Wishlist: could it be possible to display double-byte characters?

[scJazz]

Is there some reason that having spotted an enemy that you wouldn't shoot at it? Likewise you wouldn't notify all of your friends to do the same?

It does work out well once the art of artillery suppression, smoke screens, etc come into play.

[RedGuard]

Originally Posted by scJazz

Likewise you wouldn't notify all of your friends to do the same?

yeah, it's something like "I see the enemy firing but I am engaging with another enemy squad so I'll leave it to my teammates to deal with it."

[RightDeve]

Yea, in real life that will most likely not happen (all op firing). But given the game system is turn based IGOUGO which makes result readily available to players, this is the only viable opfire rule. You just need to think of it as alleviating the problem with turn based system. So far I find no problem with that given the TB system.

[RightDeve]

But also, you need to know that the Op fire phase IS NOT actually the other player's phase! You have your own phase of action, and so does your opponent. And op fire is NOT really a phase.
That said, your enemy can actually pick up and shoot what is moving at his will when it is HIS OWN phase. So that's quite realistic also.

Sometimes we need to posses philosophical thinking ability to understand how TB games work compared to RL.

Cheers,
RightDeve!

[runequester]

Opfire kind of represents that it is a constant firefight.

It does depend a bit though: Lower experience units shoot less often, suppressed units shoot less often, and it seems that after taking multiple shots they'll "wear out" and shoot much less frequently during a turn.

Make sure to use long range suppressing fire first though, before engaging with infantry at close range.

[scJazz]

I might be totally insane but I've always thought they have exactly the same number of shots during OPFire that they have during their turn, minus whatever suppression effects cause.

[Mobhack]

Originally Posted by scJazz

I might be totally insane but I've always thought they have exactly the same number of shots during OPFire that they have during their turn, minus whatever suppression effects cause.

Err - nope, not at all.

Guaranteed Opfire Shots = any unused shot opportunities left over from your phase. (i.e. after any voluntary firing, movement, and suppression)

GOS will be reduced if they receive any further Suppression, damage or adverse morale results in the enemy phase of course!.

Once GOS are reduced to zero by opfiring/other effects in the enemy phase, then an experience/suppression/morale test gets taken when a new opfire opportunity arises. If that small chance, but significantly better for unsuppressed experts test passes, then an extra opfire shot is allowed. That is over and above the original SSI code, and was specifically designed by us to stop the "teasing out opfire shots" tactic. In the original SSI version, once you had made the Tiger expend its shots then you were guaranteed a free ride. Now in our system, you are not. Plus in our code the Tiger tends to prioritise opfire shots to avoid the cheap trucks etc and concentrate a bit more on dangerous stuff.

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So - if you think the enemy will be frisky enough to require lots of opfire, then do not fire voluntarily in your phase, so leaving GOS high, do not move, and reduce any bad S by rallying.

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I quite often leave the rifle line unfired, when defending or otherwise expecting there to be a bit of a firefight - firing only support weapons from the rear area behind the line (MMG/AGL into clumps or stacks of enemy grunts, snipers at depleted squads or AT teams or MMG or any spotted enemy sharpshooters, etc).

Rifle platoon HQs I usually leave just behind the rifle line as well - those are almost always left unfired even if the rifle line fires, as security (and to stop enemy putting S on my commanders ). HQs should never take the point...

Cheers
andy

[scJazz]

Originally Posted by Mobhack

*SNIP Many Good Details*
Cheers
andy

OMG Thanks for clearing that up with the details!

[RedGuard]

I read all the replies above and have to say that I've been persuaded. Frankly speaking I encountered no problem with that opfire rule. Just try to make it a better game

About the promotion, WinSP has attracted several friends, we play PBEM everyday and the number of us gradually grows. Golden age of WinSP in China!

[Mobhack]

No - find out from experience of combat, like normal troops do.

We don't tend to give any details out, especially specific numbers, for many reasons. For one thing, they are subject to change, and for another it gets us into detailed circular arguments with the rivet-counter a-retentive types.

The SP type games are not "chess type" games with guaranteed pre-ordained results from given actions, so everything is subjected to a bit of randomness. It's a "Monte Carlo" type simulation. That was how SSI designed them, and how we have continued. Real life is somewhat random, unlike chess or whatever. Real life is more of a roulette game really. perhaps the best approximation of most of the code routines is a pinball type affair. Sometimes a flipper can be triggered that rebounds the code down an unusual branch of the sprawling tree of routines. It is not a deterministic set of tables in any manner of speaking. There are "dice rolls" all throughout.

So for whatever data point you are wanting to examine, then the real way to find out what happens is to set up an exactly repeatable test scenario and then repeat that test a statistically significant number of times. Probably at least 100 iterations.

Even if you had the source code to hand, that would really be the best way to exactly figure out what happens !.

Cheers
Andy