Borderlands patch WARNING - corrupts saves!

[DaveSimmons]

Update:

People in the Borderlands and Steam forums are reporting 3 separate issues after patching:

1. Crash from saying yes to stat tracking
Fix: say "Disagree" when asked to track stats after reading EULA or to to Options > Game Options > Stat Collection and set to Off

2. Game slows to crawl after 1-5 minutes, freezes or crashes
Fix: this seems to be caused by installing the Dr. Zed patch needed for the Oasis fast travel mod -- this was my main problem. See fix below.

3. Crash after select Single Player / Multiplayer
Save files are either corrupted by 1. - 2. above, or are hacked saves (WillowTree).
Fix: restore older backup

Dr. Zed patch fix:
- If you have nvcpl.dll in your ..\Steam\steamapps\common\borderlands\Binaries folder, remove it and then run the game. This is enough to fix things for some people. (Make sure you've backed up saves first though.)

- If you still have problems, remove the other files that Dr. Zed alters, then go to Steam > Library, right click on Borderlands, Properties, Local Files, Verify. This should re-download the files you've deleted.

Delete:
\Engine\Localization\INT
Launch.int
UnrealEd.int

.\Willowgame\CookedPC\
DrZedPatch.UPK

.\Binaries\
UE3ShaderCompileWorker.exe
nvcpl.dll -- you should already have deleted this in above step


I'm running fine now with Dr. Zed removed and stats off. Knoxx will be a pain when I get back to it though, without Oasis + the Hub.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Today's steam patch completely broke the game for me, but luckily I read about the save game corruption before trying to play it. I'm paranoid enough to back up the my documents > borderlands folder now and then, but I would have lost 4 days of play with my second character (soldier)

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2109669

For me, shortly after the movies end the framerate drops to about 1 fps (with a GTX 560 ti) and Task Manager shows it using 99% of the CPU on a Core 2 Duo, 3.0 GHz E8400 with 4 GB RAM.

This is after 152 hours playing it without a single problem or crash until now.

I don't have any hacked items and am not running any mods at the moment (was using Oasis during Knoxx). I get this even when creating a new character.

 

[Spoooon]

Damn, thank the gods I saw this post.

 

[Aikouka]

Hmm game seems to be fine for me. Not sure what's different other than you've got a nVidia card and I've got an AMD card.

Although, I saw it using around 25-30% of my CPU (i5-2500k -- quad-core), so it using around 60% of yours wouldn't be too uncommon (assuming it has some multi-core capability).

 

[DaveSimmons]

Like I said though, 152 hours before the patch without a single problem.

It seems to be mixed, some people posting they have have no problems, others getting corrupted saves or crashes on start (probably from corrupted saves).

It could be Nvidia cards, or a sudden jump in CPU or RAM use (I have 4 GB, you probably have 8 GB), or Windows version (mine is Win 7 Ultimate 32-bit), the ethernet port driver, or who knows what.

I did verify my local cache for Borderlands, but perhaps it's still corrupted somehow.

 

[Barfo]

So they're adding stuff they want to test for Borderlands 2, effectively turning the people that already bought their game into free beta test mules, and they don't add any new content in return, sounds like a good deal

 

[Specop 007]

Damn, I got the error. Running the exe as Admin got things working though.

 

[Elcs]

Damn, thank the gods I saw this post.

This.

I'm not sure when I'll be playing my co-op game with one of my friends but hopefully this will be fixed and I won't have to do anything before then.

At least I am forewarned and thus forearmed.

 

[gorobei]

works fine for me.
i declined the stats reporting agreement, so who knows.
amd card

i also have the game files backed up from before the update so as long as i turn off steam auto update i can restore from those files and be at last known working.

 

[Markbnj]

Hmm, I've had no major problems, but I saw a couple of puzzling little glitches last night, so perhaps it's related. I had the newbie control help panels pop up... and there was one other small hiccup I can't remember.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Update:

People in the Borderlands and Steam forums are reporting 3 separate issues after patching:

1. Crash from saying yes to stat tracking
Fix: say "Disagree" when asked to track stats after reading EULA or to to Options > Game Options > Stat Collection and set to Off

2. Game slows to crawl after 1-5 minutes, freezes or crashes
Fix: this seems to be caused by installing the Dr. Zed patch needed for the Oasis fast travel mod -- this was my main problem. See fix below.

3. Crash after select Single Player / Multiplayer
Save files are either corrupted by 1. - 2. above, or are hacked saves (WillowTree).
Fix: restore older backup

Dr. Zed patch fix:
- If you have nvcpl.dll in your ..\Steam\steamapps\common\borderlands\Binaries folder, remove it and then run the game. This is enough to fix things for some people. (Make sure you've backed up saves first though.)

- If you still have problems, remove the other files that Dr. Zed alters, then go to Steam > Library, right click on Borderlands, Properties, Local Files, Verify. This should re-download the files you've deleted.

Delete:
\Engine\Localization\INT
Launch.int
UnrealEd.int

.\Willowgame\CookedPC\
DrZedPatch.UPK

.\Binaries\
UE3ShaderCompileWorker.exe
nvcpl.dll -- you should already have deleted this in above step


I'm running fine now with Dr. Zed removed and stats off. Knoxx will be a pain when I get back to it though, without Oasis + the Hub.

 

[BlueWeasel]

What does this new patch add?

Seems odd that a 250MB patch was issued nearly two years after the original game release and a year after GOTY.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Stat tracking (buggy) and steam cloud saves.

The stat tracking is apparently something they wanted to try out now before adding it to Borderlands 2.

 

[mk]

Thanks for the heads up. So far haven't seen any problems. Hopefully there won't be any.


edit: saves are hacked with Willow Tree, nothing extreme though.

 

[ibex333]

I updated yesterday - no problems with my saves.

Either way you shoud have em backed up.

 

[Elcs]

In Borderlands 2, they better fix the damn aspect ratios otherwise I'm going to stick the Dev team and publishers on a boat in a storm, as see how they like it.

 

[slag]

I like borderlands and have the 3 addons for it, but the middle addon, the arenas, is a total waste of time. I spent several days playing those damn repetitive arenas and there just isn't any end in sight. I think the joke's on me as the whole addon was just the same thing, over and over and over and over.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I like borderlands and have the 3 addons for it, but the middle addon, the arenas, is a total waste of time. I spent several days playing those damn repetitive arenas and there just isn't any end in sight. I think the joke's on me as the whole addon was just the same thing, over and over and over and over.

I just use it for the item bank. Sadly it doesn't add a cross-character item bank like Torchlight has -- so to give items to another character you still need to run 2 copies of BL on your PC as a LAN game (or so I've read, haven't tried it yet)

 

[Red Storm]

Quick question on Borderlands... Can Mac and PC players play co-op together?

 

[Nebor]

I like borderlands and have the 3 addons for it, but the middle addon, the arenas, is a total waste of time. I spent several days playing those damn repetitive arenas and there just isn't any end in sight. I think the joke's on me as the whole addon was just the same thing, over and over and over and over.

It's a lot of fun in coop with the difficulty cranked up. Plus you can get 2 additional skill points out of it if you finish it in both playthroughs!

 

[Aikouka]

so to give items to another character you still need to run 2 copies of BL on your PC as a LAN game (or so I've read, haven't tried it yet)

Yeah, that's how I trade between characters.

Quick question on Borderlands... Can Mac and PC players play co-op together?

It should work.

 

[Red Storm]

It should work.

Cool.

I gave Borderlands two previous tries before, but I couldn't get into it. Seeing this thread made me go try it one more time, and now I'm actually enjoying it! I don't know what it was, I think I may have stumbled into some enemies much higher in level than me the first two times I played. I love the art style, now I just gotta get my friends to play...

 

[DaveSimmons]

Were you playing a Siren? Now that I've tried all 4 classes I can agree with the conventional wisdom that the Siren is the easiest to play solo since:

- SMGs (especially scoped) are the most useful all-around weapon
- Phasewalk is the best skill to escape from a tight spot, especially when you get health and shield regen
- The elemental chance increase makes elemental weapons much more useful
- Daze on bullet hit is great for crowd control, and with the SMG spitting out a huge volume of fire you're much more likely to daze.

I'm still on playthrough 1 for the other 3 classes, but I'd say the difficulty goes:
Siren < Berserker / Soldier < Hunter

At least for me the toughest part is when I get mobbed at close range. A siren can Phasewalk (and damage them in the process), a berserker can go berserk and pound away with regen and damage reduction, a soldier can drop his turret as a distraction, while a poor hunter can only launch his bloodwing which just does 1 attack (until level 19).

 

[Red Storm]

Were you playing a Siren? Now that I've tried all 4 classes I can agree with the conventional wisdom that the Siren is the easiest to play solo since:

- SMGs (especially scoped) are the most useful all-around weapon
- Phasewalk is the best skill to escape from a tight spot, especially when you get health and shield regen
- The elemental chance increase makes elemental weapons much more useful
- Daze on bullet hit is great for crowd control, and with the SMG spitting out a huge volume of fire you're much more likely to daze.

I'm still on playthrough 1 for the other 3 classes, but I'd say the difficulty goes:
Siren < Berserker / Soldier < Hunter

At least for me the toughest part is when I get mobbed at close range. A siren can Phasewalk (and damage them in the process), a berserker can go berserk and pound away with regen and damage reduction, a soldier can drop his turret as a distraction, while a poor hunter can only launch his bloodwing which just does 1 attack (until level 19).

Ha, I played Hunter, twice before (Love me them sniper rifles). That must be it, trying Siren this time.

 

[Aikouka]

I haven't played Brick much yet, but I didn't find the Soldier and Hunter much different in difficulty. The Scorpio Turret isn't too bad, but you have to be very careful where you place it or else it could become incredibly ineffective. The only area where I tend to have trouble on my characters is in the arena fights when I don't out-level them.

I recall having some trouble on my Hunter when I was doing the Circle of Death at level 38 and fighting two level 40 Badass Bruisers at once. The biggest problem that I've seen is that slow firing weapons have another drawback... they don't "delay" enemy attacks. Between using slow firing weapons and fast firing weapons, I've noticed that enemy attacks are usually delayed very slightly when they're hit. A single hit from a revolver doesn't usually do much, but constantly hitting them with a SMG seems to put a significant delay into their attack (and you'll hear all the "augh!" sound effects as well).

With that delay and the slowing effect on the Siren's Mind Games ability, enemies rarely pose a threat. I actually used the melee version until I could get Mind Games, which helps on things like Skaggs. I would actually jump over top of Skaggs, look down and melee at the same time. This would effectively hop over the Skagg and slow it, which made it easy to kill.

Dave, it is still worth mentioning that I don't think the Siren's elemental effect increase affects the tech pool regen rate. Each elemental weapon has a pool (think of it as energy) and each elemental shot takes a piece of the energy. The pool also regens at a certain rate, and if the pool is empty or there isn't enough energy for a shot, you will lose the proc. This is why low-end elemental weapons are pretty darned useless. It's nearly impossible to know how big the tech pool is without looking up the weapon piece stats, but typically, the higher quality, the larger the pool. I can't remember the "#x" on the weapon affects the pool size or the regen rate. Essentially, 3-4x and "(very) high chance to..." are the stats you want on an elemental weapon.

Another good piece of advice is learning about how fast shields recharge. On my Siren, I used to use the largest shield that I could find, which is great when you're fighting a lot of guys that you can kill relatively fast as each kill will start recharging your shields. It is worth noting that if your shield is recharging via the talent, and you kill another enemy, it simply goes back to the max (doesn't add on). Now, I tend to use shields with fast recharge, because while they aren't the largest shields around, sometimes you simply cannot rely on shield size alone.

There are four things that define a shield's stats: grade, left, right and body. Left and Right are from the perspective of the shield, so they are the reverse of what's shown on the screen. Left and Right sides have no penalties, so getting the highest of each is the best. Left adjusts regen time and regen rate, and right adjusts the shield's capacity. You'll know if you have the highest of each based on the shield's number. Left 4 = 500, Right 4 = 50, which means 550 = L4 + R4.

The hardest part about understanding shield model numbers is when you look at the base Left and Right part which have no model number. Whenever your shield has a base part, it actually divides the other part's number by 10. For example, if you have a shield with Left 4 (500) and Right 1 (0), the shield's model will actually be 50.

Bodies are a bit more straightforward and it comes down to remembering the best model code. In my opinion, the best code is "AWE", which is Body 4. Body 4 provides the best regen boosts out of all the different models. I can't remember the exact code for the second best (I think it's "OB"), which is Body 1 (Balanced). If I remember correctly, Body 1 Balanced is a combination of Body 1 and Body 2, which gives it a decent regen boost and a decent shield capacity boost. The other bodies tend to have penalties that may raise capacity, but reduce the recharge time/rate.

The grade of a shield is directly related to the manufacturer, which each manufacturer has their own bonus. For example, Anshin shields will have better recharge time/rate, and there are three different types (Impeccable, Exemplary and ??? I think). Essentially, if you want the best recharging shield, you'll want to find an Anshin 550AWE. I believe it's Tediore that makes the larger capacity shields, which I think the highest is Fortified.

 

[Markbnj]

At least for me the toughest part is when I get mobbed at close range. A siren can Phasewalk (and damage them in the process), a berserker can go berserk and pound away with regen and damage reduction, a soldier can drop his turret as a distraction, while a poor hunter can only launch his bloodwing which just does 1 attack (until level 19).

I just jump over them, or around them, sprint away, turn and reengage. The bloodwing is nice at higher levels, but never really turns the tables. But with a sniper rifle doing over 400 dmg at level 32 I can usually take out even big mobs before they get to me.