Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Panama
AMD Athlon 7750 Dual-Core 2.7mhz 64 bit processor (dual core won't matter with TOAW since I don't think it takes advantage of it does it?)

Not really, Vista might throw the sound on the second processor, but that's pretty minor. In the next game, I'll work more on running on multiple processors, but it's pretty hard to do right while keeping things correct and not actually slowing them down, most of the algorithms like supply calculation depend on the neighboring hexes, so calculating those things in parallel can't be done. I can do some things to speed up Elmer since some of the formation calculations can be done independently, but I'm not sure I can do a lot to speed up the end of turn calculations.

Ralph

*EDITED*
Sorry, hit the wrong button and removed the quote. Ralph

According to TOAW's product page, the game can run on a pre-millennial 32 MB card.

What is the GPU's effect on TOAW performance? Negligible?

ORIGINAL: desert

According to TOAW's product page, the game can run on a pre-millennial 32 MB card.

What is the GPU's effect on TOAW performance? Negligible?

Yes.

ORIGINAL: Panama

Personally I would like to see transport as precisely modeled as tanks are. If something isn't there to pull the artillery it isn't going anywhere. If something isn't there to move the ammo something isn't going to be able to shoot. If something isn't there to move the fuel a tank is just a pillbox. Won't ever happen but it would be nice. [;)]

I'd take the position that you might as well model food supplies just as precisely. It does matter whether that's a battalion of T-26's or a battalion of T-34's that just popped up in your rear. It doesn't really matter whether it's a Ford or a Bedford lorry or a requisitioned bread van that brings the shells up -- all that matters is that they are brought up.

...and that's another point. There's a whole lot of stuff that isn't directly represented in TOAW at all that still has to be moved.

Let's take an artillery battalion. Twelve 105's and twelve trucks (actually, six, but never mind that).

Great, it's motorized.

In the real world? Not. No way to move the shells, no way to move the communications and forward observers, no way to move the food. That battalion is going to need three trips to get everything hauled to the new firing point.

So it's all a bit arbitrary to want the number of trucks to somehow match the number of weapons. There isn't a one-one correlation in real life, and you're going to save yourself a whole lot of rather pointless fussing if you just think of the 'truck' as an abstract representation of the transport assets available to the unit. You assign 'trucks' until the unit has the mobility you feel it should have. After all, in reality, a fully motorized unit with twelve field artillery pieces would presumably have more like sixty trucks than twelve.

Let's take a British infantry battalion up to 1940 TO&E. Around twenty trucks or so, as I recall. Does that mean everyone rides, or that half ride and then the trucks come back for the other half?

No. No one rides. They all walk. The organic trucks are to haul tents, bedding, ammo, food, field kitchens, etc. The unit's got a springier step, and its supply is always right at hand -- but it's still quite completely foot-bound. In fact, there were further divisional level transport assets (in theory) to allow one brigade out of every three to be 'lifted' as needed, so the division would be semi-motorized, but not because of the battalion-level transport assets.

You can't literally represent the actual trucks in an OPART unit. Why? Because the OPART 'unit' itself omits half of what's being hauled. So it's a fools errand to start worrying about having the number of trucks somehow appear to match the number of weapons.

ORIGINAL: desert

*EDITED*
Sorry, hit the wrong button and removed the quote. Ralph

According to TOAW's product page, the game can run on a pre-millennial 32 MB card.

What is the GPU's effect on TOAW performance? Negligible?

I have an 8mb integrated card(I think, doesn't really run any 3d games), works just fine.

No trucks and a unit moves one. One truck or horse or jeep or cart and it move nine. Nothing in between. One or nine. That's what abstraction gets you.

This makes me wonder why we have trucks in the TO&E at all. Why not really abstract them and let the scenario designer assign movement allowances? Give some kind of guide lines and let the scenario designer decide how a unit will move instead of tying it to transport that's abstracted to the point of giving the scenario designer little control of movement allowances. (Read above, one or nine)

Oh wait, forgot about 'asset sharing'. Something else in need of fixing.

ORIGINAL: Panama

No trucks and a unit moves one. One truck or horse or jeep or cart and it move nine. Nothing in between. One or nine.

Assuming you're talking about a unit with one weapon, that might be the case. However, if we're discussing units that commonly appear in scenarios, you can get whatever movement rate you like.

That's what abstraction will get you -- and more to the point, you'll always have an abstraction. Representing all the transport that's actually in the unit is certain to produce invalid results -- unless you want to start having field kitchen squads and surgical aid squads and signalling squads and orderly squads and sanitary squads and field post office squads and provost marshal squads and colonel's mistress squads and...

By and large, TOAW simulates the weapons that actually provide the unit's firepower. You add the transportation assets necessary to give the unit appropriate movement characteristics. If 'truck' disturbs you, pull out the ol' Bioeditor and rename it 'mechanized transportation asset.' Then assign whatever number produce the desired movement rate.

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Panama

No trucks and a unit moves one. One truck or horse or jeep or cart and it move nine. Nothing in between. One or nine.

Assuming you're talking about a unit with one weapon, that might be the case. However, if we're discussing units that commonly appear in scenarios, you can get whatever movement rate you like.

In FitE I want Soviet Rifle Divisions to have a movement of 7 to temporarily reduce their mobility compared to the Axis infantry. It has 60 horse teams and a movement of 12. If I reduce the horse teams to ONE it has a movement of 10. If I reduce the horse teams to ZERO it has a movement of 1.

If there is something I'm missing that allows me to assign movement allowances, please tell me. If you have a little trick that won't screw with the units equipment what is it? In short, I would like to know how you would give this unit a movement allowance of 5.

ORIGINAL: Panama

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Panama

No trucks and a unit moves one. One truck or horse or jeep or cart and it move nine. Nothing in between. One or nine.

Assuming you're talking about a unit with one weapon, that might be the case. However, if we're discussing units that commonly appear in scenarios, you can get whatever movement rate you like.

In FitE I want Soviet Rifle Divisions to have a movement of 7 to temporarily reduce their mobility compared to the Axis infantry. It has 60 horse teams and a movement of 12. If I reduce the horse teams to ONE it has a movement of 10. If I reduce the horse teams to ZERO it has a movement of 1.

If there is something I'm missing that allows me to assign movement allowances, please tell me. If you have a little trick that won't screw with the units equipment what is it? In short, I would like to know how you would give this unit a movement allowance of 5.

Five is presumably below the normal foot movement rate but there must be some way of doing it -- I do it in Seelowe, where I want the battalions of elderly veterans (there were such units) to still be able to fight okay but not able to march as in the days of their youth.

brb...

Alright. I used this to get a unit with about two-thirds of the standard leg movement rate. It's a battalion, but the principle would work for any unit.

36 Light Rifle

12 Movement inhibitors. DF of 1, box 4 (static) checked.

2 Porter squads (mod). DF of 1, boxes 9 (very slow)*, box 59 (infantry), box 8 (transport) checked.

I'm not really sure you need to do this. Fairly obviously, the principle I've used is that twelve pieces of static equipment and only two porter squads to carry them drag down the overall movement rate below that of straight light rifle.

You could try just making more of the division's equipment static and/or giving it porter squads or wagons instead of trucks.


* correction made here after my initial post.

Wish List Item:

Giving the scenario author the ability to assign movement points to units regardless of equipment contained in a unit. This movement allowance can be changed via the event engine at any time.

Setting the Movement Bias could work for some scenarios, but it can't be set by the Event Editor. For East Front scenarios you could set the bias to get your desired movement allowance at start, and then have truck replacements start whenever it is desired to increase movement allowances.

ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653

Setting the Movement Bias could work for some scenarios, but it can't be set by the Event Editor. For East Front scenarios you could set the bias to get your desired movement allowance at start, and then have truck replacements start whenever it is desired to increase movement allowances.

Yes, I had thought about movement bias and it would be a nice tool just as communications levels would be. However, since it can't be changed in the course of a scenario I have never bothered with it. Also, both the Axis and Soviet armies are a mixed bag to say the least. Isn't movement bias a force type tool rather than unit or formation? If this is true, a broad stroke is the same as nothing. I'm not looking for an all or nothing tool.

What we need are tools to make flexible scenarios. It's very very possible. Just needs to be implemented. What set me off down this stupid truck path in the first place was the inability to give units the movement allowance that would fit the scenario and the inability to change that allowance later.

All through history conditions of campaigns large and small have changed and the impact on the units changed their behavior. Why we can't mirror some of the major changes is frustrating to say the least.

ORIGINAL: Panama

ORIGINAL: sPzAbt653

Setting the Movement Bias could work for some scenarios, but it can't be set by the Event Editor. For East Front scenarios you could set the bias to get your desired movement allowance at start, and then have truck replacements start whenever it is desired to increase movement allowances.

Yes, I had thought about movement bias and it would be a nice tool just as communications levels would be. However, since it can't be changed in the course of a scenario I have never bothered with it. Also, both the Axis and Soviet armies are a mixed bag to say the least. Isn't movement bias a force type tool rather than unit or formation? If this is true, a broad stroke is the same as nothing. I'm not looking for an all or nothing tool.

What we need are tools to make flexible scenarios. It's very very possible. Just needs to be implemented. What set me off down this stupid truck path in the first place was the inability to give units the movement allowance that would fit the scenario and the inability to change that allowance later.

All through history conditions of campaigns large and small have changed and the impact on the units changed their behavior. Why we can't mirror some of the major changes is frustrating to say the least.

I did outline how you could do it. So it's untrue that you can't 'mirror' these changes. You can.

You outlined modifying the TO&E so some units were static when there is no static equipment. Nothing is mirrored simply cobbled together. Let me break the leg on this horse so it doesn't move as fast would be a more historic solution. [:D]

ORIGINAL: Panama

You outlined modifying the TO&E so some units were static when there is no static equipment. Nothing is mirrored simply cobbled together. Let me break the leg on this horse so it doesn't move as fast would be a more historic solution. [:D]

You complained that you couldn't slow units to some intermediate rate between full foot movement and one hex per turn. I showed you how to slow units to some intermediate rate.

Frankly, TOAW is chock-full of deficiencies. To some extent, this is inevitable, as it attempts to impose a simplified, uniform paradigm on a wide range of situations that were neither simple nor uniform.

I usually address myself to rectifying these deficiencies in my scenario designs. If it's something that can't be rectified through design, I bitch. However, as far as I can see, this can.

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Panama

You outlined modifying the TO&E so some units were static when there is no static equipment. Nothing is mirrored simply cobbled together. Let me break the leg on this horse so it doesn't move as fast would be a more historic solution. [:D]

You complained that you couldn't slow units to some intermediate rate between full foot movement and one hex per turn. I showed you how to slow units to some intermediate rate.

Frankly, TOAW is chock-full of deficiencies. To some extent, this is inevitable, as it attempts to impose a simplified, uniform paradigm on a wide range of situations that were neither simple nor uniform.

I usually address myself to rectifying these deficiencies in my scenario designs. If it's something that can't be rectified through design, I bitch. However, as far as I can see, this can.

Sorry Colin, I realize why you're doing what you're doing and I'll probably have to do something similar from your example. I sincerely hope that in future releases some seemingly simple flexibility is added to scenario design. But then again, maybe it isn't so simple. [;)]

ORIGINAL: Panama

ORIGINAL: ColinWright

ORIGINAL: Panama

You outlined modifying the TO&E so some units were static when there is no static equipment. Nothing is mirrored simply cobbled together. Let me break the leg on this horse so it doesn't move as fast would be a more historic solution. [:D]

You complained that you couldn't slow units to some intermediate rate between full foot movement and one hex per turn. I showed you how to slow units to some intermediate rate.

Frankly, TOAW is chock-full of deficiencies. To some extent, this is inevitable, as it attempts to impose a simplified, uniform paradigm on a wide range of situations that were neither simple nor uniform.

I usually address myself to rectifying these deficiencies in my scenario designs. If it's something that can't be rectified through design, I bitch. However, as far as I can see, this can.

Sorry Colin, I realize why you're doing what you're doing and I'll probably have to do something similar from your example. I sincerely hope that in future releases some seemingly simple flexibility is added to scenario design. But then again, maybe it isn't so simple. [;)]

We can't have much of a fight if that's going to be your attitude.

Okay fine. Here's more broke.

When I add a cavalry squad, a combat unit and a non abstract item, to an infantry division with no transport the divisions movement goes from one to nine.

When I add a jeep, a non abstract item but what should be a transport item as well, to an infantry division there is no affect on movement, it remains one. I would bet that if I did make a jeep a transport item adding one jeep would increase an infantry divisions from one to nine.

I have a feeling that the code says that if you add one transport item, regardless of what it is, to a unit it's movement will increase a dramatic amount. This is a Bad Thing. A Broke Thing. It needs to be a Fixed Thing.

I suppose if I looked there might be more. I don't have the patience any more.

It would be nice to treat all transport alike. You have X number of train, ship, aircraft transport. Why not give other transport points? One horse team can carry X amount of weight. It doesn't matter how abstract you make horse teams. It can still only carry so much weight. If you don't have enough horse teams the unit's movement is reduced accordingly. And don't start carrying on about ammo and supplies and mail and all the other things a unit might have. A train carries the same things when it's carrying a unit so I don't see a problem with it.

Well, I suppose now I'm going to have to go and mess with bioed and see if making a tank a transport item will increase a divisions movement by a lot.

ORIGINAL: Panama

...When I add a jeep, a non abstract item but what should be a transport item as well, to an infantry division there is no affect on movement, it remains one. I would bet that if I did make a jeep a transport item adding one jeep would increase an infantry divisions from one to nine.

I have a feeling that the code says that if you add one transport item, regardless of what it is, to a unit it's movement will increase a dramatic amount. This is a Bad Thing. A Broke Thing. It needs to be a Fixed Thing.

I think that your division has some relatively modest number of items that require transportation: hard to say without knowing the scale, but I'd guess four or eight.

So the truck starts moving them back and forth. Nu?

By the way, 'scout truck' may fulfill your desire for a jeep with transport ability.

It's hardly a strong point of the system, but I can think of a hundred things I'd rather see 'fixed' than this. If it's a bad thing, a broke thing, it's a bad thing like it's a bad thing that Haiti doesn't have free hi-speed internet access.

Maybe there are still more pressing needs.