What causes Prop Pox (and how to avoid it)

[FrankU]

Yes, that would indeed be very useful.

Also it would be nice to have a list of certain pox causes: files, props, lots, whatever.... Of course as far as they are found. I guess it will never be certain that we have found all causes of pox.

At least, as far as I understand this thread, there is no such list. Sorry if I overlooked something obvious...

[Diggis]

The reason no list is done is the only thing we have found so far that defininetly causes the Pox is the 2 props identified by Bap.  We know there must be more as the Pox is older than those props, but to date we have been unable to find any more.

As for a tutorial, sure, when I get home from Croatia next week I'll look into it.

[RippleJet]

I have just now arrived home after having a vacation in France...
and this was the first thing (and the only thing for tonight) that I had to check...

It works!    It works!    All the props have been restored to the Near West Side of Chicago!    And that's a lot of props.

Thanks for sending me the city file, Steve!
Unfortunately the city is not prop pox free though...

However, only three props appear after the point of corruption in the prop subfile.
These three props are all marked as "deleted" and have lost their TGI addresses.

Was this the state your city had immediately after "curing" it, or was it after playing for another 15 years?
If it was immediately after curing it, then I would appreciate if you could send me your latest version, so that I could see if the pox is contained or spreading.

The subfile has almost doubled in size to almost 31 MB, though - does anyone know why that happened?

Just as the case was with Shaun's testing, there are a huge number of props marked as disabled.
In your case you have 182,315 disabled prop records (out of a total of 358,732 prop records).

[z]

Thanks for sending me the city file, Steve!
Unfortunately the city is not prop pox free though...

Unfortunately, I just discovered this too - the hard way.  Although my city was pox free (at least in terms of visible symptoms) after 15 years, I ran it for an additional 25 years, and the pox started to come back.  It is now spreading rapidly. 

However, only three props appear after the point of corruption in the prop subfile.
These three props are all marked as "deleted" and have lost their TGI addresses.

Was this the state your city had immediately after "curing" it, or was it after playing for another 15 years?
If it was immediately after curing it, then I would appreciate if you could send me your latest version, so that I could see if the pox is contained or spreading.

The file I sent you was saved immediately after the fix was applied and appeared to work, but before I ran the city for 15 years.  With the information I've provided here, do you still want a more recent copy of the city?  If so, I can give you a copy after the 15 year period, or the current version 25 years after that, or both.

[RippleJet]

The file I sent you was saved immediately after the fix was applied and appeared to work, but before I ran the city for 15 years.  With the information I've provided here, do you still want a more recent copy of the city?  If so, I can give you a copy after the 15 year period, or the current version 25 years after that, or both.

Since you've already discovered the result the hard way, there isn't really anything for me to look at.

[sithlrd98]

You know, I have a wild question that pertains to both "Prop Pox" and Growing empty lots. Seeing that blank lots have been set for the most part with a Maxis building family , and the Prop pox deals with props that are referencing Maxis props...and the blank lots were released back in 2003 along with a lot of other "radical" mods, could there possibly be any connection between these or any other mod released around that time, or even the bldgprop.dats?

Since the empty growables grow almost everywhere and the prop pox does the opposite by removing almost everything , its would be interesting to know if those who are affected un-willingly know they have these in there folder.Its a stretch, I know...just wondering if there could be a connection?

Forgive me if some of this was already brought up...just thinking out loud!

Jayson

[RippleJet]

Nae, I can't really see a connection between landmarks growing on empty lots and the prop pox.

The landmarks growing on emtpy lots are building exemplars (having an invisible model or no model) erroneously belonging to an in-game family of growable buildings. Buildings and props are not saved in the same subfile in the savegame, and the prop pox only appears when the prop subfile becomes corrupted.

[sithlrd98]

Like I said...it was a stretch 

Jayson

[z]

It seems to me that we are really close to fixing this problem, so I don't want to give up yet.  I gather that Diggis' fix replaces the prop subfile with a completely clean version, so it seems to me that the only way the pox can come back is if the bad props still exist in the city.  Does this make sense?  If so, it should be possible to track them down and find them, which in itself would be an accomplishment.  Then, of course, removing them and reapplying Diggis' fix should get rid of the pox for good.  Any suggestions on how to proceed here would be welcome, and I am happy to do any testing required and ship off further files as necessary.  I have snapshots of my city at all stages, starting from before I applied Diggis' fix.

[RippleJet]

It seems to me that we are really close to fixing this problem, so I don't want to give up yet.  I gather that Diggis' fix replaces the prop subfile with a completely clean version, so it seems to me that the only way the pox can come back is if the bad props still exist in the city.  Does this make sense?

It certainly does, as Shaun once was free of the pox, but did get it back if he had the Beach Development Kit in his plugins.
The prop subfile in the city you sent me did not have any records with the Beach Umbrellas or Recliners though.

I think we need to get Shaun to take part in these discussions as well... once he's back from wherever he is...

[z]

It seems that there's a rather straightforward (if tiresome) way of identifying the bad prop(s), then.  I would just need to go through the following series of steps:

• Save the current city in a safe place.
• Bulldoze exactly half of the (remaining) city.
• Apply Shaun's fix to what's left.
• Reload the city, run it for a month and save it.
• Examine the prop subfile for corruption.
• If the pox is gone, restore the saved city and bulldoze the other half.
• Rinse and repeat.

For a large tile with 64K squares, this procedure would need to be done a maximum of eight times before just the bad prop was left.  All I need to know is how to examine the subfile.  I don't think this was mentioned in this thread, which is why I needed to send the city to Tage before.  So if someone can tell me this, I can follow this procedure and find the bad prop.  If there's more than one bad prop, it's a little messier, but not by much.  And I doubt that there's more than one, as all my other cities are fine.

[projectadam]

I am somewhat confused about the prop pox and I am sure this has been answered in the 17 pages but at 17 pages, material in between is hard to track down. One identified problem is PEG_OWW2_BDK_RESOURCE.DAT and I just wanted to make sure that is the exact file name. I have some of the OWW2 collection and am pretty for sure that I am up-to-date with the dependencies but could not find this anywhere on my system.

In addition, I do not know how many of you have been following my new city but all I have been placing so far is the road tiles. If I would happen to have this file, from reading everything I believe that these tiles already have the prop pox? I get confused at the part where it states that even if you do not use the lots, if you have the file in your plugins you will get the prop pox. I think I am missing something here though because if this were the case, what good would modifying the files do since your city would already have the prop pox?

Like I said, this has probably been addressed but after reading a couple of pages of this thread I could not find this addressed and I am also guessing that I am slightly confused on the matter and missing something that connects the dots.

Thanks for any clarification.

[RippleJet]

In addition, I do not know how many of you have been following my new city but all I have been placing so far is the road tiles. If I would happen to have this file, from reading everything I believe that these tiles already have the prop pox? I get confused at the part where it states that even if you do not use the lots, if you have the file in your plugins you will get the prop pox. I think I am missing something here though because if this were the case, what good would modifying the files do since your city would already have the prop pox?

It's pretty difficult to tell if any of those modified props have already appeared on any of the lots that might already have grown in your city. Since those props appear on several in-game low-stage R§§ lots, the risk is considerable that you already have them there though. That's the reason for the conclusion, that if you've had the BDK in your plugins, you most probably are at risk...

On the other hand, it seems as if the prop pox appears only if (at least) one of those lots having an offending prop would become deleted (mostly due to being upgraded to a higher stage lot) just at the right moment, when the prop subfile surpasses 16 MB in size.

If you've only built some roads in a newly started city, then that city probably is not affected though.

[projectadam]

It's pretty difficult to tell if any of those modified props have already appeared on any of the lots that might already have grown in your city. Since those props appear on several in-game low-stage R§§ lots, the risk is considerable that you already have them there though. That's the reason for the conclusion, that if you've had the BDK in your plugins, you most probably are at risk...

On the other hand, it seems as if the prop pox appears only if (at least) one of those lots having an offending prop would become deleted (mostly due to being upgraded to a higher stage lot) just at the right moment, when the prop subfile surpasses 16 MB in size.

If you've only built some roads in a newly started city, then that city probably is not affected though.

RippleJet,

You take such good care of me in SC4; I hope I meet you someday to treat you to lunch for all of the questions of mine you have answered

After your response, I am lead to believe that as long as the props never appear in your city you are okay, which since I have just placed roads I believe I am in the clear for at least now. I also wanted to just make sure that this is the file name that I need to be on the lookout for: PEG_OWW2_BDK_RESOURCE.DAT

Thanks for everyone checking this out and for continuing to answer my questions.

[z]

RippleJet,

You take such good care of me in SC4; I hope I meet you someday to treat you to lunch for all of the questions of mine you have answered

I think that RippleJet has done enough for all of us to be treated to free lunches for the rest of his life. 

But I do have a question, and it's one that I asked above, and seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle.  I'm all set to find the offending prop in my city, but the one thing I need to know is how to tell when my prop subfile is corrupted.  Could someone please tell me that?  Thanks!

[WC_EEND]

You'll need wou's savegame explorer off the LEX to check it, You'll need to open your city tile with it, and it will tell you whether it's infected or not

[RippleJet]

But I do have a question, and it's one that I asked above, and seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle.  I'm all set to find the offending prop in my city, but the one thing I need to know is how to tell when my prop subfile is corrupted.  Could someone please tell me that?  Thanks!

In addition to WC_EEND's reply I have also sent you a PM...

[SC4BOY]

This got me thinking, if we can rebuild the sub file we might be able to remove the Pox.  After a few failed attempts which left my cities still poxed I have found a technique that at first checks appears to remove the Pox and restore props to poxed lots.

1. Back up the poxed city
2. obliterate the city (using the mayor mode tool with the dynamite that removes the city, but not the terrain)
3. open the backup in the reader and delete the prop subfile
4. open the obliterated copy in the reader and copy the prop subfile into the backup
5. restore the back up and open the game
6. set the city display level to minimum, save and exit
7. set the city display level to high and save and exit.

Its been a while since I read this but I decided to actually try it today.. the reason is that I had a city tile that would CTD when I did certain kinds of terraforming. I had learned on that region that for whatever reason I could remove the plugins, load the city, edit the terrain (it would not crash in this instance), then I could reload the plugins and continue with the city.. of course many of the custom lots would loose their "looks".. like the prop pox. Anyways, I figured that instead of reploping (or regrowing for growable customs  ) that I might try this method for "refreshing" the missing stuff. Well I didn't get far. I am inexperienced in the use of the reader so came up against a wall. I am perfectly willing to do the above, but I feel there is needed a BRIEF tutorial with a few pics to show how to do this.. For example in the READER the "props" file (along with many other entries) seem to be shown as "Unknown". I assume its the big fat file there, but I am very uncertain and it seems foolish for me to charge in until I get a bit more expansion on this method..

If anyone can provide such a brief "tutorial" I, and I'm sure others not so "reader-wise", would be able to tackle this.  How to tell which file, which technique or window to use to open the file, where to use the menu to delete & copy, proper save and exit method,  etc..  Thanks

[BarbyW]

The props file has a Type ID of 0x2977aa47.

[Diggis]

SC4Boy, for what you are doing you can skip steps one to 5.  They are Pox specific.  That was written for people who were testing for the Pox and understood the relevant files.  From the limited testing we have had some minor success but no real breakthrough.