[2021] Weird bug resulting in massive performance issues

Thanks for the very detailed post! However if you feel this is a game bug then the place for it is the Bug Reports forum, not here - we could only help if this was a game installation or Windows/computer settings issue. Bugs can only be fixed with patches, not the kind of tweaks we can do here.

Have you tried opting into the beta of the next patch 1.4.5 , now in the Steam betas tab for this game? If not you could try that, best to start a new campaign under that patch for the sake of it being a good test.

I'm willing to look into logs from a run with a completely unmodded campaign that is having the problem, if you can acquire those.  

We don't move threads to Bug Reports, as when you make a new thread there there's a form to fill out to make sure all needed details are supplied.

Assuming logs2 is the later test, there are lots of unexpected errors in there , quite aside from the mod error! Probably best to do a clean reinstall including mod removal, to clarify matters.

- undo any hardware overclocking you have enabled
- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- unsubscribe from ALL mods in the Steam workshop for this game
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox Interactive/CK3 folders
In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.

- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add CK3.exe to the exceptions list of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.
- start the game with no mods active and test with a new campaign, as before.

Good luck!  

Then I'm not sure why you get those errors in that log? Because they sure look like mod or bad installation sorts of issues ... if you delete that error log and try the game again, do you still see those?  

Yes, I mean the first 7 lines of that log. There are many fewer errors in that one than the previous one, but that may just be due to only running the game briefly.

I don't there's a lot more you and I can do here. It may be that QA simply do not test the game with immortal characters. I'm not familiar enough with the gameplay of this game to know - is that a standard option or something you have to mod in, or use debug mode to achieve?  

I just tried your save file here on two machines. On my iMac a month flew by in about 2 seconds, on my modest PC about 4 seconds.

The save file loaded in maybe 10 seconds on both.

So I conclude there's something wrong in your game installation, your Windows or hardware! Yet as you had it on a previous machine, that only leaves the GPU ....


Do you have access to any other machine to try this on? Or another GPU you can swap in?  

The GPU is involved in opening menus of course ... but if you don't think it's the GPU, what else could it be? You are sure there is no other component brought over from the old machine that also had this?  

Yahyud said: it says that CK3 created 82 threads for a 16 thread system. If that's not normal behaviour, maybe that's part of the problem?

I have no idea in all honesty, not something I've looked into ever. But surely then that would affect my machine - indeed everyone's - as well as yours?

Yahyud said: I could try to specify 16 threads and test if there's a commandline argument for that?

In CK2 etc I know there is a launch parameter -threads=1 ... maybe try some variations on that?