Panther Games' Highway to the Reich revolutionizes wargaming with its pausable, continuous time game play and advanced artificial intelligence. Command like a real General, under real time pressures to achieve real objectives on a real map all within the fog of war. Issue orders to your powerful AI controlled subordinates or take total control of every unit. Fight the world's most advanced AI opponent or match wits against your friends online or over a LAN. Highway to the Reich covers all four battles from Operation Market Garden, including Arnhem, Nijmegen, Eindhoven and the 30th Corps breakout from Neerpelt.
I am somewhat mystified by the behavior of my 4th Arm Bde in the Terror of the Tynes Tees scenario. Have a look at the picture below. I have ordered the 4th Bde (units highlighted) to attack in the Welshap Airport area. The attack started OK, but suddenly, the AI reversed orders and now you can see that all units are being asked to withdraw near Oerle. What's happening? I don't want them to withdraw there, I want them to push on the attack forward on the airport, as it is planned ![&:]
Could it be that the AI decided that units need to reorg and that's why he is disengaging them? But why is he disengaging so far ? I did not received a message telling me that "4th Arm Bde passed its threshold for its Attack task" so I thought everything was going OK.
Anybody has an idea why suddenly the 4th Arm Bde is withdrawing?
Hmm, it could be shuffling which part is being held in reserve, or moving the reserve in while backing out some battered units ... tough to tell with just one screenie...
Did you set a form up waypoint or just click attack then pick the spot? It is possible that based on the front line fire, the AI picked a FUP in a safer location.
Hmm, it could be shuffling which part is being held in reserve, or moving the reserve in while backing out some battered units ... tough to tell with just one screenie...
Did you set a form up waypoint or just click attack then pick the spot? It is possible that based on the front line fire, the AI picked a FUP in a safer location.
I set up the FUP myself (just east of Oerle). They indeed formed up there, went on the attack, and then suddenly units became pink and the next thing I know the AI is ordering them to withdraw, but my attack marker is still on the airport (as well as the attack markers placed by the AI for the battalions of the brigade).
Dave is on vacation for the next five days and Paul although he drops by here from time to time is very busy guy.
So, I hope they won't mind if I step in and try to address that.
(1) At various points during an attack, the AI may issue a replan. This can happen if cohesion drops or the AI meets too much resistance.
(2) In the current beta patch version, I have documented a bug such as you describe that will cause an attack to replan for no apparent reason. The primary manifestation of that will be inexplicable fallback to the FUP. You may in fact be encounter that exact bug. I am not sure at what point it was introduced into the code. (I doubt whether it has always been there as it can be pretty noticeable when it happens.)
(3) The bug in item #2 has already be diagnosed by Dave and fixed by Paul. The beta team is waiting for a new build to continue testing.
(4) The specifics of the bug as I understand is this: Any order issued by a player will make the FUP waypoints on the map appear to have been moved by the player. As such, the AI will issue a replan as it perceives that the player has made a change. The only workaround would be not to issue new orders while an attack is in progress. Now, of course, there may be more to it than that, but nothing that I am aware of.
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So, that's all I can tell you about it. Although the beta's are under NDA, I am pretty sure that Dave would have let you known if you were seeing a known bug. So, I hope he won't mind that I did so upon his behalf.
2021 - Resigned in writing as a 20+ year Matrix Beta and never looked back ...
If I am encountering option 1, I guess then I should see the AI re-plan the attack correctly once the troops have re-formed and re-organized (I will just lose a lot of time though).
If it is option 2, I guess I'd rather then delete the order and plan a new attack.
If it's the bug, it may only apply to complex attacks, since otherwise I would expect that we would be seeing a lot more of it. Paul would know better the exact circumstances. When I had seen it (twice), they were complex attacks. A complex attack has more than a single HQ involved.
2021 - Resigned in writing as a 20+ year Matrix Beta and never looked back ...
If it's the bug, it may only apply to complex attacks, since otherwise I would expect that we would be seeing a lot more of it. Paul would know better the exact circumstances. When I had seen it (twice), they were complex attacks. A complex attack has more than a single HQ involved.
It was indeed a complex attack. I gave the order to the 4th Arm Bde HQ directly, and it has under his command 3 battalions. I'll keep my saved file in case.
What kicks off the problem is not in anything you are doing, but in the interface itself. Thus, there is no work around. It's impact (in causing replans) is not just limited to complex attacks. However, during other orders it manifestation is very hard to detect to the casual observer as opposed to a fallback during an attack. It's more likely to be seen during complex attacks, since they have a much longer duration than basic attacks.
Happily, it is fixed already and we are busy working towards getting the next patch out.
Enjoy the holiday, if you are celebrating one this weekend.
2021 - Resigned in writing as a 20+ year Matrix Beta and never looked back ...
Well, an update on this. I did not change the order and let the game continue to see what would happen. After some time, the attack was re-planned correcly and the units of 4th Bde were again on the move. So I guess it was just re-planning. After some more progress, it seems the same thing is happening again, and the AI is calling back the units again (the enemy resistance has been strong I have to say).
OK, I have experienced something very like the symptoms described in the posts above in multiple attacks during the Arnhem historical scenario using various XXX Corps units (mainly inf bdes) running 2.2.86
Was 2.2.86 supposed to fix this, or is it a later patch?
Yes, 2.2.86 was supposed to fix this problem. Replanning of attacks can still happen, and is intentional behaviour, for the reasons MarkShot mentions in his post. I guess it's also possible there is still a problem, but I am not the person to determine that I'm afraid. Unfortunately Dave and Paul will be off at Origins starting next week and are flat out getting sorted for their trip, and I am not a coder so I can't be any help with this one. If by the time the guys get back you are still not happy with it, can you remind us, and they'll have a look at it?
As one of the many players who spotted the original problem I found that checking the 'log' for the hq unit gave some answers. If the AI was re-planning then the log showed 'new orders' even when none had been issued. The 'fun' I had with the 214th Bde in my game against Yakstock is documented in the AAR above. Since I installed the new patch I've noticed a couple of instances similar to that related by Tzar but without the tell-tale 'new orders' in the unit log. So if it is a bug, it's not the one that 2.2.86 was supposed to fix.
Sure, I'll keep an eye out and if it seems to happen I'll do screenshots and a save file, that way if it's real you'll be able to do something about it maybe, if not you can smack me
