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Before I upgraded I noticed in 4.3b the AI had moved up a Valentine tank that op fired on my guys way too many times! With its thick skin I had to hurl everything I had at it and get infantry up close. Everytime one of my units moved his 2 man turret found more rounds even then my stationary tanks had. I know that crew rating can increase the the ROF and if enemy units move within 2 hexes, but this was a little far fetched.

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This is called "Special Op Fire", which is above and beyond normal op fire. Special Op Fire are 'free' shots, based on an experience check.

BA Evans

Obviously I didn't count, but a realistic estimate is that this tank had 10 Op fire shots. That seems to me to be beyound that tanks capabilities,no matter how experienced a crew it has.

its a 'lesser of two evils' situation as i see it.

the way things were before, one could 'game' the system, by being able to both predict how many OP shots an enemy unit would get and take advantage of it by moving a non-vital unit to force the shot to be taken.

True, this can result in some cases in a unit getting an extraordinary # of shots ( i remember engaging a singular 76mm AT gun, with ONE surviving crewman left, it got off no less than **5** spec op shots!!!!!) but the benefit is that your no longer assured of getting in a kill or free shot after x number of rounds. Very frustrating at times but thats what war is all about!

Originally posted by Nikademus:
True, this can result in some cases in a unit getting an extraordinary # of shots ( i remember engaging a singular 76mm AT gun, with ONE surviving crewman left, it got off no less than **5** spec op shots!!!!!)

Remember - a turn could be up to 5 minutes .. and you'll shurely agree that a lonely gunner who's really scared could put out 1 shot per minute .. at least as long as he has some ammo nearby, that is.

Arralen

Thanks guys, I guess I can except the Special Op Fire algorithm a bit better now, but that darn Valentine tank still irks me. War is Hell, especially when your AI opponent is the virtual Wild Bill.

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Old gamers never die; young ones do.

If an AI Flammpanzer III fires 12 times per turn (Double the rate of fire) something is not right about Special Opfire?
All veterans seem to say that nothing is wrong. Should I agree?


Assumptions about shots per turn:
t = time
r = rate of fire(shots per unit of time), includes loading, aiming, etc.
F = r*t = shots per turn


In order to increase the rate of fire one must increase r or s.

Increase in r (time period fixed).
One can usually increase this variable only marginally.
You cannot suddenly load a gun twice as fast as usual and do that multiple times in a row.
Maybe in extreme cases with elite troops max.20% with lighter weapons? But even that cannot last from turn to turn. One can usually maintain “super effort” only a short period of time.
No double shots per turn from here.

Increase in t?
This is the hardest part to accept
If a turn is not a fixed period of time then you do not have the concept of time at your disposal
You don’t know how much time has passed or how much time you have left to finish tour tasks.
A TURN IS A MEASURE OF TIME, right? If that measure varies randomly one minute in the future may not be the same length of time as it is now (Please, spare me from advanced physics .
The funniest part is still to come since the time variation does not concern both parties
The opponent (AI) is the only one that gets Special Opfire, I don’t. Then if opponent can have special OpFires way beyond reasonable increase in r, and I don’t have even a modest increase in number of shots per turn, it means that e.g. 1min to our troops is 5min to opponent? Where is the reality?
If you mess with the time, you really mess with the reality


Could this be reality:
One turn must be a fixed period of time that must be same to both parties. Then the only increase in shots per turn(per unit of time) can occur via r, and that can be only marginal.


Q :Why attacker want to use as many units as possible when attacking?
A: He knows that enemy rate of fire is more or less fixed and it can have only modest increases. If enemy rate of fire is quite fixed, then increasing attacking units decreases the suppressive fire per attacking unit per time and that way increases the possibility of an successful attack. If you can have 15 units against one enemy unit in one unit of time, you know that enemy cannot fire at every unit if the enemy rate of fire is 6.


Conclusion:
Special OpFire has nothing to do with the reality if it allows as big increases in shots per turn as it does at the moment.
If I got something wrong, please tell me. Otherwise this thing should be referred as “SpecialWormholeFirefromOuterspace”

//Don’t mess with the time

Your conclusions are technically correct, Casualty. However, as stated previously in this posts and others, the inability of the AI to intelligently assess the threats (fires on moving empty truck when tiger tank is in view), something had to be done to limit the advantage that this gives to its opponent. A smarter AI would be the best solution, but that is always the solution in human vs computer games. A decision had to be made as to how to increase the challenge inspite of the AI. Plus there are different rates of fire. I have a video clip of an 88mm AA gun crew doing rapid fire against ground targets during the battle of the bulge. The clip was quite short, but they were putting shells down range at a rate of about one every 3 seconds. Would you like to see this rate of fire, with that weapon, modelled in the game (1 turn = 5 minutes = 100 rounds)?

This game cannot truly model reality. The intent is to simulate reality in a way that is challenging and fun.

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Robert (Bonzo) Lindsay, Coordinator
28th (North-west) Battalion Headquarters
Main http://nwbattalion.tripod.com
Mirror http://dreadnaught.home.icq.com
E-mail nwbattalion@icqmail.com

Ok here is how i look at special opps fire ...it is a time thing... and time is anything but linear when under fire or in similar situations time does all sorts of weird stuff ... what is unrealistic i think is that fresh units can be sequentially fed into an attack when in fact they are all pretty much attacking something you are trying to overwhelm all at once and then that poor Valentine fires in one direction the folks coming from the other direction being omnicesent know it can't be fring at them and don't duck ....

just think of it this way ya got 5 units attacking a valentine and it is fighting for it's life smoke and flame shot and shell everywhere yer scared and can't see much the tank fires again everybody ducks ( suppressed) ok in the game the tank fired 5 times to get this effect maybe even one of your own units fired and you thoughtit might be supporting infantry may they even fired on you thinking your were supporting maybe it WAS supporting infantry you don't know ....

in short i LOVE the Special Op fire thingy sheer genuis IMHO nice way to handle it counting the shots and overlookin how it affects the game is (ok this is mean but i mean it in a nice funny way ) the way folks who have only painted rocks on the parade ground would see it. (not a personal attack just joking sorta trying to help ya see special op fire as super realistic in effect) altought i hate that it uses up limited ammo

Before the advent of special op-fire, the basic "tactic" (trick would be more fitting) was to advance a few expendable things and make the target fire at them and then only attack with more valuable and costly units.
That was much more unrealistic since in real life all of the attacking units would have to move simultaneously and the defender would try to fire against the biggest threat it could eliminate.
Special op-fire makes using that "tactic" much less profitable and therefore I welcome it.


wWhen defedning special op-fire can be a mixed blessing since many shots highly increase the risk of weapon break-down besides using good ammo for often poor shots (a sensible attacker will never let you keep any acquisition as he won't fire twice in the row with the same unit or keep moving the target of your last shot once op-fire has been drawn)

Short quotes, replies, some yadayada and the end

Bonzo:
“inability of the AI to intelligently assess the threats”
-Correct and it is good that it is compensated, but this is way too much.
“88mm AA gun crew doing rapid fire against ground targets”
-Technical detail about different rates of fire towards different targets (aiming/effect). Irrelevant?
“This game cannot truly model reality”
-This game can model reality very well, but time distortion is a serious matter in this magnitude.

Though it is the only way at the moment, it is not the correct one and we should not take it as “Good” in the long run. Patches should improve AI truck vs. Tiger targeting and decrease time distortion.


AmmoSgt:
“and time is anything but linear when under fire or in similar situations time does all sorts of weird stuff”
-I particularly asked ppl not to take advanced physics into this discussion


Antonius:
-I welcome it too, but this is way too much.


The increase in attackers effort is increasing very rapidly with defenders rate of fire.

E.g. Flammpanzer III gets one special opfire and I must use infantry in attack.
-One more unit to spend before I get a chance to destroy tank (infantry will not take fire and stay around)
-Infantry comes in three, so I must locate also the two other units nearby (command)
-Command vehicle is also needed (command)
=I must have 4 more units in the area if enemy gets +1 in rate of fire
+When number of enemy units increase, I run out of space very quickly and my troops are much more vulnerable to enemy artillery.
= Attackers effort is increasing really FAST. (Just think what the attackers effort is when enemy gets +100% rate of fire per turn&#8230

I had reserved exactly 12 motorcycle units to take out that Flammpanzer III and you can imagine that I was not very satisfied with 0 assaults


It is also a problem with all units when you are moving under enemy fire. One 20mm AA can at the moment stop you attack alone in open area by shooting with the huge rate of fire and decreasing severely the movement of your troops trough an area. You need again a huge pile of troops to get trough with decent movement.

The point:
Time is important measure for the fire and movement and it should be considered as a Holy Thing
Distorting time is not the way to make things work. It can be used almost not at all.
The time distortion is way too big at the moment. The problem is greatest with the units that have heavy firepower. Defending is way too profitable compared to attacking. This problem is big like the VCR one.

//The end.

Turns and time - one of my favorite "soapbox" occasions...

First my assumptions:

1) Combat is inherantly more asynchronous than synchoronous.

What does that mean? It means that one part of front (unit wise) moves at a different rate than another part of the front. For reasons best laid out by Col Boyd (of OODA loop fame) each unit marches to the beat of its own drummer. This is the princple failing of gaames that attempt to set a strict time limit on a turn and allow all units to operate at some fraction of theoretical maximum each set time increment.

I use the term "miniature-itis" to describe it becasue it was most common among tactical minis rules where each turn is 30 sec or a minute and movement rates were based on d=r*T and not OODA. The result was a Brigade level encounter moving form recon to contact to massig and breakthrough all in 30 or 40 game turns - or 15-20 minutes in "real time" when such an evolution would be lucky to occur in full daylight on a summer day.

IGO -UGO games are teh ultimate in asynchronous representation - EVERY unit performs its move before another moves. This in itself "warps time" to a certain extent. THe alternative is the "newtonian clockworks" where players give orders to units and they move in near perfect synchronization. Ask any Battalion CO and the hardest task in combat is kepping the rates of advance of his companies synchronizzed. THat is one reason there is such current emphasis in "network -centric warfare" circles about achieving the Holy Grail of self - synchronizing forces. THer Germans were able to accomplish this throught their doctrine of Auftragstaktic better than any other army in WW2 and this allowed them to hold off Soviet Tank armoes with regiment kampfgruppes and delay the whole bloddy Allied army in the West to a few hundred yards a day.

2) Since IGO-UGO is the "extreme" of asynchronous behavior, one must bse game design decisions not on what any particular unit can theoritcally do in a turn, but on what a SIDE - over the course of a two piece turn (both IG and UGO) can accomplish.

THe argumant for a strict adherance to a time frmae is correct if you are concerned about trees, but at the cost of seeing the forrest. In a game concerned with a few plattons, essentially operating synchronously, the "trees are more importan than the forest and a "clockwork" engine like CM has works very well. IGO UGO give's folks fits. But as you ad units, the tables turn and particularly if you move one company before moving any units of another, or play with a time constraint online where you can only move a portion of your force befor the enemy gets a chance to move part of his) then IGO UGO - as the forrest is concerned, actually is "more realistic"..becasue it captures this problem of achieving sychronization.

3) So the result is a "turn" (a pair of player turns) describes as "several minutes" CAN"T be a set period of time, it must be assumed to be a bit abstract, based on the intensity of the action. Combat - even at close quarters, was not the continous thing games typically prtray, but a mostly inactive place punctuated by fits and starts of advaces, firefights, and withdrawls. This is why "real" battles generally took hours where gamers play the engagement in minutes. TO properly restrict the players OODA loop would result in an extremely frustrating process that was largely out of teh players control. THe "God-game" view players want, is directly at odds with reality, so the need to "telescope time" to account for the players omniscience and BORG like OODA loop.

SO game time DOES warp, and in an IGO UGO system, one MUST abstract time or the forrest will be lost. THe view of teh trees does suffer for this, but THe basic design intent of SP was always aimed more at portraying the forrest, then the specifics of each tree. We ahve tried to give more definition to the trees, but its still an abstract artists landscape, not a realists portrait of trees.

As to the need fo a huge pile of troops to advance...the US army found that a 3-1 advantage at the point of attaack was necessary to HAVE ACHANCE - 5-1 was considered the norm for a 50-50 chance and 7-1 desired to keep the chance of failure acceptable low in a "key engagemet". (I belive thats found in the 1949 edition of FM 100-5)

A truly excellent explanation, Paul. I've bookmarked this thread & will direct future threads on Opfire imbalance to this one. Thanks

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Robert (Bonzo) Lindsay, Coordinator
28th (North-west) Battalion Headquarters
Main http://nwbattalion.tripod.com
Mirror http://dreadnaught.home.icq.com
E-mail nwbattalion@icqmail.com

Casualty i'm not talk about advanced physics i am talking about human perceptions and ability to function under stress. The phsyics would be P*S/T=C
where P= Pucker factor
S= Stress
T = Time
C= confusion

Casualty, we can discuss the concerns we have with SA:WaW regarding many issues: the AI, the way time is modeled, etc. One has to bear in mind the limitations of coding & the fact that SP:WaW as will be available in version 4.5 is the result of a lot of unpaid hours by a few very skilled people. Our concerns are valid, but are probably best addressed in a new game, where the coding is not as mature. I am very suprised to see v4.5 so soon. I would be more suprised to see a v4.6, ever. New oobs, yes, from members of this forum. New icons, maybe. new scenarios and campaigns, definitely. New version, can't see it unless something truly horrendous turns up in v4.5.

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Robert (Bonzo) Lindsay, Coordinator
28th (North-west) Battalion Headquarters
Main http://nwbattalion.tripod.com
Mirror http://dreadnaught.home.icq.com
E-mail nwbattalion@icqmail.com

Please do not misunderstand me. My purpose is not to say that this game sucks or that people who give effort for this are doing poor job.
This timing issue was not (is not? Will not be?) perfectly clear to me and the provided answers did not satisfy me. I decided to give my point of view and wait for clarifying replies, which I have got.
I personally believe that objective and critical discussion is the best way to stay in the right path. If you find yourself in a situation where the only argument left is “That’s just the way it is”, you know that you are in wrong direction with big probability. I hope my favourite game can find a right path whatever it will be.
I still have few questions

Special Opfire is used to compensate the lack of AI intelligence and especially to simulate asynchronous battle conditions, right?


Asynchronous battle conditions

When Special Opfire is used to simulate asynchronous battle conditions it means that time in combat situation is measured by the amount of units that can trigger Special Opfire?
-More attacking units = more time to spend (return fire).
-Time is a function of triggering units.

The problem(?)
Time is not a decreasing function of units triggering Special Opfire?
If not:
-A unit can have an infinite amount of special Opfires? E.g. take a Flammpanzer III and put it next to ammo dump…it can fire over 30 times …only limiting factor seems to be the available ammo.
-If firepower differential between two units is big enough and bigger firepower is elite unit already with considerable rate of fire (Flammpanzer III vs. infantry), one cannot increase the probability of an successful attack by increasing the number of attacking units
-There is ot difference in achieving synchronization whether you use elite forces or not.
-Events (fights) are independent from each other in time, so the battlefield is absolutely asynchronous and you cannot synchronize your forces at all.
-A forest consists of large number of individual trees that must have some binding constraint between them (time & space)? If trees are represented individually in time or in space they cannot form a forest?

I understand (hopefully) for what the Special Opfire is used and I welcome it. But the extend in which it is used is in my opinion way too much. At least the time should be a decreasing function of triggering units (if it is not). The slope of the function is a subjective issue, I would prefer steep slope and try to find other means to create asynchronies.

Disclaimer: following text is just thoughts and may not have any sense at all

In order to model better the difficulties of synchronization one should keep the time constant and have random variation in unit performance rather than keep the unit performance constant and have variance in time?
Why not use something like the combat friction when determining the movement?
Units could have probability distribution that gives random values for the movement?
That distribution would be affected by different variables like unit characteristics, weather, suppression, command, terrain, etc?
This way one would get variation in movement which would be more much realistic way to raise the difficulties of synchronization?
One would need to measure movement more accurately to make it work? If infantry moves four hexes the minimum change in movement is 25%.
-Change the scale. E.g. double the movement points and make bigger maps accordingly
-One would get min. change 12.5%


//We all know how crucial the timing is in a battle.

The difference in firing speed might well have to do with target acquisition. There is a mayor difference between the at-gun firing long range shots, they try to make every shot count. Until the enemy comes to close and they start shooting like hell to keep them off their back (I can really imagine this flammpanzer spraying flames all around without too much aiming to prevent the infantry coming too close)

patrick

Key points about SpecOpFire:

1)The rate at which it occurs depends on certain factors:
a. Continued incoming fire from a unit.
b. Continued movement in LOS of unit.
c. Morale level of unit firing.
d. Experience level of unit firing.
2)The amount of fire depends on certain factors, as well:
a. Ammo supply of unit.
b. Successful experience checks.
c. Perceived threat to unit.

Elite units will fire more often than average units, and second-line will fire less. Suppressed units will not fire as often, unless they are about to be overrun, when the threat is greater.

I have read reports of men in combat exceeding the firing rates of their weapons in close-quarter fighting, not only in WWII, but Korea and Vietnam. Adreneline gets pumping, death is all around them, and the chance of survival depends on their ability to destroy the enemy.

So, I don't find it unusual to see units in-game get lots of SpecOpFire shots. Even my own troops will get them.

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The Motor Pool
http://www.geocities.com/aurion_eq/index.html?976419304550
kmcferren@cvn.net

Casualty: THe things you argue are at the heart of game design, I hope you do not feel they were given short shrift!

One big thing I left out of the explanation that seems to be missed is that Special Opfire has a VERY large dependance on experience, only high experience troops will opfire a lot, low expereince troops do not. Theoretically a unit could have infinite opfire if it were attacked by infinite units, but there is a similar probability that all the air molecules in my office will all move to the corner over my shoulder and I will suffocate

A few clarifications - its somewhat a matter of realtivity in looking at whether a high opfire situation is actually that little piece of the front taking more time (while other sectors are quiet) or if those troops are doing more per unit time. The result is the same, and falls within the level of abstraction required in an IGOUGO game - ie while you move the units sequentially, the implications is that the actions are not necesssarily REALLY sequential)

While special OPfire is not a function of time, its effect is a function of suppresion. Think about it this way, if 200 troops walk slowly up to a squad with a mchine gun, given that a turn is 3 or 4 minutes, is the number of troops killed a function of time, or firepower? The while the number oif shots are random fuction of experience, the EFFECT of those shots is a function of a great number of things, suppression being one of the more significant. So if those 200 troops are all shooting at the squad, its "theoretical firepower" is not necessarily reduced (ie number of opfire opportunities) but the effect of those shots progressively degrades as suppresion is built up. This is arguable, but the way the game is structured. The limiting factors become experience and suppression - not time.

Your other comments are very good - but in some ways covered. Combat friction does affect movement - if "approach the front" ie get spotted by enemies, you slow down, you lose more movement for getting shot at. Making the penalties random is a good idea, but making too many things random makes debugging very difficult...

Measuring movement more accurately requires abandoning hexes...needing a new system. YOur ideas are right on target - but are for a different game...Stay tuned

"I hope you do not feel they were given short shrift!"
If I ever felt that way even a marginally short period of time, I certainly do not anymore

"the number of troops killed a function of time, or firepower?"
f(t,f,a)=efficient rate of fire per unit of time=troops killed per unit of time?
t= time
f=firepower
a= accuracy



I thank you all for the clarifying replies.
Though I understand and accept it to certain extemd, the elite Flammpanzer III may be something that I will never get by. No soviet blitzgrieg with motorcycles.


//fried soviet soldier