question on air movement

[WanderingHead]

Is there a way to force a landbased air units route, without changing the home base?

An example that happened to me earlier is: I'm Allies, Axis has taken Gibraltar. I want to get a Tac Bomber from the Canary Islands in the Atlantic to the Western Mediterranean, but I need it to go through Spanish Morocco in order to avoid op-fire from Gibraltar.

When I did this, I first moved the unit to Spanish Morocco, then moved it to the Western Med. All good ... except it flew back to Spanish Morocco rather than the Canary Islands. Not what I wanted, but I don't know how to force the route without the change of home base.

Any help?

Thanks.

[5cats]

Yes, this is a question that pops up for many of us!
Fleets too suffer from "tunnel movement" where they only want to move from a>c via b, not d! If you know what I mean. It would be nice to be able to "plot" their movement sometimes, or at least have an "alternate movement' button to force it to find a second route. It might also help if the movement plotter avoided opp fire, eh?? Lol!@
I think it's come to 2X3's attention, but has a low priority right now.

[Joel Billings]

Unfortunately there is no way I know to avoid switching the home base when moving air units over land as in your example. We do have on our list the desire to add an override key to force a one area move between two specific adjacent areas. This would help some of the moving transports at sea issues, but would not solve your home base air issue. These were some of the prices we paid for keeping the system relatively simple. You have to live within these limits, even when at times it seems very unfair and restrictive of what seems like reasonable moves.

[5cats]

We'll manage somehow...
It's not a big problem since it doesn't matter most of the time.

[Doobious]

I have noticed a somewhat similar thing happening with navy ships.

They will auto-route themselves through ocean territories in very long and circuitous routes. Does the pathing try to avoid "neutral" territories or something?

I have had ships try to route themselves through 5 ocean spaces when I can "force" them by moving 1 space at a time to only pass through 3 spaces.

Anyone else noticed this? [&:]

[Joel Billings]

Transports will often do this because it is "free" to move transports over other transports that have all their movement points left.

[Big Lou]

Doobius,

Are you refering to the movement of transport ships perhaps? Since a transport can move for "free" (expending no movement points) through a sea square containing another transport that has not yet moved, it is possible that moving 5 squares over existing transports actually costs fewer movement points than moving 1 or 2 squares directly. I have found that the computer will always try to route your transport to its destination using the fewest movement points but not necessarily the shortest route.

[Doobious]

Aye... transports. [;)]

Thanks again Lou!

[aauminki]

Do transports that have not moved, but been used for unit strat moves, count as 0 movement cost for other transports too?

[Big Lou]

No.

If a transport has been used for strat movement, its movement points are reduced to zero. Thus if another transport tries to move thru the first transports sea zone, it will have to pay the full movement cost. The transport that has been used for strat movement of troops/supplies is treated as having actually moved. This is why my WA turns take me an hour to play. I have to sit there and think about how I want my final transport chains to look before I move a single unit or supply.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: Joel Billings

Unfortunately there is no way I know to avoid switching the home base when moving air units over land as in your example. We do have on our list the desire to add an override key to force a one area move between two specific adjacent areas. This would help some of the moving transports at sea issues, but would not solve your home base air issue. These were some of the prices we paid for keeping the system relatively simple. You have to live within these limits, even when at times it seems very unfair and restrictive of what seems like reasonable moves.

This wouldn't be so bad if the computer chose good routes. E.g. if the option is a 3 point move through op-fire versus a 4 point move around op-fire, I can understand. But it would be really nice if it could be at least improved so that a 4 point move without op-fire is chosen in place of a 4 point move with op-fire.

I just had bombers sit idle, instead of taking out artillery, because they insisted on taking a route through the mediterranean, covered by fighters, instead of over friendly north african territory. If I forced the north african route, then the bombers would relocate away from possible resupply and be sitting ducks, so instead they did nothing.

I don't care about any of the non-air units, those are workable. But with air it can be a serious problem.