Save games and damage

[Aquitaine]

Hi there,

Occasional SH4 player here. Running 1.5 with TMO and RSRD. On my first patrol after live fire tests.

Run into a few merchants and sank them. Saved my game upon encountering a fourth. Return to that save later and immediately my sub takes a bunch of damage - all fore tubes destroyed, bulkheads destroyed, foreward flooding, 1% hull damage. I hadn't been damaged at all for the entire patrol.

I reload an earlier save and have the same problem. I reload an EARLIER save and am fine, so just have to sit and wait at my patrol area to re-encounter the most recent contact. I save and reload to test the save - my sub is fine, but now the freighter that I'd sighted is suddenly on fire!

I searched the forums and found various save issues with SH3, but a couple posts saying that they were supposed to be gone for SH4, or that, if they were there, they caused CTDs. I couldn't find anything about abruptly taking a bunch of damage that you hadn't taken before. What gives?

[Distortion]

Or you messed up the install order with other mods, or delete some, after the last save, or you saved with time compression on. That last is my experience, it can happen.

[Aquitaine]

Install order is just as TMO and RSRD indicate.

Time compression is possible though unlikely. Seems like a fairly elementary thing to catch in bug-testing though. :/

[SteamWake]

Either you have a corrupted save or you recieved some damage prior to that save.

If you recieved damage prior to a save even though that damage was repaired you sill get flashing lights damage reports and shouting and general excitement. Wait a few moments and every should calm down.

[Aquitaine]

No damage in the save, as I said. I've only run into merchants so far in this patrol.

I'm fine now that I reloaded an earlier save, I'm just baffled how this happens. I saw several posts about 'oh, it's my fault, I saved within 50km of an enemy ship' - when precisely did the developers think we would be saving? While relaxing on the beach in Hawaii?

I'd never run into this before in previous SH4 games so hopefully it was just a fluke.

[SteamWake]

Yea its a flukey thing there are all sorts of 'rules' founded with little evidence in fact.

* Dont save while submerged
* Dont save near other surface units
* Dont save at high TC
* Only save from map view

Frankly Ive violated each and every one of those and have only had a corrupted save maybe twice in several years worth of playing.

At least you had a previous save :rock:

[Webster]

corrupted saves vary for each computer setup so there is no set rule but rather guidelines to follow if you get corrupted saves.

here is one sure fact about the game, when you respawn from a save you are NOT placed in the same spot so you spawn close to where you were but not the exact spot.

if you are submerged in shallow water when you save you will not see your boats depth change but rather the distance to the bottom will be a little off for a second or two and this is where most people get that instant damage from when coming out of a save. the bottom hits you in other words. by saving on the surface the bottom cant hit you so you avoid any chance of damage that way.

saving in close proximity to another object, ship, or land will have a simular effect and can give you that instant damage. think of it like the sub sitting still and you jiggle the environment around you, anything close to you can and may bump into you causing damage but you dont see anything different after you stop jiggling.

all this happens in the blink of an eye so its not something you can watch happen and as SteamWake said it doesnt happen to everyone. even two people with the same setups, one may get corrupted saves and the other doesnt.

from my own investigation i feel its less likely to happen the better your computer is. with my old p4 computer i had to follow all those rules to avoid corrupted saves and now with my quad core and 8800gt i feel i could ignore the rules and be ok, but from habbit i still follow the guidelines anyway.