Industrializer

OK, this was probably asked before (couldn't find a valid topic via search, probably used the wrong keywords) or is covered in the manual (where?) but is there a way to _force_ to AI to move the troops exactly as intended by the player ? The situation is that I probably managed to sneak a platoon behind the enemy lines, they crossed a street that was covered by the enemy without being shot at, entered a building and were now relatively save from being spotted. I've than ordered them to cross the building, move across the rubble and continue advancin unseen in the back of the enemy. And what did the TacAI made of my movement order ?? Changed the 'walk-through-the-house' into 'take-a-walk-around-the-block', therefor my men were spotted / shot at and now my opponent knows that he has some unwelcome guests in his backyard and will no doubt take care of them :mad:

one reason for a fallback line could be: you set up a first line of defence, with AT guns, infantry guns, minefields etc but as soon as the enemy has destroyed most of your heavy equipment and breached your mine fields / barbe wire defence line, your infantry would be trapped helpless in their trenches unable to combat the enemy tanks or other long range support fire. Than you retreat to your second line of defence were again AT and Inf. guns with good line of fire are set up. Probably only valid for large scenarios were you can afford to buy enough equipment to build a second line of defence. In smaler scenarios its more likely a 'not a single step back' situation.

Hmm, if the guys up front are only supposed to exchange a few shots with the enemy they need no foxholes or fortified positions, hiding in the woods and than pop up to fire some shots would be enough. The same ist true if you've repelled the first attack and than retreat with no enemy in sight... why ?? I thought the line was fortified in the first place to slow down such an attack / prevent a breakthrough and not to retreat even before such an attack is commenced. So why give up good defence terrain with no need to ? A real fallback position would be a second defence line behind a first defence line but than the question remains, if this first line is under a lot of preassure and you are forced to retreat.. how ? Does it help to deploy some trenches to connect both defence lines ? If Infantry is running inside a trech, are the largely protected from enemy MGs and arty ? Or are they seen as running outside by the CPU ?

Well, actually my (crack !) Shreck team missed their first two shots before the enemy HQ appeared. And they didn't shoot too much to the left or right but into the ground before the IS-2. What were they aiming at, the wheels ? You can still see the imacts near the rear of the IS-2 at the picture I've attached.

YankeeDog, thanx for the answers! Indeed, my panzerschrecks got pinned, guess that's why they missed the IS-2 with the second shot. Concerning the enemy HQ. Well, if I were in an anti tank team, faced with an IS-2 at 18m who's slowly turning his 120mm gun towards me and a few enemy men who are pinned by my own guys I'd know at whom I'd point my HEAT projectile And about the Low Kill chance: well, the IS-2 was pointing its side/rear towards me (60-100mm armor) therefor my HEAT would have struck his armor probably at an unfavorable angel (171mm penetration at 0°, 86mm at 60°), explaining the low kill probability. Thanx again for the quick answers!

In a late-war QB I had a crack Panzerschreck team inside a Church with two Sturm squads at the top floor to scare away enemy Inf. Than an IS-2 drove up to the church, I ordered my Panzerschreck from the middle of the church to run to the side the IS-2 was, they did that and fired two rounds at the side of the IS-2 at a distance of 18m ... missing both ! Than, at aprox 30 sec into the turn an enemy HQ ran into the church and the Panzerschreckteam switched targets from the IS-2 to the HQ ! Great, the next 20 sec they pointed their Panzerschreck at the enemy HQ without fireing (understandable if the Panzerschreck would be useless against infantry but than why would they switch target ??) (the enemy HQ was probably broken and was also fired on by my platoon HQ in the church, being no threat for my Schrecks) At the beginning of the next turn I manually reassigned the the IS-2 as a target (now ponting his rear towards the schreck) but the target pointer showed me clear LOS, 47% hit probability (at 18m ??) and kill: very low ??? How's that, a 88mm HEAT into the rear should kill an IS-2 easily, what's wrong with my HEATs ?? And more important, what's wrong with the TacAI of my schrecks ? Or is this low hit probability / crude target selection normal ?

agree, I've seen this too, even if the gun is pointed straight at an enemy, as long as the hull is still rotating the tank wont fire.

I'd like to see more realistic landscapes (not the sqare spots of wood) and some interesting (historic ?) buildings incorporated into the game (german Reichstag, maybe some complex bunker systems (Sevastopel), game supported summer/winter cammo (no mods necessary). New units: rail guns, naval guns, fixed guns maybe some prototypes for WhatIfs (Maus, T-28, ....) New Scenarios/Landscapes (desert, beach invasions, ..) Multi-turreted tanks (T-35, 5 turrets, yeah !)

OK, send, have fun during debugging

I have no save File from the said battle as it was vs. the AI but I have some saved PBEM playbacks were the exact same happened. This time at a 100% flat (city) map. One of my marder III just shot 6 of his precious HE into the _exact_ same spot (but not were they were supposed to land), another PzIV was plotting a line towards his target (Patch 1.02) I'll send the save games ASAP :cool:

If they were "turret down" they would have been unable to fire at the target but they did, with each shot landing 1-2 meters closer to the target. And as I said before, my tanks and the targets were basically at the same level, no obstacles or hills blocking the view.

So, this is a bug, but is there a workaround ? Does advancind a few meters help ? Or cancelling the target and reassigning it ?

nop, I didn't move them as I thought that their best chances of hitting the target would be if they can use their previous shots to calculate the exact distance and not getting confused with advancing and having to rethink everything But especially the 'unable to hit a 5m high brick wall from 100m' incidence made me belive (until proven wrong) that the program code needs some correction.

I could understand the misery if the tanks were below the target, having no straigt line or could just barely hit the target without overshooting it but in this scenario the tanks and the target were almost at the same height, no tank was hull down.

During some QB I've diecovered that tanks are really poor at hitting a target other than enemy vehicles. In one game I ordered a veteran PzIV to AreaFire at a 2store factory (110m away) The first 5 shots fell short and as I haven't continued I can't tell whether they'll hit that damn building with the sixth shot. That is totally unrealistic, a 2 store factory is at least 5m high, at targets below 200m the gravity has absolutely no influence on the projectiles course so all the tank crew has to do is point the damn gun straigt at the building and shoot. Even a conscript crew should be able to do this and hit with the first shot ! Another point is hitting smaller targets, guns or Infantry on the ground. At first here is a little pic from my last QB against the AI were my tanks (all veteran) trid to hit small targets. As you can see the PzIV took 18 shots, not even getting close to the target (the MG inside the trench) but plotting a nice line, the Tiger also shot 11 times (at the Inf. inside the destroyed building) into the dust and the StuG would have done the same had I taken this picture a little bit later. Well, I dont know how good the WW2 tankers were at hitting small target but in this QB the targets were less than 300m away and every tank should have zeroed in at least with shot 3 or 4! Veterans should be even better because their experience should help them to guess the distance better. Here is a little shot from the Tigerfibel (official handbook for the Tiger tank commander) telling how to zero in on a target with 3 shots if the area behind the target can be observed or 3-4 shots if the area behind the target can't be spotted (and both methods are demonstarted for targets 2000+ meters away!). Maybe this can be corrected with a new patch ?? Pretty please ?? [ February 23, 2003, 01:59 AM: Message edited by: Industrializer ]