Game keeps the same old defects

Gary Grigsby’s War in the West 1943-45 is the most ambitious and detailed computer wargame on the Western Front of World War II ever made. Starting with the Summer 1943 invasions of Sicily and Italy and proceeding through the invasions of France and the drive into Germany, War in the West brings you all the Allied campaigns in Western Europe and the capability to re-fight the Western Front according to your plan.

Moderators: Joel Billings, RedLancer

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fbs7
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun May 11, 2008 10:46 pm

Game keeps the same old defects

Post by fbs7 »

I am extremely disappointed that the game keeps most of the old bad behaviors from WitE -- even if it costs the same full amount as a brand new game. For that amount I would expect that some of the old irritations would have gone away, but looks like they are going to stay forever.

A simple example: I click on AFHQ, and I see it has I FF Corps; great. I click on I FF Corps and I can see its composition. But, where is it? I would have expected that after 5 years of game development I would get a button to Find the unit on the map, or if I clicked on the icon it would find it on the map.

The inability to find your units in the map is one of the biggest irritations in WitE, and lo and behold continues in WitW -- with some other added irritations. Still in AFHQ, now I see several units listing in there. Great. Now, which ones are in the map and which ones are not? I have no idea! Clicking on the link doesn't help. Finding your units in the map is one of the most basic things in a wargame. But I'm back to not only the old bore of following command lines with Shift-Z to find my units, but also now I need to figure out if some units are in the map at all, or not.

Another example: I see the slick, brand-new AD screen. Great. Then I want to see how many aircrafts an air group has lost. I can't - I can't believe this. The air group screen has the number of kills for the group, per pilot, but still doesn't list how many aircrafts were lost. I must be the only one that is curious how many aircrafts a fighter group lost in order to achieve 10 kills. Again, knowing the exchange ratios for your air groups is one of the most basic things in air combat, but just like WitE I can only know the mush of the global kills and losses.

It's like at some point in time God said "Thou shall not click to find your units!", and that is set in stone; and "Thou shall not know how many ac you lost in our unit!", and that's set in stone. And who knows what else - looks like some of the old limitations will stay around forever!
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RedLancer
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RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by RedLancer »

Try hotkey-h to find your units....[:)]

We do continually work to improve the game - in fact if you had posted before then we might have addressed your irritations ages ago and saved you many hours of frustration.

Your suggestion for tracking kills by air group is a good one. I'm not sure whether it is easy to do but Joel and Pavel will no doubt read this post and may take it further.
John
WitE2 Asst Producer
WitE & WitW Dev
Kronolog
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RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by Kronolog »

ORIGINAL: fbs7

Another example: I see the slick, brand-new AD screen. Great. Then I want to see how many aircrafts an air group has lost. I can't - I can't believe this. The air group screen has the number of kills for the group, per pilot, but still doesn't list how many aircrafts were lost. I must be the only one that is curious how many aircrafts a fighter group lost in order to achieve 10 kills. Again, knowing the exchange ratios for your air groups is one of the most basic things in air combat, but just like WitE I can only know the mush of the global kills and losses.

If you bring up the info screen for an air engagement, go to details, then to air combat, you can see what the participating air groups lost in that particular engagement.
fbs7
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun May 11, 2008 10:46 pm

RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by fbs7 »

ORIGINAL: Kronolog

ORIGINAL: fbs7

Another example: I see the slick, brand-new AD screen. Great. Then I want to see how many aircrafts an air group has lost. I can't - I can't believe this. The air group screen has the number of kills for the group, per pilot, but still doesn't list how many aircrafts were lost. I must be the only one that is curious how many aircrafts a fighter group lost in order to achieve 10 kills. Again, knowing the exchange ratios for your air groups is one of the most basic things in air combat, but just like WitE I can only know the mush of the global kills and losses.

If you bring up the info screen for an air engagement, go to details, then to air combat, you can see what the participating air groups lost in that particular engagement.


And that's a good idea, but a raid has dozens of engagements all over the place.. it's mighty difficult to go through the one by one.
Cheers!
fbs7
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun May 11, 2008 10:46 pm

RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by fbs7 »

ORIGINAL: Red Lancer

Try hotkey-h to find your units....[:)]

We do continually work to improve the game - in fact if you had posted before then we might have addressed your irritations ages ago and saved you many hours of frustration.

Your suggestion for tracking kills by air group is a good one. I'm not sure whether it is easy to do but Joel and Pavel will no doubt read this post and may take it further.


Appreciate the consideration; these were part of old dicussions at launch time on WitE.

If I remember that right, I raised the same thing in WitP and WitP-AE too, but that was like, 10 years ago?

Anyway, if that's even considered, I'll appreciate that.
Cheers!
fbs7
Posts: 4
Joined: Sun May 11, 2008 10:46 pm

RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by fbs7 »

ORIGINAL: Red Lancer

Try hotkey-h to find your units....[:)]



A note on finding units. I understand I have 3 ways to find a unit in the map from their HQ:
(a) Right-click on the HQ unit to open its dialog, open Commander Report from the HQ dialog, find the subordinate unit in CR, click on the location of the unit in CR
(b) Left-click on the HQ unit to focus on it, Shift-Z to see command lines, follow command lines to find the subordinate unit
(c) Right-click on the HQ unit to open its dialog, note the subordinate unit name, press H to search for the unit, click on "Unit" under "Find What", type in the unit name, click on "Go to <name>"

My point (for a few years now) is that all these options involve a lot of clicks. I'd very much like this:
(a) Right-click on the HQ unit to open its dialog, click on the subordinate unit name, the map automatically move to the subordinate unit

or, as alternative,

(b) Right-click on the HQ unit to open its dialog, click on the subordinate unit name, click on the unit icon on top left, the map automatically moves to the subordinate unit

That would be 2 clicks (or 3 clicks) to find a unit from its HQ; the current methods are much slower.

Thanks.
Cheers!
LuckyJim1010
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RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by LuckyJim1010 »

Have to agree with fbs7 here.
I fired it up just now and to be frank the lack of 'User Friendliness' in finding a unit is pretty poor.
I can see a unit in the CR and when I double click it I expect for the CR to close with the unit I double clicked selected.
Unless I am missing something?
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RedLancer
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RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by RedLancer »

Click on the location co-ordinates just once - that takes you to the unit detail screen with the map centred behind.
John
WitE2 Asst Producer
WitE & WitW Dev
LuckyJim1010
Posts: 260
Joined: Tue Jul 06, 2010 4:08 pm

RE: Game keeps the same old defects

Post by LuckyJim1010 »

Ah yes, I am currently blushing and starting to rethink my career in IT
Shift H key is mildly useful <more blushing>
And from that I used the O key (not zero, O, O as in Oh my God what a noob I am)
Job jobbed

But it would be nice to select a unit on the map, hit the 'O' key and have it displayed in the Order of Battle screen

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