Bug? Units retreating from battle vanishing

Amhazair · #1 April 7th, 2008, 10:06 AM

In a current game I'm at war against Pangaea. I had a smallish army set on retreat orders, in case his Gorgon pretender decided to attack the province they were in.

At the end of the turn, a battle occured in that provinces, due to (apparently) a stealthy Pan producing some non-stealthy maenads in that province. As the maenads had no commander they routed, but obviously my army that was set to retreat did so too.

Even though there were several adjecent friendly provinces, non of the units or commanders that retreated appeared in any of them. I also didn't receive a message saying the fleeing commanders 'did not have anywhere to retreat to' but the entire army has disappeared.

I did not see an issue like this mentioned in the bug shortlist (though I might have missed it), although I would have expected behaviour like this to be documented already, after all I wouldn't think stealthing Pans are that uncommon. Anyone else has noticed anything similar?

Zeldor · #2 April 7th, 2008, 10:23 AM

What type of units? I think that magical/mindless cannot retreat even with retreat orders and commander that could take care of them doing so too.

Amhazair · #3 April 7th, 2008, 10:48 AM

Just normal units, hoplites from the mod nation of Arga Dis and militia. As well as a couple of indy commanders and two blood hunters.

NTJedi · #4 April 7th, 2008, 06:00 PM

There are a few rare bugs where the battle results are different from the actual end result. This sounds like one of those scenarios.

Unfortunately reporting a random unreproducible bug is like walking into your workplace and saying you saw a UFO spacecraft. If you can find a way to reproduce a bug then the devs have a good chance of fixing the issue.

Amhazair · #5 April 7th, 2008, 09:25 PM

Quote:

NTJedi said:
There are a few rare bugs where the battle results are different from the actual end result. This sounds like one of those scenarios.

I very much doubt so. There is only one way this battle could go. He had some 20 leaderless meanads, the only thing they can do is rout. On my side I had a ~50 strong army, set on retreat at the end of the battlefield. Being the defender they go first, and all of them run off the battlefield. The PD stays and fights (well, runs after the fleeing maenads. Battle's over. The end. There just isn't anything on his side capable of killing an army.

You're right about the reproducability part of your post though. I kinda hoped this was a known issue - or at least that some other players had experienced it - since it seemed so specific to me. I'll check tomorrow if I can reproduce it. It doesn't seem to hard to set up the same situation again.

PvK · #6 April 7th, 2008, 10:36 PM

You're sure your units vanished? I've not seen that.

Corwin · #7 April 7th, 2008, 11:23 PM

Quote:

NTJedi said:
There are a few rare bugs where the battle results are different from the actual end result. This sounds like one of those scenarios.

Unfortunately reporting a random unreproducible bug is like walking into your workplace and saying you saw a UFO spacecraft. If you can find a way to reproduce a bug then the devs have a good chance of fixing the issue.

The bug can be reproduced just fine - no matter how many time you watch the turn you can observe it.

I don't think it would make much sense to ask user who report such bug to figure out a way to reproduce it on another computer. It is up to devs to find a way to reproduce the bug on one of their test machines. All user can do is send them save game files/game logs and tell their system configuration and game info if needed.

NTJedi · #8 April 8th, 2008, 03:00 AM

Quote:

Corwin said:
The bug can be reproduced just fine - no matter how many time you watch the turn you can observe it.

I don't think it would make much sense to ask user who report such bug to figure out a way to reproduce it on another computer. It is up to devs to find a way to reproduce the bug on one of their test machines. All user can do is send them save game files/game logs and tell their system configuration and game info if needed.

I never said anything about reproducing on another computer... a different computer wouldn't and shouldn't make a difference unless the patch version is different and/or mods are being used.
If you have a set of save game files which reproduce incorrect battle results when hosting the turn please email them to Illwinter.

Corwin · #9 April 8th, 2008, 04:48 AM

Quote:

NTJedi said:

Quote:

Corwin said:
The bug can be reproduced just fine - no matter how many time you watch the turn you can observe it.

I don't think it would make much sense to ask user who report such bug to figure out a way to reproduce it on another computer. It is up to devs to find a way to reproduce the bug on one of their test machines. All user can do is send them save game files/game logs and tell their system configuration and game info if needed.

I never said anything about reproducing on another computer... a different computer wouldn't and shouldn't make a difference unless the patch version is different and/or mods are being used.
If you have a set of save game files which reproduce incorrect battle results when hosting the turn please email them to Illwinter.

Sure, I can do it. Just to clarify - are you affiliated with Illwinter NTJedi? (sorry for asking, I have not been visiting this forum for the last year or so, up until last month when I have catched Dominions bug once again

).

Amhazair · #10 April 8th, 2008, 06:34 AM

Yep, it can easily be reproduced. It looks somewhat (to my untrained eye at least) as if - since those battle happen out of the normal battle phases - the devs forgot to add an extra 'retreat phase' to the code to account for these extra battles.

Any idea what files exactly are needed to check this? Fthrland and .trn files?