Spring RTS Engine

I've had this problem for a while now, whenever i play any game it plays fine for a few minutes but after 4 or 5 minutes TA Spring freezes in a strange way, the game just stops, but any units that were moving just before the crash glide slowly the way they were moving, sort of like they're in space. This has been happening with previous versions as well, and the biggest problem is, it freezes everyone else's game as well in the exact same way, but it only happens when i'm in the game (since noone's ever seen this crash before). This doesn't freeze the whole computer, just the game, and after a minute of the game being frozen, it shuts down and sends everyone back to the game room.

I have no idea what's causing this, i do get a game without a crash, but rarely. I think it might have something to do with my router settings, i have a d-link 604 wired router. I have all the needed ports open, and i'm running Windows XP x64.

Any help is appreciated.

Let me guess, you were host?

If this problem happens for everyone in the game at the same time it seems something went wrong with the server thread, maybe it crashed... same could happen if your router/firewall/spyware breaks the connection after a while.

No, this happens when i join another game as well.

Hm, sounds like you are somehow crashing the server 4-5 after you connect...

No clue how that might ever happen though...

I get this problem too...

It seems to occur after a random interval in what appears to be random games. I never had this problem with 0.72b1, however it could be equally a problem with the 2.2x AA mods.

It seems to be a problem, too, that effects some maps more than others. Green Fields is particulary susceptable to the issue.

I am yet to establish a trigger though. I am never the host and i dont know what other players experience when i crash like this. I pretty sure it screws them all over pretty royally as well.

I'd be happy to share any log details, if i knew where to look.

This is a connection related issue.

Are you sure its everyone? Or everyone but the host? Because this is what would happen if the host became urnesponsive temporarily, but as soon as the data throughput to the host starts flowing again the positions and actions are resynced and it continues as normal again.

I dont really know how it effects everyone else, to be honest.


But i have come to the conclusion that the only games in which i seem to get this problem are hosted by flop. so perhaps its just the connection with him that is dodgy.

That behavior describes when I played without 'dynamic' virtual memory in Win XP. I have tons of RAM but it didn't like static virtual memory settings.

This happens to me every game I play. It's happened with the AA and Balanced annihilation mods, not sure about xta. The last couple lined of my infolog.txt file are:
<cool2104> ok (this was the last in game chat message)
Client read net wanted quit
Path cache hits 3 25%
Path cache hits 6 13%

It usually happens after about 5-6 minutes of play.

This sounds like what I'm dealing with in another thread.

Its definitely a new bug (or at least has gotten much worse with 0.74b1). I'm trying to diagnose it thoroughly to help out the devs, but I don't know how to generate useful debugging information (logs or backtraces).

Please comment on the other thread if your experience matches mine or if you have any advice!

I'd even pitch in some money along with other people experiencing this bug to try and motivate a dev to fix it. I'm poor, so don't get too excited. :)

OuchOfDeath wrote:I've had this problem for a while now, whenever i play any game it plays fine for a few minutes but after 4 or 5 minutes TA Spring freezes in a strange way, the game just stops, but any units that were moving just before the crash glide slowly the way they were moving, sort of like they're in space. This has been happening with previous versions as well, and the biggest problem is, it freezes everyone else's game as well in the exact same way, but it only happens when i'm in the game (since noone's ever seen this crash before). This doesn't freeze the whole computer, just the game, and after a minute of the game being frozen, it shuts down and sends everyone back to the game room.

I have no idea what's causing this, i do get a game without a crash, but rarely. I think it might have something to do with my router settings, i have a d-link 604 wired router. I have all the needed ports open, and i'm running Windows XP x64.

Any help is appreciated.

That crash sounds strange, but its not, because all crashes happen that way. That sometimes happens with me but its normaly because of the hoster and normaly on the beggining of the game, and so changing the host normaly solves the problem.

manored wrote:That crash sounds strange, but its not, because all crashes happen that way. That sometimes happens with me but its normaly because of the hoster and normaly on the beggining of the game, and so changing the host normaly solves the problem.

Changing host does not solve the problem. See my thread for more details.

This crash may not happen often enough to bother most people, but that doesn't mean there isn't a bug that needs fixing. I have yet to complete a game with Spring 0.74b1 because of this bug.

I know its a bug and needs fixing, but it looks like it only happens with certain people that for some reason are "crashers", and some people seen to only cause crashes if they are the host. I think we should collect the most information we can from those "crashers" to see if they have something in common.

manored wrote:I know its a bug and needs fixing, but it looks like it only happens with certain people that for some reason are "crashers", and some people seen to only cause crashes if they are the host. I think we should collect the most information we can from those "crashers" to see if they have something in common.

Agreed! :)

Any suggestions? I'm willing to help however I can. I've only noticed the crash while playing AA and balanced annihilation, has anyone had it happen with another mod?

I dont remember so, but AA is the mod I play almost all time so I cant be sure .

I got the bug two times yesterday also ...

Same symptoms:

- some units are sliding away
- you can only select or unselect units (but don't give orders, or build anything)
- no message about sync problem
- you can quit the game normally ... or wait a few min and the game close
- it was internet games
- the mod was XTA 8.1
- client is linux native, and host is windows xp
- the Host complains about some "lag" during the game (before it crashed), on my side (client) I didn't notice any lag, my ping is approx 100-300ms (too high for fps game for ex)

Host and client (we were only two) are both disconnected, the symptoms description are from the client side (but may be the same on the host).

This is a connection related issue.

If a host starts lagging but the clients dont lag, then the clients get delayed update messages and units and particles don't stop moving and start to 'slide'. When the connection resumes they're locked back in the right place and the game speed quickens up to catch up with the host. However, if the connection time-out, then spring closes.

the moral of this story is never to use unreliable hosts who lag.

I don't think this is an issue with bad hosts. It happens in every game I join, nomatter who is hosting. And yes, I have noticed that the game will often slow down and get jerky and then the units will jump back to the right places and speed up for a few seconds. This problem is like that but the connection never resumes. Is there any way to modify the code a little bit to slightly increase the network buffers or something? This bug only seems to be effecting a small number of people.