Units should be less willing to move/manoeuvre.

[wodin]

ORIGINAL: fleischer

Well, I've just finished my third scen., and I can't see any major difference from COTA on this point. I haven't played too much with trenches/fortifications yet, so maybe that's different.

Really?? I'm suprised as I feel so much more confident than in CotA and HTTR...I do know Dave worked on this and I can see a vast improvement...I'm not saying it doesn't happen it does...but nowhere near as much..

Again like I said and its been discussed many times in the CotA forum...when you see a unit rout its not actually running away as such just pulling back a little...I think this needs looking at...maybe have a rout icon and a pull back icon or something.

[wodin]

ORIGINAL: Arimus

The thing I find odd is units retreating out of prepared positions but only moving 100 meters or so and stopping. Now they are much worse off because they are in the open and usually still within LOS of the units that made them retreat. Soon they will be suppressed and low moral and won't move for anything. Common practice was to plan fall back positions. Maybe down the road we will be able to give a unit a fallback position when we order a defend mission.

I like that idea....go put it in the features request!!

We can at the moment do delaying actions so the code is sought of there already.

[MarkShot]

I understand what you want ...

Anything "in-situ" in the game simply means don't move.

What you really want is FUP-less attacks. Hasty attacks. An old fashion bayonet or Bonzai charge?

[kipanderson]

MarkShot, hi,

What you really want is FUP-less attacks. Hasty attacks. An old fashion bayonet or Bonzai charge?

No... as forcefully as I can say it.... no, it is not what I want nor do I guess do others. This reminds me that earlier you “seemed” to suggest that it was micromanagement that I am after.... not necessarily.

Let me try to explain.

At the moment if you order a battalion to attack it will go through FUP, fine, I play with Painfully Realistic ordered delay, all part of the fun, all part of the realism. In the real world you cannot just throw around units. It’s all like running in mud. Hence in BftB I wish for and like the same. Problem comes later.

Your companies move off and attack, this normally goes fine they react well to events at this stage. Where it goes pear shaped quite often is after the attack is well under way they continue to wonder around. They have moved off to the right or left several hundred metres for no apparent reason. When in the real world they would press on with their attack and either succeed or fail. If fail they may dig in just opposite the unit they were ordered to attack or withdraw a very few hundred metres, “back towards where they came from”, and dig in.

In short the FUP and approach march/movement are normally fine, they should react to unexpected encounters. The trouble starts once the attack/assault has been under for a short or longer time.

Once the assault is under way they should do one of three things.

1) Succeed and occupy the ground ordered to take and dig in.
2) Fail but dig in near adjacent to the unit they are attacking.
3) Fail then withdraw near straight backward about 200-300m and dig in.

That is about it except in “very” rare situations.

They should not wonder all over the battlefield as so often they do.

The slowness, the operational procedures, the order delays are good, not bad. But the company units move around far too much once an attack is under way or over, win or loose.

Great game... am a big fan.... but this is “the” fault or problem currently. No doubt better than it was, but still very much there.

Company sized units should stick at what they told to do either by the human player or the higher level AI for far longer periods unless overwhelmed by morale issues. Hours at a time.

If this could be sorted out the system would move from “great wargame” to being an “all time great” game. (Alongside Combat Mission which I currently believe deserves that title.... but each to their own... ).

BftB is positively drenched in high quality features. Company units just need to relax and do as they are ordered. Unless they die or crack under the strain.

Hope you understand my ranting.... !

All the best,
Kip.

[Arjuna]

Kip,

Now you have me scrathing to understand what you are on about here.

This movement by the asssault units is it controlled movement or are they reacting ( ie retreating, routing )?

Are they following an asault route - in which case are you really at odds with the assault route chosen?

Have they finished the attack and repositioning on the objective?

Perhaps you could send us a save taken just before the behaviour you talk about occurs.

[MarkShot]

A couple of marked up screen shots could be useful here too. As one man's spaghetti is another man's inspiration.

[kipanderson]

Arjuna, hi,

I will try to explain better with Saved games and screen shots.....

Just to briefly try again in words....

The move up to the FUP point is fine, the move from the FUP point to the Assault point is fine. Sometimes they are diverted but nearly always “realistically..” when moving from the FUP to the Assault location.

However, once the Assault is underway, sometimes after a short while sometimes after the longer time, the individual company units may suddenly “take off” towards some other location 300m or 400m away.

This should not happen... company sized units should for hours at a time stick at what they were ordered to do. They should do one of the three things listed previously

1) Succeed and occupy the ground ordered to take and dig in.
2) Fail but dig in near adjacent to the unit they are attacking.
3) Fail then withdraw near straight backward about 200-300m and dig in.

Once an Assault is under way or after an assault they use their initiative too much and move around too much. If under human control they should not move again unless ordered to by the player. If under AI control then the AI should move them far less.

Will try to explain with Saves and screen shots.

All the best,
Kip.
PS sometimes they are retreating or routing sometimes not. But when they do retreat/route it should be straight back they way they came, not off to one side.

[Ron]

I know what you mean kipanderson - the back and forth action of the companys while attacking, almost like a bumblebee dance. It has been a part of the engine since the beginning, a little surprised it is still evident. I agree this behaviour should be more deterministic as you suggested. Though, not wanting to derail your thread, there are quite a few un-WWII-like features in the game!

[kipanderson]

Arjuna, hi,

Have sent a Saved game to your “contact” email.... at Panther Games.

My email is kip@su76.com... A bit strange, sometimes caught by spam filters. So the Saved email may be...

All the best,
Kip.

[wodin]

Another misleading thing is that when you see a counter drop back alittle you think why are they running away...but the counter isn't your troops...its the footprint thats important...it might be that the footprint doesn't move as drastically as the counter has...just a thought.

What might be good if there was an option to see a ghost footprint under you counter so you can see the actual real area that your troops are occupying. If people didn't like it they could turn it off.

As far as the assualting troops so far I haven't seen anything like whast been reported...well I haven't thought thats odd anyway...they may move but I know why they are moving there.

Being able to select a fallback postion when setting a defence order would be fantastic....men could even dig a trench in the fallback postion and the main postion...then all move to the main position.

[wodin]

I do notice that my units can shoot off quite far away but when you check them they have been hammered. I find the Arty can decimate my men very quickly and fatigue is a massive headahe....before long my men fall flat on their backs asleep even in precarious posistions. I haven't got the hang on the new rest buttons yet I think.

[Arjuna]

Kip,

I have received but not yet viewed your saved game. Thanks for that.

quote]The move up to the FUP point is fine, the move from the FUP point to the Assault point is fine. Sometimes they are diverted but nearly always “realistically..” when moving from the FUP to the Assault location.
[/quote]

Here is a source of confusion. Let me clarify what should be happening. First the assault group moves to the FUP. There it reorgs. Then it starts its assault from the FUP to the objLoc. Once it reaches the objLoc it conducts a finalReorg. Ie:

• Advance to the FUP ( task objLoc = FUP )
• FUPReorg ( task objLoc = FUP )
• Assault ( task objLoc = Attack objLoc )
• FinalReorg ( task objLoc = Attack objLoc )

Now in the above quote you mention that the "move from the FUP to the Assault point is fine". We don't use the term Assault point but if this is a distict second stage like you are referring then this in fact is the Assault task. You should see a big fat assault arrow in the unit task info box when you hit F1. If this is so, then what you are referring to in the third stage is the final reorg on the objective, when the units redeploy into defensive positions and then reorg. Again if you have hit F1 you should see the reorg task icon in the unit info boxes.

Can you please checka nd get back to me and confirm if this is the case.

[loyalcitizen]

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

Here is a source of confusion. Let me clarify what should be happening. First the assault group moves to the FUP. There it reorgs. Then it starts its assault from the FUP to the objLoc. Once it reaches the objLoc it conducts a finalReorg. Ie:

• Advance to the FUP ( task objLoc = FUP )
• FUPReorg ( task objLoc = FUP )
• Assault ( task objLoc = Attack objLoc )
• FinalReorg ( task objLoc = Attack objLoc )

Now in the above quote you mention that the "move from the FUP to the Assault point is fine". We don't use the term Assault point but if this is a distict second stage like you are referring then this in fact is the Assault task. You should see a big fat assault arrow in the unit task info box when you hit F1. If this is so, then what you are referring to in the third stage is the final reorg on the objective, when the units redeploy into defensive positions and then reorg. Again if you have hit F1 you should see the reorg task icon in the unit info boxes.

Can you please checka nd get back to me and confirm if this is the case.

No problem with understanding the tasks here. I suspect Kip would say the same. The problem is the FinalReorg too often gives up great defensive terrain or moves dead tired troops 400m through difficult terrain. Or three Coys all swap spots for no good reason.

I end up having to issue an In-Situ Defend order as soon as my Coys get near their destinations, so they don't abandon the ground they just bled to capture. Would love to see that as an option to add to an attack order:

[Checkbox] In-Situ Defend After Assault

[Arjuna]

OK thanks for clarifying that.

[kipanderson]

Arjuna, hi,

Yes.... Loyaocitizen has explained it very well. Combined with what I wrote above,
“Once the assault is under way they should do one of three things.

1) Succeed and occupy the ground ordered to take and dig in.
2) Fail but dig in near adjacent to the unit they are attacking.
3) Fail then withdraw near straight backward about 200-300m and dig in.

That is about it except in “very” rare situations.”

I hope that clears up with mean but do ask more if in doubt.

All the best,
Kip.

[Arjuna]

I don't necessarily agree with those three options. I would add a fourth and that is to redeploy into best defensive positions provided the conditions are right. Sometimes the final assault positions on the objective are good defensive positions vis a vis the likely enemy approaches but often they are not. After all they were more than likely chosen by the enemy to face the direction you just came from not the opposite direction from which the enemy will now come. The key IMO is to define the conditions when it is best to do so or to stay put. One obvious condition is the nearby presence of effective enemy forces ( ie ignore any routing enemy ). Another may the curent visibility. If low then be more likely to stay put.

Anyway this is food for thought.

[wodin]

How about about when giving a defence task you can also stipulate a fall back position that the men dig for you whilst digging the main defence position? That way when you do get a defender pulling out of a dug in postion it falls back to a prepared postion and not left in the open.

[fleischer]

I think one of the factors that contribute to units "milling about" is that the AI often seems to be very poor at taking units' current position into account when deciding who goes where in a formation. Perhaps this is even a bug of some sort, because often the AI will "flip" the current formation around when given a new order(i.e. the leftmost unit changes place with the rightmost unit, and so on). Consider this situation, for example:



Notice that the unit at the bottom is given the topmost position in the new formation while the unit at the top is given a position at the bottom. It is as if the AI does the opposite of what would be logical. And this example is just the first and best I could find, and far from a worst-case.

I imagine this has quite an impact on fatigue too, especially with foot units in larger formations.

[Adam Parker]

ORIGINAL: fleischer

I think one of the factors that contribute to units "milling about" is that the AI often seems to be very poor at taking units' current position into account when deciding who goes where in a formation.

Or another possibiliy is that we've never had an operational wargame before that shows movement at 100 meter increments inside a huge 1km sized square. Usually the micro-maneuver of btn's and coy's in wargames is hidden from us within the realm of movement between hexes of 1-2km in scale.

So isn't the real issue here, more one of - why does this game fight with an entire battalion within a 1km square? Heck, spread those companies out!

What the AI does within its 100 meter boxes shouldn't really be of concern.

[fleischer]

ORIGINAL: Adam Parker
So isn't the real issue here, more one of - why does this game fight with an entire battalion within a 1km square? Heck, spread those companies out!

What the AI does within its 100 meter boxes shouldn't really be of concern.

You can set formation depth and width manually, so that's not really an issue - but yes, the default ones are small.

As for this problem, it occurs wether we are talking 100 meter boxes or 1000 meter boxes, so the problem gets bigger the larger the formation size/area size is. The biggest concern is that units get shot to pieces by artillery when moving around.