I'm getting long (~15s) delays at the start of dialogues for some reason.

The only thing I'm doing unusual that I can think of is that I'm using quest script variables to determine which options are available and which not. There are non-Auto properties to go with the variables so I can set them from end fragments. I was wondering if I was hitting a threading delay, but I wouldn't have expected that when accessing the variables directly.

Any ideas, anyone?

I see the same kind of 15s delays sporadically also, but at the end of the dialog, not at the beginning. One example, most times, the dialog ends and my new spell is added immediately, other times, it takes like 15 seconds for the dialog to go away and the spell to get added. I have two other dialogs and the others do it also (those two assign a companion, no spell or inventory involved.) I'd love to know what's causing it, but I've seen this same kind of delay in a totally different mod. In my other mod, I first started noticing it when 1.6 came out so I haven't worried since I hadn't changed the dialog.

I'm getting these consistently at the start. It's going to make the mod unplayable.

It wasn't happening much before today, so something I've done today must have set it off. I just wish I knew what though.

I suppose I can un-set a few "goodbye" flags and at least mitigate the problem

BTW, I am using script variables in my other mod and those topics have never had a delay. But it's interesting you mention the GoodBye flag because now that you mention it, all three of my dialogs have the Goodbye flag set. (I don't remember now if the delay I've seen in my other mod was on dialogs with the goodbye flag or not.)

Interesting. Is there another way of having an NPC end a conversation? The only way I know is setting Goodbye, and that's always been a little flaky

I saw in AV's Falskar thread there is a new dialog bug after the last update. Could that be it?

I wondered about that. I thought the bug only manifested when you altered vanilla dialogue, but this could be related.

The other thing I'm doing that I don't usually do is the "say once" flag.

Interestingly, none of my testers has reported the delay problem.

I wonder if it could be something amiss with my game, rather than the mod itself.

Sadly, that doesn't mean much... you should ask them just to make sure.

Maybe they do see it but haven't mentioned it because they see it in vanilla and/or with other mods too or just didn't care. Hopefully they really aren't experiencing the problem... maybe it's CK related? I'm not sure how, but I have had a problem with the CK crashing when I have both Skyrim and the CK running. (I7 with 12GB RAM so I don't think it's a resource problem...)

I have seen long delays at the beginning of dialogue and actually tried putting quest variables in to fix them - with no luck, but I don't think they made it worse. When the last CK patch came out people thought it had fixed the problem of dialogue without audio voice files going past too quickly in game (although I still sometimes have that problem), so I really wonder if this is a recent bug.

I saw this as well in my latest testing so I added a menu state int to my main quest and check/update it within the menus. At first it seemed to really make a difference (Once I got into the sub menus), but then when testing today, things seemed slow again. I am beginning to suspect it may also be impacted by the size of the quest script that the conditional variable is declared on. That is to say, I have noticed in my scripting when I check variable values within loops that are stored on other scripts, there is a signficant performance impact (like 10 times slower). As though the compiler has to load the entire other script in memory in order to check that one value. So... why would dialogue conditionals be any different? It may make a difference if one creates a new quest specifically for mainence of the menu state to keep the script associated with the variable as small as possible. I will be trying this within the week to see if it makes a difference.

That rings true. It was only when my quest script started getting large that I began to see the delays.

I can probably factor the script into two or three smaller ones without any great difficult. As you say, a dedicated state variable script could solve the problem.

Of course, what would be really useful would be to be able to test conditional variables on scripts attached to actors. Easy enough to do from papyrus, but does anyone know a way to do this from dialogue conditions?

[edit]

GetVMScriptVariable looks like it should do the job, but I never had a lot of luck getting it working.

I'm using it without problems. Just make sure you use the Conditional keyword on both the Quest and the property:
http://www.creationkit.com/GetVMScriptVariable

Yeah, but I want to test a variable on a script attached to something other than a quest. An actor for instance. You'd think GetVMQuestVariable would get data from quests, and GetVMScriptVariable would get them from other script bearing objects. (Disclaimer - away from CK and cannot check my facts)