help! my scenario crashes on me!

[hardjoy]

Just finished the playtest version of my scenario Hammer v2, and adding up the final changes. And then... whoom, the scenario crashes. It won't even open up but gives the following error :

CIV2 forårsagede en undtagelse 03H i modul KERNEL32.DLL på adressen 0167:bff768a1.
Indhold af registrene:
EAX=00000000 CS=0167 EIP=bff768a1 EFLGS=00000286
EBX=00830000 SS=016f ESP=0093d3f0 EBP=0093d504
ECX=e2f8dbf0 DS=016f ESI=81789780 FS=6457
EDX=bffc9490 ES=016f EDI=00000000 GS=0000
Byte ved CS:EIP:
c3 cc cc 55 8b ec 56 57 68 c0 94 fc bf e8 01 d9
Indhold af stakken:
0058a3f1 00000000 81789780 00830000 ffffffff 74736f4d 63657220 20746e65 20534f44 6f727265 20203a72 00322020 203a6174 31203035 00000000 004d0105

It must be something in rules.txt or game.txt since these are the only files I changed since the last build (apart from a minor change in labels.txt.

It cannot be something with the scn-file or the events-file since earlier builds (which are tested and okay) do also not work.

The things changed were these :

-obsolescence of the hammer, berserker and viking raider units,
-swapping of the mangonel, trebuchet, horse and dragon, and battering ram unit slots, and respective sounds
-adding a sound for the battering ram (custom1)
-name change of the tech Baptism (Bro) and the AI values of a couple of techs (tried changing them back, which didn't produce better results)
-nuke diplo messages in game.txt.
-tech advance rate changed from 20 to 17

I made changes in events to reflect some of these changes, but the events doesn't even load, so it can't be a problem there.

I cannot get to grips about what went wrong. It's probably just a minor thing. Anyone who'd like to take a look with fresh eyes?

[hardjoy]

Here's the game.txt.

I'd really appreciate if anyone could give me a second guess, as I tried making all the changes back, without luck, which leads me to conclude it must be a typo or something or a simple mistake, which I cannot see.

[Mercator]

Rename one of them first. If the scenario still crashes, it's the other text file that is the problem, if it doesn't, you found the culprit... And just to be sure, rename both of 'em. If the scenario still crashes, it's something else entirely.

Scenario crashes like that are related to some more severe text file "bugs", most likely in the rules. Or in the game.txt, maybe you deleted some sections, or tried using some funny "codes" (e.g. like the ^ or @ and such) that Civ2 doesn't like (not in that place then anyway)?

For the rules.txt, a tech tree loop, or the inability to reach the future tech seems likely to be the problem. Otherwise, you might have inadvertently added/removed some lines?

[hardjoy]

Thanx a lot - using your method of deduction I managed to track down the problem to the rules.txt.

Using copy and paste I tried tracking down which section of the rules was causing the problem.... but still to no avail. When I pasted in the following part of the units section, the game started crashing... and to my best, even changing everything below to a 'neutral' status still made the game crash. Is there something obvious I don't see in this section?

Is it possible that the rules has a size limit like the events.txt - or some other twist not related to the text itself?

-I did add some supplementary information behind the ;'s in some places, but that has never been problematic before.

Thegn, nil, 0, 1.,0, 6a,3d, 2h,1f, 8,0, 1, X7, 000000000000000
Bishop, nil, 0, 3.,0, 0a,1d, 2h,1f, 5,0, 6, ToG, 000000000000011
Tradesmen, CA, 0, 1.,0, 0a,1d, 1h,1f, 2,0, 7, Pot, 000000000000000
Merchant, nil, 0, 1.,0, 0a,1d, 2h,1f, 4,0, 7, CA, 000000000000000
Missionary, nil, 0, 1.,0, 0a,1d, 1h,1f, 1,0, 0, Bro, 000001000000011
Battering Ram, nil, 0, 1.,0, 12a,3d, 1h,2f, 4,0, 0, E1, 000000001000000
Gode, nil, 0, 6.,0, 0a,12d, 2h,2f, 80,0, 1, no, 000000000000011
Ballista, nil, 0, 1.,0, 6a,3d, 1h,2f, 6,0, 3, Ato, 000000000000000

[hardjoy]

Narrowed it down to the unit slot just before the custom slots....

Missionary, nil, 0, 1.,0, 0a,1d, 1h,1f, 1,0, 0, Bro, 000001000000011

But if I get what is wrong with this, its beyond me. Bro is the tech that got its name changed, btw. It didn't help changing it back, and its preqs are nil,nil.

[hardjoy]

Apparently the scenario opens as long as the above unit is called an 'explorer' - and crashes when called a 'missionary'..............

Never knew anything like this. This game has behaved strangely on me before, but nothing like this....

Wait a minute.... maybe this is events-related after all.......... I'll try cleaning up the events-txt and hope this solves the problem. Sounds like a probable case.

[edited]
CASE CLOSED - PROBLEM SOLVED. The events.txt was over the high watermark, just barely. Nothing wrong with the rules. The reason the scenario loaded without the rules was obviously that the events.txt then checked out as faulty.

Thanks for the help in deductive analysis, Mercator, it helped me get on the right track and tracing the origin of the problem.

[Mercator]

Nice one. (not sure I would've figured that out)
Sorry I couldn't help any more.