Winter War Scn 12 Errors

[jakemon]

This issue begins here: http://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewtop ... 64&t=82513 and continues to this new thread.

My modest Win7 box runs OOB 5.2.3 x64 not-Steam. My install is a clean build with stock options: all DLCs except Panzerkrieg, no mod content, and the only tweak is in variables.txt changing "sefaultMaxZoom = 37" to "defaultMaxZoom = 200".

My first time through Scenario 12 Tali-Ihantal (Finns defend Mannerheim Line in 6/44 against every Soviet unit ever defined x3), in turn 7 the AI went to thinking and never came back. I let it go all night and crashed out in the morning.

Reloading my previous Auto Save (Turn End).sav provides a different result today: the AI turn appears to complete, but throws a popup warning an ERROR.sav file has been created, and advises my saved games files are subject to corruption and please forward the file to something like @contactAristocrats. When I hit F9 to get a screenshot, a completely different "Quickload" image popup was saved.

The attached zip contains:
* [Winter War] Auto Save (Turn End).saz (all you can do is hit next turn and see what the AI will do)
* ERROR.sav (for the developers?)
* Screenshot 1.jpg (F9 did not save the error message on the screen- it saved this)

I'm obliged if anyone can offer more data points. Meanwhile, Quickload popup has gone away, but the scenario hasn't died, so I'll see what comes next. Thanks.

[GabeKnight]

Oooh, love that mission, wiped out the Reds completely last time around. The lovely StuG...

I was curious, tried it, and your save works fine with me, just... your frontline doesn't look that good next turn, my friend...

[jakemon]

Thanks for reporting on the save file Mr. Gabe. It's encouraging you had no mechanical issues- I want this stuff to work. Can you perhaps point out any differences in your platform that could account for that success?

Beyond the mechanics, my first pass at Winter War finds the Mannerheim defensive scenarios are brutal and make my belly hurt. My base strategy of holding the opening defensive line for as long as possible seems to fall victim to the Soviet artillery. (In particular I hate & fear those feckin Katyushas ). I'm thinking now running at a regular pace is a better way, which suggests preparing fortified roadblocks at regular intervals.

The Stugs don't seem to live up to their reputation. They have no experience, and seem to only last a turn or two, and have limited replacements.

I'd be happy to sit at your feet and learn how you were able to destroy the Reds- thanks for your insights.

[jakemon]

The upper image shows the AI moved a Soviet infantry unit into the same hex as a German unit. I was able to move the Germ away during my turn.

The lower image shows the AI moved a Soviet mech unit into the same problem hex with a Soviet infantry unit in it. The image also shows the "ERROR OCCURED" pop up window that announces an ERROR.saz has been created. FYI any existing ERROR.saz file will be overwritten.

error.jpg (293.15 KiB) Viewed 1688 times

[GabeKnight]

@jakemon
Sorry, if it came across somewhat arrogant, I tend to sound like that sometimes. But there's really nothing wrong with the savefile and the scenario as such.
I also play on Win7 64bit, i7, 16RAM, GTX1060, OoB 5.2.3 steam (no beta!), all DLC, no mods, except "sefault" zoom, but I have no idea what you mean by "Win7 box"...

And I really love that mission, to me it's a fine example of a perfectly balanced scenario. Seems overwhelming at first (and for new players), but I suppose I was playing at diff. level 5 last time, and it was still doable to kill all Reds. You'll probably noticed already, that the Russians do not have any income and thus NEVER repair. I'd choose a different deployment than yours (way more arty) and your units were mostly outdated and/or heavily damaged. You kind of completly neglected all your planes, except the two fighters - you didn't even deploy. In "Winter War" you have to be WAY less aggressive and let the enemy come to you and then wait for the right moment to counter-attack. Instead of spreading your troops so much, you should create "choke points" at the bridgeheads and at the victory hexes with heavy AT-support.

You asked for advice, you get something better, so you'll know I'm not just talk. I took your "Turn End" (Turn 6) savefile and started playing from there. Granted, with your deployment some retreat and recuperating was necessary, and I was not able to kill *all* of them, but nonetheless... I'll attach a Replay and three savefiles from turns 10,15 and 20, so you can take over at any time - as there are minor issues with not destroyed enemy units in Replays (bug). I revived some of your dead units and upgraded most of your existing inf. core forces, that's why I had almost no RP's left all the time (granted, I did some poor and costly moves, too ), otherwise this mission's ideal to save up quite some RP's (60/turn)!
If you have questions after that, shoot.

And what did you say about the StuG's again? Repeat please?

Good luck playing! I love this game.

Turn 30 end

Screenshot 92.jpg (538.81 KiB) Viewed 1683 times

[jakemon]

My modest Win 7 box = (x64, i5 quad core @ 3.2 GHz, 8Gb RAM, Intel graphics). Yours is more powerful, but I don't see enough difference there to explain my AI thinking all night. It only happened once, so it could just be a random event.

It was more disturbing to launch my save turn file and see the AI keep placing 2 units in the same hex. That threw the warning popup and generated ERROR.saz each time. I emailed the Artistocrats a copy but did not yet get an ack. You didn't encounter this, so I'm wondering if crashing my stuck AI introduced some kind of bit rot. Time will tell.

Your critique of my core maintenance & deployment is sound. I became RP poor in the previous scenarios and could no longer afford elite replacements. With the training spec, purchasing new units seemed more effective than upgrading existing. My first time on this map, I expected to retreat until a final Gotterdammerung defending the primary objective. It looked like artillery would get overrun. The biggest surprise was the Finns getting and keeping air superiority- I expected to fly once, get my stuffing beat out, and never have the RPs to repair. Instead, even the fighters were useful knocking out the red rockets.

So I soldiered on with my save turn file, ignoring the AI errors. I stopped the advance with the additional RPs awarded on turn 10. The turn 15 arty bonus crippled the spearheads, and from turn 20 on the invaders were rapidly rolled back. The only survivors I could see were clustered on the south central map edge. My StuGs did... okay.

Thanks for your help Gabe.

[13obo]

I've had the stuck on thinking issue happen once or twice after playing a few turns on different DLCs. What works always though is to do a restart of the game and reload the latest autosave.

Feels like something in the code causes the AI to throttle over time and eventually it gets stuck...? A similar issue is that loading a game takes longer and longer the more you play- a load takes around 5-10 seconds (on my machine) after you've just fired up the game, and goes to about 30 sec-1 minute after playing for awhile.

[GabeKnight]

I've had the stuck on thinking issue happen once or twice after playing a few turns on all the DLCs. What works always though is to restart the game and reload the latest autosave.

Feels like something in the code causes the AI to throttle over time and eventually it gets stuck...? A similar issue is that loading a game takes longer and longer the more you play- a load takes around 5-10 seconds (on my machine) after you've just fired up the game, and goes to about 30 sec-1 minute after playing for awhile.

Exactly the same with me - and always been like this. The loading times seemed to speed up a bit after the v5.x updates (maybe 64bit?), though.
[Although my machine seems to be a bit slower than yours... ]

[GabeKnight]

My StuGs did... okay.

Thanks for your help Gabe.

You're welcome.

For me, the last mission's a bit of a bummer though. Not gameplay-wise per se, but that I'd have to turn on my former friends. Always tried to advance and attack as little as possible...