Same problem here... 9900K, 3090 RTX, 64GB RAM, 120Hz 4K HDR Gsync display (mostly ultra getting ~80fps)

I'm not CPU bound nor GPU bound. As a game developer programmer, I suspect the following:

• Tends to trigger in high populated areas, especially during raids with monks running around. Likely hitching on pathfinding or ai states. If you run away from the monastery, it clears up, only for it to get worse again when you return.
• ...but you would think moving on to a new area would clear it up, but it doesn't. It persists. So failed pathfinding moves feels less likely.
• Seems to also trigger during cutscenes as well or get worse.
• When running through the world, it's less of an issue. Once you get near people, boom...
• Once triggered, it's permanent and over time gets worse (except while solo exploring open areas).

My guess without knowing the tech -- maybe there is some sort of memory pool recycling/reset issue with AI states or pathfinding, or potentially a thread contention issue. I'm going to watch my cores to see if any of my cores are maxing out/spiking...but I rarely see over 50% utilization (8 cores - 16 logical cores). This almost certainly has nothing to do with performance settings. But once it triggers, it only gets worse, and restarting the game fixes it... for 30-60+ minutes (longer if exploring, sooner if raiding/major battles).

Loving the game so far, wish I didn't have to keep restarting the game to lose the hitches.

More observations:

• Possibly triggered by civilian panic states during raids or large battles in populated areas.
• Causes some kind of corruption involving NPCs
• The spikes happen in areas with more people, actively drawing them.
• When you walk away from people, the spikes nearly go away
• Gets worse over time. The F1 graph shows massive spikes (I'll get 70fps average, but the spikes have a high amplitude both ways (down to say 20 and up to my cap of 120).

So possible garbage collection issue or processing invalid data (anims, models?)

I think this has been fixed in the latest 1.05 patch without it being specifically mentioned. I'm no longer having any stuttering issues. FYI, I've been using a wireless Xbox Elite 2 controller the whole time.

More observations:

• Possibly triggered by civilian panic states during raids or large battles in populated areas.
• Causes some kind of corruption involving NPCs
• The spikes happen in areas with more people, actively drawing them.
• When you walk away from people, the spikes nearly go away
• Gets worse over time. The F1 graph shows massive spikes (I'll get 70fps average, but the spikes have a high amplitude both ways (down to say 20 and up to my cap of 120).

So possible garbage collection issue or processing invalid data (anims, models?)

Same problem here... 9900K, 3090 RTX, 64GB RAM, 120Hz 4K HDR Gsync display (mostly ultra getting ~80fps)

I'm not CPU bound nor GPU bound. As a game developer programmer, I suspect the following:

• Tends to trigger in high populated areas, especially during raids with monks running around. Likely hitching on pathfinding or ai states. If you run away from the monastery, it clears up, only for it to get worse again when you return.
• ...but you would think moving on to a new area would clear it up, but it doesn't. It persists. So failed pathfinding moves feels less likely.
• Seems to also trigger during cutscenes as well or get worse.
• When running through the world, it's less of an issue. Once you get near people, boom...
• Once triggered, it's permanent and over time gets worse (except while solo exploring open areas).

My guess without knowing the tech -- maybe there is some sort of memory pool recycling/reset issue with AI states or pathfinding, or potentially a thread contention issue. I'm going to watch my cores to see if any of my cores are maxing out/spiking...but I rarely see over 50% utilization (8 cores - 16 logical cores). This almost certainly has nothing to do with performance settings. But once it triggers, it only gets worse, and restarting the game fixes it... for 30-60+ minutes (longer if exploring, sooner if raiding/major battles).

Loving the game so far, wish I didn't have to keep restarting the game to lose the hitches.