[EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities *FIXED*

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Hemlet
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[EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities *FIXED*

Post by Hemlet »

I posted this problem to the Steam forums as well just in case someone else runs into this, but between both of us Googling and trawling the Steam and Starwraith boards neither of us have found a solution or even another case.

The short version of the problem is that, for whatever reason, my friend cannot dock at cities because the game will not let him go below 56000 altitude. If he tries it's as if he were bumping into another ship and he just keeps "bouncing" away. As a result, he can't get close enough to the landing pad to trigger the dock.

-We have attempted this in both single and multiplayer

-This is occurring across all planets as far as we can tell (there hasn't been exhaustive testing, just the 3 odd planets he's attempted to land on)

-He has not altered any of the default settings beyond keybindings

-We have determined that 56000 altitude seems to be the consistent "limit" to how low he can go

Any insight would be appreciated, because we're both stumped.
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Vice
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Vice »

One way that could potentially happen is if your friend's system is having trouble keeping up with the resource demands of the current terrain detail setting (or whatever setting is being applied by a server they are playing on in multiplayer). If their system is failing to update planet terrain in time, the game will keep them away from it via altitude suspension until the update process finishes. This would indicate a system that may be too weak for the detail setting(s) being used.

First, check to make sure your friend's system meets the minimum requirements for the game so that it should at least be able to work at minimum detail settings. Next, monitor the framerate on your friend's system (hold the ~ tilde key and note the value in the top left corner of the screen). If that number is around 20-25 in open space, their system is likely struggling to render the game at the current detail settings they've selected and near planets, that number could drop to 5-10, making detail updates take a very long time. Changing detail settings in general should help the game run faster.

The next step I would suggest is having your friend try different terrain detail settings in single player. Have them change the value to 'Medium' first, then test for changes. If it still takes a while to update and allow for closer approaches, change it to 'Low' and test for changes. If this is the issue for your friend, one or the other setting will likely improve things a lot, possibly without any altitude suspending delay.

If you are playing with your friend on a private server via direct IP, or LAN, or you can otherwise change the terrain detail setting on a server they play on, doing so at a 'Low' or 'Medium' detail level may help accommodate his lower performing system better in multiplayer.

Another possibility is that your friend's system is running out of memory and the lack of a collision index for planet terrain is causing the altitude suspension instead. So checking the system summary screen in msinfo32 would be another step I would suggest. Note the value next to 'Available Physical Memory' and make sure it's well above 1.5 GB, especially if they are using non-minimum detail settings. When providing tech support, I occasionally help people who believe they have enough memory because they have 4 GB or so installed, but it's reduced down to only a few hundred MB available because of all the other residual programs they have running in the background using it up. So a low memory environment is another condition I would suggest looking into. The game can still function under some pretty remarkably bad memory conditions. But problems like that, along with invisible structures and CTD's, can occur if the memory just isn't there when the game needs it.

If your friend continues to encounter the problem, I'd be happy to review their configuration for other possible options/solutions. Simply have them complete the steps here (no need to include the save game, just the zipped msinfo report): http://www.starwraith.com/evochronlegacy/faq.htm#208
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Hemlet
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Hemlet »

I will pass that information along when I can get a hold of him again and we'll work our way through the steps you've suggested. I'll be sure to post an update on how things are going once the opportunity presents itself.

Thank you for the help Vice.
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Hemlet »

Update on the situation (TL;DR version)

-We set all of the settings to low and had him fly towards the planet. No go, still stuck at 56000 alt

-Checked frame rate throughout, we weren't 100% sure which of the three numbers in the top left you were referring to for FPS, so we noted all of them and none of them dipped below 29

-Set all of the settings as high as they would go for laughs, same result

-Available physical memory is well above 1.5 GB at ~5.4 GB

-All tests were done in singleplayer to get negate any possible interference from latency issues

So, still no idea what's going on and according to him he has sent an email with the msinfo report. We have determined, if nothing else, that for whatever reason the planets are not rendering.
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by matchbox2022 »

Bit of a long shot, but are you playing with your friend on a multiplayer server?

When I set my planetary detail to high, it isn't a problem on single player, but other servers will mandatorily either select high terrain or medium terrain values.

Whenever I had my SP settings set to high terrain (which increases elevation differences on planets by quite a bit) then hopped onto a MP server that is set to medium terrain, I suppose my profile would be high and the server would be medium...I believe this causes a mismatch and I get the exact problem you are discussing.

Sometimes it corrects itself in game, dying and restarting helped me...but also running my game in medium settings on SP, then exiting and going back onto the medium terrain MP server worked. It's definitely some kind of strange glitch thing..

Keep in mind I'm also running this on a laptop which barely keeps up as is so it could be a system thing too.
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Vice »

This problem is unrelated, something new I haven't encountered before and is universally happening to them in single player and multiplayer. We're in the process of troubleshooting the issue via e-mail. There are a couple of possible trouble areas with the system that I've sent some suggests to try.
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Hemlet »

Update and success! My friend has let me know that deleting the sw.cfg file from the sw3dg/EvochronLegacy folder (per Vice's suggestion) and updating his video drivers just to be sure has done the trick. Thanks for the help and suggestions everyone!
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Re: [EL] Friend Cannot Dock at Cities

Post by Vice »

Thanks for the follow up and confirmation that it worked.
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