Out of plane slots?

[JustJoe]

Stock game, was playing with 1.6 patch. The game would not let me add planes to any of my air units. Its a PBEM game ( June 1944) so we both upgraded to the 1.806 patch looking for a fix but no joy. I remember reading something about a 30K limit so I suspect we hit that. Is there any fix for this?

[Terminus]

No.

[JustJoe]

Well, thats a definitive answer. What are people doing to get around this issue?

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: JustJoe

Well, thats a definitive answer. What are people doing to get around this issue?

Everyone has different ideas - lots of this is discuessed in the Scenarios Design (Mod) subforum - look in there for various solutions.

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: JustJoe

Stock game, was playing with 1.6 patch. The game would not let me add planes to any of my air units. Its a PBEM game ( June 1944) so we both upgraded to the 1.806 patch looking for a fix but no joy. I remember reading something about a 30K limit so I suspect we hit that. Is there any fix for this?

I'm a bit confused here. It sounds from the title that you are designing a new scenario, but from the text, it sounds like you have some problem with a game in progress.

If you are designing a scenario, the stock game left a number of empty aircraft slots in the database. Many of the popular mods filled in all these open slots. AE will have significantly more slots than stock.

If you are playing a scenario and you are running into some kind of problems with units taking replacements, you may have run into some kind of bug or the aircraft pools you are trying to tap have dried up for some reason.

Bill

[rtrapasso]

Heh - i had interpreted it as he was trying to make a new scenario for a game in progress... (ie - a new scenario to try to compensate for shortcomings of his current game.)

Of course, if one DOES make a new scenario, a complete restart is necessary - i know of no way to insert data from a current game into a new one.

If the original post is trying to solve a problem of a game in progress (i.e. - to continue a current game), it is not a "slots" problem.

"Slots" problems refers to inability to add plane (or ship, or LCU, etc) types to the game because there are limited number of "slots" for such in the game database.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

Well, i think he has a problem with airgroups that cannot draw new planes, even if enough planes are aviable.

This is also true for the pilots disappear-problem.
 
One of the biggest problems, cause you play a game into 44 (or 43) and then your pilots are gone or - for the allies even worser, you can´t replace losses.

A serious problem, because it happen latewar. For a short time a reinstall of the latest patch helped, but only for a few weeks. The missing pilot problem is evil, esp. for the japanese (if they have raised the level of their airgroups and they loose 1000 pilots and the replacements have exp.25 this will really hurt you). But not even draw replacements ist even worser. So you have 1000 B24 but sadly you can´t replace losses.
 
Does a solution exist?

[rtrapasso]

i'd like to get a clarification before trying to answer the question... i.e. - i'd like to answer the correct question.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

hm, my english is bad, but i think he has the problem that his air groups with less then maximum planes can´t recive replacement planes.
 
I had some head to head continuos games (with andrews map and experimential mods) and if i run it into 1943 this problem happened.

the allies couldn´t fill planes or pilots in their groups, the japanese couldn´t fill pilots (but still planes)

Like a 64-size group with 21 planes and 17 pilots couldn´t get the missing 43 planes or 47 pilots. even if 2100 planes were in pool or 4000 pilots.
 
In real games head to head (against my brother) we had similar problems with the pools. me as the allies had 2000 army pilots in the pool and every group was full. Next turn my squadrons lost 1700 land- and 700 navypilots (not planes) and my pools were empty. Same for the japanese
 
My opinion was (untill now) that the modification of stock games (replacement rates) had to be accused for this. But if in a real stockgame this happen also it seems to be a big bug.
 
The missing pilots happend around 4 days in a row, after that 2-3 weeks nothing wrong and then again vanishing for 3-4 days.

We even deleted 2000 planes each side, nothing helped. I check the iron storm mod in the moment and had deleted the soviet planes (cause we (my brother and me) play without the russians and to reduce the number of planes)
 
I think this is a serious bug and it has to be fixed in AE. I thought everbody knows about it...

[rtrapasso]

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi

hm, my english is bad, but i think he has the problem that his air groups with less then maximum planes can´t recive replacement planes.

I had some head to head continuos games (with andrews map and experimential mods) and if i run it into 1943 this problem happened.

the allies couldn´t fill planes or pilots in their groups, the japanese couldn´t fill pilots (but still planes)

Like a 64-size group with 21 planes and 17 pilots couldn´t get the missing 43 planes or 47 pilots. even if 2100 planes were in pool or 4000 pilots.

In real games head to head (against my brother) we had similar problems with the pools. me as the allies had 2000 army pilots in the pool and every group was full. Next turn my squadrons lost 1700 land- and 700 navypilots (not planes) and my pools were empty. Same for the japanese

My opinion was (untill now) that the modification of stock games (replacement rates) had to be accused for this. But if in a real stockgame this happen also it seems to be a big bug.

The missing pilots happend around 4 days in a row, after that 2-3 weeks nothing wrong and then again vanishing for 3-4 days.

We even deleted 2000 planes each side, nothing helped. I check the iron storm mod in the moment and had deleted the soviet planes (cause we (my brother and me) play without the russians and to reduce the number of planes)

I think this is a serious bug and it has to be fixed in AE. I thought everbody knows about it...

i think they are separate bugs... they are known about... don't know of a current fix.

EDIT: Actually, i was referring to the original poster's question.

[Adnan Meshuggi]

well, thank you for the infos.
At last, with no correction i will not buy AE. Its a game-killer-bug. I can live with many bugs, but not with this. Playing against my brother is no problem, but against others here? Investing 2 or more years only to see the game end because of fatal error? Very sad that it seems that no real interest in solving the problem exist. And i allways thought this happen "only" in player-mods. But now, i learn it is also in a stock game.
 
I think that one part of my description is his "problem".
 
But as i said, if no solution is known...
 
 

[wdolson]

As one of the code gnomes working on AE, I know for a fact that there is a strong interest in fixing as many bugs as possible.  At the moment, work on bug fixes for the original game have stopped temporarily, but the reason the game engine is up to version 1.806 is because Matrix was willing to invest in the support effort.  It's very rare for a game to be updated more than a year after its initial release.

I do not know this for sure, but I believe that there is a plan to go back to the original game after AE gets to the point where the code is frozen for release and incorporate some of the bugs fixed in AE into the original game.  At the moment, the manpower to fix bugs in the original game isn't available. 

I know it's very frustrating to run into these sorts of things.  All the programmers play the game too and we've been bitten by them.  I volunteered for the AE team because I wanted to do my part to make the game better.

Bill

[rtrapasso]

There is continued work on fixing game bugs in the standard WITP game that AE team members may or may not be aware of... Since the two game engines are the same (or almost), fixes for one will affect the other.

However, for someone to announce a problem and then give an ultimatum (fix it or else ___) is not conducive to induce cooperation by unpaid* volunteers to give aid. It is by folk (volunteers) that bugs are fixed.


(*or paid ones, although i know of none on this forum.)

[Adnan Meshuggi]

Well, maybe you misunderstood me?

I play WITP... i still make clear that AE needs to fix game-stopping bugs or i (personal opinion) will not buy the game i otherwise would buy now.

If AE was a patch - i would see it different.

The problem with WitP is, it has some harmless bugs, some serious bugs and some game-stoppers. The pilot-vanishing-thing is a gamestopper. For both sides. Also the "i can´t fill up my air groups even if i have the planes"-bug is in the same category.

As i wrote earlier, i thought it depends on playerdefined games (messing something), but if STOCK-Games are involved too, then i think the most important bugfix is to clean up this problems. I do not care if the torpedo-hitrate is 3% to low or the combat value of my bbs are 7% to high. But the "damned, i can forget my airforce cause a bug nobody know to find a solution"-bug should have priority 1.
 
My question is, what good purpose do AE have if gamestopperbugs not even are recognized or worked for?
 
Just to make it clear, i love WitP, i played since it came out, every day. But i am really frustrated that all games i played against humans stopped because of these bugs and neverever did i hear "we work on it".
My opinion is, that the named pilot pool is guilty for it.
I have deep respect for the programmer who try to fix the bugs.
 
In WitP we have to live with the bugs - but for AE as a consumer i can expect that the game works well. And that i have a chance that my air groups are useful from start to end.
 
It is quite easy to reproduce... just make head to head and continuos game, go into 1944 and try to put pilots into allied air groups. voila
 
So sorry if i sound agressive - i am just very frustrated that this bug wasn´t taken serious so long or that no workaorund exist (i have deleted russian air force to "save" plane-numbers (if this is the problem))
 
No bad feelings from my side, just frustration

[rtrapasso]

My question is, what good purpose do AE have if gamestopperbugs not even are recognized or worked for?

The bug is known about, and patches ARE being worked on. AE is being worked on by many of the same team members, but i believe many of the improvements of AE will be reflected into standard WITP.

All of this takes a lot of effort, and since it is being done in our "spare time", it might not get done as fast as we players would like, but work DOES continue on the fixes.

Since i am not a programmer, i don't know how close fixes are to the particular problems you have described, but i believe these are on the "to be fixed" list.

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

There is continued work on fixing game bugs in the standard WITP game that AE team members may or may not be aware of... Since the two game engines are the same (or almost), fixes for one will affect the other.

I stand corrected then. I didn't know that any bug fixes were being done on the original game at the moment.

Bill

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: Adnan Meshuggi

Well, maybe you misunderstood me?

I play WITP... i still make clear that AE needs to fix game-stopping bugs or i (personal opinion) will not buy the game i otherwise would buy now.

I can't guarantee that AE will be bug free. That's very difficult to do with program this size. However, all the programmers are focused on fixing bugs as we find them. We have a team of play testers trying to break the program so we can fix it. The current programming team are all veteran programmers and we've seen a lot of bugs.

If a show stopper works its way into the released version of AE, it will be something obscure enough that we missed it during testing.

The problem with WitP is, it has some harmless bugs, some serious bugs and some game-stoppers. The pilot-vanishing-thing is a gamestopper. For both sides. Also the "i can´t fill up my air groups even if i have the planes"-bug is in the same category.

I'm not working on the air code, but I believe the vanishing pilot problem was fixed in AE. I haven't seen any issues come up about it.

My question is, what good purpose do AE have if gamestopperbugs not even are recognized or worked for?

Since the effort to patch the original game started, there has been an effort to catch an eliminate every major bug possible. In some cases, what appeared as one bug to a player actually were several different bugs with the same symptoms.

In WitP we have to live with the bugs - but for AE as a consumer i can expect that the game works well. And that i have a chance that my air groups are useful from start to end.

It is quite easy to reproduce... just make head to head and continuos game, go into 1944 and try to put pilots into allied air groups. voila

So sorry if i sound agressive - i am just very frustrated that this bug wasn´t taken serious so long or that no workaorund exist (i have deleted russian air force to "save" plane-numbers (if this is the problem))

No bad feelings from my side, just frustration

As a WitP player, I know your frustration. I know many software companies come out with new versions of products that have more features, but they don't bother to fix the bugs. I think that is dishonest business. The focus in AE has been on both: add the new features, and fix bugs when we find them.

As I said, I'm sure AE will have some bugs we missed, but we are striving to fix everything we find.

Bill

[JustJoe]

This is the thread starter here.  The problem is in a current game that we have been playing for two years.  As the Japanese, I have plenty of planes but the game would not allow me to add any to my units saying there are no slots available.  The same thing happened with the Allied player.  However, after a turn with aircraft/pilot losses the game will allow us to add some planes to our units.  This leads me to believe there is some upper game code limit on either pilots or planes that we have reached. 
 
The work around that we come up with is to send transport units to thier deaths by being intercepted over designated bases.  Also, as the Japanese I will make use of the Kamikaze function to get rid of as many second rate aircraft as possible.  This should allow us to keep our front line units somewhat up to strength.  This sucks, the Japanese pilot training program is now in shambles, but it allows the game to go on.

[wdolson]

I don't know of any limitations on the total number of aircraft in the game.  It doesn't make sense that there would be.  There is a limit on the number of fragments though.  If you split up a lot of the large air units into smaller pieces, that could cause you to run into a limit.  I haven't played stock for a long time, but I believe USAAF units are group size and you can split them down to squadron size. 

So if you have divded up a lot of air units, that could be a problem.

Bill

[Adnan Meshuggi]

Hi,
 
thanks to all.

First, i have a huge respect for the crew that made so much bugs vanish.

It sounds great if the "pilot loss"-bug has been elliminated. Cause this one is really a pi*-off. As the japanese, you carefully manage to fill your pilot pool and elite crews and then - zap - they are gone. And mostly these experienced pilots are lost. So the braindead recruits stay and the aces go.

For the allies, it is the same. If you need to fill up quickly 2000 carrierpilots but your pool is empty you end with exp-30-pilots
 
naturally, AE will have thousends of bugs, that is normal for such a large game - but i am more happy now with the informations (and even if i lie to myself). I hope that the bugs that come to life can be handled.
 
I just hate the idea of 1 year intensive playing with ae to learn the new features and then 2 other years for gameplay with a dammned gamestopping bug nobody can do something about. But this is not the guilt of the playtesteters or programmers (okay, the programmers AFTER Gary). I just hope most of the hardcoded goodies (i call em different) are gone. So no Zerobonus, no Übercap, no "Japanese Pilots gone stupid at a certain day in 44".

WitP is the best pacific war game and i miss such a game about the eastern front (i am fair, 20km per hex and bat-level would be enough for me ) I am a fan of complex games and i accept problems. I just hate such problems nobody can do something against.
 
greetings