Units Not Firing

[choppinlt]

How do I attach game files? I went to the attachments tab below and was getting errors with dragging and dropping and going through the add files button.

The selected Inf Plt on the pic below did not fire at all when a Soviet T-80 tank co advanced and halted in the 1500 VP location. The Soviet Co was visible before disappearing after a time sitting idle. After thinking about it NO unit fired at the Co when it arrived (unless it was returning fire only), despite the Soviets being visible. The Co arrived at the VP spot and annihilated a dug-in mech plt 2 hexes to the southwest of it (it has a red 11). The Co went invisible, then popped up again to destroy various other units. The curious thing is that none of my units engage it UNLESS it is returning fire. For instance there is an M901 plt and M-1 plt to the southeast that can both "see" in the hex yet have never fired a shot. There are a couple other units that can see as well. This is the same same Co I mentioned in another thread that ripped through an M-1 plt at 3.5km with first shots and zero damage.

[JacquesDeLalaing]

I'm not a developer. Some guesses:

1) If an enemy unit is displayed on your map, it is visible to at least one of your units. This does not neccessarily mean that it is visible to the inf coy. you're refering to. You can check what your units can see if you open the detailed unit panel and go to "Staff", where the game lists the actual contacts of the unit.

2) I can't see what kind of concealment there is in the 1500 VP hex. If the enemy has good concealment in the hex, it will be hard to spot a stationary (HOLD or SCREEN) enemy, particularly if the enemy unit is small (e.g. recon teams or badly shot up companies). In this circumstance it's quite common for enemy units to pop up only when they fire and temporarily broadcast their position due to their fire signature. It's just natural that your units get no solution on target if the target is behind trees and buildings and only pops up a split second to fire at your units (which might be easier to spot for the enemy?). Spotting in FC:SS can be one-sided, which is a big plus in my book.

3) If it was indeed a fresh/large company of T-80s, it's unlikely that the infantry had troubles to spot the enemy unit on the move (but for the other units further away it's quite likely). However I wonder if your infantry platoon still had anything left to fire at the T80s? Did you still have ATGMs left? The tank company is parked about a kilometre away. If there are no ATGMs left, there is nothing to shoot with.

[choppinlt]

Jaques, to your points...
1. I took care to ensure whatever went into that VP location was going to catch holy hell by finding at least 6 different locations and placing units there that have vision in that hex. I believe there were 2 tank units, 1 M901 and 3 Inf Plt (2 that were within range to fire). The hidden/dug in infantry to the SW was quickly spotted and destroyed by the tank co (at least 8 tanks were there as I recall). Before they died the inf to the SW got to return some fire to no avail, but NONE of the other units that could "see" fired a shot in support. Again I might be missing something here, but that is what I saw.

2. It's a town so yes it has good concealing terrain, but that doesn't change the fact the company has been basically able to arrive, spot, fire and destroy hidden/dug in units with virtual impunity despite the hundreds of eyes waiting from all directions. In other words I have not experienced this otherwise that I am aware of. This does bring me to a question I will ask later.

3. The infantry was a fresh platoon that had not seen combat. They did have the unfortunate situation of getting gassed, with some casualties, but they decon'd a few hours before. So they are otherwise good to go other than being disturbed at watching their friends do the funky chicken. The plt has a single Dragon, but it was never used. Again the biggest point is that NONE of the 5 units that could do any support fire have done so.

So my follow-up question to the group is about how spotting/target acquisition works. Working with the current example a company of tanks goes into the town and disappears after some time despite 6 units seeing it arrive. I'm assuming that the game correctly makes contacts disappear after being idle for some time after factoring concealment in hex, not moving and not firing. I have no issues with this, other than shouldn't we have something to illustrate that on the map?

[JacquesDeLalaing]

Jaques, to your points...
1. I took care to ensure whatever went into that VP location was going to catch holy hell by finding at least 6 different locations and placing units there that have vision in that hex. I believe there were 2 tank units, 1 M901 and 3 Inf Plt (2 that were within range to fire). The hidden/dug in infantry to the SW was quickly spotted and destroyed by the tank co (at least 8 tanks were there as I recall). Before they died the inf to the SW got to return some fire to no avail, but NONE of the other units that could "see" fired a shot in support. Again I might be missing something here, but that is what I saw.

Are you describing the situation from the screenshot you posted above? In the screenshot, I don't think that many of your units except the infantry platoon would have a decent line of sight on the VP hex. I can't tell for sure as I don't have your save file, but I would assume that their LOS-quality would be rather bad (check the numbers in the LOS overlay) - at least not good enough to spot a stationary unit in decent concealment.

The HQ in the south is 2.5km away and its LOS might be degraded by the wood (not sure whether it is positioned high enough to look over that wood)? The sp. AT unit in the southeast is about 3km away and its LOS is definitely degraded - it LOS seems to cut through the hex of your infantry platoon, which severely degrades LOS (97% concealment). The tank and infantry units northeast are about 3.5km away and I strongly assume their LOS is also quite severely degraded (if not cut completely) by intervening terrain (town, trees). Again that's all assuming that you're refering to the situation in the screenshot.

Another possible reason if your units were indeed spotting the enemy company: Did you check your SOP settings? Your units allowed range to open fire?

Also worth mentioning is that the Dragon has a range of 1000m (=2 hexes), so this might explain why the infantry has not fired at the tanks when they were approaching the VP hex (out of range!). It does not explain why it wasn't firing when the tank company was already in the VP hex though. Not sure if ATGMs need to keep the target acquired for some time in order to fire...?

So my follow-up question to the group is about how spotting/target acquisition works. Working with the current example a company of tanks goes into the town and disappears after some time despite 6 units seeing it arrive. I'm assuming that the game correctly makes contacts disappear after being idle for some time after factoring concealment in hex, not moving and not firing. I have no issues with this, other than shouldn't we have something to illustrate that on the map?

To my understanding this is indeed how it works, yes. I'm not sure whether "disappearing" units are documented somewhere. Could be handy in larger scenarios. I suppose you can look it up in the units' logs. Perhaps there is also something in the "Intelligence" staff report?

[JacquesDeLalaing]

Here are some pictures showing the LOS overlay from some of the positions shown in your screenshot. It's the LOS overlay for a soviet tank company.

The position of your HQ in the south has no LOS on the VP hex ("Pautzfeld") at all. It's in the dead angle (LOS shadow from the wooded plateau).

The sp. AT unit (southeast) has a very bad LOS (quality 19). It seems unobstructed (it's not in the LOS-shadow of the little wood). The bad LOS is probably just a result of the long distance in combination with the decent concealment in the hex.

Same goes for the tank and infantry units' positions in the northeast (quality 11).

[Tcao]

Damn, I should not step into this thread. I just began a PBEM game as Soviets.

Yes, that hex is a town with 90%+ concealment.

Regarding its deadly long range fire. It is very likely a fresh T-80B[M] co. get into that town. All the 13 tanks in that Company can fire tube launched 9K112/AT-8 ATGM. So be aware of those T-80's long range firepower.

[Tcao]

To my understanding this is indeed how it works, yes. I'm not sure whether "disappearing" units are documented somewhere. Could be handy in larger scenarios. I suppose you can look it up in the units' logs. Perhaps there is also something in the "Intelligence" staff report?

If my memory is correct, this kind of information is recorded int the intelligence staff report. It has a long list to report all the spotting contact and all those lost track contact in last 1 hour

[choppinlt]

I think I just discovered something notable. I primarily use the SOP range to determine vis in relation to weapon reach. Using the LOS tool yields different data. Is it supposed to work that way? I quickly looked at the manual and it appears that there should be no difference.

As I had stated before, using the SOP range method I had 6 units that could see (1 died before my pic was taken) and 4 had weapons within the range though none ever fired.

Using the LOS tool, there are many numbers that vary from the SOP range tool...and most importantly the LOS tool shows the M-1 unit to the NE cannot see into the VP hex. Conversely, being in the VP hex you can see the hex with those same M-1s. Certainly reaching that hex CANNOT mean that you can fire without the enemy being able to return fire.

Let me end by saying that I'm not complaining about what happened, I'm saying that something didn't feel right. Most importantly the behavior has been repeatable when I go back to the autosave 6 times, the enemy tanks NEVER get fired at 6 times, so something seems off.

If my memory is correct, this kind of information is recorded int the intelligence staff report. It has a long list to report all the spotting contact and all those lost track contact in last 1 hour

Which is part of what I am getting at. Currently units just disappear and a player MAY be able to dig up that intel somewhere in the UI. It would seem reasonable to have some sort of marker to denote the almost certain presence of enemy troops with a red question mark in this case...doesn't have to be any more than that due to the situation...just something to let the user know where enemy has been, was or likely exist. Overall minor point, and would only be a wishlist item for me.

[cbelva]

@choppinit, I'm sorry for the delay in getting back to you. My daughter and grandkids, who I have not seen in over a year, arrived for a visit right after I received the file. So, I have been a little busy.

I looked at the saved game file. I looked at it very carefully and watched the turn play out. I'm also able to look at the other side's situation. It all looked reasonable to me. First, the urban hex the tanks are in is filled with smoke from artillery and the burning hulks in the town. That further hinders visibility into the town. Smoke that results from arty firing and burning AFVs do impact visibility. Second, the mech plt in 2507 has a damaged moral. Their moral is less than 50% which further hurts its ability. You said that it had been hit earlier by chemical weapons. Their tendency at this point would keep their heads down. I'm assuming it was non-persistent gas since I don't see any contaminated markers on this side of the map. That in itself would account for the lower morale. Being gassed would shake almost anyone. Third, the only weapon that the infantry plt has that could possibly attack armor is its Dragon. It is at extreme range and the enemy armor is in an urban hex. I would call that an almost impossible shot. They only have 4 rounds; it would be wasting them to shoot. I have seen dragon fire, and there're not as easy to use as one might think.

The Soviet tanks in the town can't see out themselves. They can't see the two tank units that they eventually fired on until those units opened fired on other targets. When I unit fires or moves, it increases its visibility. They had been hidden to the Soviet tanks until they fired. The tanks can't see the Mech plt in hex 2507 himself.

You had also asked about having a marker on the map to identify locations where units had previously been spotted. If you check the Enemy SIREP map in intel screens you will a red square denoting known and previously spotted enemy units. There is a red square in that town hex denoting that there either is or had been recently enemy units there. I use this map to plan arty strike on targets deep behind the enemy's main force.

Enemy Sitrep.jpg (241.28 KiB) Viewed 680 times

[choppinlt]

Thanks for the response, I really appreciate you looking into this! The biggest surprises to me about that situation were that the M901 and M-1 to the SE, nor the M-1 to the NE ever fire/return fire since they all have thermals. The other thing I did notice was that the LOS tool and SOP tool yields different data. Perhaps the biggest thing I noticed was that the SOP showed visibility between the NE M-1s and the VP hex. However the LOS tool showed vis to the M-1s, but it showed the M-1s did NOT have vis to the VP hex. I believe I was using the M-1s as the selected unit in relation to using both tools and relative spotting. Is any of that an issue? Just trying to understand it all.

And a big THANK YOU for letting me know about the intel screens. IMHO it would still be nice to have a marker on the playing map, however that's just a wish list item. Knowing about the intel screen and spotting will be a great help!