Reviewing Combat: F11, MSG=1, MSG=7?

[MarkShot]

I just took a minor loss in a scenario and will be reviewing the ground action with the excellent tools under F11.

I have many, many saves as I implemented by my own quicksave key that creates time stamped checkpoints.

I normally play at MSG=1, but I am thinking rerunning some fights at MSG=7 to see if there are any deeper insights?

Have anyone tried reruns at MSG=7 for deeper insights? Did you find more than what is in the F11 report?

Thanks!

[Top(W.)Model]

You should try it and see by yourself. If I remember correctly, at higher numbers you will be show every ground element weapon usage (miss or hit) and the distance at which they occured. Same goes for A2A combat. You can always turn the message number up or down during combat as long as you stay higher than 3 (at wich point it kind of « autoresolve») I like to do this while playing against the AI to test stuff out (trying the same fight with different air or ground support units attached and check how it unfold, or even doing the same exact same thing to see what's up). IMO, level 4 or 5 are the best as they show you exaxctly what kills or damage what (plus the range at which it happens). The on-map combat reports are also useful if you want to know which units are the most efficient / usefull in combat.

EDIT : I'm pretty sure that battle reports data (as shown on-map using F11) does not depend on message level, which can ony be used while combat occurs. I use 0 or 1 msg level when i don't play first against the AI in a given scenario yet the reports are the same as usual. The best is always to try it for yourself and see; this is also the best way to check if things are indeed WAI.

[MarkShot]

Thanks. I did try it at 7 and after about 30 minutes, and the forces had not closed, but at least explicit air support got completed and the algorithm was working its way inward to shorter range weapons. After 30 minutes I ended my test ...

I may try at 3 or 4. I play at 1. But probably for GC play I might toggle between 0/1.

Oh yes, I concluded that 2 hours are better spent reading the docs than watching the game in slow motion. Also, playing and targeted reading is good. It's the only game I play dual monitor with the secondary being used for the PDFs. (I don't know why, but I find window flipping one display to be context interrupting.)

[Zovs]

I use 2 for critical battles and 1 for everything else.

[Joel Billings]

An alternative is to turn on the Export Battle Details (CSV) preference item, and keep the detail level at 0 or 1. It will take many seconds longer to resolve the combat, so it's really only something to be used sparingly for testing. After the battle, go to the /logs directory in your save game directory and open up the CombatMessages csv file for the turn. Even for a small battle, it could have thousands of lines of information, but you can search for specific weapons that fired or hit something. Again, I don't recommend this during normal play, but it can be interesting to look at one of these to get an idea of the combat flow.

[MarkShot]

Joel,

When you introduced that feature, I had asked for some form of battle ID to be presented for each engagement so that it might be tied together with the in game tools like F11 and CR. Did you ever get around to that request?

I was even considering building an MS Access DB tool and GUI front end for analysis of results and interim occurrences similar to some of the fine tools which were done for WITP-AE. What the CSV does now is give you DATA, but with a MS Access and battle IDs, it would become INFORMATION.

Thanks.

PS: The built in tools ... particularly CR in WITE-2 is one of the best data analysis tools I have seen in a game. It is truly on par with commercial products for business data analytics. Despite studios like PDS which always have a many page ledger, these implementations look and feel like games. (BTW, one of my previous lives was design and operations of a data warehouse for one of the USA's largest commercial banks for monthly review by The Board. So, my comments are qualified.)

[Joel Billings]

The CSV numbers each battle in the turn, but we haven't done anything to get that number into the game. I'll have to ask Pavel if it's easy for him to get it into the CR and battle report, and the battle report (F11) (I think very easy for the CR). I see as long as the CSV export is turned on, the battle is assigned a number starting from 1, and that number is saved off. If you turn off the CSV preference item, it stops assigning the value to any new combat (if you turn it back on, it starts assigning the numbers again from where it left off). Are you looking for this number just when you have the CSV export turned on? Unfortunately with it turned on, battle do take significantly longer to execute. In a quick test I noticed the battle number reset on the 2nd turn. Are you looking for this in game battle number just for combat that you execute while you have the CSV export turned on? Are you looking for one number that never resets, or is it ok if it resets each turn for what you are looking to do?

[MarkShot]

It would be nice to have a battle header row with a unique number that duplicates what the basics on the first line of the battle report window like hex, date, battle #, for the the hex. Things don't need to be too structured as it can be loaded into a generic table in MS Access and either massaged with SQL queries or scanned sequentially and parsed into derivative tables.

Ultimately, you would be building a hierarchal structure of weeks, hexes, battles, combat engagements, events. At which point you could formulate queries to answer various questions like how effective is artillery attached to an HQ; how effective are tank destroyer SUs in providing ranged protection for infantry ... Is speed more important than maneuver for AC?

Right now you can only review the combat resolution window and have a vague notion of such things, but blow by blow data should provide numbers as opposed to simple inference. Of course, the downside of building such a tool is that you will have the hardcore players picking apart you game's calculations ... as we've already seen much debate as to which side is ahistorically over powered. Then, the debate may go all the way down to the element/device level.

Well, that is how I envisioned it.