[NIGHTLY 12 Feb] Bug crashes Angband on opening

[bdgamer]

Was trying out the newest nightly build out of curiosity, and it loaded fine on the first attempt, but each subsequent attempt returns the error:

"Parse error in monster line 10406 column 2"

[Nick]

OK, this looks like it's a problem with the new randart storage system.

The way it now works is to write an 'artifact.txt' file into your user directory, and load from that. Check if you have one of those, an if so, if there's an entry for 'Grond' in it.

Are you playing with randarts?

[bdgamer]

I was attempting to play with the randarts, yes.

So I looked into the user dir for artifact.txt, it was there, but it was completely empty.

I deleted it, and doing so caused the error message to disappear... But, am not sure that any artifacts are actually loaded without the file, based on some of your previous posts.

[bdgamer]

I started a new game, with random artifacts again chosen, and it had the same result. Same error, and same empty artifact.txt in /user.

[Nick]

OK, this is not something I've experienced, I'll have to do more testing.

Which operating system are you playing on, and where are you running Angband from?

[bdgamer]

I am running Windows 10 64-bit, and I ran into that issue with the program running off of a folder on the desktop, as well as in a folder on the C: root.

[Nick]

Thanks, I will test this when I have the chance.

The way I have implemented this seemed very neat and efficient at the time, but I may have made it too fragile.

[Nick]

All right, the problem is just really sloppy programming on my part. I will let you know when the it's is fixed.

[Nick]

New windows build is up, should fix the problem.

[bdgamer]

Nick, I downloaded the updated version, and attempted it, and the same bug still occurred. Blank artifact.txt was created again.

[bdgamer]

So, just to check, I reloaded the game with standarts, and it worked, both first time and logging back into it. I then tried randarts again, and it ran into the same thing.

[Nick]

So, just to check, I reloaded the game with standarts, and it worked, both first time and logging back into it. I then tried randarts again, and it ran into the same thing.

OK, I'll have another attempt today.

[Nick]

The latest nightly build works for me in Win 10 now - don't change over in the middle of playing a character, though.

[bdgamer]

Whatever you changed on the latest build definitely seemed to work. The artifact file generated like it is supposed to this time. I will have to play with the latest build some, and see how it feels.

[Nick]

There will be a further update to this system at some point, because it does have some wrinkles; I'll make it clear when new builds go up what needs to be done about randart files.