New version issue - defenders attacking
 

I just made a scenarion using the new v2.0 (assault/defend). When I tested it AI vs. AI, all my defenders leapt from their dug-in positions and advanced toward the attackers. When I checked, I found that the defenders had no reaction turn...usually it's 99. I read in the patch that you can set reaction turns to 98 to hold units in place. Does this new feature mean that the game no longer assigns reaction turn 99 to defenders? Do we have to manually set each unit to 98 to defend?

Beeg

p.s. It's a river crossing scenario. I just checked the "mission" in the buy menu for the defenders and it's blank. The attackers says 'river crossing' - as it should.

Re: New version issue - defenders attacking
 

BEEG,

Although, I am not sure if this was intended (manual setting of 99), I will try to help you with the new settings:

Set your mission to delay or defend and then manually set the REACTION TURN for all AI units.
All of your units will respect the "REACTION TURN" rules (related with the VP flags) while the REACTION 98 will lock them.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: New version issue - defenders attacking
 

Pyros,

Thanks for the info. I've used the 'reaction turn 98' function and it works well. My concern is that in the pre-patch version when you created a defend scenario, the game automatically set all units to reaction 99. Then you could tweak individual units to react at different turns. Now when I create a defend scenario, all the defenders reaction turns are blank and they advance turn 1. Each formation reaction turn needs to be set manually. For large scenarios this is a chore.

Beeg

Re: New version issue - defenders attacking
 

Beeg,

Unfortunately, I think that this was not intended.

After I ran a short test assault/defend scenario against the AI, I noticed that the AI has left all fortified positions and moved towards me.

This is certainly something that needs FIX as soon as possible, since the AI won't behave normally in any delay/defend battle.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: New version issue - defenders attacking
 

Pyros,

Thanks again for your help. You guys are wonderful. Your prompt attention to this matter is greatly appreciated http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Beeg

Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

Sadly, it seems there is a problem in the new EXE 2.0.

This was caused by the modification of the reaction turn with the addition of REACTION TURN 98. This has somehow, altered (erased) the setting of REACTION TURN 99 as default on every unit in delay/defend scenarios.
As a result, the AI won't behave normally in delay/defend scenarios/campaigns.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

I'd like to add that this problem does not affect pre-patch scenarios. It only occurs when new units are bought using ver.2

Beeg

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

Thats because 2.0 is when the Reaction 98 feature was added in. Something during that process must have affected how the AI assigns the default 99 reaction to all units.

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

does this also effect generated battles?

thanks

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

Yes nosrac,

This should create problems with every delay/defend generated battle/campaign, in which the deployment is set to AI.

cheers,
Pyros

??
 

Should we set them to 98 or 99 ?

Artur.

Re: ??
 

Hi Artur,

This only works if you set the battle for AI delay/defend.

If you set the AI defenders to REACTION 98 then these formations will stand ground during the whole duration of the battle (whatever the percentage of occupied VP locations).

If you set the AI defenders to REACTION 99 then these formations will behave according to the "REACTION rules"

This is what Don has post in another thread:

Re: ??
 

Thanks.

Artur.

Re: ??
 

Any suggestion on how to best set up generated scenarios till a change is made? I play these quite a lot with the AI set to delay or defend for practice.

Re: ??
 

Use the copy of WinSPMBT you backed up before adding the patch. They can then be "transferred" by copying the 'saved game' file to the new version.

Assuming you backed up your 'old' versionhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif

Re: ??
 

I didn't back it up, but it's the CD version and so I re-install it to a separate directory. I created a new generated game with the AI in delay and copied the save files to the new V2.0 version of winSPMBT and it appears to run ok.

Re: ??
 

Cheers for the explanation Pyros. Have just spent two days testing a scenario and wondering why the units waiting to ambush me had charged me before I hade finished crossing the start line.
On a similar note, if units set to defend are given waypoints, will they follow them starting from their rection turn or will they defend until the v-hex ownership triggers them?

ie. defenders reserve force with waypoints to flank my attacking force set to reaction turn 5.

Will they start to move at turn 5 and follow their waypoints even if the rest of their force is dug in and I haven't taken any v-hexes?

Re: ??
 

Bernard,

IMO try to design/direct the AI movement with the careful positioning of VP flags.
The AI units will almost always ignore any way-point in order to contest VP flags.

If you wish to apply way-points in your scenario design you must experiment A LOT with their use!!!
From my experience the waypoints are good if you like to set the pace of movement; for example:

You have a convoy (moving on a road straight line) and you wish that different units with different speeds maintain formation. Then if you carefully plan their step (through the use of waypoints) you may achieve to have a simultaneous advance of all units.

But for the moment try to direct your AI manouvers with the use of VP flags.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: ??
 

Pyros,

We'd been told that there wouldn't be any more work done on WinSPMBT after the patch (working on WinSPWW2 instead). Is there any chance this glitch might be corrected soon?

Thanks,
Beeg

Re: ??
 

I might be guessing here but I believe that was in regard to changes, new features and stuff like that. If there are bugsor coding anomalies that can be identified and replicated I am sure these will be addressed. IIRC the powers that be are on a short but much deserved vacation/break till this weekend some time. Give them some time to get back into the game and see where things are. Obviously they will have to sort through the posts, emails and whatever else is out there and decide where to start responding, making adjustments, etc.

Re: ??
 

Thanks,

Don't want to rush anyone. The guys sure deserve a break and I think the patch is great. Just curious is all.

Beeg

Re: ??
 

Beeg,

For a problem as critical as the "reaction 99 issue", I think that a FIX will be issued as soon as possible.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: ??
 

I would agree with this as well. Just an upgraded exe file would be ok. I don't even need the installer http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

?????? Really? I just tested this three times with the AI defending a generated battle and nobody leaped out of their foxholes from the AI defenders side right away. There IS coding that will send defenders off to counter attack but from what I've seen so far with generated battles from the AI side they are not advacing on the first turn. The last test was a French assault vs Russian defend in a 43 turn game and I see the Russian reaction turns have been set ( this occurs after the game starts ) to 23, 19, 21 and 21 turns and it was turn 5 when I checked that and the first French units were just making contact with the lead Russian defenders and ALL Russian defenders are in their original foxholes

Scenarios are a different issue. I am unable to contact Andy at this time as he is in the middle of moving but I think the reaction 98/99 issue was intended to be set maually by the scenario designer. Yes, it's a pain....that's the cost of the added control

Don

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

The generated battles work. Everything else doesn't (including generated campaigns).

Hope that is a helpful clue so that it gets fixed soon, seeing as how the game is broken for my purposes (generated campaigns).

Generated battles are very good sometimes, though, so not all is lost until a fix. And human battles are still fine I assume.

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

Well, I just did a very quick test battle, Israeli assault on Egyptian defense on a 20x20 map. I just bought some snipers to observe. At turn five, I saw the first enemy squad coming out of its foxholes. At turn seven or eight it looked like a full scale counter-attack. Could the size of the map affect this? The number of points? Anything?

I ask because I often like to play small reinforced company size campaigns, or battles, and this could prove annoying for most assaults.

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

The number of turns in the game will affect the reaction numbers. It's easy to check. Build a game as you would normally then save it after playing a couple of turns. Load the save and set it to both sides Human. When the P2 defender starts up go to the HQ menu and you will see all the reaction turns in light blue. I'm looking at a 30 turn game on a 160x130 map and the reaction turns of the defenders is 15-4-14-20-17-20-24-12-15-16-17-13-16-18

I'll check into campaings later today

Don

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98 *DELETED*
 

Post deleted by Beeg

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

I did some more testing on the AI delay/defend mechanism and judging from the results (data of several generated battles) I concluded that in version 1.0 approximately the 60% of units had assigned as reaction turn the value 99, while in version 2.0 none unit had assigned as reaction turn the value 99.

More precisely:

In the version 1.0 the 60% of AI units had assigned as reaction the turn 99 and the rest had assigned a number of turns that was around the 50% of game length

In version 2.0 all the units got a reaction turn around (+/-10%) the 50% of game length (their gravity center was around 50% of game length), and NONE unit had assigned the reaction value of 99.

Now, if you generate a battle with 5-6 turns in version 2.0 and you examine the after-battle "view map" you get the wrong impression that everyone is on the move from beginning... while on the other hand if you generate the same battle on version 1.0 you get the feeling that almost everyone is holding ground.

cheers,
Pyros

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

It's on the to-do list.

Don

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

I cant follow all the ins and outs and implications, so whats the final story? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Is it a problem when playing Quick Battles or only Campaigns or both?

Thanx!

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

A lot of writing, questions and answers. What I've come up with out of all this is that the AI side, in a delay or defend scenario will observe reaction turns with the following exception.

If the reaction turn is 98, they won't move at all, no matter what.

If set to 99, the units will move on the reaction turn given them, or if an objective hex is taken by the human player.

Reaction turns and waypoints are important tools in scenario design and in version 1.2 worked pretty good for me. Entebbe, for example, all depends on timing and the units seem to do the right thing, both in waypoints and reaction turns. I hope the same is true with 2.0

Am I correct?

WB

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

I think the confusion started when people started noticing that units when purchased in the editor did NOT get assigned the reaction 99 automatically. Something we all because accustomed to. Since the addition of the reaction 98, as a designer you now HAVE to manually assign reaction time to ALL units during the creation process.

In auto-generated battles, the AI assigns reaction times automatically and they seem to be adjusted based on overall game turns. The problem may be in shorter games where even during delay/defend battles the AI seems to have units jump the gun and displace too early. In delay/defend battles the AI should probably be more hesitant to move units into counterattack mode.

IIRC this issue is being looked into to see exactly whats going on.

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

The issue is on the to do list when I can regain contact with Andy. The automatic "99" reaction has been lost for AI controlled defenders and that was the one where they would hold in place until a V hex was captured and then they *may* or *may not* react to that ( It's a random factor that is checked each turn for each formation after V hexes are captured). 98 was introduced so scenario designers could enter that reaction turn and lock down specific troops that would NOT , under any circumstances, react to V hex capture. 98 was meant to supplement 99 not eliminate it but the automatic 99 has disappeared.

In both generated games and scenarios ,when the AI's units are deployed, random defending units would , and are, sometimes assigned reaction turns that are based on a random number of game turns. These units are there to keep people on their toes to ensure things are kept interesting . What used to happen was you would get, for example, 85% - 90% of the AI's defending force set to 99 reaction and 10% - 15% set to a random number. Now 99 has gone missing and scenarios, for example now set NO reaction turn to 85% - 90% of your AI force which means they are going to start "patrolling aggressively" right off the bat. With generated battles it depends on the length of the game but typically the random reaction will be 50% of the game length give or take 25% either way and that will be given to roughly 80% of the AI force ( I've dug into this enough know what the problem is not get exact stats ).However, as there is no "99" any more there are WAY too many AI defender units that will just start advancing rather than defending. In scenarios you can control this by setting the reaction turns manually. In generated games where the AI is the defender you have no control.

When Andy gets back on line I can discuss how we are going to deal with this and I will keep you informed. For now I would avoid generated games where the AI is the defending unless you like the idea of attacking into a counterattack and for scenarios designed with Ver 2.0 I would check that every AI defending formation has a reaction turn ( unless you DO want them to start advancing right away) 99 will randomly react to V hex capture and 98 will lock them in their foxholes.

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

Okay, got it now. according to the above, 99 may or may not hold the units in place or their activation may be random. 98 does work and locks them (such as MG teams, etc)

Thanks for the update. Please advise us when 99 is fixed (I know you will).

Wild Bill

Re: Side-effect of reaction turn 98
 

99 holds them in place until a V hex is captured by enemy forces and then there is a chance every turn after that point that they may attempt to recapture the V hex. 99 still works that way but it currently must be entered manually.

Don