Proposal for formation templates - reducing micro management

[papajack]

How the system going to determine which div to reinforce when source are limited ?

Those trap in north or those dying at the south ..eventually you have to go  through manual reinforcement .....

you may even have  to turn on and off those auto refit every turn to avoid sending to the wrong div ..in battle things change rapidly ..that will be more tedious 

what about experience points , you might want to avoid mix with green unit send by the system...

what if suddenly that div need extra fire power that different from the initial template ? you can manual transfer let say bazooka but how the system going to do auto refit ?

[ernieschwitz]

I agree with papajack.

I don´t want templates. Much as i hate building up units from the ground, templates would ruin the ability to do special things. It would standardize things too much.

[jomni]

ORIGINAL: papajack

How the system going to determine which div to reinforce when source are limited ?

Those trap in north or those dying at the south ..eventually you have to go  through manual reinforcement .....

you may even have  to turn on and off those auto refit every turn to avoid sending to the wrong div ..in battle things change rapidly ..that will be more tedious 

what about experience points , you might want to avoid mix with green unit send by the system...

what if suddenly that div need extra fire power that different from the initial template ? you can manual transfer let say bazooka but how the system going to do auto refit ?

Some switches on reinforcement priority will do the trick. For TOE template tweaks, you just create a new enhanced TOE template and assign to that div. The units will then just flow to the div automatically if available.

Why fear change in these aspect when it will make your life easier? Flexibility will still be retained.

[TPM]

ORIGINAL: ernieschwitz

I agree with papajack.

I don´t want templates. Much as i hate building up units from the ground, templates would ruin the ability to do special things. It would standardize things too much.

You might have missed this earlier in the thread, but those of us who want templates want them to be OPTIONAL. Having them would not ruin anything, and they would only standardize things if you wanted them to.

[TPM]

I'm going to delve into this a bit more 'cause I'm totally into it.

First of all, as far as templates are concerned, we're talking about two different concepts:
1. Creating units from a template.
2. Sending replacements to those units that are somehow flagged as being from a certain template.

My quick ideas for both:

For creating units from a template, I believe this could be done with the current system in place by creating an action card within the game. There would be a card that says "Create template", and then you would be taken to a screen where you create and name the template. This would then turn up in the Action Card screen as a unit that you could build (similar to tweber's scenarios). It would cost PP, etc. (the "etc." means I haven't quite worked that part out yet).

For sending replacements, well this probably would require a new process in the current system. I'm imagining that certain units would be "tagged" with a formation template. Say, 3rd Division has a "Infantry Divsion #1" template tag. There would be two ways of sending replacements:

1. There would be some buttons in the unit screen like "Auto-Replace?", "Don't take replacements", and the most important--"Replacements Now". When you press the "Replace Now" button, your unit immediately gets reinforced up to the template level from its parent HQ. If there aren't enough units in the parent HQ, or if there isn't enough transport, guess what happens? You get what the HQ can send you and that's it. Again, this WOULD BE OPTIONAL. If you wanted, you could totally ignore the template tag and put WHATEVER YOU WANT INTO THE UNIT. The presence of the template tag WOULD NOT STOP YOU FROM PLAYING THE GAME THE OLD WAY. But using this alone would get rid of alot of clicking...instead of clicking a unit and picking infantry, blah, blah, you just pick the unit, press "Replacements Now" and bam, you're done, move on.

2. Auto replacements from the HQ. This one is more complicated, I haven't totally worked it out. Basically, I'm thinking you'll just press a "Auto Replace" button in the HQ and the HQ would send out whatever it could...in what order? I haven't worked that out yet...there might be optios for this.

Yes it's complicated to some degree, but it would also be freaking awesome. Gotta spend some more time on it...

[papajack]

i am all for creating template , as it does make life easier

But auto reinforcement it is a different ball game , it might create more tedious management beside the complex programming  as it need to take in a lot of variables but I am no expert on that

One might argue that it will be an OPTIONAL but from what I see , it is quite complex and to implement it . some changes has to be made to the game engine which so far has made AT / ATG so damn fun to play

I am not totally against this but I feel Vic's limited time can be better use somewhere. addressing much urgent features/bug

Perhaps in near future like AT 3 ?? 

p/s I do enjoy doing manual reinforcement , I always has few DIV that are my favorite , I name them Imperial Guard ...always give them the best units [:)] That something I have been looking forward to do each turn [:)]









[:)]

[Josh]

@ TPM "...Yes it's complicated to some degree, but it would also be freaking awesome. Gotta spend some more time on it..."
 
Well it sure is complicated, not only to implement it in the gameengine and the programming, but more important... how can you improve the game without making it *more* complicated and clickheavy? The Germans have a great word for this: "verschlimmbesserung" meaning one tries to make something better, only it gets worse and worse [:)] We've seen a few instances of this, devteams working for a year or more to improve a game, only to find out the gamingcommunity hates it when it finally gets released.
I'm playing a island game right now, it would be hell for the "AI template routine" to reinforce units two HQ's, a few ports and lots of contested seahexes away.
Gotta spend some more time on it for sure, well there's always AT2 ofcourse in the far future, say 1,5 year from now.

[sIg3b]

Err, I hope this is not a stupid question: Is there at least a copy button, or x2, x5 buttons, to create a couple of identical units at once, without typing in the same info 30x, if you want to create 30 identical units?

If not, this would be my highest priority wish. (I don´t have the game, yet.)

Edit: It would also be nice to copy an EXISTING unit, so you don´t need to type the info even once, if you want to create exact duplicates of unit you already have.

This would save me a lot of time, since I like to create an 'industry standard', rather than individualized units.

[Barthheart]

ORIGINAL: Josh

...
The Germans have a great word for this: "verschlimmbesserung" meaning one tries to make something better, only it gets worse and worse [:)]
....

That's interesting... in engineering we say "Better is the enemy of good". Only the Germans would have come up for a single word for it! [:D]

[Westheim]

ORIGINAL: Barthheart

ORIGINAL: Josh

...
The Germans have a great word for this: "verschlimmbesserung" meaning one tries to make something better, only it gets worse and worse [:)]
....

That's interesting... in engineering we say "Better is the enemy of good". Only the Germans would have come up for a single word for it! [:D]

These Germans have indeed totally awesome words, like Gewerbesteuerzerlegungserklärung. There's one lying on my desk in the office, and I don't want to think about it.

But on topic. People seem to ignore the inherent problems with auto reinforce systems. There ought to be two different types of these imaginable:

A) When selecting a unit, the options panel shows a button "auto-reinforce" to bring it back to full template strength.
B) Each round, HQs reinforce subordinate units automatically to full template strength.

B can be discarded right away under Advanced Tactics, since reinforcing a unit ends that units turn automatically. This will hurt the player in about nine of ten cases. If something's under attack and suffered casualties it might be a better idea to do something about it rather than to send more sheep into the hail of gunfire. It would also kill XPs in a veteran unit and cause many more issues.

A would give you the option to reinforce a unit which has suffered under the enemy's attack on the interturn back to full template strength. So, if it would have been a unit designed for defense against infantry, the template would call for 30 infantry and 5 machineguns in the unit, plus 5 horses for mobility. The evil enemy has attacked and there were some losses: now only 20 infantry, 2 machineguns and 3 horses are left. The player hits auto-reinforce now, the lowest HQ in the chain of command would be called for to send down 10 infantry, 3 machineguns, and 2 horses.

But too bad, only 5 infantry and 2 horses are available. The enemy has attacked elsewhere and has taken one of the towns producing for the HQ. So, no more reinforcements for now.

Let's say the next higher HQ has a reserve of 30 infantry and 20 horses. But the infantry is of the wrong type (rifle instead of SMG or whatever), and even worse: sending down reinforcements from here right into the wounded unit would cause disruption again, killing readiness and so on. So should be this second HQ in the chain of command be called at all? Well, maybe you could define this over an additional button or box to check in the formation template.

But should be the "wrong" infantry type be sent down as reinforcements? Wait, let's define it over an additional button or box to check in the formation template. But of course there are different situations all the time, so better add an additional box to check for the HQ in question which overrides the template box. Or shouldn't it? Add another box to check here, too.

Oh, waitwaitwait! The top level HQ has 215 of the "right" infantry type in reserve! Should those be sent down, causing disruption, consuming tons of landcap and so on? Add a few more buttons and another box there. Of course, there are other fronts as well that need reinforcements, so maybe we'd need another option to disable this and that ...

Of course these template editors, 20 additional buttons and 60 boxes to check flowing all over the screen would be entirely optional and could easily be turned off with this button there in the far left bottom corner of the screen.

Terrible system, thoroughly terrible. This will never end, as soon as you run out of reinforcements to possibly cover all things and casualties that can happen to you between turns. Don't tell me you're too lazy to look after your units after the AI's turn is finished. You would still have to even with this terrible system. The current system of manual reinforcements is working well enough (I don't say it's perfect, what then again life in itself sucks and is far from being even remotely enjoyable, let alone perfect), and I'd suggest to keep it this way, not as an option, but mandatorily.

[kendollem]

Yea i dont see how automatic replacement has any feasibility what so ever for a number of reasons ..

I think a template system would be nice where you can create new units from it and and choose a template for a Division and click a button to reinforce that division from the local Hq.. Tho as said prolly isnt going to save as much micromanagement as thought for reasons stated above ..

[jomni]

For those against the notion of auto reinforcement: why do you hate it so much when it is already being implemented successfully in several other games?  
 
Again, if there were a button to turn it off, then why are you guys still against the notion of implementing?

[MrLongleg]

ORIGINAL: Westheim

ORIGINAL: Barthheart

ORIGINAL: Josh

...
The Germans have a great word for this: "verschlimmbesserung" meaning one tries to make something better, only it gets worse and worse [:)]
....

That's interesting... in engineering we say "Better is the enemy of good". Only the Germans would have come up for a single word for it! [:D]

These Germans have indeed totally awesome words, like Gewerbesteuerzerlegungserklärung. There's one lying on my desk in the office, and I don't want to think about it.

But on topic. People seem to ignore the inherent problems with auto reinforce systems. There ought to be two different types of these imaginable:

A) When selecting a unit, the options panel shows a button "auto-reinforce" to bring it back to full template strength.
B) Each round, HQs reinforce subordinate units automatically to full template strength.

B can be discarded right away under Advanced Tactics, since reinforcing a unit ends that units turn automatically. This will hurt the player in about nine of ten cases. If something's under attack and suffered casualties it might be a better idea to do something about it rather than to send more sheep into the hail of gunfire. It would also kill XPs in a veteran unit and cause many more issues.

A would give you the option to reinforce a unit which has suffered under the enemy's attack on the interturn back to full template strength. So, if it would have been a unit designed for defense against infantry, the template would call for 30 infantry and 5 machineguns in the unit, plus 5 horses for mobility. The evil enemy has attacked and there were some losses: now only 20 infantry, 2 machineguns and 3 horses are left. The player hits auto-reinforce now, the lowest HQ in the chain of command would be called for to send down 10 infantry, 3 machineguns, and 2 horses.

But too bad, only 5 infantry and 2 horses are available. The enemy has attacked elsewhere and has taken one of the towns producing for the HQ. So, no more reinforcements for now.

Let's say the next higher HQ has a reserve of 30 infantry and 20 horses. But the infantry is of the wrong type (rifle instead of SMG or whatever), and even worse: sending down reinforcements from here right into the wounded unit would cause disruption again, killing readiness and so on. So should be this second HQ in the chain of command be called at all? Well, maybe you could define this over an additional button or box to check in the formation template.

But should be the "wrong" infantry type be sent down as reinforcements? Wait, let's define it over an additional button or box to check in the formation template. But of course there are different situations all the time, so better add an additional box to check for the HQ in question which overrides the template box. Or shouldn't it? Add another box to check here, too.

Oh, waitwaitwait! The top level HQ has 215 of the "right" infantry type in reserve! Should those be sent down, causing disruption, consuming tons of landcap and so on? Add a few more buttons and another box there. Of course, there are other fronts as well that need reinforcements, so maybe we'd need another option to disable this and that ...

Of course these template editors, 20 additional buttons and 60 boxes to check flowing all over the screen would be entirely optional and could easily be turned off with this button there in the far left bottom corner of the screen.

Terrible system, thoroughly terrible. This will never end, as soon as you run out of reinforcements to possibly cover all things and casualties that can happen to you between turns. Don't tell me you're too lazy to look after your units after the AI's turn is finished. You would still have to even with this terrible system. The current system of manual reinforcements is working well enough (I don't say it's perfect, what then again life in itself sucks and is far from being even remotely enjoyable, let alone perfect), and I'd suggest to keep it this way, not as an option, but mandatorily.

I don't think it is so terrible. Of course we need to change the fact that units get disrupted from being transferred. That was one thing I mentioned in the original post and also one thing the I believe needs to be changed anyway. And again - if you like spending fifteen minutes per turn sending reinforcements that is completely okay since you would not have to use the template system. I would love to have the templates. I could even settle without the auto-reinforce feature in the beginning if they would be a button to reinforce from the chain of command. But that would have the disadvantage that the units would not get filled in a round-robin way just focussing the reinforcements on the first units you use the button on.

On another note I think that although life sometimes sucks it can be still quite enjoyable

Prost !

[Westheim]

It was mentioned above that other games successfully employ auto reinforcement systems. Meanwhile you seem eager to change Advanced Tactics and it's concepts into something that it isn't. Of course transferring units causes disruption. Have all division commanders in history shared the same characteristics? I doubt so. I'm sure a Confederate unit transferred from Longstreet's to Stonewall Jackson's command would have felt pretty disrupted at first. One could certainly argue about the amount of disruption and 50% loss of readiness can seem harsh, but disruption is a well working concept of the game. This is about long term planning more than anything else. Get your stuff straightened out *before* you attack and assign units accordingly. Mentalities of "Today Yugoslavia, tomorrow Greece, and next week I'll drive through Russia" have worked out rarely in world history.

Instead you want to add a concept bound to clash with Advanced Tactic's mechanisms of how unit stats are handled. This is also why you want disruption to be killed off - it directly prohibits your auto reinforcements idea as soon as you enter the second HQ from the bottom in the chain of command. Of course this would have advantages. You could break through somewhere with an armoured unit, buy 50% losses, and then immediately reinforce it - while the unit is actually behind enemy front lines - with some experience loss, but if the readiness would not suffer, this wouldn't be such a bad trade at all. How unrealistic is that, reinforcing units in the middle of enemy land with no penalties and downturns whatsoever.

Anyway. Seems to me that you want to change Advanced Tactics into some other game.

[lion_of_judah]

If this is made a possibility, then has anyone considered having templates for Brigades with the Brigade symbol, and Divisions with the Division symbol or is this not possible. I saw screenshots from Decisive campaigns was it that Vic made where you could tell which units were brigades and divisions, bltn's and what not. Curious on if this is even possible....

[jomni]

ORIGINAL: Westheim
Anyway. Seems to me that you want to change Advanced Tactics into some other game.

Yes I want it to change to a game that I want to play.
Currently I'm not buying ATG because of this issue as I found it tiresome in AT.
No worries, I guess I'll have to keep playing the other games. [:D]

[JJKettunen]

As a noob I have played an evensteven scen (Ger vs. Rus) to learn the ropes, and I have to say that already after a couple of days the constant TOE managing starts to feel a bit tedious. Some people may enjoy this game as a TOE manager, but I'd rather concentrate more on operational manoeuvres, if possible.

Please fix or do somefink! [;)]

e: just to clarify, optional unit templates and an optional replacement system is what I wish (if feasible), not screwing up the original design.

[Grymme]

I for one would see the template option, ratios, officers etc..., really anything that adds to the game without subtracting anything else as a positive. Off course it is.

And there is nothing wrong with wishing things for a game, it in itself is a pure positive.

What i do think some people (me including) have issues with is the complaining. If the game is not what you were expecting fine, then maybe you have a valid point. But if its just that you dont LIKE some aspect of the game that does play as it was intended, wish for it or keep quiet, dont complain.

[Casus_Belli]

I had this very idea at about 3am when I should've been getting some sleep . And so I endorse it.

ORIGINAL: el hefe

I would also like to add that it would also be nice when you select your templated unit to build, that the game would automatically use your naming provisions numerically. So, if I created three templates for units and we'll call them "Infantry Division", "Armored Division", and "Cavalry Division." When I click on the add new formation, the game gives me the option to create one of three templates that I created. The game then automatically renames them using my templates name. If I create a new armored division from my template, it automatically names the unit "x Armored Division".

These templates should be completely optional and players could fully ignore them if they choose.

Trey

[Casus_Belli]

@ Westheim: "life in itself sucks and is far from being even remotely enjoyable".

Steady on! At least there are games like ATG to play and enjoy.