Matrix Games Forums

I"m playing the boot camp 4 battle. I've got my squads all in bldgs for cover. the T34's come rolling up. But they're unbuttoned.

So I want to put some fire on them to force them to button up. I take the farthest platoon, put it in an engage mode and try to target the T34's with two of the squads.

The target msg says good chance to hit. but when I click, the line goes grey. Tied this over two order phases, I finally gave up and qwas able to get one of the blue boxes showing and set it up "close" to the tank - it wouldn let me put the blue box on the tank.

The tank finally started taking fire and buttoned up.

But what would be keeping me from targeting the tank? I tried facing the squads, but that didn't help.

Rick

EDIT:

Well replaying again and managed to blow track off lead tank and force both tanks to button up with area fire and close assault.

Took out the rear tank, then while the command squad of the last platoon held the front T34's interest, brought the entire 1st platoon to assault the remaining T34.

Turn 8 Legendary vicotry - it's really kinda neat watching a couple of platoons take on a couple of T34's .

But the question remains about targeting the tanks.

Rick

I thought the same thing as you at first, Rick.  I thought I could lay down some fire to cause the tanks to button up.  Apparently you can't target the tank commander, only the tank, and outside of close assault range your small arms fire cannot harm the tank in any way.  Hence the gray line.  Just don't target the tanks until you're in close assault range, then you'll get the red targeting line as you can see.
 
As for the rationale for why you can't target the tank commander, Erik will have to explain that.  It doesn't bother me though as the game abstracts many things and doesn't necessarily have to account for every possibility explicitly.  I wouldn't have a problem with using small arms fire to make tanks button up, either.

ORIGINAL: Capitaine

I thought the same thing as you at first, Rick.  I thought I could lay down some fire to cause the tanks to button up.  Apparently you can't target the tank commander, only the tank, and outside of close assault range your small arms fire cannot harm the tank in any way.  Hence the gray line.  Just don't target the tanks until you're in close assault range, then you'll get the red targeting line as you can see.

As for the rationale for why you can't target the tank commander, Erik will have to explain that.  It doesn't bother me though as the game abstracts many things and doesn't necessarily have to account for every possibility explicitly.  I wouldn't have a problem with using small arms fire to make tanks button up, either.

Capitaine,

Thanks - sounds like it was set up this way, I was concerned that maybe I wasn't understanding something. I was able to direct area fire - only problem with that is that the area fire wouldn't move with the tank so over the course of a phase the tank would move out of the area fire.

But the next time I went through the battle, I was able to get them both buttoned up and killed both tanks with no losses to my two platoons - that was quite fun.

Thanks I'm enjoying this game.

Rick

Yeah, they button when receiving small arms fire < 25m.&nbsp; Are you saying that you were able to fire on them > 25m and forced them to button?
&nbsp;
I know that I used one squad to fire from a building at the lead tank to attract his attention, but he drove close and I was pretty sure he was < 25m.&nbsp; I'd have to look at that one again to see if the gray line fire actually affected the tanks.

ORIGINAL: Capitaine

Yeah, they button when receiving small arms fire < 25m.  Are you saying that you were able to fire on them > 25m and forced them to button?

I know that I used one squad to fire from a building at the lead tank to attract his attention, but he drove close and I was pretty sure he was < 25m.  I'd have to look at that one again to see if the gray line fire actually affected the tanks.

I thought i made him button from distance using area fire, but perhaps not. Maybe Mobious, Stridor, or Erik can speak to the way it's supposed to work.

Rick

ORIGINAL: Rick

ORIGINAL: Capitaine

Yeah, they button when receiving small arms fire < 25m.  Are you saying that you were able to fire on them > 25m and forced them to button?

I know that I used one squad to fire from a building at the lead tank to attract his attention, but he drove close and I was pretty sure he was < 25m.  I'd have to look at that one again to see if the gray line fire actually affected the tanks.

I thought i made him button from distance using area fire, but perhaps not. Maybe Mobious, Stridor, or Erik can speak to the way it's supposed to work.

Rick

Yes I think that is a little quirk of the game that allows you to cause TCs to button but at the expense of revealing your position. Actually it is a good little tip you found there Rick [8D] It won't however kill the TC (that needs a "direct" hit on the vehicle"), but will markedly restrict tank vision to help your guys get into a better position.

Actually another use for mortars is to do the same!

It would be very cool if sniper class units could target TCs of unbuttoned vehicles...

[
quote]

Yes I think that is a little quirk of the game that allows you to cause TCs to button but at the expense of revealing your position. Actually it is a good little tip you found there Rick [8D] It won't however kill the TC (that needs a "direct" hit on the vehicle"), but will markedly restrict tank vision to help your guys get into a better position.

Actually another use for mortars is to do the same!
[/quote]


Ah - good - if I'm not able to target the tank, then I'm glad I can at least use area fire to "scare" the TC and force button. When I played the BC, it seeme like if I didn't get him buttoned up, I was sure to lose at least one and maybe more squads - I'm really enjoying this game - I hope I can rember to carry over some of the things I learned in bootcamp to other Campaigns.

I'm getting ready to start BC 6 now.

Thanks,
Rick

I didn't know you could button anything up with area fire.

The reason you get a gray target line to a tank with LOS and within effective range from any gun is that it can't do any damage, not even track damage. So it would be like saying "Here i am shoot me."

ORIGINAL: FNG
It would be very cool if sniper class units could target TCs of unbuttoned vehicles...

Thus the reason why many hatches open forward.

ORIGINAL: Mobius

I didn't know you could button anything up with area fire.

The reason you get a gray target line to a tank with LOS and within effective range from any gun is that it can't do any damage, not even track damage. So it would be like saying "Here i am shoot me."

Sounds like I need to do a test - maybe an excuse for me to learn more about scenario editing.

Rick

Sounds like we have a "design issue" here. It's not really a bug but rather an unintended consequence. When we added some additional penetration checking code, we dd not intend for that to prevent the human player taking "hopeless" shots like shooting at a tank with small arms from range. It was intended mainly to help the AI, but it looks like it did carry over to human targeting.

We'll take another look, I agree that infantry should be able to open fire on a tank outside close assault range to try to make it button up.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Sounds like we have a "design issue" here. It's not really a bug but rather an unintended consequence. When we added some additional penetration checking code, we dd not intend for that to prevent the human player taking "hopeless" shots like shooting at a tank with small arms from range. It was intended mainly to help the AI, but it looks like it did carry over to human targeting.

We'll take another look, I agree that infantry should be able to open fire on a tank outside close assault range to try to make it button up.

Yes, and per the variable penetration system not all hopeless shots are hopeless. Some just have a less than 8.34% chance of happening.