Matrix Games Forums

Now don't get me wrong, part of the charm of this game is its micromanagement, but there are aspects of it that drive me up the wall.

I have, inevitably, (well that's my story and I'm sticking to it) ended up with lots of little fragments of units all over the place. Really in themselves not militarily important but I'd feel happier if they were re-united with their mates.

At present my method is to look for them (takes ages), to send some ships for them, (takes a while), to load them up and send them to some central collection points, drop them off there and that at least means I get one or two locations where I then can keep looking to find fragments that can then be sent to have a 'welcome back' drink or two.

All this kinda gets in the way of the main business.

Am I missing a trick or two here? How do others sweep their fragments together?

Go on, say it, everyone else transports whole units carefully and never leaves parts in far flung locations...... yeah guys I believe you.

i find air transports to be very useful in getting little bitty fragments reunited. Much, much faster than the boating route!

Also, the looking for them can be sped up by hitting the list all ground units and sorting by name. Fragments stick out like a sore thumb.

Yes looking on that list is faster I agree. As regards air transport, that's fine provided the fragment is a light one that is air transportable......

Both good points thanks.

ORIGINAL: ctangus

Also, the looking for them can be sped up by hitting the list all ground units and sorting by name. Fragments stick out like a sore thumb.

ORIGINAL: Roger Neilson II

Yes looking on that list is faster I agree. As regards air transport, that's fine provided the fragment is a light one that is air transportable......

Both good points thanks.

ORIGINAL: ctangus

Also, the looking for them can be sped up by hitting the list all ground units and sorting by name. Fragments stick out like a sore thumb.

There are some annoying "glitches" with air transport. Sometimes, air units do NOT want to pick up that very last little load, even if the load cost is small... you can get around this sometimes by resting up the air unit or by switching to a high-morale air transport unit to do the job. Sometimes, they never will move, and i end up sending a ship to remove the last "speck". Fast transport missions are very good for this.

Plan your airlifts in a more organized fashion?[:D]

It's the helter skelter withdraw, with no plan, that causes units to be scattered.

I thought that if the unit had vehicles or equipment like AT guns, that they could not be air transported?

its not supposed to be.

ORIGINAL: BlackSunshine

I thought that if the unit had vehicles or equipment like AT guns, that they could not be air transported?

Well - not all fragments have AT guns or vehicles... usually these stay with a parent... eventually if you evac enough of a parent, they will be stuck with big stuff but become a fragment. These can be very hard to get out in hostile environments. Things like Sound Detectors usually end up staying behind (too big for a Fast Transport mission).

'are' you using air transport or sub transport?

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

its not supposed to be.

Yup it seems like only airborne units suffer the air transport penalties for heavier devices - whereas full infantry divisions do not!

ORIGINAL: jwilkerson

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

its not supposed to be.

Yup it seems like only airborne units suffer the air transport penalties for heavier devices - whereas full infantry divisions do not!

Usually i can not get a lot of the heavier stuff out by air transport. Some stuff that shouldn't be able to be moved will go on some aircraft - like some artillery pieces.

To my surprise, I pulled a whole division out of Andaman (the IJA 18th) back to Victoria's Point, via air transport. I had expected to have to bring some out via other means, but the whole lot came out on the planes!

yep....its a bug. I moved an entire armored division, Shermans and all by air in a test. Pretty funny. Never liked the air transport routine to begin with. Too easy...too fast.....too efficient.

That's crazy!

Roger

ORIGINAL: Nikademus

yep....its a bug. I moved an entire armored division, Shermans and all by air in a test. Pretty funny. Never liked the air transport routine to begin with. Too easy...too fast.....too efficient.

Holy Cow - what version was this under??? [X(]

Wow. 
 
I did not know this.  I had noticed the fact that airborne units never brought their heavy equipment along.  I assumed therefore I couldnt move entire divisions, let alone armored units!  Boy, was I wrong.

This seriously needs looked at, and Im surprised this isnt a house rule in a lot of games.

A bit gamey I would say. Discovered this myself when I airlifted a 5" CD gun.......

I definitely now watch closely to avoid "gamey situatuions".

JW, hope this is on the "fix it" list for the next patch...........

Technically, airborne units should have all elements air transportable.  In the real world, their artillery was small and light so it could be air transportable.  The 75mm pack howitzer, which was designed to be able to be carried by mules was used by many US light infantry units including airborne.  Merril's Marauders also used them.

It is frustrating when something that should be air transportable won't move and something she should not fit in a C-47 gets transported by air.

In any case, back to the original question.  I don't end up with too many small fragments around.  I'm in the habit of checking a base after transports have left to make sure the units I was moving all loaded.  If possible, I load the fragment that wasn't loaded onto the next transport and sent it after it's parent.

This is easier to do in versions before 1.804 which made the loading bug a lot worse.  I went back to 1.801 and units usually load completely.  Though I noticed the game going in cycles.  There was a week of game time where tranports behaved weird, not fully loading units, when selecting multiple units to load, it would only load a few of them, stopping loading when full and just sitting there instead of heading to the destination, etc.  Then it all went away and things started behaving normally again.

Having debugged many programs, it looks like the game has a blown pointer (a pointer that is not pointing to the right place) somewhere.  In pre-1.804 versions, it only creeps in occasionally.  In 1.804, it's a lot more consistent.  Somethine lower down in the code probably got bigger, so the blown pointer is now pointing closer to something critical. 

I hate it when that happens.  In a big program it can take a huge effort to find it.  If it isn't fixed, we're likely to see intermittant problems like this off and on.

Bill

I hate the fact units have a "carry cost" for different kinds of ships, which is never accurate since ships are in different sizes and units continue to "grow" while loading, ergo, commonly leaving fragments if you miscalculated, which is TOO DAMNED EASY TO DO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!![:@]