Few questions

[moet]

Hi everyone. I played the little tutorial game and already got some questions.

About scenarios

I observed that the deployment of Soviet enemies was very different in my game than showed in the tutorial manual. Does it mean that the enemy AI modify the setup deployment of the units every time we start a scenario?

About spotted enemy

I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

Some visual sign (or event text) should notify the player.

About routed units

I got one routed infantry unit, according to the event showed in the Event Message Log. When I selected this routed unit, all I could see in the Unit Detail Area was that it was suppressed. I did not see anything else in the main battle screen. Is the routed status of a unit showed somewhere else than in the Event Message Log ?

I could even give a move order to that routed unit, which is very confusing !!!

About moving (platoons orders)

The previous routed unit was part of a mounted platoon on halftracks. Of course, after it got routed by artillery fire, it got automatically dismounted, while the other squads (including the platoon leader) stayed mounted and moving. After the routed unit recovered a "suppressed" status, I tried to give it a move order to make it follow the rest of the mounted platoon. It appeared to be impossible to give that order since the mounted platoon leader was not itself on a move order. The only way I found to make the dismounted unit moving was to:
1. Stop all the halftracks.
2. Dismount the platoon leader.
3. Give a move order to the platoon leader toward its halftrack.
4. Give a move order (then available) to the dismounted unit.
5. Wait till the next phase/turn to give a move order to the whole halftrack platoon.

Is there a more convenient way to give a move order to a dismount unit that is part of a mounted platoon ?

About moving during reaction phase (platoons orders)

While my whole tank platoon was bonding ahead, I asked one tank to fire a target. The tank stopped to do so and quickly killed the enemy ATR. Then, at the reaction phase, I tried to make the still tank rejoin the rest of the platoon. It was not possible to get it moving till the end of the turn. I would have thought that the platoon move order would allow any subordinate platoon to move during the reaction phase.

I think there should be a "stick-to-the-platoon-order" order that would allow the player to "cancel" a sub-order given to a platoon member.

[eniced73]

About spotted enemy

I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

Some visual sign (or event text) should notify the player.
I agree. I have also observed my units spotting enemies and no lines are drawn to the enemy unit. I have also observed my units acquiring a target with a 'red' line, after spotting an enemy, as the turn is progressing. Also you will see a 'yellow' line to your units when spotted by the enemy. Why your units sometimes spot but do not instantly acquire the enemy unit with a 'red' target line could be because of a bad shot or the time delay between target checks. Not 100% sure on that one.

About routed units

I got one routed infantry unit, according to the event showed in the Event Message Log. When I selected this routed unit, all I could see in the Unit Detail Area was that it was suppressed. I did not see anything else in the main battle screen. Is the routed status of a unit showed somewhere else than in the Event Message Log ?

I could even give a move order to that routed unit, which is very confusing !!!
You answered yourself on this one below. The unit recovered during the turn and was able to move in the next phase.

About moving (platoons orders)

The previous routed unit was part of a mounted platoon on halftracks. Of course, after it got routed by artillery fire, it got automatically dismounted, while the other squads (including the platoon leader) stayed mounted and moving. After the routed unit recovered a "suppressed" status, I tried to give it a move order to make it follow the rest of the mounted platoon. It appeared to be impossible to give that order since the mounted platoon leader was not itself on a move order. The only way I found to make the dismounted unit moving was to:
1. Stop all the halftracks.
2. Dismount the platoon leader.
3. Give a move order to the platoon leader toward its halftrack.
4. Give a move order (then available) to the dismounted unit.
5. Wait till the next phase/turn to give a move order to the whole halftrack platoon.

Is there a more convenient way to give a move order to a dismount unit that is part of a mounted platoon ?
Yes. I believe you should use the engage/stay for the HQ while he is still mounted. This will allow you to give the dismounted unit an engage/move order.

Sort of related to the above. Watch when you give your platton a move order and then you adjust the sub units move orders to be shorter than the HQ's. What I found out is that the sub units will finish their moves and go into Defend. You will not be able to move the sub units again until you cancel the HQ's order or it is finished moving and it too goes into Defend mode. Then on the next Orders phase you will be able to issue another order to the HQ and thus the sub units.

About moving during reaction phase (platoons orders)

While my whole tank platoon was bonding ahead, I asked one tank to fire a target. The tank stopped to do so and quickly killed the enemy ATR. Then, at the reaction phase, I tried to make the still tank rejoin the rest of the platoon. It was not possible to get it moving till the end of the turn. I would have thought that the platoon move order would allow any subordinate platoon to move during the reaction phase.
I believe you can issue a withdrawl order but not an advance or move forward order.

[rickier65]

moet,

i'm going to piggy back on some of eniced answers.

ORIGINAL: moet

Hi everyone. I played the little tutorial game and already got some questions.

About scenarios

I observed that the deployment of Soviet enemies was very different in my game than showed in the tutorial manual. Does it mean that the enemy AI modify the setup deployment of the units every time we start a scenario?

The Soviet deployment shouldn't have changed much from desribed in the manual, though once the game starts they might have started moving.

ORIGINAL: moet
About spotted enemy

I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

Some visual sign (or event text) should notify the player.

Another thing I look at is the minimap. on the minimap you should see little red squares appear for Russian units, and blue for German units. Playing with the floating 'icons' on help as well. toggle the 'i' key.

I find the Engage base order the most flexible to use. It allows me to order movement, targetting, or overwatch (hold) orders to individual tanks or squads.

thanks
rick

[diablo1]

Yes. I believe you should use the engage/stay for the HQ while he is still mounted. This will allow you to give the dismounted unit an engage/move order.

This is really the bad part of the game I've encountered myself. One shouldn't have to make so many commands just to get one unit to move and/or fight. I really hope they can do something to fix this or change it for this game as it becomes annoying more than fun. Each unit should be able to issue any commands without having to first goto the HQ to get them to do so. Just use delays or something less annoying if they happen to be out of command control. Even in Mad Minutes games you can click on a Flag and TAKE COMMAND of the individual units from the main command leader and at any level of command.

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: eniced73
About spotted enemy

I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

Some visual sign (or event text) should notify the player.
I agree. I have also observed my units spotting enemies and no lines are drawn to the enemy unit. I have also observed my units acquiring a target with a 'red' line, after spotting an enemy, as the turn is progressing. Also you will see a 'yellow' line to your units when spotted by the enemy. Why your units sometimes spot but do not instantly acquire the enemy unit with a 'red' target line could be because of a bad shot or the time delay between target checks. Not 100% sure on that one.

Relative spotting means sometimes units are spotted for a short time and sight will be lost and then regained again. Depending on movement, actions like firing and intervening terrain. Spotting often is temporary.
There may be a slight delay in acquiring a target because of a number of factors.

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: diablo1

Yes. I believe you should use the engage/stay for the HQ while he is still mounted. This will allow you to give the dismounted unit an engage/move order.

This is really the bad part of the game I've encountered myself. One shouldn't have to make so many commands just to get one unit to move and/or fight. I really hope they can do something to fix this or change it for this game as it becomes annoying more than fun. Each unit should be able to issue any commands without having to first goto the HQ to get them to do so. Just use delays or something less annoying if they happen to be out of command control. Even in Mad Minutes games you can click on a Flag and TAKE COMMAND of the individual units from the main command leader and at any level of command.

Delays aren't a very realistic way of dealing with C2 on an intra-platoon level. Maybe from high level of command off map to a lower level but not at the tactical level. I wouldn't even know what it would represent. Radio contact? Runners? Confusion?
Without every unit following the same orders you basically have a scrum with no regard to TO&E.

[Erik Rutins]

Hi Moet,

ORIGINAL: moet
I observed that the deployment of Soviet enemies was very different in my game than showed in the tutorial manual. Does it mean that the enemy AI modify the setup deployment of the units every time we start a scenario?

The AI keeps to the setup defined by the scenario designer, but as soon as the clock changes to the first second, of course things change. After that, the AI does use different strategies and can approach the same scenario in different ways if you play against it multiple times.

I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

I guess we could add that as part of an "extra-verbose" mode. However, what I find useful is the aggregate view that you see when you have no unit selected. That shows you all enemy units that are visible to any of your units and you can pretty quickly see when a new unit appears or disappears. Keep in mind the floating icons ("I" key) and the size changes can help make sure you see where all the units are.

We're also considering a "reverse LOS" check in the future, where clicking on a sighted enemy unit will indicate which friendly units can see it. You are correct that right now you need to click through the plausible friendly units that could see a particular enemy to see which ones have LOS to a particular enemy unit.

I got one routed infantry unit, according to the event showed in the Event Message Log. When I selected this routed unit, all I could see in the Unit Detail Area was that it was suppressed. I did not see anything else in the main battle screen. Is the routed status of a unit showed somewhere else than in the Event Message Log ?

In the unit details on the left hand side if it is routed it should say "retreating" for its orders. Note that units have an initial chance to rally when routed . If they fail that chance, then they stay routed and start trying to get away from the enemy.

I could even give a move order to that routed unit, which is very confusing !!!

It sounds to me like they passed their rally check and did not remain routed.

The previous routed unit was part of a mounted platoon on halftracks. Of course, after it got routed by artillery fire, it got automatically dismounted, while the other squads (including the platoon leader) stayed mounted and moving. After the routed unit recovered a "suppressed" status, I tried to give it a move order to make it follow the rest of the mounted platoon. It appeared to be impossible to give that order since the mounted platoon leader was not itself on a move order. The only way I found to make the dismounted unit moving was to:
1. Stop all the halftracks.
2. Dismount the platoon leader.
3. Give a move order to the platoon leader toward its halftrack.
4. Give a move order (then available) to the dismounted unit.
5. Wait till the next phase/turn to give a move order to the whole halftrack platoon.
Is there a more convenient way to give a move order to a dismount unit that is part of a mounted platoon ?

The easiest way is to set the still-mounted HQ to Engage- > Hold and then set the dismounted squad to Engage -> Move.
As long as the platoon has a base order that allows a movement sub-order, this should work fine.

While my whole tank platoon was bonding ahead, I asked one tank to fire a target. The tank stopped to do so and quickly killed the enemy ATR. Then, at the reaction phase, I tried to make the still tank rejoin the rest of the platoon. It was not possible to get it moving till the end of the turn. I would have thought that the platoon move order would allow any subordinate platoon to move during the reaction phase.

How did you tell the tank to fire if not during the reaction phase? Bound normally handles the alternation of moving and covering units automatically. Normally you would change that with a target order in the Reaction phase and then be able to reset the Bound movement order in the Orders phase immediately afterwards. You can also turn off the Reaction phase and just play with every turn as an Orders phase now in the in-game options.

The reaction phase only allows Withdraw as a quick reaction move (or Halt). Normal move orders are only for the Orders phase.

Regards,

- Erik

[diablo1]

ORIGINAL: Mobius

ORIGINAL: diablo1

Yes. I believe you should use the engage/stay for the HQ while he is still mounted. This will allow you to give the dismounted unit an engage/move order.

This is really the bad part of the game I've encountered myself. One shouldn't have to make so many commands just to get one unit to move and/or fight. I really hope they can do something to fix this or change it for this game as it becomes annoying more than fun. Each unit should be able to issue any commands without having to first goto the HQ to get them to do so. Just use delays or something less annoying if they happen to be out of command control. Even in Mad Minutes games you can click on a Flag and TAKE COMMAND of the individual units from the main command leader and at any level of command.

Delays aren't a very realistic way of dealing with C2 on an intra-platoon level. Maybe from high level of command off map to a lower level but not at the tactical level. I wouldn't even know what it would represent. Radio contact? Runners? Confusion?
Without every unit following the same orders you basically have a scrum with no regard to TO&E.

Remember the wargame rule book of building a game. When it comes down to historical accuracy or realism vs gameplay, put gameplay first. It's what every other game out there does really. It puts the control of the game in the players hands not restrict them by some historical rule. The Total War series does it, Mad Minute and Norbsoft games do it well and <shock> dare I even say the CMx1 series does it well. Even Steel Panthers W@W.

As it is now it's just a tedious system that REQUIRES (and shouldn't) us to go through the HQ unit which throws all the movement and target lines to that order of the HQ, then we have to goto each individual unit and give them individual orders and if we ever want to change our HQ orders we have to do this all over again an again an again. I have other units in the squad/platoon focused on their thing but I need to issue an order to the HQ of the group and it throws everything off and makes all the rest of the units do what I just wanted the HQ unit to do. Couldn't we have a HQ ONLY command please?

[diablo1]

We're also considering a "reverse LOS" check in the future, where clicking on a sighted enemy unit will indicate which friendly units can see it.

Yes Yes this is a very good idea.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: diablo1
As it is now it's just a tedious system that REQUIRES (and shouldn't) us to go through the HQ unit which throws all the movement and target lines to that order of the HQ, then we have to goto each individual unit and give them individual orders and if we ever want to change our HQ orders we have to do this all over again an again an again. I have other units in the squad/platoon focused on their thing but I need to issue an order to the HQ of the group and it throws everything off and makes all the rest of the units do what I just wanted the HQ unit to do. Couldn't we have a HQ ONLY command please?

The system requires some getting used to, but really it's not a bad way to build in some of the historical limitations. With that said, improving the orders system is one of the top items for the next release. The orders were already tweaked for this release and no other major changes to them will happen in this release.

Issuing an order to the HQ only changes the rest of the platoon's orders if you change the base order or use the Shift key to force the order to be a full platoon order.

Regards,

- Erik

[diablo1]

Issuing an order to the HQ only changes the rest of the platoon's orders if you change the base order

Because the turns are so long I change the base orders a lot. After 80 seconds a turn too much changes not to.

But, ok that's fine I'll drop it on the orders if you're not going to fix it no use arguing over a dead horse.

When you say next release though are you talking about an expansion for this game or PC4? West front or ?

[Mad Russian]

ORIGINAL: diablo1

When you say next release though are you talking about an expansion for this game or PC4? West front or ?

Yes.

Good Hunting.

MR

[moet]

ORIGINAL: Mobius
Delays aren't a very realistic way of dealing with C2 on an intra-platoon level. Maybe from high level of command off map to a lower level but not at the tactical level. I wouldn't even know what it would represent. Radio contact? Runners? Confusion?
Without every unit following the same orders you basically have a scrum with no regard to TO&E.

Well, I think that its usual for a company leader to tell one of his platoon to move a bit later than another one. In the same way, a platoon leader could delay the movement of one of his squad. The goal here is to make the platoons (or squads) end up at the right place at the right moment.

[Mad Russian]

Delays in activating orders will be discussed in the next game of PC.

Not sure how we'll handle that but there will be some kind of delay option for telling one unit to move later than another.


Good Hunting.

MR

[diablo1]

Not to bring up another game but in a game soon to be released like this one they have a "wait" command. Put in the amount of seconds you want a unit to wait where it's at or before moving.

[Erik Rutins]

Thanks Diablo1,

We've all played that game too. [8D]

Regards,

- Erik

[moet]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: moet
I noticed that nothing warns the player when an enemy get spotted : no event log and no special color on icons in the Unit List. After a phase/turn, the player has to select all his units, one by one, to know if an enemy is now in sight. This can be very annoying with the big scenarios.

I guess we could add that as part of an "extra-verbose" mode. However, what I find useful is the aggregate view that you see when you have no unit selected. That shows you all enemy units that are visible to any of your units and you can pretty quickly see when a new unit appears or disappears. Keep in mind the floating icons ("I" key) and the size changes can help make sure you see where all the units are.

Sorry about that one. I did not not keep in mind that the icons were visible when no units were selected. So it can stay as it is.

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
We're also considering a "reverse LOS" check in the future, where clicking on a sighted enemy unit will indicate which friendly units can see it. You are correct that right now you need to click through the plausible friendly units that could see a particular enemy to see which ones have LOS to a particular enemy unit.

This would be great, though not essential. They tried it with Achtung Panzer, but it was pratically invisible (I never succeeded to see it).

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
The easiest way is to set the still-mounted HQ to Engage- > Hold and then set the dismounted squad to Engage -> Move.
As long as the platoon has a base order that allows a movement sub-order, this should work fine.

I will remember that. [:)]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: moet
While my whole tank platoon was bonding ahead, I asked one tank to fire a target. The tank stopped to do so and quickly killed the enemy ATR. Then, at the reaction phase, I tried to make the still tank rejoin the rest of the platoon. It was not possible to get it moving till the end of the turn. I would have thought that the platoon move order would allow any subordinate platoon to move during the reaction phase.

How did you tell the tank to fire if not during the reaction phase? Bound normally handles the alternation of moving and covering units automatically. Normally you would change that with a target order in the Reaction phase and then be able to reset the Bound movement order in the Orders phase immediately afterwards. You can also turn off the Reaction phase and just play with every turn as an Orders phase now in the in-game options.
The reaction phase only allows Withdraw as a quick reaction move (or Halt). Normal move orders are only for the Orders phase.

I did ask the tank to fire at the beginning of the order phase, and the tank did its job (killing the ATR) before the beginning of the reaction phase. I'm still surprise that the reaction phase doesn't allow the player to give the kind of orders that match the platoon leader's order (bonding in this case).

[moet]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: diablo1
As it is now it's just a tedious system that REQUIRES (and shouldn't) us to go through the HQ unit which throws all the movement and target lines to that order of the HQ, then we have to goto each individual unit and give them individual orders and if we ever want to change our HQ orders we have to do this all over again an again an again. I have other units in the squad/platoon focused on their thing but I need to issue an order to the HQ of the group and it throws everything off and makes all the rest of the units do what I just wanted the HQ unit to do. Couldn't we have a HQ ONLY command please?

The system requires some getting used to, but really it's not a bad way to build in some of the historical limitations. With that said, improving the orders system is one of the top items for the next release. The orders were already tweaked for this release and no other major changes to them will happen in this release.
Issuing an order to the HQ only changes the rest of the platoon's orders if you change the base order or use the Shift key to force the order to be a full platoon order.

Personally, I appreciate the PCO platoon order system because it forces the player to think as a company/platoon commander (just think about great is the order system of Command Ops : Battles from the Bulge, though that way of commanding won't please everybody). But it is also very important that the order system works naturally, with no strange or bad surprise for the player.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: moet
I did ask the tank to fire at the beginning of the order phase, and the tank did its job (killing the ATR) before the beginning of the reaction phase. I'm still surprise that the reaction phase doesn't allow the player to give the kind of orders that match the platoon leader's order (bonding in this case).

The basic design idea behind the reaction phase, which we realize is not everyone's favorite feature, is that it represents quick reactions and very brief orders that can't include the level of detail the main order includes. So reactions are in effect their own order set. At the same time, there are some benefits to that, in that a platoon with Rush orders can be stopped and start targeting the enemy in the Reaction phase, where as normally that base order only allows movement. The main conceptual limit on Reaction orders was they had to be something that could realistically be conveyed in just a few words or seconds.

The idea you're getting at though, I think you'll be happier with the new orders system that's coming in the next major release. That one will take a bit less getting used to, but if you get the hang of this one you'll find it does work well and encourages planning ahead in your commands. The orders system is really the main learning curve of the game. Once you get past that, the rest of the game should open up.

Regards,

- Erik

[Mobius]

ORIGINAL: moet
Personally, I appreciate the PCO platoon order system because it forces the player to think as a company/platoon commander (just think about great is the order system of Command Ops : Battles from the Bulge, though that way of commanding won't please everybody). But it is also very important that the order system works naturally, with no strange or bad surprise for the player.

The Orders are meant to actually represent short orders barked over the radio by the Platoon CO in a very short time or as hand signals. He can't spend minutes writing up AAA travel plans for each member of the platoon. The waypoints are usefull for following the orders such as "Go around to the right of those trees" or "Enfilade right".

Now the question is how can we do that and still make the game fun to play.