*Cries* Crash As Balor Dies

Discussion in 'The Temple of Elemental Evil' started by [GSF]BANG, Aug 27, 2005.

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  1. [GSF]BANG

    [GSF]BANG Member

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    I have search and not found an answer to this. I really hope that I am not the only one that has run into this and someone has an answer.

    Anyway, I am using Livonya's Mod (1.5) and I have the Balor dead, or rather a single hitpoint of damage and he will die. Yay me! Except as soon as the damage registers the game crashes to desktop.

    I have tried making the final blow with every weapon I have available as well as several spells so it doesn't seem to be caused by any particular item bug.

    For reference I am getting the following error:

    The intructions at "0x2112ddba" referenced memory at "0x9b68e40". The memory could not be "read".​

    Anyone have any ideas?

    I am looking right now for video card driver updates but I have the feeling that isn't the problem since it seems to be event driven rather than graphics driven.

    More info: the Balor summoned another Balor and I killed that (took some serious damage when it died) but the game didn't crash then which, again, leads me to believe that it has to be the event causing the problem.
     
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2005
  2. Cerulean the Blue

    Cerulean the Blue Blue Meanie Veteran

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    This is a known issue, though for some reason it has never happened to me. I get plenty of crashes during the fight, but none when the Balor dies. Then again, my Balors don't seem to explode either. So far there is no known solution.

    All right, this is a call to all modders. What causes the Balor to explode? I have yet to figure it out. IIRC, someone once mentioned that the explosion was added by Liv. If we can remove it we can stop the CTD.
     
  3. [GSF]BANG

    [GSF]BANG Member

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    Is the explosion different from the one that I experienced when the first Balor died (the one that did the damage to my party, the one the Balor summoned)? Because that one didn't cause the CTD.

    You probably expected this but the Video card driver update didn't help.


    This is really frustrating. I really would like to finish this game. I want to run another party build after this but it is a little hard to get excited to do so if I am not going to be able to complete that one as well.
     
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2005
  4. Cerulean the Blue

    Cerulean the Blue Blue Meanie Veteran

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    ShiningTed reported that as long as there are two Balor in combat, when the first one dies it won't cause CTD. People are just having to repeat the combat until it finally doesn't CTD.
     
  5. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    Well, the explosions bit are a series of things in syspart2.tab. I don't understand that file, but I can tell you that blindly fiddling with it will impact on the crash issue (I had many CTDs in a row, fiddled the file, killed a Balor no worries, then had a CTD the time after that :yawn: ). As for switching off the explosion, mmmm tried very hard but couldn't do it, it seems to be directly associated with the Balor model.
     
  6. [GSF]BANG

    [GSF]BANG Member

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    Repeat the entire combat? I have a save just before he dies. DO I have to start the combat over or am I just going to be repeating that last hit until it doesn't CTD?

    I guess that without a root cause it will be hard to say.
     
  7. Gaear

    Gaear Bastard Maestro Administrator

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    IIRC, we're barking up the wrong tree here. The Balor's death throws have long been known to cause CTDs for whatever reason. Liv implemented (or enabled) the exlosion so as to avoid this CTD. Are you sure you have Liv's stuff installed properly?

    Incidentally, I remember dealing with this issue long ago and finding that sooner or later you'll get a game where the Balor's death does not cause a CTD. Saving during combat is usually a bad idea, but in this case I'd save right before the Balor dies and then keep trying the final moments until it worls.
     
  8. Cujo

    Cujo Mad Hatter Veteran

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    I think that I'll add my $0.02

    As the balor was one of my test subjects for The Sword of Cahoem I killed him many times and I still haven't encountered this CTD you all speak of. I also don't have not much if any lag in the fire node either (crappy old PC)
     
  9. [GSF]BANG

    [GSF]BANG Member

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    OK, I'll give as much info as I can, maybe it will help figure out what is happening.

    Things I have tried:

    - Running the battle from beginning to end - CTD when Balor dies
    - Saving incrementally up to Balor has a single hitpoint before dying - CTD when balor dies
    - Taking the final hit with every weapon and spell that will actually do damage - CTD when balor dies
    - uninstalling and reinstalling ToEE and all patches and mods - CTD when Balor dies
    - Uninstalling, deleting all files but the save, reintstalling all patches and mods - CTD when Balor dies

    I like this game anough that I am willing to play through again with a different party build and just take the battle with the Balor as the final scene but it would be a lot more satisfying to actually finish it for once (the first time through the game was ruined because I just installed all 3 Atari patches).
     
  10. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    I killed Frank a lot of times in testing and never had a problem, but the other 'Balor' in my mod (who never made it thru to release) regularly caused the death bug, except when Frank was on the screen. Its just peculiar.

    The Balor explosion stuff is in the 'original' Gaear, it is in partsys2.tab as it appears in ToEE4.dat which was added by the patches. lIke the kids, Liv may have activated it.

    Theory: did anyone fiddle partsys2 lately for a mod? Spell effects?

    Edit: Never mind, they couldn't have because it is not 'in the game', the game is using the one from the .dat.
     
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2005
  11. krunch

    krunch moving on in life

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    my 2 ¢

    I have experienced the Balor crash. The save during combat is a bad idea. Delete that saved game; everything will be the same at the moment when it is ready to die, including what is causing the crash. Also, my suggestion for when it happens is to close the game so that ToEE is not running. Then, reboot your computer. Try it again after the reboot and do the entire fight.
     
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2005
  12. Cerulean the Blue

    Cerulean the Blue Blue Meanie Veteran

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    It is my experience that ToEE and Norton's do not play well together.
     
  13. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    I'll second that.
    Liv posted this back in March. I think taking a 50 point beating when he dies was Liv's idea, but the explosion was already there. (The animation i mean).

    Can I mention I have had this issue with the other Node guardians as well?
     
    Last edited: Aug 28, 2005
  14. [GSF]BANG

    [GSF]BANG Member

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    This was a last resort. I had tried the fight so many times that I thought maybe I could isolate when the problem occurred.


    That is actually interesting. I do have Norton and I am sure that I have run with it disabled but I am not certain that I have during this fight.
     
  15. Cerulean the Blue

    Cerulean the Blue Blue Meanie Veteran

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    It didn't matter if I had it enabled or disabled. The only thing that worked was running msconfig and stopping Norton's from load at start up. But then I had no antivirus at all. I got rid of so many problems when I switched to AVG. Of course, Norton's doesn't go quietly when you try to uninstall it as well.
     
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