Confused re: comment - City Plans (installed vs activated)

[Jacozilla]

Only have default RotC + Simple series city plans installed. Definitely not all activated - just doing few settlements at a time (no pre-built conqueror in this playthrough).

Was looking at the city plan contest entries pack (https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/35648?tab=posts) and saw post from uituit that confused me whether it is too many city plans installed or activated that causes stress on system.

Had always assumed the latter, not former, but now not so sure.

The comment was reply to a poster's comment of -
"Don't do what I did and download both main files.......instant black screen upon launch"

reply "ah yeah to many city plans adds to many scripts so if you have both Main files activated you will never be able to play"

Unless I am misunderstanding, this seems to say that mere fact of having many city plans installed - regardless whether activated or running, will trigger stress / crash / CTD. I thought it was having too many city plans running at once that was the issue, not dormant city plans installed?

 

[NDCowdy]

City plans actively building in game add a fair bit of script work. But the only difference as far as I know of having extra plans installed is a small delay with the game populating the lists for players to pick from. Not quite sure what the above quotes are referring to.

 

[Tinuvia]

There are two different issues with your system and city plans:

1) having many built up in your game may cause rendering issues and also script lag if they are upgrading simultaneously (which is why Conqueror has you wait in the Vault on a new save until they are all built up). This issue can cause CTDs.

2) there’s a data script limit of 64 mb hard coded into the Fallout 4 engine. There doesn’t seem to be any particular reason for this, but Bethesda probably never imagined mods such as city plans. Dynamically building cities demands heavy usage of script properties, which can reach 64mb if you have a lot of them or other mods using script data. This is regardless of if you have the city plans built or not. If you have them installed they will count towards the script data limit. Unsure if disabling the esl/esp makes a difference. If you reach the script limit, you will have infinite load screen (unsure if it’s only in the menu or even before you get to the menu).

Since discovering the script data limit, Kinggath has worked a lot to reduce the script data used by SS, addons and city plans. But this is the basics of it, anyhow.

Edit: more info on the wiki, here.

 

[RayBo]

Only have default RotC + Simple series city plans installed. Definitely not all activated - just doing few settlements at a time (no pre-built conqueror in this playthrough).

Was looking at the city plan contest entries pack (https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/35648?tab=posts) and saw post from uituit that confused me whether it is too many city plans installed or activated that causes stress on system.

Had always assumed the latter, not former, but now not so sure.

The comment was reply to a poster's comment of -
"Don't do what I did and download both main files.......instant black screen upon launch"

reply "ah yeah to many city plans adds to many scripts so if you have both Main files activated you will never be able to play"

Unless I am misunderstanding, this seems to say that mere fact of having many city plans installed - regardless whether activated or running, will trigger stress / crash / CTD. I thought it was having too many city plans running at once that was the issue, not dormant city plans installed?

I might have something to add here but need more info?

Are you talking at the very start of the game "before the first save after the mirror" or later after? Like after leaving the vault?

 

[Jacozilla]

There are two different issues with your system and city plans:

1) having many built up in your game may cause rendering issues and also script lag if they are upgrading simultaneously (which is why Conqueror has you wait in the Vault on a new save until they are all built up). This issue can cause CTDs.

2) there’s a data script limit of 64 mb hard coded into the Fallout 4 engine. There doesn’t seem to be any particular reason for this, but Bethesda probably never imagined mods such as city plans. Dynamically building cities demands heavy usage of script properties, which can reach 64mb if you have a lot of them or other mods using script data. This is regardless of if you have the city plans built or not. If you have them installed they will count towards the script data limit. Unsure if disabling the esl/esp makes a difference. If you reach the script limit, you will have infinite load screen (unsure if it’s only in the menu or even before you get to the menu).

Since discovering the script data limit, Kinggath has worked a lot to reduce the script data used by SS, addons and city plans. But this is the basics of it, anyhow.

Edit: more info on the wiki, here.

Ah! this makes sense, ty for the info.

I always knew about #1 and it's very YMMV - depends on type of city plan used, your system performance and specific mod builds (and conflicts). So never expected any exact X answer here, cause some ppl can use more concurrent, some less.

#2 was what I was looking for - wondered why there might be issue of having too many city plans installed, even if you're not using many of them. Glad I only installed the bare minimum then - I just have RoTC default 1 per city plus the 1 extra per city from bowejen's Simpel series.

I'll hold off installing the city plan contest entries until I want to switch from the Simple one.