How to control unit facing in the editor?

[Bulletpoint]

When painting enemy unit setup zones, I thought the game would make the units face towards the enemy side of the map. But I'm seeing many cases of troops facing East when "enemy side" is set to "North".

 

This is a problem, because units are spotting better in the direction they are facing.

 

Is there any way to fix this?

 

(While hand-placing enemy units, it's possible to issue face orders like normal, giving good control. But it's not possible to combine this with AI plans, as far as I can see....)

[BLSTK]

So it isn't just me? Glad you brought this up, BP. I'm finding this as well during QB versus the AI.

 

My units work hard to to attain LOS, only to find the enemy armour is facing in the opposite direction. Now, don't get me wrong. I like to win as much as the next guy. But not like this.

[benpark]

This is on everyone's wishlist for AI orders.

 

In the meantime, I would try giving the unit another movement order in the direction you wish it to face. The unit will face the last order direction as the AI order system works currently. You may need to plot the previous AI movement order just past where you want it, so that the "facing" order gets positioned where you want the unit to be at the terminus.

[benpark]

I just looked at your post again- sorry, I'm out of it. Yes, that is strange as far as the facing goes with just the initial setup. Let me look at it, and I'll report it as a bug if it is consistently...inconsistent.

[ASL Veteran]

At set up AI troops will always face in the direction they were deployed in the editor when the designer placed the troops on the map.  Friendly edge has nothing to do with initial facing of troops deployed on the map.  Once they move somewhere they will then face in the direction of their next waypoint.  Once again, friendly edge has nothing to do with it.  Friendly edge only affects what side of a wall the troops choose to align themselves on and which direction troops will route when under heavy fire.

 

edited to add - in case this isn't known when you place troops in the editor with the move command you then face them in the direction you want to face them by using the face command just like you would if you were playing the game normally.  These troops will then retain their facing until they move to a new location.  Once at the new location they will then face their next waypoint.

Edited August 14, 2015 by ASL Veteran

[A Canadian Cat]

True guys but what if your AI plans have yellow painted setup areas.  I believe that if your AI plans do not have yellow setup areas then the troops start as setup during deployment but if your AI plans have yellow setup areas painted the I am not so sure what governs their facing.  Could that be what @Bulletpoint is seeing?

[BLSTK]

When I play versus the AI, I have zero control over placement of its troops, especially vehicles. And it is always with the AI defending.

 

One would think the AI would want its armour facing the enemy. But this is not happening.

 

How can I correct this behaviour?

[ASL Veteran]

True guys but what if your AI plans have yellow painted setup areas.  I believe that if your AI plans do not have yellow setup areas then the troops start as setup during deployment but if your AI plans have yellow setup areas painted the I am not so sure what governs their facing.  Could that be what @Bulletpoint is seeing?

Units will always retain their original facing from how they were deployed by the designer regardless of where they end up if you use an alternate set up zone for the AI.  For infantry it doesn't really matter, but with AT guns and tanks it makes it problematic to give them alternate positions unless you are babying them with very small AI groups and you are repositioning them in locations where their original facing can still be viable.

[ASL Veteran]

When I play versus the AI, I have zero control over placement of its troops, especially vehicles. And it is always with the AI defending.

 

One would think the AI would want its armour facing the enemy. But this is not happening.

 

How can I correct this behaviour?

You as the player have no control over it.  If you are creating a scenario the facing is set by the designer at the time the units are deployed on the map.  If you are playing scenarios then units are facing the wrong way because the designer placed them facing the wrong way.  If you are playing QBs then I can only assume that the game is retaining the original default facing that the game uses when units are initially placed out on the map for the designer to deploy.  Since there is no designer in a QB then the game has no means of altering the facing on its own unless the map is set to have those units move somewhere.  At that point the units will then face their next waypoint.

[womble]

You as the player have no control over it.  If you are creating a scenario the facing is set by the designer at the time the units are deployed on the map.  If you are playing scenarios then units are facing the wrong way because the designer placed them facing the wrong way.  If you are playing QBs then I can only assume that the game is retaining the original default facing that the game uses when units are initially placed out on the map for the designer to deploy.  Since there is no designer in a QB then the game has no means of altering the facing on its own unless the map is set to have those units move somewhere.  At that point the units will then face their next waypoint.

Which state of affairs prompts the suggestion to BFC that this be looked at: using friendly edge interactions as a sanity check for automatic "free space" deployment facings might be a way to go.

[A Canadian Cat]

Units will always retain their original facing from how they were deployed by the designer

Cool, good to know. I personally prefer to set units initial positions for the AI via the editor at least for the defence.

[RockinHarry]

Cool, good to know. I personally prefer to set units initial positions for the AI via the editor at least for the defence.

Although that nicely setup key holed positions for certain units does not always work, cause individual soldiers will not always be at the same spot, as when initially set by face command. Large HMG teams are affected most. Thus I prefer the smaller ones, or cut crew by 50%.

Me too supports the idea for friendly map edge settings having an influence on unit setup facings. ...erm ...as well as for units that retreat/rout.

[ASL Veteran]

I can't see the utility of anything that automatically sets unit facing during set up.  All that would do is cause aggravation as all your carefully placed and positioned units began to automatically reorient themselves.  Under no circumstances would this automatic facing be an improvement over what the designer does on his own when placing the units in their defensive positions because presumably the designer is placing the units for a reason.  If you place the units and then the computer automatically changes the facing of every unit then chaos would ensue as the designer would begin screaming at the computer "I want you to point in THAT direction! Stop shifting about!".

 

If people are just being lazy and not wanting to manually alter the unit facings during deployment all you have to do is select the entire battalion or whatever size unit you are working with, select the face command, and then just click on the far side of the map.  Presto, your whole command is pointing in the direction of the enemy.  All told it takes about four clicks.  Two clicks to select the entire command by double clicking on the unit commander, one click to select the face command, and then one final click on the far side of the map.  It's really a non issue.

 

The game has also always lined everyone up along one map edge or another, although sometimes if you have setup zones already painted it might place them inside the setup zone, but all the game is doing is plopping the troops down onto the map for you, the designer, to deploy.  It's really not a big deal since you have to deploy everything anyway.  It would be nice if platoons weren't separated sometimes, but it just takes a few minutes of sorting and before long you are ready to roll.

Edited August 15, 2015 by ASL Veteran

[A Canadian Cat]

I agree that messing with deployed positioning would be bad. But if I want to override the deployed position of an AI group in one of my AI plans it would be good if the automatic placement of troops inside the yellow set up order did something reasonable. It seems people are thinking that it does not now. I personally have not seen any issues but I also have never used the yellow setup order area for defending troops yet.

[Bulletpoint]

 It seems people are thinking that it does not now. I personally have not seen any issues but I also have never used the yellow setup order area for defending troops yet.

 

I'm a big fan of replayability, so I use yellow setup zones exclusively for setting up the defense.

[ASL Veteran]

I agree that messing with deployed positioning would be bad. But if I want to override the deployed position of an AI group in one of my AI plans it would be good if the automatic placement of troops inside the yellow set up order did something reasonable. It seems people are thinking that it does not now. I personally have not seen any issues but I also have never used the yellow setup order area for defending troops yet.

Well the main issue is that you have no control over where the game places any particular unit of a specific AI group within a single set up area (not zone).  Once again, this affects some units more so than others and the size of your AI group in terms of units is also a factor.  For example, the game does not associate ammo bearers with the particular weapon that they are bearing ammo for so if you have an AI group with three HMGs and three ammo bearers and you split the set up area between three buildings the game is likely to put two HMG in one building, one HMG in another, and three ammo bearers in the third building rather than putting one HMG and one ammo bearer in each building.