Thoughts on Waypoints.

[Mobius]

The wood1 has a point. I don't think Regroup should go on while in combat. I think of it in terms of reforming or recovering unit cohesiveness. You wouldn't be doing that in the middle of a firefight.

[RocketMan]

ORIGINAL: Capitaine

Needless to say, I wholeheartedly agree with Bil H and feel this overarching need for micromanagement is counterproductive. The waypoint "need" is illusory, as PCK's design demonstrates. And while I too thought it would be necessary for road movement, Mobius describes a different mechanism that may work just as well.

Waypoints eliminate a lot of micromanagement. With waypoints, I can plot a units orders once, covering multiple turns, and then not have to worry about replotting them when I need them to make a turn.

For instance, if I want to circle around behind somebody in PZCK, I have to issue multiple orders over multiple phases, and even then, my units would probably either overshoot the turn or spend time stopped waiting for a new orders phase. With waypoints I could issue orders once and forget about all the micro management.

And yes, sometimes you will cancel your multi-turn orders and have to reissue new orders, but worst case, you are just back to level of effort it takes to plot orders without waypoints.

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
Well...Waypoints would help with this.
Seriously, I'm very surprised that it's not being mentioned more...am I unlucky? The pathing, generally, is good. However, I am getting pretty bloody tired of units getting stuck on other units. In this particular case, I ordered a bound command to my units.

The front unit is staionary this phase. The second unit which is stuck behind the front unit was the one moving along with the other unit on the bridge. It started to the left rear of the staionary unit and all along that phase moved behind the staionary unit and continued to turn north until it eventually sat behind the front unit, tracks amovin and sat there until the end of the phase.

So regardless of any other reason for waypoints, my main gripe is pathing issues and waypoints could help illiminate the problem.

The problem isn't waypoints so much is that infantry will block tanks from running over them. To get out of that cluster... mount those infantry on the Ferds to get them out of the way. As the Ferdinands move over the bridge you can dismount them. I think the infantry might even dismount behind the Ferds so you might try mounting and dismounting to see where they go.

Edit here too. In this new picture the infantry are out of the way. So is the order a bound? Probably a bridge is not a good place to bound over. And trying to guide a rear vehicle like a Ferdinande around stopped tanks would be difficult in RL. I remember I saw video of the assault by tanks on the Russian Congress building during the end of the Soviet Union. A company of T-72s were on a bridge waiting to attack. Two were trying to get in their positions and they bumped into parked tanks already positioned. It took about 5 minutes for them to move just about 30m to their lead positions.

[JudgeDredd]

ORIGINAL: Capitaine
Needless to say, I wholeheartedly agree with Bil H and feel this overarching need for micromanagement is counterproductive. The waypoint "need" is illusory, as PCK's design demonstrates. And while I too thought it would be necessary for road movement, Mobius describes a different mechanism that may work just as well.

It doesn't appear to be illusory when you need to circumvent friendly units. As I clearly pointed out.

[JudgeDredd]

Mobius

I appreciate your input, but perhaps admitting there is an issue rather than hiding it behind a workaround would be better received. I know you are closely linked with the game...but it doesn't detract from the fact that this is an annoying issue.

Besides, it's not the infantry blocking the path...it's the Ferdinand...my Ferdinand is clearly stuck behind the other Ferd.

And again, this picture shows exactly how this bound order panned out. The Ferdinand which was blocking the one in the previous picture is now executing it's movement order under the bound command. Unfortunately, the lead Ferdinand has stopped on the bridge, having executed it's bound order. The bridge is now closed to all traffic and the Ferdinand (and all the troops who were crossing the bridge) have now decided to move massively out of the area and go the longer route through the fording area.

So there is an issue with pathing, which is exacerbated with a bound order. Made worse still when a route is narrowed somewhat.

The point is, I think, if you want to remove waypoints from the user, make sure they don't need them. In other words, get your pathing issues sorted out.

I'm 3 turns into this scenario and already I've had to make 3 posts and am getting more riled every time I go back to it.

Pure and simple, it's winding me up now!

[rickier65]

ORIGINAL: Mobius

The wood1 has a point. I don't think Regroup should go on while in combat. I think of it in terms of reforming or recovering unit cohesiveness. You wouldn't be doing that in the middle of a firefight.

Well, Im not sure I totally agree. ). I actually thought regroup was an ideal "move to combat" order stance- ( although knowing now that Regroup uses rush order I may have to rethink that).

Rick

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
Well...Waypoints would help with this.

Actually, I'm not sure they would help at all. Order chains might, but not waypoints.

Seriously, I'm very surprised that it's not being mentioned more...am I unlucky? The pathing, generally, is good. However, I am getting pretty bloody tired of units getting stuck on other units. In this particular case, I ordered a bound command to my units.
The front unit is staionary this phase. The second unit which is stuck behind the front unit was the one moving along with the other unit on the bridge. It started to the left rear of the staionary unit and all along that phase moved behind the staionary unit and continued to turn north until it eventually sat behind the front unit, tracks amovin and sat there until the end of the phase.

A bridge is a bottleneck. You shouldn't try to pass more than one platoon over it at a time. The Bound order also involves alternating units stopping and starting, which will exacerbate the bottleneck if they're in a column trying to move over a bridge.

Honestly, I think the biggest issue here is orders planning. I'd suggest getting your Infantry Platoon out of the way, then give the Ferdinands a short Rush order to get them across the bridge, then cross the infantry platoon over (or vice versa, but not both at once).

I don't think the situation you have pictured would work much better in CM either, it's just a traffic jam.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
I appreciate your input, but perhaps admitting there is an issue rather than hiding it behind a workaround would be better received. I know you are closely linked with the game...but it doesn't detract from the fact that this is an annoying issue.

I don't think anyone's trying to hide anything. I have to tell you that as an experienced player I don't see myself ever creating the situation you have in your screenshots and I honestly don't blame the pathfinding for it.

Besides, it's not the infantry blocking the path...it's the Ferdinand...my Ferdinand is clearly stuck behind the other Ferd.

How can the infantry not be blocking? In your screenshot, there are three infantry squads blocking every approach to the bridge on your side with not enough space between them for the Ferdinands to get through. Since they won't run over their own infantry, where are they supposed to go?

I'm 3 turns into this scenario and already I've had to make 3 posts and am getting more riled every time I go back to it.
Pure and simple, it's winding me up now!

I'm sorry, but I really think this is an issue of your own making. Trying to get more than one platoon across a bridge at a time, especially with units as large as Ferdinands and having an infantry platoon in the way, compounded by a stop/start order is a recipe for disaster in just about any game.

Regards,

- Erik

[JudgeDredd]

ORIGINAL: Mobius

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
Well...Waypoints would help with this.
Seriously, I'm very surprised that it's not being mentioned more...am I unlucky? The pathing, generally, is good. However, I am getting pretty bloody tired of units getting stuck on other units. In this particular case, I ordered a bound command to my units.

The front unit is staionary this phase. The second unit which is stuck behind the front unit was the one moving along with the other unit on the bridge. It started to the left rear of the staionary unit and all along that phase moved behind the staionary unit and continued to turn north until it eventually sat behind the front unit, tracks amovin and sat there until the end of the phase.

So regardless of any other reason for waypoints, my main gripe is pathing issues and waypoints could help illiminate the problem.

The problem isn't waypoints so much is that infantry will block tanks from running over them. To get out of that cluster... mount those infantry on the Ferds to get them out of the way. As the Ferdinands move over the bridge you can dismount them. I think the infantry might even dismount behind the Ferds so you might try mounting and dismounting to see where they go.

Edit here too. In this new picture the infantry are out of the way. So is the order a bound? Probably a bridge is not a good place to bound over. And trying to guide a rear vehicle like a Ferdinande around stopped tanks would be difficult in RL. I remember I saw video of the assault by tanks on the Russian Congress building during the end of the Soviet Union. A company of T-72s were on a bridge waiting to attack. Two were trying to get in their positions and they bumped into parked tanks already positioned. It took about 5 minutes for them to move just about 30m to their lead positions.

And yes, it's a bound command, as I stated here

...I ordered a bound command to my units.

So it's my fault my units are stuck on each other? Because I choose a command offered me and the terrain doesn't lend itself too well to that?

For gods sake. I only want to bound across the bridge. Why is that a bad idea? I mean, from the games perspective, I now see why? But in real life, as is always quickly pointed out, wouldn't you want to bound over a bridge?

Regardless of the order given...where the terrain narrows (in this case a bridge), you are going to get pathing issues.

You can excuse my tone if you want or not. Suffice it to say, I'm just pissed off at the moment...3 turns into a campaign!

[Mobius]

I don't think waypoints would solve anything in your situation.  Something is blocking the paths.  So even with waypoints a path way around would be routed to the waypoint. So after going way around via the ford it would come back on the bridge facing the wrong way seeking the waypoint.   So you are stuck regardless.  You have to clear the blocking units from the bridge.  The infantry has to be moved aside because I don't think that one tank will block other Ferdinands from crossing.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
So it's my fault my units are stuck on each other? Because I choose a command offered me and the terrain doesn't lend itself too well to that?

I'm not trying to upset you and you know I have no trouble with admitting problems in the game, but honestly in this case, yes. You chose the wrong order and didn't manage your platoons well. Bridges are bottlenecks that force a platoon into column order. Bounding in column order has obvious drawbacks. On their own, I'm sure the Ferdinands would have made it across with Bound, but once you throw the infantry platoon into the mix which they can't run over, it's a perfect traffic jam. The fact that the order was offered is immaterial - you could also have chosen Defend -> Stay but it wouldn't have gotten you over the bridge. Even Rush would only have gotten you across if the infantry weren't in the way.

Regardless of the order given...where the terrain narrows (in this case a bridge), you are going to get pathing issues.

It's not regardless of the order, but yes any bottleneck will make for a potential traffic jam and crossing a bottleneck area should be managed more carefully. The issue is not the pathfinding but actually the collisions between squads. They had paths that would carry them across the bridge if they didn't have other units in the way. Based on your screenshot, I could see no way for the other Ferdinands to get through the infantry and cross the bridge.

If you'd like me to look at a save file I'm happy to do so and if it turns out that I'm wrong, I'll post it here.

Regards,

- Erik

[z1812]

Hi Mobius,

ORIGINAL: Mobius
Too many way-points and routing far ahead of a units ability to actually see the ground contours seems too much like using Yahoo Maps to plot your course to me.

Actually I can direct units now to move way beyond their ability to see. That has nothing to do with waypoints but rather a players discretion.

I don't see this as a debate between waypoints and the current method of giving orders. I see waypoints as being an addition to the already established way of moving.

In COTA for instance you plot a path and the computer generates it depending on what type of movement you want. Fast, Safest ect. Contained in the path are waypoints that you can adjust or not as you wish.

With-in the order system that already exists I visualize waypoints generated on the movement path that can then be adjusted if you wish.

Regards John

[thewood1]

z, I think that is part of the problem.  Some people are thinking its an either/or situation.  I think a lot of us are just saying that PCK has a good system in 80 - 90% of the situations and a method to improve that wouldn't hurt anyone.

As I have said before, any system should avoid forcing a strict method of playing onto a player.  But the penalties should be severe enough that the player has a very, very good reason for trying to do things outside the system.  The penalties should not be more micro-management of the interface, but actual tactical penaties that inhibit comman and control.  If a player wants to send a Soviet squad on a foray out on the left flank, he will lose communications to it and might actually have to send an HQ unit after it to get it back into command.  The squad may even have a chance to melt away, if its inexperienced enough or over all morale is an issue.

[rickier65]

ORIGINAL: z1812

..
I don't see this as a debate between waypoints and the current method of giving orders. I see waypoints as being an addition to the already established way of moving.

...
Regards John

Actually, I think I saw Erik say he'd like to get some waypoints (1 or 2) into the next release. That they had hoped to do it in this one, but were not able to.

To me that pretty much tells me I can expect it in the next game in series - I'm pretty satisfied with that.

Rick

[JudgeDredd]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
So it's my fault my units are stuck on each other? Because I choose a command offered me and the terrain doesn't lend itself too well to that?

I'm not trying to upset you and you know I have no trouble with admitting problems in the game, but honestly in this case, yes. You chose the wrong order and didn't manage your platoons well. Bridges are bottlenecks that force a platoon into column order. Bounding in column order has obvious drawbacks. On their own, I'm sure the Ferdinands would have made it across with Bound, but once you throw the infantry platoon into the mix which they can't run over, it's a perfect traffic jam. The fact that the order was offered is immaterial - you could also have chosen Defend -> Stay but it wouldn't have gotten you over the bridge. Even Rush would only have gotten you across if the infantry weren't in the way.

Regardless of the order given...where the terrain narrows (in this case a bridge), you are going to get pathing issues.

It's not regardless of the order, but yes any bottleneck will make for a potential traffic jam and crossing a bottleneck area should be managed more carefully. The issue is not the pathfinding but actually the collisions between squads. They had paths that would carry them across the bridge if they didn't have other units in the way. Based on your screenshot, I could see no way for the other Ferdinands to get through the infantry and cross the bridge.

If you'd like me to look at a save file I'm happy to do so and if it turns out that I'm wrong, I'll post it here.

Regards,

- Erik

nevermind. I've calmed down now.

I did order too many units over the bridge...but they were dispersed, so I didn't envisage the blockage.

But your units do have pathing issues

[thewood1]

I think any tactical game at the individual vehicle level has pathing issues.  Look at CMSF, with a combined 9 years of experience and 4 years in development, vehicles there still have pathing issues.  What is different about games is how they let players overcome or supercede the AI in getting around them.  I think a lot of people see fewer issues in PCK because a lot of people play by not plotting destinations longer than a unit can reach in a phase/turn.
 
That said, one of the ways people used to avoid bottlenecks in CM was to plot waypoints and pauses.  It was pretty micro-managed.  The alternative was to watch a unit hit another unit and keep reversing/moving forward until it cleared the obstacle/unit.  In PCK, it seems the unit will sit there until a player intervenes.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: thewood1
z, I think that is part of the problem.  Some people are thinking its an either/or situation.  I think a lot of us are just saying that PCK has a good system in 80 - 90% of the situations and a method to improve that wouldn't hurt anyone.

Just to be clear, I also agree that it would be good to have at least 1-2 waypoints as an option. However, I also want to keep the platoon orders system and also add a company layer.

I do want to improve the current system in all respects, but I don't want to lose the philosophy behind it in the process.

Regards,

- Erik

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: thewood1
If a player wants to send a Soviet squad on a foray out on the left flank, he will lose communications to it and might actually have to send an HQ unit after it to get it back into command.  The squad may even have a chance to melt away, if its inexperienced enough or over all morale is an issue.

Oh, I can just imagine the feedback this would generate... [;)]

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: thewood1
That said, one of the ways people used to avoid bottlenecks in CM was to plot waypoints and pauses.  It was pretty micro-managed.  The alternative was to watch a unit hit another unit and keep reversing/moving forward until it cleared the obstacle/unit.  In PCK, it seems the unit will sit there until a player intervenes.

They'll also work their way around it, if there is a path. Unfortunately sometimes the only available path is way out of the way.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: JudgeDredd
nevermind. I've calmed down now.
I did order too many units over the bridge...but they were dispersed, so I didn't envisage the blockage.

Ok, understood, I'm sorry it got you upset in the first place but I'm glad you got it worked out.

But your units do have pathing issues

The pathing and collisions can always be improved, but I think in comparison to some other similar games (CM or CC) we're doing pretty well. I'd like to make the collision-handling more predictive, which will involve more calculations that increase as more units are involved, but that will probably be the next big improvement. We made a lot of pathfinding/collision improvements since Winterstorm and we'll continue doing that for the next release as well. If you have a specific case (like the one you sent me earlier) where it's just not working, we're happy to look into fixing it in an update.

Right now though, it looks pretty good to me overall.

Regards,

- Erik