Help debugging a CtD

[kdodge]

OK .. well.
As a result of my posts in the .32 bug thread, it seems I have some problem on my machine that needs debugging. I posted a savefile that reliably CTD on my machine, but at least 2 other posters report no problems.

So rather than junking up the bug thread with my personal issue, I'm asking the community for help here.

How can I debug a FFH crash to desktop?

I get them relatively frequently as the game progresses past turn 250 or so, always assumed it was related to hell terrain or some other issue, and just the price to pay for a really cool mod.
But now I am discovering it seems to be ME!
I have a pretty decent setup: WinXP OS, DellXPS machine: 3.2Ghz single core processor, 1GB memory, Radeon X1650PRO 512MB 128-bit video with the latest catalyst drivers & Dxdrivers... should be able to chug the system just fine.

I'm pretty technical (java servlet & EJB designer/programmer) but don't have much windows OS or Python experience.. so don't spare me details, but I may have some follow up questions.

If it *was* crashing on everyone's machine, what would the mod team do to debug the issue?
Any help on where I can start looking to find the issues?

 

[xienwolf]

Typically, go into Worldbuilder and start deleting things till you can stop the crash. Then start putting it back in until you get the crash to return. Once you think it is isolated to a specific element, load the original file, delete just that one offender and see if it fixes the crash to verify your testing.

If debugging a general crash instead of a specific Savegame, then you look at the differences since last stable version and do the same by removing/adding them until you have it isolated.

 

[kdodge]

Thanks for replying Xien.

oof. ok had hoped there was some stack tracing or error logging somewhere to look at that would help me narrow it down.
loading & reloading and hitting world builder brute-force debugging seems rough.


I also wonder.. since others are not having CTD's with the same save, is there some good way to check other dependencies like drivers, graphics, etc?

For example, once I narrow it down to "it's some problem with those skeletons in that stack" (which is my current guess).. now what?

 

[xienwolf]

There very well could be another approach, and for isolation of a crash that is not reproducable my method is horribly lacking. I just happen to be a very brute-force programmer

 

[Kael]

There is no easy way to troubleshoot a CtD (unfortunatly). Its also difficult to prove a cause by deleting a resource in thw worldbuilder unless you can setup the same situation in another save and reproduce it. Ive spent well over 10 hours on single CtD's to get them worked out.

The reason is that you may delete a skeleton and that may stop a crash in your save. But the reason the crash stops could be that with that skeletons comb at no longer using up a number on the random number generator something downstream of him (a burning sand catching fire, a diplomacy starting, a civ declaring war, a unit dying) may occur or not occur that effects the CtD.

We really need other people to download your save and try it out. Id be especially curius to see if people with 1Gb of RAM or your Radeon video card are able to reproduce your crash.