Reinforcement battles - to CTD or not to CTD

[khelvan]

Ok, this is the last major CTD we have to handle, and right now we haven't a clue as to what is causing it. We're trying to gather data on how and when it happens, so please post your reinforcement CTDs here, with the following information:

1) Factions - (Yours/Theirs)
2) Circumstances - Siege battle? Rally? Open field? Bridge? Fort? Where and when (winter?) did it happen?
3) Leaders - Were they captains, generals, or family members?
4) Outcome - Level of victory/defeat, did any defeated stacks survive? How many units remained?
5) Positioning - Were any of the stacks standing on siege graphics? On a land bridge? On a river crossing?
6) Version - EB Version (v.72, v.73a, v.74)
7) Traits - Does the traits file found right here affect the CTD?
8) Screen shots - If possible, please provide screen shots so we can see things like the units in each army, what year it was, whether there was a general, etc.
9) Save game - If possible, please use a free file hosting service, such as Yousendit, to give us the opportunity to test it.

Also, we're looking for information on reinforcement battles which happen without CTDs.

If you have, please post here with the pertinent facts:

1) Factions - (Yours/Theirs)
2) Circumstances - Siege battle? Rally? Open field? Bridge? Fort? Where and when (winter?) did it happen?
3) Leaders - Were they captains, generals, or family members?
4) Outcome - Level of victory/defeat, did any defeated stacks survive? How many units remained?
5) Positioning - Were any of the stacks standing on siege graphics? On a land bridge? On a river crossing?
6) Version - EB Version (v.72, v.73a, v.74)
7) Screen shots - If possible, please provide screen shots so we can see things like the units in each army, what year it was, whether there was a general, etc.
8) Save game - If possible, please use a free file hosting service, such as Yousendit, to give us the opportunity to test it.

Gathering this data will allow us to find correlations between various things happening, and the outcome.

Thanks for your help!

[Moros]

Well 0.72 Doesn't seem to have the problem at least not with my version. (tough that one might not be modified a bit.) I've played with the Semeucids this weekend and I4ve played a lot of battles where I played with 2 to 2.5 full stacks against 2-5 Egyptian army's (most of them were medium sized). Tough I'm not sure if there were any family members in the Ptolemy armies since every general I see gets killes within at least 3 turns. (I've got 3 assasins with at least 9 agent's skill and a few more. I wander what will happen if I've killed al the family members?)

anyway I've played so many battles with even more then 5 armies as reinforcements so I can't imagine that there are any problems in 0.72 or my version is modified so that the bug has gone away. (I've downloaded a few traits updates and other changes so that might explain?)

[jockey]

1) Factions - Romani (mine)/ Makedonia (AI)
2) Circumstances - Siege battle (where my besieging army was attacked by an enemy relieving force, not a sally): once in Epidamnos, the second time in Corinth; the prior was in Winter, the latter was in Summer, 242 BC.
3) Leaders - Both times I had a family member and was attacked by a mix of enemy family members and captains- both times the family members instigated the attack on me.
4) Outcome - Both times I had heroic victories (ofcourse...) with very few enemies remaining, perhaps a couple of hundred each time? (on huge settings)
5) Positioning - The enemy stack was on a siege graphic (it was a relieving force- I was never attacked from the city)
6) Version - EB Version v.74

I'm afraid I cannot take a screenshot, but the army make up was, basically,: Romani- two generals, two sets of Rorarii, Accensi, Hastati, Principe and Triarii, and one equites Romani (with the addition in the second battle of two Samnite Spearmen); Makedonian- pretty much a varied mix of phalanx types and pelstati, with some thessolonikan cavalry and general's bodyguards.

[Kull]

Before being combined, there were/are two threads on this topic:

1) The Non-CTD Reinforcement Battles thread

2) The CTD Reinforcement Battles thread

[khelvan]

Why following the steps and giving us this information is important:

Thousands of you have downloaded this mod. Hundreds of you have given us your feedback (most of it positive) about how the mod plays. A very small subset of you actively follow any given request for testing/steps used to test and report for specific things.

The purpose of releasing this Open Beta was not for the feedback to tell us if you like the mod, though we certainly appreciate that many of you do. The purpose of releasing it as a beta was that we knew we could not track down the source of problems without your help, and so we needed a large group of testers to help us. This reinforcement CTD is an example of why.

Because we can't find the source of this problem, we must gather data on how and when it happens, and find similarities in the data. We also have steps that you can go through to rule out various things for us, such as using the neutered traits file.

However, the trend has been that a great many of you love to play the game, but we have far more people demanding that we fix various things than we do people willing to go through the steps we ask for which are necessary for us to actually fix them. Not everyone falls under this category, but enough do that it makes an impression. Remember, this beta was released so that we can get the specific, structured feedback which we need so that you can play this mod without CTDs and other bugs that affect gameplay.

If people just -play- the mod, and won't join our structured tests, we can't improve the mod, and we might as well not have beta versions up for download.

So please, follow the above steps, and help us. If you can't do the screenshots or savegame uploads, at least follow the other steps. With your help we can find this bug, without it everyone will continue to crash to desktop.

Thank you.

[jockey]

I'm not sure if that was directed at my feedback or not, Khevlan, but I have something more substantial to report anyway. I apologise if my last report was... lacking.

I retried the battle with the character traits file and found that, with the same heroic victory outcome and the same scenario of battle, I avoided the CTD. I was then attacked again after that battle, in the same turn, again winning a heroic victory, and again avoided the CTD.

I hope that helps some more, if you like I can send you the save game.

[khelvan]

No, that was a general message. I was inspired by several posts demanding that we fix the reinforcement CTD immediately. As this bug is a source of frustration for us, we of course have tried to fix it, and having posts implying that we aren't paying attention to it is, at times, troublesome for us.

Thank you, the traits issue seems to be a recurring theme. I think we will have to examine the traits file in depth now. As I am not a member of the traits team, this is a little chilling for me; I hope it is a problem with a specific trait, and not with the way we are handling traits in general.

[Alleycat]

everytime I have a battle w/ cpu reinforcements I just save it and play the battle. If it ctd's , I swap in the nuetered traits and reload the game. Its solves the problem every time. I've probably done this like 25 times now. Then I exit the game and put in the normal traits or else I get new family members w/ no personality. Given that this solves the problem every time, I don't see the point in writing down the info of every reinforcement ctd unless the questions are geared toward finding which trait is being triggered based on battle circumstances. I know this attitude makes me a bad beta tester but I'm willing to live with that.

[khelvan]

No, the fact that 25 battles have been solved with the neutered traits file is indication enough. I haven't asked for help in trying to figure out what trait it is, and wouldn't expect you to, as that is a little more in-depth than reporting the circumstances of a battle.

However, it would be useful to know, at least, if you had captains only in those battles, generals, or both. That shouldn't be too much trouble.

Thanks!

[PseRamesses]

Before being combined, there were/are two threads on this topic:
1) The Non-CTD Reinforcement Battles thread
2) The CTD Reinforcement Battles thread

Three threads on the topic: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=62110

[Masy]

1) Factions - (Rome/Carthage)
2) Circumstances - Siege battle : enemy stack attacked my beseiging forces. Outside Kart Hadast and in Autumn
3) Leaders - Mine was a family member (Cotta, the original), beseiged was Carthage family member(Mago) , attacking stack was captain.
4) Outcome - Heroic Victory, only small portion of attacking stack fled, those in beseiged were all killed.
5) Positioning - Beseiged army were in city.
6) Version - EB Version v.73a
7) Traits - CTD was unnafected by trait file, i just withdrew upon reloading the 5th time :(
8) Sorry no screenshot, happened a while ago.
9) Again, a wee while ago so no saves.

[khelvan]

7) Traits - CTD was unnafected by trait file, i just withdrew upon reloading the 5th time :(

Does this mean you used the empty traits file and you still got a CTD, or you didn't test it?

[Masy]

I used trait file after reloading and fighting 4 times (twice with background script off, i still got CTD). Still crashed upon using trait file. Hope this helps.

[Malrubius]

@Masy: Could you zip up your savegame and email it to malrubius@europabarbarorum.com ?

Thanks!

[Malrubius]

Ok, until I can find the cause of this crash, I'm posting a workaround.

1. Download the workaround file.
2. Unzip/Extract the zip file "ReinforcementCTD.zip" to your C:\Program Files\Activision\Rome - Total War\Data folder (or wherever you have installed EB).
3. In the folder named "ReinforcementCTD", you'll find a Readme.txt file with instructions for bypassing the CTD.

This folder contains a file for working around
battles which crash to the desktop (CTD) after
the end of the battle.

This workaround will bypass all the trait triggers
as a temporary solution until we can determine exactly
what is causing this CTD.

To apply this workaround,
1. First, save your game immediately before the battle and exit RTW.
2. Next, double-click the file labeled "EB_1_Swap.bat".
This will backup your original traits file and copy in one without triggers.
3. Load up your savegame and play the battle normally.
4. Immediately after the battle, save the game and exit RTW.
5. Now, double-click the file labeled "EB_2_Restore.bat".
This will restore your original traits file.
6. Load up your savegame and continue playing.

[econ21]

I just had a CTD that I can replicated twice after loading a savegame (most of my other CTDs are not replicable), so I will report it:

1) Factions - Rome (me) vs Macedon

2) Circumstances - Siege battle? Rally? Open field? Bridge? Fort? Where and when (winter?) did it happen?

Open field, raining.

3) Leaders - Were they captains, generals, or family members?

Enemy was 2 outcomes.

4) Outcome - Level of victory/defeat, did any defeated stacks survive? How many units remained?

No - wiped out both stacks to a man.

5) Positioning - Were any of the stacks standing on siege graphics? On a land bridge? On a river crossing?

No.

6) Version - EB Version (v.72, v.73a, v.74)

v.74

7) Traits - Does the traits file found right here affect the CTD?

I tried Malrubius's workaround, but it still CTD a third time. Note - in the two replications, the savegame starts at the pre-battle scene. So there is no chance to enable the EB scripts via the advisor.

8) Screen shots - If possible, please provide screen shots so we can see things like the units in each army, what year it was, whether there was a general, etc.

Posting savegame instead.

9) Save game - If possible, please use a free file hosting service, such as Yousendit, to give us the opportunity to test it.

Sent it to Malrubius with as CTD1.zip.

[abou]

Fight with CTD:
· Romani vs Makedonia
· Attacked while sieging Dalminion by relief force battle then took place at an open field. My units were the same that took place at the battle near Segestica after retraining at Rome sans the Family Member who was managing the newly captured city.
· Only captains
· Heroic victory
· EB v0.74


Note: This was the second time I was attacked by a relief force. The first time I had a heroic victory with no CTD, but the force that arrived from the city garrison did not participate in the battle, but was on the battle map. I would have screens and a save, but forgot to grab them.

Fight without CTD:

· Romani vs Eleutheroi
· Attacked while near Segestica by Eleutheroi force with assistance by the garrison - battle then took place at an open field.
· Romani had a family member, the Eleutheroi just had captains.
· Clear victory with no enemy stacks remaining - it was a win or to-the-death for the Eleutheroi.
· EB v0.74
· Traits - here is a screen with traits, plus a little more info of the field. As you can see, I also blockaded the port.



Saves for both battles: http://abou.heliologue.com/uploads/saves.zip

[Jarardo]

I've never had the problem, after reading about it, I get a little timid commiting to fighting big, long battles with a lot of enemies. But its never happened to me. Though I am a special sort of person.

I've mostly played Macedon. I havent spent any long amount of time playing as anyone else. I've also only used version 7.4. I'll see if I can get a save loaded up.

I just cant help myself!

[pezhetairoi]

just for the record, I have NEVER had a reinforcement battle CTD, despite fighting countless relief/sally/field/bridge battles in various different configurations against every faction except the sauromatae, pontos, hayasdan, ptolemaioi, sweboz and yuezhi.

[Jarardo]

Still haven't had a reinforcement CTD, I'd like to help if I can though. Heres a picture of one about to heppen. I'm the Makedons, the AI is pontus, theres a pontic family member in the town, and one in the southernmost army, the middle army is led by a captain. I had 1 family member in my stack. I killed both family members, and chased most of the rest away, I didnt kill very many of their soldiers. I have the save if you want to check it out, I can use the UsendIt, what email should I send it to?

[PseRamesses]

Is there any progress in hunting this bug down guys?

I´m currently stucked in my Seleukid camp. When the AI attacks, ctd. When I attack, ctd. Only way is to autocalc but I know I´ll loose big and I really don´t want to be set back at this stage in the campaign.

[Avicenna]

1) Factions - (Yours/Theirs)
I am KH, enemy are Makedon
2) Circumstances - Siege battle? Rally? Open field? Bridge? Fort? Where and when (winter?) did it happen?
Open field
3) Leaders - Were they captains, generals, or family members?
Captains for them
4) Outcome - Level of victory/defeat, did any defeated stacks survive? How many units remained?
One of their units remained from the reinforcement stack, other stack annihilated. Heroic Victory
5) Positioning - Were any of the stacks standing on siege graphics? On a land bridge? On a river crossing?
Negative
6) Version - EB Version (v.72, v.73a, v.74)
not sure.. the one before 0.8

[Rodion Romanovich]

1) Factions - (Yours/Theirs)
Macedon (me) vs 3 stacks of Getai
2) Circumstances - Siege battle? Rally? Open field? Bridge? Fort? Where and when (winter?) did it happen?
Siege, spring, small enemy stack attacks, one medium and one big stack of enemies join as reinforcements.
3) Leaders - Were they captains, generals, or family members?
I had 1 general, they had 2 generals in the big reinforcement force (which begun in the besieged city) and 1 general in the medium force, only a captain led the small Getai force that did the actual attack.
4) Outcome - Level of victory/defeat, did any defeated stacks survive? How many units remained?
I won, it was 1500-40 in kill-loss ratio, there were enemy survivors in all stacks, but two of them had so few I guess they'd get "army routs" status on campaign map.
5) Positioning - Were any of the stacks standing on siege graphics? On a land bridge? On a river crossing?
Don't think any was standing on siege graphics (don't understand what it means to stand on siege graphics). None was standing on land bridge or river crossing.
6) Version - EB Version (v.72, v.73a, v.74)
0.74

I don't think I've had a single siege battle with enemy reinforcements that hasn't crashed... In one battle I solved the problem by hiring a mercenary and putting him as a single-unit stack between my siege army and the enemy, so the enemy couldn't attack me, but that isn't always possible...

[GiantMonkeyMan]

had my first ever CTD with EB so far i've been impressed with the stability (even in the first version)...

1) Macedon (me) vs 2 epirote armies
2) siege battle
3) 1 general and one captain (the reinforcements)
4) heroic victory... i think i had about 500 kills and them about 100? i completely wiped out the reinforcements and the other army only had about 80 left
5) two armies were on the siege graphics
6) 0.74

hope this can help

[llib]

A.
1) Factions - (Koinon Hellenikon/Epirus)
2) Circumstances - Open Field, not sure about season. I was defending, one phalanx unit was as primary attacking squad, big stack was as reinforcements.
3) Leaders - I had two, not sure as about enemy
4) Outcome - Heroic Victory, first stack of enemy was attacking alone, while the rest of enemy get stucked in the entrance area, some units on the field, others just partly or out of map completely. First stack(one phalanx) was eliminated completely(as I was chasing them, I found out that many of them were far away from the rest of unit - about one quarter of the map distance). Some of reinforcements made it out (I ended battle a while after they were routed).
5) Positioning - field.
6) Version - EB Version v.74
7) Traits - Didn't tried yet
8) Screen shots - NA
9) Save game - Planning to send it when I'll get home.
---
10) Bit of comment - I have fought the same battle after starting the game again, the result was victory again, but this time I let few men from 1st stack phalanx survive. CTD did not reappeared. Other than that, reinforcements stack was still just standin near the borders as the first time, they moved only after I have advanced forward to them and made very uncoordinated attack - attacking in single units. I'm wondering whether there isn't some issue with formations.

B.
1) Factions - (Koinon Hellenikon/Macedonia)
2) Circumstances - Enemy fort. My full stack of attackers, they had few defenders, plus two reinforcements stacks.
3) Leaders - I had two, enemy had just one - general alone was one of two reinforcement stacks, the other was bigger.
4) Outcome - Heroic Victory, they were all evaporated to the last man.
5) Positioning - Winter, fort in the open.
6) Version - EB Version v.74
7) Traits - Didn't tried yet
8) Screen shots - NA
9) Save game - Planning to send it when I'll get home.
---
10) Bit of comment - I have replayed again after starting the game again. This time only fortification stack was evaporated, other two survived (just general lost few Hetairoi's). The CTD did not reoccur.

------
As I wrote, I'll try to post savegames when I'll get back home.
BTW, is it supposed that AI doesn't have siege equipment on map when you try to breakout? Not sure if it is the same with player as besieger.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

Thanks llib. I'd say you probably needn't worry about posting a save game now. The build has now been moved over to 1.5 and we will just have to get it to a point where we can start testing it to find if this problem still works. We appreciated you posting the details here, and there's been no real statement that we don't need more data on the Reinforcement battle CTD's, but I just haven't seen anything on the internal boards that would indicate to me that posting more savegames and information on this problem in 1.2 would help us solve it in 1.5.

Thanks for trying to help everyone!

[Tellos Athenaios]

Haven't yet encountered a CTD with this so far but reading all the info given and espescially the fact that a lot of the CTD's happen after a Heroic Victory with a general, I started wondering if it would be due to a trait issuing problem. I mean after Heroic Victories the game is most likely to issue a general a trait to improve his command ablebilities, and it's precisely at the moment the game should do this (immediately after/ during the campaign reloading process) the CTD's seem to happen.

[Kull]

Still haven't had a reinforcement CTD, I'd like to help if I can though. Heres a picture of one about to heppen. I'm the Makedons, the AI is pontus, theres a pontic family member in the town, and one in the southernmost army, the middle army is led by a captain. I had 1 family member in my stack. I killed both family members, and chased most of the rest away, I didnt kill very many of their soldiers. I have the save if you want to check it out, I can use the UsendIt, what email should I send it to?

At this point we are only looking for save game files in which your army is led by a captain. Thanks for offering!

Is there any progress in hunting this bug down guys?

I´m currently stucked in my Seleukid camp. When the AI attacks, ctd. When I attack, ctd. Only way is to autocalc but I know I´ll loose big and I really don´t want to be set back at this stage in the campaign.

Have you tried the special traits file? Just load it for the turn of the battle, and then (assuming it worked), reload the old traits file and continue your game.

We are still working this bug hard, but it's proving exceptionally difficult to track down. We have some ideas for fixing it, but they involve a significant change to the EB traits system. The "solution" is very unappetizing, especially since there's a chance the whole problem will be solved by porting to 1.5. Anyway, that's where we are.

[PseRamesses]

Have you tried the special traits file? Just load it for the turn of the battle, and then (assuming it worked), reload the old traits file and continue your game.

We are still working this bug hard, but it's proving exceptionally difficult to track down. We have some ideas for fixing it, but they involve a significant change to the EB traits system. The "solution" is very unappetizing, especially since there's a chance the whole problem will be solved by porting to 1.5. Anyway, that's where we are.

Just wanted to check if any new development has been made. Seems a bit painstaiking to save, exit, activate fix, start, play, save, exit, activate original and finally get back in the game just to do it all over again in the next siege battle.
I´ve come up with another solution, playwise, to this problem that solves my problem. For every campaign I bring two stacks, one elite led by my general, and one "baggage-stack" mostly containing pantodopai. My general does all the battles but my 2nd stack starts the siege and my general is moved into the stack for the assault which I autocalc if reinforcements are standing on the siegeworks. Expensive, yes. Realistic, hmmm - pretty much since it slovs me down and all campaigns are more planned. In reality no army has ever launched any sucessfull campaign without auxiliaries, baggage and good logistics.
If the porting to 1.5 is more than a month away you might consider solving this issue anyway. Think of the hundreds of hours you´ll be saving, all the relief from frustration from your players and the fact that I do think you guys obtains HC knowledge that might prove usefull in the future.
Anyway I must say, and I do speak for a lot of us, that we´re grateful for your work and for revitalizing a pretty boring game into something that it should have been from the start.

[Dayve]

Or to make things easier you could just withdraw whenever they attack you with reinforcements... The reinforcements will probably follow you and attack you alone, so fight those, then move forward again to attack the city... If they bring more reinforcements, do it all again... Obviously this isn't realistic because in reality sieges could last years... With this tactic you will have to assault the turn after you lay siege, otherwise you risk getting attacked with reinforcements and having to retreat and do it all again, but it has to be done...

Failing that, you'll just have to save and reload so that the script is de-activated, fight the battle and then activate the script again.