Misc Modding Questions: Foundation Overrides, Holiday Decoration Examples, and Overdecorating

[mckaychandler6]

Hello to whoever's reading this! I'm about halfway done with a big faction-themed plots addon, but I have a few questions that I didn't see answers for in the modding guide. I'd love some help with them.

1. Is it possible for a plot to override the foundation it's tied to? It would make sense for a lot of these plots to use a dirt or concrete foundation rather than the base wooden one, but I haven't found an option for that yet in the scripts.
2. I'm having trouble finding examples of what the holiday object spawners actually spawn, and the "use info" trail in the Creation Kit hasn't lead me anywhere. I'm just looking for an idea of the sorts of the objects that the various spawners are associated with. Is there a resource out there? or a Formlist I missed?
3. I'm concerned that I'm overdecorating, and I'm looking for a precise metric I can use to determine if a plot is too memory-intensive. Does the "M%" at the top of the Creation Kit render window work? I'm averaging about 40MB per exterior plot, 12MB per interior plot. What's a good metric to use and what should I be staying under?

 

[msalaba]

You may want to request access the the SS2 author'2 discord here:

https://simsettlements.com/site/index.php?threads/addon-makers-toolkit-discord.15723/

As to your questions:

1. The answer is yes, but not easily. You have 2 options (I can think of).
   1. Copy the plot Activator and PlotConfig Armor records. Then edit PlotConfig to change the default foundation.
      1. I do not recommend this method as you would need to update your addon any time SS2 makes a change to these records or scripts to avoid issues.
   2. Create a dummy object the player builds in workshop mode with a script that places the plot and configures the foundation.
      1. I recently created a script to do just this but not for the foundation. When placed, a menu pops up allowing a choice of building plan and skin. I'm not 100% sure this would work. I'm assuming because city plans can place plots and configure the foundation.
2. I would have to look. I don't remember... IIRC, the holiday spawners point to a FormList of possible items of a certain size to place. These FormLists can be added to by addon packs. I would assume using use info on an actual holiday object would point to its Formlist.
3. A good metric is match the item density of the vanilla game. Add as many items as you can to your building model. This keeps the number of draw calls down.
   1. From what I remember, FO4 doesn't really care about memory usage. The thing to watch out for is the number of draws and triangles. If an area ends up with a lot (I don't know the magic numbers) fps starts to drop. I can't remember for sure, I think a better graphics card can increase these numbers.
   2. In the StageItem MiscObject script, there is a property iType setting this to 9 makes it so that item will not spawn on the plot if the player has the performance setting "extra objects" turned off. This can also be configured in the StageItems.scv if using the xEdit import script. I'm pretty sure this is explained in the wiki.

 

[mckaychandler6]

Thanks so much for answering!

1. Huh. Yeah, that's unfortunate, but it's about what I expected. The result probably wouldn't be worth editing SS2 or creating a special menu.
2. Most of the holiday-labelled STAT objects have blank "use info" sheets, and weirdly most holiday-labelled Formlists contain nothing but a keyword and perhaps some blank SCOLS: sensibly labeled, but only containing a pivot dummy. Skimming through the Christmas lists, I found an outlier that contained static objects, but their models were invisible markers. Presumably there are scripts working in the background here, but I can't find them. I guess the real answer is that I would have to make a plot containing all of the objects and test it in-game...
3. It's definitely less dense than the vanilla world in vertical areas, but having experienced size problems playing SS2 (crashes etc) I'm still worried. The base SS2 plots are a bit hard to go by, since they have a lot of variance. Some are bizarrely simple, while others are bizarrely dense. I'm definitely not, say, filling an entire room with shelves and lockers full of weapon models. But these plots also aren't lumps of dirt with corn growing out of them either. I have been including as many objects as I can in the building model, so that's good.
   1. SS2-labelled static objects contain draw and triangle information, so that's helpful advice.
   2. Yeah, the tutorial covers that. I have some custom clutter formlists and I should go back and apply itype 9 to them when they pop up on stageitem sheets.

 

[msalaba]

Most of the holiday-labelled STAT objects have blank "use info" sheets

I forgot I was going to look when I had the CK opened... But, I remembered there is this tutorial:

Holiday System

Describes how the Holiday System works, how you can add new decorations, and even how you can define your own holidays if you're feeling extra ambitious!

wiki.simsettlements2.com

Its no wonder "use info" failed... Its all setup via script in-game.

Looking at your pic, I would say the models look fine. Fps drop is usually related to too many StageItems collectively being loaded.
For me with a GTX 1070, building Sanctuary with a population of 20 with only default SS2 2x2 plots will cause my fps to average around 50 fps, sometimes dropping to ~40. In HQ, I start getting slight fps drops on the main level when around 50% of the construction projects are complete. Once I start building "decoration" types, fps drops start to exceed 10 fps when walking around through the hallways. Its particularly bad near the default player room.

I'm not really one to consult on this issue. Though it is why I created the Bare Essentials addon. In my current playthrough using a combo of my addon and default interior building plans I do not get fps drops in Sanctuary with a pop of 16. Yet... (knock on wood)