db_zero Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 This has already been requested, but I'll repeat. At some point it would be a good thing for a player to tell squads/units to advance in line, staggered or other formation-especially when using the hunt command. No rational, let alone experienced troops would advance in a direction where enemy troops are known to be in a column formation where one short burst of MG file will mow them all down. This just happened to me and my troops were using the hunt command with a very short move plotted. It was a split squad with 5 men and 4 got hosed. In real life, they not only would have been in a line or staggered formation, but 1 or 2 men would have advanced a short distance while the rest of the element provided cover. The 2 initial men who made the advance would have the taken cover while the rest of the element advance in pairs. This would have alternated continually... Unless I'm mistaken and the concept of bounding over watch was a concept that was not understood or practiced in WW2 at a very small unit level and grunts made it common practice to advance in column formation in close proximity to enemy forces. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 +1..just a staggered line formation would do me if nothing else..so they can sweep say forest terrain etc. Having the Tac AI send two men up front to recon would be uber cool..one day maybe. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
db_zero Posted January 30, 2014 Author Share Posted January 30, 2014 Be nice if you could just right click and drag to set some sort of line formation, then left click and drag to set the facing. Aside from being useful to sweep woods, it would be useful in urban combat. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faelwolf Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 Be nice if you could just right click and drag to set some sort of line formation, then left click and drag to set the facing. That would be a great way to implement it, also the length of the right click drag could set the spacing, so we could have that option as well. Or perhaps have something similar to setting waypoints, have a start, middle, and end point so you could set up a V formation etc. and also set the spacing the same way, the troops would be set evenly apart along the line you create. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
para Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 I like both of the above ideas 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erwin Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 +1 A simple "spread out more/keep more distance between individuals" command would work in many cases. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BletchleyGeek Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 Be nice if you could just right click and drag to set some sort of line formation, then left click and drag to set the facing. Aside from being useful to sweep woods, it would be useful in urban combat. Did this happen on our game, DB? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 This has been brought up before, but it is something I have been thinking about lately. I am not saying CM needs to adapt to a 1v1 action square (1.5m-2m) system such as Sudden Strike used, but I do think such a system creates a framework for the AI to work with that is more flexible than the larger action squares used now. Two other features Sudden Strike had were a scatter command, and a seek cover command that were also helpful. The scatter command used the 1v1 grid as a control of the separation. Each time the player pressed the command the units would spread a few more action squares. The cover command made units seek the closest cover within a certain radius of action squares. Ideally for CM I would rather all this be AI controlled. Where the 1v1 action squares come in is that it allows each man to be able to move as individuals while still being connected to a squad or team. The AI could dictate that each member of the squad keeps a 2 action square interval for example in a line formation, or to spread out and seek cover. Even with a 1v1 action square troops could still be close together as they are now, but could also have the flexibility to spread out randomly, or in different formations using the 1v1 grid as the control guide. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
db_zero Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 Did this happen on our game, DB? Nope it was another game...unless this just happened again in the turn I've yet to replay! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Los Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 I'd like to see this as well. I for one don't like having to break up squads in a team as a matter of standard procedure just to ensure they are spread out. I don't mind sometimes micromanaging things in specific situations, I don't want to do it as a standard procedure...especially since I prefer to play as a Company commander or bn commander. Los 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 Trust me, I think we'd all like this. The problem is it's not easy to accomplish in a way that is either a) easy to use or reliable enough to trust the AI to do it for you. I'm not saying there isn't a way to do it, rather it's one of those things that from a programming standpoint can be a bit of a black hole. To put this into perspective, the basic movement portion of the game has been around since 2006 with the first release being 2007. We are STILL finding situations where soldiers will go onto the wrong side of a wall. Yet what could be more simple than saying "have all your guys stay on one side of a wall"? Unfortunately from a programming standpoint it's not as easily done as you may think. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
db_zero Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 Trust me, I think we'd all like this. The problem is it's not easy to accomplish in a way that is either a) easy to use or reliable enough to trust the AI to do it for you. I'm not saying there isn't a way to do it, rather it's one of those things that from a programming standpoint can be a bit of a black hole. To put this into perspective, the basic movement portion of the game has been around since 2006 with the first release being 2007. We are STILL finding situations where soldiers will go onto the wrong side of a wall. Yet what could be more simple than saying "have all your guys stay on one side of a wall"? Unfortunately from a programming standpoint it's not as easily done as you may think. Steve I assume the fact AI is programmed into the pixel troops is part of the reason for the difficulty? Games like Sudden Strike, Blitzkrieg and Command and Conquer don't have the same level of AI built into squads/fireteams/platoons so they don't have the problems that CM has to contend with? As much as I realize this is your teams pride, love and joy have you ever considered opening up the engine to modders and releasing tools to allow some tinkering? This is by no means a comparison or criticism of BF and the work you've done and the product you produced, but consider this... There is a disaster with another game/simulation involving Romans and to date the modders have turned a true cluster**** into a semi playable game and while patch after patch has been released and progress has been made, there is little doubt that until the modders take the helm you're stuck with a busted product. Even past game releases have been made far better once the modders did there thing and unfortunately parts of the game engines are hard coded in so to this day parts remain broken. I realize BF is a small company with limited staff and only so much can be done with such limited resources. It would be interesting to see what could be done if some outside assistance could be mustered. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BletchleyGeek Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 Nope it was another game...unless this just happened again in the turn I've yet to replay! I was wondering, because the firefights so far have been quite one sided 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
db_zero Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 I was wondering, because the firefights so far have been quite one sided Hard for me to tell whats going on due to spotting. I can tell you from playing the German Campaign game as well as Green Hell, the German Paras are tough hombres and seem to have lots of firepower. Them also seem to be troops who will fire their weapons when you tell them to as well as when you don't and they see a target. They don't lack drive, initiative and fight. We're playing a 43 scenario so they are the cream of the crop. Not sure if the one I'm using are same ones who fought at Monte Cassino. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tequila Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 Be nice if you could just right click and drag to set some sort of line formation, then left click and drag to set the facing. The ultimate way to do this was in my opinion was done in the RTS World in Conflict. You had a button to cycle through formations(,I think). Then if you clicked and dragged you could set the location of the move order, the facing by dragging in the direction you wanted your unit to face, and the spacing of said units by dragging a short distance for close spacing or dragging a long distance for wide spacing. It made things very quick and easy. Of course I see that it's a very different type of game where speedy reactions were at the core of the gameplay, just see it as inspiration how you can cut down on the somewhat tedious aspect of CM without removing any of the complexity. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LRC Posted February 23, 2014 Share Posted February 23, 2014 Trust me, I think we'd all like this. The problem is it's not easy to accomplish in a way that is either a) easy to use or reliable enough to trust the AI to do it for you. I'm not saying there isn't a way to do it, rather it's one of those things that from a programming standpoint can be a bit of a black hole. To put this into perspective, the basic movement portion of the game has been around since 2006 with the first release being 2007. We are STILL finding situations where soldiers will go onto the wrong side of a wall. Yet what could be more simple than saying "have all your guys stay on one side of a wall"? Unfortunately from a programming standpoint it's not as easily done as you may think. Steve About "trust the AI to do it for you" : There are possible "10% human / 90% AI solution" that would be useful. Example1: Human draw all waypoints for 1 unit, then select all other units and select "follow this unit" order. All other units would then have same waypoints as "followed" unit. Example2: Human selects multiple units, select "deploy units" order, draw start&end of a deployment line. AI then generates waypoints distributed along the deployment line. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashez Posted February 23, 2014 Share Posted February 23, 2014 Tactical AI is important part of the game. You are not supposed to tell individual soldier how to behave in every possible situation. And while I agree that increasing team's formation awareness could bring some benefits I am against giving EVERYTHING to the player. In CM1 we had 'borg spotting'. I am afraid that giving a player tools to impose a strict formation on a team will create a form of 'borg knowledge': soldiers will react based on player's knowledge, not their own. Maybe it is Sudden Strike's way, C&C's way, but certainly not CM way. There are ways to manage your squad: you can designate scout team and send those 2 soldiers first. You can split your team into 3 parts. You can change facing. Sometimes your troops will lose their way. Stand in a wrong place. Walk in column straight into machine gun fire. This happens: AI is not perfect, its a price we have to accept. But if BF introduces what you suggest we will never see green troops going in column against mg nest. Why? Because even conscripts will align themselves perfectly against enemy they don't know about, but player does. So...disperse-why not. Forced formation: NO. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quintus Sertorius Posted February 23, 2014 Share Posted February 23, 2014 I agree 100% with this suggestion. I'd actually like to be able to control the spacing of the staggered troops using an arc like the firing arc commands have. You could drag an arc across an area of terrain (a woods, for example) and the troops would fan out and advance cautiously to the edge of the arc. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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