Single Player bugs and crashes - After the 24th of February 2014

[Dancing Hoskuld]

New game snail, noble and it is taking 15 turns to study a tech and 20 turns to build a building. Something has changed as it used to be about 5 turns for a tech and 7-10 for a building.

 

[Thunderbrd]

This is the result of that aberration I mentioned before where a unit, (the rogue) attacks at 0% chance of winning but 100% chance of retreating. It gets 9 xp for that. Even though I did not exploit it by continually attacking at those odds, it does add up. Also the destruction of roads in neutral territory gives xp, I mentioned that problem too. Neither one has taken all the terrain promos yet so those should still be available to them but are not.

It should be getting very little xp for retreating (as in next to none) when it has such a chance of retreat. I believe I've fixed that since then and it was a problem with Dynamic XP. If it's still giving this much then I may have inversed the calculation so that easier retreats actually give more and it could be revealing of that.

The roads bit... I thought that was controlled better now or has since been eliminated but then again I do recall leaving the dynamic xp portion somewhat alone since I really don't care about that option and believe we could do without it now since the base core system works like a better thought-out dynamic xp as it is. At this point Dynamic XP mainly means 'less XP if you're taking reasonable risks'.

And those terrain promos was what I noticed as one of the variations that made me think it may not all be about maxing out the promo options btw and does therefore warrant a little code investigation. I wonder if it has to do with somehow adjusted access there but I'm not sure at this point. You'd think if that was it the retraining mechanism would eliminate the promos that are no longer valid on them unless they simply haven't had the opportunity to upgrade since then so they haven't had another check against adjusted promo accesses. That's entirely possible. 'spose a way to test would be to take an odd promo like one of the purple ones and change the qualifiers to make sure that tech/unit-wise they should be able to select it and if they suddenly are able to, then once selected they lose a few promos they shouldn't currently have access to, then we've got a successful diagnosis of placing the blame on updates changing what they should be able to obtain.

What stands out to me on both screen shots is a Profound lack of AI defense against and elimination of these 2 units. No AI in any of my games would ever be allowed to get a Rogue or similar unit that heavily promoted.

The AI must Not be programmed to use Dogs and the Visibility Promo to secure their borders. Nor be weighted to seek out and destroy these type enemy units either.

Dogs do seem to be a weak point currently. There's a major strategic problem with the AI in that it tends to not have enough of the unit roles recognized and since some role needs overlap significantly it tends to be one 'best' unit is found to fulfill that role when there are numerous sub-roles within that role.

This is a major problem for them. It affects them in numerous strategic ways and I have a plan to resolve it since I'm on my own to do so here. The plan involves taking some further steps so that I can give myself more controls in the xml and hardcode less. Such a fix is not simple but should really help a lot once done. Pretty much the next cycle or two is planned out to address those things starting with the base projects that will enable the system intended.

And units of this type or any unit for that matter, to get that many Promos needs to be capped! This is rather absurdly unbalanced imho.

@T-Brd, now you see a perfect example of why I squawk over Promotions and there being way, way too many of them. Blatant player exploitation with no repercussions, while the AI lacks the ability to counter.

The AI lacks the ability to counter because the AI sucks. Improving the AI is the solution. I'm looking at most of those promos and 90% of the time 90% of them wouldn't help as most are very situationaly beneficial. Any number of good strategies could eliminate them and really piss off the player that controls them. Super units like these have a way of eventually having their luck run out in the most unusual situations.

It's an RPG standard to allow a basic man to become a deity with enough experience. Can't take that away from us man! But there ARE options that you may prefer such as not utilizing unlimited XP. Just consider how far back these units would be set if they upgrade now without unlimited XP.

And on Size Matters the most powerful promotions will zero out the XP amount with or without unlimited XP. (AND they will also make the unit gain less xp when they are awarded xp!) Very frustrating but entirely worth it given the power-up they get there. And the AI has its ways of working with that - I've seen some mean AI units that could easily trump these, not in XP but in ability at least, rather easily generated by the AI in Size Matters.

I think it would better then if you PM AIAndy and get advise from him on this since he is the person that set that stuff up.

Shouldn't be necessary. I just have to research back to when I did it last. He had given me the instructions on how to expand into new game object classes before and I do have a fair recollection of the process but I'd want to look at the files changed during the SVN revision I made long ago. He set up the first one then had me do the rest back then. So the challenge will be sorting through all the SVN revisions til I find the one where I did that.

 

[strategyonly]

New game snail, noble and it is taking 15 turns to study a tech and 20 turns to build a building. Something has changed as it used to be about 5 turns for a tech and 7-10 for a building.

I dont think anything was changed?? But why as a tester are you playing on snail, you need to get to the Modern Era at least, in 3 weeks time, snail will take 3 months.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I always play on snail and noble. I have a maximum number of units I can keep straight in my head once my empire has more than that number of units I stop playing and start a new game. That means sometime in the Renaissance/Industrial era for C2C as you need so many units just to maintain your cities where as in other mods that is done via buildings.

edit I used to be able to get to the Renaissance/Industrial in three-six days.

 

[charlesb96]

This promotion problem is V34 no SVN so if it is fixed, that will be good for the next release.

Are bee bombs supposed to do anything? Right now they do not give ANY benefit at all, just cost to build.

 

[Thunderbrd]

This promotion problem is V34 no SVN so if it is fixed, that will be good for the next release.

Are bee bombs supposed to do anything? Right now they do not give ANY benefit at all, just cost to build.

Ah... cool ok.

Bee Bombs have an effect that is limited to an option still under development so since v34 they've been made dependent on that option. I'm getting a little impatient to get to developing out that option - it's the next on the development plan for the Combat Mod. But I've got all these other issues to deal with so it'll probably still be another version or two since everything in the code is falling on my shoulders now.

@SO: I've found the commit where I did all that previously with setting up game object classes for the replacement. So it won't take too long now.

 

[Thunderbrd]

My units have stopped getting promotions. Look at the 2 Rogues, both ready for promotions but not able to give any.
V34 no SVN

Ok, so I'm not sure what the problem is for ya there but on the current SVN codes it clears up with an end-turn.

 

[Thunderbrd]

@ TB

I added in the World Info with the GOM_options but now its crashing??

Ok, so I've officially fixed up World Infos to successful work with the Replacement Mechanism.

However, some basic testing shows that on a Deity start with your option with the world info file as you had it set, as soon as you plant your first city you go into -50 gold per round (strike) at 0% research. That... might... be... interesting.

I'll not include your world info file in the update here but you'll be able to use and test it and tweak it to your heart's desire.

I DO think it's a really great idea to manipulate world infos for the nightmare mode option though so I'm totally on your side with that as an added way to stretch the difficulty a bit. I just think that those particular settings end up far too extreme is all. Certainly not against forcing the player down to a smaller % of research on the slider right away and on Deity wouldn't be offended if it caused a strike as soon as the game starts but -50 at 0% is a little too much imo. I don't think you'd get past your first city until the Renaissance era. If you wanna make things truly impossible you've got it.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I have noticed that some animals that attack me and get killed are being resurrected! Perhaps the message is the clue

 

[strategyonly]

Yeah went i get to an enemy city area (sometimes) i get 4-6 units that are now mine, just popped up?, also when i conquer a city i get 2 units also?? And i can NOT playing with Size matters or Combat Mod.

 

[Thunderbrd]

I have noticed that some animals that attack me and get killed are being resurrected! Perhaps the message is the clue

Yeah went i get to an enemy city area (sometimes) i get 4-6 units that are now mine, just popped up?, also when i conquer a city i get 2 units also?? And i can NOT playing with Size matters or Combat Mod.

Based on the message it sounds like there may be a lurking bug in the LadiesOgre merge. I'd really have to catch it in the act though so if you have a save from just before the round end that then leads to this situation it would be good to see.

 

[JosEPh_II]

I have noticed that some animals that attack me and get killed are being resurrected! Perhaps the message is the clue

Please don't tell me that is in regular C2C now?!

JosEPh

 

[Thunderbrd]

I have noticed that some animals that attack me and get killed are being resurrected! Perhaps the message is the clue

Ok, I searched for a long portion of that message throughout our text files and found the right text key reference. Did a search for that text key in the dll and found the source where it's being delivered. Evaluated what was taking place there and determined, based on my knowledge of this effect's current implementations in the mod:

1) The tracker that was attacked must have the field medic stack heal ability stemming from one of those Astrological promos. It was triggered by that attacked tracker because he won the battle.

2) The effect did not make sure to isolate that only units of the defender were to be healed on the plot in which combat was taking place so it was potentially able to heal the enemy that just attacked him.

3) The message was identifying the attacking unit as the unit that brought about the healing rather than the defending unit that was victorious.

I think that by fixing these issues that pretty much sorts it out. It's one of those parts that duplicate in the code for stack attack and normal attack sequences which is a bit of a pain but oh well. It also revealed another similar bug lurking in a related bit of code as well. I'll include the fix in the next dll update.

Sidenote: These effects have a LOT of neat potential for advancing further 'field' healer abilities I think. Will have to soon take a look at some new promos for healers that utilize these!

 

[Thunderbrd]

Yeah went i get to an enemy city area (sometimes) i get 4-6 units that are now mine, just popped up?, also when i conquer a city i get 2 units also?? And i can NOT playing with Size matters or Combat Mod.

What kind of units?

 

[strategyonly]

@ TB
pics 1/2 are what you requested for the pop-up units, some in the 2nd pic i already upgrade to Musketmen already.

Also i am seeing ALOT of guardsmen around citie3s and i mean ALOT!!!pic 3

also there are alot of surgeons/apoth units just running around the titles with NO unit attached to them and its just plain easy pickin's for anyone to get them.pic 4

 

[Thunderbrd]

@ TB
pics 1/2 are what you requested for the pop-up units, some in the 2nd pic i already upgrade to Musketmen already.

So you're saying those units are just showing up for you after you defeat a city? I'm not sure what mechanism could be at work there at all. This isn't what I feared at least. Some of those could be a type of 'capture' like the Lord for example. But the others? I dunno... I'd probably have to see the save just before you capture the city with instructions on replicating to have a clue and even then... Perhaps wonders are creating this effect? Python? I don't know of anything in the code itself unless those units have a 'capture' tag set like our siege weapons do.

Also i am seeing ALOT of guardsmen around citie3s and i mean ALOT!!!pic 3

I've been wondering about this too but looking at it makes me think that perhaps 'plot' crime values are being considered important to get rid of for the AI. That could explain this sort of behavior. Koshling implemented that stuff a long time ago and all I've done to it recently is to get the law enforcement and health care units to take promos that help to fight crime and disease values which does vastly improve their game and cut down a lot on how badly they need such units. But valuing elimination of plot crime would probably still have them overreacting some - though they'd be thorough and once on top of it would find it pretty easy to stay on top of it.

also there are alot of surgeons/apoth units just running around the titles with NO unit attached to them and its just plain easy pickin's for anyone to get them.pic 4

I've noticed this too and wondered why they have so many running around in the field. I've no idea where these kinds of determinations are being made... perhaps they're enroute to other cities they were built to assist in reducing disease in but I think more likely it has something to do with their AI still overlapping with the Counter AI which is the AI for units like axemen and spearmen and such that the AI builds to COUNTER problems that come up like raiders and such. By killing them, you may well be prompting the AI to think to build more to take out what killed them. It's part of the general mess of the AI's combat strategies that needs to be addressed within the next few cycles (NOT an overnight fix issue unfortunately.)

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

When you raze a city if they had slaves in it you may get some of those slaves some may even become healers if they were settled healer slaves. Should only get the earliest healer units, same for story tellers from the settled entertainer slave. There is also some code for the other settled specialists but I did not like it so did not finish it.

It has some similarities with the flawed Move Great people mod.

 

[strategyonly]

When you raze a city if they had slaves in it you may get some of those slaves some may even become healers if they were settled healer slaves. Should only get the earliest healer units, same for story tellers from the settled entertainer slave. There is also some code for the other settled specialists but I did not like it so did not finish it.

It has some similarities with the flawed Move Great people mod.

Nope nothing to do with razed cities, this is just the normal lately?? Guards and Surgeons that is .

 

[CiverDan1]

Here is a screenshot showing red blobs in place of some of the units (which I am currently unable to build).

 

[strategyonly]

Here is a screenshot showing red blobs in place of some of the units (which I am currently unable to build).

I am glad i asked you for a screenie, those are PINK btns not re blobs, that is a completely different bug.

Now can you place you mouse over one of the pink action btns.