Guest kip anderson Posted July 9, 1999 Share Posted July 9, 1999 Steve, the situation is this. You are in command of a US platoon of three squads and plan to attack a farmhouse you believe has a German squad in it. You order two squads to lay down suppressive fire on the building while one squad is orderred to advance and carry out a close assault. 1) Will the covering squads stop firing at the correct time? 2)Or will the covering squads successfully fire through the assaulting squad while it enters the house? 3) Or will we end up with a blue-on-blue tragedy? None of the above takes into account what the German squad may do, but how will the AI handle the situation from the point of view of the US squads? Kip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Los Posted July 9, 1999 Share Posted July 9, 1999 I guess hopefully we'll see one of two things. (perferably both) 1. When a friendly unit gets in the line of fire, the shooting unit makes a percentage roll modified by range, visibility, experience, leadership present, and training to lift fire. 2. In the orders phase, there is a command called "shift fire To" (And you designate anotehr tgt area) or "Lift Fire" that occurs either: a. When situation 1 occurs, or... b. At a certain time during the impulse phase. (though at one minute turns it could be a moot point). Los Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Los Posted July 9, 1999 Share Posted July 9, 1999 And if you really want to get in depth, the success of the shift fire/lift fire command in the orders phase is modified by th same factors as the chance lift fire, plus: If unit coming into LoF has smoke or flares, then modify base percentage by x%. Los Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted July 9, 1999 Share Posted July 9, 1999 Only MGs and larger guns, or anything that goes BOOM, are tracked for friendly fire. This is a limitation due to CPU speed. If every squad had to check if there was a friendly unit in its LOS the game would be unplayable. LOS tracing is the most expensive calculation in the game. Also keep in mind that a squad is an approximation and could be, in reality, very spread out. What would hapen in Kip's example is the assaulting squad would (hopefully) close the distance to the house, get inside, and have a very quick firefight using max firepower and grenades. Chances are that the fight wouldn't last more than 10 seconds or so. One squad would either run away, get anhilated, or surrender in that short period of time. If the covering squads were within grenade range they would not toss any once the assaulting squad got to within a short distance of the enemy. This is to prevent friendly casualites. Since this is a proximity check, and has nothing to do with LOS, there is no speed hit for it. Once the covering squads find that they have no target (the enemy could simply be pinned and out of LOS too!), they will search for something else to shoot. There is no need to specify a secondary target because the TacAI will likely choose the best one and within a few seconds your turn is likely to end, allowing you to designate a different one if you want. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike D Posted July 10, 1999 Share Posted July 10, 1999 I seem to recall that CM will track a squads ammo level in a somewhat abstract fashion (i.e. every round carried by every soldier is not being modeled as in Close Combat for example). This is fine. My question is will we as the players be able to issue orders to a squad, either directly, or indirectly, to conserve ammo if they start running low and the situation warrants it? I.e., a large firefight in the early part of the game depletes a number of my squads ammo levels, but I know the enemy is going to counterattack later on so in the mean time I want them to take it easy on the ammo, but at the same time I don't want them to not fire if a good target comes along, or they need to do so to defend themselves. Mike D aka Mikester [This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 07-09-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Beman Posted July 10, 1999 Share Posted July 10, 1999 I'd imagine there's some sort of a hold fire order, which units will only break to shoot at really high-priority threats (close infantry, big tanks) DjB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted July 10, 1999 Share Posted July 10, 1999 Units that are in LOS of an enemy unit will fire upon it if there is good reason to do so. This means that there is a good chance of causing harm and that the enemy unit in question is not already saturated (i.e. if three squads are firing at an MG position, and have it pinned, most likely nobody else will waste ammo on it). Units also fire less often once their ammo levels get lower. Plus units will obviously not fire if out of LOS, pinned, or otherwise not in a position to shoot. So there is built in ammo conservation. If you order a unit to Hide or Ambush, it will not fire unless it is the right moment. This is how you manually conserve ammo. Realistically you won't know "on turn 10 the enemy is going to counter attack, so I had better save up for the big show" like in so many other games. In CM your units shoot when they encounter the enemy, because at this low level everything is a threat. There is no telling if that company you see moving is the main attack or just a side show. So shoot first and ask questions later Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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