Hull down : Ridiculously Simple Solution..?

[Sirocco]

While I was positioning a Sherman in the Mortain operation - spoiler alert? - I went to Rotate it and then thought "What's the purpose of the colour change on the line..." Then, after looking through the manual, and finding nothing to explain it, I thought "Why isn't that used to check LOS and hull down instead?"

I'll give an example: You're considering moving a Sherman into a hull down position, and choose the Hunt command. You position the marker in a good spot, and then choose Rotate. As you move the marker around the map you're given LOS feedback through the colour of the line - as with the LOS command - and also hull down feedback in text.

The only problem I can see is in the amount of CPU time to calculate whether you're hull down to a particular spot, but then only BTS have the answer to that...

Well, ok, shoot my idea down in flames, why don't you...

[Mannheim Tanker]

I won't flame you too badly but please do a search and you'll see that this has already been talked about ad nauseum (including in a resurrected post just last week).

[Sirocco]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mannheim Tanker:

I won't flame you too badly but please do a search and you'll see that this has already been talked about ad nauseum (including in a resurrected post just last week).<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I have done a search, and I've participated in that very discussion, but I haven't found this particular solution mentioned before. I opened a new thread because the one you mentioned is now five pages long...

[:USERNAME:]

Sir Occo

You seem obsessed by simplicity. You made some goofy posts stressing it in the other thread.

What you are proposing is just a variation of what others have posted. Maybe using the rotate line makes it 'unique' to you? I dont care at this point but I would like to know how BTS is going to aproach it for CM2 if at all.

To sum up my thoughts:

Since the game has abstracted LOS from a vehicle to be ONLY ONE LOS and has completely neglected modeling gun depression, perhaps another abstraction can be implemented to addrtess the Hull Down approach.

Its funny how people accept the stringing together of unlimited orders for a unit (even to all points on the map out of LOS at that moment) but feel that telling a vehicle to try to find protective terrain in front of it is 'unrealistic automation'. They can accept all vehicles putting out ambush markers to 300 meters but never 301 meters. Wierd. The game is loaded with abstractions and there are good abstractions and bad abstractions.

Lewis

[Tiger]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>...the game has abstracted LOS from a vehicle to be ONLY ONE LOS and has completely neglected modeling gun depression<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

It seems the los from each vehicle is from the center of the unit's mass out through its front, which is not a bad compromise, since everything in the game contains some abstraction. Gun depression is not completely neglected, I've seen main guns depress up and down in every game, even from a hull-down position.

It's really up to Big Time to decide how to handle los from vehicles, if it takes too much programming to los from every vehicles' weapon and crew member, it probably won't happen. Alot of this has to do with the 3-d nature of the game and the average target computer system they're aiming for.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>telling a vehicle to try to find protective terrain in front of it is 'unrealistic automation'<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Unrealistic. Maybe. Manuever your own vehicles from down low to see if they are in cover or not. I do agree that a commander would have a different view from up top, and the los should be modelled from him if possible, rather than the center of the vehicle. However you're going to have to find a way to have the program check los from both positions on the vehicle and do it without slowing down everything. It's also possible to manuever a vehicle yourself into a hull-down position, and check from the enemy direction to see how much of your tank is exposed. Granted you can not creep up with the main gun depressed till it just peeks over the crest, but this is a abstraction that frankly doesn't seem all that badly handled, since the terrain itself is not an exact representation. You want a command to have the tank enter perfect hull-down by itself with gun depression. This would require constant checking and verification by the program for at least 2 los from each and every vehicle trying to do this in relation to all the enemies it has los to, in constant slow manuevering speed as the tank attempts to acheive this. This may be easy in real life.... While all this is going on enemy tanks/vehicles trying to engage such vehicles would have to check their los everytime the target vehicle moves trying to get into its automated, hull-down, gun-seperately depressed, position. It'd be nice to have but probably depends on the target user-system they're going to have for CM 2. Terrain is not a exact representaion, los is not not an exact representation. Re-read appendix D of the manual.

-johnS

[Mark IV]

"We won't rest on our laurels, now that Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord is complete. We intend to expand the design and continue to advance the state of the art in tactical wargaming."

From The Manual, Appendix D

(perhaps we should assign chapter and verse numbers?)

There is a fine line between seeing new possibilities and demanding pet features right now, to be sure.

[Tiger]

It would be a good feature if possible to implement; but the overall built-in game abstractions; and the most difficult thing: average target user-system you're aiming for, are very real limitations, no matter which way you think on the matter

-johnS

[Sirocco]

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

Sir Occo

You seem obsessed by simplicity. You made some goofy posts stressing it in the other thread.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Lewis, I'm a programmer - with AI experience - not a wise-ass. I look for simple solutions because those are the ones that can be implemented.