mid-battle crashes and freezes

[UltimaGecko]

I'm playing as the Romans and it's probably around 12 turns in or so (269 - also happened in 271; on Normal/Normal); however I've got a consistent problem which - based on the fact no one else is complaining about it - is probably somehow limited to my game...

The big thing: any battle involving a cityscape crashes mid-battle without fail. In this save ([which I can't post because all of my posts from the former forum are missing so I have a post count of 0...])I'm trying to siege Rhegion, but I've tried it with Segestica (you might be wondering how I took Tarentum/Taras...but some army came out of no where, attacking me away from the city and somehow I captured it anyway).

The crash is either a frozen image, or a loss of video signal (as in, my CPU is still on, but there's no image going to my monitor anymore), or occasionally returning to the desktop (which leads me to believe it might actually be a driver problem, so feel free to recommend a driver that works with EB and R:TW).

Generally it happens when I order one of my units to attack another unit (although I'm never really keeping track of which unit is actually causing the problem). Other notable crashes were: once when I was selecting 3 units (one each of hastati, pricepes and triarii, I think), once when I was changing the battle speed. Those are the only two crashes when I was initiating some sort of combat.

The timing seems to be completely random...some are right at the middle, one was when I was inside the walls fighting towards the town center.


Field battles went off without a hitch (in one I was going against the one Greek faction that holds Taras; the other was rebels from around Venice that ventured down towards Arminium).


Potentially useful information:
Windows XP
768mb or RAM
256mb ATi Radeon x700 pro (Omega 3.8.360 driver)
Athlon 2400+

fresh install of R:TW from 1.0 to 1.3 to 1.5
EB v1.0
(I also added those permanent fixes to no effect)
I've tried city battles 10+ times, some with background script, some without.


I'd really like to try out the mod to its full potential, but the prolonged start-ups coupled with the inability to play any battle involving a city pretty much cripples the experience and makes it unplayable. So, help would be appreciated.

[UltimaGecko]

Because I should no be able to post it with my requisite '1' post:
the save file should be at http://www.axifile.com?9649711 if it's necessary.

Thank you forums, for requiring me to double post...

Upon retrospect, it probably would have let me edit that into the previous post, but oh well

[bovi]

Your rig or the drivers may indeed be the problem.

768 MB RAM is in the lower end of what can work for EB, and I would expect it to be further taxed when playing on a map with lots of buildings. You could try to borrow a chip from a friend to see if it fixes the problem. Anyway you should consider upgrading your memory as it's in the lower end of pretty much anything these days. I experienced a big increase in performance when upgrading from 1GB to 3GB, to put it in perspective (that is, once I tweaked the BIOS settings to run on a lower mem frequency so it was stable). You should run Memtest overnight to see if there is a problem with your memory.

I see you're using the Omega drivers for your graphics. You should try to use the official drivers, and there may also be a newer Omega version available. Although I'm sure you have good reason to use the Omega ones in the first place, it can't hurt to see if the official makes a difference. Also try an older driver of both kinds to see if it can work at all. If there is no luck with different drivers, you could borrow a graphics card from a friend to see if your card itself is faulty.

I'll take a look at your savegame sometime, but I initially think this problem is specific to your computer.

Oh, and I would say welcome to the forum, but you've been lurking a really long time it seems.

[Sygrod]

I also get CTDs mid battle. Some persistent, others go away with a fresh start of the computer. I have 1.5 Gig RAM and a decent video card. I have tried updating drivers, but seem to have the latest. Is there a program around that would be able to catch CTDs and report what actually triggered them (Which device, that is)?

[bovi]

Well, there is Filemon, but I think the game reads all it's going to need before starting the battle. Also there is a windows setting that will give you bluescreens instead of automatically rebooting, but it's not rebooting but rather crashing to the desktop.

So no, I don't know anything :shrug: to catch it. However, you should also try memtest overnight to be sure your RAM is fine.

[UltimaGecko]

Okay, I've managed to notice which unit I was using this time:

I was sending some Equites Romani that were engaged with some archers against some Camillian Skirmishers (of some sort) and it crashed (I'm pretty sure a few of the other crashes were also related to me having my cavalry attack something).

I'm confident it's not my RAM, because no other game gives me problems and it's been solid for quite a long time. The game also runs very fluidly when it's not freezing...I also turned down building detail and grass detail and such - aside from looking much uglier it didn't run any different. This is the same computer I had a 9200 in before, and I could play vanilla Rome's city battles without any problems back then with the same amount of ram.

I tried it again with both newer drivers; I tried the newest catalyst from ...October 11th, 2007, I think...and I was quickly reminded why I don't use them when half of my full screen applications didn't run. I tried the newest Omega drivers (3.8.421) and it's the same as the .360s...as in, stuff runs well, except EB freezes/crashes mid-battle).

I'll try playing it without using cavalry...see how that works out, I guess.

[bovi]

You could perhaps check whether the cavalry is the problem by creating a custom battle with only the units that you suspect.

[UltimaGecko]

Well, nevermind it being in this particular forum (for me, anyway) anymore; after much more testing (and loading) I reinstalled everything and eventually figured I'd test vanilla R:TW patched to 1.5 first, and - sure enough - that crashes too.

Unfortunately the technical support on such issues everywhere I've looked is ("do you have the latest drivers?" "do you have all the patches?" "did you modify anything yourself?" and "did you try reinstalling?" - all of which are non-technical, effectively useless responses)...so, if anyone in here as some sort of potential .ini changes that might help or some sort of catalyst tweak that might get around this, that'd be helpful. Apparently someone in those buried support pages had a similar problem and they just let it slid (Radeon X700 Pro too)

...I mean, it didn't happen back when I had a Radeon 9200 and it doesn't even happen on my laptop with a Radeon Xpress 200M.

I suppose I'll try it one more time...maybe try 1.0->1.2->1.3->1.5 and then maybe EB if it starts miraculously working. Otherwise I guess I'm off to Stalker, Oblivion and the first M:TW.

Sorry to have bothered the EB forums for this (perhaps Sygrod also has an X700 Pro), since it doesn't seem to be related anymore.

[bovi]

I think I did 1.0 -> 1.2 -> 1.5, without 1.3. But I really think it's your rig. Did you try memtest?

[UltimaGecko]

I let it run for 12 hours; 2000% coverage with 0 errors.

I also upgraded my audio drivers; my chipset drivers and tried an installation on the HDD with the Windows directory on it; none of that helps either.

I've determined that it's likely being near any structure on the battle map that's causing the problem (as I got through the prologue in v1.0 R:TW up until the point I had to move guys around the bridge)...do you know of any graphical effects applied to structures at close proximity? I'm thinking I might be able to fix it there.


I'm thinking there just might be an incompatability with something the Radeon X700 Pro does (since the other two times I've seen similar errors reported they both seemed to have some form of an X700)...although it'd be kind of strange to have only 3 people out of all of R:TW's (and likely M2:TW) audience only having that card.

[bovi]

Hey, I think that's the one Teleklos has too, I didn't catch that earlier. That makes a very probable case. Unfortunately I have no solution except getting another card :no:. You should probably borrow another graphics card to see if that works first though, and it's really a case that ATI or CA would have to fix (although I really don't think CA would care to do anything).

Did you try to install a really old driver BTW?

[Sygrod]

I have a NVidia GeForce 6600 card. I find that often, but not always, if I exit RTW/EB and turn the machine off, then turn it back on, I can fight through a battle that gave me CTD grief. I read in a different thread about memory leak (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=94208). Coupled with 1.5 GB memory, background tasks and virtual memory, perhaps that is part of the reson for my problems

[bovi]

Sygrod, the NVidia card whose stability I've been complaining about occasionally was a 6600 (XFX). The driver I used that allowed me to at least play the game without crashes was version 60-something, any newer than that caused it to crash after 0.5-50 minutes. You could try that to see if it works (it will be really slow though!). I suggest you try another graphics card too.

UltimaGecko, Teleklos made a discovery about the X700 that might help you too. Check the installation validation thread for details.

[UltimaGecko]

Yea, I've tried an old version of the omega and the catalyst drivers. Not a working one in 4 seperate drivers.

The 'Support DXT texture formats' box is enabled (it started that way), coincidentally, setting it to disabled crashes the battle map before it even starts (so apparently the battle map likes compressed textures or something). Although that doesn't really get me anywhere...I can only confirm that having the setting disabled will make battles completely unplayable (instead of freezing mid-battle).

...although that's probably preferable in some way, because it just CTD's disabled, every time I test it it freezes and I have to restart my computer and R:TW, which takes much longer than restarting R:TW alone.


Also, Teleklos (I'm guessing you mean on the official forums in the 'CTD before entering battle' thread) has an X1950 Pro, which is better than my X700. Unless there's another Teleklos here, which I'd gladly be directed to, especially if he has an x700.


I did, at one point, manage to get through an entire city/structure-having battle, but I consider it more of a fluke than any sort of assurance (this actually happened a bit ago, nothing to do with DXT)...especially since it was a city with no walls and went really quick, and it's done it in every other battle.

I'm really thinking model geometry with internal faces is my problem (models with less than 90 degree angles, as in: couryards, amphitheatres, bridges, L-shaped buildings). Although I can't think of anything that could really help this, unless someone would happen to know where the building models are and could try sending me theirs or if the descr_cities (or something like that) might be able to help me.

Bah, why do the fun games always have to be the ones that don't work right.

[bovi]

It's Teleklos Archelau, the EB member. Sorry to hear the setting didn't help either. I'm out of ideas, and I have no clue about model geometry.

[Sygrod]

'Sigh!'

[EoE]

I had similar problems with my 6800 GT card. After much trial and error I have narrowed it down to overheating. So I've underclocked my card, installed a new GPU fan and gone for less detailed graphics. That has resolved most of the crashes. Incidently I had the exact same problems with Civ IV.

rgds/EoE

[UltimaGecko]

Unfortunately (as unfortunate as one could see replacing a graphics card due to overheating), my computer sits in the basement, where the ambient temperature is under 60 degrees, the same place where my GPU is at 46C at the hottest.

Considering it happens even at the lowest settings, and that it doesn't crash, even when it's got immense slow down from beefy games like Oblivion or STALKER (if I feel dangerous and decide to jack up the settings), I'm just not seeing the overheating.

I just wish there were some sort of logfile that could be continuously active, so I could know why it froze (or occasionally restarted or lost its video signal).


I'm thinking I'll just have to move on to a different game, and leave R:TW until I get a newer - hopefully compatible - graphics card. I've now wasted too much time updating (and rolling back) and 'fixing' my computer to bother with this problem anymore.

Thanks for the attempted help, at least.

[EoE]

Unfortunately (as unfortunate as one could see replacing a graphics card due to overheating), my computer sits in the basement, where the ambient temperature is under 60 degrees, the same place where my GPU is at 46C at the hottest.

Considering it happens even at the lowest settings, and that it doesn't crash, even when it's got immense slow down from beefy games like Oblivion or STALKER (if I feel dangerous and decide to jack up the settings), I'm just not seeing the overheating.

I just wish there were some sort of logfile that could be continuously active, so I could know why it froze (or occasionally restarted or lost its video signal).


I'm thinking I'll just have to move on to a different game, and leave R:TW until I get a newer - hopefully compatible - graphics card. I've now wasted too much time updating (and rolling back) and 'fixing' my computer to bother with this problem anymore.

Thanks for the attempted help, at least.

It may not be overheating in your case, but I had the exact same problems. Strangely enough some very graphic intensive first person shooters gave me no problems, while seemingly "low end" games did.

I can only conclude that some forms of 3D modelling, like the ones used by Civ IV and RTW demand more from my graphics card than others, even though they may seem less demanding than games like Oblivion.

At least it helped me.

rgds/EoE