CTD on Ice Giant of Undvik questline

[BrassKnucklehead]

CTD on Ice Giant of Undvik questline

I am suffering a crash to desktop on the Ice Giant of Undvik fight everytime I take him down a third of his health. I am assuming a cutscene is trying to play out but after my screen goes black (and sometimes cycles through some shades of black) it will leave me on desktop with no error messages or anything. I have usually been saving Vigi each time but havent tried it yet without saving him.

What I'm running just in case. I have tinkered the graphics quite a bit and the only thing i've seen change is whether or not I crash straight to desktop, or if my screen goes black for a short interval, before crashing the same exact way. I haven't had any problems in the game other than this one so far, running on Ultra settings for the most part.

Graphics NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070
OS Name Microsoft Windows 10 Home
Version 10.0.14393 Build 14393
System Manufacturer Alienware
System Model Alienware Aurora R5
System Type x64-based PC
System SKU 0729
Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700 CPU @ 3.40GHz, 3401 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 8 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date Alienware 1.0.9, 9/2/2016
SMBIOS Version 2.8
Embedded Controller Version 255.255
BIOS Mode UEFI
BaseBoard Manufacturer Alienware
Installed Physical Memory (RAM) 16.0 GB
Total Physical Memory 15.9 GB
Available Physical Memory 11.4 GB
Total Virtual Memory 18.3 GB
Available Virtual Memory 12.5 GB
Page File Space 2.38 GB

 

[SigilFey]

There are definitely a few of these issues cropping up for 1000 series card users. Try rolling drivers back, and be sure to use the CLEAN install option.

 

[BrassKnucklehead]

I'll try that, though for Nvidia users what would be the quickest and easiest way to do it? Also I had another issue I forgot about until now although it might be caused by the same problem. A lot of the swords and a few items in the world don't render for me. About half the swords either don't render at all, or their sheathe does but not the blade, for instance Ciri's blade does not render, but the red scabbard on her back does, and in most cutscenes the sword doesn't render. A couple items like a cup or bottle won't render in cutscenes either. It breaks the immersion quite a bit when you are running around staring at Geralt's back where he has two scabbards but no blades and starts swinging around invisible swords I actually pick swords with worse stats because I can actually see them sometimes. I'm hoping there is a solution for this but I'm guessing it's caused by the same problem? Is there going to be a patch for this at any point or just something that will be?

 

[SigilFey]

It may be related. Let's see what the new (old) drivers do for you and go from there. You may also want to do a verify / repair through Steam / GOG while you're at it.

 

[BrassKnucklehead]

Sorry to necro this post after a few months but came back to the game and am still at this point, it's the last one I have before Isle of Mists little bit, and this questline is a little bit more important with the whole allies thing than some others so it's kind of messed up I can't complete it. I have figured out that gettting the giant to a certain health threshold (a little more than that first "segment". so a little more than 2/3rds?) I don't even pass the first little line, it's kind of an odd spot just in front of it, but everytime i pass it the game crashes. can't prolong the fight, can't change settings. I've tried to rollback and clean install and mess around otherwise but haven't been able to solve it. The whole "disappearing items" thing is also getting very very old for me. The "dream" cave with the Wild Hunt king in it? yea he doesn't have a sword that renders which makes me worried about any "epic confrontations" i have with him later. Really bums me out. All the most important npcs don't have swords, over 3/4ths of the swords I find don't render either. the knife you use to harvest trophies, doesn't render. I've had a lot of cutscenes involving drink or food (the prison food in the beginning of Hearts of Stone DLC, on the ship) they don't render at all either and it's breaking the immersion quite a lot again. I see why I stopped before but I love the game so much I'd really like to get a fix for this

 

[SigilFey]

This sounds like a problem with your save-state, especially if you've already re-installed. (I know the fight works just fine, as I've gotten through it 5 times over different playthroughs without an issue.) Let's consider:

1.) Are you using any mods, or have you ever used any in the past?

2.) Can you list the complete directory path of the installation?

3.) Is the program itself set to "Run as administrator"?

4.) Do you have any config files set to "Read only"?

5.) Are you running with Vsync On and a Frame Limit of 60 or less?

6.) Are you using Nvidia Reference Drivers downloaded directly from nvidia.com, or some other version?

7.) Are you overclocking any part of your hardware?

8.) Are you seeing similar errors (mostly focusing on the graphical issues here) in any other titles?

If you could number your answers, just to ensure we're covering all the bases, that would be goody. Hopefully, it'll be a setting / config thing. Worst-case scenario is that you added then removed a mod and it permanently borked the save-state. You may also want to open a ticket with CDPR Support:

http://en.cdprojektred.com/support/...tcher-3&platform=windows&issue-category=crash

If you could include a saved game and a dxdiag run using the 64-bit option, that would be best. (Just know that if the game was modded at any point, it may not be possible for Support to assist.) Including a link to this thread in your message will probably save time, too.

 

[BrassKnucklehead]

No problem, I'll be honest I'm not totally familiar with everything on the list but I'll let you know the best I can

1.No I haven't put up any mods. Always a stubborn vanilla fan. Have basically all the DLC, and cosmetic DLC too
2.C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\The Witcher 3 or C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\The Witcher 3\bin\x64 for the exe file I suppose?
3. Yes I set the exe to do so
4. Not sure is there a quick way to check? I haven't used any mods and haven't changed any of the config files myself so they should just be in whatever state the game installed them in
5.Vsync off and frame at 60
6. I use them from Nvidia's site. Or rather the GeForce Experience and keeps them up to date
7.Not that I know of
8.Not particularly. Barring the odd occasional bit, I haven't had a game crash reliably like this on this rig to date, or have this amount of graphic trouble.

Thanks for the responses, I'm not worried it's a mod since I have none so hopefully it's just something that needs found and changing. Rest of the game runs perfectly fine, no lag, I get some screen tears sometimes (vsync blah blah) but other than that no other crashes other than that quest.

I do get the crash info in the game files if that helps (I just noticed i have like 2 dozen of them hah! ) Can't pull them up on my end. Or attach them here.

Let me know if there's something else I can do, I may put down in the CDPR support later today or this week when i have time

 

[SigilFey]

2.C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\The Witcher 3 or C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\The Witcher 3\bin\x64 for the exe file I suppose?

Maybe this! Follow these steps for moving an existing Steam installation, and put the entire Steam directory on the root of your drive. So: C:\Steam\... Folders like Program Files, Program Files(x86), and any folder that falls under your ...Users\[Your Username]\... (like the Desktop) are protected directories. In general, it's not a great idea to install any game anywhere under these directories.

4. Not sure is there a quick way to check? I haven't used any mods and haven't changed any of the config files myself so they should just be in whatever state the game installed them in

No need. If you haven't installed any mods or purposefully changed the files on your own, then they'll be fine. (Just for future reference, you can right-click on any file and select "Properties". There will be a little tick-box for "Read only" at the bottom of the window that appears.)

5.Vsync off and frame at 60

Turn Vsync On in-game, and be sure that it is set to "Controlled by the 3D application" in Nvidia Control Panel. You can also set the following in Nvidia CP, under the program-specific settings for witcher3.exe:

Anti-Aliasing = Controlled by the 3D application
Anisotropic Filtering = 16x (great little tweak for no performance cost in TW3)
Maximum frames to render ahead = 1 (do not confuse with "Maximum VR frames to render ahead")
Power configuration = Prefer maximum performance
Texture Filtering = High Quality

If that does not seem to have any effect on the crashing, edit your user.settings file (found in ...Documents\The Witcher 3\...) and change FPSLimit=48. You can also try values of 50, 52, 54, and 58. If the crash is being caused by some weird frame-timing issue, one of these values may work better than 60. I use 48 on my 980 ti, and I run without a single issue or FPS fluctuation anywhere. 48 FPS solid, across the board.

7.Not that I know of

It's very common for Alienware, CyberPC, Digital Storm, etc. gaming rigs to use OC for various things by default. The good thing is that they're usually configured using in-house software that should be readily available, and you should be able to "Return to default clock speeds" with a single click. You'll have to go through Alienware / Dell for this one, though, as I'm not sure how they're set up, exactly. If there is any OC, disable it. TW3 often fails to cooperate with overclocking.

If you've got no mods, then I'm fairly confident one of these will sort it out. Keep us posted!