Mission Editor Bug - Crash to Desktop

[Mirzayev]

I found a bug that causes the .sce file to become corrupted and crash you to the desktop when trying to reload in the mission editor. I was able to produce this with the Fennek; I'm not sure if the same issue occurs with other vehicles. The idea was to create "damage if" and "repair if" statements to simulate the crew dismounting and remounting the vehicle, and to take into account the gunner's position being unoccupied if one of the two dismounts die. The process is a bit complicated to explain in writing, so I made a video. 

 

 

Obviously this is a very specific bug that I suspect has something to do with limitations of the programming logic when combining single vehicles. When trying to load the scenario file from the main menu, it gives the "Error loading the scenario!" prompt. 

 

I had ReShade enabled during the recording of this video. I uninstalled it and could still reproduce. 

Edited February 9, 2021 by Mirzayev

[Ssnake]

Thanks.

Well, "don't do that". I agree that it shouldn't crash and it should not corrupt the scenario, but what you're trying to do - I admire the creativity - will never work. The dismounting thing is a bit of a hack in the first place to allow dismounted scouting with vehicles where the crew dismounts (something I did not foresee in the original Steel Beasts design concept when I thought we'd be making a simple tank simulation). It will work as long as we're talking about individual vehicles where you can reference the specific dismount team of that vehicle. Once that you combine them, the dismounts will be treated as one dismount team of the whole vehicle section. The references to unit IDs in the repair condition for the gunner don't work any longer because SB can't track the sub-team unit IDs.

(Remember when we fixed an old bug that could lead to duplicate combatant IDs and we added the function to check for duplicate IDs in the Mission Debugger because this was such a terrible thing, where "Bad Stuff"(TM) would happen, so we recommended that you check all your scenarios for this? Basically, same thing).

 

Unfortunately SB has no way to read your mind when you set the conditions for the individual vehicles where it's allowed, and none of our testers (or I) had the idea to test this combination, so the trouble starts on recombination. We could delete the repair condition that points to a unit ID that no longer exists for as long as the vehicles are combined as a section. That might at least fix the corruption/crash issue. But it would delete your repair condition too. My honest recommendation is to accept that there'll be ghost CDRs and GNRs left behind if you dismount your scouts. It's not as if a mounted Fennek has awesome firepower. Put it on Hold Fire orders (which is generally a good idea for the scout), and in 95% of all cases the problem will be solved. Or damage CDR and GNR while the vehicles aren't carrying troops, but repair both even if only one guy returns. Just don't add references to the dismount team as a repair condition.

[Ssnake]

This is now bug 9542.

[Mirzayev]

Yep, just trying to push the boundaries of the in-game logic. Had an idea, found a bug instead. 😉

 

[Ssnake]

Even better!

[Retro]

I tried to reproduce this but it seems to work fine here (nice scripting idea!). Could you please upload the saved scenario(s) that crash for you? Maybe it's something subtle like a camouflage setting or callsign or such

[Gibsonm]

This does work (at least doesn't cause crashes):

 

But has the limitation of not working in a heterogeneous unit:

 

 

Edited February 16, 2021 by Gibsonm