Anyone had this problem

[Tone]

In my current campaign game i've managed to get myself completely over-stretched. I'm defending with 20 units against 8,400 (approx 140 units)Imagawa and need to get rid of them very quickly.

As it's summer and the timer is off I thought the best way was to camp with muskets. Not to rout the attackers off the map, but just to let them keep coming with reinforcements and kill as many as i could before my ammunition runs out.

This works for a while until this happens:

http://www.richards4.fsnet.co.uk/stw00000144.jpg

All the Mons of reinforcements on the field turn identical to the last unit to come on regardless of which side they're on, hence my 4 units with Imagawa Mons.

Shortly after this the game crashes.

Is there a limit to the number of units the game can cope with in one battle? Or is there something wrong with my game.

[Catiline]

Never seen that b4. That was a bloody battle though

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It's not a bug, it's a feature

[candidgamera]

Tone:

Had a similar experience in a battle recently against a Ronin horde. Had routed everybody I thought, but Ronin kept coming on, until I found and routed some guys hidden in woods. Game crashed to desktop right at end of battle - this happened 2 times in a row - very exhausting.

I'm thinking that software/hardware having trouble at some point dealing with/tracking the follow-on reinforcements if the overall forces are huge, and horde opponents gets
more than casual quantities of reinforcements onto the map. Your Imagawa bannered troops seem to point in that direction, glad to know am not alone in something like this happening. I run 1.11 still, and when this happened to me, I had my timer off also.

BTW: Very saguinary field there, wonder if this is what Nagashino looked like after the battle. And what year is it in your campaign? - your troops are so wimpy (sarcasm).

------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Anssi Hakkinen]

Whoo-whee! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/eek.gif After that many corpses, I wouldn't be surprised at all if my graphics card ran out of texture memory. That may be what happened to you, too. Check the error.log file in your STW directory and report the results to Erado-sama at the Tech Support forum, he may be able to help (or you may just have to get youself some better hardware).

As always, Erado-sama's Tech Dojo (http://erado.totalwar.org) is worth checking out while waiting for an answer...

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"I listened for response and heard only praise."
- Friedrich Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil

[This message has been edited by Anssi Hakkinen (edited 03-11-2001).]

[Tone]

Candid: glad to see i'm not the only one haha http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif spent far too much on those swordsmiths etc. But most of that honour is from this battle, talk about veterans in a day.

Anssi: checked the error.log straight away it said the last error was 7Mar this happened 10Mar, nothing to go on there.

Didn't even want to think about the hardware, don't want to buy a new GC for one unusual battle

[candidgamera]

Anssi:
Thanks for the input.

Tone:
Further: Found that beating that first army on early, and killing the general, and just keeping the routed army on the run, and getting into his reinforcement area early has avoided me this problem altogether, as never had this prior, and have beaten hordes over and over.

Also, Tone, anyone, ever had this happen?
In current campaign as Imagawa, Hojo/Ronin formerly Hojo attacked my province of Yamashiro around 25 times over 6 years and then stopped - just like French mutiny of WWI (1916, 1917 can't remember)/Kirk Douglas/Paths of Glory.

He'd notched up his attack force by 1-2000 each attack from 3-5K all the way to just over 18K and stopped after having been beaten 1-2 times.

I grew a general from 0 level to 5th in the process (and shortly thereafter went on to get him to 6th level and the +3).

I'm to understand that there's an upper limit on how many total troops/armies can be engaged in a province, as have run into this before - couldn't move more than a few armies into a province with a really big horde (about 20K).

Am wondering if the horde stopped because it couldn't add more troops to the attack because it had hit the above limit so didn't continue the attack. This under the 1.11 patch AI that trys to send more troops in on successive attacks if it can and doesn't get victory on the first try.

Tone: not to bug you too much, but again what year in campaign are in in the picture?



------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Tone]

Candid:

Don't worry not bugging, had to go and start game to check, Summer 1570.

Not sure on the other problem, i've never noticed this happen. Although i may have put an enemy attack stopping down to my brilliant leadership, cough cough.

I'm looking through the programme files at the moment to try and work out any problems with troop/unit numbers. I'll let you know if i dig up anything interesting.

[ShaiHulud]

Considering all the dead horses, maybe PETA was behind the crash..... hehe

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Wind fells blossoms, rain
fells steel,yet bamboo bends and drinks

[solypsist]

I've sometimes had the same-banner (Mons) deal happen with my own army reinforcements (river battle) but the game never crashed.

[Puzz3D]

I stopped playing the campaign for this very reason. I encountered a repeatable freeze during big battles where I let the ai bring on wave after wave of reinforcements. It always happened during the third wave (60 man units). The last time it happened no units were engaged, none of my units were moving and the camera was stationary. There were only ai reinforcements arriving. Nothing in the error log. This would happen about 1 1/2 to 2 hours into the battle. I must have tried it about 6 times, and didn't want to waste any more time trying to figure it out. I finally decided to just wait for the v1.13 patch. I sent a detailed description of the problem and my system specs to the Shogun (Richie). Never heard anything back.

It does seem like the program is running out of some resource like video memory. I was using a 16 MB Creative Banshee at the time. I had 128 MB RAM and plenty of swap file space.
I could finish that campaign using auto-resolve for the large battles. To me: standing at the ai's reinforcement entry point is too artificial.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[candidgamera]

Puzz3D:

Heartily agree with you on the "camp on the entry area stuff". The old hex map games used to handle something like that by delaying turn/time of entry and moving the entry area over. Maybe an abstracted ZOC would be the trigger for this, and AI.

Would be nice to have some abstracted connection between battle map and strategic, with some indications of adjacent provinces right on the battle map edges - flanking river provinces would then be possible, and if below impliemented you could be comining in on both sides of the river. And open up the possibilities of where/how reinforcements, AI & player enter - why do they have to enter all in column. Imagine a whole line of fresh troops entering at once - per MP - run away, keep running!

And give us an AI "sun" to relate direction, beginning of the battle you're told what time of day it is.

My big problem with the campaign is the 16 unit limit on map at one time - especially late in the game. In my campaign mentioned above (after glitch), checking the logfiles, and my saved games, my 4 armies that engaged the horde amounted to about 4500 verses just over 11K for the horde (about 1000 of the horde aborted my Ise army's attack), and it just didn't matter - once that first bunch were wupped it was all over:

Seems like this could be addressed by combination of the following:

One method:
1. AI compares number of army mons in province, player & AI, and makes a ratio.
up to 1:3 or 3:1, rounded in defenders favor, or other factors (general rank maybe, details to be thought out).

2. Whatever that ratio is that's the number of battles the guy on the low end of the ratio has to fight and win to end the general battle successively: Now when you're outnumbered 3:1 you've got to fight at least 3 times to win.

Another idea, maybe combined with above:
Let 2 armies, subject to the above ratio regime, and available armies be on the map at the same time: so if you're outnumbered 6:1 in army mons, opponent not only fights you three times, but each time he's fighting you with 2 armies instead of one.

This all goes with breaking up the horde, AI recombination of armies, and making AI armies spread out some in their deployment - like Sun Tzu says to do - flow like water. And maybe relating deployment of AI armies to groupings around good generals, (multiple columns reflecting general operational ability)

Posted some before about the above, hope no one objects to seeing it again.

candidgamera


------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[candidgamera]

Tone, if you're out there:

Finally, got around to checking my error log per Anssi-sama and sure enough getting:

D:\Shogun\Code\Main3d_1.cpp(4097) : DirectX call : DDERR_OUTOFVIDEOMEMORY

on many of my sessions, but hasn't been crashing me except as discussed, probably one of the sessions with a bunch of these stacked up(you think . . .), computer just got tired of trying I guess.

Guess I need to go for a 64MB card, running 32MB, pre-GE Force now.

Ever get a sat answer to your mystery?

games that crash teach us things,
candidgamera

------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Puzz3D]

candidgamera,

I played the campaign for a long time (3 1/2 months). When I first encounterd the reinforcement feature in the battles, I thought it was a neat solution to the 16 unit limit. However, after playing many campaign battles, I've found them to be more enjoyable before they reach the 16 unit limit.

I think you should battle ai armies individually. Just drop your army on the enemy army that you want to fight. If there are multiple enemy armies in a province, you would have to fight and beat each one in separate battles to win the province. the winning army could stay in the province even if there were other enemy armies there, and the province would enter into a contested state. This would eliminate as yet unused armies from dissapearing because the first 16 units were routed and there was no friendly province to retreat into.

It makes sense to me to think of each army in a province as geographically separate. You just have this 16 unit limit for performance and management reasons. The game is running into a limit anyway. It's just being imposed by something outside the program. I can never get back those hours that I wasted because of this big battle freezing problem, and it was a lot of hours.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[candidgamera]

Puzz3D:

Agreed, no problems up to even when maybe 1-2 16 unit armies per province, and up to 16 units per side engaged works good.

Don't know if I'd go with being able to attack specific armies - might be too much control. Like the direction in general you're going, as is its kind of like a surreal battle of "champions" for the province - ohp! guess its my turn today, off I go - other troops don't matter. Like the contested province idea-goes on with sieges-why not repeated battles in the field. Where this leads to is a campaign for the province, in the province, gaining control, rather than marching into it repeatedly - the horde comes in to stay, and you get to see his campfires every night in a manner of speaking.

The foundation my ratio's is to refer to what goes on in custom/historical battles and apply it with in reason to campaign battles - keep total on map forces to 4, 16 units max counting all sides. Combined with successive battles in province same season/turn, and ratios - reflect the troops in the province - you just never go back to strategic map until its finished. As you say the troops all get engaged and have to be dealt with.

Hybrid of yours/mine would be to give player choice, chance to pace his campaign like a "in the field siege" - you could pick how many battles you chose to fight in a season
therefore the intensity/pace of the campaign. But to make it even more "fun" the AI/human opponent could decide whether to continue as well (base success failure for initiative - who sets the aggenda on general operational ability below - simple as comparison of generals rank maybe).

Other subjects, but I'd be factoring in the supply "carrying capacity" of the province, attrition (disease/desertion), and the ability of armies to retreat.

Europa Universalis is doing some of this in dealing with fighting the natives to conquer the province-you can just keep attacking as long as your forces hold up and/or until the natives are all gone.

Old SPI monster "War Between the States" did something like this in that battles were fought in the hex and each player made a commitment/intensity level and results were based not only on relative forces, but commitment level.

Posted before on this, but would like to see the AI move as columns rather than a horde, the columns lead by 2-3 level generals, maybe give them more armies, ect. I'd factor in an operational rating in this too to govern how many moned armies a general could lead.

That would be more challenging than now. In above Imagawa campaign horde attacked me repeatedly, when there were other routes of march/approach not guarded nearly as heavy as Yamashiro.

Also, lets make that "reaction" phase symetric - player gets that too - kind of like "defensive fire", success based on the above operational rating - sometimes the orders are issued, but it just doesn't happen.

All this would give nice "operational"
"battalions/ regiments/ divisions" feel/nuance to the game - being a general would mean a little more.

Been thinking about your last para's premise.
would prefer to think of it as "the armies have geographic location". What follows relates to above, and goes with:

Maybe the way to approach the "bigger map" issue is to make the provinces a collection of maps the size we have now that have geographic/edge relationship to each other, fit together - this way in the above each battle would take place on different map, and you get to pick what "sub area" to go to, above "reaction move" in effect per above. Would allow more spectrum of posturing: maybe move in just to establish presence, maybe direct confrontation.

If armies were small, might have to split up to corner your opponent, strategic map movement again would have direct relationship to the battle map in terms of entry.

In all this - you'd have to own all the province to get the koku - its as you say: contested.

Where I'm trying to go here is so program still is dealing only with one tactical battle map at a time - the hard graphics part - running out of video memory.
Think that the current battle area of the maps is believeable, especiallly if in province there's more places that fights could take place.

Additional load on program would then hopefully be mostly in keeping track of more places and how many troops in each place, and effectively more increments of time within a season for the successive battles - more number crunching - a simpler task - - developers????

Mainly just trying to offer a concept here, understanding that program may not "do it this way".

I hear you on the long battles and crash stuff - same experience http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/frown.gif.

Just out of curiosity, how many campaigns have you completed?

Think I'm going to finish this one, cross my fingers, go to 1.12, and go online. Expect it will be a bracing experience - as they say BANZAIII!!! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif.

Interested in what you/anyone thinks,
candidgamera


------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[GunShire]

dont have smoke on-line it just makes LAG...

[Puzz3D]

candidgamera,

You have a lot of good ideas there. You might want to discuss them in the editing/mods/patches forum.

I don't know how many campaigns I played in 3 1/2 months, but it was a lot. I always played on expert to keep the tactical challenge high. So, I lost a lot of campaigns. I played a tremendous number of battles in that last unfinished campaign with the v1.12 patch. From about the middle of the campaign onwards the battles became huge, but my enjoyment of the game declined. Then I happened to get a couple of small battles, and they were very challenging. I remember my enjoyment picked up again. The big battles are challenging, but also tedious. I just think the battles play better without the reinforcemant feature, and I was trying to think of the simplest way you could stay within the 16 unit limit and still have a campaign game. If I went back to finish that last campaign now, I'd use the auto-resolve feature to get around the freeze problem and the tedium.

If you're into the tactical aspect of the game, then definitely go online. It might be tough going at first, but you'll improve, and the quality of the battles far surpasses what the ai can throw at you. You also get 2v2, 3v3 and 4v4 co-op battles which can be down right intense.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[candidgamera]

Puzz:

Think I'll give it a whirl, though I notice the mods part of this forum, languishes a bit in terms of getting feedback.

Better samurai-sama than me, have been playing my campaigns on hard.
Especially after hearing about the bottomless AI cheating at the expert level.

Based on your comments on big battles: is that you're having to fight WWI over the same province season after season like me, or having difficulty getting AI army all routed and on the run to avoid having to deal with his reinforcements in too much strength? Small are you talking say 400-600 a side? Stayed away from the autoresolve because it just made me a loser in the horde defensive battles where I was vanquishing the horde armies when I tacticaled.

Have had some battles where my guys ran out of gas endurance wise getting to the controlling ground of the reinforcement area - one mostly about having to "navigate the alps" getting there, and one not enough YS to his fresh YS - got to get that dike plugged early or its over - one of those though helped spread a horde out so I could better defeat it in detail.

General observation unrelated, just BSing:
Big pull of these Shogun battles for me is getting to see that "point of decision moment" that's implied reading about a battle. Am very reminded of American Civil War playing this, from above, just what Pickett's charge looked like as it crested at the angle. Different periods, weapons, but seems common elements.

Hear you on the exhaustion factor. Sometimes though for me that part's like the Far Side cartoon of the pioneer full of arrows, sitting against his burning wagon saying to his buddy: "Yeah Clem I hurt, but its a good kind of hurt."

Am wondering if you need to go to 32MB card from your 16 - in general have had no troubles with 32MB - the freeze issue as discussed. And I think avoided the hubub about Nvidia drivers - my understanding probably doesn't apply to me with a Diamond Viper 770D Ultra though it has Nvidia component.

Online:
Am going to be interested to see how well my 38K average connection speed fares. Imagine with literally a world of "gladiators" as an arena I'll get spanked hard. But hey, played 10 years at Advanced Squad Leader before I started to win. Probably keep it at 2v2 max - machine really chugs on anything higher - re: the big downloaded version of Sekigahara.

regards,
candidgamera

------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Puzz3D]

candidgamera,

It would be nice if there were separate difficulty settings for the strategic and tactical parts of the game. I would like high tactical difficulty, but balanced economics. I've made the suggestion to CA/DT.

I played a lot of defensive bridge battles in the campaign to wear down the ai. These did become tedious. Routing the first 16 units off doesn't achieve the objective which is to inflict high casualies. I played some pretty big battles in Musashi, and never got the freezing problem. I don't remember the name of the map that the freeze occured on. It wasn't a river map. I could substitute a different map for that province, and see if I still get the freeze.

It's really the bridge battles that I was thinking of as being tedious. The large non-bridge battle was more interesting since there wasn't a single choke point on it, but the order of reinforcements was unbalanced. The second wave of ai reinforcements was all cavalry, and the third wave was all no-dachi. The reinforcements come on at a single point and follow a predictable track. IIRC, this was a battle where the ai has about 10,000 men and I was defending with 3000.

By small battle, I mean those where you don't need the reinforcements. Once you have to worry about getting those reinforcements, your maneuvering options become more limited. Your onfield force can't get too far away from the reinforcement point, and don't want enemy units in that path.

That's a good point you have about the horde issue and auto-resolve. I wonder if the game is even winnable on expert difficulty if you always use auto-resolve for the battles?

Pickett's charge is an excellent example where the strategic need to win the battle of Gettysburg outweighed sound tactical considerations. You can see the desperation of it in the phenominal cyclorama painting by French artist Paul Philippoteaux. Go here for some info about it: http://www.nps.gov/gett/gettcyclo.htm

I'll be getting a new machine with a 32 MB video card soon. So, maybe that will get around the freeze problem.

Definitely turn off smoke as GunShire suggests and maybe get rid of the fauna and music as well. Stick to 60 man units. It does seem like you'll be limited to 1v1 and 2v2 online. Some people play low koku battles, and that keeps the unit count down which helps slower machines. I hope your connection doesn't drop down to anything lower than 38K. Games that show a latency of under about 500 should work ok. If you get the drop countdown as the joiner, you can stave it off a bit by pressing T and hitting send once each time you see the countdown. Sometimes this will get you back into the game, and sometimes it won't.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[candidgamera]

Puzz:

With you on the settings. Have I got it right to assume what you mean by "high tactical difficulty/balanced economics"?:
1. AI is all over you in the tactical battles - no "feint right, feint left, and then straight at you stuff".
2. No AI "magic economics" of deficit spending, ect.

Rail Tycoon II, had a mix and match like you mention, sure would be nice with STW.
Not of the "gotta make everybody in my image school" here, and above would make STW able to make detail people like me and people wanting lighter fare happy too.

Your devils choice of take-out-more/route 'em early is just like my battles for Yamashiro in Imagawa campaign. Started to make headway on this when I could work in 1-3 YC to make their retreat more costly, and or do the "Cannae thing" - getting in their rear and chewing up their archers - short battles/routed early/high losses inflicted, say 600-800 instead of just 100-300. Still left the tedium of season after season though, just moved the attrition process along faster.

My cav experiences like yours mentioned have seeing lots of massed CA, some YC too. Haven't had the all "red pants" experience, mostly its been massed YA, that are pretty easy to get running. The imbalanced force entry at a point, part basis my comments on opening up to let more stuff be on, let them come on in a line also. Thinking a left mouse click lays down one limit, and then another marked in red Japanese style banners. AI would do something similar in its own way.

My 2nd Shimazu campaign had lot of riverline action at Kawachi. Found if I could repell initial assault off the bridge and get in force on the other side, the river didn't matter - in that province. YC again was important. Haven't really fought a lot in Musashi - playing my longest running campaigns as Shimazu and now Imagawa - its kind of like a "crossing the Rhine" experience - - its "1945" and its all getting moot, by the time I get there.

My main tedium has been repelling straight on attacks where I could have 3-4 archer units - the rest mostly YS, maybe a YC unit, and a good slope with trees at top. Archers just sit there and nuke YA or even WM on approach, and then YS crash down on them, well rested from their hidden positions in the trees. Repeated experience in Buzen me as Shimazu, AI Mori.

Your relative force numbers are familiar, as I posted above when the horde stopped though I was about 1000 and horde attacked with 18000+. BTW: have any knowledge on that magic forces engaged limit per province in the campaign?

Found it depends on reinforcements - attacking Shimosa, found them quite useful
because of relative position of the bridge board edge - shot off arrows, routed off archers, got cav, MU on. Sounds like you've had some longer, more spread out battles than me.

Suggestions to EA/DT: Lost some of my campaign improvement suggestions postings from the community forum - thread got chopped. But the map thing and a collection of thoughts from here, the "bureaucracy post" (http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000559.html) and campaign improvement suggestions: http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000421.html
still have. Kind of waiting for the xpack and 1.13 before I collate and send my ideas off . Thinking out loud here . . . wonder if people have tried a "louder voice" method with devs, making submittal of suggestions backed up as a petition of many names?

Good question on autoresolve.

Have tried to turn sound off, but can't get it to go away in the battles. Have to try the no birds or smoke stuff.

Online: Latency? Am assuming that some all this will be self-explanatory. Just found out this coming fall Cable modem available my area - probably try to give that a whirl, had been considering DSL up to now, about a wash here in terms of the cost paid now for 2nd internet phone line.

OT on Gettysburg:
Been there a number of times, once on a Memorial Day (real clear nice day that) and have seen the cyclorama. Seen the movie - think its a little syrupy toward the south - but otherwise succeeds in conveying how special the event/place was. A little of Michael Mann-type editing, and thrift - like in "Last of the Mohicans" in order maybe. Have to check your link. Have you been down there? If not really worth it, very good Railroad musuem at Strassburg in that same relative area too. I found something special about G'burg, especially that Memorial Day.

Always trying to imagine two college football stadiums (went to Univ. of OK - seating up to 75K) deployed in that small of an area, and that climatic cheer along the Union lines after Pickett's Charge was repelled. All of America at the time there . . . the regiments each state's delegation, North and South to more of a kind of "Greek Democracy", not a republic, with votes, debates, resolutions resolved by force of arms (rightly or wrongly) . . . and the personal courage of simple, ordinary people.. Don't take my meaning wrong, trying to say the above in a tone of humble, sober, awe, and not at the expense of our international comrades out there, but just connecting to my own country.

Hope this not too long of a post for you, have enjoyed chatting,
candidgamera

------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Puzz3D]

On hard and expert the ai troops get a hidden honor bonus. This makes them harder to defeat. I don't think there is any change in ai tactics between normal, hard and expert, but some think there is. You could get a different action by the ai in a similar situation with higher honor troops because the ai might decide to attack instead of retreat.

I was thinking of Shinano as an example of a map where the reinforcemant point is far away from the ideal defensive position. When you go on the attack on any map, you get into difficulty as your reinforcement path gets longer and the enemy's path gets shorter.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[This message has been edited by Puzz3D (edited 03-19-2001).]

[candidgamera]

Puzz:

Think what you're getting at on reinforcements to with how mountainous a province you're in: Shinano's a bastard.
Also found in the most recent part of my I campaign that Echizen and Kaga were hard too in general, just mountainous. My campaigns have been as western clans, by the time I get into, maybe, more mountainous (?) west, my horde's been broken - don't run into the same problems in general you describe. Did lose in pursuit over this as mentioned in one province, getting worn out getting to his reinforcement area as defender - lost potential energy going down in a valley to engage than trying to get back up.

The thing on the honor - the flags I see attacking - no more than at most 2 honor - no generals to mention. No honor, no generals - maybe dumber AI. Saw a post while back, think on community, about some trickiness pulled fighting against Uesegi Kenshin - 6th level general.

[Puzz3D]

candidgamera,

The honor bonus that I'm refering to is hidden within the combat calculation. There is no visual indication of it. The developers revealed this in one of the answers to Erado San's Question Time 1.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

[candidgamera]

Puzz:

Thanks for the clarification.

Should clarify that I got this game as soon as it was available last summer, but had 2-1/2 month break from it from late Sept. to end of first week in December - work related. Wasn't on the Sword Dojo in what must have been the "classic" time of postings, missed some I think - during the limited registration time.

We keep this going, and you're going to help make me a hero - guess that's not as flamboyant as the Shiro/Catiline competition http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/wink.gif http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif.

regards,
candidgamera


------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Tone]

Candid:

Been away for a few days only just read all this. Ive never had your error: out of video memory. Even the other day when I switched my card to an old 8mb one (I loaded the game I was having problems with and exactly the same happened at the same time.

Apart from this crash with nothing in the errorlog file the only crash I had was switching between campaign and battle and got a surface lost error.

As far as I can see, the problem with large numbers of reinforcements being used is that the game has to record and update several variables for every individual soldier walking onto the battlefield. After the battle these updates are applied and the process will start again. The problem with large battles being that the soldiers that have left the field can't be forgotten about until the battle is over and eventually an upper limit is reached.

The problem could be got around by some of the ideas you two have mentioned. If you somehow split the large battles then the game can deal with the information in smaller chunks. I like some of the ideas.

[candidgamera]

Welcome back Tone:

Been keeping your thread warm for you http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif.

Just curious how much graphics card RAM you had to start with?

No gee-wiz computer guy here, but wonder if its possible to get an error that just doesn't get logged in the error log, just not indentified.

Your third para is about what I was thinking as explanation to the couple crashes I had.
That would not bode well for my speculations above on graphics = hard, number crunching = easy. Left to wonder if the "that upper limit" you mention would inter-relate to PUZZ's comments about swap filing, having the right stuff in the right place when needed - like you say - losing the ability to keep track.

Going to start another thread shortly on the mods section putting together the "ratios", maps, and operations stuff.

BTW: Heart goes out to you folks over your F&M problem, Mad-Cow's.

regards,
candidgamera




------------------
"If I determine the enemy's disposition of forces while I have no perceptible form, I can concentrate my forces while the enemy is fragmented.
The pinnacle of military deployment approaches the formless: if it is formless, then even the deepest spy cannot discern it, nor the wise make
plans against it." Sun Tzu

[Tone]

Candid:

The original graphics card is 32mb (shouldn't be any problems there).

Getting errors that aren't logged is all too common on lots of software, and is usualy a sign that the manufacturer is going to deny there is a problem.

Swap files would look to be the problem, but with my config. they shouldn't be. But thats the limit of my comp. knowledge.

Thanks for the sympathy

see you in the next thread

[candidgamera]

Tone:

Sounds ominous on the error log thing.

Puzz3D had some "maybe useful to you" info to offer over on Tech section under the "RAM" post, pertinent to the swap file thing, and more:
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum2/HTML/000180.html

candidgamera

[Tone]

Candid:

Thanks, that's helpfull (I missed that one)

[Anssi Hakkinen]

Just checking: you do have tried the old AGP bus aperture trick (http://erado.totalwar.org/tech/solutions/perf_agp.htm), have you not?

And if the error doesn't appear in the logfile, that may just mean that the error was so fatal that it completely locked up the computer (as it did). If your computer is locked up, it sure as heck isn't going to append anything to the error log. Of course, it *could* be a conspiracy, but...

[This message has been edited by Anssi Hakkinen (edited 03-20-2001).]

[Tone]

Yes tried that.

No the comp. didn't lock up in my case, there should have been something in the error log. It's always easier to blame it on a conspiracy isn't it.