Deceptively performance ruining mods?

[Algiark]

Are there any mod that seems simple or doesn't add much but causes huge performance drop when installed? Mods that you thought won't affect performance that much but causes significant FPS drop or uses way more RAM than it should?

[Guest]

How about you list all your mods and their versions so you can be properly advised.

[cantab]

The first and last time I tried Realism Overhaul, Smokescreen and Realplume lagged the game horribly.

[Streetwind]

I had the same experience with RealPlume. Tried it after it got featured in Modding Monday - without any other mods installed - and it severely degraded my framerate even with small rockets. Seemed like SRBs were the main culprit, the liquid engines didn't cause that much slowdown.

[Nansuchao]

RealPlume create serious lag if you don't limit the particle number from the Smoke Screen UI.

[metl]

I had that problem. I had no idea it could be fixed. Sweet!

[Nansuchao]

Yes, limit the particle to 2000, as suggested also in the RealPlume thread.

[Kerbas_ad_astra]

Some plugin bugs can throw exceptions every frame, causing the game to slow down. I know Kerbal Engineer has a couple of these that will be fixed in the next release. (They only trigger under certain circumstances and with certain custom configurations, so this may not be specifically your problem.)

Regarding RAM use, most addons' memory burdens are correlated with the sizes of their folders, but addons with lots of uncompressed (non-DDS) textures can take up much more than that. Clouds and IVAs come to mind (other textures can usually be compressed without causing problems).