Missing texture crash?

[hungry]

I'm getting a CTD when I try to enter a battle to capture Ancyra, a rebel settlement in Turkey. I get the message:

Generic Error:
Failed to find texture 'data/RTR/models_unit/textures/gaul_peltast_longshield.psd'.

The extension is definitely .psd. I double-checked.

In Ancyra, among others there is a Skirmisher Warband unit that oddly has the picture of a vanilla peasant unit. The unit description says it is supposed to have a shield with a defense rating of 6 but the dudes are only carrying knives and wearing cloth. That unit seems to be responsible for the crash. I'm not certain about that though, as I've fought a few units like that Skirmisher Warband in other battles.

I'm playing as the Macedonians and its Winter 272 BC.

I don't want to auto-resolve the battle.

Hopefully there is a simple fix and the Skirmisher Warband unit will look better ...

[florin80]

You`re not playing vanilla RTRPE, are you? there is no skirmisher warband in the two rebel armies in Galatia if that is what you are referring to. There are only aor galatian slingers along with other aor galatian and gallic units.

[hungry]

You`re not playing vanilla RTRPE, are you?

No, version 1.9. I have the RTW Gold Edition with RTW and BI on separate CDs. I installed RTW, then BI, then patch v1.6. Then I played the game for a couple of years accumulating saved games, replays, and custom battle setups. Then I installed RTR Platinum v1.9 (the 222 MB version, not the mod switch version, and no optional add-ons). I hadn't installed any mods previously and so I assumed that is equivalent to having a "fresh install". I think that the campaign_map_reset.bat file ran without any problems. I played a couple of campaigns without any problems until the Carthaginian quadrireme-dockyard crash. That was solved by installing the RTR PE CTD fix found in this forum.

there is no skirmisher warband in the two rebel armies in Galatia if that is what you are referring to. There are only aor galatian slingers along with other aor galatian and gallic units.

Right. That's true when I start a new campaign. Ancyra has 8 units and a nearby rebel army has 7 units. I don't know what the armies are composed of, but I assume you're correct.

In the attachment, you can see the Skirmisher Warband unit. Perhaps the slave faction trained the unit or it moved in sometime after 280 BC? Perhaps it's related to the CTD fix which somehow accounted for the missing peasants?

I find it odd that there are only .dds, .tga, and .sct, but no .psd files in the directory named.

I have some other ideas but I don't want to confuse the issue further ...

[florin80]

I see. Imo it`s likely that the CTD fix is too blame. In the vanilla rtrpe files that I`ve checked there was no skirmisher warband there at the start. And the only skirmisher warband unit is the one of the faction gaul. Which explains why you get the peasant icon(that`s a placeholder card the game uses every time the right card is missing for a certain faction). And also why you get the crash. The dmb entry of this unit only has sprites and texture for the gaul faction. The unit gets recruited by the slaves and when you load the battle the engine can`t find the slave faction tag it needs in DMB for the texture and so generates that confusing message. I`ll tell Salvor to take a look to what he changed with the fix and see how it can be solved.

[Salvor Hardin]

This is really strange, as the slave faction should not be able to recruit this unit: the EDB file only allows this unit to be recruited by the gaul faction. It looks as if the game is cheating :hmmm:

[Salvor Hardin]

For the moment, I have updated and uploaded a new CTD fix version, in the proper thread.

[hungry]

... And the only skirmisher warband unit is the one of the faction gaul. Which explains why you get the peasant icon(that`s a placeholder card the game uses every time the right card is missing for a certain faction). And also why you get the crash. The dmb entry of this unit only has sprites and texture for the gaul faction. The unit gets recruited by the slaves and when you load the battle the engine can`t find the slave faction tag it needs in DMB for the texture and so generates that confusing message ...

For the moment, I have updated and uploaded a new CTD fix version, in the proper thread.

I installed the new CTD fix and it worked. Besides capturing Ancyra, I went through a full turn and everything is working.

FWIW, I still got the peasant-skirmisher warband card prior to the battle. I forgot to check the skirmisher warband card in battle, but its sprite and behavior was correct. Perhaps if the slave faction trains a new skirmisher warband, the better card will appear. The better card does appear for the gaul faction.

Some other perhaps trivial stuff:
* The peasant-skirmisher warband card lists the unit at normal costs rather than dirt cheap like other slave units. Recruiting these peasant-skirmisher warband units may weaken the slave faction.
* There was a Gallic Auxilia Phase II building in Ancyra. There was also a barbarian Warrior's Hold (which supposedly allowed the training of Illyrian Mercernaries) and a Sacred Groove of Epona.
* I'm fairly certain that I fought a peasant-skirmisher warband unit when capturing the nearby rebel settlement of Nicomedia. I recall the peasant-skirmisher warband unit killing some of my pezhetairoi with its javelins and my cretan archers unit killing the skirmisher. This was at least a couple of turns prior to the Ancyra battle. Strange.

[hungry]

Thinking back, the biggest mistake I may have made is using an older RTR Platinum 1.9 savegame. When I started playing, I checked out the Macedonians and saved the beginnings of the first turn. Perhaps I later loaded that savegame (rather than starting a new campaign) and forgot that the savegame was prior to the CTD fix and prior to my switching to the BI engine.