My JTCS:ME impression

[carll11]

Good Morning;

Hope you don’t mind but as a very long time TS, now JT grognard, I thought I’d share my impressions, re: JTCS-ME.

Be advised for whats its worth, this is from the perspective of a closet gamer;) In other words I don’t (can’t PBEM) etc.

I used a 2.6 quad core, 6 gb Ram lenovo to play on.

I played a few small-mid range beer and pretzel scenarios, then took the plunge and created my own, to test its limits and, as a closet gamer, designing or playing mods really matters, a lot to me.

I created a scenario using the largest map, 73 Suez expanded, created an OOB of 360K and a scn size of 140k, IOW many Israeli Tank bdges and Para Bns,2 Egyptian Divs plus ancillary units etc.

The set up was pretty much same as EF/WF ( I still dream that one day the team will design it so you can use hotkeys in ‘scenario edit’ mode and have a visible hex option in ‘map edit’ mode), so nothing new there really, however- I do love the larger force dialog box, thank you….

Flow- computer mechanics as the AI makes a turn; for a scn. this size and approx. 70% of the units engaged in movement/combat, in EF/WF the computer would have taken 2 hours (or more depending on man made obstacles) to complete its turn. ME routinely did it in 20 minutes, excellent!!

Next- the Adaptive AI- yes, it works and very well imho. I replayed a scn to turn 15, twice, same set up Objectives etc. and AI found or changed to new routes, It didn’t just keep wading in mindlessly (even on 100% aggressiveness) towards the same obj hex straight on as the ‘AI’ does in EF/WF in the face of withering fire and 80% casualties, it looked for weak spots so to speak, even moving initially, away from the objective hex.

Aggressiveness- hand in hand with the adaptive AI, this has improved in that, when it has closed in and though has taken heavy casualties it will overrun and drive thru defending positions. In EF/WF my experience was the offense even on 100% many times the units would balk, and sit mindlessly even at the moment they could get into the defenders positions and really do damage etc.

I understand that this is not always realistic, there is a point at which even the bravest units just cannot make that final push in the face of huge causalities even if they sense they are on the cusp of overrunning a position, BUT- at 100% aggressiveness they should, and here they do.

A Huge, Huge improvement. [&o]


Other notes;

I’d like to note though that some OOBs created by the team , example- the Israeli tank Bgds and Bns, in the Ismaliyah OOB. The inf. Units provided to the HQ groups don’t have any mech units capable of portage, either the units at ‘6’ are too big or the 113’s at ‘2’ are not correct.

Also, my hot keys ( on 2 different laptops btw) don’t seem to work, except once.
Then, they won’t/don’t. Unless I get out of the game, then come back, then the same, example- ctrl L will load or unload one time, when I try the hotkey again, its non responsive. However and here is the stranger thing too, if I let my cursor hover over the icon on the toolbar but use the hotkeys, it will work…..weird.

[Jason Petho]

ORIGINAL: carl11

Other notes;

I’d like to note though that some OOBs created by the team , example- the Israeli tank Bgds and Bns, in the Ismaliyah OOB. The inf. Units provided to the HQ groups don’t have any mech units capable of portage, either the units at ‘6’ are too big or the 113’s at ‘2’ are not correct.

Thank you for the feedback! It is appreciated!!

Regarding your comment above, please note that you require only a 3SP M113 platoon to move a 6SP infantry platoon. The lower 2SP M113's are intended for the heavy weapons.

The order of the M113's as they appear on the map when adding a mechanized infantry company to the map is to suit the infantry platoons are listed for carrying. For example:

6SP Infantry Platoon
6SP Infantry Platoon
6SP Infantry Platoon
2SP Mortar
4SP MMG
4SP M113 (Typically 4 vehicles as the Israeli's split up their platoon into 4 vehicles in most cases, but not every case, obviously!)
4SP M113 (to carry one infantry platoon)
4SP M113 (to carry one infantry platoon)
2SP M113 (to carry the mortars)
2SP M113 (to carry the MMG's)

Hope that helps!
Jason Petho


4SP M113

[carll11]

Thank you jason, yes, I sorted it out eventually as to the portage parents and occupants.

The issue in the command grps per Battalion, the '6' provided in the Ismaliyah OOB, the infantry squad assigned to the command group should be a '2', as they are in say the Great Bitter Lake scn.- that is carried by the '1' Nagmash example- the 410th/500th Arm Bdg. has a '2' inf. unit in its Bn. command grp. not a '6'.

[Jason Petho]

Ah yes, typo in the file!

I'll fix that for the 1.02 UPDATE!