Kamikazes - Some Strange & Some Downright Odd Observations

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: Raverdave

WTF is WAD ? [&:]

WAD has to do with the quantum mechanical nature of the univer---- OK, OK, WAD = Working As Designed.

[:D]

[yeknod]

Oh.. not Weak Ass Dude? ... better read again...

[ChezDaJez]

My email to Andy Mac included the before and 3 separate afters where I was able to reproduce the fault. Once identified this took around 1/2 an hour to generate. Clearly the before is most useful as it allows you to re-run the turn to see if you can reproduce the fault/issue. The after just shows what happened and not necessarily how.

Hi bsq,

I'm apologise if you thought I was referring to you. I wasn't trying to refer to any one person. Your postings have been straight forward without any harsh criticisms.

I was just trying to say that some civility when presenting a perceived problem with the game would be nice instead of some just ranting "This game is broken!"

Chez

[bsq]

Chez

No need to apologise at all, that post was just to show how easy it is to actually create and send a save to you guys.

I have (on and off) tested software for the last 24 years and I am quite good at 'breaking it'. This to the point where the software field engineers for certain suppliers of military hardware/software dread seeing me in the trials crew.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: bsq

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: bsq

I think that this is a stack overflow error that has been seen before. Look at the numbers after the casualty figures ie 0 Destroyed and 0 Disabled. These are just screwy numbers the maths throws out when the CPU is confronted with something it cannot handle. I think we are lucky, it most software I have worked with it would be an unhandled exception at the very least and a CTD in most cases or perhaps a BSD (God forbid). At least AE just reports it with a virtual 'shoulder shrug' and then moves on...

I had assumed they were civilian cacualties. The Destroyed and Disabled numbers are by squad, and are always military.
And, while I'm not a very good programmer, I doubt a stack overflow error would also trigger the text output to preface the Allied casualty report. Why was there ANY math done in an Allied casualty calculation module that allowed a potential stack overflow?

The same has been observed when the combat has been air vs naval with no troops being carried. The numbers seen vary wildy, but are always greater than 65536, hence appearing (to me) to be a mathematical error in the code somewhere. Civillians are only abstracted in the game as population numbers at certain locations where they have a conseqence to production and the like. When these are lost (to strategic bombing) they are only ever expressed in small numbers (up to the value of the population for that particular hex).

No, they are represented as casualties when the attack ordered from the City button is against Manpower. It's your game; what attack did you order in this case? Was it Industry, Manpower, Oil, what? You're still avoiding the issue--WHY are Allied casualties of any number attempted to be calculated at all in a City attack on the HI?

For that matter, if it was a Manpower attack, where is the Fires report? I don't remember exactly from WITP if Fires is reported in the combat report, or if the player must Recon mission the city the next day, but Fires should be a result of a Superfort Manpower attack. Did you recon the next day? Any attack that kills 90,000 civilians ought to have a non-zero Fires report.

[bsq]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

ORIGINAL: bsq

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58





I had assumed they were civilian cacualties. The Destroyed and Disabled numbers are by squad, and are always military.
And, while I'm not a very good programmer, I doubt a stack overflow error would also trigger the text output to preface the Allied casualty report. Why was there ANY math done in an Allied casualty calculation module that allowed a potential stack overflow?

The same has been observed when the combat has been air vs naval with no troops being carried. The numbers seen vary wildy, but are always greater than 65536, hence appearing (to me) to be a mathematical error in the code somewhere. Civillians are only abstracted in the game as population numbers at certain locations where they have a conseqence to production and the like. When these are lost (to strategic bombing) they are only ever expressed in small numbers (up to the value of the population for that particular hex).

No, they are represented as casualties when the attack ordered from the City button is against Manpower. It's your game; what attack did you order in this case? Was it Industry, Manpower, Oil, what? You're still avoiding the issue--WHY are Allied casualties of any number attempted to be calculated at all in a City attack on the HI?

For that matter, if it was a Manpower attack, where is the Fires report? I don't remember exactly from WITP if Fires is reported in the combat report, or if the player must Recon mission the city the next day, but Fires should be a result of a Superfort Manpower attack. Did you recon the next day? Any attack that kills 90,000 civilians ought to have a non-zero Fires report.

Excuse me but I am avoiding nothing. I don't have an answer for you as I cannot explain it. What I can say is that your first sentence is incorrect. See here:

Night Air attack on Yokohama/Yokosuka , at 113,61

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Japanese aircraft
D4Y2-S Judy x 5
J1N1-Sa Irving x 9
Ki-45 KAId Nick x 10
Ki-109-I Peggy x 5


Allied aircraft
B-29-25 Superfort x 3


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-29-25 Superfort: 3 damaged



Manpower hits 4
Fires 2555

Aircraft Attacking:
3 x B-29-25 Superfort bombing from 10000 feet *
City Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Yokosuka Ku S-3 with J1N1-Sa Irving (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 3 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 9000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 30 minutes
332 Ku S-3 with J1N1-Sa Irving (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 1 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 12000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 34 minutes
S-804 Hikotai with D4Y2-S Judy (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 5 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 9000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
53rd Sentai with Ki-45 KAId Nick (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 4 being recalled, 6 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 11000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 41 minutes
107th Sentai with Ki-109-I Peggy (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 29 minutes

Raid detected at 80 NM, estimated altitude 14,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 25 minutes

Clearly manpower hits are abstracted as how could a game (even as complex as this) hope to accurately track civilians.

So whilst I cannot tell you what these numbers are - I can tell you what they are not - they are not civilian casualties.

[freeboy]

well, big large bombers should not make it througfh the above high AA and cap, period... not even in an IJFB wd, BUT causing critical cascading damage should be realistic, on some ships. I do think an Iowa class ship should be pretty toogh to sink... Andy, please let us know what you find!

[DuckofTindalos]

It's being checked. You'll learn soon enough.

"Manpower" doesn't equal "Civilian Population". It's what's used to fill out squads; if you want it to equal population, then I suppose it's "males capable of bearing arms".

[freeboy]

thank you...

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: bsq


xcuse me but I am avoiding nothing. I don't have an answer for you as I cannot explain it. What I can say is that your first sentence is incorrect. See here:

Night Air attack on Yokohama/Yokosuka , at 113,61

Weather in hex: Partial cloud

Japanese aircraft
D4Y2-S Judy x 5
J1N1-Sa Irving x 9
Ki-45 KAId Nick x 10
Ki-109-I Peggy x 5


Allied aircraft
B-29-25 Superfort x 3


No Japanese losses

Allied aircraft losses
B-29-25 Superfort: 3 damaged



Manpower hits 4
Fires 2555

Aircraft Attacking:
3 x B-29-25 Superfort bombing from 10000 feet *
City Attack: 10 x 500 lb GP Bomb

CAP engaged:
Yokosuka Ku S-3 with J1N1-Sa Irving (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 3 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 9000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 30 minutes
332 Ku S-3 with J1N1-Sa Irving (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 1 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 12000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 34 minutes
S-804 Hikotai with D4Y2-S Judy (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 5 being recalled, 0 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 9000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 12 minutes
53rd Sentai with Ki-45 KAId Nick (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 4 being recalled, 6 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 11000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 41 minutes
107th Sentai with Ki-109-I Peggy (0 airborne, 0 on standby, 0 scrambling)
0 plane(s) not yet engaged, 2 being recalled, 3 out of immediate contact.
Group patrol altitude is 6000
Time for all group planes to reach interception is 29 minutes

Raid detected at 80 NM, estimated altitude 14,000 feet.
Estimated time to target is 25 minutes

Clearly manpower hits are abstracted as how could a game (even as complex as this) hope to accurately track civilians.

So whilst I cannot tell you what these numbers are - I can tell you what they are not - they are not civilian casualties.

So the raid in the combat report was a Ground Attack against troops? If so, there is STILL more wrong than a stack overflow, because, again, NO ALLIED TROOPS WERE IN TOKYO. The Japanese report is wrong--maybe due to a stack overflow--and a different problem exists in the firing of the text lines to report Allied LCU casualties, and then, possibly, a stack overflow in calculating Allied casualties which should never have been calculated.

IF these results feed into VP calaculations, and IF this represents a repeatable bug, it has as much or more effect on the game than the potential kami errors you've described. 100,000 troop casualties from 34-plane raids gets you to auto-victory pretty fast.

Maybe there's a corruption in your particular game/save, but if this is really a code problem, I'd say it needs fixing as much as the single-shot kami thing.

[bsq]

ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

IF these results feed into VP calaculations, and IF this represents a repeatable bug, it has as much or more effect on the game than the potential kami errors you've described. 100,000 troop casualties from 34-plane raids gets you to auto-victory pretty fast.

No because these reuslts (if indeed thats what they are) are completely ignored on the Intelligence Report screen - it is as if they did not occur (which is what I think is happening as they are just a glitch).

So the over powered, overused Kamikazes are still the main issue here.

[freeboy]

did anything come of the "its being checked?" yet thanks again for your helpful and truley humerous posts Mr. T...
freeboy, proud member of the Mr. T fanboy, makes me a MRTFB  ![&o]

[freeboy]

bump
 

[Erik Rutins]

Note the last code change in the final readme. [8D]