[EN] General bug reporting

[spajda77]

Hi, I have a problem with mission Ar 8. After a few minutes the game falls down and write me an error log.

1x: "Access violation at address 00673746 in module 'OwarFull.EXE'. Read of address 13F5C19E"
7x: "Invalid floating point operation EAddress: 0049C581"

[McBenn]

Bloody floating point exceptions It seems you are one of the lucky ones to get those errors. I can't reproduce them so you have to help me out here, if you want. Let's narrow down the problem. Copy and overwrite the files from each of the rar files in turn into the mission folder (mods\[mod name]\Missions\__Ar) (you may want to take a backup first) and try playing the mission again and note if the problem still occurs. One of them disables the AI and the other all events. Those are the major chunks of code making up the mission and I belive the bug to be in one of them.

[vanimpe]

Mission 12 has great textures, but it needs some corrections. I mean, some grass and plants should be added. Now, this map looks like something is missed

Maybe, grass like in mission 13 am?
----

I found error, in mission 12 on the almost end Rolf said:

"$ D10-Ro-1
- So this is how you run the show, Heike!"

and he suddenly and quickly died. I didn't start to attacking him. But, enemy did.


Btw. in polish it is:

//The player intentionally shoots at the UPF traitor
$ D10-Ro-1
- Więc taki z ciebie dowódca, Steyer.

[McBenn]

The Rolf bug should be fixed now.

You can thank Enguzrad for the GBI Hm I thought it was ok without any particular environmental objects to make it look more harsh but do feel free to add some grass and stones and PM me the map

[vanimpe]

Small bug. <attached screen>

[McBenn]

So what happened? You answered wrong and the guard started asking you about the car?

[Antitheus]

1. Wrong answer
2. "Gimme your papers, we need to talk" dialogue
3. Youlose screen
4. (meanwhile) "All ok" dialogue.

[McBenn]

I thought it was something like that. Couldn't reproduce it but it may be a rare case with some timing. I've put in a Wait() after the YouLost function. If that doesn't fix it we will have to be more creative

[Krotos]

It's possible to get Russian Heavy Machine Guns as vehicles in Ar13. Also it seems ALL of your vehicles are moved over to Ar14, which means that you need to keep moving the unmanned, spawning ones away at the beginning to ensure you get all the forces you wanted.

Is it intended that the player cannot see how much time he has left until he loses the mission in Ar14? Either that or time lapsed (like in Am07) would be useful. Same about the convoy we get info about. It'd be nice.

Is it intended that destroying the warehouses and depots is more beneficial than capturing them? Destroying them grants you tons of resources, mainly siberite, while capturing - only a set amount of specific resource on top of not giving you 10 crates for dismantling the building.

The convoy glitched out once for me, failing to spawn more cargo trucks, leaving me stuck with 4 cargo bays full of resources waiting for the rest to arrive. Forever.

Speaking of which - the cargo bays will sometimes pick the resources they'd left back up, effectively denying them.

On the other hand - is it intended that Gonzo can gain exp by the end of each mission? If so, why does assigning him exp in mechanical and scientific skills doesn't carry the levels over?

There seems to be an error in Ar14, where attempting to detonate the mines will cause OW to crash. It happened every time I'd destroyed southernmost defenses of the base and killed the civilians.

Here are the crash logs. I have 2 additional ones. I was able to reproduce the crash every time.

[0dd1]

Thanks for the info. I just applied a bugfix to those, hopefully it's enough for now but keep me posted if anything else comes up.

It's possible to get Russian Heavy Machine Guns as vehicles in Ar13. Also it seems ALL of your vehicles are moved over to Ar14, which means that you need to keep moving the unmanned, spawning ones away at the beginning to ensure you get all the forces you wanted.

There's nothing wrong with taking Russian vehicles, though in my testing I only captured them when really needed to. Which is why the following slipped my mind. Now, only as much as is needed for people to drive is carried over, and the vehicles are prioritized so they can still take the Russian ones if there's nothing else available.

Is it intended that the player cannot see how much time he has left until he loses the mission in Ar14? Either that or time lapsed (like in Am07) would be useful. Same about the convoy we get info about. It'd be nice.

I think something even better would be indicating the time by mission or plot related events (like something Heike could say at a specific point to give an indication of how's the player doing), but I don't have any ideas on how to make it very clear. I may get back to it at some point, but for now I added an accurate to the minute timer (just so it's not too convenient), on easy and medium difficulties.

Is it intended that destroying the warehouses and depots is more beneficial than capturing them?

No, something went weird, because it seemed to work that way only in some cases. I used McBenns AI here, and from what I can tell, the events used for setting these amounts should have done the trick. Anyway, I added another solution around that and tested it, so now you will be getting just slightly less by destroying than by capturing.

The convoy glitched out once for me, failing to spawn more cargo trucks, leaving me stuck with 4 cargo bays full of resources waiting for the rest to arrive. Forever.

I assume you destroyed all guards just after they spawned? Don't really see how would that be put on hold otherwise. I added a bit of code controlling the cargos after the fight, so they don't just stand around and it seems to work fine now. Same about the resource stealing.

On the other hand - is it intended that Gonzo can gain exp by the end of each mission? If so, why does assigning him exp in mechanical and scientific skills doesn't carry the levels over?

Gonzo is treated the same way as any of the characters, only excluded from selection screens and such to avoid bugs. As far as I can tell he levels up same as any of them. Can you be more specific about this?

There seems to be an error in Ar14, where attempting to detonate the mines will cause OW to crash. It happened every time I'd destroyed southernmost defenses of the base and killed the civilians.

I assume you refer to the mines left by Gordon. There was a bug, the mines were supposed to destroy vehicles in the base too, but if you destroyed all of them first, the command was to place the mines on nonexistant coordinates, causing the game to crash. It's fixed now.

[Krotos]

There's nothing wrong with taking Russian vehicles, though in my testing I only captured them when really needed to. Which is why the following slipped my mind. Now, only as much as is needed for people to drive is carried over, and the vehicles are prioritized so they can still take the Russian ones if there's nothing else available.

Could you make it so that a player can choose what vehicles his men will appear in instead of being randomised then? Half-Tracked Siberite Rocket Launchers are next to invaluable in this mission compared to hovercraft light guns for example.

[quote=""0dd1""] Now you will be getting just slightly less by destroying than by capturing.[/quote]
Okay, although that's gonna be a huge reduction - if you're lucky enough, you can get up to 20 hundred siberite at the moment, not to mention the oil you can mine from the middle base and the obtainable crates.
[quote=""0dd1""]
Gonzo is treated the same way as any of the characters, only excluded from selection screens and such to avoid bugs. As far as I can tell he levels up same as any of them. Can you be more specific about this?[/quote]
It's possible to give him medal + mission exp by the end of each mission - it's not an issue as long as he's not level 10 in combat as you'll just give him levels there. It arises in Ar14, because he's 10 by then (or well, that's when I noticed something) - he doesn't carry any of the level-ups in mechanical and scientific skills he'd gain through mission reward exp at all, which is sad as it'd make him even cooler of an apeman than he is right now. (And he's one hell of an ape)

[quote=""0dd1""]It's fixed now.[/quote]
Thanks a lot.

Another thing I noticed:
In Ar15a there's no quote or anything coming from the Alliance once you deal with Russians compared to the ones you hear after having dealt with Americans. Is it intended or is there some text line missing?

I'm certain it's intended for the base in Ar07 not to be able to have all 4 resource nodes (southernmost oil, oil and siberite, northernmost siberite) within its reach but is it really intended for it to have only one spot in the entire map where you can get 3 of 4? (either oil, oil and siberite or siberite, oil and siberite) I like how that oil tower is in such a satisfying place from a geographical perspective but it's a bit of a stretch.

Could the dialogues in Ar09 indicate that you need to hurry before the Russians announce a cargo to be missing? It seems logical, but a dialogue reminder wouldn't hurt.

I know it's a weird request, but is there any chance we could get a mechanic together with Aviradze's reinforcements? In AM and RU campaigns we get one pretty much right off the bat and it'd be nice for Arabians to get one with him as well. I noticed that the random soldiers from his reinforcements always seem to have someone with proficiency in mechanical skills (level 2 base) so it'd be nice if he/she could have exp moved aside from combat to mechanical skills.

Speaking of Ar04 - perhaps you could - in the future - offer us an option to get that 1 American guy we save in Ar01_cont to join us? It'd be a lovely addition and would strengthen the theme of Arabian forces made of mercenaries, sheikhs and people who no longer deem their former side's case to be worth their blood.

Back to Ar14 - why is there no explanation behind being able to research biodetection? It just is there. Will it appear as an extra quest in Ar12?

By the way was it ever intended for the escapees to serve as reinforcements pre-Omar's arrival in Ar13? I'd command all of them to stick to my 3 groups and in a short time I'd be able to outlast any Russian army out there. Feels cheap. Perhaps make them flee if within attack range of Russian weapons?

Why is there no dialogue line for Omar's death in Ar15a? Powell and Platonov have one, I suppose the Alliance does as well (I sided with them so no clue), but Omar just dies in silence. I hoped to hear something like "I'm sorry, Heike" or "Perhaps you were right" with three periods in between every second word to imply he's dying (E.g. "I'm...sorry...Heike..." or "Perhaps...you were...right...". It'd add to the scene and amplify the feeling Heike and Omar had a thing for each other.

Any chance you could name the Muddy River base in Ar14 intro map? It was one of the bigger Arabian bases, considering it had 2 other ones so close to it. Perhaps the trio could be named (in Am11 as well if Stucuk or anyone updating the core campaigns of the game is reading this) New Riyadh (Easternmost in Am11, The base we're in in Ar14), New Jeddah (Westernmost in both Am11 and Ar14) and New Dammam (Easternmost in Ar14, Southernmost in Am11 aka the one we strike at the beginning)? I suggest that since the towns brought up here are the 3 largest metropolies of Saudi Arabia and Arabians have a tendency to name their bases after the biggest cities of Arabic world. What do you think? By the way I'm suggesting the name order to be like that because of the size of these towns in real world (From largest to tiniest in the order I presented them)

By the way once you get done with the missions and start working on the cutscenes, may I suggest using diary/letter format? McMillan has the artbook, Gorki a primitive computer, it'd be nice if Heike simply writes letters while saying things from her perspective. We'd have all forms of "leaving a print" that way. It's also much easier to make a cutscene that is just some text being written with style + a change of light via candle / shaky lamp than the artbook/computer JMM/Gorki have.

Anyways, keep up the good work! I'll post some more once I spot something that'll happen to irk me. Also sorry for twisting my post into "add this plz" halfway through reporting stuff. I'm just really enthiusiastic about Arabians (fav nation and all) and want to help.

[0dd1]

Could you make it so that a player can choose what vehicles his men will appear in instead of being randomised then?

Too bothersome. You would have to either spawn all the vehicles on map (there would have to be a lot of space organised for it) and somehow manually pick them during the intro, or use query choice boxes, which are too limited to account for all the variables, like the number, chassis, weapons etc of all the vehicles present. Right now it works this way:
There is a set number of vehicles (rockets and gatlings to be exact) you get depending on difficulty. Then, vehicles left from the previous mission are picked for the remaining people, in the priority order of:
Random two of the hovercrafts-> Rockets (irrespective of chassis) -> Gatlings -> Guns -> Flamers -> all other (light trikes, other hovercrafts or the Russian ones).
I figured a hovercraft may be useful in crossing the river, in the bottom left corner, though I suppose I could make the rockets be picked first.

Okay, although that's gonna be a huge reduction - if you're lucky enough, you can get up to 20 hundred siberite at the moment, not to mention the oil you can mine from the middle base and the obtainable crates.

You should be able to gather all you need on easy level without having to dismantle anything. If you play it right, you should also have some extra to produce something during the mission. And I purposely decreased the amount of oil and sib you can get from the depots, so there's more emphasis on finding and capturing the resource mines.

The issue with Gonzo is not related to levels but experience points. It's not something you can control through SAIL, the game engine is resetting the experience for any ape that is gaining experience in combat. The engineer level is always kept the same as combat and other skills are brought back to zero points. So in next mission 0 experience points reset the skill to level 0 or 1. I guess the apes were never meant to have these skills and I don't really know what can I do about it.

In Ar15a there's no quote or anything coming from the Alliance once you deal with Russians compared to the ones you hear after having dealt with Americans. Is it intended or is there some text line missing?

I guess it is just assumed that you would defeat the Russians at the end, so you go right through to the ending dialogues.

The cool thing about mission 7 is that you can get a little creative with choosing the exact place and configuration of your base. In other missions it's always designated for you, mainly by the resource locations, where is the base supposed to be.

There aren't any vehicles to use in mission 2, so a mechanic would be useless. You have a mechanic character Haradach (previously Willard) in mission 3. Besides there are people with good mechanical skills beside their primary ones, like Sonya and Ralph.

offer us an option to get that 1 American guy we save in Ar01_cont to join us

Honestly that doesn't seem likely, especially so early in the game. There is already some benefit to previously sparing him when it comes to diplomacy, though.

Mcbenn placed some dialogue about it relating to Aviradze and Mark in mission 13a, and I assumed something similar would be found in mission 12, so in later mission the tech is already invented.

I did make the escapees stay idle on purpose, so they can sometimes help in repairing or healing your units. Didn't consider holding them indefinitely, so I'll have to add some restrictions to it.

I got the impression there wasn't any need for dying Omar to speak. He let Heike go and she didn't look back and that was it.

The base naming sounds ok. Implementing it into original campaigns is up to Mcbenn, but I can name the first one for now.

[Krotos]

There aren't any vehicles to use in mission 2, so a mechanic would be useless. You have a mechanic character Haradach (previously Willard) in mission 3. Besides there are people with good mechanical skills beside their primary ones, like Sonya and Ralph.

That's not true - Delta has 2 manual machine guns you can capture. I know you don't seem to consider that too much, but it's still a nice addition. By the way why isn't Delta called Delta?

Honestly that doesn't seem likely, especially so early in the game. There is already some benefit to previously sparing him when it comes to diplomacy, though.

Wasn't aware that sparing him makes Donaldson more likely to cooperate. Thought it was intended to be able to get an Alliance with Americans anyway.

I got the impression there wasn't any need for dying Omar to speak. He let Heike go and she didn't look back and that was it.

Still feels weird that he dies just like that. Takes away from his death and it feels like his should be the most important one.

The base naming sounds ok. Implementing it into original campaigns is up to Mcbenn, but I can name the first one for now.

Thanks!

By the way could the base in Ar05 be named G.K. Zhukov? It seems to be one of the outer rings that defend V.I. Lenin together with L.P. Beria and S.M. Kirov (based on the plot of the mission). That or some other Russian Marshal would fit as a name. I understand the Arabian one has no name as it's merely a forward outpost in preparations for an attack. Either that or the bases in Ar06 would be nice (Northern G.K. Zhukov and Southern G.K. Zhukov in that case, although destroying it in Ar05 would be more fitting).

[McBenn]

In Ar15a there's no quote or anything coming from the Alliance once you deal with Russians compared to the ones you hear after having dealt with Americans. Is it intended or is there some text line missing?

Yes I guess I just assumed that you would defeat the Russians as the last foe, not having the Arabs sticking around. I'll get that fixed.

I'm certain it's intended for the base in Ar07 not to be able to have all 4 resource nodes (southernmost oil, oil and siberite, northernmost siberite) within its reach but is it really intended for it to have only one spot in the entire map where you can get 3 of 4? (either oil, oil and siberite or siberite, oil and siberite) I like how that oil tower is in such a satisfying place from a geographical perspective but it's a bit of a stretch.

Yes the map was specifically crafted to make it hard to encompass three resources nodes at the same time, and make it impossible to get four or more (yes there are 5 resources nodes when I count ).

Could the dialogues in Ar09 indicate that you need to hurry before the Russians announce a cargo to be missing? It seems logical, but a dialogue reminder wouldn't hurt.

Hmm well ya hmm, I would prefer not to if that's ok because, as you say, the player can figure that out. It's these small coherent logical aspects I like about OW. It makes it feel "real".

I know it's a weird request, but is there any chance we could get a mechanic together with Aviradze's reinforcements? In AM and RU campaigns we get one pretty much right off the bat and it'd be nice for Arabians to get one with him as well. I noticed that the random soldiers from his reinforcements always seem to have someone with proficiency in mechanical skills (level 2 base) so it'd be nice if he/she could have exp moved aside from combat to mechanical skills.

I see your point but I'll have to go with 0dd1 on this one. Even though Delta has vehicles, Aviradze can't count on you capturing one. If you don't a mechanic is useless.
But you are right. The base should be called Delta. Fixed that.

Thought it was intended to be able to get an Alliance with Americans anyway.

It is, but sparing the American in 01_cont just makes thing easier. And killing him is one of the first blows to Heike's perception of the world (as laid out in the "cutscene" between Ar04 and Ar05).

Back to Ar14 - why is there no explanation behind being able to research biodetection? It just is there. Will it appear as an extra quest in Ar12?

Correct. The state of things are a bit odd at the moment because I still haven't finished Ar12 while 0dd1 has completed both Ar13 and Ar14. Aviradze invents it in Ar12 using inspiration from Bodenhof's research. I think it's a nice touch. Those two can't stand each other but in the end they end up using each other's research to invent biodetection completely independently of each other

Why is there no dialogue line for Omar's death in Ar15a?

When I read this I was like "that can't be true" but it is. Dunno how that has slipped my mind. Gonna fix that.

Any chance you could name the Muddy River base in Ar14 intro map?

I'm also maintaining the original campaign (which is part of the explanation why making Ar12 is taking it's time). We can easily name the bases in the Arabian Campaign. Doing the same in the original campaigns is a bit more tricky. Not technically but politically (if that's the right word for it). People tend to feel rather strongly about the original campaigns and anything but bugfixes I don't dare to implement without the consensus of the community. Try raising the question somewhere appropriate here on OWN. If people are up for it it's no problem to make the change.

By the way once you get done with the missions and start working on the cutscenes, may I suggest using diary/letter format?

The thread about the cutscenes is here: https://forum.original-war.net/viewtopi ... =80&t=4173. As you can see there hasn't been much progression in that field and we haven't prioritized it because it's not that important right now. But your suggestion with letters almost match the suggestions already in the thread about books or just paper scraps. And I like that idea

By the way could the base in Ar05 be named G.K. Zhukov? It seems to be one of the outer rings that defend V.I. Lenin together with L.P. Beria and S.M. Kirov (based on the plot of the mission). That or some other Russian Marshal would fit as a name. I understand the Arabian one has no name as it's merely a forward outpost in preparations for an attack. Either that or the bases in Ar06 would be nice (Northern G.K. Zhukov and Southern G.K. Zhukov in that case, although destroying it in Ar05 would be more fitting).

Fitting name for the base in Ar05 - it will be done. Hm and maybe the names of the other Russian outer ring bases should be mentioned in the dialogue.

[Krotos]

Thank you for your response, McBen!

Regarding Ar02 - understood. I'll just farm it through mechanics repairing one over and over.

@Ar05 - don't forget to mention L.M. Kaganovich as well. Also any chance we could have Corporal Grishka present in Zhukov? He could have the very same line he uses in Ru03 to warn Kirov about the attack.
@Ar07 - Understood.

@Ar07 & Ar08 - there's a certain feeling of discontinuity there. In Ru08 you learn that Heike had to pull out from V.I. Lenin to defend New Kabul, but in Ar07 you do that from New Khandashar. At the same time creating the research facility of New Khandashar right after New Nishapur makes no sense. Perhaps moving Ar07 to Ar10 would make more sense plot-wise.

This way the plot makes sense - Heike pulls out from beyond Outer Ring defenses, while rescuing Bodenhof's group. She's then captured and gets some secret info from The Archive (perhaps naming that base would help as well - S.F. Akhromeyev for example. The dialogue in Ar11 would be changed a bit and intro to current Ar07 would need a bit of dialogue changes too, but this way the mission order would make a bit more sense. Right now the change from Ar07 to Ar08 is a huge plothole. I sense a few more issues with Ar07's plot (namely the American attack) but it's easier to solve I believe.

@Am11 - I'll suggest it in an appriopriate thread then, provided there is one. I really want this change to go through.