Frustrating AFV Moves

Ryne · Post by **Ryne** » Sat Sep 23, 2000 12:47 am

I know it's been said before, but this bug/glitch/unfortunate characteristic needs to be mentioned again. Can something be done to prevent AFVs from trying to drive through buildings or obstacles when you give only an endpoint to the move. I can't tell you the number of tanks I've lost to immobilization when for some reason they leave the road to crash through a house! I know I could click hex by hex, but shouldn't it be the opposite---click on the house if I want the tank to doze through it?

Thanks

Ryne

Tom_Davie · Post by **Tom_Davie** » Sat Sep 23, 2000 3:50 am

While this can be frustrating, I *never* *ever* move more than one hex at a time. Sure, it takes a little longer to play through a game (not to mention really ratcheting up the tension level); but I've never run into a building since Steel Panthers 1 (er, at least not into a visible buildingh

).

Tom

Billy Yank · Post by **Billy Yank** » Mon Sep 25, 2000 11:44 pm

Also, the program should never move a vehicle through a minefield hex unless I specifically tell it to.

Wild Bill · Post by **Wild Bill** » Mon Sep 25, 2000 11:50 pm

If you choose a hex for a vehicle to go to without taking it hex by hex, it will look for the quickest way to get there.

If there are mines, sometimes it will avoid them, if there is a good alternate route. If not, it will brave the minefield in obedience to your orders.

The thing is guys, that you must, as Tom has well said, lead your vehicles through touchy places or you place them at risk.

Don't count on them choosing the best way. They won't. They simply obey orders and get there the quickest way they can.

So look over your battle carefully before you click on a hex 10 hexes away for it's destination. You may (as I often have

)
come to regret it deeply!

Wild Bill

------------------
In Arduis Fidelis
Wild Bill Wilder
Coordinator, Scenario Design
Matrix Games

Owl · Post by **Owl** » Mon Sep 25, 2000 11:57 pm

Version 4.0 seems to be much better at not driving tanks through buildings, and has always attempted to avoid mines in my observation. My main problem right now is the stone fences. I have a 100% break-down rate on going through/over those and the tank crew doesn't seem to be aware of the problem as they happily drive over them - well try anyhow. Is this "normal" or have I just had a string of bad luck? Can they go over the walls without tossing a track? If not then make the walls impassible terrain. If you've not encountered a scenario with the stone fences consider yourself warned.

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(.) (.)
...V...

Charles22 · Post by **Charles22** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 5:17 pm

I don't know what the deal is, but I can't recall EVER, in the life of SPWAW, a unit going through a hex with a known minefield. Perhaps it's just that I'm playing against minefields much better than I used to and don't realise it. On the other hand, for me anyway, if I'm encountering my minefields or the enemies, my units are generally under some sort of fire, and I've learned enough times that when you're crossing an arc of fire, you better not just blow through in one fell swoop. Big moves frequently cause big disappointment, as you never know how much fire you'll take to get enroute to that hidden hex, and could find that unit out in the open (the fire causing reduction of movement), with things possibly being as bad as having a minfield at their back, with the enemy determined to destroy the unit or retreat it.

Owl: I'm new to the commando sort of game, but it gave me an idea. At first, I thought, well why don't you just blow the stone walls with engineers? While that might do, if it's possible why not use commandos? Sure, make the stone walls you're intending to cross their infiltration point and blow a few hexes up. So much the better if they destroy bits and pieces of it from angles where the walls remaining will block the enemy spotting them.

Kharan · Post by **Kharan** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 5:38 pm

Originally posted by Ryne:
I know it's been said before, but this bug/glitch/unfortunate characteristic needs to be mentioned again. Can something be done to prevent AFVs from trying to drive through buildings or obstacles when you give only an endpoint to the move. I can't tell you the number of tanks I've lost to immobilization when for some reason they leave the road to crash through a house! I know I could click hex by hex, but shouldn't it be the opposite---click on the house if I want the tank to doze through it?

Thanks

Ryne

Weird, I think it's been improved greatly in v4.0. In fact, I can't seem to get my tanks to go through houses unless I go one hex at a time

. They automatically find holes in bocages and go through them, and I've even seen a large AI tank force go *around* a city to get to victory hexes.

One problem is still those vertical city-roads, which look like you can drive through, but the result is an immobilized vehicle because there's no straight up or down in hexes

.

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 6:23 pm

The routines have been much improved, but you still need to take positive control in situations where there the "right" move requires stacking, crossing bridges, in urban "blocks" and around certain types of terrain like streams and walls.

Kharan · Post by **Kharan** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 6:42 pm

Just for the fun of it, I tested this path-finding thing.

I created a row of buildings like this:

----------|
| ________|
| |
| |
| |

And placed it full of halftracks and tanks. When the rows were about 5 hexes long or shorter, no matter where I clicked them to go, they always used the opening in the south. When I increased the length above 5 they started to take the shortest way through the buildings. Not too shabby pathfinding!

One sure thing is that there is no way to accidentally drive through a lone building in open field, unless you go one hex at a time.

Voriax · Post by **Voriax** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 7:15 pm

Originally posted by Kharan:

One sure thing is that there is no way to accidentally drive through a lone building in open field, unless you go one hex at a time.

There seems to be one method. I haven't tested it via self-made map but observations suggest that when there is a building and a trail at same hex, then the pathfinder 'sees' only the trail and promptly crashes into a building in that hex.

Voriax

Kharan · Post by **Kharan** » Tue Sep 26, 2000 7:55 pm

:
There seems to be one method. I haven't tested it via self-made map but observations suggest that when there is a building and a trail at same hex, then the pathfinder 'sees' only the trail and promptly crashes into a building in that hex.
Voriax

No, I couldn't get tanks to go through buildings even that way.

No matter if the tanks started from next to a building or a few hexes away, or if the end point was at the end of the road/trail, they always automatically avoided the building, went back to the road, avoided the next building and so forth

.

[This message has been edited by Kharan (edited September 26, 2000).]