Non-existent colonist died

swni · September 14, 2016, 02:23:29 AM

I randomly got a message like "Tom has died of a heart attack", pointing at the lower-left corner of the map (presumably coordinates (0, 0)). At the time, I believe the only humans on the map were my two colonists. I don't recall having seen any pawn from any faction named Tom. My colonists got the "colonist died" debuff and the statistics tab showed that a colonist had died, but the population graph showed no change in population.

No mods. Playing on linux, version 0.15.1824. This happened several years ago in-game time, so I'm not sure if the save file would be useful to see.

Deimos Rast · September 14, 2016, 06:27:21 AM

Wait, this happened several years ago? Tom probably had a family you know.

In all seriousness, it sounds like you missed a drop pod, or (a stretch) maybe it landed off screen? They can technically be spawned and drawn off screen, maybe it never landed at all? Best I can come up with.
And do you mean version 0.15.1284?

swni · September 14, 2016, 06:59:17 AM

The three colonist-added events were disabled (drop pods, wanderer joins, chased by pirates), and those were the only disabled events. (I'm trying to beat the game with two colonists starting with a tribal start, I have all the resources and tech to build the spaceship and am just finishing up the rest of the tech tree now.) There was no body to be found. And yeah, I meant 0.15.1284.

Phantazmya · September 16, 2016, 09:37:49 AM

Did you check your colonists' relationships? It's happened to me where they were somehow related to a person in another faction and if that person dies in simulation then you get a notice of the death (and the mood penalty).

swni · September 16, 2016, 10:36:08 AM

Nothing of note in the relationships.

You got a "colonist died" mood penalty when someone in a different faction died? Or was the mood penalty you got due to a related person dying? If the latter then that doesn't sound like a bug.

slamo · September 20, 2016, 07:45:59 PM

I once recruited a colonist names Tom and he was almost immediately shot and kidnapped by raiders. A day or two later I got a message that Tom had died of infection — he was offscreen when this happened.

Perhaps something similar happened for you?

swni · September 20, 2016, 07:58:25 PM

Maybe my colonists got a mood debuff in sympathy for the tragic loss of your Tom, but I never recruited a colonist or had a colonist kidnapped. My population has remained steady at two colonists from the very beginning (which is confirmed in the population graph). Good idea though.

In your case, did you get the "colonist died" debuff? Did the notification message point to the lower-left corner of the map?

GlitchKs · September 20, 2016, 11:55:16 PM

Made an account just to reply as I came here for kind of the same thing.

While i never saw a mysterious message... all of my pawns have the "Colonist died" mood debuff. No one has died. I found a auto save just before and after said bug occurred. No one is missing, no one new has joined in more than a season but somewhere in the 12 hours between autosaves something happened.

I DID have chick32 a random chicken that was not bonded to anyone killed by a fox but I have never seen that cause sadness before.

swni · September 21, 2016, 10:08:12 AM

Glad to hear I'm not crazy and this has happened to others. The devs might be interested in your auto saves from before and after (though I don't know how it'd actually help at all...).

Did you also do a custom scenario? Any disabled incidents, like I had?

GlitchKs · September 21, 2016, 12:39:37 PM

I did save the auto saves just in case

Yes I was playing a senerio but nothing disabled event wise. However I have 20 ish mods running so not sure how much good it will do.

They effect was only -3 for 7 days or so. Not a big deal. I'm role playing (writing it off) that they all feel bad that the chicken died. I'm Just powering through it.

skullywag · September 21, 2016, 01:12:19 PM

If you have pawns kidnapped they still "exist" as a world pawn, if they die you are informed, its not a bug per se but should you know he has died? I would say not.

GlitchKs · September 21, 2016, 05:20:18 PM

Agreed but in my case no one has been kidnapped the entire game (or any game I have ever played really)

I sold a bonded chicken off once on accident. 3 seasons later a guy asked to join the colony from the near by settlement. I thought it was just a dude. Nope, it was Tico the chicken that came wandering back into my colony. That was the closest I have come to having a member off screen for any reason.