[perf/logging] `RequiredContentPack is being ignored` logged at WARNING per entry — ~16,800 lines per load

[nx-thaddeusaid]

Repo: BattletechModders/ModTek · File: ModTek/Features/Manifest/ModsManifest.cs
Branch verified: master (as of 2026-05-24) · Severity: low / log-volume + I/O

Summary

UnsupportedFeatureContentPackRequirements() logs a Warning for every manifest entry that
specifies a RequiredContentPack (an unsupported feature that ModTek then nulls out). In a
content-heavy pack like RogueTech — where thousands of entries carry RequiredContentPack — this
single line accounts for 16,809 log lines per session in our captures (17/17 sessions), the
single largest contributor to ModTek.log size by three orders of magnitude.

[WARNING] 		Specified RequiredContentPack is being ignored.      ← ×16,809 / load

It's pure noise: the message is identical every time, carries no per-entry detail, and is not
actionable by the player or pack author on a per-entry basis. The cost is string formatting +
disk writes for ~16.8k lines on every launch.

Source

ModTek/Features/Manifest/ModsManifest.cs (lines ~374–389):

private static void UnsupportedFeatureContentPackRequirements(ModEntry entry)
{
    if (entry.RequiredContentPack != null)
    {
        Log.Main.Warning?.Log($"\t\tSpecified {nameof(entry.RequiredContentPack)} is being ignored.");
        entry.RequiredContentPack = null;
    }
}

private static void UnsupportedFeatureAddToDb(ModEntry entry)
{
    if (!entry.AddToDB)
    {
        Log.Main.Warning?.Log($"\t\t{nameof(entry.AddToDB)}={entry.AddToDB} is being ignored");
    }
}

(AddToDB's sibling notice on line 387 has the same per-entry-warning shape and the same problem,
at lower volume.)

Why a level-downgrade does NOT work here

A tempting one-liner is to downgrade these from Warning to Debug. That does not reduce
volume in ModTek's default configuration: Log.Main is created at NullableLogger.TraceLogLevel
(Log.cs:8), i.e. it emits everything including Debug and Trace. Captured logs confirm it —
they contain 16,245 [DEBUG] and 182 [TRACE] lines. Downgrading would merely relabel the 16,809
lines from [WARNING] to [DEBUG]; they'd still be written. The fix must stop emitting per entry.

Suggested fix — aggregate to a single summary line

Count ignored entries during manifest processing and log one summary after the loop instead of one
line per entry. Concretely in ModsManifest.cs:

// class fields (near line 25)
private static int s_ignoredContentPackEntries;
private static int s_ignoredAddToDbEntries;

// UnsupportedFeatureContentPackRequirements (~378): replace the per-entry Warning with a count
if (entry.RequiredContentPack != null)
{
    s_ignoredContentPackEntries++;
    entry.RequiredContentPack = null;
}

// UnsupportedFeatureAddToDb (~387): same
if (!entry.AddToDB)
{
    s_ignoredAddToDbEntries++;
}

// end of BuildModdedBTRL(), after the `foreach (var modDef in mods)` loop:
Log.Main.Warning?.LogIf(s_ignoredContentPackEntries > 0,
    $"Ignored unsupported RequiredContentPack on {s_ignoredContentPackEntries} manifest entries (feature not supported).");
Log.Main.Warning?.LogIf(s_ignoredAddToDbEntries > 0,
    $"Ignored unsupported AddToDB=false on {s_ignoredAddToDbEntries} manifest entries (feature not supported).");
s_ignoredContentPackEntries = 0;
s_ignoredAddToDbEntries = 0;

This keeps a visible, actionable signal (the counts) while removing ~16.8k lines/load — the
dominant ModTek.log line family — and cuts per-launch log I/O substantially. The loop is
single-threaded (BuildModdedBTRL is a sequential enumerator), so plain counters are safe.

Notes

• The root-cause volume originates in content packs declaring RequiredContentPack on entries
  ModTek can't honor. That's arguably valid forward-looking metadata, so suppressing the log
  (ModTek side) is the better fix than stripping the fields from every pack.

Evidence

• ModTek.log search: Specified RequiredContentPack is being ignored. → 16,809 occurrences in
  the latest captured session; present in all 17 sessions.

[nx-thaddeusaid]

Correction to the suggested fix: a level-downgrade (Warning→Debug) would not reduce volume here — Log.Main runs at TraceLogLevel by default (captured logs contain 16k+ [DEBUG] and [TRACE] lines), so downgraded lines are still written. Updated the body to recommend aggregating the per-entry notice into a single summary line instead.

[CptMoore]

I've checked the documentation about this feature (written by me but was some time ago..)

Note that RequiredContentPack is only supported for newly added resources. Merging, appending or replacing resources won't allow to change RequiredContentPack of existing resources. Custom resources do not support RequiredContentPack.

So the warnings you are seeing is not an unsupported feature in general, but an unsupported feature for that particular resource. So it has to be outputted for every resource individually to make sense.

I think its indeed a bug with how RogueTech is probably using this feature (and the AddToDb one). Since RogueTech is generating its json files, there is a good chance this can be fixed on their side. Unless they also don't know which resources can even use RequiredContentPack. So probably best to ask them.

If indeed that's not possible, it might make sense to introduce a global flag to just suppress the warnings altogether here in Modtek or maybe just add another log prefix filter to ignore it on the logger level in the default ModTek config of RogueTech.