Missing plugin

[Jelle 33]

RESOLVED, SEE BELOW.

When I started the game today, I got this message:

 

It is the first time I got this message, and my other cities don't show it. Is it harmful to keep playing? Anyone know what's missing?

Just an hour ago I tested the WestWindStreet mod by hugues aroux but that worked fine. As said, I have never seen such a message.

Okay after some more googling it found this topic https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=1401.0 about the same message. It appears the number shown by SimCity is a decimal representation of the missing exemplar's Instance ID. Conversion of the decimal to hex: 3AC328B0. Which leads me to Glenni's Farngaten 18.

Destroying the building in my city, saving and reloading: no more message.

Redownloaded the files for the plugin (seemed to be missing some), restarted the game and built the Farngaten landmark in an clean city. No more warning!
No idea where I went wrong in the original install, but alas.

 

IN CONCLUSION:
The above "plugin pack" converted to hex, found corresponding plugin, redownloaded plugin. All works.

I have resolved this particular issue but will leave this post up for future reference. Mods, feel free to lock the topic.

  Edited December 9, 2024 by Jelle  
resolved issue

[CorinaMarie 29,565]

2 hours ago, Jelle said:

Mods, feel free to lock the topic.

How about we leave it unlocked in case someone has the same or a similar problem?

Even if that's years from now and Google leads them to this exact topic, it'll be fine if they bump it. (Once CB and I were given sole adminship of ST, we removed the ban about bumping old topics. We find it's actually better to keep like questions in the same place as the existing discussion. And it only happens a few times a year anyhow.)

 

2 hours ago, Jelle said:

Destroying the building in my city, saving and reloading: no more message.

Bulldozing the building before re-downloading and adding the files back to your plugins can have anywhere from a teeny tiny influence to a devastating impact on your city tile. Just depends on what type of building was missing.

The way it works is the game's save file knows things like the building's exemplar ID and it'll use that to look up a lot of the info from the plugin itself so the game doesn't have to store as much data. If you bulldoze a building while the file is in plugins then the game knows exactly what to reverse such as pollution generated and other things. However, if the file is not in plugins when bulldozing, it treats all those numbers as zero. This means you could have an empty spot producing air, water, and garbage pollution and then have no way to remove that. Ofc, if it's small amounts and near other buildings also producing similar amounts you won't likely notice.

OTOH, if you have a building such as schools or medical or any with budget sliders and you bulldoze them while the plugin file is missing then you can create a Phantom Slider situation and that can be really annoying.

All that to say: Be careful when bulldozing buildings. You really want to have their files in your plugins folder when you do.