[v7.00 BUG] Fighters periodically freezing up during combat while in low attention - Fix in a future build.

[Koizuki]

I've been testing some different things in a new v7.00 game, and have noticed an issue that I don't recall having during v6.20 when I was playing my main save: Fighters appear to periodically freeze up during combat for no discernable reason, and stay "stuck" for a while before eventually resuming, but seemingly only when in low attention. I remember seeing someone talk about this a couple weeks ago for a somewhat unrelated topic, but they posted a video of fighters (Eclipses in his case) becoming "frozen" mid-combat. A response by Moderator BlackRain seemed to agree it was a bug, but thought it was supposed to have been fixed at some point, but I'm not sure if this is in reference to 7.10 or not, as I didn't see anything related to this in the changelog in the Beta forum (granted, I may have missed it because there are so many changes there.)

Either way, what I can say is that I am observaing that behavior in v7.00 public release on Steam, English, no Beta participation, no mods/vanilla, Wayward Scion gamestart.

I believe I have managed to get a save file that should reproduce the issue quite clearly; it is available here for a limited time; Google is starting to nag me about buying more space, so if it's deleted by the time the devs get to this, I can reupload it; Otherwise I'd appreciate a headsup if it's been downloaded so I can remove it earlier.

Reproduction steps:
The save file was created right after my player-set alert went off notifying me of a Xenon Capital entering Hatikvah's Choice I.
Upon loading the save, you should see that a Xenon K is approaching the highway area, where the HAT Defense Station has long since succumbed to the repeated onslaught.

Instead, I have a Raptor parked nearby, and the K should be just about entering into its range. The Raptor has 96 Fighters on board; 48 Takobas on Intercept (which shouldn't do anything here because the K is alone,) and 48 Chimeras on Bombard, which should soon launch and go after the K.
This should be in low attention mode, as the player character is currently in Segaris.

Observe, from map view, that the Chimeras will rush over to the K, fan out, then some of them will simply freeze up, while others continue to move around a bit. At some point the frozen ships will recover, but others might freeze up in the meantime.
Curiously, if you bring the battle into high attention at any point (whether via Livestream view, or teleporting over,) frozen ships will immediately recover and begin moving.

The same will occur with the Takobas as well, although to see that occur with this save, you may need to send the Raptor into the Tharka's Cascade gate so they have some S/M ships to intercept on the other side, or just wait for the Xenon to send more S/M ships out into Hatikvah's Choice.
I have also observed similar issues with the faction fleets when they fight each other, although at the time of this save, I don't believe there are any large-scale AI battles in progress.
The one thing I just realized I haven't tested as I'm typing this, is whether or not this also affects Position Defense squads.

If this has already been fixed in 7.10, then you can use the save to verify or something, and I'll just free up my Google drive.
If not, hopefully it is helpful to figuring out what is happening to these fighters.

[j.harshaw]

Confirmed. Fixed. Should be in a future update. Thanks for the report and the save.

[Koizuki]

Thanks for the confirmation, although I am assuming the "future update" refers to v7.20 or something? Because it looks like this issue is still prevalent in v7.10 that just released publicly today..
Getting higher-than-normal attrition losses for fighters while in OOS as a result of this, especially when an H shows up, forcing me to have to livestream every H encounter to ensure the gate defense fighters don't get blown up. This assumes I even get the custom alert in time, as I do spend a lot of time managing the empire in map view, causing all these alerts to get queued..

[j.harshaw]

Correct. I requested that the fix not be included in 7.10 because it was too late in the beta cycle for it to get the testing it needs to make sure that all cases were caught and that nothing seemingly unrelated is negatively affected.

[Koizuki]

Understood, thanks for the update; Hopefully 7.20 comes out soonish then, but in the meantime it looks like I'll have to just sit tight and continue babysitting the fighters for a while longer. Definitely can't continue my main save until then, as I have too many groups of defenders to watch in that game.

[user1679]

Confirmed. Fixed. Should be in a future update. Thanks for the report and the save.

Thanks for this.

Quick follow-up, is the fix only for combat or is it a general issue? I've seen a few times where a ship with "collect drops" order will stop for a while, despite there being drops that existed before the order was set.

[j.harshaw]

Case was specific to combat. If you're seeing a different issue, would be great if you could drop a report with a save before it happens and steps to reproduce the issue into a separate thread.

[Alan Phipps]

@ user1679: I would assume that you have checked for simple reasons why loot collection fails when there are still floating containers, such as for ammunition or cargo-wares when collection ship is already at respective full capacity or where illegal item collection is disallowed.

[user1679]

@ user1679: I would assume that you have checked for simple reasons why loot collection fails when there are still floating containers, such as for ammunition or cargo-wares when collection ship is already at respective full capacity or where illegal item collection is disallowed.

Yes. The loot was general crafting wares, the kind that goes into the pilot's pocket not the ship's hold. When I assigned the collection there were about 30 boxes and she collected about 12 then stopped. I waited a few minutes and then added a "fly and wait" command to the queue, moved it above the "collect" command and then cancelled it immediately when she started moving. She continued to collect the remaining boxes.

[Koizuki]

Is there any sort of update on a potential timeline when we can expect the fix for this bug to go live?
As of 7.10 Hotfix 3 right now, I don't believe I've seen any mention of this issue in any of the hotfix changelogs, and have been unable to play the game since my report, as the attrition this issue caused me was unacceptable personally.

I've been playing some other games in the meantime while waiting for this fix to arrive, but I was wondering if maybe it was already live and simply wasn't included in any patch notes or something, or if we're still waiting on this.

[Alan Phipps]

Hotfixes aren't usually public beta tested as they are intended for the specific and important few release version corrective issues reported in their changelogs and use internal dev testing. Fixes intended for the next versions should go to public testing and may evolve or even be replaced or withdrawn during the testing process.

[Koizuki]

Ah, all right; I understand the nature of hotfixes, but was mostly referencing how sometimes patch notes end up forgetting to list some changes that have happened (so-called 'stealth' patches of various game issues, essentially.)
That said, if the notes have been completely accurate, then it appears I still have no choice but to continue to wait, and hope that the next full patch arrives soon so I can play with my saves again.