Evil Event Editor Question

[RedAss]

Well, the Holidays are here, and I've got a million things to do, so OF COURSE I dusted off an old unpublished scenario and dove right in.

Here is my quandary.

To keep it fresh on replay, I want to have an unexpected offensive to occur by Elmer. I was thinking of having one of four options happen at random so the human player couldn't game the scenario.

It's not a WWII scenario, but it provides a good example:

If I wanted to have the PO Allies invade Continental Europe from May - September, but have it select randomly between:

Normandy
Southern France
Italy
Greece

That way the German player can't just stack up units in Normandy and await the historical inevitability.

Can't quite get a line on the best way to accomplish this, Event Editor-wise. Would it be:

• A dedicated formation with different PO paths? How to randomly select the PO path? If I could figure that out, this wouldn't be a problem.

• An event with 25% probability, which if cancelled, activates another event with 25% probability, and so on? However, I WANT an offensive to occur, so what if they all failed to meet the threshold?

• Theater options somehow?

Somebody HAS to have done this or something like it before?

[rhinobones]

I recently uploaded a revision to the scenario 1941 Operation Munchen v02. In it events 60 thru 65 are an example of what you are designing. The scenario events are for objective tracks, but you can easily adapt them for formation orders. Your probabilities would be 25, 33, 50 and 100. Suggest making a small test scenario before going to the big one.

There are some other things you need to do, but we can work thru them later.

Regards, RhinoBones

[RedAss]

Thanks, Rhino! Will download and take a look. That Event Editor is a fickle mistress. She's beautiful, but high maintenance.

[RedAss]

I recently uploaded a revision to the scenario 1941 Operation Munchen v02. In it events 60 thru 65 are an example of what you are designing. The scenario events are for objective tracks, but you can easily adapt them for formation orders. Your probabilities would be 25, 33, 50 and 100. Suggest making a small test scenario before going to the big one.

There are some other things you need to do, but we can work thru them later.

Regards, RhinoBones

Alright, I took look and that looks like exactly what I want. (Nice counter set and .bmp scenario opening image, BTW).

So looking at it, it looks like I need to copy PO track 1 to PO Track 2, 3, 4 and 5 to ensure that all the other units in the scenario continue to their assigned objectives.
I then take the formation(s) that are taking part in the "surprise offensive" and edit them in each of those objective tracks to objectives specific to that offensive.

Am I on the right track (he asked, succumbing to the obvious pun)?

[rhinobones]

So looking at it, it looks like I need to copy PO track 1 to PO Track 2, 3, 4 and 5 to ensure that all the other units in the scenario continue to their assigned objectives.
I then take the formation(s) that are taking part in the "surprise offensive" and edit them in each of those objective tracks to objectives specific to that offensive.

Am I on the right track (he asked, succumbing to the obvious pun)?

I like puns!

Looks as though you intend to have 4 assault formations, of which only one will be in play during any one game. You also plan to use all 5 objective tracks for the assault formations. I’m using the term “formation” when in actuality I expect that each assault formation will be composed of multiple smaller/individual formations.

Before you start copying objective tracks, I suggest you do the following:
1. Build all of the assault formations in the force editor.
2. Deploy the assault formations in their starting location.
3. Set the starting location for each assault formation as Objective Track 1, Objective 1.
4. Copy track 1 to 2, 3, 4 and 5.
5. Assign objective 2 thru X for every assault formation and all 5 tracks.
6. Write the events which randomize the objective track used in the scenario.
7. Write the events which randomize/deploy the assault formation.
8. Write the events which deploy the assault formation’s sub formations. These events are triggered by event activation of the parent assault formation, step 7.
9. In the force deployment editor, use the “Remove Unit” to take all of the assault formation units off the map.
10. In the force deployment editor enter the event for each unit from steps 7 and 8 which deploy the units.
11. Test.

Steps 6 thru 10 involve a lot of typing which means typos will occur. Be deliberate, take your time, double check and do it once. Typos are very difficult to detect, localize and correct.
Step 6, suggest that you enter something in the event news block which tells you which objective track was randomly selected. After testing you can erase the news entries.
Depending on deployment of the forces, the scenario may crash/end early if no units are detected on turn 1. If this happens, build and deploy a dummy unit somewhere on the map. The game will detect the unit and consider the game valid; on turn 2 you can write a Disband Unit event to remove the unit.

Regards, RhinoBones

[RedAss]

Yup -- that order of doing things makes sense.

Thanks for laying it all out, Rhino!