Poll: To many tank and gun crews running around the battlefield?

MacCready · Post by **MacCready** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 5:57 am

Im just wondering what people think of all the crews that generally litter a game of spwaw?

I mean you can't even call in reinforcments because all the crews are still taking up valuable formation slots.

Also wondering if the crew thing could be coded to turn off and on like other features?

[ December 24, 2001: Message edited by: MacCready ]

Alby · Post by **Alby** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 6:00 am

At least in spwaw they can actually sometimes do something, In spww2 they seldom rally and just sit in same spot entire game.
i know what your saying though, its been discussed at length before....

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 6:28 am

Hmmmm never gave this aspect much thought till now.

But I agree, those crew units do seem a bit odd. I for one think that a crew exiting a vehicle would be more inclined to "fade" just as units currently suffer the effect of "dispersing". Its not that they are useless, just unlikely they should have any more impact than those units that "disperse".

Given a choice, I would rather like to see crews that survive, get a randomly selected amount of time to "get lost". If the enemy doesnt get them in the first 1-3 turns, then they are gone.

True this will mean that crews that exit a vehicle wont be there later to miraculously re crew the vehicle. But I think its a good way of eliminating an odd behaviour.

Personally I would rather like to see a veteran crew get its butt off the battlefield so its still alive for next battle. Nothing bugs me more than having valuable experienced crews wandering around stopping bullets eh.

But this would require a large amount of redesign. So complaining is a waste of time (Version 7.0 should be the last version). But it would be nice if they use this line of thinking in Combat Leader.

DanTepX · Post by **DanTepX** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 8:07 am

I kinda like all those guys running around, seems more realistic. It also means I have to defend my bailed crews, they are worth alot to me. Plus, I like to re-crew abandoned vehicles!

peter hellman · Post by **peter hellman** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 3:54 pm

I understand it can be annoying with all those crews running around. But I also like to man those abandoned vehicles, and in a campaign it's really important to get that experienced crew back in the next scenario. I usually have some APC's or such running around collecting those crews, transporting them to the RT-hex. As I do with almost killed units also.

And I like to turn up my own kills by decimating the enemies crews <img src="wink.gif" border="0">

Warrior · Post by **Warrior** » Tue Dec 25, 2001 6:40 pm

Crewman can be a real pain, especially when they stop my advance with their small-arms fire. However, it's too much to expect that every vehicle or gun I destroy will also have the entire crew killed. And it can be a nasty surprise when a hitherto hidden crew gets their weapon working again. <img src="eek.gif" border="0"> As a matter of safe policy, I slaughter all crewman. <img src="smile.gif" border="0"> I think not having them would be a loss to the game.

[ December 25, 2001: Message edited by: Warrior ]

Capt. Pixel · Post by **Capt. Pixel** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 9:20 am

I like to go in and rename my bailed crews to increase the 'Fog of War'. If my opponent catches sight of an 'M9 Bazooka Team', he might think twice about moving up that alley, or waste valuable HE blowing up a single guy with a pistol and a smoke grenade. <img src="cool.gif" border="0">

Warrior · Post by **Warrior** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 10:44 am

Originally posted by Capt. Pixel:
I like to go in and rename my bailed crews to increase the 'Fog of War'. If my opponent catches sight of an 'M9 Bazooka Team', he might think twice about moving up that alley, or waste valuable HE blowing up a single guy with a pistol and a smoke grenade. <img src="cool.gif" border="0">

In my opinion, this is dishonest and could probably be considered cheating.

RichardTheFirst · Post by **RichardTheFirst** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 3:35 pm

I agree with Warrior about that renaming thing. If I catch a PBEM opponent doing that to me I'll never play with him again.

There is a tactic I use often to protect my advance when I have reconaissance vehycles or armoured cars without smoke. I bail out the crew of the front vehycle lay some smoke and advance the rest of the platoon.

By the way: do any of you guys know if killing a crew increases a unit experience for the next battle? I know it scores a kill.

What does "Poll" means?

[ December 26, 2001: Message edited by: RichardTheFirst ]

The MSG · Post by **The MSG** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 4:17 pm

Suddenly I see a future for "ambulance" units! If u need to get rid off em, load em up and run em off to the retreat hex. Battlefield evacuation needed isnt to far fethed now, is it <img src="wink.gif" border="0">

john g · Post by **john g** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 6:08 pm

Originally posted by Warrior:

In my opinion, this is dishonest and could probably be considered cheating.

What pollyanna world do you live in. It was common practice when I played VGA planets to rename freighters as warships and warships as freighters.

Any player who makes use of the game kindly telling him what the opposing unit is, or how many men have been killed etc in mind is the one who is edging into the realm of cheating.

It puts the fear of God into you when you have less than perfect info? I'm all for it.

I thought that was going to be one of the features of CA/CL, units making mistakes about what is in front of them.
thanks, John.

richmonder · Post by **richmonder** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 7:09 pm

Let me end this right now.

I think if you right click on an enemy unit you'll pull up a limited info screen. In that screen will be a .lbm shot of what that unit *actually* is - and the crew .lbm can't be mistaken for a RPG, Bazooka, or any other AT device. Renaming that unit does not change the lbm pic.

So, for what it's worth, I see no issue with someone renaming a unit in play. If I fire on any enemy without some IDing, I am a fool. And it's so easy to just right-click an enemy unit. Besides, crews don't advance towards your forces like Inf-AT units do...

Richard the 1st - 'poll' means survey, as in a social study concerning a particular issue and the opinions that people have on it. Which is what this was, in a sense.

[ December 26, 2001: Message edited by: richmonder ]

[ December 26, 2001: Message edited by: richmonder ]

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 8:39 pm

While it might not be my arguement, I will insist on inserting my comment.

When a player uses a facet of the game, to effectively abuse an opportunity (such as re naming a unit), it is neither cheating nor good game play.
What it is, is unacceptable behaviour though.

It is the primary reason while board style wargames come complete with extensive daunting imposing rule books. It prevents a person from "inventing" moronic interpretations. My favourite being "you may not save unused movement from this turn to be used as additional movement points in the next turn".

True if not stated clearly that you cant, that invites a player to say why cant I.
But any logical person can explain why you shouldnt be able to.

If a person used the chance to rename units in that fashion, rather than just enjoy the game exactly as I was, in good faith, only using the game design in good faith, well I would summararily brand the person a jerk (and not surprisingly not play that person any further).

Of course in real life. I would ignore the Geneva Convention (if I am willing to kill you, civilized behaviour has already be dispensed with). I would shoot people in the back (best way to get surprise). I would cheat and do all manner of heinous acts. But dead tends to be rather permanent (so I would rather win as opposed to not in real life).

But in a game, its merely recreation.
I have always lived by the credo, if you have to cheat in an intellectual challenge, then you just dont have any faith in your intelligence.

One persons cheating might be another persons slick move. But cheating or not, it leaves a foul taste. Its a good way to burn a potentially good game opponent. And in the end, thats the real loss.

Larry Holt · Post by **Larry Holt** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 10:48 pm

It seems to me that renaming units is nothing more than a simulation of battlefield deception. IRL units do conceal or change their markings to confuse the enemy. To expect that a unit will always be marked the same is not realistic.

Les_the_Sarge_9_1 · Post by **Les_the_Sarge_9_1** » Wed Dec 26, 2001 11:06 pm

There is nothing in common with painting a Firefly gun barrel to make it look shorter in real life for instance, with re labelling a unit in a software environment to be stated what it is not.

Admittedly this would not seem like a realistic attitude. But software has to endure that dumb "B" label enough as it is, without encouraging people to impose random undisclosed unofficial alterations of the playing environment.
Would you mind if while playing chess, I stuck new labels on my pieces mid game so that the identites were suddenly altered (you of course would get to see false labels while the labels on my side of the piece declared something altogether contradictory). That queen piece is actually a pawn for instance.

A brutally simple analogy but its appropriate.

Perhaps the game should just dispense with labels entirely.
When a sherman gets blown to hell, let the victim locate the source themselves. If you see the firer, and it looks like a tiger, assume it might be a tiger.
During the war all german tanks were tigers till proven otherwise,and every gun was an 88 initially. If the tiger brews the sherman and is visible to a surviver let them wait till they see it long enough to make it known what it was. If it goes out of sight it regains its ambiguity.

I have some wargames that use wooden blocks. They are released through Columbia games. Excellent notion. I get to see what the pieces are during battle. Afterwards they are righted and I get to remember the pieces as best I can. Fog of war has its limitations.

I find it hard to see though, why the functionality of software should be a license to alter identities without the other player aware this option is being chosen. Given a chance to play that sort of player, odds are I would change all the labels before play so that they were already wrong in advance. That way every one of my units would be indicated as the worst case possible in the first place. If my M3 Stuarts all looked like Fireflies I wouldnt complain.

RichardTheFirst · Post by **RichardTheFirst** » Thu Dec 27, 2001 12:55 am

I think this have to do with what one enjoys when playing. Me for example when playing PBEM I enjoy the gameplay and the challenge as well as the opportunity to create friends and be chatting and commenting the battle with them. This means I look for opponents more or less with the same tastes as mine.

For me that renaming thing seems more like a battle than a game. But hey that is all on the rules: if we accept the rule that we will do everything to win the game, than the next step is to accept cheating like for instance accept that the guy in the other side is reloading in his turn whenever things turn worst.

Could be an acceptable style of playing the game but it is not my style.

lnp4668 · Post by **lnp4668** » Thu Dec 27, 2001 1:37 am

I got an opponent who rename his stuck Tiger about 2 hexes in front of my 122mm AT gun: "I am going to die" Give me a good laugh.

Really, it is just a game.

RichardTheFirst · Post by **RichardTheFirst** » Thu Dec 27, 2001 1:47 am

Well, that is a more than acceptable rename.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

john g · Post by **john g** » Thu Dec 27, 2001 2:43 am

Originally posted by Les the Sarge 9-1:
If a person used the chance to rename units in that fashion, rather than just enjoy the game exactly as I was, in good faith, only using the game design in good faith, well I would summararily brand the person a jerk (and not surprisingly not play that person any further).

To whom do the unit names belong? I have always thought they were an aid to the person playing them. Not an aid to his opponent. If I want to change the names of Engineer squads to squad A, squad B, etc. in the event that those names mean more to me, then why would you feel I was exploitng some "feature" of the game? What if I changed the name of every leader to that of my own. It would get mighty confusing for me to try to figure out which leader just failed the morale check, but that would be my problem, which would make up for having everyone named after me.
thanks, John.

RichardTheFirst · Post by **RichardTheFirst** » Thu Dec 27, 2001 3:58 am

John:

You got a point there as long as that is understood between you and your opponent, otherwise you are risking loosing him as an opponent for future games. Like I said: depends on the rules (implicit or explicit ones).

[ December 26, 2001: Message edited by: RichardTheFirst ]