Stupid Purple Flags!

Yellowbeard · Seaman Posts: 208 **7885 Gold** -

Hello, I've been running numerous flag & sail mods from here, most of which are very, very good, but I've noticed since adding things to the custom folder I have been seing a lot of Stupid Purple Flags!

Usually these are the flags of a ship at sea on the main caribbean map of usually invasion ships (assorted nations), pirate raiders and sometimes pirate hunters (assorted nations).

I'm talking a very basic, almost neon purple flag with no patterns or designs, and it appears for various nations and sometimes for pirates.

This has to be a bug of some sort. I have viewed all my DDS files and not a single one of them is a purple flag, so I can't seem to track down what is causing the problem.

Has anyone else seen this, or am I the only one? What can I do to fix it short of abandoning custom flags?

Kristian95 · Boatswain Posts: 3149 **4687 Gold** -

I think that the purple colour is the one used as transparent.... maybe it sometimes fails to find the appropriate flags, and thus you only get the transparent background (purple) ???
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Yellowbeard · Seaman Posts: 208 **7885 Gold** -

I was guessing that was the transparency color or something, but any clue as to why it's appearing and what I can do to fix it? Anyone else with this problem?

I mean, it's effecting differant nations and even pirates, so where is this problem coming from?

rupertlittlebear · Helmsman Posts: 4545 **10381 Gold** -

Sounds like you are using a bad .FPK file.

When FPK packer has the destination file within the source directory, you will always get this problem.

If you made the FPK yourself, this is the problem.
If it is one you downloaded, we got a problem file in the Mod seciton.

Yellowbeard · Seaman Posts: 208 **7885 Gold** -

Thanks Rupert... I only have one "flag" FPK* in my custom folder, I can't remember where I got it but it's called "Fabs Historic Flag pack" which has some very good historically accurate flags in it... it's the only FPK I have.

Should I just "unpack" it and use the dds files sans the FPK file? Would that solve my problem?

*I do have a couple other FPK's but they are character FPKs... that wouldn't effect flags, would it?

rupertlittlebear · Helmsman Posts: 4545 **10381 Gold** -

Yellowbeard · Seaman Posts: 208 **7885 Gold** -

Hmmm... I'm confused... is the purple flag problem caused by a bad FPK pak itself, or the files within the FPK?

I have tons of DDS flag files (though none are screaming "i'm the purple problem"), but only one flag FPK. The problem doesn't seem limited to any particular nation, so I'm not sure where the problem is coming from.

I have just unpacked the FPK file and put the DDS files as-is in the custom folder... I will play for awhile and see if this solves anything, or am I wasting my time? Is my FPK file the culprit, or could it be any one (or combination) of my DDS flag files?

rupertlittlebear · Helmsman Posts: 4545 **10381 Gold** -

PrinceScamp · Gunner Posts: 891 **213 Gold** -

hmm, this reminds me of CIV2 graphics...with the pink backgrounds...(still cant make my own graphics though...?)
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Steelkilt · Powder Monkey Posts: 13 **543 Gold** -

I have this problem too, big time. I've downloaded pretty much every flag and sail emblem that's been posted on this site. Are there certain one's I should get rid of to make this problem go away? If so, which ones are they?

rupertlittlebear · Helmsman Posts: 4545 **10381 Gold** -

Either you have a problem, or the mod section has some strange files.

(Ok Daughter of Frankenstein is a strange one.)

Would help to know what files are giving you trouble.

Purple galore should only come from a FPK file.

No flags/sails should be uploaded in that format as you cannot use them in the game.

The city flag mods are a different kettle of fish, they should be in FPK format so you do not see them. The game uses several flags for each nation, for each nation, for each nation, for each nation (yes it uses loads of them for each nation).

Yellowbeard · Seaman Posts: 208 **7885 Gold** -

There doesn't seem to be an answer. I have posted this same thread on the Addicted to Pirates forum, and other folks have responded seeing the same problem there as well.

It is clear there is a problem either with the game and custom flags in general, or with a particular download that all of us folks with the purple flag problem all have in our custom folder.

Problem is, I'm sure like me, we've all done a fair amount of downloading and probably all have tons of custom flags in our folder before we noticed the problem, so it's nearly impossible to track to a single file or download if it is indeed caused by a single file or download.

I'm still not convinced if it is a problem with the game in general, a specific single bad download or perhaps a combination of X,Y,Z downloads that triggers this problem.

Nonetheless, this problem definately exists and it's not limited to me... several folks have reported this problem. All of us who have the problem have MULTIPLE custom flags downloaded (none of which are a purple flag!)

Wolfwood · Boatswain Posts: 2527 **33917 Gold** -

Have you tried just taking some flags out of the custom folder to see if the problem goes away (if you have too much stuff there and Pirates! gets confused).

Also, it should be easy to track down the culprit with a simple mathematical process:

1) Just remove half of the files from the custom folder, check if the problem exists. If it does not, remove the half that you are left with and put back the half that you took away.

2) If you now have the same problem with half the files you did previously, repeat the process, again dividing your remaining files into two patches and checking which one includes the problem file.

This way, you eliminate half the files at a time and it should be faster to track down the bad one. Unless there are two bad ones, which might cause some problems.
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Kristian95 · Boatswain Posts: 3149 **4687 Gold** -

rupertlittlebear · Helmsman Posts: 4545 **10381 Gold** -

Takes forever to remember, but you know . . .

Pirates acts funny if you add or remove files while it is running.

Gives purple crap.

Are you adding files while the program is active?