Solved Is it normal for the "Finishing Plots" stage of the initial setup to take hours?

[Excessive Paranoia]

I've just had to quit after more than two hours of waiting for the "Finishing Plots" stage of the initial setup to complete and only getting to 70%. I've already tried just letting my character sit at the base of the Vault 111 elevator and even then it only reached ~90% after several hours. Is this normal, or do I have something going wrong?

Thanks.

PS: I guess I should mention that I've got a heavily over-modded install wherein I've converted quite a few ESPs to have the ESL tag to allow for more mods. The vast majority of the mods are weapon and clothing / armor, but I do have some large quest mods and Horizon installed.

 

[Phil_T_Casual]

The more mods you have the slower this process can be.

There is a great alternative by @MrCJohn though, https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/38520
I used it myself 2 days ago and it's such a time saver.

 

[Excessive Paranoia]

The more mods you have the slower this process can be.

There is a great alternative by @MrCJohn though, https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/38520
I used it myself 2 days ago and it's such a time saver.

So it is normal for it to take that long with a mod load like mine? In that case, I'll just suffer through as I don't think the pre-builts offered are going to fit my needs because I tend to get pretty picky about which city plans I use while at the same time desiring the variety that having the mod pick one of the options randomly offers.

 

[Phil_T_Casual]

If you want to go that way then you could just do the pre-builds on a light loadorder and install your mods afterwards. If you go this way start a new save without the mods installed, don't using an existing with them just disabled.

 

[Excessive Paranoia]

If you want to go that way then you could just do the pre-builds on a light loadorder and install your mods afterwards. If you go this way start a new save without the mods installed, don't using an existing with them just disabled.

That's a thought, but I don't mind playing through the initialization. I've already disabled all of the "early" settlements that I'd get to within a few hours (I generally don't even get to Corvega within the first 10 hours), so its just a matter of finding enough time to actually play through the whole process. I was also concerned there was something worse going on so I didn't want to wait through the whole thing and start committing time to the playthrough, only to find out there was a serious problem that would have forced me back to square one.

 

[spacefiddle]

FWIW, it's generally safest, if somewhat.... excessively paranoid, heh... to start a new game with no mods at all. You don't have an inventory at the start of the game, and the engine cheats in a couple ways in the whole intro sequence. Sometimes it can cause problems for a mod that's expecting the normal game environment.
As someone who makes a ton of new games: I took a modless*, plain-vanilla start on Survival, gave the character a temp name like Squeaky Clean or Spiffy Bastard, and played the first 30 minutes or so, until you are at the exit of Vault 111. *The only thing I keep active is a hotkey for creating a new save. Do this, save the game, exit. Never save that character again.
You now have your own clean quickstart, and the reason you stop there is because of the last-second-changes menu the Vault Lift has: you can load up Spiffy, change their name (DO THIS FIRST THEN IMMEDIATELY SAVE), adjust stats, adjust appearance, exit vault, start game. This is because the game creates its unique key for the character's save based on name. So now you've preserved Squeaky in all their Cleanliness for the next start, have a customized character, and a blank slate.

This all takes less time to do than to read and think about. So for you: when you load your personal quickstart, have just SimSet + Conq and its related resources enabled. Rename the character, save, adjust stats and preferences, exit vault, and nothing else will be loaded while Conq builds the world. Since "hours" does indeed seem excessive, I am curious as to how much of a speedup this would be for you.

 

[mytigio]

Personally, I set my graphics detail to Low at the SS prompt in the begining, which speeds up the city building quite a bit, then after it's done I adjust my settings back up so they'll repopulate with the higher detail stuff when I get close.

 

[Excessive Paranoia]

FWIW, it's generally safest, if somewhat.... excessively paranoid, heh... to start a new game with no mods at all. You don't have an inventory at the start of the game, and the engine cheats in a couple ways in the whole intro sequence. Sometimes it can cause problems for a mod that's expecting the normal game environment.
As someone who makes a ton of new games: I took a modless*, plain-vanilla start on Survival, gave the character a temp name like Squeaky Clean or Spiffy Bastard, and played the first 30 minutes or so, until you are at the exit of Vault 111. *The only thing I keep active is a hotkey for creating a new save. Do this, save the game, exit. Never save that character again.
You now have your own clean quickstart, and the reason you stop there is because of the last-second-changes menu the Vault Lift has: you can load up Spiffy, change their name (DO THIS FIRST THEN IMMEDIATELY SAVE), adjust stats, adjust appearance, exit vault, start game. This is because the game creates its unique key for the character's save based on name. So now you've preserved Squeaky in all their Cleanliness for the next start, have a customized character, and a blank slate.

This all takes less time to do than to read and think about. So for you: when you load your personal quickstart, have just SimSet + Conq and its related resources enabled. Rename the character, save, adjust stats and preferences, exit vault, and nothing else will be loaded while Conq builds the world. Since "hours" does indeed seem excessive, I am curious as to how much of a speedup this would be for you.

*Rimshot*

As for creating a clean save, I have one, but hardly ever use it because I tend to play one save for hundreds of hours with the added RP twist of keeping a journal, so even as minuscule as it is, the intro helps get me in the RP mood. I think I've only actually started 3-4 playthroughs in the two years I've had the game. This whole thing is more about wanting to make sure I get it started correctly and without issues.

Personally, I set my graphics detail to Low at the SS prompt in the begining, which speeds up the city building quite a bit, then after it's done I adjust my settings back up so they'll repopulate with the higher detail stuff when I get close.

This is a good idea. Is it just the normal SS quality settings that I'd change to make that happen? From the initial windows and the tutorials that I've seen, you're kind of given the impression that once you've set it, you're stuck with it.

 

[mytigio]

*Rimshot*

As for creating a clean save, I have one, but hardly ever use it because I tend to play one save for hundreds of hours with the added RP twist of keeping a journal, so even as minuscule as it is, the intro helps get me in the RP mood. I think I've only actually started 3-4 playthroughs in the two years I've had the game. This whole thing is more about wanting to make sure I get it started correctly and without issues.



This is a good idea. Is it just the normal SS quality settings that I'd change to make that happen? From the initial windows and the tutorials that I've seen, you're kind of given the impression that once you've set it, you're stuck with it.

Nah, all of those start of game prompts that SS puts up are just pre-configuring things in the Holotape. You can edit them all again to your liking afterward. For example, setting it to Low Quality does things like turning of extra NPCs, Visitors, High Detail models on the plots, etc.

 

[Excessive Paranoia]

Nah, all of those start of game prompts that SS puts up are just pre-configuring things in the Holotape. You can edit them all again to your liking afterward. For example, setting it to Low Quality does things like turning of extra NPCs, Visitors, High Detail models on the plots, etc.

I wonder if the wording of that final conqueror popup shouldn't be changed to reflect that the detail settings could still be changed. It seems like that final warning is really only about the fact that you can't go back and re-randomize / re-select which settlements are pre-built.

 

[mytigio]

I wonder if the wording of that final conqueror popup shouldn't be changed to reflect that the detail settings could still be changed. It seems like that final warning is really only about the fact that you can't go back and re-randomize / re-select which settlements are pre-built.

Oh, I'm sorry, I meant the Details and Settings pop-ups.

You are correct that the pre-build cities pop-up is the one that is one-shot only

 

[spacefiddle]

added RP twist of keeping a journal

You probably are using this buuuut just in case you aren't, you should know about this mod, and for that matter all of Registrator's mods. Looks like you're also on PC, so Hotkeys especially among them.

I have to admit, having come back to the game after a year+ break, I too started from the intro sequence to get the full effect. Actually seeing the detonation that destroys Boston. never mind the fact that if you were really facing it your retinas would have been fried over-easy....

 

[cosmic-cube-keeper]

I have a game save from the first time I played the game; as in the morning it unlocked in Steam. Saved just before the vault exit. I have it backed up in several places, just in case. I also have a second save in Sanctuary, also with no mods. It was taken just after I spoke to Codsworth & unlocked the workshop. I've seen the opening sequence for the game perhaps five or six times.

The save outside the vault obviously won't let me start with pre-built cities, but the other most certainly will.

 

[Excessive Paranoia]

You probably are using this buuuut just in case you aren't, you should know about this mod, and for that matter all of Registrator's mods. Looks like you're also on PC, so Hotkeys especially among them.

I have to admit, having come back to the game after a year+ break, I too started from the intro sequence to get the full effect. Actually seeing the detonation that destroys Boston. never mind the fact that if you were really facing it your retinas would have been fried over-easy....

I tried using that for a while, but it lacks certain functionality that's critically important (like the ability to back up your work to an external file). I do have more than a few of his mods though, so I can appreciate his contributions.