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Alright, since I can't play the Tempe scenario I'm using the spare time to report some anomalies, dealing with arty behaviour. Pls check the pictures below.

1) The mad arty: 2nd Mot. Fd Arty Bn, Regt 102. The unit is conducting "on call" bombarding missions, but look at what it's bombarding: Maybe its cannons' sights are blurry, or even missing, but its fire is kind of avoiding the marsh. Interesting detail: It's classified as a motorized unit.
The really funny detail is, that the automatism, which is supposed to avoid friendly fire, went on vacation.

If I wouldn't issue rest orders or fire missions for the artillery, several artys (if i remember correctly) targeted this SAME spot for hrs. It's an older savegame, and i just looked at the time stamp: it says it's been created on 1st of November 2006. (which version was the most recent version back then? I use to play with the most recent patches).

I thought the savegame was created using a newer patch, but it doesn't look like it. [&o][:D]

Savegame sent to support[at]panthergames[dot]com.

In that email, I stated that i think it's been saved using the latest patch, sorry about that.

Please let me know whether this kind of anomaly would just proceed to appear because it's an old savegame being played on a newer version, or if it's really a persistent glitch still being present in the game.

2) I can't find the savegame containing this anomaly yet, and I can't remember when I created this screenshot, but the file's time stamp says it has been created on 8th of March 2007, so the anomaly must have appeared playing with the latest patch, since it's the NARVIK scenario, a relatively new custom scenario.

The artillery (off-screen, bottom right corner) is not able to bombard the enemy unit, due to the "friendlies in way" being triggered. The only friendly unit nearby (pls see green crosshairs) resides 2 - 3 kilometers further south, too far-off to trigger friendly fire, usually.

Again, this might deal with the fact that some artillery units still avoid impassable terrain (fire-mission-wise), or (even worse) rivers. I would like to know why an arty unit shouldn't be allowed to target an enemy unit which tries to make it over a river. Arty units still aren't able to bombard some rivers and the units trying to cross them. Bombarding beaches would work, here and there, though.

The glitches in the arty code haven't been fixed completely, I think. Serious question (not meant to be polemic): Would I have to buy BFTB in order to have them fixed, in case the upcoming patch for COTA doesn't address this? I assume the upcoming patch is going to be the last one for COTA?

Good Guy,

re Bombarding impassable terrain. That was an issue earlier but was fixed in one of the patches ( not sure which ). I just checked it with the latest build ( 3.1.147 ) and it works fine: see below.

re friendlies in the way. One issue with this is fidelity. We store a map of friendly concentrations based on a 300m grid. This grid is fixed - ie its orgin is 0,0 and not relative to the target's loc. So depending on exactly where the target loc is you can sometimes get a no go zone up to 900m - ie the square root of 300 x 300 doubled along the diagonal. This could occur only if the target was in the top left corner and the friendly unit was in the bottom right corner of the diagonally adjacent grid.
 
The reason we use this concentreation maps rather than a direct lookup based on the actual units is to reduce processing speed. Otherwise we would have to do another specific series of distance checks, looping through all units. Something we want to avoid.
 
However, given the screen dump supplied I'd say that this does not apply as the nearest friendy is obviously south of the target and by a good measure.
 
To determine exactly what the cause is I need a saved game based on the latest patch 2 version of the game.

Ok, just fired up "Tanks at Platamon", hell yes I can target all rivers etc. Ha !
Guess the last patch fixed it Well, I shouldn't open old savegames, eh? [:)]. Thanks for checking, though.

EDIT: Digging for the savegame now.

No worries GoodGuy, but now that I am working on a defence contract my rates have gone up. Where do I send the bill? [;)]

Send the bill to my parents, who weren't able to teach me not to tinker with old savegames. [:D] [;)]
Defence contract? Ha! Then you can hire a p2p-guy to program the "AA-Central" with the upcoming loads of bucks [;)].

Seriously now, does the contract incorporate anything dealing with the AA engine? [8D].

ORIGINAL: GoodGuy

Seriously now, does the contract incorporate anything dealing with the AA engine? [8D].

Surey, GoodGuy, you arn't trying to get Dave to divulge classified government information?

"Divulge classified" infos? You're funny . He came up with the contract thingy, not me [:D].
Look at this website: http://www.bistudio.com/inside/profile.html . Scroll down and see the developer (who created Operation Flashpoint) publicly advertizing "classified" infos about their training software for the military. Everyone knows that the famous Close Combat series had been used (or is still being used) by the USMC, as well.

My question was rather like "is it a consulting contract, or does it involve the AA engine?". I just wanted to know something about what kind of contractual work he was talking about there. As everyone knows, Panthergames isn't exactly mega-wealthy, so I'd be happy for him if such a contract (especially if it's not "just" consulting) would bolster the game projects in one or another way, see?.

Ok, Maestro can u keep a secret? I'm an working as an undercover agent for a small group called "Rising Sun", and my task is to gather infos about companies who produce niche-games that could be used to train military personnel around the globe. Once sufficient infos about current sims have been collected, the sub-group "AA babies" will develop the ultimate train. sim, which then will be offered to the Russians. Does that answer your question? [;)]

Back to topic: I'm still trying to find the Narvik savegame... I may have to play this scenario again.

ORIGINAL: GoodGuy

"
Ok, Maestro can u keep a secret? I'm an working as a undercover agent for a small group called "Rising Sun", and my task is to gather infos about companies who produce niche-games that could be used to train military personnel around the globe. Once sufficient infos about current sims have been collected, the sub-group "AA babies" will develop the ultimate train. sim, which then will be offered to the Russians. Does that answer your question? [;)]

My fears have been confirmed. [X(] I'm still wondering what your "front" is; perhaps recreational officer for the Green Party?