Matrix Games Forums

First, thanks a lot for fixing this bug !

[1.11.08] SHQ no longer ignores "can't go below 3 power" during transfers

Changelist for v1.11.09
[...]
-Fixed the transfer limit of 3 individuals for the SHQs, you can now transfer the last 3 out as well.

However, another new(ish) one has popped up :
What confuses me is that, considering this text, this is something that would have been deliberately implemented at some point since my last game (circa v1.08)... but why would you add extra troop transfer limits, it's not like this can be abused, since a unit uses the lowest AP of its troops anyway ?? (And why the second condition too ??)

Also there might be another unrelated (?) bug :
You can see that the SHQ has listed -1 Pow(er?), this seems to be calculated as 1-2 = -1, which doesn't make sense to me, as troops are being added to the SHQ ?
(This issue doesn't pop up when trying to transfer to the BattleGroup, but *does* also happen when trying to transfer to a non-independent Battalion.)

See also :

ShadowVillage wrote: Fri Feb 11, 2022 11:34 am I used to be able to transfer troop from my SHQ to other units stacked in the same hex. Now I'm getting a message saying "Source unit has 0 AP and did not move/attack this turn" and I'm no longer able to make the transfers. Is this a recent change and if so was it intentional? If not a change in the game, is there something I'm doing that's creating this problem?

[1.10.08b] Cannot transfer units from SHQ

(That seems to have been fixed correctly now, no issues transferring from SHQ to BG even though both the SHQ unit and the troop it contains has 0 AP.)

And the reason why this matters is that in this case I am stuck with a single Ind.MG unit, while otherwise I could make 2 of them, both of which would be ready to move (on their own) next turn.

But I remembered another way around this issue : the SHQ Troops % slider.

A quality issue with it, probably bad for new players ?

And then, restarting the turn and re-doing this, I ran into a bug I had already noticed circa v1.07-08 : this slider results in the wrong number of troops in unit : The consequences are :
1.) Having to do extra clicks to transfer the missing troops.
2.) The creation of an "illegal" unit with less than 3 troops.
3.) The readiness of the later unit merged up to 3 is probably messed up as a result :
Starting readiness in SHQ : 65 Readiness of the 1-troop unit : 32 (half of 65, truncated ?)
Readiness of the merged unit : 54 =? (32 + 65 + 65)/3 Should it be 65 or 32 instead ?

Another old bug : (Total should be 18% and Raise Formation greyed out.)
Variations : Seems to block it just fine if none are produced ?

Save for the above one :

BlueTemplar wrote: Fri Jan 13, 2023 7:58 pm [...]
What confuses me is that, considering this text, this is something that would have been deliberately implemented at some point since my last game (circa v1.08)... but why would you add extra troop transfer limits, it's not like this can be abused, since a unit uses the lowest AP of its troops anyway ?? (And why the second condition too ??)
[...]

Coming back to the "Source unit has 0 AP and did not move/attack this turn" issue, I found a perhaps even more annoying situation : when trying to "reshape" militia units after heavy combat (like after conquering a new city) far from a SHQ : without one, you can't even temporarily store troops to be immediately re-assigned, and so can't make any mistake, otherwise you are stuck with not being able to transfer out the troops that were just transferred in this turn, since the unit now has 0 AP !
(Or I guess it should still work if doing it in a single turn... if there are no "stragglers" that is... or maybe if you give the units a "workout" by moving them out of the city and immediately back in again so that the "did not move" condition doesn't trigger ?? But why have all this needless complication and extra micromanagement in the first place ?!?)

Fixing the bug! thanks for reporting.
As for the battlegroups issue you noted I tend to agree.
best,
Vic

Thanks a lot, and I am glad that you agree !
I'm still curious : what was the reason behind adding the "Source unit has 0 AP and did not move/attack this turn" restriction ?

I'm actually going to miss this bug - combined with unit customization, it allowed for novel unit tactics and specialized formations. Forex, I'd fairly commonly add 1000 bikers to motorized infantry (b/c if we're talking about old-but-useful bugs, transports still count as troops for determining how many auxiliary troops you can add when customizing), raise a BDE with only bikes (plus the 500 IN & 50 trucks for the OHQ already in the SHQ), then set bikes to elite and only Tolerate anything below elite. Viola, a TOE dragoon formation that was strong & mobile in the early game. Similar late-game shenanigans would allow for dedicated walker formations.

Unless I'm missing something, you can still do this by removing the troops that you don't want after raising the formation ?

BlueTemplar wrote: Fri Jan 13, 2023 9:08 pm And the reason why this matters is that in this case I am stuck with a single Ind.MG unit, while otherwise I could make 2 of them, both of which would be ready to move (on their own) next turn.

But I remembered another way around this issue : the SHQ Troops % slider.

A quality issue with it, probably bad for new players ?

And then, restarting the turn and re-doing this, I ran into a bug I had already noticed circa v1.07-08 : this slider results in the wrong number of troops in unit :
ShadowEmpire_S8dShwxbZi.png
ShadowEmpire_AHcM9hxdiB.png
The consequences are :
1.) Having to do extra clicks to transfer the missing troops.
2.) The creation of an "illegal" unit with less than 3 troops.
3.) The readiness of the later unit merged up to 3 is probably messed up as a result :
Starting readiness in SHQ : 65
ShadowEmpire_ygGUAx9OWl.jpg
Readiness of the 1-troop unit : 32 (half of 65, truncated ?)
Readiness of the merged unit : 54 =? (32 + 65 + 65)/3
ShadowEmpire_tu17eMHvJN.png
Should it be 65 or 32 instead ?

The above is still an issue in v1.25f :

1.) Raising formation still defaults to not using SHQ troops, and even after checking that, the default is still that none of the veterancies being selected, which means that it's very unlikely that new players will realize that you can do that.
(Reusing the old screenshot, and the tooltip is still wrong.)


2.) Units are raised with the wrong number of troops : So this unit group has its ToE filled at 40% for infantry and 100% for MG.

Expected :
HQ unit with 200 (or maybe rather 300, because 200 is illegal) infantry.
5 units with 300-400 infantry and 200 MGs.
All troops moved from SQH into the units.

Result : HQ unit with 200 infantry (<= illegal !)
1 unit with 100 infantry and 100 MG (<= illegal !)
1 unit with 200 infantry and 100 MG
3 units with 400 infantry and 100 MG
Somehow, 100 infantry and 500 MG (half of them !!) have NOT been moved to the new units, and were left at the SHQ.

So now I have to do extra micromanagement to fill the units up with the missing troops
(and also remove a few, since my goal was 100 infantry and 200 MG per non-HQ unit, but removing infantry was already to be expected, while also having to add MGs was not)...
which most likely, yet again, results in the final readiness being different than expected.

Save : The more I think about it, the more it seems to me that all these restrictions only over-complicate the game for hardly any benefit (and even without this bug, can still be cheated around whenever you take losses to put a unit under 3 troops).

It would probably be better to just let players to directly raise units of any size (lower than maximum), and groups of units also of any number of units (lower than maximum, and at least the OHQ). (Ditto for the current limit of minimum 25% ToE for replacements.)

It will allow for both less micromanagement, and also to more fully explore what smaller units have to offer, especially in early game : I'm especially thinking of Recon point thresholds and especially "Control" point threshold to capture an hex (which seems to be 4 troops next to it, assuming no other non-friendly units also have any CP there ?)

Well, the less micromanagement bit will be especially successful if you figure out how to make a much better raise group screen, which is probably the hardest thing to do here... (see also : difficulty to pick the mix of troops you want to raise when they are of the same reinforcement type)