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Status of the mysterious no PBEM file after pressing the big red button problem


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I am still seeing this problem every now and then. I am playing PBEM with the 1.01 version of the game on a PC. The opponents that have also experienced the problem are also using PCs and the 1.01 version of the game.

To refresh everyone's memory here is the problem:

  1. You open the turn from your opponent and watch the disaster that came from your orders unfold in front of your eyes (or if you are lucky you watch the sweet success that comes from your brilliance - but that is rare for me)
  2. You press the big red button and issue your clever orders to get out of this situation
  3. Once you are happy with the orders you press the big red button again
  4. The save game dialog appears with your game name along with its new turn number ready to go
  5. You press the OK button and wait while the game does its thing

Then you go to the outgoing mail folder only to find no sign of the turn file you just watched the game create for you.

This does not happen every time and I cannot see a pattern of what I do before this happens. I have several PBEM games on the go right now and for most of them this has not happened even once. But for two of them Carbide Carbide and Bois de Baugin it has happened to me twice each and at least once for my Bois de Baugin opponent.

Are others stills seeing this from time to time? Can a tester or BFC let me know if this is a known issue? Is there anything that I can do that would help figure out what the problem is? I can send turn files. I can start saving turns before pressing the big red buttons so I have a game file before the problem occurs to send you. I can run a special exe for you if you want to gather more info. Anything you want I'll do it to help.

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While not having done any empirical testing, I have found that slowing the entire save process down has reduced the incidence of this.

1. Go to unoccupied corner of map, looking away from all icons etc, at level 1.

2. Count to 5

3. Press red button.

4. Count to 5 while slowly moving cursor to save file button

5. Press save file button ONCE and once only and do not touch anything.

----

If the save process happens "too quickly" then it is a save crash.

If it takes a few seconds or more once the 2nd button is pressed, you are good to go.

----

I still had four save crashes in a row when I split two Ami companies into teams and gave them all orders. By reducing the numbers of splits I was able to save.

I think it depends on your system and what is going on in the game when you push save, and how fast you ask the system to do things in a row.

Sometimes I think it just chokes.

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While not having done any empirical testing, I have found that slowing the entire save process down has reduced the incidence of this.

1. Go to unoccupied corner of map, looking away from all icons etc, at level 1.

2. Count to 5

3. Press red button.

4. Count to 5 while slowly moving cursor to save file button

5. Press save file button ONCE and once only and do not touch anything.

I'll try anything to help things along. OK I am *not* killing any chickens or making any other physical sacrifice. But counting to 5 and rubbing my belly while patting my head... I can do that.

:)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks for your suggestions Sgt Schultz but they are not working for me. I played around 7 turns over the weekend and the game "lost" two of them.

Looks at the chicken, shakes head "no way don't be silly".

I am now back to saving each turn before I continue just in case the turn gets lost.:(

So, my original question stands are other people having this problem? Is it just me?

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Hey Ian - it's not just you. This is a problem we're currently looking into. As you note it's hard to reproduce.

Sgt Schultz - interesting. Thanks.

Don't know if this helps or not, but I'm on an Apple MacBook Pro (vintage 2009) with 8 Gb of memory and I've never seen the problem on this specific platform. Sounds like an internal caching (flush?) problem on specific hardware where disk writes aren't being completed, or a virtual disk memory issue on machines with lower levels of memory?

Anyway, thought I'd throw in two cents from an old Fortran mainframe programmer ... :D :D

Regards,

Doug

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ive enountered this frequently as well. It seems that if once you hit the button and the save file name box comes up, you need to click it a few times. i noticed if you click a few times in a hurry it crashes or mis saves a lot more often. where if you're very patient, slow about it, it seems to not crash as easily. odd. also using Shultzes method DOES seem to help. Its important that theres almost nothing in your view when you exit though, I think it has something to do with memory.

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