STW CTD

[General Malaise]

I've been playing the STW campaign for awhile now without any problems but for some reason today it keeps crashing to the desktop after I click the End Season button. I ran a search to see if I could find anything but all the information related to CTDs was on medieval and the tech help links at Erado San's site aren't working. Anyone give me any information as to what causes this and how to fix it? If you need more details or system specs let me know.

[Red Harvest]

Not sure what revision you have, but I recall that sometimes you might have to clear all the unit and building queues to get around a crash like this. I seem to recall there were some bugs if an heir was in the queue at the wrong time as well. I'm assuming it is only doing this for a single save, not all?

[Kraellin]

red,
i dont think the bug about units in the queues showed up till mtw.

general,
normally, something like what you're describing occurs because of something that's been changed on your system, drivers, virus, new software, something turned on in the background, new hardware, but something that's changed and is now affecting the system. you could also be in need of a defrag of your harddrive or be running out of space in the c: drive swap file.

in more severe cases, your harddrive could be starting to fail or ram is going bad or your cmos battery is dieing or your cd rom drive is starting to fail.

i'd check the first paragraph stuff first, especially for viruses, polling software, or something running in the background, like a call home trojan or something like that.

if none of that fixes it and if your hardware seems ok, post some specs and we'll take a closer look.

K.

[General Malaise]

Red,

Yes, it only happens with one file after one specific turn. I canceled all the building, training, and movement actions but it still crashes.

Kraellin,

My hard drive was just defragged, I shut down all background programs before running, and there's no new software on my machine. As for viruses, since this is the only slight problem I'm having (with just this game) and I have update anti-virus software running I doubt that's it too. Here's my system specs if you need them.

Processor: AMD Athlon™ Processor 1.1 GHz
BIOS: American Megatrends
DOS: 7.10
OS: Windows 98SE
Memory: 320MB RAM
Hard Disk: 28.62GB Maxtor 7200RPM
Sound Card: Creative Soundblaster Audigy
Video: 64MB PowerVR Kyro

Did I miss anything?

EDIT: I just noticed the autosave before the turn crashes as well when I load it. It says you have just finished building the cathedral then when I click OK it crashes to the desktop.

[Kraellin]

ok, before you go to any drastic measures, try simply removing the save game file and starting a new game and see if it crashes with that one.

K.

[General Malaise]

Kraellin,

I did that already and it still crashes. It's only in this campaign during this turn that the game crashes... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

[Drucius]

Why not try a re-install on top of your existing installation, that would replace any corrupt files you may have, whilst retaining your savegames. Remember to patch it up though.

[Red Harvest]

One other thing that will cause a crash in STW (a bug I documented some time ago) was in the MI version. If you assigned an assassin to kill someone, and the target got killed before your assassin reached him (like if you sent 2 after the same guy), you could have a crash if you moved the assassin on the following turn. He would still show to be on assignment... Leaving him alone for a turn would clear his assignment queue. I believe this caused an instantaneous crash though, not an end of season/turn crash. So you might have to consider what your agents are doing as well.

[General Malaise]

Drucius,

Tried reinstalling already. Still crashes...

Red,

All my agents are simply counterspying. I didn't even move them...

[Kraellin]

umm, i hate to say this, bubba, but this:
Quote[/b] ]My hard drive was just defragged, I shut down all background programs before running, and there's no new software on my machine. As for viruses, since this is the only slight problem I'm having (with just this game) and I have update anti-virus software running I doubt that's it too. is a change in your system.

also, this:
Quote[/b] ]I did that already and it still crashes. It's only in this campaign during this turn that the game crashes... doesnt make any sense to me. you swapped out the save game and it still crashes, yet it's ONLY in this campaign ... that the game crashes. sorry, but that seems to be a contradiction.

what it sounds like happened, is that when updating your anti-virus or in de-fragging, something changed on your system as a result. it could be something seemingly insignificant, but enough to alter a driver setting or something.

also, were the kyro cards supported in stw?

check the Tech Library for additional help with stw. that's the archive for all the earlier stuff on stw and we/mi from the apothecary. there's lots of stuff about ctd's and kyro cards in there.

my guess, again, is that this is a driver problem, either sight or sound. you may have to get some other drivers.

K.

[Oaty]

I have had 1 game go corrupt on me before don't know what caused it and how to get rid of it but that particular game was unplayable so I just deleted it.

Even though this does not answer general malaise Q. I can mention the cure for the spy causing crashes. All you have to do is the spy that has a mission on a person that is dead, is to assign him to kill another unit instead of moving him, then just cancel that new assassination attempt and he is free and clear to do what he wants

[Red Harvest]

Quote[/b] (oaty @ Aug. 06 2003,02:10)]I have had 1 game go corrupt on me before don't know what caused it and how to get rid of it but that particular game was unplayable so I just deleted it.
I've had a couple go corrupt. I simply went back to earlier saves. It is less common in VI than MTW.