Glorious War Stories Ending With CTD

[antisocialmunky]

:furious3: Please end all your stories with 'CTD.'

I just had one the other day where I was playing the KH and was fighting outside of Pella. In between turns, my general was camped on the side of a mountain and managed to defeat two armies twice his size: The first was nothing but skirmishers but the second was filled with classical hoplites and phalangites. (The Alex AI is definitely better at recruiting.) So I start out by finishing off what's left of one of the stacks. I then attack the other stack which is camping right next to Pella. This pulls its garrison out to a field battle.

Now, this garrison was pretty tough and outnumbered me 2 to one. Gone where the days of nothing but low rank phalangites. Pella was full of good quality tons of Peltestai, 2 Pezheteroi, and other goodies. I routed the remnants of the skirmisher army quickly. The Maks marched up to my lines in perfect formation which was quite surprising. I had four units of slingers and 3 units of Kretan Archers. I told them all to try and kill the enemy FM.

Eventually the lines merged. I have nothing but 4 units of hoplitai haploi and my Spartan general sitting in the middle. Their cavalry predictable tries to flank. My slingers take down one, a units of haplois chase down the other one and kill it. Eventually the enemy FM charges my slingers on the left of my formation. I tell my slingers to hold and continue firing point blank at the Mak. They do so fairly sucessfully and manage to whittle the FM down to 3.

Now things are getting desperate in the infantry battle. The Pez are pushing my Haploi back and the horde of peltestai are getting into position to flank my men. I have no choice but to commit my elite Kretans who actually do quite well against them. One unit flanks one of the Pez and starts killing it surprisingly well. Another goes to kill a flanking unit of Peltestai(This fight goes on until the end of the battle). My last one goes to help a unit of haploi hold off a horde of untis trying to flank me. Kretans are very nice units to have. My Spartans are slowly killing the Pez and my calvary chasing haploi return to pile onto the Pez, they are now surrounded but htey won't die. Meanwhile the hordes of peltestai are trying to surround me and my slingers are still working on 3 or wait, FM horsies that are left. Three units are attacking him melee and one units is holding off one of the units accompanying the FM.

<30 minute mark.>

Eventually the Pez go into fighting to the death(this is good, I don't want them running back into Pella). They still take like 10 minutes to all finally die through. :wall: Those guys are tough cookies. Finally with the main threat to my army is eliminated, I finally can relieve my unit of haploi and a unit of Kretans that's been holding off about three times their number in units.

As relief finally reaches the now lone FM, I tell my slingers to run for it since I don't want to lose them all. They've done a good job. Three units of slingers kill about 50 of the Mak FM's horsies... :smash: I now have my whole army go for that FM. 5 minutes later, surrounded and all along, he finally dies. His relief unit is the last unit to go and I win. 2000 casualties to 1000 casualties. I click the okay button.

CTD. :2thumbsup:

[Zradha Pahlavan]

I do not know what a CTD is. Could you explain? [or someone else]

[NickTheGreek]

Crash To Desktop, where the game breaks and sends you back to your desktop (as the name suggests) rendering anything you just did and didn't save destroyed. Very annoying when they happen.

[Cyrus]

I have a huge heroic victory from just yesterday with koinon hellenon. i Had taken all of sicily and was putting my men on boats to take carthage when to my surprise the romans attack massalia. i destroyed the army and tokk (with a spy) the next turn taras. i then sent a scouting party of 2 units of greek noble cavalry (can't remember, was it Xistophoroi hippeis or what?). i soon arrive at capua, where i see 2 small armies: one is the town garrison comprised of 1 slingers and 1 leves, the other is with an equites 1 triarii 1 principes 1 hastati 1 elite heavy infantry of the italic allys and 1 rorarii. i try an ambus in the woods close to the city and they take the bait.Unfortunately it tells me they had time to prepare. so i decide to accept. i attack emediately the equites general who had ran off and kill him at the first charge, they rout, i isolate and charge from front and rear every unit exept the triarii, and they all rout emediately. now i decide to allow my exausted soldiers a rest and since i have no battle time limit i do so till they are fresh again. so i charge from front and rear some exausted triarri and to my horror they dont rout. Mind you that on huge unit sizes i now had about 70 units left due to the principes who after routing rallied and charged the back of my charging hippeis.so i wait i few minutes and decide to withdraw them and make'em charge front and rear again and it works :beam:. so i get a heroic victory with almost all my casualties healed exept 10, i press ok annnnnnnnnnd
:wall:ctd:wall: :furious3::furious3::furious3::furious3::furious3::furious3::furious3::furious3:

[Zradha Pahlavan]

Ah yes. Many times has that happened. But by the far the best one was this:

Playing as Epeiros, I had managed to conquer Greece and hold Taras. My troops moved northward in Italia and took a few cities, including Rome. The Romans had two cities left, one of which was under siege. They had one last big army that attacked my besieging force.

They had a good mix of heavy infantry, slingers, and Italian Allied Cavalry, and had more troops than me. My troops were mostly levy phalangites, with Samnites, Lucanians, and hellenic heavy skirmishers for support. The battle started and the enemy advanced. Their slingers were busily obliterating my skirmishers while the infantry plowed into my phalanx and the Samnites. There was a huge pitched melee in which both sides were taking heavy losses, but then I noticed that the enemy cavalry was no where to be seen. They had opted to go behind my lines and attack my general's unit, and in the ensuing fight I lost all but five men in that unit. The general survived, but he had to be pulled out, and all I had on and were the units of skirmishers who had been reduced to uselessness by the enemy slingers.

The enemy cavalry then ran away, and the infantry fight continued. They then turned around plowed into the left flank of my army. I saw it coming but there was nothing I could do since everyone was either fighting or dead. The entire left flank broke and ran. The enemy then split their troops to chase down the runners and to envelope my other flank at the same time. The whole battle broke down into chaos as everyone was all over the place, some units routed and others rallied, and meanwhile I tried to get my phalanx troops into a more circular formation. I had to retreat the general and leave them on their own while tried to collect a relief force.

The enemy cavalry finally got what they deserved when my tiny groups of routing phalangites finally stopped running and I was able to get them to turn their spears on the enemy. The cavalry routed, but the enemy general had survived, and my skirmishers were busily fighting the enemy infantry. I rushed everyone over to the big showdown on what had been the right flank, and arrived just in time to intercept the enemy general as he and his horsemen charged into the fight. He got killed by my skirmishers, and the enemy finally ran for it. I was about to pursue them when I noticed the enemy Triarii were still fighting, holding everyone up long enough for the rest of their army to escape. I made sure to kill all of the Triarii, but just then the enemy reinforcements showed up! Late for the party, but they still brought some good troops, and had to have my exhausted men form up again for another fight.

I managed to kill them too by outflanking them with the skirmishers. In the end there were two minutes of the battle left. The victory screen goes up. I click OK, then the campaign map loads.

The little animated general lifts up his hand and shouts "Victory!"
CTD.

[NightStar76]

Is there a patch coming to render the game more stable? :/ I keep getting CTDs and I'd really rather avoid them. :(

[Shylence]

Had one of these last night actully.

The backstory goes like this..

As the Kingdom of Epieros i had control of all Hellas (minus Sparta) Illyria and Magna Graecia, excluding siclly, at the start of my great wars anyway. The Ptolemies were the great super power in the world. capturing the heart of Seleukos's domain in mespotamia and then pushing forward on each side. I watched closey as they came into anatolia and began to eat up the last cities Seleukid cities which were warring with Pontus and. The last of the Macedonians which, in my role playing, had become Pegamon. Managed to make advances in Ionia and Karia but then they soon collasped. So i rushed east to Byzantion fearing that some "Pharaoh wannabe" was making designs on himself being the next Alexander. I had to defend the Hellespont and Bosphorus at all costs.

So a young General by the name of Balakros was given the chance to lead the first standing army of Epeiros to hold the European side. He was perfect for the role and young. Things could only get better. After a few years of Sieges and battles around modern day Gallipolli. I had no choice but to head east and cut the head of the beast that bit at me. Pontus struggled on in its northern coast but i could sense their impending doom. Pegamon was finished off by me, ironically, but in my role playing, the last of them pleaded for my protection.

With a core of Prezhetaroi(sp) with Podromoi and thracian peltasts i bypassed Nikeia which i had infected with spies and went straight for Sardis and Ipsos working my along the southern anatolian coast and straight through Central Anatolia taking Ankyra and Mazaka. Meanwhile A war on Italia had broken out as the Carthies sensed weakeness I repelled them at Taras, regained Rhegion with homeland reinforcements and liberated Syracuse. This left a strain in the east and my well veteraned army needed reinforcements So Greek and Galatian mercenaries from my new lands were hired on the promise of liberation. The Carthies betryaed the peace treaty and had tp punished and eradictated from Scilly. Many young generals answered the call along with natives of Magna Graecia
after the capture of libeo Carthage itself had to be punished and an invasion and sacking of the city occured. Peace was finally restored but it left hundreds of out of work soldiers and lusting generals ready for more war they set sale for Cyprus.

Making an alliance with Pontus and Galatian mercenaries I had hired to back up a ragtag second levy army, led by a few brave comanders, I gave central Anatolia to them. And as the role playing premise was liberation against the great agressor i had to give the southern cities to KH who held out in sparta and Rhodos, as independant cities. by this point the savaging of the eastern silver empire by the parthians and ptolmies had pressed on into a stalemate leaving one small Seleukid satrapy left. The yellow death now focused on Armenia

30 years since Balakros left for Byzantion aged 19 he was now outside of Karkathiokerta Cyprus became and staging post for Levantine invasions and now what was once yellow was a patch work of purple, blue, orange and green. The southern coast was KH. North of that all of anatolia minus pergamon (loyal to the ptolimes and the last macedonian rulers refused to join with Epieros) and Mytilene (mine) were Pontic. Amerians had re-gained control of their homes (thanks to me) and any attempts back in Anatolia were thwarted.

Syria, Assyria and phonecian lands were coming under my control By this time i had 4 armies. Balakros and his veterans. Our leader Milon and his new army and two levy/mercanery ragtags holding captured regions while the last resistance is mopped up.

This turn then had 6 battles.

A battle outside of Antioch
The sige of Sidon
The siege of Damaskos
The sieg of Edessa
and the battle at the pass of Ani-kamah
The last being Balakros and his fight for Karathiokerta

After all these battles it would be a while before any major reinforcements from egypt or mespotamia would come to aide the straggling western regions. With just one Royal stack minus a general ready to be dispatched in the next turn.

Each battle was fought in the said order, most large with the loss of one general outside of Antioch. At the end turn i was attacked at Karathiokerta i had 1500men they had 3500 together. I beat them off and just as the battle was won and the turns carried on. IT CRASHED! NOOOO!!! i came back and all my armies were back where they were pre-battles minus Balakros and his veterans, they had disappered. The turn itself took 2 hours to fight... i was soo annoyed.


The end :laugh4:

[Chester]

I had a battle hardend Roman army of roughly 1/3 the size of the attacking Iberian force. The enemy army had mostly bronzed chevrons, I had silver and a few single gold.

I was vastly outnumbered, so I used my calvary to run around drawing away units from the Lusto forces. I've never micro managed so much in my life. The battle lasted 38 minutes. I took major losses but the enemy took far more. The victory would have secured the region of Arse for at least another 8 turns, giving me time to move my newly recruited army in Italy over to reinforce Arse.

Just as I hit ok on the casuaties window.

CTD:skull::furious3:

[Dayve]

It helps if you wait 30 seconds before clicking the button to return to the campaign map.

However, when reinforcements are involved in a battle, the game is basically going to crash every single time.

When it's just your army fighting 1 single enemy army, 9 times out of 10 it won't crash afterwards. When it's your army fighting an enemy army plus a reinforcement army which also joins the battle, basically... it's going to crash.

It's a real pain in the ass and most of the time there's no way to avoid fighting two armies at once when they attack.

[antisocialmunky]

I haven't had that problem too much. It might just be a problem if you have several massive reenforcement armies. I could see how that would work. I've seem several different types of CTDs. I've had them occur on the autosave at the begining of a turn or something causing a graphics card failure and hard boot. Though most of the ones I've seen are at the end of battles. Sometimes when I click okay, sometimes when it goes to the campaign map.

Sigh, Empires better fix them...

And yes, I've forgotten how bad it is when you are attacked or attack multiple armies, kill everyone and then it CTD's.

[kekailoa]

I was the Carthaginians right next to the Lusotan capital. My army with battered and beat, with ten units of Liby-Phoenician infantry, two Numidian skirmishers, two Libyan Infantry, two Celtic slingers, two Carthaginian Citizen Cavalry, and two Generals.

I was fighting a full stack of elite Luso infantry and cavalry, lead by their gold chevron faction leader who was an EIGHT STAR GENERAL. While this makes no difference on the battlefield, auto-calcing against this guy was death. I met this army at a ford, with two crossing. Thankfully, the AI only took one, and I put my battered infantry and slingers to hold that ford. My cavalry stood at the other ford.

The AI charged their entire army across the ford, and my infantry met them. It seemed defeat was imminent for me, and my infantry was slowly being pushed back. My slingers were sent into the midst, and my general stood behind the mess, encouraging his men. Meanwhile, my cavalry, who had waited until all the enemy forces were engaged, crossed the other ford and circled behind the rear of the Luso forces. My infantry were all down to below thirty for each unit, and the carnage was heavy. My cavalry charged, only to meet a countercharge of the Luso light cavalry. They duked it out while my infantry was being steadily pushed backwards. Then, the enemy general was cut down. The lighter luso infantry broke, and the cavalry began to flee. But suddenly, half of my infantry forces began to rout. I charged my General into the midst of this, rallying his men and breaking the rest of the Luso infantry. I had done it. I had broken the back of the entire Luso peninsula.

Then,


CTD. The battle wasn't even done. The enemy had just began to flee.

CTD.

[lenin96]

Is there a patch coming to render the game more stable? :/ I keep getting CTDs and I'd really rather avoid them. :(

EB 1.2 patch.

[Cambyses]

Every couple of months I actually try to quit playing EB when the CTDs start coming too frequently, but it never works, I always come back. I think it was easier to kick my smack habit. :skull:

Its just that feeling of having an hour+ of your life totally wasted, and having to go pull off that same miracle victory all over again. I cant deal with it. I tend to just start a different campaign when I come back, but what do you guys do?

[Subotan]

Every couple of months I actually try to quit playing EB when the CTDs start coming too frequently, but it never works, I always come back. I think it was easier to kick my smack habit. :skull:

Its just that feeling of having an hour+ of your life totally wasted, and having to go pull off that same miracle victory all over again. I cant deal with it. I tend to just start a different campaign when I come back, but what do you guys do?

It's official then; EB, better than smack.
I'm in the same boat though. I always leave it for a few months, then come back to it and play it for a while and love it. You can't spend all your time playing it.

[antisocialmunky]

It's official then; EB, better than smack.


That needs to be a EB Loading Screen. So needs to be a EB Loading Screen...

[Cyclops]

Had one of these last night actully....

Me too. Generally my EB 1.2BI will ctd after a long (3+ hour) session, especially if there are multiple sequential battles. Once the CTD starts happening it generally snowballs: first one take sages to happen but then its like the gremlins got into the game and it'll happen all the time.

Last night my trusty Lussotannans (CTD free since 272, 40 something years) were toiling up toward Brittany (heh trying to think of a pun involving Britanny spears, but I'm too fatigued). I took some of the medium spears and a few skirmishers so I'd have to storm the place against superior foes. Down came the walls but my attempted outflank got stuck and it turned into a slog with some Scorto's on sheildwall fighting back to back ("back to back we must fight these restless dead" some WH memory popped into my head) and the rest repeatedly charging the enemy line, and the FM throwing himself in at the end. A tough victory, nothing glorious but satisfying to recover from a botched attack, and those boys are well armoured so the losses weren't heavy, pats on the back all round, click on the tick to end the battle...

CTD.

[antisocialmunky]

You know, I've foudn that if oyu wait a little bit before refighting the battle. You can usually get a even mroe awesome victory.

I RP that CTDs are just the General's Dreams before the night before the battle. :-p

[artaxerxes]

That needs to be a EB Loading Screen. So needs to be a EB Loading Screen...

Agreed:laugh4:

[Joszen1]

It made me (a) start a KH campaign, (b) despair and play Spore, for a while at least:

Playing 1.2, Luso vh/vh, year 212BC, conquered: Iberia, Southern/Western Gaul, Isles of Tin and Balearics. Holding Massalia with a broken army after defeating the Avernii there. Betrayed by Romani allies (saw that one coming). Army in Massalia: Lots of Celtic levies, couple of depleated Balearc Slingers, two Northern Gallic Merc, some Alpine swordsman, some Luso medium spearmen, 1 unit Cureapos, I think that is it, none have many chevrons. Romani army marching west from Segesta: 2 Pedites Extraordanarii, 4 Camillian Triari, 2 Romani Heavy Cavalry, 1 Samnite medium spearmen, the rest of the full-stack Camillian Hastati and Principes.

Also on its way through the Alps: a full-stack of Polybian hastati and principes with some old-school rorari and, eeek, 3 Polybian Triari.

Not to worry, I use my uber-faction leader (and his uber-army of 10 silver-chevron, fully equipped Iovoman, 4 Caetrannan and 4 Scortamareva) to block off the Alps (anything can be beaten with sufficient javellins and enough of a slope, or so I am hoping).

Massalia is besieged and six months later attacked. I duke it out, the walls are defended and then conceded, the town-square is held with massive casualties, the timer is on and the last Romani is run down by the Cureapos. Heroism abounds. I patiently wait before clicking "Victory". The Romani dissolve. The other army attacks my heir on his mountain, I laugh with joy as the flames that will burn Rome are lit.

CTD.

[Kromulan]

So, in my Getai campaign, fighting my former ally (Rome) in Po valley. Rhessus (defender of Carrodunum) is leading my army of falxmen and Thracian peltasts, with horse archers and a few elites in support. I saw a Roman fullstack sitting on a river crossing and decided to let them come to me. Click end turn and the Roman stack dutifully jumps me.
Romans had 4-5 Triarii, 5-6 PE, 2 FM and the rest were gallic spearmen (arrow bait).

So, I my line with peltasts in center with Rhaetian axemen, elites in reserve and falxmen on flanks and send my HA sprinting forward to harass the Roman advance. HA take a frightful toll on the gallic spearmen, then hang out in the rear after running out of ammo (rout chaser position). AI keeps a beautiful formation, with PE in the middle and Triarii on the flanks. The lines crash together. . . middle is stable, no advantage, while my falxmen butcher the triarii (dolts with sticks). 2 enemy FM die in melee vs the falxmen and the Roman flanks collapse. I send my elites and remaining falxmen into the flanks/rear of the PE and BANG! Full-scale rout. So I click the [Continue] button, my HA chase down the routers and I get the Clear Victory screen. About a minute or so to check the battle stats (I am a stats geek), I lost ~250 and killed ~2700.
Click out of the battle and CTD.
My first with EB. Only one so far <knocks on head. . . er, wood>.

[Aurgelmir]

In my experience,5 out of 10 heroic victory's are ending in a ctd.Dont had any probs when fighting reinforced battle's(playing 1.2 btw).But its really a breaker getting a ctd when you just managed to win multiple battles in one turn with the same lousy army against the uber army's of AS(i forgot to raid his lands...so i deserved it).But getting a ctd after the last battle in that turn(about 2 freaking hours)....you really have to see my second! mouse...

So i trying things...like waiting to click or save for every battle(lot of ctd's fighting on mountains side-hv-).I also tryed to go back to the main menu of eb after a couple of years....almost no ctd' attack.

Try it.just save.eb main menu.load save game.activate the script again...(mayby this issue has something to do with the script...i dont know,but loading a new savegame also requires to activate the script again)

[Tristuskhan]

In my experience,5 out of 10 heroic victory's are ending in a ctd.

If it was so, none would have been able to play Pahlava or Saka more than 10 years.... Since if you survive for ten years it means that you had a full load of heroic victories yet. And many more to come.

[machinor]

Don't get me started. -_-

[Aurgelmir]

If it was so, none would have been able to play Pahlava or Saka more than 10 years.... Since if you survive for ten years it means that you had a full load of heroic victories yet. And many more to come.

I hope not...But i never play the cav factions.Like i said i tryed to go back to main menu after a couple of years,and had 2 or 3 ctd's in over 70 years.