Suggestion for More Troop Order Options

[stimpy]

I don't know how many times this was hashed over so far since I just started reading this board, but here are some commands I would like to see added to the game for units:

Formation Move -

This simply says the group you have selected will all move as fast as the slowest unit in the group. I hate when a flamethrower is left behind, and/or tanks go flying up ahead of everyone.

Force Load -

This will force vehicle units to preload a certain type of ammo. If a tank just engaged infantry and has HE loaded, but you know their is a Tiger over the hill, you can force load a tungsten round or something.

Abandon Position -

Many times I have an M1919 crew or similar in a situation where they are immobile and my empathy comes upon them. I would rather them just abandon the gun to keep from getting captured. Or if the team is out of ammo and I just want them to lose the gun so they can retreat faster...

Waypoints for Group Moves -

Just as it says... Move em all at once and plan their routes all at once.

Fire X Number of Rounds -

Tells mortars, arty, etc. to fire only this many rounds at a certain target. I have alot of units wasting ammo on areas that only needed one or two rounds.

Salvage Ammo -

Sends unit to a dead unit's location to pick up ammo off them. It's all good...

That is all I can think of right now.

Thanks for your ears...

stimpy

[M. Bates]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Formation Move -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Flamethrowers are separate units, so move independently.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Force Load -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Personally I would like see that implemented.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Abandon Position -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

And this idea is good as well. Providing an abandoned gun or whatever does not count as an enemy hit.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Waypoints for Group Moves -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, that would also be good for when feeling lazy.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Fire X Number of Rounds -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

YES. Often a whole 60 seconds of arty fire is WAY too much. Some kind of pause command would be welcome.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Salvage Ammo -<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Nah, makes CM like Doom or some other 1st person game.

[Guest Mirage2k]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Salvage Ammo -

Sends unit to a dead unit's location to pick up ammo off them. It's all good...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

The use of fallen comrades' ammo is already modeled. If you'll notice, your infantry's ammo count never reaches zero. The lowest it can go is "low," which only means that they will not fire as often, and are probably not good units to attack with. This represents your men taking ammo from wounded, killed, or missing buddies.

-Andrew

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[Maximus]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mirage2k:

The use of fallen comrades' ammo is already modeled. If you'll notice, your infantry's ammo count never reaches zero. The lowest it can go is "low," which only means that they will not fire as often, and are probably not good units to attack with. This represents your men taking ammo from wounded, killed, or missing buddies.

-Andrew

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

No flame attended here, but I'm not so sure about that. Because that doesn't explain the loss of ammo with casualties after movement. If a 2-man AT-crew takes a casualty and then moves, it's ammo is automatically reduced to 3. This simulates that less men can carry less ammunition.

[Guest Mirage2k]

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

No flame attended here, but I'm not so sure about that. Because that doesn't explain the loss of ammo with casualties after movement. If a 2-man AT-crew takes a casualty and then moves, it's ammo is automatically reduced to 3. This simulates that less men can carry less ammunition. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Point taken, but I don't remember seeing that effect with any unit other than the AT teams. Unused AT rounds are harder to come by than rifle or MG rounds.

Of course, anything I say has to be taken with a large grain of salt...I'm not known for intelligence.

-Andrew

[Randy Mauldin]

Well remember that AT rounds are kept track of individually whereas Small Arms Ammo is not. Small Arms Ammo represents the number of times a unit can fire. When it reaches "Low" you will not be able to Target with them, and they will fire only when in danger.

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It wasn't MY company..It was the Armys' or so they told me.

[Tiger]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Formation Move -

This simply says the group you have selected will all move as fast as the slowest unit in the group. I hate when a flamethrower is left behind, and/or tanks go flying up ahead of everyone.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I dunno, maybe. One problem would be you'd have to program all units in a certain group to move at the same speed as the slowest unit attached to that group, taking into account the different terrains that everyone is moving over. Another problem is how would you assign and unassign units to move with a certain unit designated as "slowest". Seems like this opens up a rather large can o' worms.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Force Load -

This will force vehicle units to preload a certain type of ammo. If a tank just engaged infantry and has HE loaded, but you know their is a Tiger over the hill, you can force load a tungsten round or something.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I disagree. Too much micromanagement. You're not supposed to be controlling every minute action of units. What would happen when that infantry charged your tank and you had forced it to load AP? Would also lead to over-use of tungsten, a rare ammo.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Abandon Position -

Many times I have an M1919 crew or similar in a situation where they are immobile and my empathy comes upon them. I would rather them just abandon the gun to keep from getting captured. Or if the team is out of ammo and I just want them to lose the gun so they can retreat faster...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Not sure why heavy mgs become immobile either. Perhaps there was no time to code it or it was deemed a somewhat insignificant event just to save 1 guy? Why not be able to have gun damaged or immoblized vehicle crews leave their vehicles also?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Waypoints for Group Moves -

Just as it says... Move em all at once and plan their routes all at once.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I have always been against this. I still see it as a holdover from RTS game fans who don't want to be bothered with moving individual units, since with RTS games you typically move large #s of units together in mass. CM is just not that kind of game.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Fire X Number of Rounds -

Tells mortars, arty, etc. to fire only this many rounds at a certain target. I have alot of units wasting ammo on areas that only needed one or two rounds.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Not sure if this is how real artillery missions work. Typically you call in a strike, the arty guys respond with as much volume as is deemed sufficient according to the doctrine they employ. Have a hard time picturing the spotter asking for just 1-2 rounds during a battle. I can imagine the arty unit behind the lines getting another frantic request for an arty mission and dropping 1-2 rounds again because that's what they thought you said earlier....

Try using spotting rounds instead.

jmtcw,

~johnS

[chrisl]

Formation Move - the "move" command moves all units (including vehicles) at the same speed.

Force Load - if you target something in the orders phase, it will force loading of the appropriate arrow. Not quite what you want (if something has turned back into a symbol and you can only area target it you're going to get HE)

Abandon Position - kind of like an extreme version of "withdraw" which eliminates command delay and can only be done toward a friendly map edge (which I don't think I've ever used, as it can cause units to break as they run)

Waypoints for Group Moves - might be nice, but is unlikely for a patch. Maybe CM2 if we're lucky. I haven't seen much need for it, as terrain usually isn't appropriate for this.

Fire X Number of Rounds - would be nice. Real fire missions work that way (search under "Bullethead" as author. He does/did arty for a living. Present workaround is to move the target slightly (which means the rounds will have a delay before they come again). Also, if the target point is in LOS the time counts down 1 sec/sec, and when it's out of LOS it's 2 sec/sec, so you can also use that to control arty delay.

Salvage Ammo - as described above - infantry never run out of small arms ammo. MG teams do lose 1/n or 1/(n-1) of their ammo when they lose a guy.

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Slayer of the Original Cesspool Thread.

[Lanzfeld]

Mirage2K is correct about units with a "low" ammo count are assumed to scanvange ammo. Its in the manual.

[Tris]

Waypoints for Group Moves -

Just as it says... Move em all at once and plan their routes all at once.

I have always been against this. I still see it as a holdover from RTS game fans who don't want to be bothered with moving individual units, since with RTS games you typically move large #s of units together in mass. CM is just not that kind of game.

The way to best model group moves and still stay within the spirit of the system would be to implement discreet formation commands to platoon/company commanders, who would then pass these instructions down to any units then in their command radii. So, you want a platoon of infantry with attached bazooka/MG/mortar assets to move from here over to there in a V formation, you click on the commander, which brings up the order menu, where there's another option called FORMATION. Click on that and a submenu pops up with the various group formations to select from. In this manner the game can then juggle the various factors involved (intrinsic unit speeds, experience, fatigue and battle worthiness) and decide best how to carry out the movement order.

A different approach would be needed with regard to road traffic concerns. First of all, no command considerations were built in with vehicles in mind (again, this limitation might well have been influenced by a desire to see the game playable on lower platforms, then again it could just as easily have been a conscious design decision, whatever the rationale--if so, I think the developers went the wrong way), so a method would be needed to assign a string of vehicles to a group, and then to order this group to proceed in line formation along a given roadway. But this implies other command restrictions. What if we found tanks in the rear of trucks and wished to get our tanks to the fore of the column and then proceed as described above? I presume this would need to be juggled manually by the user prior to the issuance of his vehicular FORMATION order--it would be nice, though, to see some reasonable order of intelligence with re to traffic control employed by the AI. No doubt it would slow down affairs gamewise, but then are we in any particular hurry? Is the community which has interest in CMBO such that it would balk at the "inconvenience" of having to wait for the system to calculate more sophisticated movement routines? Well, I have seen it before but I don't know. That's an item for BTS to ponder. My vote is always for greater realism, my advice is to always design up, not down.

Another point: vehicles do not always want to move on roadways or in column. What to do with a platoon of tanks in open ground to cross? What to do with halftracks carrying infantry? There are many circumstances to examine.

Something should be done. At present we lack good control at times since this aspect of play was wholly passed over, perhaps for reasons having to do with a desire to ensure the game would fit in below some arbitrary hardware threshold, perhaps due to time restrictions in terms of overall development of the project. It doesn't really matter for purposes of this discussion: some users are left with game play they feel to be unsatisfactory insofar as it introduces unrealistic restraints into a simulation which otherwise wants to behave more realistically; these users feel frustration with regard to intelligent manipulation of assets given system restraints. Maybe BTS will say this requested change simply can't be done, and that might be the case. There is nothing surprising or gamey about the request, however, as it would buck up the quality of play.

[This message has been edited by Tris (edited 11-12-2000).]

[Olle Petersson]

Force load is totally useless, because CM currently doesn't predefine what's loaded. Shell type is defined first when the shot goes off.

I've mentioned this example before:

I had a Priest shelling a building. Just after it's reloaded a big, fat, juicy King Tiger shows up and expose it's broadside. The Priest immediately target this one and pops a hollow charge into it, knocking it out. No reloading inbetween.

Cheers

Olle

[Los]

Just so you know some of these will most likely see the light of day in CM2 though I'm not at liberty to say. Have heart!

Los

[coralsaw]

LOS, you tease!

Gimme more!!!

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My squads are regular, must be the fibre in the musli...

[Tiger]

I disagree. There is certainly no lack of control when each available unit may be moved individually, target individually, react individually.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Another point: vehicles do not always want to move on roadways or in column. What to do with a platoon of tanks in open ground to cross?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You move each unit exactly where you want it to go. I do not understand why we need the game to do this for us. Laziness? I think you're trying to use CMBO at the operational level. It's a tactical simulation.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>First of all, no command considerations were built in with vehicles in mind (again, this limitation might well have been influenced by a desire to see the game playable on lower platforms, then again it could just as easily have been a conscious design decision, whatever the rationale--if so, I think the developers went the wrong way), so a method would be needed to assign a string of vehicles to a group, and then to order this group to proceed in line formation along a given roadway.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Vehicles have a menu of orders that you can give to each vehicle, much like each squad or weapons team has. If you want 2-4 tanks to move together across a field or down a road...move them that way. You can already assign multiple move orders & pause commands. Unless your playing a 5000 point battle, the system you describe would be useless on the maps that CMBO uses. If you are playing a 5000 point battle, even on a large map you're unlikely to have time to use formation moves, on a road or in the field.

CMBO was designed to make the player get down and move units on the field. That and historical accuracy are its main draw. There are a few who want to change it into an operational type game. I would like to see the Combat Mission series retain its tactical feel, not gravitate up to an operational level.

-johnS

[This message has been edited by Tiger (edited 11-13-2000).]

[Tris]

I joined in with my opinion to bolster the thread in spirit--I have no great passion either way.

As for your points, I agree that this game was meant as a tactical exercise, not operational but in the main what's being requested is reasonable as it would free the user to spend less time fiddling and more time conducting the greater orchestra.

[coralsaw]

I would be extremely happy to see SOPs as in TacOps.

Major H hit the nail on the head there. Most of the gripes about movement orders can be addressed under an SOP umbrella, per platoon or vehicle.

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My squads are regular, must be the fibre in the musli...

[Stoffel]

Coralsaw is right TACOPS features a nice SOP menu.

Some good points off it are,

Retreat after fire and(or) pop smoke.

Ideal for ambushes hit and run tactics.

Retreat and(or ) pop smoke if fired upon.

Unload vehicle if fired on.

And so on.

You can set this standard for all units.

As regards groupmovement check page 18 and 19 of the manual it all is described there.

A good point though is a menu to change the ammo load of a tank (% in HE or AT ammo)

I hate it when you might run into 2 or 3 tanks your ammoload has say 25HE and 35AT rounds you should be able to change it in something like 15 AT and 45 He or whatever you like.

[Splinty]

I don't think having formation commands for either infantry or armor is out of CM's scope at all as long as the commands are limited to platoon level. It is part of the platoon leaders job to assign movement formations in his op order or frag order and to change them on the fly when needed and circumstances permit. Especially when we're talking vehicles, I mean that's what radios are for (or flag signals). Anyway just my .02$

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Nicht Schiessen!!