Crusader Kings 3 Dev Tracker

Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox/CK3 folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add CK3.exe to the exceptions list of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.
- start the game with no mods active and test

In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.

If that doesn't help:

- If GeForce Experience is loaded, unload it - any different?

- What if you exit the Steam app entirely and run ck3.exe directly from File Explorer - any different?

- If you have any overclocking enabled, please disable it while we work on this.   ...

I don't see any reason for those problems in those files. Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox/CK3 folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add CK3.exe to the exceptions list of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.
- start the game with no mods active and test with a new campaign BEFORE restoring any saved games.

In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.

Is that any better?  

SandogPL said: Windows Update says everything is up-to-date, i have forced it to check for updates, nothing

No major updates have been applied to it since 2017. Run Update again and look for a new Windows version to apply - not an update or patch, a whole new version. Apply that, reboot, run Update again, apply everything it finds, reboot - keep doing that until there is nothing to apply.

THEN go here:

...

Read more

Those are all .log files. You must have view of file extensions disabled in File Explorer.  

So the game gets to the main game menu okay every time? The crash always comes after that point, is that right?  

Does it also affect CK2, HOI4, EU4 and Stellaris?

During the freeze, what do you see in Task Manager - Performance? Or is the whole machine hung, you can't even alt-tab out?

I see you have had crashes in Xcom, Xcom 2, Dropbox, Handbrake and even NVDisplay.Container.exe - would you say you are having general problems in this machine?  

To see the AppData folder you'll need to enable View Hidden Items in File Explorer.  

I see some ck3.exe crashes in that dxdiag but they look like ones I've seen when the game will not run at all, rather than during play. Very odd. And the error.log is quite worrying.

This is the same machine as before except with a new SSD disk, is that right? So a clean reinstall of Windows?

Do CK2, EU4 or Stellaris also have any such problem?  

There's a copy of your last save at Documents/paradox/ck3/last_save.ck3 - does that load okay, does it show the problem?  

If you can run ck3.exe but the launcher cannot, there will still be a launcher issue of some sort.

What launcher version do you see? Current is 2021.2

In this folder are some .log files:
C:/users//AppData/Local/Paradox Interactive/launcher-v2/
Please attach them here.  

We are not at all suggesting anyone buy a VPN, nor that this problem will go on forever without being addressed. As you say as a tech support rep I'm just trying to help you past the problem, if at all possible.

If it is not, I am sorry! I have great hopes that the next game patch will fix or at least help with the problem. Until then it looks like you won't be able to use MP, for which I apologise unreservedly!  

Those errors typically mean the Windows installer/updater processes have a problem. Run the Update app, does it load okay? If so apply anything it finds to fix and reboot.

If that doesn't help, try MS's tool to fix updater issues:

Fix problems that block programs from being installed or removed

The Program Install and Uninstall troubleshooter helps you automatically repair issues when you're blocked from installing or removing programs. ... Read more

Turning off mods does not remove effects they have already had on the save game file, so I'm afraid we cannot help you with that save file here. You could try the User Mods forum.

If however you get any such problem in a save that's never had any mods used in it, please let us know!  

I'm afraid your AMD Radeon HD 7660G video system is well below the minimum requirement for this game, the AMD® Radeon™ HD 7870:
UserBenchmark: AMD HD 7870 vs Radeon 7660G It has less that 1/5th of the GPU power required, and the driver has not been updated since 2015.

The CPU is also below spec, although not by nearly as much:
... Read more

This is a bit of a long shot, but I see your Intel(R) HD Graphics 4600 video driver is from 2014. Can you please check with AsusTek for an update, or Intel themselves:

Drivers & Software

Download new and previously released drivers including support software, bios, utilities, firmware and patches for Intel products. downloadcenter.intel.com
I also see errors about a missing Microsoft DLL in ... Read more

Despite the unusual symptoms I think this must be another aspect of the endemic CK3 MP problems we are having.

If you have a VPN can you try connecting via that? Especially if it is set to the USA, that helps a lot of affected users apparently.  

I haven't see other reports of the issue in your title here, very odd indeed. You are using the Paradox account associated with this forum name, or some other one perhaps?

Are there any unusual characters in your password, like spaces or accented characters? If so please try changing it to one that only uses standard Latin alphanumerics.

If that doesn't help I don't know what has caused this problem to you. Do you have access to any other computer , to see if this happens there too?  

Has it always happened ever since you've had HOI4? Or only since when?

DXDIAG is a program you run from the Windows search box on the task bar. After running it will open a window and start collecting info with a progress bar in the lower-left corner. When it completes click the 'save all information' button and save it to a file then attach that file here.

Please attach your Documents/Paradox Interactive/Hearts of Iron IV/pdx_settings.txt and settings.txt.
From your Documents/Paradox Interactive/Hearts of Iron IV/logs/ folder, attach system.log , error.log .  

What antivirus app do you use?

But that error log is pretty concerning. Please do a full **clean** re-install:

- move any valued save games elsewhere
- "uninstall" in Steam-CK3
- manually delete both the Steam/SteamApps/common/CK3 AND Documents/Paradox/CK3 folders
- re-install game in Steam, run a Steam Verify when done.
- add CK3.exe to the exceptions list of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.
- start the game with no mods active and test with a new campaign, BEFORE restoring the saved games

In particular make sure there are no files or folders left under either the Steam CK3 or Documents CK3 locations, before installing again.  

What antivirus app do you use?

DXDIAG is a program you run from the Windows search box on the task bar. After running it will open a window and start collecting info with a progress bar in the lower-left corner. When it completes click the 'save all information' button and save it to a file then attach that file here.

Please attach your Documents/Paradox/CK3/pdx_settings.txt .
From your Documents/Paradox/CK3/logs/ folder, attach system.log , error.log