Group Movement question

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

OK, obviously there is a Group Movement feature which alleviates the tediousness of having to order each and every unit one at a time.

Just like there is a feature to show all Movement Lines and all In-coming and Out-going Fire.

And a feature that allows us to "See" everything that all of our units can see at the same time. Oh wait! That's what full map display is! Whoops! Let's not go there! OK, sorry, just had to slip that in.

My question is though.......

When we draw the little boxy thing around a group of units and issue them an order, can you then order a unit within that group to breakaway sometime during the 60 second turn to do their own thing, or are they "stuck" in that group move?

------------------

"Fear is the path to the Dark Side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering."

--Jedi Master Yoda

[L.Tankersley]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Ol' Blood & Guts:

When we draw the little boxy thing around a group of units and issue them an order, can you then order a unit within that group to breakaway sometime during the 60 second turn to do their own thing, or are they "stuck" in that group move?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

My guess is the "group move" command will issue a string of orders to every selected unit. If you want to order a unit to split off, seems like you would select the unit and delete the automatically-generated orders until you reached the point you wanted to split off at [from?].

------------------

Leland J. Tankersley

[Guest tom w]

ok..

now, that's a good question, really...

I can se we are ALL just chomping at the

bit to get at the release version and those new Gold Demo Scenarios.

-tom w

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by L.Tankersley:

My guess is the "group move" command will issue a string of orders to every selected unit. If you want to order a unit to split off, seems like you would select the unit and delete the automatically-generated orders until you reached the point you wanted to split off at [from?].

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, that makes sense. Let's just hope that it actually works that way.

------------------

"Fear is the path to the Dark Side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering."

--Jedi Master Yoda

[Moon]

After giving a group order you can select each unit individually and alter its orders without any restrictions.

[Black Sabot]

Ok, now this might sound like a stupid question but here goes...

When you issue a group movement order, can you alter a specific units orders for a brief moment in its movement and then return them back to the group?

Example:

I issue a GMO to a platoon, they move out together, along the way they enter a patch of woods, Now i alter the squads to zig-zag from tree to tree to take advantage of cover, then the platoon leaves the woods still under the GMO.

[L.Tankersley]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Black Sabot:

When you issue a group movement order, can you alter a specific units orders for a brief moment in its movement and then return them back to the group?

Example:

I issue a GMO to a platoon, they move out together, along the way they enter a patch of woods, Now i alter the squads to zig-zag from tree to tree to take advantage of cover, then the platoon leaves the woods still under the GMO.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

No. My understanding is that the group move order is just a shortcut to automatically generate a set of movement orders all at once. These orders are exactly the same as if you had manually selected every unit and clicked out the orders individually. Think of it as having a staff weenie by your side when you're playing CM and you tell him "Move this platoon from HERE to HERE because I'm too lazy to do it my own self" and the staff weenie in turn selects every unit you indicated and manually clicks down some movement orders for each one to move them generally between the points you selected. When he's done using your mouse and keyboard you can select each individual unit and see the orders he issued and tweak them as desired (moving waypoints and so on). But unless the ability to insert orders in the middle of a unit's order list has been added since the beta demo, you won't be able to do that for orders generating using this shortcut.

I think it kind of defeats the purpose anyway -- if you're going to bother selecting the individual unit anyway, why not just issue the commands manually?

------------------

Leland J. Tankersley

[Moon]

Here's a bit more info on group orders (and btw, I seem to remember that CMHQ ran a feature about this a while ago, you might want to dig Madmatts and Fionns archives a little )

When you select a group (by dragging a box around them or hitting SHIFT-left click or double-clicking on a HQ unit), you can then issue orders to the complete group. No waypoints are possible, it's a simple "move from A to B" order. It's a great way to have, say, a whole platoon advance in formaiton down a road or through some forest. If you need to tweak the order(s) for an individual unit (e.g. you want to have one of the units leave the road and move through a house on the side), you can then select it one by one and alter/add/delete any orders given to the whole group. You can add waypoints, change their destination, use PAUSE commands, whatever you want to do.

There is no "return back to the group" really, Black Sabot. The group order is just a way to issue the same command to a lot of troops quickly. It works great and has really cut down the time you spend in the orders phase for larger scenarios by a wide margin.

I hope this clears up some questions.

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Moon:

It works great and has really cut down the time you spend in the orders phase for larger scenarios by a wide margin.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Which is why I have stated that a click on every unit to see their LOS, is a TOTAL waste of time, using the same logic as this Group Move thing. Yes, to have such a feature would be realistic, but to what benefit would it provide to gameplay? It would slow down the orders phase tremendously.

Hope this clears up my point of view.

I always thought that into creating a great game you need realism and ease of play. Adding every little realistic thing eventually starts destroying ease of play. So you have to draw the line somewhere.

Thank you,

A BTS spokesman WANNABE.

PS--Thanks Moon, I'll go back and look at the CMHQ feature.

------------------

"Fear is the path to the Dark Side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering."

--Jedi Master Yoda

[Guest Madmatt]

Yes I have actually done TWO features on this but let me recap and add to what Moonshas already said.

No waypoints with group move. A to B

Units maintain their relative position in relation to the group leader throughout the move, assuming the units are not interupted by anything (i.e. arty, incoming fire, uncrossable terrain, morale failures etc...)

The group leader can be manually selected by clicking one time on any member of the current group. This unit will be outlined in a different color for ease of identification.

You select an entire group by either left clicking and dragging over an area or shift clicking any individual units.

Units can be deleted from the current group in the same way. Shift click.

Groups can not be remembered from turn to turn. You will need to relselect a group to give a new group order however a group order can last much longer than a single turn, for example a movement destination which is 900 meters aways will take several turns to complete. During this time the group will continue to try and carry out the orginal order and no player interaction would be required unless you wanted to change the destination mid-stream.

You can also give other orders to a group such as targeting, and hide commands. All units in the group would then target (or try to) the selected target or all units would hide.

That is all for now...

Madmatt

------------------

If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ!

combathq.thegamers.net

[This message has been edited by Madmatt (edited 04-24-2000).]

[Black Sabot]

Thanx for the replies guys,

Yes it did answer a few questions. However, being the curious S.O.B. that i am i have a few more questions re: group move, and considering you all have nothing to do...

1) What happens if a unit in a group encounters terrain which slows it down? does the entire group slow down to maintain formation? Or if not does the slowed unit fall so far behind that it's no longer part of the group?

2) I assume the group leader is designated to provide direction to the group (please correct me if i'm wrong). What happens when the group leader is blown away in mid-movement? Does the group continue?

Just curious

------------------

"I do like to see the arms and legs fly"

[Guest Big Time Software]

I think you missed a point of Moon's The Group Order is simply, and without any extra baggage, a means of issuing the same order to multiple units at the same time. There is absolutely nothing more to it than that. No group control is exercised at all. In fact, there is no such thing as a "group" in CM, just the standard HQ "attachments" (which have nothing to do with orders).

To be clear, you can group select 50 units of all different types and issue a single "Move" order. Any unit that can perform a "Move" order at that current time will be issued the same "Move" order in relation to a single designated unit. This does not mean that all 50 units are somehow now in communication with each other, because that would be silly

Steve

[Guest Madmatt]

I love how Steve can say exactly what I mean with about 4 words!

Steve, YOU ROCK!

Madmatt

------------------

If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ!

combathq.thegamers.net

[Black Sabot]

I understand now

I was under the assumption that 'group move' was done in a way to simulate a real life manuever, only simplified.

Interesting though, the game for the most part strives for a realistic feel of combat and manuever, yet this feature is included.

Just my thoughts FWIW

------------------

"I do like to see the arms and legs fly"

[SS_PanzerLeader]

Sabot - I believe this was done for playability. It takes a lot of time to move the units individually and can be tedious for starting movements- imagine this on a map with hundreds of units - this would get very old without it

------------------

SS_PanzerLeader.......out

[Guest Big Time Software]

I'm not sure how you can say that this feature some how is unrealistic? I was never in the Army, but I doubt a 400 ft black pointer never came out of the sky and warped me to another position The primary reason we included it was to speed up the Setup process, which has no parallel in real warfare.

When you create a new scenario all units appear on the edge of the map. You thought rearranging units already deployed is time consuming... you ain't seen nothing until you see a whole battalion lined up on a map edge So you select a company and toss them off to one side of the map, another company in the middle, and another off to the other side. Then you toss about the support weapons. Then you go about putting stuff in exact positions once you have taken your first organizational pass. This is mad A LOT EASIER and quicker with the Group Move.

During the Orders Phase you can use this same feature to move units from A to B (note, NO WAY POINTS) using the same order. But unless you have all your guys on a road or abreast with no impassible terrain in front of you, the Group Orders feature doesn't really do much for you. And in any case it does less for you control wise than giving out individual orders.

Steve

[Blindicide]

Black Sabot says" Now i alter the squads to zig-zag from tree to tree to take advantage of cover"

Why?I was under the impression trees were indicative of the area not actual representations,so why bother.

[This message has been edited by Blindicide (edited 04-25-2000).]

[Mark IV]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>a 400 ft black pointer... came out of the sky and warped me to another position <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The second time that happened to me, I got out. Russians we could handle, but Hunting Dogs from Space were not in the enlistment contract.

Group selection is very CAD-like. Nice. Can we add to a rectangle-selected group, with another rectangle-selected group (i.e., rectangle 1st squad, Shift-Rectangle 2nd squad)?

[Guest Big Time Software]

Blindicide, your understanding is correct. A "tile" of woods does not have individual trees simulated within it. However, LOS is not totally blocked until x meters have been passed through (x depends on the type of woods and what the LOS has passed through before).

Mark IV... good call! The "click of death" wasn't a problem with early Zip Drives, but was really a Soviet secret weapon

Steve

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

Yes, I was just about to say that the tree graphics AREN'T one-to-one. That was brought up a while back, so zig-zaging from graphic to graphic has no real effect. Other than to look cool, of course.

But the x-distance within a tree "block", that Steve mentioned to block LOS brings up another interesting question. How much is that x-distance? Or is that something that will be stated within the manual? If so, don't worry about it.

------------------

"Fear is the path to the Dark Side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering."

--Jedi Master Yoda

[Black Sabot]

Ahhh, i learn something every day

SS,

I agree the group move command is very useful during set-up and the first few movement phases. Who knows, you might use it to retreat in our PBEM game

Steve,

when i said "unrealistic" i was referring to your example (moving 50 units w/ one command) in actual combat, not set-up

mind you, i'm not criticizing the game, just making an observation

Blindicide,

I never knew that. Thanx for pointing that out to me