Sandbags ruining concealment

[Sven]

I'm guessing this has been mentioned by plenty others before me, but what's the point of sandbags if all they do is give away your position? Even though my enemy can't see the actual unit or gun hiding there, they open up against the bags and that's it.

[Falaise]

ha ha!
    when you play against the AI it doesn't matter!
On the other hand in H2H it happened to me to use them but not to occupy them ... but my opponent has to maneuver well to flank them, the poor one!

[Sven]

32 minutes ago, Falaise said:

ha ha!
    when you play against the AI it doesn't matter!
On the other hand in H2H it happened to me to use them but not to occupy them ... but my opponent has to maneuver well to flank them, the poor one!

That's true. I almost never play against the AI, only the same friend over and over and we tend to stick to scenarios where setup sometimes isn't very flexible.

[chuckdyke]

10 minutes ago, Sven said:

That's true. I almost never play against the AI, only the same friend over and over and we tend to stick to scenarios where setup sometimes isn't very flexible.

Select a map and use it to play quick battle. 

[BornGinger]

2 hours ago, Sven said:

Even though my enemy can't see the actual unit or gun hiding there, they open up against the bags and that's it.

It's also not so fun when you as the player see some foxholes and know that there might be enemies hiding. It would be more fun if foxholes where more like a hole in the ground where the enemy was hiding and their shooting at you was a surprise.

Edited April 16, 2021 by BornGinger

[Anonymous_Jonze]

Don't occupy all the sandbags you place. When the enemy fires at the empty ones try to see where it's coming from then profit.

[Sven]

I agree with you both, but it's really something for Battlefront to patch somehow.

[Freyberg]

In Assault scenarios, you get to see quite a few of the enemy fortifications and positions before Turn 1, which makes sense.

Otherwise, fortifications don't seem unreasonably easy to spot. It's amazing what you can see with the naked eye from 3-400m away, with binoculars even more so. 

I'm not sure how invisible you'd expect fortifications and emplacements to be...

[FlemFire]

10 hours ago, Sven said:

I agree with you both, but it's really something for Battlefront to patch somehow.

Patch what, exactly? Constructed defenses are very visible by design. There are still ways to obscure them and keep them in keyholes and the like, but if an attacker is just staring across the field it's not like a big stack of sandbags is going to go unnoticed.

[Sven]

Well, maybe it's the fact that the guns in scenarios start behind those sandbags that's the problem. What's the point of sandbags if all they do is ruin your setup?

[chuckdyke]

16 hours ago, Freyberg said:

I'm not sure how invisible you'd expect fortifications and emplacements to be...

Yes, the proverbial sniper in the church steeple. Sure, nobody can see him, but everybody can see his hide. I just lob a few 75mm HE in those places of worship to make sure. 

[chuckdyke]

1 hour ago, Sven said:

What's the point of sandbags if all they do is ruin your setup?

Yes, a skilled sniper sees if some foliage is strange, he can spot hides from 1 km away let alone ATG's. Trenches foxholes consider the reverse slope position not right on the ridge. Playing H&H don't get rid of trees by pressing Alt+T but in Gog and Magog noone can stop pre artillery planning at the bushes. The scenario defense is a little silly in that regard. H&H use the map and as a QB. 

[Bulletpoint]

On 4/16/2021 at 10:21 PM, Freyberg said:

Otherwise, fortifications don't seem unreasonably easy to spot. It's amazing what you can see with the naked eye from 3-400m away, with binoculars even more so. 

I'm not sure how invisible you'd expect fortifications and emplacements to be...

 

15 hours ago, Khalerick said:

Constructed defenses are very visible by design. There are still ways to obscure them and keep them in keyholes and the like, but if an attacker is just staring across the field it's not like a big stack of sandbags is going to go unnoticed.

 

But the big ol' gun behind the sandbags is apparently invisible until it fires. Why the difference in spotting the gun and the sandbags? Both can be camouflaged.

[MOS:96B2P]

11 hours ago, Sven said:

Well, maybe it's the fact that the guns in scenarios start behind those sandbags that's the problem. What's the point of sandbags if all they do is ruin your setup?

OpFor fortifications have fog of war and are invisible until they are spotted.  If the scenario has intel set to some percentage above zero then in theory some of the fortifications might be visible (I never tested that) on the first turn.  But otherwise fortifications are invisible until spotted.  After they are spotted the first time the location/fortification always remain visible.  That kind of makes sense since fortifications are not mobile.  Once the position of a fortification is known its not going to change.  However the units in the fortification might move. So you need to spot the scout team in the foxhole to know if they are still present.  You know that the foxhole itself is not going to maneuver to a different location. 

I'm not sure what else could be done that would change the knowledge of a discovered static fortification.  I guess it could be made to appear as a tentative contact like a unit.  Only to be completely revealed during times you had active LOS and return to a tentative contact when not in LOS.  But you would still be able to area fire at it just as you can now so probably nothing really changes. 

In real life this situation is sometimes handled by alternate / secondary positions etc.  In the game having alternate / secondary positions can also be useful.    

Edited April 17, 2021 by MOS:96B2P

[LongLeftFlank]

13 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

Yes, the proverbial sniper in the church steeple. Sure, nobody can see him, but everybody can see his hide. I just lob a few 75mm HE in those places of worship to make sure. 

Mr. Neasbitt has learned the first lesson in How Not To Be Seen: not to stand up. However, he has chosen a very obvious piece of cover....

With regard to the OP, it seems fortification types are treated as immobile vehicles for certain purposes (though in some respects they are distinct). Therefore, they are spotted far more quickly than unfortified infantry.

My longtime CM wishlist includes placeable abstracted 'camo' counters covering a single action spot. They do not hinder outgoing LOS but provide (invisible to the player) SMOKE like concealment to units in the square that have not moved or fired. Once any unit in the square moves or fires, the 'camo' is removed and plays no further function in the game. Not perfect, but an improvement....

Edited April 18, 2021 by LongLeftFlank

[chuckdyke]

11 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

However, he has chosen a very obvious piece of cover....

Exactly you can hide in a castle, but you can't hide the castle. Ramparts and towers are now foxholes and trenches you can't hide them either for very long. 

[SimpleSimon]

I tend to think the problems with fortification visibility make them surprisingly handy for dummy positions myself...

Edited April 18, 2021 by SimpleSimon

[Sven]

Yes, unless they're pre-placed.

[SimpleSimon]

Well you can de-couple infantry from their entrenchments by using different AI plans and leaving the entrenchments out, i've fooled myself a few times in some of my own scenarios by forcing myself to guess between whether the positions I observed were actually occupied or not. It's a sort "maybe the Germans aren't there any more" sort of thing that leads to another awkward question which is "if they're not here then where are they???" 

[Bozowans]

It always bugged me how easy it is to spot fortifications, but not the guys inside them. I can usually spot foxholes from very far away, but not the enemies in them until I get much closer or they open fire. It doesn't seem quite right. If I know that there are holes in the ground over there and I can see them, why would I not be able to see the big group of helmet shapes and faces sticking up over the top of them? Unless they are all literally hiding down at the bottom of their holes, which is rarely the case in CM.

Seems like it should be the opposite. The foxhole positions themselves should be more difficult to spot than the infantry inside them. If I were looking at enemy positions from a long distance, like through binoculars, I would imagine that the first thing I would see is those little helmet shapes or heads sticking up out of the ground looking back and forth. Maybe I would only be able to see the top of a helmet or two, but the exact nature of the position itself would be harder to tell. Like if they are foxholes, trenches or something else entirely.

[Cobetco]

hmmmm thats a new spambot trick. neat

[chuckdyke]

If you put your fortification in such a place from which you can observe all of the AO. The consequence is that all enemy units have the potential to observe you too. Better if your places of observation don't have any manmade structures. 

[Ultradave]

3 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

If you put your fortification in such a place from which you can observe all of the AO. The consequence is that all enemy units have the potential to observe you too....

A variation on the old axiom "Tracers work both ways"

Dave

[Artkin]

Disagreed. CM should simulate a little concealment for sandbags. Theyre wayyyyyy too easy to spot. Why even have them? Theyre essentially useless. If I know where your troops are they are D E A D.

You hear me?

Edited April 19, 2021 by Artkin

[Artkin]

21 hours ago, Bozowans said:

It always bugged me how easy it is to spot fortifications, but not the guys inside them. I can usually spot foxholes from very far away, but not the enemies in them until I get much closer or they open fire. It doesn't seem quite right. If I know that there are holes in the ground over there and I can see them, why would I not be able to see the big group of helmet shapes and faces sticking up over the top of them? Unless they are all literally hiding down at the bottom of their holes, which is rarely the case in CM.

Seems like it should be the opposite. The foxhole positions themselves should be more difficult to spot than the infantry inside them. If I were looking at enemy positions from a long distance, like through binoculars, I would imagine that the first thing I would see is those little helmet shapes or heads sticking up out of the ground looking back and forth. Maybe I would only be able to see the top of a helmet or two, but the exact nature of the position itself would be harder to tell. Like if they are foxholes, trenches or something else entirely.

x2