Bogged & Immobilised

[Erwin]

Uh...  that would be Team 1 for me. They just sound more honest and have a higher integrity.  One must ask if Team 2 has finally stopped beating their sigothers and fiddling their taxes.

[MOS:96B2P]

1 hour ago, Pericles said:

<Snip> Team 2 believes that bogging probability is not higher for "fast" than for "quick".   

Perhaps we could resolve this via consensus.

All those supporting Team 1, please write "1". All those for Team 2, write "2". 

I will add to this and make it more interesting / controversial (not to mention accurate).  In the game you are no more likely to bog on Fast than you are on Slow.  I am talking game mechanics not real life.  Some things that do make a difference in bogging IMO are the type of ground tile (mud etc.), ground conditions and vehicle commander experience. 

I vote for team 2.  They are obviously the better looking.    

       

[Pericles]

6 minutes ago, MOS:96B2P said:

In the game you are no more likely to bog on Fast than you are on Slow.      

That's crazy talk.

[Michael Emrys]

3 hours ago, Erwin said:

I always cross damageable terrain at SLOW.

This has always been my practice as well, but to be honest I have no idea how the game is programmed on this issue. I do what I do simply because intuitively it makes more sense and that is usually a sound practice when dealing with CM. But again, I have no idea really what is going on under the hood here.

I might add that while I sometimes see track damage after crossing an obstacle like a fence, I can't recall ever breaking a track completely. Also I seldom get bogged and almost never have been immobilized simply for traveling.

Michael

[Euri]

13 hours ago, Pericles said:

Team 2 believes that bogging probability is not higher for "fast" than for "quick". 

 

This was never what I asserted. On this i plead ignorance. My assertion was that the immobilization probabilities assigned to fast movement when crossing dry clear terrain (let alone roads) are unjustifiably exaggerated in the game.  In my humble opinion they should be verging to zero (if not zero). A secondary remark I made  is that the "telos" of having a "fast" command is certainly not to increase the probabilities of bogging, but  rather the increase of the probabilities of bogging is the ramification of moving fast in uninviting terrain.

PS: the above was deliberately composed to non-midwestern English with a view to accentuate the psychological war waged against  @MOS:96B2P in the context of our ongoing PBEM :-P

[MOS:96B2P]

2 hours ago, Euri said:

<Snip> PS: the above was deliberately composed to non-midwestern English with a view to accentuate the psychological war waged against  @MOS:96B2P in the context of our ongoing PBEM :-P

Yes you are crushing me in both the game and on the forum.  May all your imperialist Yankee tanks become immobilized!!!!!  Air Controller Comrade Petrov,  "Send in the MI-24s!!!   

[Erwin]

Maybe there is a difference between bogging and damage in the game.  I am certain that my vehicles that cross a fence or bush on SLOW rarely accumulate damage.  Moving QUICK increases the probability of damage.  That is what one would expect in RL. 

I would be disappointed that moving FAST in "boggy" terrain wouldn't increase the % to bog.  But, then again, I could understand that moving FAST may decrease the bog chance since momentum would carry the vehicle thru - like water skiing.  So, (once again), without info from BFC we have another CM mystery. 

I am 99% sure that in all these years someone did a bogging test - maybe lost to CM forum history...?

[MOS:96B2P]

8 minutes ago, Erwin said:

<Snip>  I am certain that my vehicles that cross a fence or bush on SLOW rarely accumulate damage.  Moving QUICK increases the probability of damage.  That is what one would expect in RL. <Snip> 

The game AI changes the speed from Fast (or whatever speed the player has selected) to Slow when crossing a fence, wall etc.  Not sure what you mean by "bush" so I'm going to pretend I did not see that word .  So even my vehicles cross obstacles at Slow.  But after the crossing they floor it again.  

[Erwin]

My experience has been that if I don't change the order to SLOW when crossing destructible terrain there is a higher chance of track damage.  It makes sense that a vehicle on FAST would automatically slow when crossing destructible terrain - but am certain (subjective I know) that damage is less likely to occur when one manually issues a SLOW order. 

I very rarely see track damage when using SLOW in these circumstances. 

Perhaps the automatic deceleration you are referring to is still faster than SLOW.

[MOS:96B2P]

8 minutes ago, Erwin said:

<Snip>  but am certain (subjective I know) that damage is less likely to occur when one manually issues a SLOW order. 

I very rarely see track damage when using SLOW in these circumstances. 

Perhaps the automatic deceleration you are referring to is still faster than SLOW.

Hmmmm, I will load my CMBS test map and crush some walls...................

[A Canadian Cat]

18 hours ago, Pericles said:

All those supporting Team 1, please write "1". All those for Team 2, write "2".

Vote all you want but it's not actually a democracy.

Team 2 is correct (as well as better looking) - I did the test:

 

Edited November 30, 2016 by IanL

[A Canadian Cat]

14 hours ago, Michael Emrys said:

This has always been my practice as well, but to be honest I have no idea how the game is programmed on this issue.

You guys can keep doing that if you like but it is not necessary - the tank drivers in game slow down all by themselves already.  If you just fast through a fence you can see the tank zip up to the fence and then slow down to knock it down and then zip away again - assuming it still can .

I don't remember seeing a tank actually get immobilized knocking down fences but I do know their top speed can be reduced due to track damage.  I usually have the platoon take turns dealing with obstacles to spread the pain around.  I learned that the hard way in the fields of Normandy.

Bonus tip - if you see a gate in a fence then tanks do not need to knock down any fence to get through: this is gamey but hey it prevents track damage and preserves the FOW too so I do it when I can.  If you have a tank approaching a person sized gate in a fence make sure that you have one way-point directly in front of the gate and an other one directly on the other side so that the movement segment is perpendicular to the fence line.  How far away is not important it is the 90 degree approach that matters - and that the movement segment goes through the gate.  Now the tank will not knock over the fence but instead pass through the gate.  Magic. I said it was gamey

[MOS:96B2P]

13 minutes ago, IanL said:

<Snip> If you have a tank approaching a person sized gate in a fence make sure that you have one way-point directly in front of the gate and an other one directly on the other side so that the movement segment is perpendicular to the fence line.  How far away is not important it is the 90 degree approach that matters - and that the movement segment goes through the gate.  Now the tank will not knock over the fence but instead pass through the gate.  Magic. I said it was gamey

Cool.  Thanks for the tip.  I'll try to use this in the Steel Storm Tournament.  May we meet in the final round!  ( Looking at the brackets I think its the only way we can meet .)

[A Canadian Cat]

That would be awesome, not just to play you but also because I have never made it past the first round of a tournament and I have never defeated @eniced73.

[MOS:96B2P]

Ian beat me to it but here are the results of Fast and Slow vs a low wall with screenshots from my CMBS test map. 

Both vehicles sustained the same damage.

[Erwin]

Am assuming that you did a few dozen tests?  If so, that is very interesting and very helpful.  Will save (me) a LOT of time not making all those SLOW waypoints. 

My only surprise is that the vehicle using SLOW to cross the walls received any track damage at all.  I have usually experienced no damage to vehicles when using SLOW over a couple of obstacles.  Altho, usually that is bushes or fences.   Can't recall the last time going over a wall.

It also looks as if the SLOW WP vehicle gets to the endpoint at the same time as the all FAST mover.  So, the FAST vehicle automatically changes to same speed as SLOW?

 

[A Canadian Cat]

27 minutes ago, Erwin said:

It also looks as if the SLOW WP vehicle gets to the endpoint at the same time as the all FAST mover.  So, the FAST vehicle automatically changes to same speed as SLOW?

That's what it looked like to me.  @MOS:96B2P's test looks like it shows the same.

Yep, save the extra work of placing additional way points and changing speed commands.

[MOS:96B2P]

2 hours ago, Erwin said:

Am assuming that you did a few dozen tests?  <Snip>

It also looks as if the SLOW WP vehicle gets to the endpoint at the same time as the all FAST mover.  So, the FAST vehicle automatically changes to same speed as SLOW?

10 tests.  In the screenshot the vehicle traveling at Fast arrived at the endpoint about 5 seconds before the Fast & Slow vehicle.  I just snapped the screenshot after both vehicles had come to a complete stop.  

[Pericles]

1 hour ago, MOS:96B2P said:

10 tests.  In the screenshot the vehicle traveling at Fast arrived at the endpoint about 5 seconds before the Fast & Slow vehicle.  I just snapped the screenshot after both vehicles had come to a complete stop.  

Thank you IanL for your making us aware of your controlled and reliable experiment. It seems that moving slow has the same bogging probability as moving fast, which is quite stupid and needs to be changed. 

MOS, I request that you repeat the test for wooden fences. I hypothesize that the unit moving slow over wooden fences will not take track damage, whereas the unit moving fast will. I base this on my experience with track damage in CMBS. 

[A Canadian Cat]

1 hour ago, Pericles said:

It seems that moving slow has the same bogging probability as moving fast, which is quite stupid and needs to be changed. 

Perhaps but it has been that way for a long long time (my initial tests were back in 2011) clearly not very high on the priority list.  I recommend against holding your breath .

 

1 hour ago, Pericles said:

MOS, I request that you repeat the test for wooden fences. I hypothesize that the unit moving slow over wooden fences will not take track damage, whereas the unit moving fast will. I base this on my experience with track damage in CMBS. 

There is a fair amount of randomness to track damage.  I have seen no damage or a little damage from the first wall or fence knocked over.  If you have one tank keep knocking walls over over and over it will damage the track at some point and become worse the more walls you knock over.

[Michael Emrys]

1 hour ago, Pericles said:

MOS, I request that you repeat the test for wooden fences.

And wire ones too, if that is not loading you down with too much work.

Michael

Edited November 30, 2016 by Michael Emrys

[MOS:96B2P]

3 hours ago, Pericles said:

<Snip> MOS, I request that you repeat the test for wooden fences. I hypothesize that the unit moving slow over wooden fences will not take track damage, whereas the unit moving fast will. I base this on my experience with track damage in CMBS. 

 

1 hour ago, Michael Emrys said:

And wire ones too, if that is not loading you down with too much work.

Michael

I tested for both wood fences and wire fences.  Wire fences generally seemed to cause damage before wood fences.  Most of the time the first fence can be crushed (wire or wood, fast or slow) with no damage.  Sometimes as many as three fence lines could be crushed (wire or wood, fast or slow) with no damage.  Again speed did not seem to matter but the obstacle did.  Low walls are harder on tracks than wire fences which are a little bit harder on tracks than wood fences etc.   I also suspect that the vehicle is another variable.  I did all tests with M2A3 Bradleys.  But at the end, just for fun, I ran a Humvee through the wire fence five time and it took damage earlier than the Brads.             

[Michael Emrys]

3 hours ago, MOS:96B2P said:

Wire fences generally seemed to cause damage before wood fences.             

This does not surprise me. There are many ways that wire can become entangled in a mechanism as complex as a track, and given Murphy's Law, it is practically a sure thing. Also, I recall what one of our ex-tankers wrote some months back on how averse tankers were to drive over wire.

3 hours ago, MOS:96B2P said:

...I ran a Humvee through the wire fence five time and it took damage earlier than the Brads.             

This does not surprise me either. Recently I played a battle where I ran both Shermans and Greyhounds over wire and noticed that the ACs were showing damage even before the tanks. Also, it is entirely believable that walls would be the most destructive of the three obstacles.

Michael

[John Kettler]

Euri,

I forget which thread it was, but I'd remarked on how slow the Abrams was on Fast. The response I got from our Abrams types is that the tank can go faster but it puts a lot of strain on the suspension, which can easily lead to a thrown or broken track, which is why Fast is so seemingly slow. Yours truly has had critical AFVs first Bog then Immobilize on dry ground, so can relate to your frustration and pain. You are also probably having a bad run of "die rolls" in terms of what happens to your vehicles. There was a case in Iraq in which simply driving across a narrow open sewer running across the road in a village immobilized an Abrams on otherwise bone dry ground. If it helps any, maybe the way to think of these events is as being things like brake or transmission problems which become big deals, a failing road wheel bearing or any of probably dozens of other mishaps. What if, for example, a key circuit goes down, power fails and such? Am sure the tankers, IFV and soft skin types can paint any number of situations in which the vehicle first shudders to a halt and ultimately packs it in for hours or worse. The test results concern me, in that logic tells me that an already stressed system (wheels/tracks and suspension) is more likely to be damaged by sudden additional load than one under less stress to begin with suddenly subjected to more. To me, the former is akin to ignoring the tachometer's red line when there is no need to do so. Would welcome feedback from the people named regarding the known damages from running through wooden fences, being already well aware of what  stumps, wire and other things can do. I suspect this tank, under current modeling, wouldn't have made through all the crunches and smashes seen here before its mad run was self-ended via high centering itself on a traffic divider.

Regards,

John Kettler

 

Edited December 5, 2016 by John Kettler