Confirmed Bug Stuck At Sea When Assaulted During Mooring

[Pieter Boelen]

Hmm then definately something wrong with my game files...

At what exact point in the game do you get that message?

 

[A.H]

Somehow its working now.. not sure how and why but as you saw on screenshot.. once I engaged the enemy ship, freeze happens.. by freeze, not screen freeze but all command & button & keyboard freeze; only ALT + F4 can remove this freeze.

But now it worked fine... did you hack into my computer and fix it?

 

[Redbeard]

I remember now why I took a weeks break from the game lol!

I was trying to get to La Granade to continue the Rhiem's quest, and I hit space on the overworld map, near the city. I then hit enter chose the 'PORT' not the 'MOOR' command and recieved this lovely message.



Reload: Continue despite locked locator. Please post your compile.log file at piratesahoy.net!
Can't reload...
Reload locator '' in current location not found!

As per the instructions I've added the compile.log.

Also, this is during the Nathanial Hawk campaign with the old July 28th 4.1 Beta WIP build.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Thanks for reporting.

Did you actually get stuck or could you continue play?

The problem with that one is that it requires very specific and unlikely circumstances to trigger that bug.
So whenever we do anything to try and fix it, it is basically impossible to test of it works.
That is why the log message is there: so that when people do run into it, at least we'll get to know.

 

[Redbeard]

Ah interesting.

I forgot to add, it became impossible to do anything. I couldn't control my ship, and then the game crashed.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I forgot to add, it became impossible to do anything. I couldn't control my ship, and then the game crashed.

Thanks!

Unfortunately that means that despite our continued efforts to fix this, it still doesn't work like it should.
Bug report reopened.

 

[KillPhil]

Pieter, this bug would go away if it was possible to delete the delay between mooring and actually loading the port. Right now, if you are fast than approx. 0.25 Knots, you hear the anchor drop and then about 2-3 seconds later the game loads. Especially in arcade, this time can be enough for a enemy ship going into fight range.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Removing the delay is easy. Stock game didn't have it and we deliberately added it.
I'd hate to lose it though as the instant reload always felt quite sudden.

 

[KillPhil]

Hm how about this: Is it possible to add that you can only moor when you are under a certain speed? Let's say at about 1 Knots. It wouldnt feel that sudden then, because your vessel is already almost standing. Would be more realistic too, because I dont think you can throw the anchor at 10knots+ without taking severe damage^^

 

[Pieter Boelen]

True.

I always assumed the moment you press F3 is the moment you start the anchoring procedure.
Technically the sound should then be delayed until your speed drops below a certain value.
But that would just make it worse.

The fix we've been trying to get to work is to force the reload to proceed once started, regardless of whatever happens afterwards.
That would be the best way of fixing it. But while it DOES continue where it was meant to now, apparently it is still aborted somewhere later in the process.
Big question is: Where and why? Once we know, we can skip that too.

 

[KillPhil]

Well, I think its better to let mooring not be possible at too fast speeds. We then could get rid completely of the delay, without much of atmospheric loss, and the bug would be gone too. And a nice sideeffect would be more realism on shiphandling
Though I have to admit I have no idea if its possible and if yes, how complicated it is.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

It's probably possible somehow. Not sure how easy though.
Might be harder than we'd hope, since then the "reload to shore" actions would need to be disabled while at a speed greater than, say, 2 knots or so.
It'd have to go into the "continuous interface update" loop so that it can show up as soon as the speed drops.

 

[Grey Roger]

One unpleasant effect of that is that those of us who have limited play time and want to just "Sail-To" the port, moor, and go into town to do whatever we're there to do, would need to spend time waiting for the ship to slow down.

 

[KillPhil]

Well it goes quite fast for me with speeding up time. If there are strong winds it also helps to W and S all the time so the battle sails are at approx. 5% and then the vessel decelerates faster. I always try to go 0.2 Knots so I dont have this loading time

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Pillat: In PROGRAM\BATTLE_INTERFACE\BattleInterface.c find:

  if (CheckAttribute(PChar, "Anchoring") == true && sti(PChar.Anchoring) == true) {
     if (!CheckAttribute(PChar, "Anchoring.Duration")) PChar.Anchoring.Duration = sea_time;
     if (stf(PChar.Ship.Speed.z) < 0.3 || GetSeaTime() - sti(PChar.Anchoring.Duration) > 3) { // PB: was 5 seconds
       bool bImmediate = CheckAttribute(PChar, "Anchoring.Immediate") == true && sti(PChar.Anchoring.Immediate) == true;
       DeleteAttribute(PChar, "Anchoring");
       PChar.ForceReload = true; // PB: To fix potentially getting stuck
       if (VISIT_DECK == 1 && bImmediate == false)
         GoToDeck();
       else
         AnchorDrop();
     }

On that line marked "PB: was 5 seconds", you can replace the "3" with an even lower number.
That'll make the reload process occur faster than it does now.