Whining about tank gunners/commanders AI

[illo]

One thing that really pisses me off goes as following:

My recon spots enemy tanks moving along the road. I set Panther in ambush position at about 90dgr angle using building or trees for cover. (Commander should know enemy tanks are coming!!! there is even infantry in the house or forest observing and tank is unbuttoned)

Then just as enemy tanks are coming in front of Panther it sees infantry at 300m to opposite direction...turret rotates. 3 Shermans come along road and soon my Panther is dead with some rear turret hits!!! So if they know that multiple enemy tanks are 30m away..why to rotate turret to opposite direction??!

Other thing is, why it takes about 5-10seconds to fire after visual contact at extreme short distance ambush. I would guess there is round ready in barrel and aiming should take no time when enemy pops directly in your sights.

With current system Tiger and Panther tanks would be far better without any turret...Tigers just wildly change targets in multi bogey evironment never getting a shot

(just try Wittmann scenario to see some really mindless turretswinging and rear turret penetrations...huh and they say Wittmann was elite I just hate advancing towards enemy tanks with turret pointing backwards to some stupid vehicle crew.

...sorry i got just bit frustrated.

great game anyway

...well awesome

[This message has been edited by illo (edited 11-22-2000).]

[Wayne]

Did you give the tank an ambush command? You might also target the enemy tank even though it is out of line of sight. This has been discussed before and is one of the weaknesses of the game. Each turn you have to specify a target for your tank to keep it from switching to a crew or infantry unit. It takes some practice to control tanks in close combat.

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Blessed be the Lord my strength who teaches my hands to war and my fingers to fight.

[LuckyStrike]

You can get around this by targeting the ground where you want the turret to face using area fire, just use the MG not the main gun. If any enemy armor appears your tank will usually stop the area fire and switch to the new target.

[Guest KwazyDog]

Ill also add to this that if you target an ambush point with a tank AND set that tank to hide, he should ignore all enemy other than those crossing his ambush point...

Dan

[This message has been edited by KwazyDog (edited 11-24-2000).]

[Strat]

In a game I am presently in, a Stug III advances high enough up a slope in the road to get a top turret penetration hit on a Sherman (105). The Stug III reverse back down the slope were the allies pop smoke all around it. There is another Sherman on the right but the Stug is protected by a small ridge. Since the smoke was there, I decided to advance the Stug forward into a group of trees to attack an M8 and two MG halftracks. The group of trees offered protection on the right flank. I knew if I advanced without the smoke the Sherman would challenge the Stug. Anyway, I started my advanced. I used hunt instead of fast advance. The smoke, screening my right flank, all of a sudden cleared and the stug was halfway to its destinantion. The first shot from the Sherman was high. Instead of advancing toward the trees, the Stug commander decided to challenge the Sherman. The Sherman got off three missed shots before the Stug could turn to it. The Stug got off two shots, then the Sherman knocked it out. Why did the TC stop instead of moving to the protection of the woods where I directed it?

[Guest Captitalistdoginchina]

Kwazydog,

Unfortunately if he is also on hide he will refuse to fire back at another tank which targets him ...unless that tank rolls onto the ambush marker

CDIC

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"Death solves all problems - no man no problem"

J.V.Stalin, 1918

[This message has been edited by Captitalistdoginchina (edited 11-24-2000).]

[Bastables]

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

In a game I am presently in, a Stug III advances high enough up a slope in the road to get a top turret penetration hit on a Sherman (105). The Stug III reverse back down the slope were the allies pop smoke all around it. There is another Sherman on the right but the Stug is protected by a small ridge. Since the smoke was there, I decided to advance the Stug forward into a group of trees to attack an M8 and two MG halftracks. The group of trees offered protection on the right flank. I knew if I advanced without the smoke the Sherman would challenge the Stug. Anyway, I started my advanced. I used hunt instead of fast advance. The smoke, screening my right flank, all of a sudden cleared and the stug was halfway to its destinantion. The first shot from the Sherman was high. Instead of advancing toward the trees, the Stug commander decided to challenge the Sherman. The Sherman got off three missed shots before the Stug could turn to it. The Stug got off two shots, then the Sherman knocked it out. Why did the TC stop instead of moving to the protection of the woods where I directed it?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Because you used Hunt, which means adv at 2/3 speed until a enemy 'tank' is spotted and then engage.

Rushing from cover to cover? use all new FAST move! 8 out of 10 Hamsters prefer all new FAST move. Try it Today!

[Guest KwazyDog]

Actually Captitalistdoginchina I just tested this and the tank will come out of hiding if engaged by another threat. I did test this in 1.1 though

Dan

[Doug Beman]

Strat, your tank doesn't "know" anything; your infantry might see advancing tanks, but the only other entity who knows this is the player; it's his job to give the tanks the right orders.

In case you say "well the infantry should tell the tank," how would they do this? In WW2 radio communication wasn't as advanced as it is today. A tank might have its own radios, and a platoon might have its own radios, but these radios were usually (IIRC) tuned to separate nets; the tank to his platoon net, the infantry to their company net. It wasn't as easy to retune to somebody else's net as it is today. Additionally, the infantry couldn't go running over to the tank because that would usually get them shot at by the bad guys.

DjB

[Maximus]

Killing another thread, Doug?

[Doug Beman]

Maximus, posting "kiled another one," thereby keeping the thread alive, it sorta defeats the purpose of asking me if I've kiled the post.

You kuh-nucklehead!

DjB

[Lordfluffers]

Yes Doug, but infantry are able to gesture back to tank crews without the use of radios. There are set hand signals to tell other units what a unit can see. If a TC has line of sight to an infantry unit in a building it should be that the TC knows an enemy tank is rumbling down the road because the infantry have just signed to him that armour is advancing.

[Doug Beman]

Fluffy, I had completely forgotten about the hand signals. Do we know if they were used all the time? I don't.

However, I would hazard a guess that doing all the extra LOS calculations, and then calculating "infantry does hand signal X, does tank see it? If yes then tank does Y, if no then tank does Z" would drag the game engine to a crawl (or else make the system requirements about double what they are.

DjB