Traffic Jam

[Greenman]

I'm not really good with armor, having focused on infantry tactics since I bought the game.

Recently tried to rush three Shermans around two Priests up the road. As it was wet and raining, I didn't want to off-road them for fear of bogging down. Anyway, the resulting snag cost me a VL as the AI plot insane courses around each other.

Anyone know how wide, in terms of vehicles, the road is? Can one vehicle pass another? How do people deal with lots of vehicles on narrow little roads? :confused:

[Maastrictian]

In general you can pass three vehicles abrest on a paved road, two on a dirt road. The key is to have the passed vehicle stationary if possible and to plot the movement points very finely.

--Chris

[YECoyote]

also make sure you have higher experienced crew in the lead, because they will usually start moving before some greenie will.

[Soddball]

Have you tried resizing the units to realistic? That might give you a clearer idea of how much space you have.

[nedlam]

Another trick I use for moving large columns of vehicles is to used my commmand delay and spread them apart. It's only about 15 seconds or so but it keeps them moving rather than them rear ending the vehicle infront of them and then stopping all together.

The idea of resizing the icons is a good one too, I use it all the time. It gives you a better idea on who can fit where on the road. Another trick, when your setting up waypoints look at the terrain the waypoint is dragging across and make sure it never turns red or else you'll have the AI doing all sorts of things to get the vehicle from point A to point B.

Nedlam

[420]

try playing "No Way Around" by BigDog for practice. half of the challenge of that scenario is traffic management. i'm talking about major gridlock that would paralyze an 8 lane freeway.

[ January 31, 2002, 03:31 AM: Message edited by: hal9000 ]

[Greenman]

I don't visit the board much anymore, I usually just stick to my club's board. I got a hoot out of seeing my post from June resurface ... I remember that scenario, 2nd or 3rd from Any Port after Storm the one with the big hill ... hehe.

I finally got the knack of it. Playing through Trun is a good lesson in how to steer tanks. All that fire drives the tacAI crazy. Gotta watch it.

[Moriarty]

You can also use the pause command to stagger the starts of vehicles down a road.

[Liebchen]

This week finds me shouting at my computer as I watch a convoy of vehicles make the most inane attempts to drive down a road in what is supposed to be single file. If I weren't so pissed off, it would be hysterical. It's now a quarter of the way through the game, and I barely am situated for any sort of action.

I know all of the tricks about spacing and pausing. I have been ultra careful in this regard, even waiting for all of my units to be set up in their proper spacing positions before giving the "roll out" orders. Still, they manage to screw it up.

I'm sick and tired of watching vehicles stop and back up so as not to hit another vehicle that it 20 meters ahead of it and moving away, and then causing a chain reaction of other vehicle behind them doing the same. :mad:

I'm sick and tired of watching vehicles try to bludgeon their way through a line of wrecks rather than follow my explicit orders and move around them. :mad:

If there is any one area where the AI needs improvement, in my book, it is this one. Oh, yeah, and the tendency to forget about hostile tanks when they duck behind obstacles can be frustrating, too.

[Redwolf]

Liebchen, I agree.

I certainly smile about all those folks disliking CMBO because the TacAI engages the wrong targets blah blah blah. It doesn't for me, it's fine in this respect.

But traffic behaviour of TacAi is really a big much bad done. Not only did I suffer vast delays, I also had immobilizations when vehicles went out of way of each other by leaving the road for mud (now that is a nice idea of traffic jam prevention - cause a tank breakdown), driving into minefields (my own!) and/or presenting the side or even rear to enemy fire while turing around each other. I kinda like the chaotics and control requirements that arise from the TacAIs fighting, but for moving I think it adds nothing to gameplay, and it also seems to be worse than for fighting. Apparently the fighting was greatly improved in the patches, but movement was not.

[Uncus]

One of the things I like about this game is the traffic it can generate and how we have to solve it (It reminds me of the scene from PATTON where the general has to do a trafic cops job)

Anyway I usually do four things 1. Place the experienced crews first (so they dont bump into the slow starting ones) 2. Use the pause command so they separete each other 3. place to command points on the right side of the road so I can use the left for passing destroyed of stopped vehicles 4.Select all the units at once so they move as a convoy.

Here is an idea: Why dont have a convoy command for several different-speed vehicles to move as a convoy (trucks and jeeps for example)? This could be good in the second game of CMBO where apparently there is going to be armour leaders in a different vehicle than his platoon.

[Cameroon]

Originally posted by Uncus:

[snip]

Here is an idea: Why dont have a convoy command for several different-speed vehicles to move as a convoy (trucks and jeeps for example)? This could be good in the second game of CMBO where apparently there is going to be armour leaders in a different vehicle than his platoon.

I recall reading (though God knows where on this forum) that the Move command is a vehicle speed suited to coordinated movement with infantry. If that is the case then Move is the speed you are looking for in order to keep everyone together.

[murph2]

Different vehicles move at different speeds when you give them the move command so just giving them all the move command won't work.

Some take off at a fair rate of knots while others like Churchills crawl along.

You can't always select which vehicles to put in front either especially in some scenarios. I recall one where your have to exit the map with some XXX corps vehicles which appear in dribs and drabs over a number of turns. Your very short of time, after all you are trying to relieve the airborne troops ahead and can't afford to use a lot of pause commands to get your faster units to the fore.

In damp conditions when your more or less forced to stick to roads with heavier vehicles things can soon become chaotic. It only takes one mistake and the tac ai goes off plotting moves all over the place.

[xerxes]

You all think it's bad when you're plotting moves all by yourselves. Try it as part of a multi-player rumble! I'm in the BoB Bocage Rumbles as part of a reinforcement. We had 4 players coming in on a single dirt road. It looked like the worst rush hour tie up that you ever saw. Vehicles stalling because someone didn't send in their move, trucks careening off into the ditches, reversing back onto the road and setting off chain reactions. It took a couple turns to go 60m. Would've been faster to get out and walk!

-marc

[russellmz]

hmmmmm...i did a scenario where you have to run a bunch of trucks, HTs, jeeps of varying experience out of a town before the german horders arrived. i could evac ~2 platoons out with all the vehicles in approximately 5 minutes when i got the hang of it.

basically: the fastest, most experienced units go first, no delay. the middle ones get pauses to be sure the faster units get some distance.

don't cross the streams...i mean the colored lines when moving. roads have room for three vehicles, use only two lanes though.

have the slow green units go last with maximum number of pauses...

make sure you have as few twists as possible. and don't run an insane number of vehicles in either.

[ February 17, 2002, 02:23 AM: Message edited by: russellmz ]