Save File Issue - Potential Fix Here

I've had the long save issue occur now on both an Xbox One X and an Xbox Series X. The peculiar thing is that the saves were about as long on both machines, despite the Series X having a much faster CPU and an internal SSD.

It really does seem like the engine is waiting for some timed background process to complete before finalizing the save.

jpowzy said:

Just a quick 2 cents here.
I took break in order to wait for a save fix but updating now and will be giving it a fresh attempt right from the vault.

Anyways, I read through this thread and spotted a couple posts talking about plots maybe being the issue. I spotted this issue just after talking to Codsworth, don't think I even touched the Sanctuary workbench yet so hadn't built a recruitment beacon/tower and Jake hadn't shown up yet to build the first house. So don't think plots have anything to do with it.

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Yeah, most people are reporting it after building 2 or 3 plots in “if I had a hammer.” I made it all the way through, all 16 plots, without a single slow save. Then I go to tenpines, clear corvega for the 100th time (is there a mod that changes that quest location? Corvega sucks and so does its bobble head.) then back to sanctuary to drop off my junk, then I got my first slow save. Now it seems to be back to normal (slow saves in settlement) but the duration of the save seems to be related to the number of plots.

smitty420 said:

Yeah, most people are reporting it after building 2 or 3 plots in “if I had a hammer.” I made it all the way through, all 16 plots, without a single slow save. Then I go to tenpines, clear corvega for the 100th time (is there a mod that changes that quest location? Corvega sucks and so does its bobble head.) then back to sanctuary to drop off my junk, then I got my first slow save. Now it seems to be back to normal (slow saves in settlement) but the duration of the save seems to be related to the number of plots.

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Since you mentioned it, on my latest character, Tenpines acrually sent me somewhere other than Corvega. I don't recall where it was but it was the first time that I haven't been sent to Corvega for that first settlement quest. I ended up clearing it on my own much later. Maybe it's not actually a set location for that quest as I'm not running any mods that change radiants or MM quests.

leelazarous said:

Since you mentioned it, on my latest character, Tenpines acrually sent me somewhere other than Corvega. I don't recall where it was but it was the first time that I haven't been sent to Corvega for that first settlement quest. I ended up clearing it on my own much later. Maybe it's not actually a set location for that quest as I'm not running any mods that change radiants or MM quests.

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It’s not set as a location but it’s the most common place to be sent same like overland and backstreet apparel.

to expand this if you preclear locations or say you already helped ten pines you can be sent to oberland or any other settlement with preexisting settlers. The quest just searches through predefined prerequisites for locations.

XxA1xX said:

It’s not set as a location but it’s the most common place to be sent same like overland and backstreet apparel.

to expand this if you preclear locations or say you already helped ten pines you can be sent to oberland or any other settlement with preexisting settlers. The quest just searches through predefined prerequisites for locations.

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In a similar vein, yesterday was the very first time Rhys sent me to clear somewhere other than College Square as the first Cleansing the Commonwealth instance. I still haven't even discovered College Square, yet, much less pre-cleared it. (Tenpines still sent me to Corvega, though.)

Torberg said:

In a similar vein, yesterday was the very first time Rhys sent me to clear somewhere other than College Square as the first Cleansing the Commonwealth instance. I still haven't even discovered College Square, yet, much less pre-cleared it. (Tenpines still sent me to Corvega, though.)

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Yeah oberland sent me somewhere weird the other day and I was confused cause 99% it’s backstreet guess the engine can randomize a little.

kinggath said:

Any of you on PC dealing with the long save file issues who'd like to be part of an experiment to try and get to the bottom of this, I've got something for you to try.

Several folks have tried this in private, but the results are mixed, so I'm looking for a larger sample group to see if my theory is in the ballpark or not.

Theory

The best theory I have right now is that the long save file times are coming because we added a ton of new ActorValues in the 2.0.0 patch - these are used to store information on references. There are a special type of ActorValue called Resource ActorValues, these automatically transmit their values to the workbench, so they are very powerful - but it's possible having too many of these causes a save to have to record a significantly larger amount of data. Especially after a City Plan is built/upgrades, as a ton of new items would need to be recorded in the save.

This file takes about 75% of our new Resource ActorValues and converts them to normal AVs, which if my theory is correct, will mean they don't have to record a value or be tested for a value unless it has been explicitly set on an item, and none of these particular AVs are used outside of HQ.

Using This

To use this, simply download the attached mod, and enable it your load order, and then go try and trigger the long save file. So go do all the sorts of things that seemed to result in such a save problem with this installed and see if the issue still occurs.

Note that occasional long saves of a minute or so are not unusual after a large number of workshop items have been built (City Plans being a huge source), as workshop items have to be recorded to your save since they are non-temporary objects. 20 minute saves though should never be happening....

Please report back any feedback or anecdotes you have using this.

Warning
Assume this will invalidate your save, and so you should only play with it for the sake of experimenting - when trying to make actual save progress, you should disable this.

If will also break several features in HQ, such as the disease research system - another reason not to use this plugin on a save you plan on making longterm progress on.

Goal

If the majority of folks testing this have a positive experience over the next few days, it will mean I need to recode some things in HQ before I can make this a permanent fix. So assuming my theory is correct, assume the earliest we can have this fix incorporated into the mod will be sometime after Christmas. This is high-priority for me, but this is not something I can just hotfix without considering all the consequences.

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The only problem I have is after talking to the guy in vault 81 he does not turn up at the HQ so it breaks the quest and I can not get the plans for the HQ I tried to load a new save yet same problem. If there is a way to fix this please tell me because i am stuck for ideas

Angrysiren939 said:

The only problem I have is after talking to the guy in vault 81 he does not turn up at the HQ so it breaks the quest and I can not get the plans for the HQ I tried to load a new save yet same problem. If there is a way to fix this please tell me because i am stuck for ideas

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Update: After the above issue all quests after the guy in vault 81 is broken the pipboy radio dialog plays then it stops nothing else goes on i will try it now after the new update i will reply if it fixes it.

Angrysiren939 said:

Update: After the above issue all quests after the guy in vault 81 is broken the pipboy radio dialog plays then it stops nothing else goes on i will try it now after the new update i will reply if it fixes it.

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I feel like there was a thread for this specific issue. Look 2 or 3 pages back under questions and help, or just search for cedric.

I naturally comes up with the theory was actually since I have almost all settlements running with 20 ASAMs (as a default city plan) therefore causes the lagging as they might be "calculating" the materials, no?
Especially when you attach all of the caravans to one place (my case is Sanctuary). Do you think it is possible that there is some conflict with what job each settler has too?

A lot of special settlers will just be wandering around the Commonwealth before you finish their quest, I can see how is that adding up too?

I have no idea with mods, but like just my assume so please don't take all too seriously.

XxA1xX said:

It’s not set as a location but it’s the most common place to be sent same like overland and backstreet apparel.

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It's been Corvega literally every single time for me. I've no interest in preclearing it cuz I don't want to go there at all. I'm sick of it. There's too much BS on the outside to deal with, and if you go in the front door you're surrounded as soon as you make a sound. It's not a good place for a low level character.

I always clear Olivia first though (sometimes before I even go to codsworth) for Mary's locket but it's not always there. I haven't yet figured out the conditions for it to appear, but it's not related to the abernathys cuz I've gotten it several times before visiting them. It didn't happen until I started modding, so I'm thinking UFO4P tried change it, but it doesn't always work.

Russ0612 said:

Especially when you attach all of the caravans to one place (my case is Sanctuary).

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Are you using vanilla provisioners? Cuz the caravan plots are supposed to connect and route themselves. My Santuary/Sunshine/Starlight caravans make a triangle and I've never told them to do anything.

smitty420 said:

Are you using vanilla provisioners? Cuz the caravan plots are supposed to connect and route themselves. My Santuary/Sunshine/Starlight caravans make a triangle and I've never told them to do anything.

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I literally connect all of them to Sanctuary using vanilla provisioners, because I feel they take too long if I just let them be

smitty420 said:

I feel like there was a thread for this specific issue. Look 2 or 3 pages back under questions and help, or just search for cedric.

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i did im by him now lol yet his dialog is just "help in the vault" type of stuff.

Entering opening the actual workshop bench seems to reset "long save" occurrence for me. If I then enter workshop mode again, it will be a long save.

nosfsos said:

First of all, thank you for the reply it made things much clearer.


Is it possible to access that information somehow? Maybe using a third party program or something like that? I read on another thread that Kinggath already suspects it is not a script error but an I/O problem. Finding out where the I/O is getting stuck would point to where the SS2 code could be changed to try a different way to serialize.

Is there a program that open save files? I noticed that when it hangs, it stops writing to the file. For instance, my saves are around 60 mb, but when it was hanging on those 4.5min it was only around 22mb. Unfortunately, Todd serialization is in binary (instead of json or something humanly readable). I took a quick look at Fallrim, but I cannot order by serialization, i.e., get the timestamp of each property saved and order by it.

If anyone has any idea on how to approach this I'm all ears

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Would it be possible to look at the data structures 22mb into the save file to determine what's being saved at that point? Even though a snap shot is being taken, I'm assuming it's just 'variables' and not static 'structures' like esp records, etc., though the engine might try and access them for some reason or another and seeing what's being written at that time might help point to a potential cause.

My character is currently in the basement of Shamrock taphouse and on my first attempt I got a infinite load screen when trying to exit via basement exit. Now in my second attempt I have a very long save happening, at least 5-10 min+ at the moment. A bit strange since there aren't any plots in the Shamrock basement.

Another thing I was thinking was... has anyone tried playing a modded game that has SS2, WSFW and SS2 - Chapter 2 installed, but without actually doing any of the quests, using the holotape or anything else to 'start' the SS2, quest lines etc.,.? Just to see if the problem rears itself with just the inclusion of the data files (which it shouldn't) and other mods. Then after a certain amount of time, start the main quest but don't build anything. Play for a bit, testing the save times, then build the first residential plot. Play for a bit... save some... to try and see at what point it seems to appear?

From what I've read, it seems to happen after industrial plots, which I'm using RoTC and it doesn't happen all the time, it's very random but I'm thinking it didn't start until I fired off SS2 using RoTC (not implying the problem is with RoTC, it just uses SS2 functions). Here's a sampling where each time SS2 was started without using (or necessarily picking up) the holotape and just from the MCM settings:

watching for un-responsive task: 'Fallout4(24136)'.
'Fallout4(24136)' was un-responsive for '5' seconds.
'Fallout4(24136)' was un-responsive for '4' seconds.
'Fallout4(24136)' was un-responsive for '48' seconds.
killing un-responsive task: 'Fallout4(24136)'.

watching for un-responsive task: 'Fallout4(21604)'.
'Fallout4(21604)' was un-responsive for '1' seconds.
'Fallout4(21604)' was un-responsive for '15' seconds.
'Fallout4(21604)' was un-responsive for '11' seconds.
killing un-responsive task: 'Fallout4(21604)'.

watching for un-responsive task: 'Fallout4(16604)'.
'Fallout4(16604)' was un-responsive for '1' seconds.
'Fallout4(16604)' was un-responsive for '4' seconds.
'Fallout4(16604)' was un-responsive for '10' seconds.
'Fallout4(16604)' was un-responsive for '160' seconds.
'Fallout4(16604)' was un-responsive for '60' seconds.
end task resource monitoring: 'Fallout4(22096)'. <--- normal quit game.

This is from 3 gaming sessions (sorry about the time stamps, I'll code that in here in just a sec). When the 'Fallout4.exe" was auto-killed it was because it was waiting over a set tolerance (60 seconds). I've upped to 180secs, or 3mins, to see if most saves fall within that range. Interestingly, the time the game is un-responsive goes up, then middles out (without further sampling I can't tell it it will go up again and always middle out).

Normally the snapshot only takes a second most of the time, it's a moderately modded game, with at least 5 settlements somehwere in the RoTC building it all framework (though realistic build times is ON).

Quick Edit Note: All the 'un-responsives' were detected when trying to save the game.

Russ0612 said:

I literally connect all of them to Sanctuary using vanilla provisioners, because I feel they take too long if I just let them be

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take too long?

They have a limited range, but as long as you have 2 plots within range of each other they should connect instantly.
Provies are useful for long routes (like the Castle, I always acquire it far earlier than any in-range settlement like nordhagen, JP, or whatever) so I need a vanilla provisioner unless I want to double scrapping missions (f that.)

The only downsides of the vanillas are that they won't use salvage beacons, and unassigning them can be very difficult, usually requiring you to send them to another settlement, go there and find them just to send them back to the original. You can try assigning them to an unassigned plant, but it usually takes several tries, if it works at all, and they have a tendency to wander off while you're trying to do it. It's not an SS2 thing, I think Bethesda expected people to leave provisioners assigned permanently and didn't put much effort into polishing them.

Torberg said:

In a similar vein, yesterday was the very first time Rhys sent me to clear somewhere other than College Square as the first Cleansing the Commonwealth instance. I still haven't even discovered College Square, yet, much less pre-cleared it. (Tenpines still sent me to Corvega, though.)

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...seen that too, but only if I've already cleared out the area like Corvega first, but now that you've mentioned it, I'll keep an eye out on this playthrough.

I have noticed other interesting anomalies such as when trying to 'equip' the pip-boy NAX configuration, I started getting 'can only be used with power armor', which I'm pretty sure comes from the game engine looking at the game data- and is completely wrong. I've only seen this once in all my play throughs.

Normally, you 'equip', if that's the correct term, the NAX configuration, then a menu will be presented with the various mod's options. Which worked at the start of the game, but after awhile, went south. I could fix it by removing the holo-tape from my inventory and adding it back in. So the problem was the resident game's data (which gets saved out when the game is saved) which was 'removed' when I removed the holo-tape, then re-initialized back in when I added another one back (didn't try adding the same one).

To me, this is game data corruption of some kind, with one possible explanation is if a variable 'overflows' (whether a script variable?, injected dll- less likely since the long saves occur on xBox platforms which doesn't use F4SE) into an adjacent one which will alter it's value completely with any number of side effects from just strange things happening, to a full out CTD if the game engine doesn't like it, or it trying to handle data that doesn't normally require any sanity checking.