finally let me run with some select mods, though Hosav's is still a bit of a issue. I want to note I took a incremental approach to addressing my issues, I didn't do all of the below at once and declare victory, I did each incremental, played a session or two when I could, and wrote down any issues I ran into following any changes I made.

I did as suggested and dialed down the gfx a notch, but TBH while I didn't notice the look of the game being any worse, but the performance was still poor with any mod active. I can't speak to how or why this happened, only that if I had them active the slide show event would happen like clockwork during combat, and if I had none it wouldn't, like...at all.

I know my gfx card is "only" a 3060TI, but we all remember the clusterpuck of that time and it was all I could get without being raped by scalpers. That said, it has performed very good in just about anything I've thrown at it.

My first suspect was the shadows, with Unreal 4 I had a number of games that always saw remarkable improvement whenever I adjusted shadow rendering. But I had to do more than just choose less shadows from the menu. Long story short, I made use of King of Predators "Performance .ini tweaks" in the Guides, targeting shadow settings and making a change to the "mouse smoothing" he makes mention of.

TBH-I have zero idea why flipping this setting to false made a difference, but the game appeared to run smoother-I'd notice this mostly when I was in my base running to various crafting hubs or if I aggroed large camps.

Then I made use of Icebreaker's instructions-the game wound up looking noticeably prettier without any hit to performance, this was true putting the settings to ultra or epic, I left them dialed down a notch from ultra as I figured if I can't tell the difference in gfx quality, it still has to push less pixels that way which results in better performance.

But despite what was said above, upon recommendation from a friend I set the FPS to "Uncapped" and that made a huge difference. I will upon occasion slow down if the action gets very busy, but its brief and clears up quick in those instances. Running mods is no longer a issue on in game slow down. While I may not run a lot of them, its really nice to be able to make use of the few I like.

Thanks for the feedback, it took a bit, but with this feedback and my own explorations, I managed to land in a good place.