Deadly custom particles bug

HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
in Mapping Forum
<div class="IPBDescription">Errr.... help?</div>I hate it when clips on MTV have water sounds as samples, they make me go potty.

Anyway...

I was mapping away again today on ns_settlement when I added an env_custom_particles entity. And not wanting to risk having my PC crash and die again, I read <a href="http://www.chromeangel.fsnet.co.uk/NS/Guide/ABerzerkersGuideToMappingForNaturalSelection.htm#Appendix%20One%20-%20Env_Custom_Particles" target="_blank">ChromeAngel's Mapping Guide</a> on custom particles. So I set up my entity by the book and still I got this weeeeiiird error message dialog box thingy telling me to e-mail the bug to the NS team. Which I couldn't because my system completely hooks up when the error occurs. And I have to reboot, luckily I ran scandisk too because it found 2 errors on my Harddrive(s).

Anyway, this is the error, I wrote it down before rebooting:

<!--c1--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td><b>Code Sample</b> </td></tr><tr><td id="CODE"><!--ec1-->The system has failed an assertion:
Assert: "theTemplate" @
c:\projects\strathl\mod\avhparticlesystementity.cpp: 162
ASSERT TEST VERSION 1.0
stack symbol information only available when linked with COFF debug symbols.
Dumping hex trace instead: *load of HEX crap that wasn't to read because my system was locked and I couldn't scroll down*<!--c2--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--ec2-->

The odd thing about this I think is the path in this error. Where the hell does it lead to? It's sure not on my pc, all that's on my C drive is Winblo... eh -dows. What kind of sick version of NSTR do I have???

<!--emo&:p--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':p'><!--endemo-->
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Comments

  • FlayraFlayra Game Director, Unknown Worlds Entertainment San Francisco Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 3Super Administrators, NS2 Developer, Subnautica Developer
    Well, I don't think there's anything wrong with your version of the NSTR.  The path that you see in that error message refers to code on my PC, nothing on your machine.

    I've never heard an error like that reported.  I'm pretty sure you just have a bad number or something in your entity.  Double-check all your values and try again.
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  • HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
    Still I think it's odd. Because whenever I enter a wrong number in any other, standard HL entity for example, the entity simply doesn't work and it doesn't crash and kill my PC.

    <!--emo&???--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt='???'><!--endemo-->
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  • Relic25Relic25 Pixel Punk Join Date: 2002-01-24 Member: 39Members, Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Contributor
    For some reason, I woke up this morning thinking about this problem. :/

    Anyway, I remember getting an assertion error with a particle system, and the cause was an absolute path in the "Particle sprite" field.  When I clicked "browse", located an clicked on a sprite name, the entire path appeared in the field (ie: C:\sierra\half-life\nstr\sprites\spritename.spr).  I assume that since HL already knows to use the mod folder for the root of the path, it was essentially adding the above path to the root, and not finding the sprite.  Simply deleting everything in the path up to "sprites" did the trick.  The field should only show, for example, "sprites/spritename.spr".

    I can't say for sure if this is what's causing it for you or not, but I thought I'd throw it out anyway, just in case.
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  • HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
    Nope, I've been mapping HL for 4 years (not very productively though) and I know how to fill it in. And I double checked on sprites/somespritename.spr

    So that's not the right solution.
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  • MoleculorMoleculor Namer-of-Bob Join Date: 2002-01-24 Member: 9Members
    I -believe- (and this is only going off of that error message, and what I've learned in the past few weeks in my CS courses.. I don't have access to Flayra's code, or head.) that what the assert-fail thing is, is where Flayra tried coding an assert function much like the new Java 1.4 will have, where it basically lets you stick stuff saying assert(<some function that should always be true); and if you ever run it and it isn't true, you know that there's a problem with whatever variables are going into that function, and can track down the problem.

    Or am I just wrong in this? (Not that being right helps any, but...)
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  • HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
    I'd be a grassy plant if I knew what that means.

    And i'm not.


    Anyway, i'll wait for NSTR2 to come out before adding ANY custom particles again. It's lethal! But, could it be that quick compiling is a bad idea? Do I have to compile the map completely? (not that I abort halfway compiling, dunno if you WC people have quickcompile) <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo-->
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  • Relic25Relic25 Pixel Punk Join Date: 2002-01-24 Member: 39Members, Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Contributor
    Yes.  Well, it's easily possible to do a -fast VIS anyway, but  I know that doesn't have any affect at all on the particles, since I've done it before on a test map with 6 particle systems generating about 9000 particles, all in one square room.

    Can you post each involved entity as well as each entity's every setting/field/variable?  If we knew exactly how you had things set up, maybe we could figure out what the problem could be through the process of elimination.

    Btw, I'm not questioning your mapping experience at all.  Some of the settings and quirks of these new entities aren't always intuitive, so sometimes it's easy to miss something.  I know I have had to learn the NS entities by trial and error, and I've made plenty of mistakes along the way.
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  • FlayraFlayra Game Director, Unknown Worlds Entertainment San Francisco Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 3Super Administrators, NS2 Developer, Subnautica Developer
    Yeah, export your map and paste in the contents of that env_particles_custom, the error should be apparent to Relic or I.
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  • HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
    Eh, well now I have to admit that i've been mapping on and I deleted the env_particles_custom in the meantime. All I can say is that I used the settings as they were written down on <a href="http://www.chromeangel.fsnet.co.uk/NS/Guide/ABerzerkersGuideToMappingForNaturalSelection.htm#Appendix%20One%20-%20Env_Custom_Particles" target="_blank">ChromeAngel's Mapping Guidelines</a>.

    But I can add it again. Then just open the .map with a text editor? (Notepad, Textpad...)?
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  • MonsieurEvilMonsieurEvil Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 4Members, Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Contributor
    Notepad - wordpad can add invalid chracters if you're not careful, but notepad is too featureless to do that.
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  • AragornAragorn Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 98Members
    Featureless, indeed, that's right!  <!--emo&:D--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':D'><!--endemo-->
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  • HowlingHowling Join Date: 2002-01-26 Member: 97Members
    I'll use Textpad then - works the same as Notepad but has more functions and features than Wordpad. <!--emo&:p--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/tounge.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':p'><!--endemo-->
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  • MonsieurEvilMonsieurEvil Join Date: 2002-01-22 Member: 4Members, Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Contributor
    Hell yeah! Textpad is a great product. I also recommend <a href="http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-4003619-101-7326715.html?tag=st.dl.4003619-100-7326715-7326715.dln.4003619-110-7326715" target="_blank">editpad</a>
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  • JaciusJacius Join Date: 2002-01-25 Member: 43Members
    Hrmmmm. The only problems I've had with particle systems are A:

    -Bad sprite name
    -Bad velocity params
    -Bad # of animation frames

    If it isnt already, set the "Animation frams in sprite" to 1.

    I don't know if 0 would cause a problem, but it logically doesnt make sense, and if you say there are more frames than there are, HL will get a headache and die.

    And, likewise, make sure you're velocity params are 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0. Or something. That's sure to be a valid param <!--emo&:D--><img src="http://www.natural-selection.org/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':D'><!--endemo-->

    I hope that helps, because particles can be really fun and rewarding, if they dont crash your system :-(

    -Jacius
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