Suggested Rework of Ambush Command

[John Kettler]

I feel galled, and I bet I'm not the only one.

My ambushes seldom work, let alone work well.

All too often, the foe drives all around,but never touches, my ambush marker. Though frustrating, the reason for this is obvious: small ambush zone; big battlefield.

I believe the ambush marker would be of much greater tactical utility and far greater realism were it to be implemented as a line running from the firing weapon to the ambush marker. Crossing that line would trigger the ambush, rather than crossing the current problematic small spot on the ground.

This would prevent the militarily ridiculous situation of watching the foe drive right past the waiting ambush set, say, between two patches of woods, simply because he didn't happen to drive over the ambush marker.

In the real world I'd have that approach enfiladed and when that tank crossed the opening Wham! I wouldn't be sitting there rotating on my finger while gnashing my teeth in frustration.

If the gun is boresighted properly, it should hit anywhere along that axis of fire, not just those few square yards represented by the ambush marker.

I don't know whether this is feasible from a coding aspect, but I sure hope so. I think it would be a substantial improvement for a defense already laboring under other restrictions not found in the real world.

What do the rest of you think?

Regards,

John Kettler

[KiwiJoe]

I think the current ambush marker is fine. I'd like to see another option.. something like a "focus area". This would consist of a pie shaped wedge of maybe 10 degrees in which the unit would focus its fire. Thus it would only reveal itself and fire at targets that entered this area. Obviously it wouldnt get the same bonueses to fore that the abush marker gives... maybe the 1st shot fires a little quicker.

[:USERNAME:]

Its an OK abstraction. I say abstraction because you can target a point in a flat field.

I agree with you that the defense is at a disadvantage generally in CM. I think the attacker is given way too much movement coordination and can abuse the run command.

Others have brought up the smoke advantage an attacker gets. Maybe the use of ambush can address this. If you set an ambush marker and it gets smothered in smoke, then any unit that enters the ambush marker (or perhaps crosses a line between the firer and the enemy unit) triggers area fire into the area.

This is also an abstraction but an effective one. Theres good abstractions in games and bad ones. If they have an overall realistic feel or reduce gamey behaviour or a balancing effect, I approve.

Lewis