SS1 Vet: SS2 Has Ripped My Arm Off and Beaten Me To Death With It

[mnbv99]

tldr; I'm unable to get SS2 to a playable state, mostly down to plot assignment failures, manual and automatic; send help.

After a long hiatus from FO4, I put together a fresh mod list and replaced everything SS1 with SS2 (started with 1.1.0b, current as of posting). I've since spent long evenings this last week trying to get SS2 to behave with even the smallest and simplest settlements.

I tried the SS2 main quest a few times and was eventually able to progress to the where the stranger finds his crate of toys in USAF Satellite Station Olivia. But wow did it take a bunch of fiddling, consoling, reloading earlier saves, and even a few complete restarts from Vault 111 to get all the way to Olivia without the dialogue and/or quest stages getting stuck on something new each time. I've since moved on and now use the holotape to cheat all plots, items, etc., into the game so I can focus on just trying to get SS2 working (without starting or skipping any quests, just the "add stuff" cheat commands).

I've narrowed down the actual symptoms seen so far to:

• I've confused many instances of things working fine but SS2 giving no player feedback for things not working, e.g., not enough aluminum in the stock pile for an agricultural plot to produce food, not enough homes for a commercial plot to build. There's probably still a fair few of these I've yet to figure out. It does feel bad fighting through these inscrutabilities though and not my happy place for an evening's fun.
• Most actual problems seem to trace back to settler to plot assignment often (but not always) failing for me (manual and automatic). The most common thing I see is a settler showing as assigned (hovering over them outlines their plot, track items quests show correct markers from the settler side and from the plot side, and the plot status is "Operational". But their plot's "AR" GUI (floating plot icons) shows a red assignment and their plot produces nothing according to both the SS2 report UI nor the workshop UIs across the top and the bars on the left. Far more rarely, but non-zero, I also see the reverse where settlers are unassigned by all indicators, but a plot shows a green assignment indicator. Multi-bed residentials seem to have problems all their own (mainly that SS2 seems to consider them work assignments rather than home assignments). Assignment, manual and automatic, to vanilla items like beds and harvestable plants work without issue and immediately update the UI.

I tend to see 70-90 FPS outdoors and roughly 130 indoors and according to SKK's Script Lag Detector maintain 0% script lag. I generally see only 1-2 active scripts in saves, never any suspended frames. SS2.esm is losing 21 CELL conflicts to InteriorsEnhancedAll-In-One.esp, 7 LCTN conflicts to a variety of mods (including WorkshopPlus.esp), and one REFR to Hunkered Down.esp. SS2Extended.esp wins its only conflict, which is with SS2.esm.


Here's the "core" load order:

Spoiler: Abbreviated MO2

Fallout4.esm
DLCRobot.esm
DLCworkshop01.esm
DLCCoast.esm
DLCworkshop02.esm
DLCworkshop03.esm
DLCNukaWorld.esm
Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch.esp
XDI.esm
HUDFramework.esm
WorkshopFramework.esm
SS2.esm
CanarySaveFileMonitor.esl
WorkshopPlus.esp
SS2Extended.esp
SS2_XDI Patch.esp

Papyrus logs do show these errors fairly often, which may be related (granted "errors" from Papyrus can be quite normal and not indicative of an actual root cause):

Spoiler: Papyrus

[10/23/2021 - 08:49:03AM] error: Property WorkshopContainerType not found on workshopobjectscript. Aborting call and returning None
stack:
[WSFW_ProductionManager (0C007AF].workshopframework:workshopproductionmanager.::remote_WorkshopParentScript_WorkshopObjectDestroyed() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[10/23/2021 - 08:49:04AM] error: Property sCustomVendorID not found on workshopobjectscript. Aborting call and returning None
stack:
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.UnassignObject_Private() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.RemoveObjectFromWorkshop() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.RemoveObjectPUBLIC() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[ (00054BAE)].workshopscript.OnWorkshopObjectDestroyed() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[10/23/2021 - 08:49:04AM] warning: Assigning None to a non-object variable named "::temp723"
stack:
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.UnassignObject_Private() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.RemoveObjectFromWorkshop() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[WorkshopParent (0002058E)].workshopparentscript.RemoveObjectPUBLIC() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[ (00054BAE)].workshopscript.OnWorkshopObjectDestroyed() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[10/23/2021 - 08:49:04AM] error: Property WorkshopContainerType not found on workshopobjectscript. Aborting call and returning None
stack:
[WSFW_ProductionManager (0C007AF].workshopframework:workshopproductionmanager.::remote_WorkshopParentScript_WorkshopObjectDestroyed() - "<unknown file>" Line ?
[10/23/2021 - 08:49:04AM] error: Cannot call UpdateInternalData() on a None object, aborting function call

Here are a couple screenshots from a current attempt with only one unlocked settlement with two settlers, one L1 agri plot (Ruined World's Two Step Garden), one L1 industrial (Gath's Materials Shed), and one L1 residential with two beds (Ohno's Skyline Apartments)*. The settlement shows 13 water from one hand pump and one electrical and has 6 electrical (2 remaining) from two vanilla windmills.

Spoiler: Industrial

Spoiler: Agricultural

I'm basically out of ideas and feeling beaten and defeated by SS2 in ways SS1, even in its early rough days, never inflicted. Any ideas or suggestions for things to check to try to shine light on the root cause(s) will be very appreciated. Heck, even knowing "this is just how SS2 is today" so I know to stick with SS1 for one more winter's evening entertainment.

* Note in the this attempt and others I've tried many different plots, sometimes only those from add ons, sometimes pure King Gath, sometimes mixed. I've also tried no residential and vanilla beds and only single-bed residentials. Symptoms don't change.
** Specifically to test delayed scripts I've spent real and game time outside settlements, both waiting to advance the game clock and just adventuring normally for multiple days.I've also tried the recalculate production command from the settlement desk. More than once.

 

[Muddball]

Most of what you are running into dissolves into one NOT-at-all communicated problem. The first few days of the settlement, before it all gets up and running, are relying almost 100% on your own scrap. if you are not running around concord grabbing all the things (or get the wrong RNG) then plots will just simply not work at all. Because even small electric generators are going to bust with their ludicrously high requirements for the 100% necessary basic requirement of a settlement beacon.

 

[msalaba]

You really need to make sure all your mods are compatible. When I first started SS2 I was so frustrated, I went full nuclear. I removed everything FO4 related from my computer including mods and mod manager and re-downloaded and re-installed everything. Then I spent many hours slowly adding mods to my load order to find out which ones were giving me problems. I can now go through the entire main quest without any issues.

For the settlement building, even if there is no apparent script lag, it takes a while for assignments to "complete." I've seen it take better than 10 seconds on a barely built settlement. The other thing is check the WSFW settings and make sure auto-assign is turned off for all vanilla objects. Otherwise WSFW and SS2 arm wrestle for assignments. I find better gameplay with all auto assignment turned off. Otherwise it seems SS2 moves my settlers around negating the SPECIAL bonus.

Like Muddball said, resources need to be watched. A plot will not produce anything until the operation costs are paid. In the early game you will want to focus on industrial so you can start unlocking the other material classes. IIRC, the next one unlocks when you get building materials to L2. etc down the line for the next 2 classes.

 

[mnbv99]

Thank you both! In a round about way, I was trying to say above there seems to be two classes of problems for me. First, SS2 working as intended but not as directed and giving no feedback. Second, SS2 can fail to "fully" register a settler to plot assignment.

You can see SS2 failing to assign in my screenshots. In these cases, the FO4 assignment system has registered the assignment (filled in settler icon) while SS2 has not (red AR assignment icon). Again, in this scenario the tracking quests and Operational status (vs Unoccuppied) also reflect assignment. Only the AR icon does not. Since yesterday I have found one case where this is actually "correct". SS2 will silently refuse to complete manual assignment of a settler who does not meet a plot's building's SPECIAL requirements. In that case, the assignment is registered by everything except the plot's AR assignment icon. This is doubly frustrating to spot if the building has SPECIAL requirements despite seeming it should have none (such as Gath's basic checkpoint for 1x1 Martial). A way to check if this is happening is to first assign the settler, then change to the plot building desired. In that sequence, SS2 does give a warning the building requires SPECIAL the previously assigned settler does not meet.

However, the buildings in the screenshots have no SPECIAL requirements. I've come to the conclusion there's an intermittent initialization problem with plots. SS2 will never fully assign to some plot instances and the only recourse is to scrap the instance and put it down again. I've had the most luck by following this sequence:

1. Place plot
2. Wait roughly thirty seconds for SS2 to assign a settler and trigger the scaffolding.
3. If scaffolding appears, only then make any changes (such as choosing a building type).
4. If no scaffolding, scrap the plot and the power pole (if applicable) and return to 1.

I've found this takes at most three loops to avoid whatever the root cause is. If the third attempt fails, then for me it's not been a plot initialization problem and instead was a case of "silently working as intended but not as directed". In other words, I need to check for "valid" but silent failures like unexpected SPECIAL requirements. It also feels like this may be most common with the first plots in a new settlement and once the first few plot instances have been beaten into submission, additional plot instances will work without multiple attempts. Interestingly, I've also seen it happen where I've several long-broken plot instances placed, I then scrap and replace just one, and suddenly SS2 completes assignments and places scaffolding for all plots in the settlement.

One other thing I've learned to be wary of is using the Refresh option on a L0 plot. Refresh will cause the plot to appear as if built to L1, even though it is not. I don't think this causes any logic problems for SS2, but it makes spotting problems harder for the player: "This is built up and marked Operational, why is it not working!". This burned me a bunch of times early on in my struggles. Lessons there are both to not Refresh L0 and to ignore the buildings' visuals and only consider theor AR plot-level icon when needing to know if a plot built up at. Also to realize "Operational" seems to be meaningless.

Anyway, after having spent the better part of yesterday again only mucking around the SS2 and learning the above (mainly "place, wait 30 and don't touch, scrap and replace unless scaffolding"), I'm starting to feel like I have some slight control over SS2. Again, it's still more painful than SS1. Not to mention it's taken me most of a week to get here while SS1 was mostly viable after only a few hours of player confusion and meta research (aka Google). And, I think, that's largely down to player feedback: a total lack of feedback in many areas, a lack of timely feedback in a few others, and just plain confusing feedback in others (don't get me started on the red residential plot icon rant; holy confusing UI batman). While I love the design and voice acting of the SS2 MQ, if not its sensitivity to breakage, it is no more a substitute for solid IXD than Clippy was.

I will keep SS2 in my current "test play through", but if I can't find a way to dramatically improve the player experience with SS2 by the end of the test run, then I think it'll be back to SS1, warts and al, as the only way to feel like I'm having fun with settlements and not fighting against them.

 

[msalaba]

SS2 can fail to "fully" register a settler to plot assignment.
...
It also feels like this may be most common with the first plots in a new settlement and once the first few plot instances have been beaten into submission, additional plot instances will work without multiple attempts.

This is not normal behavior. I have had delays of up to ten seconds, (normally around 3 sec.) but not 30 of failing completely. With auto assign and auto-pay construction costs on, the placed plot should be assigned (if you have a free settler) and start building (if you have the required resources to pay for it) within 10 seconds. This is why I said to check your mods for conflicts. Especially workshop mods. If the mod doesn't specifically say it is WSFW compatible, there is a good chance it is not. Almost all settlement functions SS2 needs is handled by WSFW. For example, I helped someone who was loading the UFO4 patch after WSFW. They couldn't assign anyone, as the patch was overriding WSFW's workshop scripts. I play with all auto assignment settings off including auto-pay construction costs. It seems like that system wastes too many resources moving assignments around when it should be doing nothing. With construction off, I can set the building plan I want before it starts building.
What I have learned with SS2 is if time does not fix it, there's a problem...

I do agree that there are places where a little more info/feedback would be nice. There is nothing like building your first advanced class plot to find that no one in the settlement can be assigned... There is a pile of information to help you familiarize yourself with the changes from SS1 to SS2.

Homepage

An Introduction to the Wiki

wiki.simsettlements2.com

One other thing I've learned to be wary of is using the Refresh option on a L0 plot. Refresh will cause the plot to appear as if built to L1, even though it is not.

I don't think I have tried this. If that is the case, its a bug and I can report it.

 

[mnbv99]

Thanks, good points!

I have checked for "static" conflicts. Details of SS2 records were in my post and were that SS2.esm is losing 21 CELL conflicts to InteriorsEnhancedAll-In-One.esp, 7 LCTN conflicts to a variety of mods (including WorkshopPlus.esp), and one REFR to Hunkered Down.esp. SS2Extended.esp wins its only conflict, which is with SS2.esm.

I should add that WorkshopFramework.esm and WorkshopPlus.esp lose no conflicts (nor really have any, other than a couple with Fallout4.esm).

Also, no files in the BA2s for Sim Settlements 2, Workshop Framework, and Workshop Plus have conflicts (loose or in BA2s) other than with files in Bethesda's and UFO4P's BA2s. All those conflicts are won.

As for more "dynamic" conflicts, e.g., another mod's script mucking with data used by WSFW or SS2, I of course can't say; I doubt there's an available steppable debugger for FO4 (if there is one, please do not tell me). But, I am very particular about my load order. Checking each mod over in xedit, carefully placing each in the load order by hand while considering record conflicts and BA2 contents, rejecting most mods that have supposedly "benign" problems or bad practices (like deleting records), and finally hand crafting compatibility patches for many (especially those that step on import UFO4P changes). For whatever that's worth.

I've played and debugged load orders for SS1 for years (and loved it!) so have learned the hard way (and repeatedly I'm afraid) about the sensitivity to anything that even looks slightly cross-eyed at WSFW or workshop scripting in general. Worth pointing out that the assignment problems I described could/maybe/perhaps imply that WSFW assignment is working as intended but SS2's side is not, for example, when a plot's "vanilla" indicator shows assignment and WSFW's tracking quests show ownership and assignment, but SS2's AR icon does not.

Of course, feel free to report anything you reproduce. At the moment, I feel I see far too little consistency in my observations and have too little control (aka reproducibility) to make any bug reports of any real value. Hopefully that'll change.

 

[msalaba]

I have checked for "static" conflicts. Details of SS2 records were in my post and were that SS2.esm is losing 21 CELL conflicts to InteriorsEnhancedAll-In-One.esp, 7 LCTN conflicts to a variety of mods (including WorkshopPlus.esp), and one REFR to Hunkered Down.esp. SS2Extended.esp wins its only conflict, which is with SS2.esm.

I'm willing to bet all these CELL conflicts are due to xEdit not knowing what the 'partial form' flag is. It will be displayed as 'Unknown 14'. These are not conflicts. It is xEdit not being able resolve the flagged records properly. This flag allows a mod author to add objects to the game without changing any CELL records. It also makes it so you do not need a patch to make sure certain records win. If the record does not have this flag set the record is most likely conflicting.
IIRC, LCTN records are mostly keywords and environment settings. Depending on what the conflicting record is, settlements could be affected. I'm unfamiliar with Hunkered Down, but I'll assume its a combat mod. REFR conflicts are with actual objects placed in the world. Depending on what is being overridden, these kind of conflicts can break mods, especially if the object is tied to a quest. SS2Extended is supposed to override many objects in SS2. It contains a lot of higher detail assets. I'm not too familiar with WSFW+ as I do not use it.

(if there is one, please do not tell me)

cough Creation Kit WIKI cough

SS2's AR icon

All SS2 (and WSFW) HUD elements are implemented using HUD Framework. Due to the method used to inject these elements into the game, the updating can act funny. I've been in a settlement and the needs meter doesn't update until I leave. I can't remember if toggling the icons off/on will force them to update. I do know they will if the cell is unloaded and reloads. I find the HUD elements are a little more reliable if you leave them off and use a hotkey to toggle them.

It sounds like you have a pretty good grasp of the situation. Maybe take a quick look at your patches and make sure you didn't overlook something. I can't tell you how many times I have accidentally screwed things up by moving the wrong record. Either way, I hope this helps a little.

 

[mnbv99]

Thanks. To be sure, the list of conflicts was more a way of say "there's no true conflicts, just this little stuff that shouldn't break game logic". Hmm. "Little stuff that shouldn't break game logic" and.... Gambryo... What was I thinking? Anyway, I've not had to write any patches for anything related to SS2. Actually I think your awesome XDI patch is the only patch I have that even get's near SS2 or WSFW. Any other mod that'd need to be patched I wouldn't install unless it was vital and I'd already gotten SS2 to work perfectly without it.

cough Creation Kit WIKI cough

Creation Kit doesn't allow you to attach to a running instance of Fallout4.exe and actually step through frames, pause on breakpoint, etc. At least I hope it doesn't; if it does I've missed something massive.

For what it's worth, I started yet another new save and plots seem much more responsive. Perhaps the problem's root is far earlier than when the player is eventually placing plots, some sort of global initialization failure. While I have seen messages from SS2 saying that it's initialization may have failed, I always quit Fallout, delete every save and start anew when I see that rather than follow whatever the suggested fix is. So whatever triggers that particular message isn't likely the cause here. Or it may be that this time the FO4 settlement existed (workbench unlocked) for several in game days before the first SS2 plot went down, rather than me charging in in "test it now!" mode.

 

[msalaba]

"Little stuff that shouldn't break game logic" and.... Gambryo...

Spoiler: You said you did not want to be told

Not the exe, but you can trace Papyrus stacks:

Maintenance - XWiki

Maintenance

www.creationkit.com

vscode plugin:

Home

Advanced language tools for the Papyrus scripting language. - joelday/papyrus-lang

github.com

I have seen messages from SS2 saying that it's initialization may have failed

Sometimes an addon can trigger this. Its a false positive. I don't know if the cause is known.

rather than me charging in

I have definitely noticed that issues can crop up if you try to do too much at once. You have to let Papyrus breathe every once an a while. Filling up your drive with saves can help when things go south. Sometimes just loading an earlier save is all it takes to keep going.

 

[mnbv99]

I have definitely noticed that issues can crop up if you try to do too much at once. You have to let Papyrus breathe every once an a while.

I wouldn't be surprised if this new save's SS2 reliability is largely down to me first setting up a settlement without any plots and letting it run for in-game days while I played normally and then religiously following my rule of "place plots one at a time and don't !@#$ touch them until the scaffolding comes up and scrap them if scaffolding is not up in 30 seconds". This prevents some kinds of play, like manual assignment, and requires some console cheating to replace lost resources and such. And, still plenty of weirdness, but it's feeling semi-playable at least.

At the end of the day, I feel like there's some real bugs that I may never get good enough info to make a report on. But, mostly this is me needing to meta the !@#$ out of SS2 here, the wiki, and xEdit, until I can figure out and memorize how it works and doesn't work and force it into delivering on the old SS1 promise of letting settlers build so players can go adventurin'.

 

[msalaba]

That's pretty similar to how I play, except I use the spawning of the building materials to judge if there are issues. I played SS1 with auto assignment but my time with SS2 has changed that behavior. To me, there seems to be an issue with the auto assignment system. Its like the re-assignment code runs too often but I'm unable to find the smoking gun. I have had way less issues playing with it off.

All in all, I think the hardest part of moving from SS1 to SS2, is realizing SS2 is NOT SS1. There are completely new systems that make the settlements behave quite differently. Once you get past that you will realize how much better SS2 is in most aspects. Once chapter 2 is released and Kinggath goes back to bug fixing and releasing patches, the remaining issues will be addressed and SS2 will be more robust and reliable.

 

[ElanaLoaded]

You really need to make sure all your mods are compatible. When I first started SS2 I was so frustrated, I went full nuclear. I removed everything FO4 related from my computer including mods and mod manager and re-downloaded and re-installed everything. Then I spent many hours slowly adding mods to my load order to find out which ones were giving me problems. I can now go through the entire main quest without any issues.

For the settlement building, even if there is no apparent script lag, it takes a while for assignments to "complete." I've seen it take better than 10 seconds on a barely built settlement. The other thing is check the WSFW settings and make sure auto-assign is turned off for all vanilla objects. Otherwise WSFW and SS2 arm wrestle for assignments. I find better gameplay with all auto assignment turned off. Otherwise it seems SS2 moves my settlers around negating the SPECIAL bonus.

Like Muddball said, resources need to be watched. A plot will not produce anything until the operation costs are paid. In the early game you will want to focus on industrial so you can start unlocking the other material classes. IIRC, the next one unlocks when you get building materials to L2. etc down the line for the next 2 classes.

Sidebar request: Msalaba, would you please post your mod load order? (I just returned to FO4 - a year away - MANY new things. Never played SS1)