[REL] FOTRS Ultimate Project

[Jeff-Groves]

Originally Posted by s7rikeback

Very nearly.... Jeff has shown me a way to clone ships using less resources within the game..

I'm 99% sure the maru mod will be ready by this time Friday. A lot slimmer than in my test version.

Glad to have assisted you Mate.
All the Ships working now then?


On the Bismark mission I just need to put a torpedo in it to try something.
I'll give the Bismark squared a try.
Thanks Mate.

[cdrsubron7]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

I can find nothing with my meager skills cdrsubron7, but what I'm thinking of doing is creating a mission right in the middle of the area, and just sitting there on the surface with radar while the clock ticks by. 'Course, I don't know what good that'll do... Get me sunk again, maybe? Probably. One little tidbit - I'm looking closer at (where ARE my confounded reading glasses?...) is the EastAsiaCampaign.mis file. It has the potential to generate a bunch of Akizuli destroyers, but there's usually a cruiser with them. However, the first Akizuli is the "leader", and I'm still looking through the file, getting confused...

Do you remember about where you were, and the date of the DD "display-of-force"? You said back a few pages it was October 1943, East China Sea, West of Okinawa. Were you like just about in the middle between Korea, China, Formosa and Japan?

We might take Jeff-Groves up on

and have him ask Dan what he knows about this, or get some insight into the MIS file parameters...

I'm willing to bet that even with making a mission to try and catch that bunch of destroyers it won't happen. I've had this happen to me before several times while playing FOTRS v1.3. Some of these encounters occurred while patrolling in the Luzon Straits in early '44. Every time it happens the game just stops working and bogs down.

[Jeff-Groves]

Managed to hit the Bismark twice.
What I'm working on is to get it to show where you hit it.
Right now you'll see no hole or damage mark like SH3 does.
IF I recall right it needs AO Mapping on the hull at the lest.
Then an internal damage model which I can borrow from a stock SH4 Ship for testing.
If what I'm trying works out? It also helps Iambecomelife WOTK!

[propbeanie]

Originally Posted by cdrsubron7

I'm willing to bet that even with making a mission to try and catch that bunch of destroyers it won't happen. I've had this happen to me before several times while playing FOTRS v1.3. Some of these encounters occurred while patrolling in the Luzon Straits in early '44. Every time it happens the game just stops working and bogs down.

See, early '44 cuts the 44a missions out of the equation, since they don't start until Sep 1, 1944. So it's gotta be something else, something that runs the whole game, or the internal error as suggested by others.

Originally Posted by Jeff-Groves

Managed to hit the Bismark twice.
What I'm working on is to get it to show where you hit it.
Right now you'll see no hole or damage mark like SH3 does.
IF I recall right it needs AO Mapping on the hull at the lest.
Then an internal damage model which I can borrow from a stock SH4 Ship for testing.
If what I'm trying works out? It also helps Iambecomelife WOTK!

That would be way cool. I'm cheering you on! I'm also going to ask my dad if he's got anything from my Grandpa's days in "The Great War" when he went to France as a signalman / telegrapher. iambecomelife is asking for research help again over there.

[cdrsubron7]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

See, early '44 cuts the 44a missions out of the equation, since they don't start until Sep 1, 1944. So it's gotta be something else, something that runs the whole game, or the internal error as suggested by others.

Well, all I can say if it does turn out to be a internal error, that down the road it will turn a lot of people off to this mod. I quit play FOTRS v1.3 for this particular reason. Hopefully we can find something and effect some kind of fix to it (crossing fingers).

[Jeff-Groves]

Well that went well.
Hit the Bismark and before it went down?
It just vanished!
Guess I need to check zone files and such since I test in a stock SH4.

Unless it went down so fast I missed it?

[propbeanie]

Originally Posted by Jeff-Groves

Well that went well.
Hit the Bismark and before it went down?
It just vanished!
Guess I need to check zone files and such since I test in a stock SH4.

Unless it went down so fast I missed it?

Now, I've hit it with one torpedo that "hit the magazine" (a likely excuse), and it sank in less than 3 minutes, like hitting a magic button, but usually it takes a good 10 minutes anyway to go down... after about 4 or 5 torps - definitely needs more work than an Ise in stock... Also, I created that mission with my ME on my computer with my install, and that uses a borked Bismark in FotRS Ultimate. I don't always have issues with that, but we have seen similar behavior, with ships just up and disappearing mid-mission... If you want, post the Bismark files you have, and I'll build the same mission using your Bismark...

--------------------------------------------------------------

@cdrsubron7: I finally found a search term that worked... "massive convoy of destroyers in sh4"... anyway:

1. Massive destroyer convoy SilentEnigma has SH4 v1.5 stock, near Tokyo. Short thread.

2. A tale of 54 destroyers Torvald Von Mansee, with daylight pictures.

3. Fast convoy of death! joefremont stock 1.5 from Steam.

4. Time compression bug MRAD encounters what he supposes is a TC bug, but it's actually a bunch of destroyers causing the lag. He was at v1.3, no issues. Upgraded and updated to v1.5 and has this.

I do know there's more hits than this, 'cause I remember finding them years ago after I had it the first time... Oh well. I thought mine was in v1.3 or thereabouts, but maybe not. I didn't think I'd bought my Gold Edition disk until just a few years ago, but maybe it has been a few years... anyway, I'm not going to bother with looking through all my old files anymore, and will stick with looking through v1.5.

There isn't a whole lot in those posts that we don't know already. There's more than a couple mentions of the East China Sea, and the one mention of being near Tokyo harbor, to the South and West of the harbor, which is where I was when I had mine. The Tokyo and East China Sea could be the same MIS file, ie: a convoy from Formosa / Taiwan to Tokyo. But, there are a couple of mentions of the Coral Sea, which is East of Australia. There may be more than one MIS that has an issue... The interesting post is the one where the destroyers are sitting still. The dates, including years, are also different.

One common denominator: Time Compression. But is it a cause? Or just some bad math in the game, or bad memory allocation?

[propbeanie]

Hello Jeff-Groves... have you by chance found any issues with any of the JP DDs? Specifically the Akizuki? Although, that isn't the only destroyer that is spawned when a bunch do appear.

[propbeanie]

@ cdrsubron7 especially: I have not found anything in any of the mission files I've looked at. I've not even found a "suspect" we can call "a mission of interest". Other than the fact that the Hunter / Killer groups are all destroyers, and a couple of the convoys will generate 7 or 8 destroyers - but also merchants, there is nothing in those files to suggest the line-ups those threads I referenced above have documented. One piece of what I feel would be really useful information to find out would be "how high of TC were you using?".

When I had my encounter near Tokyo years ago, I was using the highest TC level my computer could do back then, 'cause I was in a hurry, and wanted to get to my secondary mission objective fast. This is where the "fault" lies, I think. Looking at the map and where some of these groups are reported to have been encountered, the users may have been in what I'll call "an overlapping spawn area" for the Hunter / Killer groups. The game, coming out of the TC, with the user now within the games "no-go" spawning radius, has a group already spawning, and the game goes "uh uh uh..." and starts to choke on it's own data. Hence the lag AND the resultant corrupted save. It might just be that some of the issues reported as a TC issue have actually been a "close encounter of the spawning kind", and that some of the bad saves have been the same issue at their root. Way too much data to try to save. If you've got the map zoomed out, you may not see the sonar lines that are drawn when the hydrophone gets the "sonar contact, bearing 42, long range" comes across the text box, and in TC, you won't hear it. All you'd notice it the lag, and then think to yourself "I'd better save this thing before I lose all those ships I sunk"... Poof - gone.

I gotta go mow the lawn now... ratz.

[cdrsubron7]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

@ cdrsubron7 especially: I have not found anything in any of the mission files I've looked at. I've not even found a "suspect" we can call "a mission of interest". Other than the fact that the Hunter / Killer groups are all destroyers, and a couple of the convoys will generate 7 or 8 destroyers - but also merchants, there is nothing in those files to suggest the line-ups those threads I referenced above have documented. One piece of what I feel would be really useful information to find out would be "how high of TC were you using?".

When I had my encounter near Tokyo years ago, I was using the highest TC level my computer could do back then, 'cause I was in a hurry, and wanted to get to my secondary mission objective fast. This is where the "fault" lies, I think. Looking at the map and where some of these groups are reported to have been encountered, the users may have been in what I'll call "an overlapping spawn area" for the Hunter / Killer groups. The game, coming out of the TC, with the user now within the games "no-go" spawning radius, has a group already spawning, and the game goes "uh uh uh..." and starts to choke on it's own data. Hence the lag AND the resultant corrupted save. It might just be that some of the issues reported as a TC issue have actually been a "close encounter of the spawning kind", and that some of the bad saves have been the same issue at their root. Way too much data to try to save. If you've got the map zoomed out, you may not see the sonar lines that are drawn when the hydrophone gets the "sonar contact, bearing 42, long range" comes across the text box, and in TC, you won't hear it. All you'd notice it the lag, and then think to yourself "I'd better save this thing before I lose all those ships I sunk"... Poof - gone.

I gotta go mow the lawn now... ratz.

I can't argue with you on this because I've less knowledge to work with on than you. When I'm patrolling an area as I was the other night I never go higher than 1024 when using TC. And every time I've had this happen it has always been a crap load of DDs never merchants. Initial contact always is with two or three ships and then when I use the free camera to take a look there is as I mentioned before a crap load of them. You saw the screenies I posted a few pages ago, so you know I'm not making this up. As you've said there is nothing in any of the mission files that would give an indication of what the possible cause might be. Maybe it is what Jeff_Groves described as a game engine fault or was it CapnScurvy.

[cdrsubron7]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

@ cdrsubron7 especially: I have not found anything in any of the mission files I've looked at. I've not even found a "suspect" we can call "a mission of interest". Other than the fact that the Hunter / Killer groups are all destroyers, and a couple of the convoys will generate 7 or 8 destroyers - but also merchants, there is nothing in those files to suggest the line-ups those threads I referenced above have documented. One piece of what I feel would be really useful information to find out would be "how high of TC were you using?".

When I had my encounter near Tokyo years ago, I was using the highest TC level my computer could do back then, 'cause I was in a hurry, and wanted to get to my secondary mission objective fast. This is where the "fault" lies, I think. Looking at the map and where some of these groups are reported to have been encountered, the users may have been in what I'll call "an overlapping spawn area" for the Hunter / Killer groups. The game, coming out of the TC, with the user now within the games "no-go" spawning radius, has a group already spawning, and the game goes "uh uh uh..." and starts to choke on it's own data. Hence the lag AND the resultant corrupted save. It might just be that some of the issues reported as a TC issue have actually been a "close encounter of the spawning kind", and that some of the bad saves have been the same issue at their root. Way too much data to try to save. If you've got the map zoomed out, you may not see the sonar lines that are drawn when the hydrophone gets the "sonar contact, bearing 42, long range" comes across the text box, and in TC, you won't hear it. All you'd notice it the lag, and then think to yourself "I'd better save this thing before I lose all those ships I sunk"... Poof - gone.

I gotta go mow the lawn now... ratz.

pb, you have the right of it. I just got of the phone with Florida Sailor and he confirmed your suspicions. You got it right, buddy. FS also gave me some info that might help us cure it. Seems at some point when Ducimus was working on TMO this same problem occurred. He pulled the mod and had Lurker take a look at the campaign files and in the process reworked the mis.files for TMO. Thus eliminating the problem in TMO. We need to compare the mis.files in TMO with those in FOTRSU. We then should be able to effect a cure, hopefully. Nice detective work, buddy. You got a brain.

[propbeanie]

Originally Posted by cdrsubron7

pb, you have the right of it. I just got of the phone with Florida Sailor and he confirmed your suspicions. You got it right, buddy. FS also gave me some info that might help us cure it. Seems at some point when Ducimus was working on TMO this same problem occurred. He pulled the mod and had Lurker take a look at the campaign files and in the process reworked the mis.files for TMO. Thus eliminating the problem in TMO. We need to compare the mis.files in TMO with those in FOTRSU. We then should be able to effect a cure, hopefully. Nice detective work, buddy. You got a brain.

Wow, I'm techt (touched) - enn thuh haid - I are from Missouri originally, hills, that is... dadblame Cardinals... Anyway.

If my 'spicion's correct then, I'd guess they eliminated all overlapping spawn locations, maybe minimized their circle, and limited TC in the config file. I was hoping though that you would have said you had been doing 8096 or maybe 5012, or some really high number, and that we could leave 2048 in there at least... I wonder what the limit is, if there is one? I do remember getting that huge group in TMO though, but it was a long time ago, like maybe v1.9 or thereabouts? All I do remember is being ticked off at Ubi about v1.5, finally buying the add-on from them online 'cause all the mods were using it, and it started that © ® @ p on me, no matter the mod. I'm probably one of those newbs that complained very vociferously in one of those threads. I was capital Pee Ah Ess Ess Eee DEED!

As a secondary corroborating witness, Torvald Von Mansee has daylight pix in the #2 link above:


that could be a near duplicate of yours. But the most telling one is:


with MOST of them lined up, but notice off to the right? Someone's getting out of line! He's also one of the ones (Torvald) that said that the group was growing while he was watching it.

I sure am curious though as to what it was they did for a potential "fix", or probably something to minimize the occurance. FS didn't say which version of TMO that was that they did the re-do, did he?...

[cdrsubron7]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

Wow, I'm techt (touched) - enn thuh haid - I are from Missouri originally, hills, that is... dadblame Cardinals... Anyway.

If my 'spicion's correct then, I'd guess they eliminated all overlapping spawn locations, maybe minimized their circle, and limited TC in the config file. I was hoping though that you would have said you had been doing 8096 or maybe 5012, or some really high number, and that we could leave 2048 in there at least... I wonder what the limit is, if there is one? I do remember getting that huge group in TMO though, but it was a long time ago, like maybe v1.9 or thereabouts? All I do remember is being ticked off at Ubi about v1.5, finally buying the add-on from them online 'cause all the mods were using it, and it started that © ® @ p on me, no matter the mod. I'm probably one of those newbs that complained very vociferously in one of those threads. I was capital Pee Ah Ess Ess Eee DEED!

As a secondary corroborating witness, Torvald Von Mansee has daylight pix in the #2 link above:


that could be a near duplicate of yours. But the most telling one is:


with MOST of them lined up, but notice off to the right? Someone's getting out of line! He's also one of the ones (Torvald) that said that the group was growing while he was watching it.

I sure am curious though as to what it was they did for a potential "fix", or probably something to minimize the occurance. FS didn't say which version of TMO that was that they did the re-do, did he?...

No he didn't, but I would think that TMO v2.5 would be the one to look at for now.

[Jeff-Groves]

Originally Posted by propbeanie

Hello Jeff-Groves... have you by chance found any issues with any of the JP DDs? Specifically the Akizuki? Although, that isn't the only destroyer that is spawned when a bunch do appear.

I've been working on just the 24 suspect Ships so far.
I'll take a look at the Akizuki to see if anything stands out.

The textures folders need cleaned out.
I've found nearly 8 or more Megs of useless files.
Base of TLowRes folder alone needs the images deleted.

[Jeff-Groves]

Akizuki has a load out variation in the eqp file.
That shouldn't cause an issue on it's own.
Stock also has a cam file.
Not sure what that is for.