Hold Fire Feature? Or is it Hiding?

[Falke88]

Hey guys!

I really miss some serious tactical aspect in my opinion. To hold fire unless the enemy hasn't open fire at your squad yet.

I'm doing so with the hiding feature - which sadly resets all the time - therefore I forget to rehide some squads in the heat of closing in to enemy positions.

In my opinion its very important to have your squad oberserving an enemy or locate even more enemys to maybe organize an full fire ambush or to maybe imagine where the rest of the enemy might be (since a Platoon HQ wont be far from the rest of the platoon)

Maybe I missed some feature?

[ridethe415]

Set a target arc. The units aren't hiding, just won't open fire until the enemy enters the arc you have set. Its under the "C" panel with target etc.

[Falke88]

But they will return fire if the enemy is attacking them? Thats the point here. I dont want them to dont return fire if they are being spotted and surpressed

[JoMac]

Ummm, ridethe415 is still correct...Just give a shorter Firing Arc, and your troops shouldn't return fire.

[BLSTK]

I dont want them to dont return fire if they are being spotted and surpressed

In which case you'll want a longer "Target Arc".

Double negatives are a bitch.

[Falke88]

again...

I want my squad to hold fire until I release them (like deleting the arc) or they being attack by the enemy.

If I setup an arc which wont reach the enemy positions and the enemy is already shooting at my guys. Will they return fire then? Or will they just sit it out?

[76mm]

If the enemy has already spotted your troops and is indeed firing on them, wouldn't you want them to be firing back?

[Dynaman216]

You can't do what you want. You can either set an arc and your troops WILL NOT fire outside that arc or you can make them hide and they will not fire on anything. (granted there is supposed to be a self preservation override but I've had whole squads wiped out and it never kicks in)

But to have them not fire unless fired upon, no option for that.

[womble]

Set a target arc. Add a "Hide" if you really want them to keep their heads down at the cost of situational awareness. Cancel it/both when they take fire. The game can't play itself.

[Dynaman216]

Set a target arc. Add a "Hide" if you really want them to keep their heads down at the cost of situational awareness. Cancel it/both when they take fire. The game can't play itself.

Sadly that is not really an option in WEGO, by the time you can turn off the option your squad is almost always dead. The worst I've had happen to me is a Bazooka team have a tank go all through the team's fire arc, stop just outside the arc, and then the team never fired on the tank while said tank was blasting them. I've declined using firing arcs or hiding ever since.

[Falke88]

hm the devs really should add such mechanics...it isnt very complicated in my opinion...you just need to have a reaction on being fired on...like when the Surpress Meter rises - the team will loose all arcs awareness and fight back the aggressor

[TheVulture]

hm the devs really should add such mechanics...it isnt very complicated in my opinion...you just need to have a reaction on being fired on...like when the Surpress Meter rises - the team will loose all arcs awareness and fight back the aggressor

... at which point, having a defensive set up with covered arcs to remain hidden and catch the enemy in the open is beaten very simply by the attacker putting some suppressive fire on possible enemy positions before moving out.

The attacker can then pick off defenders one by one. Area fire building #1. If no-one fires back, it is empty. If they do, they are on their own because all their friends still have cover arcs, so that one squad is fighting the entire attacking force and that is going to go badly for them. Then do the same to building #2 and so on.

[Sailor Malan2]

Sadly that is not really an option in WEGO, by the time you can turn off the option your squad is almost always dead. The worst I've had happen to me is a Bazooka team have a tank go all through the team's fire arc, stop just outside the arc, and then the team never fired on the tank while said tank was blasting them. I've declined using firing arcs or hiding ever since.

Are you sure the bazooka team could see the ground in the covered arc? They would not ignore the tank unless they didn't see it (or were already suppressed). I think people might be underestimating the ranges at which fire can be effective. The aim of fire is to suppress the other guy before he supresses you. Don't try and hide and get close range sure kills. (Except in very unusual circumstances like being behind a building rather than in it, so you can nail the assault team as it enters the other side. But don't hide even then, just make sure here is no Los)

"Look after the suppression and the kills will look after themselves"

[poesel]

Motivation plays a role, too. Fanatic troops will adhere to a CA no matter. Lesser motivated ones will sometimes fire back.

[slysniper]

These commands have lacked from the beginning of the game design and you have brought up a point that others have pointed out before in that there should be some way to set a command to return fire if fired upon.

But years have passed and nothing has changed, so don't get too hopeful that they are going to program something to fix this weakness.

It is a flaw that you would think they could fix somehow though.

But at this point it is likely a empty wish.

[Bulletpoint]

I would love to see a "hold fire" command be implemented so that only troops of a certain quality would be able to do it - to reflect their superior training.

Or make it so that special commands like these had more chance of success with trained soldiers than excitable 18-year old rookies.

[Dynaman216]

Are you sure the bazooka team could see the ground in the covered arc? They would not ignore the tank unless they didn't see it (or were already suppressed). I think people might be underestimating the ranges at which fire can be effective. The aim of fire is to suppress the other guy before he supresses you. Don't try and hide and get close range sure kills. (Except in very unusual circumstances like being behind a building rather than in it, so you can nail the assault team as it enters the other side. But don't hide even then, just make sure here is no Los)

"Look after the suppression and the kills will look after themselves"

POSITIVE they could see it, I clicked on them and watched the tank go right through. They were not surpressed, no one was firing anywhere near them before that. I've had this same thing happen many times so it is not a random fluke either. If I put in a firing arc it is always the circle one now.

[womble]

Sadly that is not really an option in WEGO, by the time you can turn off the option your squad is almost always dead. The worst I've had happen to me is a Bazooka team have a tank go all through the team's fire arc, stop just outside the arc, and then the team never fired on the tank while said tank was blasting them. I've declined using firing arcs or hiding ever since.

Then you're using them wrong. I only play WeGo and I get significant utility out of Cover Arcs. If the enemy are getting close enough to wipe out your squad before the minute is out, you're not maintaining sufficient units with "eyes up" or you're trying to get the enemy too close before opening fire. If you're seeing the enemy advancing and they're not firing at you, they probably haven't spotted you. This is a Good Thing. However, they will, assuredly, spot you at some stage, and you have to spring your ambush before then. You seem to have gotten plenty of experience in the ranges at which advancing troops will see you, so you should be able to tell when to get your troops firing so they get the drop, not the enemy.

You don't have to have a limited angle to a Cover Arc, either, so just because you did once and it bit you in the ass is a poor rationalisation for never using them. They're a tool, one that can be made useful, but nobody's going to do that for you. Of course WeGo has abstractions, so that you sometimes have to open your ambush at 80m (where the enemy are at the start of the turn) not 60m (where they'd be 30s into the turn) but it doesn't mean you have to wait for them to get to 50m at 45s, spot your team and SMG the bejazus out of you. Timing is important. Or, if you must have split-second control of your troops, play RealTime and accept the inherent disadvantages of that mode instead.

[Dynaman216]

Then you're using them wrong. I only play WeGo and I get significant utility out of Cover Arcs. If the enemy are getting close enough to wipe out your squad before the minute is out, you're not maintaining sufficient units with "eyes up" or you're trying to get the enemy too close before opening fire.

We will have to agree to disagree. But on that no eyeballs bit, yes I did and no it did not help.

[sburke]

Sadly that is not really an option in WEGO, by the time you can turn off the option your squad is almost always dead. The worst I've had happen to me is a Bazooka team have a tank go all through the team's fire arc, stop just outside the arc, and then the team never fired on the tank while said tank was blasting them. I've declined using firing arcs or hiding ever since.

That particular issue is probably generated by how spotting is designed, not in the sense of the terrain, but when the spotting cycles kick in. However one item that you could change (and it appears you might have) is the arc itself. If you are going to have a narrow arc you should only do so if the exposed area for the team is narrow. A target armor arc's primary function is to prevent the team from wasting time on infantry and long distance low odds targets. I rarely use it to focus the actual direction of the attack. Using a 360 degree arc is all I typically use for those teams.

[womble]

We will have to agree to disagree.

That's not "agreeing to disagree". You say CAs aren't useful. That's an absolute statement that if you cleave to is basically saying I and everyone else who says they're useful is lying. I'm sure that's not your intention.

But on that no eyeballs bit, yes I did and no it did not help.

It only helps you use your troops better. It just means you're more likely to spot any approaching enemy in time with someone so you can drop your CAs in time. If it didn't help, you're just not timing your commands right, or are issuing the wrong ones in unrealistic expectation.

Regarding the MANPAT not firing, am I right in thinking you're saying they had the tank actually spotted for a good continuous chunk of time while it was in their CA and didn't fire on it? That being the case, there's a couple of possible reasons I can think of that they didn't fire. The first, and it's a bit of a facepalm, but you're not alone (I know from personal experience) is that the team might have been out of rockets for their tube. The second, and it's pretty weird, might be that the loader could see the tank from his particular position, but the Tube Guy couldn't. I'd expect them to wriggle round to address this issue, usually, but maybe they were poor quality, or poor morale state. I'll assume they weren't suppressed. But either road up, if they had it spotted, this outcome is nothing to do with Target Arcs, is it? They didn't fire at it while it was within their RoE, so there has to be some other reason. Presumably, too, you set the team with an "effective range" (I use 80m) 360 Armour Target Arc, which suggests that the target stopping outside their Arc wouldn't have succumbed to their fire anyway. Doesn't mean TAs don't work, just means you need to work on your employment of them. They are vital for a number of evolutions.

[Ultradave]

For the original question, I think you can still do it with a firing arc, depending on how you want the troops to behave.

1. For an observation post, like a team out front to provide warning who you want to remain hidden, set a small circular firing arc but do not have them hide. They will "scout" better. If they get fired on, you probably want them to fall back anyway so cancel the firing arc and bug out (assuming they've survived the initial firing on).

2. For other situations, set a firing arc short of where the enemy is or to a distance that you feel would be reasonably effective for your return fire and at which point you no longer care if they are spotted. If someone walks into that arc they may fire first, so you want to set the distance of the arc to minimize that - a guess as to when they might be spotted given the terrain. Cancel the firing arc if fired upon.

This is probably the best you can do and should handle *most* situations. What is missing is that unless you are playing RT, you have to wait to cancel the arc. Even in RT it's limited by your ability to react, pause the game, figure it out and then resume.

That's probably not too unrealistic. A team given orders to hold fire unless fired upon would probably go through a process similar to:

a. "incoming".

b. everyone ducks.

c. team leader (or the poor sucker he designates) attempts to figure out where fire is coming from.

d. team leader tells everyone - return fire on treeline at our 2 o'clock.

e. everyone un-ducks (technical term) and returns fire.

This takes some measurable amount of time (been there).

[womble]

And the thing with the Tube Guy not engaging the passing, spotted, inside-the-arc tank might be a bug, if I'm reading the OP in this thread: http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=116846 right, and they're reporting the same thing. Anyone else seen simliar?

[c3k]

At the start of a "move to contact" battle, I'll find the highest HQ, double click to make all units "selected", press "K" (for covered arc), "Shift" (for 360^ arc) and set a ~100m covered arc for all units.

That ensures that my guys don't open up at ridiculous range and give their position away.

The HQ select (can be done with Platoon or Section HQ, or any other HQ) makes it easy to set multiple covered arcs.

[Dynaman216]

It only helps you use your troops better.

I am using my troops quite well thank you - by NOT (I repeat NOT) using firing arcs other than 360 arcs. Things are working just dandy now.