Blah Blah Blah Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 I feel that the delay times when I map out a long path for a unit are too high due to the lack of suitable pathfinding by AI. Simply put, if I say to the unit go from A to B, and the road in long and windy, the AI pathfinding quit often does a very poor job. Sometime a shocker! As such I am forced to plot the course along the road making sure the unit stays on it etc. When I do this I get a massive delay penalty, that I feel is unjustified. Especially since I am normaly saying follow this road to here. I also don't want to have to baby sit the unit every move. Any contructive input appreciated. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bone_Vulture Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Fine, the AI lacks logic. But I think I'll still choose absolute control rather than let the AI plot movement for me. It's already doing a horrendous job with the "tank scare" routine. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CMplayer Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 You are right. The waypoint delay was a terrible addition to the game, poorly conceived and poorly executed. It should never have been added. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bone_Vulture Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Originally posted by CMplayer: The waypoint delay was a terrible addition to the game, poorly conceived and poorly executed. It should never have been added. Without command delays, it'd be impossible to simulate the differences between, say, German and Russian communications. I'd never attack in '41 if the T-34's were as reactive as my tin can panzers. :eek: 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sailor Malan Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Originally posted by Blah Blah Blah: I feel that the delay times when I map out a long path for a unit are too high due to the lack of suitable pathfinding by AI. Simply put, if I say to the unit go from A to B, and the road in long and windy, the AI pathfinding quit often does a very poor job. Sometime a shocker! As such I am forced to plot the course along the road making sure the unit stays on it etc. When I do this I get a massive delay penalty, that I feel is unjustified. Especially since I am normaly saying follow this road to here. I also don't want to have to baby sit the unit every move. Any contructive input appreciated. I don't quite understand your point. The AI does not do any path finding, unless you plot a move that takes the unit across illegal terrain (it wont let you plot INTO illegal terraim). So it you plot a move as a single segment, along the mean direction of a winding road (say) the unit will move dead straight, not follow the road. The absence of a 'follow the road command' has been commented upon many times, and is a slight flaw in the 'the more complicated the move instructions, the longer they should take to be acted upon' logic (since 'drive down that road' is actually a simple command in RL, but the waypoints necessary make it a complicated one in CM). I find that driving units down roads is not difficult, just a little time consuming in the orders phase. Also, a hint - don't give your units too long a move in one go. You will incurr more orders delays when you add to their path, but they will be short, and I find I was cancelling the end of long paths more often than not, because the situation has changed! When the AI HAS to pathfind, it will tend to produce a slightly 'detailed' plan, with lots of waypoints, but the answer to this is plot around illegal terrain, not through it. Does this address your point, or have I missed it? BTW, relative to RL, the command delays are ludicrously short, when you realise what has to happen to get a platoon moving tactically, to an altered plan. If you can do that in less than 1 minute, you are a better man than I! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Russian Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Originally posted by Blah Blah Blah: I feel that the delay times when I map out a long path for a unit are too high due to the lack of suitable pathfinding by AI. Simply put, if I say to the unit go from A to B, and the road in long and windy, the AI pathfinding quit often does a very poor job. Sometime a shocker! As such I am forced to plot the course along the road making sure the unit stays on it etc. When I do this I get a massive delay penalty, that I feel is unjustified. Especially since I am normaly saying follow this road to here. I also don't want to have to baby sit the unit every move. Any contructive input appreciated. Only give the unit enough of a movement order to not get to it's destination by the end of the turn. Then give the detailed directions and there is no long waiting period for the unit to begin to move. With some practice this becomes second nature. I use the multiple waypoints at times to adjust my time for starting off if I don't want to wait 10 full seconds. Add another way point and there is a couple more seconds. Whatever works for you. Panther Commander 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CMplayer Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Originally posted by Bone_Vulture: </font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by CMplayer: The waypoint delay was a terrible addition to the game, poorly conceived and poorly executed. It should never have been added. Without command delays, it'd be impossible to simulate the differences between, say, German and Russian communications. I'd never attack in '41 if the T-34's were as reactive as my tin can panzers. :eek: </font> 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flamingknives Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 See comments in the transport thread regarding the first bit. Second the bit about fine-tuning delays with more waypoints. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Krazy Canuck Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 This has been discussed in length many many times and as ususal there are two supporting camps. What worked best for me was that I just refused to play any scenarios with lots of vehicle waypoint plotting down long and narrow roads. This probably means that I'm missing some excellant scenarios out there but I absolutely refuse to deal with what I perceive to be a ludicrous and crippled transport system. KC 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bone_Vulture Posted January 25, 2004 Share Posted January 25, 2004 Originally posted by Panther Commander: Only give the unit enough of a movement order to not get to it's destination by the end of the turn. Then give the detailed directions and there is no long waiting period for the unit to begin to move. As already stated in the other thread, that does not work. There's no cheating the delay mechanism. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blah Blah Blah Posted January 26, 2004 Author Share Posted January 26, 2004 @ Sailor Malan, I think you may have missed my point... What I am saying I have experienced many a time where I have asked a mechanised unit to go from A to B and have the AI make a royal screw up of it. So instead of just saying go from point A to point B, which is all along a road with the odd turn etc, I map the points along the road from the same point A to the same point B. So the end result is the same, go from point A to point B. Except when I plot the course in detail I get massive time delays. Many a time I have seen one out of two or three units get stuck (on some invisable magnet?), go off on it's own very unique path compared to the other two. As a result I feel the need to baby sit the units, as if I don't I am likley to loose a unit or have it no where where I asked it, and not arriving when the other unit/s do. So to recap, it is not the first delay that I am complaining about, it is simply to plot the same course in detail I may end up with an additional 3 minute delay. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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