Can't kick observer as host, game hangs (crashes) on start

[CaipirinhaPilot]

Hi,

this is a new issue where the game cannot kick observers (when I try by hand, it does not work), the game then hangs forever with the kick observers? dialog visible and crashes.
This has worked before, so it is a regression bug, anybody else struggling with this?

[MostLostNoob]

@caipirinhapilot First, I would suggest that if you're using Windows, then please go to FAF client > top left menu > Settings > Forged Alliance Forever > Use FAF Debugger when starting Forged Alliance > > click "Get the latest version of the debugger". This will create a more detailed log to assist with troubleshooting.

Second, please click the Reply button at the bottom between the (View) icon & the "Mark unread" button. Next, please go to client > top left menu > Show logs folder > logs > sort by Date Modified. From there, drag/drop your most recent game_2xxxxxxx.log file (or whichever was from the last game that crashed due to the observer issue) into the Reply message window so those that can help (not me) have that data to look at.

@Jip Do you know if this issue has been addressed yet?

[Jip]

I thought we fixed (other) issues with #6222, but perhaps there are more issues. @CaipirinhaPilot can you describe the lobby state when this happens? Perhaps with a screenshot?

@Nomander if you have time, can you look into it again?

[Sainse]

I confirm that I’ve encountered the same problem including last month. Will see if I can replicate&log it. That’s an ancient bug, though it had seemed to be fixed for a while for me.
@Jip just any common lobby, let’s say 8/8 and 1 observer. Observers disabled. Everybody pressed x, you (host) see pop up ‘kick observers to start the game’, press ‘yes’ and at this moment game just freezes without logging in or dying entirely. Meaning you see the game lobby with pop up ‘kick observers?’ indefinitely until you kill it by task manager.

[CaipirinhaPilot]

Ok, I will switch on the debugger, that should create more verbose logs. I read about the issue in a post, I did not even know if it was caused by kicking observers and so I tried to kick the observers before hosting the game and it worked with 2, but one of them, it did nothing, the kick function just came back with no result. Then when starting the game, exactly the effect and crash that @SainseRow described. So I let a friend host a game and he could neither kick certain players. I will check the lobby state, is there something specific that I should be looking for?

[CaipirinhaPilot]

Question: How much does having the debug logs on impact performance? I know from my IT experience that gigabytes and gigabytes of logs can be generated, depending on the verbosity level.
Can I leave the debugging on? I just run into a bug where the T2 stationary artillery will neither aim nor fire, won't even turn, totally bugged and the whole game being affected (several players)

[Nomander]

@Jip Since the manual obs kicking can break for random players as @CaipirinhaPilot pointed out (I also had it happen myself once) and that button goes straight to CLobby:EjectPeer it must be something wrong with the ICE adapter, LUA (lobbyComm.PeerDisconnected), or the engine, but I don't know how to debug that.

@CaipirinhaPilot I haven't noticed the debugger having a performance impact in real games. As for logs, I always play with the debugger and normal game logs are 200-300 KB while long games full of errors in the log are 500-1000 KB. The debugger only traces errors and provides info about what functions errored and what was passed into the functions. Along with that extra info, it can be useful since it can write errors that instantly crash the game that the normal logging doesn't write.

Can you provide the replay of the game where T2 arty doesn't work? Nevermind you posted it here: https://forum.faforever.com/topic/8003/bug-report-t2-stationary-arty-bugged-2-factions-aeon-and-uef-doesn-t-aim-nor-fire

[CaipirinhaPilot]

Ah ok, so these sizes of logs are totally manageable and not huge, I will keep the debugger on to capture logs.

[Rama]

I have this happen all the time when hosting. Would crash on launch when game tried to auto-kick observers. If I tried to manually kick observers before launching, but the observer wasn't removed when kicked, it meant game would crash if I launched.

My solution has been to enable observers, manually kick observers before launching, and if the observer is unkickable, launch the game and allow them to stay as observers. Game won't crash if observers are enabled.

[CaipirinhaPilot]

Another possibility is also to ask the observers to leave on their own before the game starts. So why did this bug come back? I personally never had this, ever and I was one of the original players that bought Forged Alliance back when it was brand new.
Can you guys also keep the debugging switched on so you can submit the logs? Where should we submit the collected logs?