air recon in ToW

[gwgardner]

Haha, Chuck can't hide a 1-8 motorized division in the remotest part of his country anymore, and slip it in behind the advancing enemy unnoticed, to cut them off from supply.

[dooya]

Air recon reveals only 2 hexes around the target hex. This leaves much space to hide units. [:D]

[Anraz]

No, no, it is not so easy
Recon range depends on tech level and... just look at the screen beneath:

[Uxbridge]

So, recon range depends on tech level! Does this imply that combat range and bombing range also depends on tech level? It would be great if it did.

Another question: I noticed that you can now attack units in sea areas. Is there a possibility to see whether there are any units there, or do one have to do it blind and hope for the best? This is a place where recon could have an influence. Recon first, attacks second.

[James Ward]

Is this some sort of what if scenario? British recon being shot down by the Russkies in March of 44!

[doomtrader]

Uxbridge, you can attack navy by air units, but it's a roulette. If your units find enemy forces, they will try to attack.

[Uxbridge]

I see. The change from not being able to attack at all and having the opportunity to do so is very welcome; quite a big improvement in an area where the game had its most notable weekness. But I would much rather have seen that there was some way of finding out whether there were enemy units in the area before I attacked. In one sense it does make some sense, however, since in reality the intercepting side would have to allocate air units to guard certain sea areas without knowing beforehand what they were going to find. But it's far from perfect.

We have played this game daily ever since its release, so we're beginning to get rather good at it now. Seen in retrospect I would say that the most prominent fault of the naval system is psychologically. Moving land and air units around is easy and graphically pleasing. Doing something with the naval system is very much the opposite. In most of our games we simply lose interest in it a few turns after start and no one bothers to move any ships at all. Of course, this fact is maybe more so since the game crashes every time someone loads troops on transport, why we're moving everything by sea by re-writing the land_units.csv.

After the new changes, can you see immediately after the interception whether you have struck anything? If so, this is good.

[doomtrader]

Yes, you can see the result just after the attack.

[Uxbridge]

Well, that's nice! Then attacking into the area could be a way of actually examine that space. It will work fine in the Med.

[SeaMonkey]

Actually I believe the way this should work is dependent upon an allocation of air units to recon a certain seazone.  In reality, air units are made up of different aircraft types with the ability to perform certain roles, some with multi-role capability.
 
If you deploy air forces to a certain area, they aren't there just to await an opportunity to attack, they are there to provide certain functions and one of those is patrolling.  Most of the time there is a schedule of sorties for reconnaissance and IMO that should be an automatic feature of the game engine.  The act of deployment should automatically commence "the search" when the player makes the air unit commitment.
 
Sure, your recon elements shouldn't always be successful at disclosing the enemy, dependent upon the proximity of enemy air units, weather, map topography, perhaps the experience of the deployed units, etc., but still the revelation of enemy units should be calculated by the game engine and subsequently be apparent to the phasing player so that they can concentrate on the attack initiation.

[Uxbridge]

All right, but you're just talking hypothetically now, since such a change can't be implemented without a rather thorough re-writing of the game engine? If so, I do agree to the scheme you're suggesting. But within the limitations imposed by the existing engine, I feel that the new changes are welcome.

[doomtrader]

You are both right.

We have been limitated by the game engine, but we have of course remembered that the air unit should be pretty close to seazone if attempting to attack navy

[Anraz]

ORIGINAL: James Ward

Is this some sort of what if scenario? British recon being shot down by the Russkies in March of 44!

In order to test AI behavior I was playing 1939 scenario as Great Britain (to see how Germany and USSR will deal with each other). After defeating Germany (USSR won with my little help) I tried to form line of defense to attack USSR, but I was attacked by Soviets before my line was ready. I almost failed to defend [fortunately there are auto-save for rescue ].

Look at the screen blow - AI is trying to form his own line of defense ( line adequate to my own). It is not ideal but looks promising. It is a part of synthetic tests, which help us to achieve the same effect in a normal play.

[Michael the Pole]

ORIGINAL: Uxbridge

I see. The change from not being able to attack at all and having the opportunity to do so is very welcome; quite a big improvement in an area where the game had its most notable weekness. But I would much rather have seen that there was some way of finding out whether there were enemy units in the area before I attacked. In one sense it does make some sense, however, since in reality the intercepting side would have to allocate air units to guard certain sea areas without knowing beforehand what they were going to find. But it's far from perfect.

Uxbridge, one of the nice touches in the new game is the fact that an unsuccessfull anti-shipping search only costs a single AP. This permits a second search if you suspect that you just missed the bad guys the first time, or some other action if you wish. Aircraft are required to be within five hexes of the Sea Zone that they are searching, and this has produced some difficulty in deciding exactly where the boundries of a sea zone are located, but you learn where the "sweet spots" are pretty quickly (try just north of Hamburg, for example!) (We were unable to put sea zone borders on the main map.)
I can tell you from painfull experience that you're taking your life into your own hands by leaving naval units in a Sea Zone where you don't have air superiority. They dont call ships "bomb magnets" without a reason![8D]
Vindication, ha ha!

[gwgardner]

Your screenshot shows a big improvement in the AI, as far as attention to fronts goes. Now how does it react, when the enemy blitzes through that front line and begins encirclements? Does it counterattack? Does it retreat from indefensible pockets?

[doomtrader]

In my games, it mostly it move back and tries to patch the front, simetimes it tries to cut off the blitz. Many depends on what kind of units AI have in the neigbourhood.

[Uxbridge]

Well, Mike, I'm just dying to have a go at it. [:)]

[Anraz]

ORIGINAL:  gwgardner

Now how does it react, when the enemy blitzes through that front line and begins encirclements? Does it counterattack? Does it retreat from indefensible pockets?

Take a look here: tm.asp?m=2146508&mpage=1&key=&#2146508