Skyrim Z-Fighting issue

This is an issue I have with some distant mountains in Skyrim. If anyone has any suggestions how to fix it, please share them in the comments.

Don't comment on my framerate please. It's usually ok (30+) but my old GeForce 8800 GTS can't handly Fraps on top of High Quality Skyrim.

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
• technical issue
• glitch
• bug
• z-fighting
• distant LOD glitch
• Glitch (video Game)
• Skyrim

[lorfsor]

@17dizzi From everything I've read, there is still no fix. It happens everywhere if the mountains are at a certain distance but it's most obvious west of Whiterun.

And yeah, medium distant detail seems to be the only viable "fix" but I prefer good looking mountains with flickering over that.

fSkyCellRefFadeDistance=300000­­.0000 , like hlvrn suggested, does slightly help by covering more distant mountains with fog/clouds.

[hlvrn]

I have contacted Bethesda tech support about this problem. They recommended a few general things, but none solved it. Finally they said that what I told them about the problem has been passed on to the development team.

Let's hope they fix this.

In any case, this setting in SkyrimPrefs.ini can help: fSkyCellRefFadeDistance=300000­.0000

It makes it so more clouds cover the mountains, thus covering a bit of this annoying flicker.

[lorfsor]

@hlvrn Thanks, I'll try that. Hopefully they will look into this issue but with all the other stuff going on with 1.2 I think it'll take a while if they ever do look at it.

The ini settings PedisTheFetus posted were also not effective. They did "fix" the Z-Fighting but only by entirely removing the distant LOD objects other than distant land. Setting distant object quality to medium fixes Z-Fighting and looks better than his settings, so his wasn't really a satisfying solution.

[PedisTheFetus]

IMPORTANT SIDE NOTE: ENTERING THE GRAPHICS OPTION MENU IN THE GAME LAUNCHER WILL REVERT THOSE SETTINGS!

[lorfsor]

@PedisTheFetus Hm ok, I'll try this when I get home. So exactly how or what did it fix for you? I only know the TreeLoadDistance line which just draws trees further away. Not familiar with what the other settings change.

[PedisTheFetus]

I spent a lot of time tweaking these.

Change to these values in your SkyrimPrefs.ini located in My documents/My Games/ Skyrim

[TerrainManager]

fTreeLoadDistance=125000.0000

fBlockMaximumDistance=80000.00­00

fBlockLevel1Distance=80000.000­0

fBlockLevel0Distance=80000.000­0

fSplitDistanceMult=4.5000

[gbushimprov]

@17dizzi This issue has been present since at least Oblivion, possibly even Morrowind, I can't remember. I'm sure I fixed this issue in Fallout 3 with an ini tweak but I can't remember how.

In Fallout it was because distant areas were detailed with LOD boulders rather than terrain and these were fighting for room. In Skyrim this issue is caused by snow. You could remove the snow in Creation Kit, not surehow though. I'm just trying rebuilding the LOD atm. Don't know if it'll work

[Froggen88]

I get this on all my games... :(

Is there ANYTHING I can do?!

[17dizzi]

Patch 1.4 just updated, just read the notes. Still not fixed.

I will be writing to Beth and complaining, in the strongest possible terms.

Can this be an engine issue if similar Z fighting happens in their other games? Annoying!!

[hlvrn]

I've started a thread for this issue on the official Skyrim forums. The link can be found in my uploaded video (check my channel, it's my only uploaded video).

There is a poll there on the forum thread on how many got the problem, but also some information why this is happening to us. Moreover, there's a few tips there to reduce the flicker (but not fix).

For instance, I recommend everyone to do this:

Under [Display] section in Skyrim.ini, add "fNearDistance=25.0000" without quationmarks.

[allst4r666]

Oh man friggin' Z-Fighting! I had the same problem with the buildings in the PC version of GTA 4. I fixed it by using old drivers (I'm on ATI and I backrolled to 9.10 - the only version that fixed the Z-Fighting!). The Z-Fighting was gone but because the drivers were old, the performance was crap. This is just plain annoying and I feel sorry for you :(

[17dizzi]

Any chance someone has found a fix? I have lowered distant object detail to medium, and am not impressed with how that effects other stuff tho it seems to help. I am quite new to the game, does this only happen in Whiterun?

[RecoveryRx]

I have the exact same thing

[PedisTheFetus]

@antaurus8 Yes but keeping fBlockMaximumDistance = fBlockLevel1Distance = fBlockLevel0Distance will eliminate flickering when traveling from Battle-Born Farm to Valtheim Towers. It is also for this reason that I don't suggest using the medium settings. The fSkyCellRefFadeDistance=300000­­.0000 tweak that hlvrn posted seems to do a decent job of covering the bad distant LOD that results. A high fTreeLoadDistance makes the distant mountains look a bit better as well.

[antaurus8]

@PedisTheFetus

Only one of the parameters fixes flickering:

fBlockMaximumDistance = 100000.00­00 (or less, NOT GREATER!)

Others can have default values or any others, but the main rule is:

fBlockMaximumDistance >= fBlockLevel1Distance >= fBlockLevel0Distance

This tweak has helped me.