Ambiguous source of slowdown..plz heelp

[Guest Diomed]

I've tried to be as independent as I can about this problem. But 19 Uninstalls/Re installs/mod installs is too many.

After a modded install, combat (mostly magical) causes consistent, unplayable slowdown if action or ambient sounds are enabled. And I prefer them to be.

 

Been trying to install many mods on a new SoAToB game- I've picked a set bunch and tried to master the art of mod compatibility mostly by not dumping the enitire contents of a mod like Tactics with a mod like SCSII, ect. I've even started new games after each mod I install to try and pinpoint the problem, but every mod up until I'm sure the last two I install (SCSII and BG2Tweak) seems to have little to no affect on framerate, even Improved Illyic, which I use as my testing ground (usually the hallway after the genie, were the proletariats and mages spawn in).

 

Ambient sounds are the first my system loses tolerance for (unplayable lag at any volume w/ presumably SCSII)

In some cases even action sounds cause slowdown during combat.

 

I'm using a high-end radeon card right now...fairly recent cpu...

If anyone has any idea what combination of mods or anything could be causing this sound-based (not graphic) instability, I would worship you as a god, because I love this game, and lord knows I may be being naive about my mod orders/combos

[Jarno Mikkola]

Ambient sounds are the first my system loses tolerance for

So turn them off.

 

Well, to get a players out of slowdown troubles, I made a list:

0. Always patch the game, start a new game and exit after the game has auto-saves itself(so you have to make a char or choose a pre-made one), before you do any moding, and you might as well make a safe backup from the important files: data and override folders, baldur.exe, BGMain.exe, dialog.tlk and CHITIN.key .

1. Put the ambient sounds off from the BGConfic.exe, as some of the areas might have no ambient sounds and so the game tries to start them many time continuously, and so looses processing power.

2. Don't mess with the game configurations so the speed adjustment percentages stay on "normal" ratings even if you have very high end machine, as the game has own it's internal fps counter, it sometimes tries to correct the fps on it's own by lowering graphs etc. Also the games frame rate should be set to about 30, as that's the default.

3. I wouldn't recommend to install any of the speaking item mods, as they run their scripts and fire their comments everywhere, and that's bad for the fps(frames/second count).

4. Delete the old files from the Cache folder time to time.

5. Inventory management(no stacks that have more than about 200 items, in a bag, arrows etc.), -might help.

6. Trying to avoid too many effects on a character(about 20 is fine, 200 is too many, and 20 000 is way way too many...)

7. De-fragmenting your hard drive might also help... as you don't have to go find the data in the pieces. (hmm, there is a joke in there, hih)

8. Install the mods in correct order, and make sure you started from a clean install, so there is no leftovers from old mods, by deleting the old mod files, the data and override folders(don't go and overwrite them), helpful links for for Tutu and BGT(the .pdf files) -based Megamods.

9. It might be a good idea to biff your override folder, but do that knowing that you generally can't change the game much after. Or use the End_biff from here.