From several
months worth of intense experimentation, I'd identified the problem but there doesn't seem to be any workaround for it.
The mod works by spawning a Bold (and accessory effects) at the center of each depth charge explosion. Sounds simple, no? Well...
...no...it's
not.
For whatever reason, spawning a Bold this way somehow corrupts the Campaign_RND file. Don't ask me why, or how, because I've never figured that out. What I
do know is this:
- Anything with more than 40 RndGroup in the _RND file never reload without CTD
- RndGroup size between 20-40 randomly successfully reloads or CTDs, with it usually CTDing, with the CTD frequency increasing as the RndGroup size increases
- RndGroup between 10-20 randomly successfully reloads or CTDs, with it usually successfully loading at the low end, with the CTD frequency increasing as the RndGroup size increases
- RndGroup between 5-10 mostly successfully reloads, with random, occassional CTDs
- RndGroup between 1-5 almost always successfully reloads, with very rare CTDs
Even within subgroups there is no consistency. I've run a mission with a 40 RndGroup, had a successful save-and-load, only to run the same mission immediately a second time and have it CTD upon reload, yet if I reload the first mission save it still successfully reloads.
It would appear that the game is either corrupting, or incompletely saving, the "saved game" information. That's the only conclusion I can reach, as once a mission has been successfully saved, it can be reloaded time and time again.
What I don't understand is the correlation between having Bolds appear outside of being ejected from a Uboat, the Campaign_RND file, and the corruption of saving a game.
~Schlechter Pfennig