Can any playtesters look at this?

[Turin]

Just a random guess, but you could try it without my heroes mod.

I made a mistake and used #copysprite instead of #copyspr on some units and that could lead to strange behaviour.

[DrPraetorious]

Changing every instance of #copysprite to #copyspr doesn't have any effect .

I still get "sprnbr too high for this file" when I call to display some of the sprites for the dwarves (or any nation I included later in the mod.)

Thanks for the headsup, though.

[Edi]

Does the problem disappear when you reduce the number of sprites?

Because all it takes is ONE screwup for the whole thing to crash. I found that out the hard way trying to script more sites into a map file than there are in the game. Instant "sprnbr too high for this file" Något gick fel crash whenever the first province with the incorrect number was accessed (either directly or trying to view nation overview).

So there's possibly something like that. One typo. One misspelling. One incorrect assignment. One mismatch. I suggest you get out the fine tooth comb and get cracking.

Edi

[DrPraetorious]

I've been doing that, but it seems to effect one sprite - and *all future sprites in the file*. Is that normally how it works?

[Edi]

Yes. The first time a single corrupt/out-of-bounds/incorrect item is accessed, the whole shebang goes tits-up. You need to remove the problem sprite altogether and try without it. If the same problem persists after that, it needs more investigating.

Mind you, I'm just conjecturing based on how map files behave. What with the 563 sites (1-563), the game will behave normally as long as you stay in provinces with correct assignment and don't access the nation overview. But as soon as you try to enter a province that has #feature 564+ assigned in the map file, or you press F1 (which accesses the province for site reference) you get the fatal error.

Since mod files, just like map files, are text based sequential command lists where the commands are executed in order, it logically follows that the first instance of accessing an entity supposedly created by an invalid command kills the process dead.

Edi

[DrPraetorious]

Okay, here's how I know that isn't the problem.

Compare the two mod files I've attached (megamod_late.dm and megamod_late2.dm are zipped together) - you can swap from one to the other by renaming and then restarting the dominions executable. The only difference between the two is WHERE IN THE FILE the dwarves (Kharam Dzu) appear. You will also need the attachment at the root of this thread for the graphics if you don't already have it.

If Kharam Dzu appears in the middle of the file, you can play them (sprites for their initial commander load just fine), but when you try to recruit units, the game crashes (one of their recruitables is triggering the sprite error, therefore.)

On the other hand, if you move that entire block of monsters to the begining (as in the second file) Kharam Dzu becomes playable - and Trade Confederation, which appears immediately before Kharam Dzu in the first file, becomes unplayable. If you look at exactly what I'm moving, it has to be the number of things and not any particular thing which is causing the crash. The other nations that are playable in version 1 remain playable in version 2, even though they are also now-after Khazam Dzu.

So - Trade Federation becomes unplayable when you add Kharam Dzu to the begining of the file, but everything before Trade Federation remains playable, meaning I haven't added anything to the begining that screws up the entire rest of the file. Am I making sense?

I think this means that something somewhere is overflowing, and it's happening halfway through the unit list, and effecting all units after the overflow, even though all the units are formatted just fine.

Since whatever it is that's overflowing is triggering a sprite loading error - I would tend to assume that it's the custom sprite memory block (or something, again I don't know how Johan has engineered the thing) which is overflowing.

Is too late to be added to the beta testers list? I really want to get this thing working and if any of the beta testers, who are presumably more knowledgeable in this than I am, could verify my conclusions, I'd be quite appreciative because I'm not a tester and I'm kinda in the dark here.

[HoneyBadger]

I'm really hoping that the numbers of units expands a sizeable amount, into the 5000 range, because I'm currently working on something around 7 or 8 nations, and they're all unit heavy. I could probably add that many units to a game as things are, but their are too many good mods out there (and I'm sure more and better to come) that I'd like to incorporate over time into my own version of a balance-mod. Even I would-well...probably-be satisfied with a limit of 5000 units.

[Gandalf Parker]

I dont mod well enough, and dont have the time to look at one carefully, so I will toss this out and you cn forget it if its dumb.

The only mod I did try to do was an All_Nations mod. The problems I ran into was that the game did not handle duplicate handles well. I had to go thru and rename ALL of the nations so Ulm became early_Ulm, mid_Ulm, and late_Ulm. The empty slots became named as their number slots such as Nation_70.

Is there any chance of a "two using the same handle" situation in your mod? Like I said, I havent looked at it so if thats a stupid question then forget it.