screams  Okay... so I changed lights because I hated the lighting in the initial render.

THE ARTIFACTS CAME BACK.  Not only that but even WORSE than they were there before but also in the exact same place.  Texture filtering is OFF.  :blink:

I'm not sure what to think at this point.  I'll wait back to hear from E Frontier on the initial issue and then update them on what happened after changing lights.  Even if there is some trash like other folks have seen when rendering, it should disappear in the final render.