The FOW movement system needs to be changed

[dobeln]

This has been discussed before, but it needs to be raised again, as it is without doubt the biggest blight on the otherwise excellent GGWaW: The movement system under FOW. This has become even more of an issue as the combat system became more complicated in AwD.

Currently, movement-to-combat into a territory will instantly reveal hidden territories under fog of war surrounding that territory. This will in turn make the "undo-move" feature unavailable. Which means that combat odds can in some cases not be calculated without risking losing at least the first-moving unit in a completely futile attack.

Risking to lose perhaps entire games because of merely wanting to use a basic informational feature is not acceptable. A number of excuses for this state of affairs have been provided, but frankly, I don't find them convincing. What would the real-world damage be of having to wait until after combat resolution to reveal FoW in surrounding areas? As it is, this issue crops up in nearly *every game - and in PBEM reload is not a realistic option, and you have to either take a terribly cheap loss, or burden your credibility by submitting load-counted games. A fix would be most appriciated.

Regards, Dobeln

PS.
As you can perhaps tell , I just lost a destroyed infantry unit and a massive faulty deployment of naval assets due to this issue in a PBEM. Yay!
DS.

[tcart]

I'm with you, Dobeln. The FOW system is a constant challenge and I lose a couple of units every game to it. That and Spain's inclination to join the Axis are my only two complaints about an otherwise excellent game.

[Tom Grosv]

I'm really confused. At risk of incurring your wrath, dobeln, I don't understand why the present rules are a blight. It seems you want to be able to uncover FOW with no cost to yourself - what's the point of FOW then? if you feel so strongly why not play with FOW off? Is it unrealistic to lose a unit in these circumstances? I think army commanders would frequently sacrifice units to uncover valuable intelligence, though perhaps not at this scale.

There are often other alternatives. Why not move an air unit strategically to an adjacent territory then move it away - it reveals FOW and won't cost you a unit - the most you lose is some strategic movement capacity. I also find you can sometimes move a transport into coastal waters then bug out. Lastly, I have used logical deduction to work out roughly what forces might be hding behind the front.

I suspect that AWD commanders have a far better idea of the dispostion of enemy forces even with FOW on than their real life counterparts.

Perhaps I misunderstand your complaint.

Tom

[GKar]

I think that his suggestion is not to uncover the FoW adjacent to a combat zone until combat has been resolved. Thus it would be possible to use the built-in combat prediction while not losing the possibility to undo the attack (because of having lifted the FoW).

It's about getting information about possible combats, and not about getting free information regarding provinces under FoW. I agree with this sentiment.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: Tom Grosv
Why not move an air unit strategically to an adjacent territory then move it away - it reveals FOW and won't cost you a unit - the most you lose is some strategic movement capacity.

This is the secret worth remembering. Sometimes you can just attack your intended target with an air unit for no reason other than overcoming FOW of adjacent zones. Typically an air unit will survive (unless it happens to be defended by flak/fighters), so your only loss is operational loss of the unit for that turn.

You can consider this to be part of air recon.

But I recognize that this is a hint for working around the issue, not a justification of the issue.

My primary defense of the current system would be the difficulty of defining a clean system to replace it. Basically, what if you do want to see through FOW? Any unit can pass through an enemy controlled zone without combat (perhaps suffering op-fire). Wouldn't you rather have your subs see adjacent zones even when they are gliding under enemy fleets? Are subs to be an exception? What about air moving into W France to get a peak at E France?

[Tom Grosv]

ORIGINAL: GKar
I think that his suggestion is not to uncover the FoW adjacent to a combat zone until combat has been resolved. Thus it would be possible to use the built-in combat prediction while not losing the possibility to undo the attack (because of having lifted the FoW).

Thanks Gkar, I think I understand now. Yep, dobeln has a valid gripe.

[GKar]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

My primary defense of the current system would be the difficulty of defining a clean system to replace it. Basically, what if you do want to see through FOW? Any unit can pass through an enemy controlled zone without combat (perhaps suffering op-fire). Wouldn't you rather have your subs see adjacent zones even when they are gliding under enemy fleets? Are subs to be an exception? What about air moving into W France to get a peak at E France?

It is my understanding that all dobeln wants is not to lift the FoW around combats before combat is resolved. This would enable to use the combat analyzer without having to sacrifice the first unit moved into the combat province occasionally. I don't think that there's a downside to his suggestion - other than programming time, of course.

Personally I don't rely on the combat prediction that often, but the problem dobeln described has occurred to me as well and it can be a PITA.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: GKar

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

My primary defense of the current system would be the difficulty of defining a clean system to replace it. Basically, what if you do want to see through FOW? Any unit can pass through an enemy controlled zone without combat (perhaps suffering op-fire). Wouldn't you rather have your subs see adjacent zones even when they are gliding under enemy fleets? Are subs to be an exception? What about air moving into W France to get a peak at E France?

It is my understanding that all dobeln wants is not to lift the FoW around combats before combat is resolved. This would enable to use the combat analyzer without having to sacrifice the first unit moved into the combat province occasionally. I don't think that there's a downside to his suggestion - other than programming time, of course.

I understand that, but I think that there IS a downside, which is what I mentioned above.

In particular, what if you __want__ to see through FOW but don't want combat? Don't you want to see where you are going before you go there?

Most especially for subs and air which regularly pass through enemy controlled zones without engaging in combat.

Also for surface fleets that also pass over subs with regularity, and sometimes under CAP, are they not supposed to see where they are going?

Now we have found a use for every unit type except land units.

It is not as relevant from a "optimal rule design" standpoint, but I also can imagine it being a lot more difficult to program bug free. It is much easier to simply say "see adjacent zones" as opposed to "see adjacent zones unless there is a pending combat, unless that combat involves only friendly subs or friendly air or that combat is in friendly controlled territory (e.g. a sub under your fleet, your turn, or a CAP over your land), unless the opposing forces are entirely subs, etc"

[WanderingHead]

BTW, it's not like I don't agree it is frustrating. I just think it is not as straightforward to fix as at first it appears.

However, to me other aspects of FOW are more frustrating than this.

If you move an air unit and reveal FOW, and now you can't return to base if there is no combat. Somehow, if your English bombers scoot next to W Germany they can return to base only if there are enemy units in the water. If there are no enemy units, you can't initiate combat and they can't go home! It makes no sense.

I believe there should be a return to base feature for air, to return to base without combat if there are no enemy units.

[GKar]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

I understand that, but I think that there IS a downside, which is what I mentioned above.

In particular, what if you __want__ to see through FOW but don't want combat? Don't you want to see where you are going before you go there?

Ah, I see. I didn't think of e.g. planes and subs wanting to avoid combat. So there is a problem with units being able to move through occupied territory without taking opportunity fire. [8|]

[GKar]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

If you move an air unit and reveal FOW, and now you can't return to base if there is no combat. Somehow, if your English bombers scoot next to W Germany they can return to base only if there are enemy units in the water. If there are no enemy units, you can't initiate combat and they can't go home! It makes no sense.

I believe there should be a return to base feature for air, to return to base without combat if there are no enemy units.

Fully agreed. "Return to base" would solve the problem quite nicely. Until then I'll have to keep scouting with subs and transports.

[templeton]

I agree with the gripe - I'm new to the game, so I'm not familiar enough with the game to understand the combat odds fully, so I do need to drop units into an attack to see the ods - then decide if to initiatie the attack, or undo the move - but when the point unit gets stuck, that is not so good...
 
so there should be an option to finalise the move and reveal the fog-of-war - such as U-boats sailing past the UK, or sending a German fighter unit above the Channel... ie, moves with no combat that reveal fog-of-war.
 
It is also annoying in Pbem when you make a faulty move, and you get stuck with it due to the FoW rules.
 
 
It's a minor gripe, but I do need to first put the units into an attack before I decide whether or not to attack.

[christian brown]

The root issue here is the inability to run the Combat Analyzer w/o actually moving everything in.  Since everyone's current tech levels are known to everyone else, why not install a "dummy" analyzer: you would simply select the region you are considering attacking, plug in how many (and what kind of)  units you may use and..........there it is..this would be equally helpful when planning your force structure (of course.)

[dobeln]

Christian has a neat alternative solution. Alternatively, just finalize naval and air FOW-revealing moves automatically if no friendly land forces are present - should also solve the problem, but might be harder to program.