Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

IMHO the greatest flaw of the SP engine leads to the tactic of OP fire draining. This often leads to burning out the opponent's MBT's OP fire with suicidal jeep charges then go in for the kill with your valuable armor without taking any risk. Because of that the seasoned players never leave almost anything valuable with a clear field of view(even a narrow one) in front of them at the end of the turn because the OP fire is so vastly ineffective.

There are turn based (or sort of) games where this issue is more or less solved. The first example is the Campaign Series East Front II, where the player can set up the type of the target to fire and the range to every specific unit. This way the gamey approach will not work any more.(Picture attached).

The other example is the Combat Mission series. There you can set every unit whether to fire at armor(blue arc) or other type of target(orange arc) within a specified arc.(Pictures attached.)

There is one more example of an attempt to handle this shortcoming in SPWAw with confirmation on op fire. This works quite well in on-line and solitaire battles, but cannot be applied in PBEM games and it becomes very tedious in larger battles(and is a bit too unrealistic IMHO). Random special OP fire was also introduced to deal with this phenomenon but it became way to unrealistic as well.

My proposal is to allow the setting of the unit type for the specific unit to fire at. This may be armor, (heavy and medium tanks), light armor(light tanks and ACs), and soft targets(infantry and soft-skin vehicles&guns). Guns could be made a separate group as well.
As far as I can see this would not take so much programming to get it done you simply have to put 4 selectable controls on the unit information dialog (like the weapons) and you can select-or deselect the unit types to fire at. A check before performing the op fire is not a big deal as well.

The very best solution would be to set different ranges for every target type, that would need more interface programming, but it would pay off very well I am sure. Even if the simple version is done it will enhance this game a LOT as well and finally this OP fire soaking comedy will come to an end.

Imagine that a combined arms force would be even more effective, if the heavy ATGs and tanks will not have their OP fire burned out by jeeps, ACs and light ATGs & CS units would deal with the soft skins. It will now be even more reasonable to mix the heavy and lighter equipment than it was before.

This would help the creating of scenarios where the scenario designer can set the combined arms defense or assault force to fire at the proper target which means a good improvement for the AI play as well.

Artur.

EDIT.
There has been a fierce debate since this first post. I insert a picture of an deited screenshot how this feature would look like:

There would be 6 unit groups based on unit classes which WinSPMBT already has.

Armor (Tanks and IFVs)
Light Armor (APCS and ACs)
Soft vehicles (jeeps, trucks)
Infantry (all kind)
Guns (ATG AA)
Air (Planes and helos)

You can select what to shoot at like you select the weapons. By default all are selected and the unit will fire at everything. If something is excluded then the units of thet type will not be fired at.

Of course this is a rough grouping and not prefect but it would fulfill it's main reason and that is making the op fire draining tactic not feasible any more. (New picture is zipped in the attachment. infoscreen.png)

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Totally agree in principle about "target selection". Quite possibly a lot of work though.

At least in SPWW2 you get op-fire ... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Loads of work involved to do such a thing. Needs to be designed in from the ground up, so really would require a completely new game engine. Also - if we give this wonderful advantage to the human player, what then do we do with the AI - if we want the AI to be more intelligent about opfire we then have to:

a) do a LOT of thinking about new AI algorithms
b) a LOT of AI code to implement them
c) A LOT of testing of these

then after c), return to a) and rinse and repeat till you have something that even halfway works. Then put out to playtesting, and find that they find out exactly how to exploit these new AI processes within 10 or so games... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

That process is difficult enough if designed into a brand new game, but kludging and bodging it on top of a complete and sclerotic bit of spaghetti 1990's "C" adds several orders of magnitude to the process, while adding the extra side effects of the new code's unforseen interactions

So - not going to happen in this game engine.

Cheers
Andy

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

How did that get past the PR department!? LOL http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Respect for being honest, I wish we could see the same in other places.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

I am not sure thatis a hinder for the AI! Why? Because Scenario designers can set the units' OP fire in an effective way. Fooling the AI by draining the OP fire will not work any more!


Been there seen that. Spaghetti of C code with lots of global variables = The programmer's NIGHTMARE.

Well as a last word I say this would be worth even a lot of work IMHO. Of course you can see what is feasible or not I hope some day you will find the means to solve this phenomenon.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

The OP fire routine in WAW uses something alot better than the "op fire confirm routine" (which I never use BTW)
There is the "special OP fire" as it is called.
just when you think an enemy has used all its shots, it can sometimes surprize you with more shots. this way, you never actually know if an enemy will return fire or not, after it has used all its op fire shots.
This routine would be much better than the "OP fire confirm" routine, IMHO

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

It would just about make the game worth playing; that and more effective artillery. I wish that aircraft were able to target more than one hex intelligently. But since they have always been unable to do so, I'm guessing that that is just a limitation of the game engine. If I could write a new one, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

More effective artillery? You may adjust it in preferences.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

The special OP fire results in unrtealistic number of kills sometimes.
1. If you attack a Panther with several(5) T34/85 from different direction it should not have that many OP fire points as it would have in WaW. (CM models this situation the best). So a unit without!!! support but some special OP fire can still prevail.

2. You have ona tank in a keyholed position and have some small calibre ATGs near it. Here the special OP fire helps a bit and because of this situation less unrealistic events occur, however the tanks' op fire can still be burned with scores of jeeps. The best solution would be to set every unit to fire at a specific target type. Even with special OP fire sometimes unrealistic results can occur(example 1.) on the other handt the spec OP fire may not be enough (example 2.)

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

It's called combined arms for a reason. If you have a single unit that is unsupported, then it should be swamped and killed. Your 'soak off' is the game version of the single most common tactic every invented. It's presenting one unit with more targets then it can deal with.
This tactic is several thousnd years old and has survived the transition from clubs and spear thru Swords and Pilum thru Heavy Cavalry right up to Star Wars. The current thinking on defeating an ABM system is giving it more targets then it can deal with, which is the same thing the Roman legions did 2,000 years ago.
No, the tactic of swamping a single unit and overwhelming it with numbers is best countered by not leaving a unit out where it can be swamped. The Mil-speak term is unsupported.
In game terms, you need to have another unit with it's range set to where it will op fire at an enemy that is closing in for the kill. What works even better is having the rest of the platoon supporting.
Gaming the system by giving an unsported unit a majic weapon that can fire hundreds of times faster in the game then in reallife and never runs out of rounds is sort of silly, when it is easier to just learn the proper tactics.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

We're not talking about swamping a unit with more units than it can kill. We're talking about sending in two jeeps ahead of your heavy tanks to draw all the enemy fire. Realistically, the movement would happen simultaneously, and your guns would spot the tanks early on and open fire on them.

I have an idea that might work. How about a unit only op-fires once per every enemy unit, except if it fires back? That way, the jeeps, trucks or whatever will only take one hit, and so will the expensive units. Won't solve the problem completely, but its an idea.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Exactly.

In a real world defense the different squads/teams fire on different type of attackers like MGs on infantry, ATGs on armor light ATGs on armoured cars etc. A heavy tank or ATG will not waste it's shot on the folowing armoured car or halftrack when there is a smaller calibre to do the job. They shoot at the heavy tanks instead.
This cannot be done in SP yet unless Don and Andy find the means to implement this improvement... (hint hint http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif)

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

The game already has built in selective op-fire. I let this debate go on hoping SOMEONE experienced would make this point while I work in WinSPWW2 but I see that is not to be. Tanks will not open fire on jeeps and trucks unless they are right on top of the tank. The game allows secondary units the "privilege" of dealing with things like trucks

Let's examine the assertion that all you need to do is send in two jeeps ahead of your heavy tanks to draw all the enemy fire.

Really? I don't think so.

Please run the attached scenario "Test 275"

You are the Israelis. Your job is to stay quiet until the Syrian T-72's arrive. You will be faced initially by not two but six trucks and jeeps attempting to draw your fire and force you to reveal your position

As this is a test of the games Opfire routine for tanks vs. jeeps and or other tanks all you, as the Israeli player need to do is press end turn and observe how the game behaves. The T-72's will not arrive until turn four and will be destroyed .After turn one the jeeps and trucks will wander around in the Israeli LOS trying unsuccessfully to draw the Merkavas fire.

Now load scenario "Test 276"

Same scenario but with HMG's to take care of the trucks. Just keep pressing end turn .Watch and observe what happens.

In both scenarios the Merkavas have ample opportunity to fire but don't.


Don

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

So, why then in my regular games enemy AI infantry and light vehicles often drain my tank´s opfire?

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gifhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gifhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gifhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gifhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gifhttp://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gif

Yes they will not open fire on trucks and jeeps. If I ever told jeeps is because of my SPWaW past and some old instincts syill work. I tested a hell lot my African campaign I got to know the engine to a certain extent, and yes jeeps don't draim. BUT.

I also modified your 2 excellent scenarios. (OFF the maps are beautiful ON)
In the first scen I changed the trucks and jeeps to APCS and other light armored carriers which can do no harm to the Israeli tanks. I also added an infantry company.

In the second scenario I made all the changes above and I also changed most-but not all- Israely MGs to M136 a light man portable AT weapon. This is a combined arms defense with the tanks dealing with tanks, MGs dealing with infantry and the M136 dealing with the light armoured vehicled in orser not to harass the other units. Now this cannot be done in WinSPMBT.

Look Don, I really appreciate your and Andy's work very much. This is a very good game this is why I am still playing SP -I abandoned SPWaW for good- and not Combat Mission which has a more advanced engine, but this game has the OOB's the modern stuff and the good designer tools. And it looks very cool IMHO of course I like 2D stuff http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.
You have corrected many irrealistic phenomenons which made the SP engine much better like the reverse moving, the load/unload cost, reentering rebvetments, realistic artillery delay etc.

This op fire draining is the worst disease of the SP engine
and it can be cured as mentioned above. I also know doing this in the C code spaghetti is not simple. But it is very much worth doing it IMHO. (together with the spotting events. Cannot you make them visible only to one side?)

If these phenomenons wuld be solved WinSPMBT would have almost every feature a gamer would like to have. (Some bridge layers on the streams are missing). With these correction I can imagine that I would spend playing with it another 10 years.

Everyone, please try the attached scenarios to see what I am talking about.

Wish you all the best,
Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Artur, I'm sorry I'll have to disagree with you. The OP fire draining is not a 'disease' of the game engine. As c_of_red already pointed out, OP fire draining simulates an age old tactic.
You're also wrong on assuming an APC can't harm a tank, at least your reasoning is faulty. APC's carry infantry. Infantry carry weapons that can kill tanks. So tanks kill APC's whenever and whereever they can. Cause they don't know if the APC in question actually carries infantry or not. The tanker has to assume it does.
Same for light armor, it may not threaten the front of your MBT but if it can work around your line, most 'light' units carry enough punch to penetrate the side or rear armor. You're also assuming the tank (crew) think only of themselves. They will probably figure that that light unit will be a threat to some of their colleagues and try to take it out since they often have the best chance of doing so (and in relative safety).

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Well I am sorry but disagree as well. Have you tried the scenario? I see 0-zero downloads. Now if you download the scenario you would have seen that those APCs will not come close because there is a wall of M136s to deal with light armor. If it unloads infantry there are the machine guns a bit backward. I accept different views but criticizing without even taking an effort to look at the scenarios looks odd to me.

With op fir draining you simply send in infantry at 2000m distance and the armor will shoot at it while infantry cannot put a dent in the armor. It will also shoot at the APCs at 2000m even though APCs cannot hurt them from there as well. Now I can imagine you say to set the range lower BUT I want to engage the tanks on 2000 m because I have an edge on arnmor and aiming and gun power.
Nowdays seasoned players do not rely on OP fire at all because of the OP fire draining. I have been there have done that. I enter a spot with infantry and make the armor shoot at my infantry from where I cannot hurt it very much. after it has run out of shots I go in with the armor. If I have scout armored cars to sacrifice I drain OP fire with them.

With a combined arms defense it is useful to set who to shoot at what type of target. It is implemented in several games I believe not without a reason.

Even if I have a tank only force I may want to save 1-2 tanks from 5 tanks to shoot only at heavy/medium tanks.
This way even if the opponent sends in tons of OP fire drainer units which are dangerous at close range I want to have one gun left for the big boys. Or I may want to do the opposite, and keep one tank for general shooting and leave 4 for the heavies. It all depends on the recon information gained in the battle.

Please take a look at the scenarios.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

One more thing to add:

If the op fire drainer units will not make the armor fire the opponet will not even know there are tanks nearby since they are not spotted, and will not reveal themselves. You cannot drive your APCs with infantry to the armor you have not spotted. If you come up with MBTs it is too late. If the APCs are wonderinfg too far they will be taken out by the M136s.

Once again jut take a look at the scenario I posted.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

No I haven't looked at the senario and I won't. Not that I don't appreciate the sincere effort you make here, but anyone can make a specific scenario to suit the exact point they try to make so it seems like a bit of waste of time. I'll take your word the scenario show what you say it does.

You make the same mistake in your posts above that I pointed out above. For one, tanks will want to take care of APC's BEFORE they unload their infantry. The statement of 'machine guns will take care of unloading infantry' is gaming the system (or trying to) not to mention the fact that mg's will often fail to do any damage to unloading infantry. Once infantry units (squads, teams, etc) are out of the APC the tanks have lost their opportunity to deal relatively easily with a potentialy deadly threat. Secondly your assumption that infantry can't hurt tanks at 2000m range is also 'gaming the system'. In the game you can see the difference between a squad and an atgm team. In real life the tankers would just see soldiers in the woods line. They can't know, or at least can't be sure, that they don't carry atgm's. If they're wrong that could be a very costly mistake. Suppressing them with (gun)fire untill the arty arrives would be the prudent thing, which the game mimics. And there are of course squads who actually do have atgm's with a 2000m range as part of their weapons load. How will you differentiate between those and others (code wise)? Or between a dragon team (range 1000m) and a TOW team (range over 3000m)? Will tanks use OP fire against only the second at 2000m range? Or neither? Or both?
How about a TOW II team in overwatch and a Ferret approaches. Using the TOW will be a huge overkill, but if the Ferret is allowed to close, it could be deadly to the TOW team. How will you deal with that (code wise)?

You suggest a certain ideal situation in which your suggestions would work and seem like an improvement. But turn it around, make it much less suitable and see if it still works. Delete the mg's or M136's. How will your suggestions effect the outcome then? What additional work would it entail to get an optimal solution then? Now delete both, what would be needed then. Now delete the tanks and replace them with heavy SP-ATGM's. How would it work then, etc, etc.

So between the assumption of unrealistic knowledge on the part of the units in overwatch and the complications your suggestions bring along (with all the possibilities of players finding ways to exploit those) I don't see them being a significant improvement, at least not yet. And since I don't consider the OP fire draining issue broken I'd prefer it as is.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Yes, that is true. You have to try to destroy the infantry while they are in APCs. Now if they get close they are destroyed by the M136s. If they uload the infantry they are pinned by the MGs to an extrent that they will not move.
Setting to fire on a specific unit always depends on the situation. You have to have good recon anyway. If the majority of the force is APCs with infantry then you allow your tanks to fire at everything while you give your ATGMs to fire at the tanks if you have a few. If the big majority is tanks you set them to attack tanks etc.

Well you have a point here, the game works like this you know who is on the other side. Of course the commandes have some effective googles http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif. You have a point here if we stick to realism http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

Very good question.
They can use the unit classes grouped into a few groups like: Heavy/medium armor, Light armor&APCs and armoured cars, infantry like normal infantyr squads + AT squads, light vehicles, guns, air, AND all types is still an option. Maybe AT inf would be a different group.

Regarding the ferret it is advised tio have an inf squad near the ATGM, or an RPG squad. They have some short range AT weapons to deal with the Ferret. And if only the Ferret approaches the ATGM squad will not give away it's position for a cheap armoured car http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

You get the point here. This improvement will help those who apply combined arms. If one a capability of a force is gone (like you proposed delete the MGs or the M386s ) then of course you have to shoot with the remaining forces at everything. This feature is not to be used in every situation of course. But it really gives an edge to a player who applies combined arms and his force has every different capability needed for the mission. That is what it is all about!!! Of course there are many cases when the current way of operating is the best solution. But IMO there are also a lot of cases where this improvement could help a LOT and could disable a lot of gamey tactics.

I accept your opinion, it looks like we can't convince each other. Such is life http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

For the rest I suggest to try the scenarios above. I'm just like that http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

The point is that as a player you have no on the spot control over the OP fire as it is resolved (assuming we're talking about PBEM suitability here). Which means that whatever system you come up with to resolve this has to carried out and decided upon by the AI, and NOT by the player.
That brings a whole additional set of questions into the equation. For example, when are the different types of units mutually supporting? For a player it may be easy to see and decide upon but try translating that into code. I'll give you a few examples:
The tanks are in position but the mg's and light AT units are still moving up (1 hex away from final position). How is the AI to know that these close by units are not in position yet? The different units will not occupy the same hexes so they'll have different fields of fire. What happens if only some units can see the potential target?
If you elect to use a system in which you set these parameters as a player during your turn imagine this:
at the end of your turn the artillery and/or air strikes neutralise one of your elements (for example all light AT) either by suppression, smoke or outright kills. Now the tanks are the only units with AT capability but they won't fire since you set them for heavy opponents only.
The complications go on and on. In my view to the point that the disadvantages, both in-game and coding wise outstrip the potential benefits of changes by a wide margin.

Another problem, you suggest dividing units into categories but how do you distinguish? A T34/85 will be a MBT in some circumstances (depending on year and/or nations involved) and a bulky light tank in others (in relation to other available units). When does it stop being an MBT and become a light tank? What are the parameters? Repeat for scores of others units in many different year-nations set-ups. Imagine having to keep track of it as a player.
If you don't distinguish, in other words, a T34/85 remains an MBT throughout the whole array of years and nations available in the game, you could end up with Abrams that do fire at a T34 but not at a bmp2, or centauro, or amx10rc.

As an alternative solution, go outside the code. Determine and define the exact procedures you find questionable and/or gamey. Let your opponent know and agree not to use these procedures. It won't solve all your issues with Op fire but will adress some of them.

Narwan

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Yes actually it IS pretty good that the AI makes some decidions. But of course you can give more specific guidance. Imagine an inf company combat group with a section of ATGs and a platoon of ATRs, infantry with bazookas, and a section of Jacksons. You are the captain in charge. You cannnot tell each unit to fire on a specific unit coming against you during the battle. But you can give orders like: "We have to defend this area. Platoon x defends against everything at close range of 2 hexes at position alpha. Platoon y,z defends in other places range also set to 2 and engages everything but does not reveal themselves unless they are ar close range.
The MGs fire at long range but only at inf. The ATRs fire only at light armor at close range as well. They do not revele themselves to heavy armor or infantry.
The Jacksons and the ATGs stay a little behind and engage only MBTs. You may want to assign one ATG to the lights and have 3 guns for the heavies. In real life you can brief your platoon/section leaders about this before the battle or from time to time on radio. Now you can set ranges to the units. Besides that you will be able to set a unit type group as well. That is all.

This would work very much simpler than you think. Now a unit fires if
1.has just spotted a unit or a unit within LOS is moving
2.the unit is within allowed range
With this improvement it will have a 3rd criteria that the spotted unit in range belongs to the unit type you set. If you set to fire on everything as in some cases is the best solution it will fire of course.
That is all. jut one criteria more.

Now if an air strike will neutralize one capability of your combat group then you are in trouble. You will set the target types when you get the turn next time.

If you are smoked you reset target types in the next turn. Of course you also may want to move to a better position etc.

If the running up support units can see forward you set thenm the target type. MGs can shoot right away. If they are not within LOS enough and the tank is alone for a turn you will set to fire at everything of course.

That is a true problem. If it is classified as MBT throughout the timeline I have no proposal to it. I also think this should be kept simple. Remember it is only one more OP fire constraint that is all.

True, you always have to make the rules clear. BUT usually house rules are made to somehow handle the shortcomings and errors of a gaming system. and these shortcomings have to be fixed within the code then you do not need house rules.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

How many categories would that take? I suspect a lot more than you think or you'd end up with units not firing at potential threats to themselves. A jeep with an mg is not a threat to a tank, one with a RR is. So you'd have to distinguish between those. A BMP2 on the move (no atgm shot) isn't a threat to a M60 but a moving BMP1 is (73mm gun). But if you set it to fire at APC's, you'll also fire at BTR-152's. So you'll have to distinguish between types of APC's. Etc.

How would you categorize a centauro? The upgraded version has ERA which would protect it from most missiles fired at it so you'd want to fire at it with tanks, but the basic version lacks ERA so would be more a target for light antitank weapons and HEAT weapons. So you might have to distinguish between types of the same vehicle.

Of course you can keep it very simple and use broad categories, accepting that it will lead to some 'problems'. The question then is whether the new situation is less prone to exploitation by players and IF so (which I very much doubt personally) is the improvement worth the amount of work involved (which will still be huge)?

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Wel he categories would be.

1. Armor (the MBTs medium and heavy and including self propelled AT guns)
2. Light armor (light tanks IFVs) Centauros and BMPs here while they pose a great threat they can be taken out by lighter weapons and that is what counts.
3. Armoured vehicles(APC and AC)
4. Soft vehicles (trucks, jeeps)
5. Infantry
6. guns (ATG, AA)
7. air (helos&planes)
8. everything

There could be a broader list
1. Armor (the MBTs medium and heavy and including self propelled AT guns)
2. Light armor (light tanks IFVs, APCs, Armoured cars)
3. Armoured vehicles(APC and AC)
4. Soft vehicles (trucks, jeeps)
5. Infantry
6. AT Infantry (SPATGM and RPG bazooka Schrecks etc)
7. guns (ATG)
8. guns (AA)
9. air (helos&planes)
10. everything

The coded unit calsses would be used. That may cause some annomalies, but I would use this feature if it would be available.

The extent of the work is known only by Don and Andy. If the code would not have been old it would not be a big deal I guess they could confirm that. (I am also a software engineer.) But the code is old and a C code spaghetti is not a nice thing to maintain and modify. I would say it would be still worth it but they know this the best. My only intention is to see how much interest would be for this improvement within the community. I very much believe this would add great value to the game that is why I answer and lobby so intensively http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

There could aslo be a simplified list

1. Armor. (All tanks +IFvs) (they are too expensive for OP fire draining) Good point on IFVs!
2. Light vehicles (trucks, jeeps, APCs ACs)
3. Infantry and guns
4. air
5. everything.

It has to be one of the 3 lists depending on the implementation cost and what people like the most.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

We are looking into the issue and are running experiments with some ideas of our own that would let opfire remain automatic but would more efficiently assign opfire based on unit capability. The result, if experiements pan out, will mean game play will not change but when in the opfire phase the units that return fire will be more selective than before

Don

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

This is great news! If it works it may put an end to a very annoying exploit. Of course, on the other hand, it may simply birth new forms of exploits to take advantage of an imperfect AI .... but hey - thats always a risk, right?

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Hi, good news indeed from Don cáuse I was going to reply with something similar myself. Artur, sofar you've been focusing on categorising the targets, but wouldn't it be easier to categorize the units doing the OP fire?
What I'm thinking is adding a variable determining the order in which units take their fire. If a jeep appears, the mg's shoud open fire first. If they miss, then the IFV's open fire, if the jeep still lives the tanks open up, if the jeep still lives the AT units open fire. Note that this is all in one OP fire instant. In other words the first hex the jeep is targeted. If the jeep still lives to enter a second hex the whole cycle starts anew.
There would be no addition to the user interface, the player has no extra selection to do. What would be needed is mechanism to determine the order in which units of certain categories open fire at certain types of targets. That could be something like combining both the ratio and the absolute difference between HE kill capacity and AP kill capacity of a unit. The bigger the difference in favor of HE, the higher on the fire priority list vs unarmored targets (and lower vs armored targets), the bigger the difference in favor of AP the lower on the list vs unarmored targets (and higher vs armored targets). Something like that.
You could also add special restrictions on dedicated units like AT and AA (preventing SP ATGM's from firing with mg's on a jeep and wasting their one shot with the missiles for example). You could also make it depended on a unit skill roll to see if they keep their proper place in the firing order.

I'm just 'brainfarting' here btw, spewing ideas that may or may not be of use.

Narwan

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Don,

Well every improvement is welcome. There is a big problem with OP fire automatization though. Let me give an example.
Is it ok to fire with a MG at a jeep? Most liekly you say yes, but there are cases when you have a few MGs and you would rather keep them to fitre at the advancing infantry and let the ATRs aor bazookas deal with it. And the story goes on there are several examples written in this thread.

It always and always depends on the current situation which can only be judged by the player, or if we are talking about AI than the scenario designer. (Or maybe there can be made some automated target type choices if needed for a generated battle or campaign.)

A picture is worth a thousand words I edited the unit info screen picture from the manual. There are 6 groups
Armor (Tanks maybe IFVs)
Light Armor (APCS ACs maybe IFVs)
Soft vehicles
Infantry
Guns (ATG AA)
Air

You can select what to shoot at like you select the weapons. By default all are selected and the unit will fire at everything. If something is excluded then the units of thet type will not be fired at.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

I agree that the op-fire phase needs some improvement, like tasking AA units only to fire at air targets and MBTs and ATGMS only on armoured targets. However a certain amount of unpredictabity is realistic. The Lt. Colonel in command of the combat team is not going to be standing behind every MMG and Rifle Squad directing their fire. Squadies will shoot at what they perceive to be the biggest threat. I say leave the micro-managing of fire for your turn.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

"With op fir draining you simply send in infantry at 2000m distance and the armor will shoot at it while infantry cannot put a dent in the armor. It will also shoot at the APCs at 2000m even though APCs cannot hurt them from there as well. Now I can imagine you say to set the range lower BUT I want to engage the tanks on 2000 m because I have an edge on arnmor and aiming and gun power.
Nowdays seasoned players do not rely on OP fire at all because of the OP fire draining. I have been there have done that. I enter a spot with infantry and make the armor shoot at my infantry from where I cannot hurt it very much. after it has run out of shots I go in with the armor. If I have scout armored cars to sacrifice I drain OP fire with them."

I will try one more time. If you leave a unit out by itself, you deserve to have it shoot off all its shots and be killed. GOOD tactics requires that you support that unit with another unit, so that there are several units that can opfire. Then Soak off tactics just create heaps of points for the defender as the burning hulks and bleeding bodies pile up in front of the defesive line. Fighting like you want to fight is what gave us trench warfare. Without the ability to swamp a target, there would be nothing but two lines shooting at each other. Instead of piling on code to fix a feature, why not learn tactics? In this case tactics being ways to isolate a unit from it's support and swamping it to create gaps in the defense that can be exploited. Can't do that when you have units with Majic weapons that can fire an infinite number of times and never run out of ammo.
I neither know nor care what scenario you are discussing. It sounds to me like a good reason to avoid scenarios, which I already do.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

My dear firend, where have you red that I wish to improve a single and isolated unit's chances? If had you red our constructive and based on facts debate with Narwan you could have red that this feature gives an edge to the players applying combined arms. That can't be done with one unit can it?

Cheap units can soak off OP fire. Let us play a little math.
I recenty played a game in 89 era West germany against East Germany against a pro. I was with the West Germans and had tons of Fuchs APC. It costs 30 or 40 points. The T72 has 3 shots even if it had not moved. Now I spend 120 points to drain the shots and then I go in with my LEO2 for the kill. I have heaps of burning hulks and yet I gained more than 200 points for 120 points or even less if the T72 missed one or more of the APCs.
If there are more tanks I use up more APCs but the loss/gain ratio stays the same.

If you have other weapons systems it lessens this phenomenon but it can still be exploited by engaging the APCs on long range from the defensive line. (in case of supporting RPGs RCLs ATGs or even T55s which have a much less penetrating guns.)

And I did not mention the infantry, which can drain many shots even without risking the total destruction of a squad. (it is more effective to soak OP fire with inf at a distance)

You are right about the fact that defense will be more effective. As far as I know in the military they say you need 3:1 odds to perform a successful assault.


Thank you. Respect rulez...

It can be done and it still will be possible to do. It rather depends on whether you achieve it by gamey tactics or tactics that work in RL.

I do not see why. What majic weapons? What unlimited ammo?
They only thing that would be changed is that the crew will fire at targets that are reasonable to fire at.

Well this is up to you of course. If you wish to ommit the excellent work of Wild Bill, Wulfir, C.B. Blackard it's fine with me. I do not regard it as a good idea though.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Artur,
Your efforts and persuasiveness are admirable, however I think that the kind of control over opfire you are advocating simply does not exsist in a real battlefeild situation. Even a tank platoon commander has a limited number of decisions that he can make in the span of two minutes. He most likely cannot use the company radio net freely because of radio discipline proceedures. If he can, he still has his tank to command and a different line of sight from the rest of the platoon. If a tank platoon commander has some chance of exercising this control, the company commander and the combat team commander have none. What about units that are out of contact? And MG teams and AT teams that don't even have a radio? How can they get orders to change target priority? How can the combat team commander know that the AT teams are smoke blind when all he is hearing on the net is contacts from tanks. From my experience a typical combat team only has two radio nets. One for the artillery and one for everyone else. In a Canadian combat team under contact the armour units dominate the net and other units can't get a word in edgewise. I assume other countries are the same. Modern burst transmitters can send more messages across the same net in less time but must still be received and understood. Two minutes is not enough time for the CO to make all of these decisions. In reality any commander trains his troops as best he can, lays down standard operating proceedures and goes into battle relying on his troops training and common sense, making only crucial decisions at key times hoping that they filter down in time to make a difference.
Another interesting aspect of this topic is how training and experience will effect a units opfiring. An inexperienced unit can be likely to fire at anything that moves or not fire at anything at all. A more experienced unit will be more selective about their targets but may opt to ignore an order from over the radio bc they know their CO does not have eyes on target and they believe the order to be wrong. I'd rather be alive and court marshalled than buried with the VC. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif
I for one think that only a small change is required or even none at all.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Cameronius,

Well, I cant's argue with someone who has real military experience can I? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif I accept that such control is not present in RL as it is in most of the wargames.

But seriously, this god-like control exists even with or without this debated feature isn't it? If it was not you could not turn weapons on and off. You would not be able to shoot with your units at the desired sequence to use at your best advantage etc. In SPWaW there is a command and control system which uses command points to set new waypoints to a platoon and to limit the maneuvre possibilities and there are command points used up for even changing attack and defense stances! I would be happy to have such in WinSPMBT but the required work is several magnitudes more than the implementation of this feature.

Put your hand on your heart and tell is it really this feature that makes such a huge difference in the level of control? IMO it does not.

However, if the designers of the game cannot make it possible for the players to make the decision about the target type a unit would fire at, I would suggest to leave the OP-fire routine as it is now.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Gents,

What I really would like to know is that is there anywhrere on Earth an army which trains the following tactics:

1. Moving the ingfantry in the open and follow by tanks in order to make the enemy armor to fire at the infantry?
2. Exercising the armored scout car and APC crews to speed up to maximum and make short dashes in the open to draw the fire of the enemy armor or other guns?

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

OK Gentlemen,

It looks like we have debated this feature from a lot of aspects. I posted on other forums in order to have as much opinions as possible on this.

Of course Don and Andy will decide if they ever wish to implement such a feature.

But it would be very good to have the opiniuon of the over-all community to see if this feature is needed or not.
I ask everyone who reads this thread but does not wish to add more reasons into this debate to say a simple yes or no.
(Some more supporters are welcome http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif )

I promise I will not argue on this any more I think I said what I wished to say. I thank those who debated on this feature with logical reasons disregarding whether they support this idea or not. Narwan has pointed out some weaknesses which made me think about it and refine my proposal a little more.

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Isn't nr 2 just another way of describing recon by contact? And isn't that an age old tactic? It's like taking turns taking point on a patrol. Except you don't let the guy with the only radio take point. He's not expendable (wel, his radio isn't). If there is risk of taking fire when moving out, it's not uncommon to move more expendable assets first.

And as to the level of control, it's because of the detailed, god-like, control you have during your own turn that is is such a great addition to have only limited control during the opponents turn. It offsets the very unrealistic amount of control to some degree and introduces some randomness, uncertainty and murphyism that any game which strives to be a realistic simulation of combat needs. That's my view at least.

Narwan

Edit: Artur, I typed this before I saw your last post. It's been a good debate, made me think about the game and it's features some more.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

I like the game the way it is.
In SPWAW I leave op fire confirm off.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Cameronius,

SO what your saying there trooper is that its a good thing the Iraqies didnt have a lot of Bmp's and jeeps at 73East or we would have had alot of dead M1A1's ? Hardly.

Why cant a experience check be added to the firing routine for a unit to check to use the proper mg vs soft or cannon vs hrd targets? At least this the best of both worlds and not too much coding.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

I have to say that I'm with Artur on this one. It's annoying to play against a player that drains the OP-fire with jeeps or cheap APC's. Although most players wont do this (well, maybe they regard it unchivalry) and this can be countered by, for example, reducing the amount of jeeps etc. But the fact that these kind of rules must be made in order to achieve the best possible gaming experience is telling that there's something wrong.

If its achievable within the code, I would gladly accept that one could have the option of setting units to fire only some unit classes ignoring others. This could be combined by some kind of distance option within which the unit would fire anything that moves. These options would greatly improve the use of especially tanks and ATGM's. It would also be nice to use it with infantry that has AT-weapons.

As for being "unrealistic", this is not true. It's only realistic that wellhidden tank doesn't waste the element of surprise to a worthless jeep. Of course, if it's possible in code, some randomness can be added to simulate cracking nerves etc. But all in all the "Commander God" -element of the game is in itself so unrealistic that it's useless to even try to make the game one to one to real life. And the arguments that suggests that current situation is only realistic are, IMHO, pretty weird.

WinSPMBT is a great game and with honest (chivalrous) opponents this problem is much smaller than it is against the opponents whose only goal is to win without any style. But even so the suggestion that Artur made has my support.

Cheers,
Jukka

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Man how good it is to read this http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif. I could not agree more http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.
Thanks Thexder!

Artur.

PS: (It has been said before that jeeps do not drain Op fire but the cheap ACs and APCs do...)

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

That is because the game is set up to ignore unarmed unloaded soft vehicles except at ultra short distance, especially if the potential firer is currently undetected by the enemy. A few hexes further if he is known about.

Put an MG on the soft vehicle - it becomes an item of interest, ditto if loaded with passengers.

That has been in the code for over a year(?) now, so the original trick you could play of "teasing out" opfire with cheap unarmed trucks and jeeps is less valid.

The new more sophisticated opfire filter we are testing now looks promising, as does the more sophisticated AI target alocation in the normal AI phase, when it determines what target of those currently available to a unit is best to shoot at.

Cheers
Andy

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Andy,

With all respect if you cannot add an interface for the players to decide I suggest not to change the OP fire mechanism. Simply I cannot see how one can define an algorithm valid for even most of the situations. There are cases when it is appropriate to fire even at an unarmed jeep, and sometimes it is appropriate to fire only at the heavies. It always depends on the situation that is why user interaction would be so important...

Artur.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Artur, thanks for your kind words:)

But I wouldn't condemn the upgrades just yet even if they don't include interface for the players. I agree it's quite difficult to come up with an algoritm that applies to most cases but these guys seem to be pros and the fact that they're even considering this and trying new things sounds very promising to me. I've read these topics and found out that these guys are very quick to shoot down any proposed improvements that are either unrealistic or unmanagable within the context of the code. This time they're putting a lot of effort to an aspect of game that is one it's biggest weaknessess and hard to improve. At least I'm happy for their efforts and anxious to see the results.

Let's keep our fingers crossed!
And thank you Artur to for bringing this issue into discussion.

Cheers,
Jukka

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

AGREED!

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Bulletmagnet,
Where did I say this? What is your point here?

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

It is true IF you take it in the context of the game. Virtual soldiers show no fear, and don't hesitate to have their vehicles driven straight into enemy line of fire, even after watching 30 of their comrades destroyed one after the other.

However, what if the iraqi crewman were all suicide bombers and had 100(+) Jeeps/Bmps all loaded with the equivalent of 1000lbs of TNT and rigged to explode on contact with our vehicles? Could have been a different outcome.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

A user inferface would be ideal but I think the majority would not use it (myself included). I would support any enhancement that refines this aspect of the game so long as its not gonna add code that will cause other issues and degrade another part of the game. I just don't wanna see a WinSPMBT 8.3, 5 years down the road, with 3 different Mods and changes still being made. We'll end up with several versions and players getting turned off from Pbem due to the problem of trying to figure out who is playing what version and having to have numerous installs on their PC.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Uh, its a M1 there are no inexperienced commanders, zat least anymore..
you seem to be implying that op draing is ok because of radio net problems. It dosnt take a rocket scientist to look through the scope and see a jeep and and t72 and figure out which is more dangerous...
I think you are on to something though which is that experience should equal smarter target aquistion I can see a green undertrained guy blowing his proverbial load at the first thing he sees but not someone fully trained and or having battle experience.

Re: Improvement proposal I - OP fire draining
 

Maybe true realism is achieved only under real conditions..

It´s a simulation, and could be considered as kind of combat chess, with added features, and a god-eye.

But I agree with the op-fire draining in principle (and practise).