Some MASSIVE issues with Patch 1.03

[DarkeWolf]

Hence the reason why I am making backups of all my game files, as I type this out :wink:

[SubGum]

Oh, does Awakening not come out until Friday? I thought it was coming out today, and I was thinking about going out to look for it.

[Thandal]

Add me to the list of those experiencing FREQUENT crashes (CtD) after installing patch 1.03, but had NO crashing under 1.02. (Although 1.03 has fixed the ever-increasing load-time problem, which was pretty bad!) On my rig the CtD seems to occur mostly at the very beginning of combat, or when an auto-save might be triggered.

 

I'll be going through the pain of rolling back to patch 1.02 (uninstall, reinstall, hope no DLC breaks!), and definitely won't be loading "Awakening" (even though I pre-ordered) until there's a fix.

 

Game Specs:

DLC, All available (Stone Prisoner, Wardens' Keep, Return to Ostagar, Blood Dragon Armor, etc.)

 

Mods (all from Nexus DA):

Equal Love (won't play without)

Polygamey (not currently loaded)

No_Helm

Practical Female Dalish Armor

 

System Specs:

Windows 7 x64 Premium

Intel Q6600 (2.4GHz, quad core)

8GB RAM

nVidia GT240, 1GB VRAM

 

Hope Bioware is working on a(nother) fix!

 

--Thandal

Death becomes her

[jolly2807]

Doesn't the patch 1.03 only override certain files?

 

If so, if someone were to host a copy of the files it overrides from 1.02 onto Nexus, as something like "Patch 1.02 Backup", then that way we don't have to completely re-install the game again.

 

Just an idea, because I'm sure when I did 1.03 it showed the physical files it updated, and there weren't many there I believe.

[Thandal]

Doesn't the patch 1.03 only override certain files?

 

If so, if someone were to host a copy of the files it overrides from 1.02 onto Nexus, as something like "Patch 1.02 Backup", then that way we don't have to completely re-install the game again.

 

Just an idea, because I'm sure when I did 1.03 it showed the physical files it updated, and there weren't many there I believe.

 

Great Idea! Too late for me to provide even the list of files from my original install, (never expected to need to roll-back. Shoulda' known better. <sigh>) And I don't plan to go all the way through to 1.03 with my re-install just to get it, but if someone has that info I think many of us would love to see it.

[SubGum]

I actually rolled my game back to v1.02 (be re-installing).

Funny thing is, the one bug I was having with v1.03 wasn't the patches fault, I'd just forgot to put my "Improved Environments" folder back into the override folder after backing up.

I didn't realize that until I'd already re-installed the game. :pinch:

 

So even though I have no problems with patching up to v1.03 since I haven't been having the bugs/conflicts most have, I still don't have Awakening and see no real urgent need to update.

If anyone knows what files you'd need for a quick and easy v1.02 rollback, let me know and I'll try to upload them.

[Thandal]

So, I spent about 90 mins this evening doing the roll-back (well, really the uninstall and complete re-install) to get back to ver 1.02. And of course I made a complete copy of my "\Users\username\Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age" folder before doing anything else!

 

The most interesting thing was having to re-download all the DLC. Once each of the four official packages were pulled down, (I did them concurrently) I then had to re-select each one individually to get them to extract and install. Scared me for a bit 'cuz I thought I'd have to wait on each of them to d/l all over again.

 

I selected "Save Games" and "Save Settings" when I did the uninstall, and afterwards I encountered no problem with any of the mods in my "...\packages\core\override" folder. Went back and checked various saves from multiple characters, and all seems well.

 

Now, if Bioware can just get 1.03b issued before my copy of Awakening arrives... <sigh>

[Thandal]

After several days of experimentation, here's what I can report about attempts to work around the patch 1.03 crashes (YMMV).

 

SysSpecs (for those inquiring minds who just gotta know):

PC (retail disc)

Win7 x64

Intel Core2Quad Q6600 2.4GHz

8GB RAM

nVidia GT240, 1GB VRAM

 

Mods:

All official DLC (What can I say? I'm a sucker for a story...)

Equal Love (won't play without)

Dialogue Tweaks (" ")

Polygamey (more fun that way)

Improved Atmosphere (" ")

Practical Female Dalish Armour

PineappleTree's Vibrant Colours

Lelianan & Morrigan Face Morphs

du_nohat (why cover those now prettier faces?)

and, (in the interests of full disclosure, and depending on my mood)

DAModder to play around with NB's AIO (whatever the latest version is, mostly selecting RL's "flavours")

 

Tried the following "fixes" with a variety of PCs (2 Rogues and a Mage) using a variety of saves from three different complete play-throughs plus, my current PC as an elven Warrior.;

 

[Minor Spoiler Alert]

 

1. A full un-install/re-install, then patch directly to 1.03 did *NOT* solve Crash to Desktop (CtD) problem.

First instance occurred (for me) in fight with Marjolaine. Not sure what her weird "stun all the time" spell is, but casts an orange aura and when I had Lelianan toss a shock bomb into the fray... Well it was a real bomb for the program! Next CtD was during once of the "not-so-random-journey battles" on the streets of Denerim as I headed back from the Pearl to the Market District.

 

[/Minor Spoiler Alert]

 

2. Still couldn't get Pickpocketing to work, even with the "Steal_Dog_CD" fix (I think Jallard provided that.)

 

3. Un-install/re-install, then patch to 1.02, (saving "Settings" and "Saved Games") worked fine. Played through the fight with Marjolaine, tested with several earlier saves and didn't have any problems except the ever-increasing load times for transitions.

 

3. Installed DirectX-9 runtime libraries as suggested elsewhere, then re-installed patch 1.03. CtD returned!

 

4. Rolling back to 1.02 as I post this via the complete copy of "C:\Program Files(x86)\Dragon Age" folder on a 2nd drive that I made before I performed the 1.03 patch update. This still takes about 15 minutes on my rig, but that's much better than doing the un-install/re-install!

 

Received my (pre-ordered from Amazon, arrived a week after release date, see if I do *that* again!) copy of DA:A. You can bet in won't get installed until either a) an official patch-for-the-patch is released, or b) someone can confirm that WinXP users aren't having the CtD (I'll live with the stealling) problem. I could be tempted to try loading then entire game in a VM and seeing if the problem(s) go away.

 

Not sure what all this really means, except what we already know: Patch 1.03 is, indeed, an epic fail!

 

--Thandal

Death becomes her

[DarkeWolf]

I dont know if this would be the same for everybody or not, but I skipped patch 1.03, and installed Awakening directly. Yes, Awakening also installs patch 1.03, but by installing them both at the same time, I havent noticed any issues which weren't already a part of my game Before installing it.

Other than I cant get some copies of some of my armors, which were glitched from giving me a new set each time I loaded. (that kinda sucks, I used to do this to equip my mages, now it doesnt work anymore, LOL).

 

Shorter load times? yeah, right. No noticible change.

[froggiemac69]

Since installing DAO:A, I've noticed that all cheats using zz_ do not work. Anybody else notice this? I first noticed it when I tried to add more money runscript zz_money...no workie..then runscript zz_createrunes....no workie.. I'm wondering if the codes changed. Also, the mod pocket plane no longer workers and console commands didn't work until the author just release version 2.5 Cool thing most probably is that the author of the modes can make the changes in their modes to get them to work in DAO:A, but the cheat codes with zz_ appear to be out the window!