CTD Poland 39

Posted by: iron mike

CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 04:16 AM

Hi, I've taken a small break from SAW to load the Poland 1939 campaign. I'm using V 1.3 from Sandbaggers Front lines. I'm using the EAW12a.exe, Direct X 9.0c, and good nvidia drivers. I can fly single missions or as a Pole but, if I select German the program CTDs and gives a ddhelp error. I know that ddhelp is from direct X but EAW hasn't crashed in any other campaign but this one. Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks.
Posted by: Baron Von Martin

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 06:38 AM

Hello,

It looks like the Germans are not accepting you because you chose to fly for the enemy first!

LOL.

But seriously, I have flown the Original Poland Campaign and never had a CTD.

This maybe has someting to do with the upadtes one from Frontlines?

I think Dom had POland on his sight, as it was many years ago since I D/L it.

S!
Posted by: Pobs

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 10:04 AM

Hi Mike,

ahhh the old ddhelp error ... I have had a problem with ddhelp since getting rid of my old voodoo card... what OS are you using ?.... what vid card.... which version of directX ?... I found that it was a problem between directX and my invidia drivers under win98 that caused my ddhelp problems... but then if you only get it in the one set-up it is probably a corrupt file in the game.. have you tried running filemon when starting the offending career and seeing from the log which file is failing to be found or at least which files were active when the ctd occurs ? ... that often helps I find...


you can get filemon here :

http://www.snapfiles.com/get/filemon.html


cheers,


Pobs
Posted by: Rotton50

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 11:05 AM

Mike,

Does the CTD happen with every German aircraft? There may be a corrupt 3dz file for one or more of the German planes.

You could try deleting all the German aircraft .3dz files in the folder and try running the game. You'll see all the EAW default German planes if the game runs because it will pick them out of the .CDF files.

With all the experimenting I do on 3dz files, occasionally I'll get a lockup that can only be fixed by a hard re-boot. And after the re-boot the display has self re-set to 640 X 400 and 256 colors!
Posted by: MrJelly

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 12:19 PM

From distant memory I seem to recall that there is a CDT associated with a German career that is based on your rank. I think Knegel knows more about it- it is very strange.

;\) Jel
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 06:38 PM

BvM, I've found and downloaded the 1.2 version, just haven't tried to run it. I thought I'd try to get 1.3 running properly. And, I'm a little jinxed with ECA and control panel, but, if I must I'll use it. Actually I got Dunkirk to work so this should work too.

Pobs, A P-III 700mhz, Win 98SE, and Nvidia MX 420 (64Mb with a 50.xx driver, the latest one I've found that works with that board), DX 9.0 developers version (it didn't matter I used 8.1 and it still CTD). I've got a download of file monitor but don't know how to use it. I tried when I first attempted to run EAW with my XP machine but threw my hands up in dispair.

Ray, CTDs when I select a German campaign, the individual missions seem to work fine. I set up a Do-17 and outran the Polish fighters sent to intercept.

Mr. Jel, I can't even get the German campaign to start, a Polish one starts fine. I click on German and WHAM. blue screen of death. I think it may be a problem with the '40 German campaign dat file. I haven't restored the original one yet.

Wow, that's all folks.
Posted by: Rotton50

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 07:57 PM

Mike,

Similar rig to mine. Right down to the video driver set. \:\)

I'll download it and try to repeat your problem.
Posted by: MrJelly

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 10:07 PM

It is still a long shot, bu your rank can be set here in the eaw.ini

[EAW]
ExtraSquads=0
PlayIntro=0
PlayerPlane=22
PlayerNation=0
LastCampaign=3
PlayerPilotName=MrJelly
PlayerRank=3 <==============================try different numbers here
GameName=Jel's game

;\) Jel
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/06/07 11:41 PM

Thanks Mr. J, I have to wait until I get home but, that is the 1st thing I'll try. If that doesn't work I may try changing the campge40.dat file to the one from veraion 1.2. I'm sure that the fix is simple, it is just the process to discover that simple fix is not.
P.S. I've downloaded the new file manager but haven't tried it yet. First thing is to resolve the Polish question, anything else is too ADD.
Posted by: Rotton50

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 01:35 AM

Mike,

I set up the Poland campaign but I couldn't even get a Polish campaign to run.

I did get as far as the cockpit of the Polish planes but the view outside was a mess and when I started my engine the other planes on the field blew up.

On the German side I got CTD's as soon as I clicked on the German campaign icon, I never got to the plane selection screen. I did not get any error messages, however.

Something is major league wrong in the campaign.
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 02:19 AM

Cool man. Must be a 5th column thing, eh? I think I had things blow up like than after the "ode to a broken stick" episode. On second thought it had something to do with the eaw.ini file and joystick setup. I haven't had the Polish airforce explode on the ground yet, but, I will let you know after I get home from work. (On till past 10 est this pm). BTW, reminds me of a line from "Galaxy Quest", ...it turned insideout, then exploded..." Anyway, that's a fine how ya'do. We may just have to try ver 1.2.
P.S. any "big bore" Ju 88s yet? Didn't I send you a photo, or did it just plan to? Mike out.
Posted by: Rotton50

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 03:14 AM

Mike,

I'm soliciting suggestions for new projects but no one seems interested. Maybe the summer doldrums.

I'll start searching the JU88's when I finish with the project I'm doing for Ade Kelly.

Oh and I put up one last Beaufighter. PeterMBooth found a picture of one with 2 40mm cannon on board. You know I couldn't pass that up. I'm sending it to Sandbagger as soon as I edit the flight files.



Same skin as the MK VIc Coastal Command Beaufighter.





OT: My fingers a sore from "pickin" crabs. This has been the best season in the 10 years I've lived here. The conservation efforts must be having an effect.
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 06:05 AM

Hi,

Poland 39 campaign troubles ....
Sorry for dive in and just quote some txt ..but the readme seem's to be interesting ....
Have you read it (at great extend ...)?

I suppose you have also used the Shreck patch ....

Quote:
ANDYS POLAND '39 CAMPAIGN (v1.3 20/5/2005)

This is my modified installation of Andys Poland '39 campaign.
The campaign is left as it was so this is only an addition to the original
Poland 1939 v1.2 campaign by Andy who deserves all credit for this great AddOn.

This pack is distributed as is (Zipped from my EAWStab installation).
To install: Unzip all content to your main EAW dir.
To uninstall: Remove all files present in this distribution from your main EAW dir !
Or use (as I do) EAWStab or any other fileswapping utility.

See bottom of this file for what's new.

GREETINGS AND THANKS TO THE EAW-COMMUNITY AND IT'S MEMBERS.

ENJOY !

//Knug


Comments and/or suggestions:
mail: tomas DOT andersson AT ca DOT com (Weird Crapolla edit)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------





POLAND '39 CAMPAIGN (v1.2 11/12/2001)
===================

Hello,

here it is, my new Poland '39 Campaign. \:\)
It substitutes the original 1940 BoB campaign, many aircraft of the original game and other files.
I hope it will offer many interesting and variing missions. I used all knowledge on the campaign files we have at the moment to achieve this. Ok, ok, there is no moving frontline but there is no need for that I think. \:\) Just have fun and a good time.

The basis of this campaign is Emil's Poland campaign. So I wanna thank him for the idea and for taking the time to realize this idea. Further more I wanna thank all guys Emil mentionned in his readme file (included) and all the guys who helped me, especially Butch2k for doing quite a lot of research, Woolf-man for updating his planes and all the others who developed the utilities to modify all the different EAW files, gave advice, made the skins and did some research I used for this campaign.
Feel free to make comments, report bugs and inaccuracities or whatever.



How to use this campaign:
=========================

Installation:
-------------

First install EAW and the desired addons. At least you definetely need to install Enemy Coast Ahead (ECA) 1.4. Then copy all files included in this campaign to your EAW folder. Overwrite existing files. That's it. \:\) The files in the subdirectories (planes, cockpits ...) need also to be copied to the main EAW directory not to subdirectories. You can also use an add-on-manager for EAW to install all the files but please read the instructions for them crefully to get this campaign working as it should.
This campaign is not (!!!) ECA Panel compatible. So please do not start ECA Panel when having installed this campaign. If you were not able to resist install this campaign again (just overwrite all files).

I have included 3 files you may want to use instead of my standard files. These are:

campgr40.dat.sg
campuk40.dat.sg
planes_pol.dat

To install them first delete the standard campgr40.dat, campuk40.dat and planes.dat in your EAW folder. Then rename

campgr40.dat.sg to campgr40.dat
campuk40.dat.sg to campuk40.dat
planes_pol.dat to planes.dat

They should be in your EAW folder too, since you copied all files included to your EAW folder.

The two camp**40.dat.sg files change the plane appearence possibilities, so that you will more often not encounter enemy interceptors. Please use these files when flying careers with ground attack/bombing planes (Hs 123, Ju 87, PZL P.23) since you will not receive fighter escorts.
The planes_pol.dat changes the ranges of the german fighters. This was neccessary because EAW did not offer escorts to the german bombers. Since this campaign is the Battle of Britain campaign in original EAW, the programm 'thinks' the fighters have to start in France and so their range was to short to escort the bombers to the new battlefield. That means, please use this file only (!) when flying a career for the polish side.

If you want the original files back just overwrite the modified files with the original ones included in the campaign main files. To avoid problems I included a backup of them, these file have the file extention *.ori.

Hope you are not too confuseed now. ;\) To make more clear what files to use when flying what career here a little overview:


career files to use/rename
-----------------------------------------------------------

German Fighter (Bf 110, Bf 109) no changes neccessary
German Attack Plane (Hs 123, Ju 87) campgr40.dat.sg
Polish Fighter (P.7, P.11, P.24) planes_pol.dat
Polish Attack Plane (P.23) planes_pol.dat & campuk40.dat.sg




Ok, what's new at all in my campaign:
-------------------------------------

Most obvious change: You now will not always encounter enemy planes. This will more often happen when flying for the german side but can happen too when flying for the polish side. That's what reality is like. I've included 2 versions of camp**40.dat for each side. One is called camp**40.dat.sg and one is called camp**40.dat only. Use the camp**40.dat.sg files when flying a ground attack campaign (Ju 87B, Hs 123A and PZL P.23B). Delete the two camp**40.dat in the EAW folder and rename campgr40.dat.sg to campgr40.dat and campuk40.dat.sg to campuk40.dat. Since you will not get any escorts when flying strafing/ground attack missions I have increased the possibility of not meeting enemy aircraft in these cases. If you encounter enemy planes nevertheless first ask for assistance then pray and then try to fight or try to escape... ;\)
Note: when using the ExtraSquad option in eaw.ini this feature will not work properly all the time. You will often get less polish flights than german flights and the campaign will get very easy for the german side because the Germans are nearly always in mayority.

It may even happen that polish planes retreat when seeing a large formation of german aircraft, I think that's new too. I don't want to offend somebody (polish) by including this. The polish pilots will offer a real good fight when doing so but sometimes... I know, this is not real. As far as I know the polish pilots were very couraged and engaged the germans wherever they could, but I wanted this feature to be included cause it's new. To be fair, don't follow and shoot them, go for some ground targets instead... \:\)

Another new feature are the more variing targets that you have to attack now. I made the research on that by myself. So the bombers will now have to attack airfields in the beginning of the campaign then railroad stations (new!) and later on many other targets (e.g. oil storage and factories) as it was in real 1939. Further more even the fighters will have to fly interdiction missions. That's how it was in reality. Btw: most of the german plane losses were claimed by polish flak... So be aware.

I 'made' a new plane, the PZL P.7A. It looked nearly exactly as the P.11, so I used Woolf-mans P.11 3DZ, edited the skin and the flight and weapon characteristics.

I made two new skins. Applause, applause... \:\) I changed Woolfmans original PZL P.11c skin to a new P.11C skin. I added some more details and a new squad badge to get a plane of an unit that is included in this campaign. And I edited the original skin one more time to get a skin for 'my' new PZL P.7A. Both skins are fictive. Thanks to Woolfamn for offering his pcx-files. [one more new skin by me in V1.2]



other changes to Emil's original campaign:
------------------------------------------

I changed the menue graphics and texts a lot to suit to this campaign.

I deleted the medium bomber campaigns. In my opinion it's not much fun to fly around waiting to arrive at the target area, drop your bombs, head home and when beeing attacked not beeing able to do anything than watching your comrades getting shot down... Unfortunately we are not able to convince EAW to give us some escorts for these missions at the moment. \:\(

I didn't delete the PZL P.24 careers although this plane was not used by the polish airforce during these days. I share Emils opinion:
'I included the P.24 in the campaign in so that you can fly a more powerful aircraft to repulse the German Messerschmitts. This is the same reason why Woolfman designed this aircraft. You will only be able to fly the P.24 yourself. The plane will not show up as as an adversary in a German campaign where you will allways encounter the P.11 as opponent [not anymore :), Andy]. You can only change this aspect of history if you fly the aircraft yourself.'

Instead of this I included two new planes (Bf 109 D-1 and PZL P.7A, some flight and weapon characteristics included) and the appropriate historically correct squadrons.

I changed many planes used by the campaign to reflect the real loadout/armament of the planes: Just four examples, the Do 17 Z-2 now has four MG 15 (including correct gun data for MG 15), PZL P.11C now has only two guns, Hs 123 A-1 can now carry a great variety of bombs and the PZL P.23B now has 3 guns (added the gun in the ventral rear position). That's why this campaign is not ECA Panel (3.7) compatible (yet). May be it will get later when Charles updates his ECA Panel again.

Edited many flt files to move the gun tracers to their right position.

The targets being attacked by the german bombers now match to the historic reality. See above.

I changed the squadrons airfields to reflect the historically correct assignments a bit. The units of german Luftflotte 1 are assigned to the northern airfields and the units of Luftflotte 4 are assigned to bases in the south. Same for the polish units. [new in V1.1, revised in V1.2]

I edited the german weapons names. Now they are in german language -Why the hell do the german speak english? ;\) - and I have used the correct notations.

I edited the campaign selection screens and texts to fit to the planes and squadrons used. [revised in V1.2]

Some more changes? Hmmm, yes: I included the file for the height data I use. The landscape really looks fine when using it... \:\) Thanks to Dominique "DOM " Legrand for his Hills Generator.

I included the files for polish ranks, polish pilot names and two mainscreens. I'll leave it up to you wich one of the two mainscreens you want to use. Thanks to Claudio Wilches, Stanley99 and Karl_CZ for these files.



Some tips on flying and how to get most out of this campaign:
-------------------------------------------------------------

First don't use 'Alt-N' to skip to the next waypoint. In principle there is no problem when doing this nevertheless but flying is more realistic without using it. You may use the autopilot and time accelaration instead of this but always keep looking around for the enemy... Fortunately EAW will stop the time acceleration automatically when encountering enemy planes.
Use the map for orientation only, not to find the enemy (german pilots only). In my opinion Germany had no radar using ground controller at this time and in this place. The Polish had a dense system of look-outs, at least around Warshaw. So the polish pilots may know exactly where to find the Germans. So you may use the map extensively when flying for the polish side. \:\)

What to do when flying a fighter sweep but not encountering any enemy planes? Just go for ground targets, look for truck convoys on the streets or attack the airfield you are ordered to. This would be the most realistic option because there you have AA guns. The truck convoys unfortunately don't have some. So I want you to use this opportunity to simulate the real air to ground battle a bit. Nevertheless, I don't wanted the fighters to do bombing missions to airfields cause these wouldn't be counted successful since all fighters can't carry bombs. First trials with bomb-carrying fighters were first conducted in 1940. As I mentionned above the german fighter and Zerstörer units were used quite extensively for air to ground battle in 1939, but using their guns only. So let's keep historically accurate... \:\) If you wanna fly more strafing/bombing missions fly the P.23B, Hs 123A or Ju 87B campaigns using the appropriate camp**40.dat.sg files (see the installation instructions).

I nearly forgot the tips on flying... \:\) Always use the advantages of your plane (speed and fire power for the german, manoeuverability for most polish planes). And remember, dogfighting in this campaign is quite different from other campaigns, but you will see... Last tip: Fly a bit in favour of your tail gunner(s) (especially PZL P.23B). They can shot too and sometimes they can even hit a target... \:\) and have a look at the included screenshot ss03.jpg. It shows how to survive a mission in a PZL P.23B... ;\) The other screenies are just impressions out of this campaign.

The campaign was tested with EAW V1.2. AFAIK all works fine with this version. I recommend setting ExtraSquads=0.
If the campaign is too hard for the german side I advice you to use EAW V1.2a or using the ExtraSquads=1 option in eaw.ini (EAW Versions 1.2 & 1.2a only). Both favor the german side. Flying the campaign with PZL P.7A or PZL P.23B is even harder but I think that's what it was like. You have to be very lucky to get a kill with the P.7A cause it's really slow. Keep that in mind and try to trade altitute for speed if you can.



Inabilities
-----------

Unfortunately we can't do wonders... ;\)
So there are some limitations.

We still don't have a eastern front terrain, so the battle is fought in virtual german skies.

AFAIK you will always encounter 12 enemy fighters. I'm not able to change this.

You can't be ordered to attack bridges. Bridges don't work as targets, don't ask me why...

The Ju 87 B-2 has some inaccuracies: It normally carried four 25 kg bombs under the outer wings. Firstly we have no 25 kg bombs (used 50 kg bombs SC 50 instead) secondly the position of the two inner SC 50 is not correct. All 4 bombs should be where the outer SC 50s are. This is a 3dz job still to be done. [fixed in V1.2]

Similar problems with the PZL P.23B (seems to be very difficult to get the bombs where they have been on the real plane) and the PZL P.11C. Contacted Woolf-man on this already. You can carry these bombs, but you don't see them hanging under your plane, but you will see them when they are released. [fixed in V1.1]

Further more we still have no virtual cockpit for the Ju 87 and Hs 123.

Some german skins used are not historically accurate. They are from 1940. Properly skined german planes are afaik the Bf 109 D-1, Me 110 C-1, He 111 H, Do 17 Z and Ju 87 B. See their readme file for more information. [partly fixed in V1.1 and V1.2]

The polish convoys will always have no AA guns. I don't like this but we have to live with that. Of course you can change the trucks skins to tanks or whatever you want but they will stay soft targets. \:\(

Even the ground attack squads will have to fly fighter sweep missions. I would be able to change this but to the price of loosing more interesting features so I kept it. Don't care about these missions, take them as armed reconaissance and just fly them. I hope in most cases you will not meet enemy planes when using the camp**40.dat.sg files. See installation instructions above.

Your wingmen will sometimes 'see' the invisible interceptors that in fact appear when no enemy fighters appear. They will call for them but only when using the Alt-N key (afaik). That's why you should not use it. I know the pilots have been very nervous these days and most of them flew their first combat missions so they may see things not beeing there... ;\)

EAW doesn't seem to accept dates previous to 1940 as defined in the Sq**4*.dat and Camp**4*.dat files. You can define the date of September 1939 to appear in the campaign start menu but then the campaign itself will happen during March of the year 8110. This is why the campaign will unfold itself in September 1940. I thought it would be better to fly in September 1940 than in the 9th millenium. [abstract out of Emils readme]

The AI of EAW does hardly use the german fighters' advantages. That's why the german missions sometimes are really difficult cause you loose your comrades very quickly, especially when encountering a bounche of PZL P.11Cs on a sweep mission.

Ok, if you know or have some ideas how to solve these problems, tell me please.



Slot list
---------

Plane Slot

PZL P.23B P-51B Mustang
PZL P.11C Hurricane
PZL P.24A Spitfire I
PZL P.7A Spitfire IX
PZL P.37B Mosquito

Bf 109 E-1 Bf 109 E
Hs 123 A-1 Bf 109 G
He 51 A-1 Bf 109 K
Bf 109 D-1 Fw 190 A
Bf 110 C-1 Bf 110 C

Do 17 Z-2 Ju 88 A
He 111 H-2 He 111
Ju 87 B-2 Ju 87 B

retreating PZL P.11C Tempest

The slots of Ju 88 C and B-26 are used too. These planes are invisible but will not attack you. These planes 'appear' when not encountering enenemy planes. That's the trick to achieve this feature. So you can't use these two slots because all planes installed to these slots will be invisible... The Tempest slot is partly used by the virtual cockpit for the PZL P.23B so I kept the retreating P.11Cs too but they will appear very seldom.
I included the He 51 A-1 too but for single missions only. It was not used over Poland but it's a german plane out of this time and so you might have a try flying it. It's fun.
All other slots are not used by this campaign. So they are equiped with the standard planes using ECA flight characteristics. You can use other skins but since this campaign is not compatible with ECA Panel the newly installed planes will perhaps have wrong names and behave like the original EAW planes. You can change this only by Hex editing the appropriate files. You can't change this by using ECA Panel cause you will have to install this campaign again then and loose most changes you made with ECA Panel. Sorry for that. But at least you can fly all original EAW planes and use the many skins for them.



Resources
---------

Heinz J. Nowarra, Die deutsche Luftrüstung 1933-45
Enzyklopädie der Flugzeuge, Aerospace Publishing Ltd.
Die großen Luftschlachten des Zweiten Weltkrieges, Aerospace Publishing Ltd.
Adolf Galland, Die Ersten und die Letzten
Walter A. Musciano, Die berühmte Me 109 und ihre Piloten 1939-1945
Heinz J. Nowarra, Die 109
Franz F. Winter, Die deutschen Jagdflieger
Geschichte der Luftfahrt - Die Luftwaffe, Time-Life Books Inc.

and not to forget:
the SimHQ-EAW-Forum especially Butch2k and some other internet sites.



Changes in V1.1 (was never released by me)
===============

Polish planes/cockpits updated. Thanks to Woolf-man.

Fixed the Hs 123 flt file.

All careers are revised completely. The german campaigns are longer now but many more changes.
The polish side is more offensive now. So you have to fly intercept missions for the german side too. This is not historically wrong at all cause the Polish Air Force did in fact fly offensive missions, mostly to support their army but often suffered heavy losses.

The PZL P.11C now can carry four 12,25 kg Bombs. Used the 20 lb Incendiary 'weapon slot' for this purpose. Hardpoints added/corrected by Moggy. Thanks.

Changed the loadout of the Hs 123. It can now carry a greater variety of ordnance.

Removed the waist guns of the He 111. They were added because of the experience made in polish skies. Thanks to Ghostboy for this info.

Included the polish target names file by Per "vonOben" Rasmusson.

Included new german skins by Ghostboy. \:\) ...more to come...

Weapon hardpoints for PZL P.23B are right now. Thanks to Col. Gibbon. Loadout possibilities increased for that plane too.

Corrected and added some squad badges in campaign selection screens.

Included the 'No English Targets Fix' by Dominique 'DOM' Legrand. No more missions to England now. \:\)



Changes in V1.2
===============

German careers revised again cause I got new information on the topic. Added I./JG1 and I./JG21.

Added new skins (Bf 110 C-1 of I./ZG76 by Ghostboy and others with new virtual cockpit by Migge and Hs 123 A-1 of II.(S)/LG2 by me).

Weapon hardpoints and weapon drop points for Ju 87 corrected.



Ok, enough of reading, now lets fly around a bit. \:\)
Greetings to all, hope you enjoy this campaign,
Andy.

(andy AT wiesel-network DOT de) (Weird Crapolla edit)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Additions in V1.3 by Knug
=========================
Added many new screens don't remeber them all.
Special thanks to Marek "Woolf-man" Wilk for help with translation to polish.
Added a full terrain set (Von Obens Euro Terrain) with many HR objects. (Von Obens Wartime Objects slightly modified)
Trucks and armoured car for polish vehicles.
Buildings from VonOben and John 'Col. Gibbon' Graham.

Added flyable aircraft in unused slots (to fly in single missions).
Tried to find a suitable cockpit.
Some skins modified by me to better match the environment.
Special thanks to Andy for this great Addon.

Flyable:
Aircraft Slot Skin
-------- ---- ----
Ju87 p47d Andy, Geo, GhostBoy, Paulo Morais, C.Wilches Freddy.B
do17p 262a Karel. Org cockpit by C. Wilches org wingview Captain Curt
do17z p38h Karel. Org cockpit by C. Wilches org wingview Captain Curt
hs126 p47c Moggy,Andy,Claudio
pzl37 p38j Woolfman
pzl11 typh Karel
avia534 sp14 Jan Tuma (For single film stunt-mission flying ;-)
109d hirez 190d DeanH
110c hirez 110g SteveT
h111 h111 cockpit by Marco.Fax skin by Andy (h111 flyable in campaign mode)

Nonflyable:
Ju52 m410 Jan Tuma

And a special thanks to all those other great artists whos names got lost during the creation of this update !!!!!!!!.

Cheers

//Knug



Legal stuff
-----------
No responsibility is accepted for any problems caused to your hardware or software by use of this package or any of its contents.
But I can't see why there should be any.

This package is strictly freeware.
It may not be included in any commercial package, and permission is not given for such distribution.

WARNING
IF YOU ARE HAVING TROUBLE WITH EAW USING THIS PATCH,
DELETE ALL FILES WHICH CAME WITH THIS PATCH AND SEE IF THE PROBLEM IS STILL THERE.



OFF
Posted by: Pobs

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 08:59 AM

Well, just to want to add...I am using win98SE on a celeron 3.2Ghz, nvidia fx5700 vid card with the 56.64 drivers... and I have no problem flying Andy's Poland campaign for the germans,.. although I havent tried it at every rank so can't comment on Jell's point... but it does fly perfectly well if installed correctly and there are no corrupted files. If you can fly the planes in single mission mode but not in campaign mode then it isn't a problem with the models or skins, it has to be a problem with the campaign files...if you do have any problems in single mission mode, one thing to try is to delete all the files from your savedata folder incase there are conflicting settings in the saved missions... that is a common problem in single mission mode...


cheers,


Pobs
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 02:33 PM

I must either have a corrupt copy, or, I've done something wrong in the installation of v1.3, the program crashed right after clicking on the campaign selection in the main menu now. I've deleted the whole thing and installed v1.2, then flew a mission as a career 110 pilot. That says it right there. After running ECApanel 3.x and selecting the Polish option it worked.

Now I didn't run ECApanel for ver1.3 because the instructions didn't seem to say it was needed. I'll reread the version that WC has included and try again.

If things don't work out I'd like to find a newer set of files, I downloaded the original from Front Lines.

Thank you. Won't have any results before Sunday evening.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/07/07 03:42 PM

Hi Mike,

Campaigns which use altered targets need a new set of Default**.msn files. These files select all 29 default bases in every campaign and single missions, however when targets and frontlines were moved these files may no longer be correct as the game requires the default bases to be on the proper side of the frontline with proper side designations.
When these files aren't present the game will try to use the default bases and criteria based on the stock campaign, which obviously doesn't expect these bases moved to other locations on the map.
A changed frontline alone also changes the criteria of the .msn files but sometimes the stock criteria might accidentally work if the default base is close to where it is expected to be but with 4 years to select, 29 planes and a set of 30 frontlines, chances are pretty high that without a customised set things will CTD. Basically the files are only used once per plane to set the right criteria for the plane's first mission and if the criteria are right the game will not allow further selection of wrong bases as each .msn will be updated with the plane's last flown mission and possibly some values which keep track of your performance. So erasing the Default**.msn files isn't really the solution, a customised set has to be created instead, using Mr. jelly's Mission Maker tool.
Aside from the above knowledge there isn't much known about the influence of these files on campaigns but it is pretty clear that without them no true assesment of a buggy campaign can be made.
CTD's will depend on the luck you have of accidentally having a last saved .msn for that plane which fullfills the proper criteria and can happen at any stage after startup. In the worst case scenario the game will not even start at all, in other cases you might be able to fly certain planes but selecting others may invoke the CTD.
Besides this there is more new knowledge which was never incorporated or contemplated when older campaigns were constructed as people were never aware of the fact that their machines accidentally had the right criteria to run the campaign so it was believed that everything worked fine.
Many campaigns also never used the full set of targets/airfields and the unused ones were placed outside the playing field, referred to as 'behind' the wall.
Still the campaign engine might select one of these but the wall is inpenetrable and planes can not go beyond it. This means planes which are in the playing field can not get out but planes which are beyond the wall can not go in either.
The game is incapable of rendering external views when take off position is behind the wall and also will cause CTD's when such a base/target is selected. When selected the inside cockpit view will show an Alps like terrain caused by an interpretation of memory which holds actual program data.
As Pobs mentioned the campaign engine expects to find certain targets with proper side designations within a certain area, if such targets aren't present or it's side designation is wrong CTD's will also happen. It's very unlikely that the campaign engine will allow attacks on friendly targets or use enemy bases for take offs as all of these don't have a side designation for nothing. Airfields and targets even have designations for what planetypes they are available (fighters/bombers etc.), besides designations of the year when they become available. If any of these criteria is wrong a CTD may be the result.
You may understand that when targets/airfields/frontlines were moved the default campaign files need a total restructuring because what was first Allied now may have become Axis but I've not seen anyone make changes to the campaign files this extensively, we simply lack the proper knowledge to do so.
So all in all there just isn't still full knowledge on how the campaigns work, some were lucky to fly an entire campaign for a certain plane without problems while others never got to fly it at all.
The only solution seems to be to keep trying, select another plane when your preferred plane doesn't work or like few of us learn the dark art of modifying EAW and use the tools available to do it.
It's just the sad truth that 95% and perhaps even 100% of all campaigns with moved targets/bases/frontlines suffers from one or other discrepancy which simply isn't fully understood or recognised or which was discovered after it was released and no updates were made available.

VonBeerhofen
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 06:40 AM

Hi,

from the install instruction of POLAND '39 CAMPAIGN v1.2 :

"This campaign is not (!!!) ECA Panel compatible. So please do not start ECA Panel when having installed this campaign. If you were not able to resist install this campaign again (just overwrite all files)."

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 12:28 PM

Hi,

today i did install the Poland 1939 campaign(under OAW) and single missions did work find after i did click to "del MSN" , what erase possible not fitting single mission setups from the savedata folder.
Always when i did click to "career", i got a CTD, where EAW sometimes did stuck in the taskbar.

The solution is to delete the "CAMPGR40.DAT" and "CAMPUK40.DAT" and rename the "CAMPGR40.DAT.SD" and "CAMPUK40.DAT.SD"(get rid of the ".SD").

This camp dats work without problems for now(of course i didnt test all and everything).

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 02:43 PM

Late Saturday evening I was able to reload Poland v1.3 onto my winxp machine. This time I put in ecapanel 3.6 but didn't run it (hadn't put it in the first time). THe campaigns ran Polish and German but, the German was dated at 24 March, 10111. The Polish was September 1939/40. Also, I have a large mouse pointer stuck in the middle of the screen. I am using glide wrapper on this machine, EAW 1.26E, eca 1.4, and a ATI vid card. I'm going to reload Poland onto my 98se machine and see what happens there. More to follow. Thanks guys.
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 02:57 PM

Hi,

Quote:
Also, I have a large mouse pointer stuck in the middle of the screen


I know very well this phenomena ....and suffered it in any Windows OS versions as any graphics drivers and DirectX version who was loaded.
But..! this happen very rarely (one or two by year) and after few minutes or few change of view ..this dissapear ......
That's a weird phenomena and disturbing as the arrow cover your gunsight \:\) \:\)
This is more annoying when you are in a fight online ...of course \:D
I never find from where it's coming......
Anyways ..I don't bother...as this dissapear automatically ..and quickly.

OFF
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 03:45 PM

Thanks for the info, I will see if it happens on the other system, the one that runs on Windows 98SE and EAW works on all the time.
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 04:01 PM

Why the hell you always place ecapanel 3.6 into your Poland folder??

Only by installing this, you overwrite the Poland FM/DM´s and may cause strange results.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 06:31 PM

Hi Mike,

is there a reason for using the 1.26e EXE? I'm not entirely acquainted with how this EXE operates but recent research showed that some minor modifications are made to the CDF's and the EAW.INI which seemed to cause some weird behaviour on some machines.
These machines showed an EAW.INI which no longer looked comparable with the default EAW.INI and the normal 1.2 exe no longer worked good because the CDF's were altered.
Obviously the purpose of the 1.26E patch is not to enhance the 1.2 version but to make it work on operating systems which were troublesome and IMHO therefore should not be used unless you've ran out of options. Using the patch where it wasn't really necessary account for most of the above problems.
When addons rely on unchanged EXE's and CDF's to work, simply because the files they use are also unchanged and possibly different then the ones used in the 1.26 version, it seems logical to assume that either such changes must also be made to the addons or the addons shouldn't be used with such EXE's.
It's simmilar as to why you can not replace the EAW.EXE with the DUNKIRK.EXE or most other addon specific EXE's, because it uses extensively changed filenames or filetypes or other changes which no longer have any simmilarity with the stock game. When the EXE is modified to use changed files and these files are incorporated into CDF's then the problem gets even worse as no past addon was build with such changes in mind and the changed files may have been replaced with versions which rely on the default files.
The only advice I can therefore give is to use a clean 1.2 install with the glidewrapper added, that is if such is at all possible on your machine.
Furthermore EAW's installation and proper functioning can be seriously hampered by certain programs which you may have run previously or which remain working in the background. These programs may accidentally change the cache used by EAW which is used on startup or they can occupy vital parts in memory also used by EAW (this because the program uses fixed and not relocatable areas).
It is why Microprose and Atari suggested to run only the most minimal of processes in their FAQ.
Somehow I feel that installs should only be attempted with as little processes running as possible and only after a reboot to free up memory and cache.
I can't guarantee if such will help but after 7 years of having dealt with problems on hundreds of machines it's a gut feeling which is winning terrain and which seems only prudent.
BTW, you can run ECA in any subfolder and after execution you can copy/paste the changed .DAT and .STR and .FLT files into your EAW install. As Ralf says this will alter the FM/DM allready there as it will be overwritten by the ECA changes. I'm not sure if that is what you want but it's your choice to make. I think the addon will work fine without the ECA changes.

VonBeerhofen
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 07:35 PM

The readme file says to use ECA 1.4 so I put ECA 1.4 and then ECApanel 3.6 into the Poland folder before any other files were downloaded into it. ECApanel was not run, only the accompaning files were added to the EAW directory. The common folder, skin folder and terrain folder, and Poland fixes were added after the basic EAW was copied (from a successful Win 98 load). I did this because nothing else seemed to run (and I did this onto my Win XP machine which hates EAW).

I haven't gotten Poland to run correctly on my Win 98 SE machine. I've used the EAW 1.2a exe on that machine for Poland 39. I've used the 1.26e exe because of the CTD problem and most things worked fine with it, (Dunkirk, Andy's 1944, Final Year of the Luftwafffe, SAW, Great Shot!, etc).
Besides 1.2a doesn't work on the XP machine I get the not a valid 32 app message.
Now I'm really getting confused, are you saying to just load the mod directly into a freah EAW 1.2a load without any thing else added (ECA etc)? OK, I'll try that.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 07:54 PM

Hi Mike,

possibly a number of the ECA files allready changed the addon's FM by overwriting it. XP requires any EXE to be called EAW.EXE, changes in the name will produce your error. WinME and Win98SE don't care about what name you give the EXE and I have about 4 or 5 in a single install simultanously.
The 1.2a version is an unofficial recompiled version and very interesting in itself, yet there is no telling what effects this EXE may have on some machines. I guess you just need a bit of luck there and it's not known to cause problems. It however seems to suggest that you don't really need the 1.26E patch but if it works then I wouldn't try changing it, that might cause even more problems.
Are you aware of the necessary EAW.INI changes you need to make for all NoCD versions of the EXE?

[Miscellaneous]
Debug Flags=0
Debug Path=.\

Many problems are caused by differences in video hardware. Especially earlier addons were created for Glide cards and others for TNT. A common misunderstanding which slowly crept in was the believe that .TER or terrain tiles only needed hires drawings. So often you will find a hires copy of the BN***.TER in the LR***.TER slot. My research showed that some video cards needed a lores tile to function properly where other machines were able to force hires in by changing the terrain detail setting in the game.
I fear the same misconception crept into the planeskins and groundobject files Where P***TEX.TPC stands for a hires skin and P***TES.TPC for the lores version and TMOD**_H.TPC stands for hires groundobject and TMOD**_L.TPC for lores version. Ofcourse the older the card the higher the chances to run into this problem.
To see if your card is subject to this problem you can temporarily cut all .TER files into a seperate folder and see if the addon works without the tiles. If this turns out to be the problem then perhaps you can get your hands on a tileset which holds both lo and hires versions and might work with the addon.
Basically removing filetypes selectively is the best way to determine where addons are buggy. Still some knowledge on EAW is necessary to do so but in general the cut files are taken over by the default versions of these files in the CDF's.
You can then allways paste these files back in without problems, which is how OAW actually operates too.
The entire campaign is in all the .DAT files, and these should besically work as standalone too without the FM/DM or graphics/sounds/text for that addon.
There is another problem you need to be aware of. Having multiple installs on your machine can hamper redirection of registry shortcuts when cleaning the registry. If a file is found to no longer be present (pretty normal after an OAW reset), the cleaner will try to find a file with the same name and redirect the shortcut to what it finds. This means that the registry can get crossrefences to multiple versions of your install or directly into OAW folders and the game might try to use these shortcuts which ofcourse won't work since all the shortcuts need to point to the running gamefolder itself.

VonBeerhofen
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 08:14 PM

OK, so I'll take the stock 1.2 patched EAW change the ini for no cd and try that. Just so you know, the terrain doesn't seem to cause a problem on my Win 98 system. If I could find a way to get my XP system to run without CTDs I would be very happy. I have followed the recomendations for XP installs from the WIKI etc, used Knegels campaign data fix and still crash on that one. But, that is another story isn't it. Thanks much.
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/08/07 10:03 PM

Hi,

Quote:
stock 1.2 patched EAW

For use the NO-CD modification (EAW.INI modified as indicated by VB) you must use the EAW 1.2 NO-CD patch (available on Sandbagger pages)

As reminder:

1.26E is already a NO-CD version.
It's indicated in the readme ..as well the changes he provide.

Quote:
New to Version 1.26

This revision primarily improves and fixes the EAW.INI features and functionality:

EAW.INI Fixes: The entries under WinXP for TARGET NEXT ENEMY =T, TARGET PREVIOUS ENEMY =SHIFT T, TARGET CLOSEST ENEMY =CTRL T, TARGET NEXT FRIENDLY =Y, TARGET PREVIOUS FRIENDLY =SHIFT Y, TARGET NEXT GROUND =E, has been fixed .

EAW.INI Default changes: The entries for Width=800, Hight=600, Windows Joystick=1, JoystickDeadZone=3, Debug Path=.\ are now the default entries when the EAW 1.26 patch is installed.

EAW Operating Changes: A CD mitigation modification has been added to the EXE file for convinience of game play. This patch should now also allow the game to play under Win2000 in single player mode only. (multiplayer problems under Win2000 still exist). This patch is still compatable with EAW 1.2.

EAW Extra Additions: The changes that are present in Andy's German AI now use cannons.

EAW Fixes: The errors as discovered by MrJelly in the 3D.CDF, producing garbled cockpits in some of the Spits have also been included. The contrail smoke lengthened by 4X. The ground smoke from damaged objects has had its duration greatly extended. A Rocket-Freeze workaround has been implamented by modifying the smoke from back of rockets.


Regards sydbod (on behalf of The Code Group).

Thanks to Andreas (Andy) Herrmann for his work.
Thanks to Tony (MrJelly) West for his work.
Thanks to Ralf (Knegel) Kraeft and Roel (VonBeerhofen) Bartels for all their help and advice.



Quote:
Having multiple installs on your machine can hamper redirection of registry shortcuts when cleaning the registry


That's why ...it's better to install ONCE EAW ....and if you need more installs of the game ..it's better to make a COPY-PASTE of the entire game in a new folder .. \:\)
The best of course is to no made a install but just a copy-past from the CD.... (it's work!!)
Just needed to see what files are not necessary... but if they are pasted ..it's no problems created.(just a question of housekeeping and used space!)
Of course if one install was already performed ...a cleaning of the registry is in on order after the deinstallation of the game.

OFF
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 04:30 AM

Originally Posted By: iron mike
The readme file says to use ECA 1.4 so I put ECA 1.4 and then ECApanel 3.6 into the Poland folder before any other files were downloaded into it. ECApanel was not run, only the accompaning files were added to the EAW directory. The common folder, skin folder and terrain folder, and Poland fixes were added after the basic EAW was copied (from a successful Win 98 load). I did this because nothing else seemed to run (and I did this onto my Win XP machine which hates EAW).


Hi,

is there another Poland1939 V1.3 available??

In my readmy, which is the same like the one WC posted in this theatre, i can read this:

"This campaign is not (!!!) ECA Panel compatible. So please do not start ECA Panel when having installed this campaign. If you were not able to resist install this campaign again (just overwrite all files)."

But anyway, did you rename the camp40**.dat files, like i suggested??

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: Com.Greg Keene

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 05:49 PM

Hi Iron Mike,
I have/had the same probs when I want to play the German side. I have (believe it or not) installed the Version 1.3 about thirty times as told in the readme (with small differences)- and always got a CTD when I pushed the selecion button for the german side. I´m also running Win98se, DirectX 9.0c, Driver Nvidia 6.49 ( all other EAW Installs are running fine!!!)
With the several installs I figured out ( the v.1 install is/was running) - by adding the files of v1.3 one after the other and then trying out with file is making the trouble, that following files are causing the CTD:
Nationc.wsp
Ntnpicgr.wsp
Ntnpicuk.wsp
Ntnpicus.wsp
Pltcar.mpc
Esp. the file Ntnpicgr.wsp, can´t say why.
So I deleted then (or put them into an other folder than EAW), , and now I can select the german side, hmm... I works for me - but now i´m getting the standard selection screen....
Hope this helps a little !?
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 08:32 PM

To my knowledge there is only one Poland 39. However, the is Andy's v1.2 at his page on Sandbaggers site. I know that v1.3 is not compatable with ECApanel, but I tried it because it is a part of ECA. I didn't run ecapanel.exe inside of the EAW folder, just copied the files ontop of ECA 1.4. The copy didn't make a difference in running the program. It crashes with or without the ecapanel files on the German campaign side. The Polish side with it's beautiful screens works fine so far. I'm still unclear about ECA 1.4 being used at all in ver 1.3 though.

Yes, I did, it crashed with a big bang and the system became unstable (didn't tell you that part before, but the crash caused the system to go totally wonky. A second try at EAW locks it up completely).
BTW, the main Polish fighter flys like a pig.

C.C.K., humm...you know it is like chicken soup, it doesn't hurt to give it a try. I'll delete those files from the common file set before I try again. Also, I've gone back to the source and downloaded all the zips again, just in case I had a bad file.

And finaly, I am going to use a EAW patched to 1.2 with Andys 1.2ac no cd patch this time as a basis. I have run a basic EAW mission with the ini modified to nocd, 1280/1024 res my remapables etc. with out a glitch. So I know the basic installation is ok.
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 08:44 PM

Hi again,

whats about the camp40**.dat files?? As i wrote before, i also got CTD´s with the normal camp40**.dat files, that comes with V1.3, but V1.3 include two camp40**.dat.SD files, did you try them as camp40**.dat files??

Poland1939 comes with its own flight files, ECA1.4 and ECApanel are not needed and can cause trouble, if they are in the same folder.

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 08:56 PM

Hi,

Nice saga \:\)

Are you sure the name of the german operation is not "Dynasty" ...or "Dallas" ?? \:D

OFF
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/09/07 09:43 PM

Knegel, yes I deleted the campxx.dat files, actually renamed them camp40xx.bak then dropped the .sd ends for the new dat files. Didn't help. I went back to Front lines and downloaded the whole campaign just in case the original files were messed up, and am using the second set tonight to try again. This time without ECA etcera. The combined readme files are confusing to say the least.

Anyway in the meantime I'm flying a 109g-6 over Normandy using the Frontlines Site Emil's 'Normandy 1944'. I had to fly between the trees to get away from a very nasty P-47. The cannon hits are amazing to see in that campaign.

W.C. I believe the correct title should be "Damn If I Know" Out. Or, en Francais "Merd*"
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 12:48 PM

Hi Mike,

I have taken this campaign apart and it has a number of disabled targets, about 80 or so. It's these which will cause problems because the game will try to use them anyway. It's not directly clear to me if any of the other targets were moved but I'd say that this is very likely the main culprit.
You can't simply remove targets, let alone 80, without paying the penalty.
The default**.MSN may look for any of these to set up the basic single missions and if one can't be found a CTD will be the result (see my previous reply).
There are many more consequences when targets are simply removed but without going to deep into the problems I think it's easiest if you'd remove the targets.dat from the campaign.
This will restore the game's original targets and put the missing one's back on. As I wrote before, if you want to keep the unused targets then at least a new set of Default**.MSN must be created, this allready seems necessary because the frontlines.dat was also changed so targets may no longer be on the right side of the frontline. Removing the frontline.dat is therefore another option and possibly required also.
Without these files you are basically playing a stock campaign but at least you should be able to fly in it, however the outcome of the campaign is influenced by the terrain elevations and may cause more AI to crash into the ground then normal.
It's taken me a long time to find out that the above problems are very common in most campaigns and there is no quick cure for it, it needs addaptation to the latest knowledge.
This means that the 80 unused targets must be put back, a complete set of Default**.MSN files must be created and worst of all, ALL campaign files must be addapted to suit these or new frontlines and target placements.
Without this you'll be left with nothing more but a graphical addaptation of the stock game, but at least it should work. Still playing it might still be fun.
Before you do any deleting though, I might be tempted to create a set of Default**.msn files which might allow you to use the campaign as is but only in single and quick mission mode. The way things are now playing a full carreer is simply out of the question.
Once the basic single mission targets and bases are right, the game won't allow you to select the unused targets/airfields so you can then select from those which are still visible on the map.
This is the easiest solution for now but a lot more work is needed to turn it into a fully working campaign, which may possibly take a year or more.

VonBeerhofen
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 04:08 PM

Hi,

After reading all the posts above ....I came with a hurting question....
Provided ...the players with problems made a good install ...and playing the campaign for a first time ...run in big problems (CTD ...etc)and not able to correct them quickly...the evident question is :
How the creator(s) don't seen any problems when they tested the campaign..?
Testing is not dependent of any knowledges .. so it's by itself a easy task.
Or maybe they don't test it ..... ?
If it's true ...that's a shocking discovery.

OFF
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 04:24 PM

Hi Chief,

they tested it allright but it wasn't known that the Default**.MSN might accidentally point to a valid target/base in their campaign but that on other machines these files might point to something which isn't allowed. These files get updated all the time and are campaign specific.
They also didn't know that disabling targets could cause problems. I discovered this only recently and adviced to add these files when targets are moved with Mr. Jelly's target editor.
The problem may not surface for a long time as long as the game doesn't select any of the unused targets, and you might be playing for months without problems. For this reason I asked Mr. Jelly to include savedata folders in OAW so any changes the game will make to these files will be stored and can be loaded when switching campaigns.
Testing becomes almost impossible due to all the different hardware and machines too and we can only test what works on our own machines and try to use what we've learned about other machines.
Sadly not many keep up with new knowledge or perhaps they don't understand what it means or what consequences it may have.
Perhaps by now people believe that what I discover are all lies and is meant to descredit their work, who knows.

VBH
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 05:22 PM

The last few posts make some interesting reading. I wasn't able to do any experiments last night. A 12 hour day at work then an early morning was just too much to handle. I guess that the mission files are different for each side (duh), so the Poles work, their targets are inside of Germany which was recognized in the original EAW. The German missions take place outside of the basic maps, are over redrawn territory which makes things stupid? Well, I'm going to tinker about with it and see what may come. Thanks for all.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 06:07 PM

Hi Mike,

it appears that all British airfields and targets were set to unused and I came to the same conclusion as you have. The first mission I tried immeditately set me behind the wall and I crashed into what looks like the most surrealistic environment I've ever seen. Well I allready saw it before but this was really a short one.
Another problem seems to be that not all planes in the selectionscreens are available but it's not entirely clear to me how grave this mistake is. For one it doesn't allow me to create a Default**.msn for this slot.
Still the addon did run first time off and without changes. So what you need to do for each slot is first select a valid base and a valid target. This will create a proper Default**.MSN for that slot and once you've done this for all slots there shouldn't be anymore problems.
BTW, I moved my own alternative campaignfiles into seperate folders and gave em stock filenames (as suggested by Ralf). This allows me to select any combination of these alternatives from any of the 3 folders named:
AlternativesDefault
AlternativesORI
AlternativesGR
where each folder contains
CAMPGR40.DAT
CAMPUK40.DAT
PLANES.DAT
This allows me to overwrite the files at will manually, without needing a filemannager.

VonBeerhofen

P.S. there is no restriction for using ECA after having created all proper Default**.MSN files
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 06:42 PM

Hi,

while playing around, switching from plane to plane in the single mission mode and back to the career mode i also suffer a CTD.

Thats the most strange CTD i did encounter for now.

This is what i do to cause the CTD:

1. I start EAW
2. I go to the singlemission mode and choose one of the german planes.
3. I start the mission.
4. I end the mission.
5. I go to the EAW start screen and click to "career".
6. CTD.
7. I restart EAW.
8. I click to career again.
9. I can start a new career(no CTD)
This i can repeat again and again and it dont matter which of the german planes i choose to fly in the single mission, afterward the game CTD if i wanna join the "career" section, so i also cant play a polish campaign. But after a EAW reststart all work like it should, as long as i dont fly a single mission before to join the "career" section.

I can do the same with the polish planes, without CTD!!

Thats very very strange i must say, though this isnt the same kind of CTD that you suffer.

btw. i did test Poland with ECA1.4 and it dont cause your CTD.

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: Weird_Crapolla

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 08:10 PM

Hi,

Aaaahh... well.. it will be so interesting to have here few comments of the original creator (Andy) and the author of the patched version (Knug)
My crystal ball ..tell me they must be in the vicinity ...but maybe shy to drop in......

OFF
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 08:19 PM

Yeah, I've had no problems with Andy's other stuff. I've got his BoB on my hard drive now.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/10/07 11:05 PM

Hi Mike,

I don't think BoB is really a changed campaign with moved targets or frontlines. That's what makes an enormous difference and why new continents are so much harder to create. There may be a large gap inbetween the two also in which new discoveries were made. New discoveries appear almost on a monthly basis.

VBH
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/11/07 01:52 AM

I think the changes, and, improvements to EAW are the reason I prefer it to the other flight sims I have bought then put on the shelf never to be run again. Also, BoB is the subject that caught my eye with EAW in the first place. I've got most of the BoB mods available.



from "MEN OF THE RAF", Portraits by Sir William Rothenstein, Ofxord University Press, London 1942. My dad found this little gem for me when I was about 10, he new I was keenly interested in the Battle of Britain.
Posted by: Knegel

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/11/07 02:25 AM

Hi Mike,

on my side the "NTNPICGR.WSP" cause the trouble, could you please remove this file from your poland1939, maybe its the same reason for you.

Greetings,

Knegel
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/11/07 04:47 AM

For Com Greg Keene and Knegel, moving the NTNPICGR.WSP file out of the EAW directory gives me a German campaign. I've also put the Savedata folder into the mix too. I'm not sure what the default missions do, except maybe they are for individual missions.

The first misson in a BF 109-d spot was a bit weird, it was an intercept against a group of B17s listed as Invalids. I shot one down too. I've also noticed several Polish units are based at Manston etc. Well we can't have it all, can we? Anyway I'll fly it a bit and see what else happens. Danke, merci, and thank you all. Mike Out.
Posted by: VonBeerhofen

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/11/07 12:16 PM

Hi Mike,

The Default**.MSN setup the single mission of each slot and is used to store you parameterscreen selection so next time you fly that slot you will get the same parameters, amongst other things.
Since it holds the current airbase and target, as well as support groups and a few other things you may understand that when the parameterscreen would point to off the map targets or airfields, or unavailable planeslots for the set year, the game will crash.
The crash is not consistent, it can happen at startup but sometimes happens when you tick a particular planeselection side or in this selection when you pick a particular plane.
With all British bases/targets out of commision the default files will try to select a hardcoded British target when you fly Axis and try to set an Allied airfield when flying for the Allies.
Obviously none will be found, hence problems.
The removal of the NTNPICGR.WSP from the install will result in it's CDF version taking over. It's just an emblem picture and has no influence on campaigns.
With unedited campaignfiles the CTD and/or mission will be random and since 1/2 of the bases/targets are missing there's also 1/2 a chance for a CTD or some other weird behaviour. The behaviour will depend on how the campaign engine is programmed. So the removal of this file is no proof whatsoever that it influences the campaign. Proof is only when with multiple tries the same thing happens over and over and again.
You could remove 10 different .WSP's and with each start of the campaign suffer the same or a different weird problem. This only proofs that the campaign is trying to set something up which isn't valid and not because of a removed .WSP.
Understanding what a .WSP does and how it works is the only clue to it's nature and I can guarantee you with 100% certainty that this file has no influence whatsoever on plane or target selection, mission or anyother parameter linked with campaigns and or missions.
The campaign files sets target/airfield/plane priorities and when it has the values of erased British airfields or targets still in them then there will be trouble, just as much as when the single missions set impossible targets/airbases or planes.
The only cure is to redirect the campaignfiles to use targets/airfields which are available, simmilar as the Default**.MSN do for the single missions.
I hate to say this but hardly any campaign is a truely worked out one and I've never seen one which really worked. It's simply impossible since there is hardly any knowledge on how to edit them and as to how the parameters work and/or interact with other files.
On top of that, no one knew how to create all 30 frontlines or what their effect was on campaigns or single missions, so almost every camapign uses the default lines which were only put into a different order. This explains why some of them show enemy targets/airfield in the middle of friendly territory. When you understand that each target has a side designation and year of appearance you may also understand that when frontlines are randomly reordered and targets are moved within the playing field these designations no longer are correct.
New campaigns are simply a hoax in a way, not an intentional one but one caused by lack of editing knowledge. Only campaigns which don't change the data can be fully functional, one of the reasons that campaignmakers didn't move targets or frontlines but simply put a new terrain underneath which more or less reflected the theatre. Add a few new skins, a few specific objects, twiddle a bit with frontlines and it looks realistic enough to be believed and it might even work too. This goes without a doubt for every campaign and the best ones are the ones which can use all 308 targets without moving them or tampering with default frontlines, since these are the ones which really work still. Ofcourse they still work, they're nothing more but a stock campaign with a few new planes, a bit of changed mission text, pilotnames, and new tileset and map. Add to this a few new targetnames and the illusion is perfect.
Sorry for shattering everyone's dreams, but it's the sad truth. We, and not even I, know how to truely edit campaigns so they will work and I challenge every one to say inhere that he or she does have full control and knows what he or she is doing and what the outcome will be.
Do you think that any one would notice the difference between moved targets/airfields/frontlines and an unchanged campaign which only selects a squadron at a certain base, selecting certain targets for you? If you move them doesn't that effectively influence the campaign and have you heard of anyone checking the campaign missions against reality, besides me?
Moving them however has ill side effects and cause the campaign files to no longer understand, basically rewriting the campaign would mean you would hardly have to move targets/frontlines/airfields at all, you'd simply change their role in the campaign files and you effectively accomplish the same thing as when you move all the other stuff around, but the big difference is that the last option would really work and the way we have to do it now doesn't.
Still slow progress is being made and who cares anyway if the illusion gives you hundreds of hours of fun? We now can draw realistic frontlines, move targets at will, change the .MSN files and we even got a few campaigns working online too, and that's what may eventually lead to more understanding and truely working and realistic campaigns.
Untill then you'll have to fly single missions, as those at least are fully understood. Or better yet, come fly with us online and each mission you fly will be a totally new experience, \:\)

VonBeerhofen
Posted by: Pobs

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/12/07 09:37 AM

Mike,

In SAW we rebuilt the world from scratch and that included the campaign files which work pretty well, but as VB says the campaign system is still a pretty black art in EAW. I am still flying Andy's Poland and that works fine, so it would appear the problems developed in Knug's version... so if you want to fly Poland perhaps you should just use Andy's version for now ?...


cheers,



Pobs
Posted by: Baron Von Martin

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/13/07 12:26 PM

Hello,

I have had no troubles with the original Poland for EAW.

I tried Knug's Russian Winter Air War and got immediate ctd's.

Apparently Shreckie had a fix, I seeme to recall he e-mailed me the fix, but it did not work.

Knug??? What's up with your add ons?

S!
Posted by: iron mike

Re: CTD Poland 39 - 07/13/07 05:24 PM

BvM, Pobs, I've got anomalous things going on in Poland v1.3, I think that your suggestions about v1.2 are good advice. I can get it to run now but airfields and missions are wierd. Same thing about Kungs Russia stuff too.
Hey Pobs, the I-15s are a royal pain in a monoplane. I've better luck with the Fiat, but don't get many easy kills. With only two little mgs it doesn't do much damage, I'm not a "sure shot shooting...".