Gunner AWOL

[Rake]

I'm playing the second scenario in the American campaign. I had a mg team sitting off on a flank that I hadn't done anything with in a while, but when a spotting round fell nearby, I knew it was time that they moved. When I selected the unit, I realized that the icon was several action squares from where the majority of the crew was located... I suspect the gunner left to answer nature's call, but with the lack of bushes in CMFI and mortar rounds falling nearby, he must have decided to crawl under the map.

Here are the pics and I have save files available:

After taking the screen caps, I found him about 100 meters away... and the mg had magically teleported to the gunner; he was carrying it with him as he ran to rejoin the team.

Who wants the file?

[womble]

This mostly seems to happen when, for some reason, a team member cannot find a place to settle in the AS where they're supposed to set up. That grey patch just above the team is probably "impassable" (too steep?) and is interfering with the Gunner setting up. A Face change would probably sort it. It's worth noting that the unit icon will appear over a point that is the weighted average of where the unit's personnel are, so if it's 5 AS away, and there are 4 "present and correct" and one "AWOL", you'll probably find the singleton about 20 AS further away from the actual location of the unit than the icon is, along the same line.

It's baffling to me why the "finding a place to set up" algorithm doesn't have some sort of boundary parameter to stop unit elements getting so horribly separated.

[c3k]

Toss the file my way...

c3kATroadrunner.com

Thanks,

Ken

[newlife]

Happens with mortars and ATG crews as well. Be glad it was "just" an MG crew.

[Rake]

This mostly seems to happen when, for some reason, a team member cannot find a place to settle in the AS where they're supposed to set up. That grey patch just above the team is probably "impassable" (too steep?) and is interfering with the Gunner setting up.

Womble, I believe your theory has merit. When I watched the replay, the gunner moved in, set up the mg on the rock face and immediately began crawling away.

I also had a save file from before the action for this turn was calculated. This time, the gunner set up on the grassy area below the knoll and remained with the gun.

Toss the file my way...

Thanks,

Ken

Email sent

[Rake]

Happens with mortars and ATG crews as well. Be glad it was "just" an MG crew.

I saw it happen once in CMBN with a team split off from a rifle squad. The team had been resting next to a hedgerow for several minutes. When I gave them their next order to move to the north, I wondered why they began moving south... I found out why when I saw the team leader wandering god knows where two fields away.

In my current game, at least the mg team is basically out of the fight for the moment... they're just watching a flank where not much is happening. I only noticed them when spotting rounds started landing a little too close.

[Baneman]

I've also recently had an ATG crew that started "wandering" before they even deployed.

I drove them up to a thin treeline and dismounted them, telling them to move into the treeline and deploy ( slightly to the left of the truck ).

First turn they headed off to the right !

Next orders phase, I cancelled the original order, gave a new one to move the same place and deploy.

They then pushed the gun back for a turn, the turn after that, they kind of "went around" some trees and half the men walked away.

Another cancel and replot.

The "walkers" returned and a couple of the "non-walkers" then wandered off, negating the re-arrival of the original walkers.

I gave up and replotted to an adjacent AS.

They then moved the gun there and deployed.

Bottom line, it took about 6 turns to get the gun deployed in the adjacent AS after being dropped off by the truck about 2m away ! Grrrr.

But no "you cannot move here" red/yellow arrow showed up anywhere in that treeline - there was no visible difference between the AS they refused to enter and the one they did.

Maybe there was some impassable terrain nearby - I've noticed you get some very strange pathing behaviour from vehicles that get close to impassable terrain - anything within an AS of something impassable and you're rolling the dice as to where your vehicle chooses to go. But it may be totally unrelated.

[womble]

I've also recently had an ATG crew that started "wandering" before they even deployed.

[snip]

Maybe there was some impassable terrain nearby...

That would be my bet, certainly.

[newlife]

To be fair to the pixeltruppen, I'd probably be looking for excuses to go wander off elsewhere too if I was asked to do some of the things portrayed in the game.

[Sublime]

happened to me in in a pbem of shadow of the hill 7 am. i was axis and at a crucial moment redeployed a 75mm atg that had 4 crew members left after the wrath of god artillery barrage pt 3 (insomuch as it was the 3 battle in a 4 battle series, and the brits get like 10 25 lber batteries each time) anyway my opponent winkelreid was making a breakthrough with his verdammt churchills and I tried to redeploy my atg. unfortunately the gunner crew member 'seperated' and so i had this odd cannon moving at right angles on the AS a few meters away from the hapless loaders. they got gunned down after tooling around for an insane 10-15 MINUTES. I managed to slow down his advance and he eventually made it to them. in all that time they never recovered. IIRC it happened actually to me in Carbide Carbide as well. Not with an ATG however. That time I sent the file to c3k.