1:1 Representation; What WILL be 1:1?

[Halberdiers]

Could individual firers actually 'target' individual enemy?

I think could...

IMO, although the single Squad can be one target every minute, as they have 12 soldiers it can be shot in 12 different places throughout sixty seconds. Also the Squad can also shoot against a single Target every minute but from different sites throughout sixty seconds.

That is to say,in the same squad the Machinegun team shoots in the first 30 seconds and rifle team the 30 seconds rest. Machinegun team can be a objective the first 30 seconds and rifle team the last the 30 seconds. Depend of the type of order you could have more or less teams. But ever in the same squad.

Possible it is. Because, the 12 soldiers are not shot or exposed during all 60 seconds at the same second. But who knows.

[ February 18, 2005, 03:23 PM: Message edited by: Halberdiers ]

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by David Chapuis:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

The CW section was divided into two teams - a rifle team and a Bren team.

In another bone thread steve said that 1:1 will let them code specific responsibilities for each man. Does this not depend greatly on fire team structure. For example, US Marine squads in Korea had three fire teams with a BAR man in each. Would the BAR men in those squads have different functions than the LMG man in a CW section? </font>

[David Chapuis]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

I don't know what responsibilities the BAR man would have - can you explain? [/qb]

I dont know - I figured you did. (btw, do you know if WWII marine squads had a BAR man in each? that is what I was looking for when I found the Star Trek thing)

The Bren provided cover for the riflemen in the CW section - they operated independently of each other, but both under the control of the section commander. The Bren fired while the riflemen moved, then vice versa, until such point as the riflemen could get to grenade, tommygun or bayonet range.

On the face of it, I would suspect marine fireteams behaved somewhat differently....?

I guess my question is, in RL does the function of the individual depend just as much on the platoon/squad structure, as the weapon? So if BFC wanted to get an accurate model, they would need to not just have code where all LMG individuals perform the same, but a LMG in P platoon perfroms X, LMG in a Q platoon performs Y.

I am thinking the answer is yes. Surely you would want/expect a individual with a Sten gun in a CW squad to act differently than an individual in a Soviet SMG squad.

The riflemen were supported by the Bren (the Germans did it the other way round, and the LMG was supported by the riflemen).

And then is it also based on Nationality.

But then, I would also think that 'roles' would be highly dynamic once the bullets started flying - especially if things were getting erally ugly.

[Wartgamer]

"With 1:1 representation comes the ability to simulate the "jobs" within the unit. This goes beyond simply identifying the leader of a unit. I commented on this in another thread, but in short... we can now have a HMG unit have a dedicated Team Leader, Gunner, Assistant Gunner, Ammo Bearer, and Ammo Bearer (or something like that). When there is a casualty the unit loses (temporarily, usually) the functionality of the specific guy lost."-Steve

[Wartgamer]

So it seems 'personalities' or functions are also being modeled.

This does seperate 1:1 modeling from doing the more traditional detailed abstractions. More detailed abstractions could be as follows:

Present system improvement..

Platoon HQ takes a casualty, random generator finds platoon NCO took it, effect; lessening of command star rating, morale heart, etc.

With the 1:1, the exact person is tracked. So the radio operator could be toasted or perhaps just a runner is dead.

The question is, is it worth it?

[ February 19, 2005, 08:13 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[Wartgamer]

Getting back to the squad being spread out or even 'sub-united'.

Lets take the example of a squad advancing in the open. They incur some light fire and one man is pinned. The squad advances on. The man is seperated now by distance and LOS (the majority of the squad is over a hill now). Next turn the squad moves again and the man is still pinned in the same spot. They are seperated by a greater distance..

So when does a individual 1:1 soldier become divorced from his squad? Will he have a 'black' C&C line to him? Will he stay put till combined with someone else? Is the divorced soldier under any player control if he becomes unpinned yet seperated?

[Wartgamer]

I wonder if 1:1 can extend its benefits to armor?

What comes to mind is crew exposed being more detailed. Right now its 'binary' in that you are bottoned up or crew exposed.

IRL, it can be total crew up where all hatches are open and the guys are looking out (CE crew exposed) and getting some air. It could also be loader buttoned Up (LBU), RO down (RBU), and Commander and Driver up (CCE and DCE).

It could even be commander fully up or head-out (minimal exposure but he is not relying on periscopes). This is a battle posture. Rest of crew buttoned up.

Just thinking outside the Hex, of course. Funny that the designer seemed so intent on that (he even wrote a parable), but has not contributed here in this thread.

Edit: Cripes, it could even be part of the crew bailed (BO) and some still inside. Sort of a split-crew thing.

[ February 19, 2005, 10:44 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[Battlefront.com]

The designer is a busy man and can't always comment in all threads all the time. The designer also sometimes knows things that he doesn't want to get into yet beacuse it would touch on other things he doesn't want to get into yet. In fact, the designer shouldn't really be flappin his yap at this point at all

But I digress...

One of the abstractions we liked least about CMx1 Squads was the inability for the Squad to cover as much terrain as it could in real life. We do have some abstraction stuff in there to simulate spreading out, but on the move the abstractions become less and less adequate. To fill you in on why...

In RL almost all squads of all nations were internally divided into teams, or Fire Teams as current US military lingo goes. Each Fire Team had a specific function. In most WWII squads there was at least one automatic weapon, such as a Bren, MG34, BAR, DP, etc. The capabilities of each were different, and therefore relative effectiveness, but the function was fairly similar: one fire team was supposed to move while the other provided covering fire. In general offensive moves a fire team of rifles and SMGs would do the advancing while another fire team based around the full auto weapon would provide covering fire. When the rifle type team got to its destination, the full auto type team would move up. Then the advance would repeat as necessary. Same thing for withdrawals.

The above stuff had to be covered in a very abstract way in CMx1 in order to preserve the Squad concept. Otherwise you, the commander, would have had roughly 50% more units under your command (highly dependent on force mix, of course). I think you guys would mostly agree that this would have sucked and would also have required far more micromanagement of your units to get the correct results. Which is why we didn't do it

In CMx2 things change dramatically. Now that we have individual soldiers accounted for on the playing field, and each has its own purpose, these internal fire teams become not only a no brainer but an active part in keeping the game playable. Without fire temas the player would be in command of a rabble of individual guys instead of a disciplined force of cohesive units.

CMx2 will allow for national specific internal divisions, even though functionally they will more often than not perform similar roles. Thus if one nation's squad is divided up into 1 team of 10 and another of 2, while another squad is divided up into two teams of 6... piece of cake. Remember, the Germans and Russians had tons and tons of variations of their squad types at any given point in time, not to mention over the course of the war, so this is not simply a nationality thing.

Steve

[stikkypixie]

Steve, will we have to command these fireteams ourselves, or is it something the AI will take care off. I'm hoping for the latter.

[Wartgamer]

The designer is a busy man and can't always comment in all threads all the time. The designer also sometimes knows things that he doesn't want to get into yet beacuse it would touch on other things he doesn't want to get into yet. In fact, the designer shouldn't really be flappin his yap at this point at all

I will contrast this with the 'parable' where you certainly had time to slander 'Grogs' as people who couldn't possibly conceive of all the greatness that the 1:1 respresentation beholds for the future.

In any case thanks. So will Fire teams be the largest 'squad' now? Or will a Squad be composed of fire teams? Much like the present platoon is a platoon HQ with three command 'lines' coming out to three squads? Will the new squad be a 'hq' fire team with one or more possible fire teams 'connected' to him?

Perhaps this answers the question we had about will individual soldiers target enemy units themselves. The fire team may be the smallest firepower application, if you will.

[flammenwerfer]

Regarding teams, did squads always stick to doctrine or was there any flexibilty allowed.

Is it it possible to model 'a hero' acting alone or other improvisations.

[Wartgamer]

In the present system, I often split a squad, give the half squad with the most firepower (usually the lmg part) a pause and a target, have the other half squad do an assault to an objective closer to the target, and then have the covering half squad advance to the first assaulting half squad. They recombine if he makes it there.

Its abstracted but it does show a squad doing a basic cover/manuver drill OK. If there is a known enemy at the end of the planned move to point, I give the covering half squad two pauses and a definite target

[Wartgamer]

Originally posted by stikkypixie:

Steve, will we have to command these fireteams ourselves, or is it something the AI will take care off. I'm hoping for the latter.

I think he said that orders will be at the unit level. So the question is; is a fireteam a 'unit'?

[Battlefront.com]

Wartgamer,

I will contrast this with the 'parable' where you certainly had time to slander 'Grogs' as people who couldn't possibly conceive of all the greatness that the 1:1 respresentation beholds for the future.

How I spend my time is none of your business since you have no right to even 1 second of my time. As it so happens, I have a lot of experience dealing with out of control Groggery (hey, I made a new word ). Nerly 10 years of experience has shown me that I save the Forum and myself a LOT of headaches down the road by doing what I did instead of undeserved coddling. Useless, reactionary, counter productive, and even ill informed garbage spewing out from a few Grogs can seriously derail productive discussion. A virtual spanking was very much in order, which you yourself underscored. Since then things have been MUCH more productive, though you are STILL attempting to derail things. Lick your wounds, suck up your apparently damaged ego, and stick to discussing things reasonably and we'll all get along just nice.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

CMx2 will still be based around the Squad in terms of control. Fortunately, the behavior of the squad is quite well laid out in Field Manuals (Handbooks, or whatever each nation calls them). They are very specific as to how things are supposed to work in specific situations. This makes AI programming relatively easy. In fact, it is easier to program this stuff than probably anything else the AI has to do. Not that any of this is easy in the sense of not taking time and great skill.

Will Fire Teams always do what they should do in a given situation? Hell no It is up to us to program the prefect simulation of these actions and then allow the circumstances to screw around with them in perhaps unpredictable ways. For example, a really crappy Experienced unit might have the covering team get up and move too early or wait far too late. Or perhaps both will go at the same time. That sort of thing. However, this is the sort of thing that will work generally as it should for most units that have decent training, regardless of other circumstances.

Steve

[Wartgamer]

Are you refering to the testing 'discussion'?

I had quite a few examples of testing to discuss but in light of the fact that a tester even stated that speed was a goal, a test coordinator had nothing to add but the fact he used fictional animals as testers, and your over reaction to everything (which certainly precludes ever faulting you for anything); I decided to drop it.

But as far as the reaction you exhibit above (or over reaction really), perhaps, again, you need to balance your frustrations with a true sense of humor.

So if you need to vilify 'Grogs' and go out of your way to cast them in some strange light that you areconjuring up, then fine. Name calling is back in vogue.

Is it OK if we come up with some names for you? How about CLOG? Its what we called systems engineers at a job.

But if you still stand by your claim that Grogs can not fathom the intracacies, ramifications and bright new future of 1:1 representation, please read through the thread and help us.

[Wartgamer]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

CMx2 will still be based around the Squad in terms of control. Fortunately, the behavior of the squad is quite well laid out in Field Manuals (Handbooks, or whatever each nation calls them). They are very specific as to how things are supposed to work in specific situations. This makes AI programming relatively easy. In fact, it is easier to program this stuff than probably anything else the AI has to do. Not that any of this is easy in the sense of not taking time and great skill.

Will Fire Teams always do what they should do in a given situation? Hell no It is up to us to program the prefect simulation of these actions and then allow the circumstances to screw around with them in perhaps unpredictable ways. For example, a really crappy Experienced unit might have the covering team get up and move too early or wait far too late. Or perhaps both will go at the same time. That sort of thing. However, this is the sort of thing that will work generally as it should for most units that have decent training, regardless of other circumstances.

Steve

Thats interesting in that 'half squads' (fireteams) are actually out of player 'menu' control in cmx2. This is actually stepping the TACAI up as the actual granularity (1:1 rep and no tiles) is going down. I am sure some are glad to hear this. Control freaks might not like this at all.

What is a prefect simulation?

[ February 19, 2005, 01:29 PM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[Wartgamer]

I suppose a bazooka can now be assigned to a squad and acts as a attached fireteam?

[Wartgamer]

Originally posted by Wartgamer:

Getting back to the squad being spread out or even 'sub-united'.

Lets take the example of a squad advancing in the open. They incur some light fire and one man is pinned. The squad advances on. The man is seperated now by distance and LOS (the majority of the squad is over a hill now). Next turn the squad moves again and the man is still pinned in the same spot. They are seperated by a greater distance..

So when does a individual 1:1 soldier become divorced from his squad? Will he have a 'black' C&C line to him? Will he stay put till combined with someone else? Is the divorced soldier under any player control if he becomes unpinned yet seperated?

I dont see how this is addressed by fireteams. Is there a minimum 'chunk' of men that can actually be pinned (or other effect like pinning)? Can pinning really be 1:1?

[Battlefront.com]

But as far as the reaction you exhibit above (or over reaction really), perhaps, again, you need to balance your frustrations with a true sense of humor.

Ah... wait... so you're saying that the Grogs that were telling us to make sure that PBEM took priority over the game itself or that we should just patch CMAK instead of making a new game... were making jokes? Wow... now it all makes sense! Those suggestions were just so irrational, illogical, and counter productive I guess I should have seen that they were just trying to make me laugh. My mistake for taking them seriously. All straight now, thanks for the clarification

I had quite a few examples of testing to discuss but in light of the fact that a tester even stated that speed was a goal, a test coordinator had nothing to add but the fact he used fictional animals as testers, and your over reaction to everything (which certainly precludes ever faulting you for anything); I decided to drop it.

Rats... I really thought you dropped it because you realized you were out of your depth and were simply digging your hole deeper. Guess not. As for "over reacting", I thought I was rather restrained

But if you still stand by your claim that Grogs can not fathom the intracacies, ramifications and bright new future of 1:1 representation, please read through the thread and help us.

Read the threads that prompted the Parable. This thread is productive, the two threads before I made my point were not. Sorry if you're confused.

Back to the discussion...

Control freaks might not like this at all.

No, I am sure they won't. But some players (Grogs and general gamers) need to be protected from themselves. Excessive control can ruin an otherwise good game.

What is a prefect simulation?

Not sure what the context of this question is, but the honest answer is that there is no perfect simulation. Not even on paper. All that can be done is move things closer to reality without moving away from the fun.

Steve

[Sirocco]

It just occurred to me - and perhaps it's come up before, but I haven't noticed a comment on it - will the crews of TD's like the M10 and Marder be represented 1:1? And will they have functionality to provide visually represented close defence for their platform?

[Wartgamer]

In any progression of products, there is always the people that want things the way it was, slightly different than it was but really the same, better than the way it was, radically different than it was.

This is nothing new and anyone that has been around any product development knows it. One develops a sense of humor about it if they are smart.

[Wartgamer]

Originally posted by Sirocco:

It just occurred to me - and perhaps it's come up before, but I haven't noticed a comment on it - will the crews of TD's like the M10 and Marder be represented 1:1? And will they have functionality to provide visually represented close defence for their platform?

I sort of mentioned something about AFVs crews being 1:1 and the effects.

[Wartgamer]

Read the threads that prompted the Parable. This thread is productive, the two threads before I made my point were not. Sorry if you're confused.

Yes, I started the thread to be productive.

I think you over reacted. Make your point by selling the benefits/coolness of 1:1 representation.

Personally, I am liking the TACAI trying to deBorg the gamey player. The player is a MAJOR part of the Borg problem. He is the entity that abuses the Borg info. Get his Borg claws off the nitty gritty is a goal. I believe I read other suggestions along those lines in old threads.

Good Work CLOG. Keep it up.

[ February 19, 2005, 05:03 PM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[Sirocco]

Originally posted by Wartgamer:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Sirocco:

It just occurred to me - and perhaps it's come up before, but I haven't noticed a comment on it - will the crews of TD's like the M10 and Marder be represented 1:1? And will they have functionality to provide visually represented close defence for their platform?

I sort of mentioned something about AFVs crews being 1:1 and the effects.</font>