SMACX bug reporting thread

[Oleg Leschov]

I'll state here some more views on improving AC, I hope somebody will find these interesting.

BugID: Text_Scroll
Catagory: UI.
Priority: 4, minor
Status: pending

The window that appears when new technology is discovered.
In the bottom of it there is a text window with the description and citates.
This window may have a scrollbar which is supposed to scroll a text that doesn't fit in window. The problem is that it scrolls very strangely -- at least I haven't seen this kind of "scroll" elsewhere
When scrolling, every line of text still visible must remain constant. Obviously, but this is not so there.


BugID: Always_Recenter_Active_Unit
Version: Both AX and AC4
Catagory: UI.
Priority: 5
Status: pending

Don't recenter screen on active unit every time when exiting base screen
or anything else. Just do it only when 'center' command issued.
I like how it behave in civ2.


BugID: Minimum_Hurry_Cost
Version: Both AX and AC4
Category: Base.
Priority: 5
Status: pending

Concerning hurrying of production.

You may just pay whole cost, if you have it. This guarantees that in the beginning of the next turn that thing will be completed. But if the base does produce any minerals for next turn and if we suppose that there will not be drone riots then is is absolutely unneccessary to pay a whole cost. Even more -- if it's not a drone riot then paying whole cost is just a waste of money.

So what do I do: I am paying (C/A)*(A-B) credits where B is mineral production of base, A is cost in minerals to complete a thing, C is a cost in credits to complete thing; C/A is a cost of one mineral, A-B is mineral cost without mineral production per turn.

That is, suggestion --- make an additional option to hurry production -- calculate minimum amount of credits required to complete a thing in N turns with current minerals production.

[RedFred]

Some thoughts on the existing bug list:

I thought bug 150 was addressed with SMAC v4 patch. Lame city swaps now generate refusals and disparaging remarks from the AI.

Somebody posted a bug about using gas on the aliens and it hurting his rep. I am not able to confirm this bug despite repeated attempts. I don't have the list open but I believe it was bug XXX [Edit - the bug number was 21] . I have had the occasion to nerve gas the aliens many times and have not experienced anything less than a noble rep.

On to (possible) new bugs:

Is it reasonable for a non-port city to be able to work ocean squares in its city radius (two squares from the city)? It can. Is it reasonable for the same city to benefit from terrain improvements like kelp and solar collectors? It can. Is it reasonable for the same city to be able to build base improvements to enhance these ocean squares like thermocline transducers? It cannot. I would welcome other opinions on whether this should be considered a bug.

How about the battle odds display? A souped-up unit with lots of special powers will have its battle odds info running off the bottom of the display on my (fairly standard setup) PC causing the most important info to be hidden from view. Do others experience this problem?

To my knowledge no one has ever spotted a Mark III Battle Ogre in a game. You are supposed to be able to pod-pop them like Is and IIs. A bug or perhaps they are just extremely rare? If anyone does spot one I'd love to hear of it.
[This message has been edited by RedFred (edited January 28, 2000).]

[Helium Pond]

I have 2 bugs to report:

First bug:

Bug ID: FacEdit Breaks Game
Submitter: Helium Pond (jesseclark@mindspring.com)
Version: Only seen on AX
Category: Crash
Priority: 1
Satus: ? anyone else seen this?
Saves: n/a

If I add a faction to the game using FacEdit, the game will not start. The opening screens will load up, and I can make most of the game customization choices, but when I get to the faction selection screen, all I see is a window with the face of the Consciousness and her quote, and nothing else. I cannot exit this window, nor can I start the game. This is a full-on, have to press ctrl+alt+del-style crash. This happened to me twice: the first time was when I'd just bought AX, and tried out the nifty new editor. Then, as I said, it broke my game, and I had to re-install BOTH SMAC and SMAX (just re-installing SMAX didn't work), and I thought, "well, I won't go near that thing again, until after the patch." So, the second time I tried this, of course, was after the patch. Same thing. Had to do another full re-install, both SMAC and SMAX. It was awful. Now I won't touch the Faction Editor with a ten-foot pole. If I manually add custom factions to alphax, they work fine. Has anyone else had this? Obviously, there's no way to make a save game of this, but I'm sure I could make it happen again, if there was any reason to.

Second bug:

Bug ID: Fake Drones on Base Screen
Submitter: Helium Pond (jesseclark@mindspring.com)
Version: Only seen on AX
Category: Base
Priority: 3
Satus: ? anyone else seen this?

Somewhat far on in my game, on a huge planet, my bases began inaccurately reporting drones. Specifically, the main base readout seemed to be wrongly calculating Police effects, showing drones when in fact there were none. If I changed the main screen to show Psych instead of Resources, that display showed the correct effects of police powers. The odd thing is that the main screen was actually calculating some police effects, i.e., the main screen wasn't exactly like the psych screen just before the "police" report. But usually it would add about 2 or 3 extra drones. I knew these were fake drones because the bases would not revolt. Also, the population readout on the f4 screen would not show these drones. I was playing Cha Dawn, who has +1 police abilities with native units, but most of my police were not worms. Also, I had the Ascetic Virtues and was running Police State. Perhaps the main screen was ignoring one of those. As you could probably guess, this was a major pain. I was playing with the AX factions, but with a slightly modified alphax: I had taken the rate of tech discovery down to 10%. I don't think that would have affected this, but I mention it just in case. I will send my save to zsozso.

Thanks so much, zsozso! It seems like there are so many hugely wrong bugs--is there any chance all the really horrible ones will get fixed?

[RedFred]

I can't remember if Helium Pond's fake drone problem has already been reported but in any case I can confirm it. I wasted a lot of production time on psych-producing improvements before I figured this one out.

One that I haven't seen reported is a minor problem with marine control. The ship that gets controlled will move one square in a seemingly random direction immediately after a successful control. This is a minor bug compared to most, but in my current game it is very irritating. P not-so-very-much K made war with me again. PK has a large navy and airforce. The PK ships that I control tend to be about 80 or 90% damaged with only 1 or two movement points left. The one random move often means that they won't reach my base and safety - instead they get picked off by the PK airforce.

So I'll go back to the bug list again (sigh) and ensure I didn't miss it and if it is not there I will formally post it here...

Kudos to all, but particularly to zsozso and Bblue for the work that has gone into this project.

[RedFred]

Boy, that summary at the beginning of the bug list was handy...

BugID: Marine_Control_Random_Movement
Submitter: RedFred, rshypitka@hotmail.com
Version: Alien Crossfire V2
Category: Combat
Status: Pending?
Priority: 5
Save before: N/A
Save after: N/A
[I think everyone who has played pirates has seem this one, but let me know if you want a save and I'll get it]

Description: Any ship that has successfully been marine-controlled has a tendancy to move one square in a seemingly random direction immediately after capture. I believe I have also seen one more volley from the guns after capture, but this is less common.

[zsozso]

Oleg:
What you report as Text_Scroll is already listed as #0146, New_Tech_Window, Gnome

Always_Recenter_Active_Unit:
This mode already exists, press 'v' to switch to map view mode instead of unit mode, then it does not recenter. Pressing again 'v' puts you back to unit-mode.

I am adding Minimum_Hurry_Cost as #0174 with some extension (another option to pay for the 10 carry-over minerals but no more).

RedFred:
Bug 150 (lame city swaps) is kind of corrected, but I'd say it is worse than before! Previously, the AI accepted every trade, now it refuses some but it happened to me on several occasion that it has refused to trade a 1-pop no infrastructure empty base for a much better one, on the other hand it gives me a 9-pop base with SPs for a 1-pop empty one. So it seems to be fixed in the wrong way ! Now it refuses trades that are good for him and accepts complete rip-offs.

Helium Pond:
Fake Drones is already listed as #0131, Fake_Drones, zsozso.

On the FacEdit bug: you might be missing some graphics or miss-typed a file name. It did happen to me that I made an incorrect faction.txt file and the game locked up the same way. Correcting the faction file solved the problem without reinstal. However, it is realy not nice, that FacEdit lets you save an incorrect file which would freeze the game...

Zsozso

ps. RedFred, please send me a save for #0175, Marine_Control_Random_Movement.
[This message has been edited by zsozso (edited January 28, 2000).]

[Bblue]

Mouse.. Can you clarify your post a little? was not quite able to understand if you ment your had a total of +1 Planet with the Nexus (which would give you a small (25%) chance to capture natives or where you saying your total Planet score was 0 with the Nexus in which case you shouldn't be able to catupre natives... I think I have captured natives with the +1 Planet 'recieved from the Nexus' but for some reason I don't see the Nexus very often unless I am a green faction. Is that good luck or bad LOL..

Other things I have never seen/recieved from the game:
Mk II Battle Ogre
Mk III Battle Ogre
Asteroid Impact
UNITY CHOPPER from a pod!!!, I've gotten the one from the crash site though, and I'[ve played this game A LOT since about the time SMAC4.0 came out!

I know you can get these.. well I haven't actaully seen a post about anyone getting a MkIII Battle Ogre.. Must be my bad luck .. well in all cases, except the Asteroid Impact


AS far as the City swapping goes: Every game except my very first has been with SMAC4.0 of SMACX.. I saw people post about the bad trades.. The one time I tried it with a Non-submissive Pactmate, to test it, I traded a size 1 empty city for a size 20+ 4 SP City and the AI was happy to do it, so I don't use the trade city option unless the trade is a great trade for the AI. The AI trades ok under just Treaty terms as far as I can tell, I don't use the option alot. Maybe someone that knows a little bit about this one can help[ clarify under what conditions the AI is a total Idiot


------------------
"Power does not corrupt; it merely attracts the corruptable"

[korn469]

ok here are more bugs i have noticed

1. when you discover a secrets tech from an artifact you don't get an additional technology from it, it happens every time

2. many times when a base has been destroyed or disbanded it's base grid remains (the red outline), if the base is destroyed the grid should go away...i have noticed this bug on many many many occasions and can probably find you a save of it

3. in multiplayer i have tried to move my probe teams into a pact brother's base a screen pops up and ask if i want to take any action, if i hit continue moving, my probe teams disappears this one needs confirmation and i only witnessed it when doing a multiplayer (IP, not PBEM) game

4. you can't trade bases in multiplayer...if you traded with a human you could actually get a fair trade

korn469

[Qilue]

This concerns the +1 planet granted by having the Manifold Nexus in your territory.

If from SE choices or lack of, your planet rating is 0, (I haven't tested this with a 'green' faction yet) the +1 from the Manifold Nexus, although giving the ability to capture native units, the chance of doing so is 0%.

(Sorry for so many edits.)
[This message has been edited by Mouse (edited January 28, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by Mouse (edited January 28, 2000).]

[Qilue]

Bblue, an example.

If playing Cyborgs (or another non-green faction) and your not running a green SE choice and therefore have a planet rating of 0 and then gaining the nexus and getting +1 to planet. This does give the 'ability' to capture native units, but the chance of doing so is 0%.

In other words, the game says you can do it but you have no chance of succeeding.

korn469, 1) You do, but not until your next turn. I have tested this a lot, and you do get the extra tech on your next turn.
[This message has been edited by Mouse (edited January 29, 2000).]

[Patriqvium]

BugID: #0182, Pirate_Free_Ability
Submitter: Patriqvium, patrik_laiho@iobox.com
Version: Alien Crossfire v2
Category: Unit
Status: Confirmed
Priority: 3
Save before: N/A (not available)
Save after: available by e-mail
Description: The Pirates get sometimes free Soporific Gas Pods instead of Marine Detachment.
[This message has been edited by Patriqvium (edited February 02, 2000).]

[overcome]

BugID: #0176, BuildQueue_Disappear
Submitter: card@mail.idt.net
Version: Alien Crossfire v2
Category: Base
Status: Confirmed
Priority: 3
Save before: N/A (not available)
Save after:
Description: 1. Facilities or units placed in the build queue disappear, after even after repeated attempts to reconfigure the queue.

[overcome]

BugID: #0177, AutoFormer_Move
Submitter: card@mail.idt.net
Version: Alien Crossfire v2
Category: Movement
Status: Confirmed
Priority: 3
Save before: N/A (not available)
Save after:
Description: On occasion, a few formers that have automated orders, would move back and forth across a few squares endlessly. It took several minutes to regain control of the program. Sometimes you can try to open the city in the middle, and it would break the phenomena, other times you had to "end task" the game.

[overcome]

BugID: #0178, Mystery_build
Submitter: card@mail.idt.net
Version: Alien Crossfire v2
Category: Base
Status: Confirmed
Priority: 3
Save before: N/A (not available)
Save after:
Description: Occasionally, units or facilities are built without the user having given any orders to build them.

[overcome]

BugID: #0179, Loose_population
Submitter: card@mail.idt.net
Version: Alien Crossfire v2
Category: Base
Status: Demonstrated
Priority: 2
Save before: N/A (not available)
Save after:
Description: Some cities seem to loose citizens after they are built. In one particular game, the first city I built could not get more than 8 citizens in over 100 years, while the second city built was up to over 13 citizens. I would watch the city grow to 4 citizens, then shrink to 3, for no reason. Then it would get up to 5, then shrink to 4, for no reason. I could not figure it out. No mind word attacks or anything from normal gameplay. Will send progressed game file.