Spawn, bounce around on the ground, explode

[Echo38]

Okay, first time with P-51D. I created a quick, simple mission (actually a copy of my "A-10C Free Flight" mission) consisting of absolutely nothing but a P-51D, ramp start, full fuel, full ammunition, no external stores. Well, I spawn and I'm looking around the cockpit at all the wonderful switches and levers, when my airplane bounces a little. And then again. And then I explode.

 

I spawn a second time; same thing happens. Huh. I wonder if I need to adjust its placement in the editor. So I fire up the editor, move it, then reassign it to the same parking slot. Fire up the mission. Same deal. This time, after one of the little bounces, I'm moving backwards. Then I explode again.

 

Any idea what's going on? I did a search of this forum for "exploding on ground" and "explode on tarmac" and other such things, but not a single relevant thread showed up. Has anyone else experienced this? What could be the cause? Is there a solution?

 

I should point out that my pedals spike a bit, maybe a quarter millimeter in each direction, so the pedals are always quivering a little in the virtual cockpit. This might be affecting the wheel-to-ground physics, but it still shouldn't make it move and certainly not explode. Might be the problem, though, what with it being beta.

Edited September 16, 2012 by Echo38

[159th_Viper]

Need the mission file please.

[Echo38]

Attached. Would a track also help? Since I recorded it on max-realism/difficulty, I can't see what happens after my pilot is killed, but it might be useful anyway.

P-51D Free Flight.miz

[Echo38]

After uploading that mission, I moved the P-51 to parking slot 18, and now I can't even spawn. I don't know if the pilot is being killed the moment I spawn, or what. It never shows anything but the F10 map view.

 

Meanwhile, in a separate mission I made for multiplayer, I'm able to spawn the P-51 just fine, at a different airfield, and sat in the cockpit for a good half hour with no issues.

 

"Curiouser and curiouser!" exclaimed Alice.

[Krebs20]

What happened echo? Couldn't wait for beta to be over? I thought that was the plan?

[Echo38]

Someone gifted her to me! : D

(Three guesses what I call her. The airplane, I mean.)

Edited September 16, 2012 by Echo38

[Krebs20]

North American P-51D Mustang

 

But with all that money you saved, you should buy me a copy.

Edited September 16, 2012 by Krebs20

[WildBillKelsoe]

just tried it, nothing. I didn't explode on unpause, if that is what you mean.

[Echo38]

No, it doesn't happen immediately. If you sit in your cockpit for ten minutes, you should suffer a death at some point.

[Echo38]

I've now experienced this issue several dozen times, and I'm pretty sure it's a problem of collision detection. Has anyone been able to reproduce? Some airfields don't have the problem--it's never happened to me at Soganlug.

[Pyroflash]

Does the aircraft explode, or do you simply die? If the latter is true, there could be bigger problems than just collision. Does it happen the same way every time? (i.e. sometimes you explode, whereas sometimes certain parts break off)

[Echo38]

Does the aircraft explode, or do you simply die?

 

Hmm. Because of my locked track problem, I cannot tell whether my pilot simply died or the aircraft exploded. I simply return to the map screen and am unable to do anything until I spawn again, at which point I see a burning wreck somewhere on the airfield, which was my old airplane.

 

Does it happen the same way every time? (i.e. sometimes you explode, whereas sometimes certain parts break off)

 

The exact experience varies a bit, but never parts breaking off. It appears to be tied partly to which airfield, and partly to which parking spot. As noted earlier in the thread, at a certain parking spot, spawning causes instant death every time--I never see the cockpit. Other parking spots at the same airfield differ: for example, in one particular parking spot, sometimes I die with no warning after sitting on the ground for a few minutes. Other times at that same spot, I first bounce a little (with engine off) and sometimes start moving backward slowly, with the death usually coming soon after.

 

Did you give my mission a try? If you open it up in the editor and change the parking spot to 18, that should do it immediately upon spawning. If you leave the spot where it was when you download the mission, you're at one of the spots where the explosion usually happens a few minutes after spawning (if you don't start your engine). I should stress that in each case, the engine has been off, and in most cases, no changes were made in the cockpit (e.g. in most of the cases, I was just looking around the cockpit, trying to figure out where all of the controls were, and reading the labels).

 

Lately, I don't suffer these explosions often, but that's only because I'm not spending much time on the ground with my engine off, and because I've been spending most of my time at Soganlug (at which I've never had the problem), and also because I've been getting in the air as quickly as possible because I have constant crash-to-desktop when in a P-51 on the ground (engine on or off). The latter CTD problem is a separate issue which I've documented, but haven't yet reported because I'm uncertain where to put the reports.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Echo38

[Pyroflash]

Yeah, I can confirm that this is happening and 100% reproducible as you describe.

[Pyroflash]

Found the problem. It isn't parking spot related. The issue is the dynamic weather system is creating anomalies which are literally crashing your aircraft. Well, I guess it is kind of parking spot related. Different weather conditions at different spots lead to different results. In any case though, I am pretty sure that this isn't supposed to be happening.

Edited September 18, 2012 by Pyroflash

[Echo38]

Wow! I never would have thought of that. How did you figure that out?

 

Question: since the weather is dynamic, shouldn't these buggy wind spots be moving (and fairly quickly), rather than staying in one place like this?

[Pyroflash]

Wow! I never would have thought of that. How did you figure that out?

 

Question: since the weather is dynamic, shouldn't these buggy wind spots be moving (and fairly quickly), rather than staying in one place like this?

 

They are, but remember that the system isn't truly dynamic. It is given a seed number which propagates the weather conditions for the system, but for any given mission the weather will progress in the same manner.

 

I figured that it had to be something out of the ordinary, and the first thing I unchecked was random failures. When I kept exploding I checked triggers next, nope. From there it was an easy guess that it was the weather, barring any chance that the airfields or aircraft are bugged. Though a few other things did enter my mind such as some AI unit, but since there were none in the unit list, well, I guess not.

 

I hope I was at least of some assistance. Your best bet I guess is to turn dynamic weather off until we can get a dev/tester response.

[Echo38]

They are, but remember that the system isn't truly dynamic. It is given a seed number which propagates the weather conditions for the system, but for any given mission the weather will progress in the same manner.

In the case of parking spot 18, I tried spawning there several times during a single mission, and each time I was killed immediately. So it's as though this mini-tornado thing was just hovering there over that spot, which seems odd for a moving airmass.

[Pyroflash]

Yeah, I will agree with you there, but disable dynamic weather in your mission and watch it stop happening. Just because I can't explain how space whales exist, doesn't mean that they don't.

 

At any rate, I am sure that the testers will sort it all out.

 

(Space whales and all) ;)

[Echo38]

Oh, I wasn't doubting you; I was just puzzling over how the weather system works. (Heh! Your space whales comment reminds me of Newton's line about gravity.)