Unofficialcrusaderpatch: Visual errors

[ByBurton]

In the latest version I have found that a lot of visual bugs / errors occur.

This happens in 2 out of 3 matches, and it also already happened in the non bugfix version of 2.5

Edit: Others encountered this issue as well.

[Rakso69]

I've noticed that changing the 1st player colour doesn't affect the colour of the trebuchet model engineers(maybe some more troops too, I'm not sure), also spawning workers firstly are of original colour, on their "showing up" phrase, and after they're ready to move, that's when their colour changes correctly as the mod settings are. It also affect of course the other player(the original one, from whoom we took it's colour for the 1st player).

[Lolasik011]

So far I have not met such a bug...

[Panaminion]

@ByBurton I encountered that as well.. but it seemed to only happen at high game speed (~700 or higher maybe)? Was that the same for you? Also: Saving and Reloading fixes it.

[ByBurton]

@Panaminion That is right. Both of your points.

@Rakso69 This issue is already opened #58

[PitchNeeded]

Poor Nizar :(

[Rakso69]

@ByBurton Oh. I don't understand german, but I'll keep in mind it would be wise to translate it before type anything. Thanks

[Sh0wdown]

Could you send me your modified Stronghold Crusader.exe where this happens via email (on my profile)?

[ByBurton]

@Sh0wdown Will do, I guess.

[Swartonf]

Thats the bug i got with the unfixed 2.05 version. Doesn't happen anymore though

[ByBurton]

Thats the bug i got with the unfixed 2.05 version. Doesn't happen anymore though

For me it still does.

[Lolasik011]

Today I caught the exact same bug :(

Maybe this happens only in AI vs AI mode?

[Sh0wdown]

I haven't managed to reproduce this yet. Could someone upload a save file where this happens?

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown I uploaded here the link https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YyFdsIMpRlZKMKhuzev_9JPCVzt2OneJ/view?usp=sharing

[Sh0wdown]

Thank you, at least I could see it now myself. But it vanishes quickly after loading.
I am not sure what causes this. Could you who experience this test around a bit with what Patch-Settings this happens?

I suspect one of the following settings:

• Player 1 color change
• Increase of the total/general troop limit
• Only AI mode

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown Ok I'm testing.

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown I tested and got Bug again :(

Save https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uiyDEwHMPQ1h5OuWuRZfpLmy_NwGfib5/view?usp=sharing

[Sh0wdown]

What settings were you using?

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown
Player 1 color change
Increase of the total/general troop limit
Only AI mode

[Sh0wdown]

Could you test whether it happens when you _only_ have "AI only mode" enabled?

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown Enable everything except AI mode?

[Sh0wdown]

No, the other way around. :P

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown Ok :D

[Lolasik011]

@Sh0wdown I played 1 match. There was no graphic bug. I think it happened either because of the choice of color or because of AI mode only. Because I also played with an increased limit of troops.

[Heroesflorian]

@Sh0wdown I just tried the patch, and got the same glitches...

No color change, but "pure AI mode" as well as the increased general unit limit to 5000 (which is the default value).

My bet would be on either the AI-only mode, or the unit limit, as color change would seem fully unrelated, while higher unit limit seems more likely to be related to additional "ghost units" appearing. Maybe some overflow or pooling issue?

Edit: I just tried without AI mode but with increased unit limit, and didn't get the issue - at least I didn't notice it. I also tested with AI mode but without increased unit limit, and I saw the issue, although not as heavily - at some point (I think behind some regular, moving unit) a trail of dying-shapeshifting-cows appeared and disappeared again after a few seconds.

So this would indicate it is indeed the "AI only" mode that causes the issue. Although I should also note that both of the two later test games (with only one of "AI only" and "increased unit limit"), the games just didn't last as long as the previous one with both options enabled that had more actual troops ingame at once, and way more severe instances of the glitch occurring after a while, further in the game.

[Lolasik011]

@Heroesflorian I understood what the problem was. It is in AI mode vs AI!!! With a limit and other settings, everything works fine.

@Sh0wdown Need to fix AI vs Ai mode!!!!

[Heroesflorian]

@Lolasik011 I edited my above post after some further testing.
I agree it looks as if the "AI only" mode causes the issue, and high amounts of actual units in the game may cause it to occur more frequently / easily / heavily.

[Heroesflorian]

Also, I got the "We are under attack!" message a couple times with AI-only mode - sometimes even when player red was long dead and gone. Possibly some surviving chickens got shot at?

[Heroesflorian]

During some further testing with "AI only" mode, I noticed that at some point some knights from a Marshall got stuck in place (on open ground) and sort of glitched out... it looked a bit as if they'd try really hard to break an invisible wall around themselves, jittering and and moving around wildly on the tile where they currently were, playing their riding animations for different directions, swapped between sword-wielding and banner-wielding knights, switching to idle animations and back to moving animations.
Eventually some of them turned into dying cows and from those to peasants who then sat down, while those visibly remaining knights occasionally disappeared and reappeared in place.

Also, later on, a hostile army walked right through those units, so I guess they were ghost units. And they seem to have disappeared a little while after the hostile army passed their position... coincidence or not, I don't know.

And even later, on the other side some units appeared... red archers next to orange's castle, selectable with health bar but ignored by orange's archers. The red archers also "moved up and down" when toggling flat mode (spacebar) off and on, as if they were standing on some invisible wall or tower.

The red archers even played their bowing-downwards animation and their shooting animation when red's castle got attacked by orange - yet orange's archers did still ignore the red glitched archers seemingly standing right next to them. Possibly the glitched red archers were actually there on the map, but on a different position than displayed, e.g. on some tower or keep of the red Marshal, maybe?

Another match (again AI only mode, no increased unit limit), a more drastic occurrance:

(you might also notice the "glitch troop" colors on the minimap: lots of red (pig) and white (animals))

Savegame:
Marschwein glitched.zip

Saving and loading from there resolved the shapeshifting-cow-invasion, yielded a "we lost a gate" message and also somehow disabled the "AI only" mode, giving control over the red player back to me:

I could select red troops, Marshal sent messages to me (the attacked player), but I had no Lord (I wasn't marked as dead, though, either) and a handful of macemen were stuck on the keep. My name was that of the Pig still, and I found a leftover catapult from the last siege attack of the pig, with 200 cows available, lol...

When using some of my pig-macemen to attack the Marshal, I then got a fear message from the red pig, as if it was my ally and requesting help:

The red Pig was still somehow active, though, managing granary cheese levels, recruiting troops, sending around patrols and even launching a new siege attack while I was watching.

This may be the most-buggy experience I've had with Crusader so far in over 15 years, but it also is the closest thing to a shared-castle-coop game mode that I've seen yet... xD

All in all, I come to the conclusion that his new "AI only" mode probably needs some more work, but also provides some VERY interesting "hidden features"! :D

[Lolasik011]

@Heroesflorian Yes, he gives the hidden features :) Personally, I had a graphical bug only in AI mode vs AI. In other modes, everything is fine.
We will wait while @Sh0wdown fix this problem.

[Sh0wdown]

@Heroesflorian did you test with only "AI only mode" activated and nothing else?

If that setting is the source of this bug, that's already good to know.
I don't know yet how to fix it though. The way this setting works is by simply removing the player from the player list. So this seems more like a bug caused by Crusader itself, which is understandable though, because this mode was probably never intended or tested by FireFly.

[Heroesflorian]

@Sh0wdown I tested with "AI only mode" activated and without increased troop limit, and otherwise default mod settings, so far. Dunno if any of the "older" default-checked mod features are relevant, though.

[ByBurton]

@Heroesflorian Try deactivating the max. limit of units on a map (to the default ones).

[PitchNeeded]

Being able to control an AI lord's troops and 'play in co-op mode' with them is very interesting. I noticed that when I reloaded an AI only game too. This feature should be kept if possible!

[Heroesflorian]

Being able to control an AI lord's troops and 'play in co-op mode' with them is very interesting. I noticed that when I reloaded an AI only game too. This feature should be kept if possible!

I agree this has potential. Although I'd prefer if there was a more "clean" way in future patch versions, if possible, to let you start a game that way already. Anyway...

@ByBurton I probably won't have time for further tests for a couple days I'm afraid. But feel free to test yourself in the mean time, possibly you can find out more! :)

[ByBurton]

So, I tried multiple things:
Options always enabled:
-all balancing changes
-ai unit max. to the highest value
-fixed aiv by evrey
-no demolishing deactivated (both)
-adding more units for attack armies by 60 units
-Enabled disable ox tether spam
-AI trading
-Increased recruitment speed
-Gate, gamespeed
-Spectator mode aka AI only-mode

Now: The different things I have tested, and things I have noticed:

When increasing the total troup limit to max, I have this visual bug. I did not notice it in all my other test runs. But I noticed a lot of other weird stuff, I will list them here:

1. Disable ox tether spam is a lie. The AI still sometimes builds an additional ox when building a querry.
2. No demolishing is also kinda weird. I have noticed a lot of different things, which all are kinda weird:
   -Sometimes the AI destroys its own mercenary post or barracks.
   -Sometimes the AI still destroys stuff outside its castle.
   -The AI still destroys stuff it can not reach.
3. When placing a building above a quarry, the stone stockpile will be left behind, remaining there forever. This can severally limit an AI.

[Sh0wdown]

I had a test run with AI-only-mode and game speed and nothing else on with 8 AIs and the error appeared. So I think it really is caused by the AI-only-mode in some way.

1. Disable ox tether spam is a lie. The AI still sometimes builds an additional ox when building a querry.

I disabled that the AI always builds a tether with a quarry regardless of how many they already have.
That is a different routine than when the AI thinks it has too few tethers instantly after placing a quarry and builds another one.

1. No demolishing is also kinda weird. I have noticed a lot of different things, which all are kinda weird:
   -Sometimes the AI destroys its own mercenary post or barracks.
   -Sometimes the AI still destroys stuff outside its castle.

It could be that the AI still wants money and since it cannot destroy walls or the economy it goes to the next level of destroying things, i.e. barracks and resource buildings. Maybe I should have another look at this and add even more options.

-The AI still destroys stuff it can not reach.

1. When placing a building above a quarry, the stone stockpile will be left behind, remaining there forever. This can severally limit an AI.

These should get individual issues.

[ByBurton]

@Sh0wdown The last three things you said should get new issues are in one of the very first issues I have opened up here. It is a list of bugs I noticed. At least the quarry stockpile.

[ByBurton]

It could be that the AI still wants money and since it cannot destroy walls or the economy it goes to the next level of destroying things, i.e. barracks and resource buildings. Maybe I should have another look at this and add even more options.

https://youtu.be/75NJ5ayozZU?t=196

Here this happened to Udwin as well.

[ByBurton]

Haven't had this happen since basically forever. Will close this, but if someone experiences this again I will open it again.