[Linux] Semi-unplayable due to startup time; getting worse with each update

[ltallen]

Quick questions OS: Ubuntu 23.04 HOI4 version: Avalanche v1.12.14.50e7 (5555) Kaiserreich version: 5/29/2023 version from Workshop List any other mods used: Official submods only, all except those with unmet DLC dependencies Were you using Steam? Yes Were you in multiplayer? No Which expansions do you NOT have? B4B, BBA, NSB, various unit and music packs CPU: i5-6500 GPU: RX 480 w/ standard kernel driver HOI4 is installed to a steam library on an external SATA SSD

Logs (At least game and error log)

error.log is an empty file. game.log log contains a single line: [15:31:58][defines.cpp:246]: 3724 defines loaded system.log These logs were from an attempt where I only let the game run for three or four minutes. In this time it did not progress beyond Versailles.

Explanation of the issue: This is a resubmission of an issue I reported last fall.. To reiterate, when the Poland update was released, I started to experience extremely long startup times for Kaiserreich. Vanilla HOI4 takes ~1 minute to load on my machine. Before Poland, KR would take maybe 3–5 minutes. After Poland, this increased to 7–8 minutes. After the next update (Shanxi I think?), exceeded 10. With the Ukraine update, this increased dramatically but inconsistently; I have clocked it at more than 30 minutes before giving up and killing the process. The bar loads just a little on "signing the treaty of Versailles," then stops either for a long while or entirely. Then it hangs for a somewhat shorter time on "purging syndicalists." BGM plays normally, and the backgrounds and quotes change periodically. On two or three occasions, however, I have gotten it to load in <10 minutes, but there is no rhyme or reason to when this happens; if it manages to get past Versailles, it will eventually make it to the end. Most of the time that I try to launch the game, it just gets stuck on Versailles indefinitely until I kill the process after 10 min. or so. If the game manages to load, it runs normally.

I have performed a full reinstall according to the wiki instructions multiple times, to no avail. On my last thread, @Pelmen323 suggested that this may be a problem with my SSD, but that is not the case: I have gotten a new SSD since then for unrelated reasons, and it made no difference in this problem. Although it is hard to tell, since I usually go for a few weeks without playing KR then come back when there's a new update, I believe that the periodic increases in loading time are caused by KR updates, not Ubuntu version upgrades or vanilla updates.

One thing I will try is loading another full-conversion like TNO (which I haven't played in some time) to see if it has the same problem; I will report back with my results

Update: Immediately after posting, I launched again and got one of the random successes I mentioned. It took about 5 minutes to start. I am posting the logs for comparison LoadSuccessLogs.zip

Update 2: Tried loading TNO several times, and each time it loaded in 2–3 minutes. This is a Kaiserreich problem, not a HOI4-with-big-mods problem.

[Pelmen323]

Can you try to load just Kaiserreich, without any models submods, and post the result here @ltallen Models submods are huge which may cause the bottleneck.

[ltallen]

I just tested it four times without any model submods. Each test was successful and clocked in at about 4 min. 10 sec. So it appears that they may be the issue. Logs from fourth test attached. NoSubmodsTest.zip

[Pelmen323]

Also fyi - the largest submod is the "base game models" (the one that does not depend on any DLC), all others are not so big so they should impact loading speed less. Nethertheless, feel free to experiment to find the best combination. I'll close this ticket since we can't do much about that - the game forces us to use huge .dds files for textures, which are the main cause for the big size of models submods

[OrionIV]

Sorry to barge in, but I also tested the loading times in a similar case, 16 GB RAM and internal NVMe SSD, the loading time was 31 seconds, and an additional 4 seconds for loading the save of an 1937 august game. You could also try to run the game skipping the launcher, it shaved off a few seconds for some reason.

In any case, there seems to be something wrong with your config, it shouldn't be that slow. Maybe unsub and resub for Kaisrerreich? Also deleting all KR files between them.

[ltallen]

Sorry to barge in, but I also tested the loading times in a similar case, 16 GB RAM and internal NVMe SSD, the loading time was 31 seconds, and an additional 4 seconds for loading the save of an 1937 august game. You could also try to run the game skipping the launcher, it shaved off a few seconds for some reason.

In any case, there seems to be something wrong with your config, it shouldn't be that slow. Maybe unsub and resub for Kaisrerreich? Also deleting all KR files between them.

I've reinstalled the game and the mod many times, and I've more or less given up on a solution. Honestly 4 or 5 minutes isn't that bad; that's about how long I used to wait for CK2 back in the magnetic hard drive dark ages.