[Dev Team] New multiplayer beta + gameplay fixes opt-in patch 1.7.2

[Jamor]

Hi all,

Here's the open discussion post for the new 1.7.2_beta opt-in patch that we just put out. The announcement and full details are in the pinned post:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...h-gameplay-fixes-1-7-2-checksum-a220.1026699/

Spoiler: Bradbury Beta 1.7.2 Changelog

- Fixed starvation having no effect on happiness and growth
- Fixed drain Sector resources function not working with <200 Influence
- Stopped AI from nonsensically terraforming its planets and wasting a ton of resources
- Fixed Xenophile Factions wrongly considering robots to be "alien slaves"
- Fixed pre-sentients wrongly counting as slaves for the Xenoist faction
- Fixed Governing Ethics Attraction having no effect
- Fixed Devouring Swarms being able to conduct diplomacy with Enclaves
- Fixed issue preventing you from attacking the Unbidden Portal despite destroying the Anchors first
- Fixed rare crash when a threat was added
- Fixed crash when starting terraforming
- Fixed crash in swarm AI fleet update
- Fixed crash in swarm AI when a planet was destroyed
- Fixed crash when starting the game with mods that disable a tech module
- Increased society research gained by consuming Pops as a Devouring Swarm
- Stopped an exploit against the Scourge with resettling Pops to occupied worlds
- Fixed sector AI automatically deleting Slave Processing Facilities if they had less than 5 slaves
- Fixed missing terraform option for cold barren planets
- Retaking a planet from the Scourge now properly stops purging of Pops
- Fixed terraforming of inhabited planets causing tile resources to be reshuffled, because Betharian is pretty rad, but shouldn't be able to teleport
- Fixed some missing localizations
- Fixed Android defense armies wrongly being able to embark and invade planets
- Subjects will now always accept being gifted planets by their overlord
- Fixed incorrect city images for primitive civilizations

Feel free to report any gameplay issues you have with it in this thread, while multiplayer related stuff should go in the existing thread:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...irst-to-try-our-new-multiplayer-tech.1022176/

We were very happy to be able to have this ready for you guys to enjoy over the weekend. Let us know how things go.

PS did I mention you get a free space shrimp?

 

[Krille]

yes . most mods also will work um running atm with 31 mods without any problems.
btw a changelog would be nice to see what is actually changed

There is a changelog in the sticky post here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...h-gameplay-fixes-1-7-2-checksum-a220.1026699/

You just have to click the spoiler button

 

[Gruntsatwork]

@Daywalker Jamors first link has a spoiler-tag in it with the changelog.

PS. Curses, foiled again.

 

[Jamor]

Added the changelog here as well for ease of use. Mainly we do a sticky, locked thread for "official announcement" purposes, then an open one for general discussion. Anyway, have at it here, this thread's for you.

 

[Jamor]

Good. Can I continue a 1.6.1 game in the 1.7.2 beta?

The answer is: "probably?". Basically any time we change the game code it does introduce the possibility of weirdness with older saves. Give the patch a try if you like, or you can hold off on opting in until you've finished a current game. We wanted to give people the option for both.

 

[Jamor]

Hi all,

Those of you reporting an increase in CPU load, etc: can you tell us if it's on older saves loaded in the new version? Does it persist if you start a new save in 1.7.2?

 

[Krille]

Hi all!

I have two questions in order to help us trouble shoot further. For those of you who notice a performance loss:

1. Did you notice this in 1.7.1 (bradbury_beta) as well?

2. Do you get a difference if you start the game without network access?

Thanks!

 

[Krille]

Bit confused. So 1.7.2 is a patched version of 1.6.1??

1.6.1 is the current version on the main branch.

1.7.1 was based on 1.6.1 and added a new multiplayer layer and some other features.

1.7.2 is 1.7.1 + the fixes outlined in the change log from yesterday.

I hope that made some sense

 

[Krille]

So will there be a 1.6.2 which builds on 1.6.1? Personally I'm not interested in multiplayer, but am interested in game fixes. As such should I stick to 1.6.x?

The changes that would have been a 1.6.2 are in 1.7.2 (which builds on 1.6.1). The plan is for 1.7.x to be the next release on the main branch.

 

[Krille]

The fixes are there in 1.7.2, they just put them alongside the multiplayer stuff because they probably don't want two betas at once.

Yes, avoiding multiple betas simultaneously is generally a good thing when possible

 

[Krille]

Thanks to everyone that has tested the beta and reported so far. It's very helpful and appreciated! Jamor and I will go through all the reports after the weekend.

Also just wanted to remind you that the more information you can supply the better. Most of you are already great at this, but hardware information and logs are always welcome!

If you don't want to attach logs in public you're always welcome to send a PM.

Thanks again!

 

[Krille]

Hi all,

In order to help us pin down the issue even further there's one thing you can help out with. This is a general tip which is great when trouble shooting these kind of issues and works particularly well when seeing issues with CPU usage. It will require you to be on Windows though.

There's a tool from Microsoft called Process Explorer which can be downloaded here: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/processexplorer.aspx

If you unpack and run the executable you'll see a stellaris.exe when you start the game. If you right click that and select Properties you'll get a number of tabs. The one you're interested in is called Threads (it might ask you to download another dll, you can ignore that).

Under the Threads tab you're going to see several parts of the game and the CPU usage of that part. If you see anything that is constantly high, please let me know. For example: if a thread with the start address pdx_mp.dll would constantly max the CPU we would know it's something in the MP layer. If it's Stellaris.exe it could be in the game code etc.

I realize that this is a bit technical, sorry about that

 

[GAGA Extrem]

So pops are exploiting the game at the expense of the player?
...sounds like Vicky 2 to me.

Anyway, I'd guess that the Stellaris team will be able to get to wörk on that once the long weekend is over.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

Completely different issue to anything CPU/core related.
(And also up in the bug forum, but I thought I'd put it here for visibility as well...)
Is anyone else getting the same issue as me here with fleet listings? The transparent background to the ship listings is at best inconvenient...

I have seen missing UI elements in V2, where it was related to memory issues (particualry with mods where the game would eventually exceed the 32 bit memory limit).
Could that be a thing in your case? If not, try verifying files (maybe after deleting the GFX and UI folders to be sure).

 

[Jamor]

Hi all,

We put out the beta for those willing to give it a try over the weekend, entirely optionally. We had the Swedish national day which extended our weekend a bit, so I appreciate your patience while I let my people get some rest and see their families. The objective was to gather good player data before the official release, and that has been achieved thanks to your help. The CPU load issue has indeed been traced to an updated version of an external .dll and we're working on fixing it now. We'll update the beta version with this fix as soon as we've confirmed it's good to go.

As always, our beta versions are experimental and we want to expose them to live conditions to reveal stuff like this. We didn't see it locally because it doesn't seem to have equal effects on all hardware, so thanks for giving us prompt info. We knew what was going on right away this morning thanks to your feedback.

Happy to hear that the gameplay fixes seem to be good so far. Finding the right time to put them out without interfering with studio level MP betas was a challenge, but the game is stronger for them, and we'll keep going. That's what Paradox does.

I'll update you all shortly.

 

[Jamor]

Hey all, as some have noticed we just updated the 1.7.2_beta version with some changes that should improve the CPU load thing. Please get back to us with your feedback on it.

 

[Jamor]

Is the update still version a220? I can't tell whether I got it.

Yes. Version number and checksum not changed, it's just a small .dll change. We'll monitor performance based on this and adjust as necessary.

If you check Steam Library -> Downloads, it'll give your update history and if you have one in the last hour, you have the update. If you don't have it yet, you can force update by right click on Stellaris in the library -> properties -> local files -> verify integrity of game files.

 

[Jamor]

Hi all. For those of you reporting camera/ship movement stuttering, can I ask you to let us know about your hardware? It's annoying difficult for us to reproduce here which makes me suspect it might be specific to certain rigs. Also, always worth updating your video drivers, etc. Please let us know so we have the best data with which to find a solution. Thanks.

 

[Jamor]

It still doesn't fix the fact that the game doesn't launch on my computer, only with this beta. When I click play on the launcher, the game just shut down.

The game wont start for me in 1.7.2 Was the same in 1.7.1. The launcher opens fine but when I press play it closes and nothing happens.

I have the exact same problem.

Small update. I've had sessions where I have not had major problems and played fine, although CPU usage is still high, especially on my third core (90%+ while other cores are <60%). However, I have encountered several nasty issues this weekend.

1. Crashes to desktop while the game was paused or running (error report sent) where all my monitors went black and then came back.

2. Crash moments after starting the launcher (error report sent) resulting in monitors going black again and coming back.

3. Launcher crash where the program was still running, but no longer visible, had to force stop it in task manager.

Same problem for me. 1.7.2. does start the launcher but not the game.

In regards to Stellaris no longer opening with 1.7.2(a220), here's the only logged stuff I could find:
exceptions.log

######## EXCEPTION: 0xC0000005 at address: 0x022663A0: ACCESS VIOLATION read attempt to address 0x00000014 Version: Unknown Version 06/05/17 18:17:37​

system log seems to be about the same as before, no other relevant logs written(some disabled mods missing utf-8 bom)

@Devs: Installed the new beta, with very bad results. The Stellaris loader starts, but not the game. Tried new installation of the complete game, with no better result. Beforehand Adamas 1.6.1 beta worked well. I have no Mods installed.

Hi all,

I don't want the above issues to be lost in the focus on graphical stuttering, which we are working on in parallel. Can I ask if you are still getting the issue with the latest version of 1.7.2_beta that we upped yesterday? Does it happen if you don't start via steam, but by stellaris.exe directly in the game directory? Can you run dxdiag and send me the results? I want everything I can to help find and debug this thing. Anyone else affected, same request. Thanks all.

 

[Jamor]

K all, we're back and collecting your reports. Gonna figure this out. Stand by.