Search Arcs problem seems to still be flawd (bugg) ...

[witpqs]

Well, search arcs will give better results because they concentrate the assigned planes in a smaller area. But the old code is still there - and being used now - so when you have a group set with no arc (000 to 000) you get coverage.

[crsutton]

Yes, I know but I got a hot game going against a good opponent. As said above, if it is there and it will give me a slight edge, I won't be able to not use it. Another half hour of clicking.....[>:]

[bradfordkay]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

Yes, I know but I got a hot game going against a good opponent. As said above, if it is there and it will give me a slight edge, I won't be able to not use it. Another half hour of clicking.....[>:]

You know that you are exaggerating, right? It will add a hour or more to the first turn, but after that I would wager that it adds no more than a few minutes per turn - only needing to be done when a unit is moved or newly arrived.

[Kaletsch2007]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

It is a marvelous game but the time needed to play it is twice that of WITP due to a thousand more clicks needed. I find that trying to play two campaigns is almost impossible.

It is like going to see a four hour movie. Might be a great movie but for god sakes who want to see a freaking four hour movie? Edit, edit, edit. Some time spent on the next patch should be devoted to streamlining the game. I know I speak like a heritic but it just has to be done. My wife just gets tired of calling me down for dinner over and over........

You still have time for dinner with your wife ?
I need to improve my time management[:D]

[Smeulders]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

Well, search arcs will give better results because they concentrate the assigned planes in a smaller area. But the old code is still there - and being used now - so when you have a group set with no arc (000 to 000) you get coverage.

I actually think not setting search arcs sometimes has it's advantages. If you have a limited number of planes that need to search a large area (let's say enough planes to search 100° but you need to cover 300°), then setting search arcs will give you excellent coverage for a small part of the area, but no coverage at all for the rest. Not setting any search arcs you will lose some planes to the useless 60°, but at least due to the randomness you will have a chance of spotting enemies in every part of the 300° you do want to search. At the very least you will not leave a large, guaranteed open sector for your opponent to exploit.

If the search routine allows for spotting in neighbouring sectors, or allows ships to be spotted by planes in every sector that it transited, then non-continuous random sectors are certainly the way to go if there is a lack of planes to give dedicated search everywhere.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: crsutton

Yes, I know but I got a hot game going against a good opponent. As said above, if it is there and it will give me a slight edge, I won't be able to not use it. Another half hour of clicking.....[>:]

You know that you are exaggerating, right? It will add a hour or more to the first turn, but after that I would wager that it adds no more than a few minutes per turn - only needing to be done when a unit is moved or newly arrived.

Yes, I know that I am exaggerating......

But I won't back off here. There are too many details to attend to as it is.

[Alpha77]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

It is a marvelous game but the time needed to play it is twice that of WITP due to a thousand more clicks needed. I find that trying to play two campaigns is almost impossible.

It is like going to see a four hour movie. Might be a great movie but for god sakes who want to see a freaking four hour movie? Edit, edit, edit. Some time spent on the next patch should be devoted to streamlining the game. I know I speak like a heritic but it just has to be done. My wife just gets tired of calling me down for dinner over and over........

Ditoed.


I made a posting some weeks ago with some streamline/improvement ideas, but no one answered so I figured that I am a big minority here who wants less micromanagement.. [8|] Seems there is at least one more. Meanwhile I even have more ideas, but probably most rather want more clicks....[:D]

Btw/Edit: I don´t have the newest game version (guess mine is some months old) and I use only normal search, now that the allies have more search assets it seems they even detect something without arcs. It also seems that I am NOT affected by the Radar bug - when was this introduced ?? My fighters mostly scramble early enough for interception and also there is a message "detected by radar" or simmilar

[bradfordkay]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: crsutton

Yes, I know but I got a hot game going against a good opponent. As said above, if it is there and it will give me a slight edge, I won't be able to not use it. Another half hour of clicking.....[>:]

You know that you are exaggerating, right? It will add a hour or more to the first turn, but after that I would wager that it adds no more than a few minutes per turn - only needing to be done when a unit is moved or newly arrived.

Yes, I know that I am exaggerating......

But I won't back off here. There are too many details to attend to as it is.

So your argument is that since you don't want to take advantage of hte extra detail, no one else should be allowed to do so?

That's what it boils down to if the search arcs are implemented as originally intended.

[crsutton]

Well, you reach a point of diminshing return. How many good gamers have passed up on AE-many after buying it, due to the massive complexity? The problem with the members of the forum (myself included) is that we are a pretty hard core group of players and tend to love all the detail. But is it really a good thing if the game is just too complex? Is there ever a game that is too complex? I think so. I have seen may in 45 years of wargaming. In fact, I owned many boardgames for years that I never got around to trying out. The greatest movies generally are great because they have great editing. The same hold true for any simulation. Yes, this game can be trimmed a bit and might be a better game for it.

[bradfordkay]

I can understand your point. It's just that search arcs was one of the extra details added to AE that I really enjoy. It's much more fun to setup search arcs (and verify that you have the right coverage by hitting the "z" key) than it is to train pilots. Both of these are an aspect of a level of detail that the theatre commander would not be bothering with, and so are extra work that really didn't need to be in there. However, the consequences of having search arcs in the game and not using them are far less devastating than having pilot training in the game and not using it.

To each his own... my hopes are that they will be fixed.

[davidjruss]

With , it seems , the manual search arc being "bugged" at present , would a "computerised" search ( such as ASW ) from an aircraft based on a coast hex , search the inland hexes as well as the sea ones ?

To prevent my relatively few search aircraft looking in the most inappropriate areas I tend to manually select which degrees of compass bearing to use.

I therefore hope that the search problem can be resolved.

[crsutton]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

I can understand your point. It's just that search arcs was one of the extra details added to AE that I really enjoy. It's much more fun to setup search arcs (and verify that you have the right coverage by hitting the "z" key) than it is to train pilots. Both of these are an aspect of a level of detail that the theatre commander would not be bothering with, and so are extra work that really didn't need to be in there. However, the consequences of having search arcs in the game and not using them are far less devastating than having pilot training in the game and not using it.

To each his own... my hopes are that they will be fixed.

Ok, I will concede that if they do institute working search arcs that I most likely will "not" delete the game from my hard drive....[;)]

[TommyG]

I have recently discovered that many things I learned in WitP or early AE, no longer apply. I want to make sure I have the current staus of search arcs correct. I am now setting all seach at "random arc" and when I press the Z key I get a search arc of 0-30 degrees. Am I doing this right? I do not want to search 0-30, which is usually over the desert.
As an an aside, I am aganist micromanaging anything I don't want to micromanage. Getting to see the pretty green search patterns is, to me, worth the time to set it up. Pulling out pilots one at a time with multiple clicks to refill a soon-to-be disbanded squadron is not. I spend more time on pilot training than all other elements of a turn combined.
Since this is obviously a matter of personal taste, I'll live with all the details.

[Canoerebel]

ORIGINAL: TommyG
As an an aside, I am aganist micromanaging anything I don't want to micromanage. Getting to see the pretty green search patterns is, to me, worth the time to set it up. Pulling out pilots one at a time with multiple clicks to refill a soon-to-be disbanded squadron is not. I spend more time on pilot training than all other elements of a turn combined.Since this is obviously a matter of personal taste, I'll live with all the details.

+1 (and I would like to raise that by 10 to the 29th power)

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: TommyG

I have recently discovered that many things I learned in WitP or early AE, no longer apply. I want to make sure I have the current staus of search arcs correct. I am now setting all seach at "random arc" and when I press the Z key I get a search arc of 0-30 degrees. Am I doing this right? I do not want to search 0-30, which is usually over the desert.
As an an aside, I am aganist micromanaging anything I don't want to micromanage. Getting to see the pretty green search patterns is, to me, worth the time to set it up. Pulling out pilots one at a time with multiple clicks to refill a soon-to-be disbanded squadron is not. I spend more time on pilot training than all other elements of a turn combined.
Since this is obviously a matter of personal taste, I'll live with all the details.

Tommy, until they are fixed in the next "major" code patch, I would recommend not using the search arcs at all. The best way is to not select anything for them, not even the "random arc". You should not see any pretty search patterns on the map when you press the Z key. [:)]

[bradfordkay]

Mike, how can you reset to "no search arcs" without hitting the "random arc" key?

If you stand the unit down and then reset it to any percentage of naval search it will bring back up the same search arc you had previously set.

[witpqs]

Set the arc as "000 to 000".

EDIT: Which it should automatically do when you press the "Reset Arc" button.

[USSAmerica]

OK, sorry, I guess I misunderstood the "random" setting.  If the start and end are both set to 000, then effectively the search arcs are turned off.  [:)]

[bradfordkay]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

Set the arc as "000 to 000".

EDIT: Which it should automatically do when you press the "Reset Arc" button.

I was always concerned that setting the arc as 000 to 000 would set up a 360 degree search arc, as opposed to a random search arc.

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: witpqs

Set the arc as "000 to 000".

EDIT: Which it should automatically do when you press the "Reset Arc" button.

I was always concerned that setting the arc as 000 to 000 would set up a 360 degree search arc, as opposed to a random search arc.

Michael clarified that a while back - it isn't actually a random arc. It uses the old code where there is a chance to detect any TF within range.