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Elmar Bijlsma

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Posts posted by Elmar Bijlsma

    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Lurker765:

    Also, if you are giving him a hard time for posting his pathfinding bug by showing how they were working on it in July then it is good that he posted it again to show that it is still a problem in August. They July fixes should have been in for v1.02 and thus it is still a problem.

    To be fair, Redwolf has been making an ass of himself hinting that BFC hadn't spotted the pathing issues until he pointed them out. He's not being given a hard time for posting on the issue, he's being given a hard time because his chest beating is so laughable.
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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Redwolf:

    For what it's worth, I have my expectations about how much and what part of this problem is fixed in 1.03. I won't post here because it's too late to influence 1.03 and I don't want further flamewars. But I am willing to mail my expectations to somebody now so that I later have an independent voice telling me whether I was full of it or whether I predicted accurately. Would be an interesting experiment. Any takers?

    And if proved right, we will all line the streets for the ticker-tape parade held in your honour. :rolleyes:
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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Forgot to add that I, obviously, am aware of some aspects of CMSF that are broken. It's kinda hard to be a tester and not be aware of this.

    But I do not believe that the game at its core and fundament, is broken. It is not beyond repair. I believe in CMSF. Not the CMSF of the past perhaps, but the CMSF of the future. Yet some on this forum will take every little (or big) flaw and point at the concept/subject/blue bar as being at fault and that only a complete change of course can save it. This is what I take issue with.

    Go ahead and kick BFC in the nutsack for the early release, subject, daft bug or whatever. Be cruel if yo feel you must, but be fair too.

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Bahger:

    I'll tell you exactly, Elmar, using the quote you supply:

    </font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />At least for those who aren't predisposed to disliking the game itself. For those people, those who "don't get it", there is no hope.

    The vast majority of those who feel let down by the game are neither "predisposed to disliking the game" nor do they not "get it". The former implies bias, the latter stupidity. Most of the negative comment comes from those with legitimate grievances that are mistakenly dismissed by Steve as "a matter of opinion". I'm saying that the game is broken and that is a matter of fact.

    Having said that, I follow your contributions to this board closely and find your input to be really valuable and it's not my intention to irritate either of you, okay? I'm just making a case here according to the way I see the facts. </font>

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Hey Bahger, selective quoting sucks. I find the following pretty clear.

    Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

    As I've said... we take the long view. We're not happy with the rocky start to CMx2, but we aren't disappointed either. It's a temporary thing and we're quickly working through it. At least for those who aren't predisposed to disliking the game itself. For those people, those who "don't get it", there is no hope. They are lost and we will move on without them. Perhaps some changes in the future will bring them back into the fold, but i doubt it if they fundamentally do not like the direction we took. Can't please everybody, so no point crying about it.

    Steve

    Not much denial and evasion. What more would you require BFC to do at this point? Knock on your door with a pair of hookers in tow for you to have some fun with?
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    PC Gamer UK Review

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    What I assume Steve meant is: Yeah, it was released early they owned up to as much. But they aren't going to tear their hair out (Madmatt certainly won't) but instead look forwards and fix it. No crying over spilt milk, if you will.

    So when someone gleefully posts a poor review to score some points there won't be the sound of wailing and gnashing of teeth at BFC HQ. Instead you'll hear the sound of things getting done. Just the way I like it. Not endless arguments about what went wrong. They know what went wrong, better then you or me. Because what does it all achieve? Nothing. Fixing will make most people happier then Steve throwing himself on his sword for the umpteenth time in yet another "look, look, another poor review, told ya!" thread.

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Redwolf:

    All right, chaps.

    I re-did it in "move" (not fast, not quick) and with a gazillion waypoints. You might notice that these are way more waypoints that you could possibly draw for each vehicle in RT.

    Sorry, guys, but I told you so. Now that we are over with this, what will you make up now?

    Dial down the attitude, Redwolf. Did you miss where I told you MOVE would be doing this sort of thing too? Not as often as FAST and QUICK under the same circumstance, maybe you seeing it more is because you changed the test. Have you tried SLOW? Oh gee wizz, I wonder why not?

    Anyway, I'm done 'debating' this as I am pretty happy how vehicles move in 1.03.

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    For BFC: Easy GUI Enhancement

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    the suggested change would give you information you can't use. What good is info about a dead soldier to me? Hence, clutter. I'd much rather see at a glance what soldiers I do have then what soldiers I don't have.

    For that you can use the displayed unit status on the left. Though I wouldn't mind the dead standing out more or being sorted to the bottom of that display for easier identification.

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    For BFC: Easy GUI Enhancement

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Hate it.

    I don't want dead people cluttering up the UI. I want a quick view of what I've got avail.able. What I had available is completely irrelevant and just makes it less easy to see at a glance what's what as far as current weaponry.

    If you want to know about casualties then why not look at the status display on the left, where you can see what every soldier is doing. This includes being dead.

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Redwolf:

    Don't make me re-run all this in non-fast...

    Oh I won't make you. I did them myself. :D No real difference in FAST and QUICK (in behaviour and speed over short legs) MOVE might do anything, sometimes running the parcour very well (except for the truly tortuous turns) but sometimes it completely fumbles a slight turn for no real reason. SLOW is always the little dear, nicely following the waypoints.

    Elmar, there is very thick skin involved here on all sides.

    Later, let's say in 2 years, I don't want to be in a position where something is wrong and I say "this has been in CM:SF 1.02, why isn't it fixed". And people reply "yeah but you should have presented a real test case, with screenshots and savegames, maybe it would have gotten fixed then".

    Does it look intense? Sure. Doing the math or presenting actual evidence is always considered an impolite thing to do in an argument. How many people here already said "yeah, that is what I have been seeing all along, thanks for providing a test case"?

    But it would helpful if the evidence is representative of the problem, don't you agree?

    </font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Elmar Bijlsma:

    But there are very few denying there are problems with path finding.

    No, but there are many who do not or do not want to understand that all the bad pathfinding and TacAI would be much less of a hassle if it wasn't invoked needlessly. What needs to be done is turn off some of the more bizarre gizmos and replace them with simpler mechanisms (such as just slowing down in this example) so that you can then go code-fixing on the other cases.

    There is no way that Charles can right now hack up all the technical bugs (graphics, PBEM, the stuff for 1.03) and then later magically come up with great TacAI and great pathfinding. In what time? He's a single programmer and he just released a later game, that means he didn't have vacation for at least a year. It's not realistic. </font>

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by thewood:

    I think Fast just magnifies the problem. I see the same thing with Move, just not as consistently.

    I disagree, because the thing you guys think is the problem isn't. It's when it fumbles MOVE when it's a problem for me. Because IMO the vehicle getting off course isn't the problem. It's the vehicle fumbling attempts to get back on course that are the problem. However, MOVE gets off course at times where it probably shouldn't and then to add insult to injury drops the ball trying to correct. A doubly whammy of navigational madness.

    Thus MOVE is the real problem child, FAST and QUICK work reasonably well by comparison.

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Originally posted by Darren J Pierson:

    I'm not sure how FAST affects the AI's decision to turn the vehicle's rear towards the enemy. I'm not saying it doesn't affect it, I just don't see how? Or is the vehicle going so fast that it is supposed to be spinning out?

    But it's not turning it's rear to the enemy. It has no clue where the enemy is. What's happening is that it misses it's intended path because of a too high a speed and too sharp a turn. In an effort to get back on track it may do just about anything, which sadly includes some totally bizarre things. That's the real problem: Not that it can't follow the path, but that the corrections to undo the user induced swerve (or whatever you call it) can have some bizarre and counter productive results.
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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    But there are very few denying there are problems with path finding. Certainly non on the beta team that I know. So I don't really get the attitude of persecution in this thread. The 'oh, why is no one listening to me' attitude can really annoy when I wager a majority are most certainly listening.

    I can understand you want to give an extreme example of the problems you are seeing. But acknowledge it as such. Don't go around pretending (not you) that it's representative of what's going on. That's just dishonest. And if Redwolf hat bothered to use that same parcour with SLOW movement he would perhaps have given more credit to people like me telling him that going FAST most certainly is part of the problem.

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    Here is how bad the movement code actually is, and it's not just "pathfinding"

    in Combat Mission Shock Force 1

    Posted

    Is it still forbidden to say that if you want precision movement, go SLOW? QUICK and FAST are just bad ideas, especially during the more radical manoeuvres. A Bradley (capable of 65kph) is always going to have trouble going full throttle on a path as laid out for it by Redwolf. Ofcourse, the AI is singularly ill equipped to compensate for this, I agree. This exacerbates the resulting difficulties in CMSF out of proportion with what you'd expect to see in reality. MOVE seems a bit more problematic to me, as it sometimes does do the erratic behaviour too, on movements/speed where you wouldn't really expect it to.

    So... to clarify. The path finding needs serious improvements (and will be getting some of them in 1.03) But stomping your feet in anger because your units follows silly orders in a silly way is perhaps not the best use of your time.

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