Follow Vehicle Command (and then some)

[TeAcH]

Hey BTS, great job on CMBB. I really like it a lot. Especially the variable endings

I was reading the CMBB manual and when I got to the follow vehicle command, I was hoping to find that this command would allow me to keep some of my convoys together or speed up issuing commands to multiple vehicles of mine by plotting the lead vehicle to a specific destination then telling all of the trailing vehicles to follow the vehicle in front of them.

This would save a ton of time and add to the "intelligence" of these vehicle drivers by keeping them from crashing into the vehicle ahead of them when that vehicle has to make an adjustment in the move path. I recently played a game where I had to protect trucks and get them to escape on the opposite side of the field. The trucks took 3-4 turns to untie themselves from the knot they got into because of one truck's adjustment.

Please comment and or put this on the TO DO list.

Thanks,

TeAcH

[Michael Emrys]

In asking for this command (and I agree that something like this would be nice to have) I wonder if we have sufficiently considered some of the problems that might be associated with programming it.

For instance, I assume that what we want would be something on the order of "Maintain Interval". That is, vehicle #2 maintains, or attempts to maintain, a fixed distance behind vehicle #1. Setting aside the question of what happens when vehicle #1 is traveling over faster terrain than vehicle #2, there is the even trickier question of what happens when vehicle #1 turns a corner. Does vehicle #2 immediately change course, or does it wait until it reaches the corner to make its turn?

TacOps has a pretty good way of dealing with that problem. After plotting movement for vehicle #1, you plot waypoints for vehicle #2 until it reaches the present position of vehicle #1 and then copy its movement orders from that point onward. But there would be problems with this system as well. Take the case of vehicles joining the convoy from different directions and possibly arriving at unpredictable times. Traffic jams are still likely to happen.

Is there any way to solve these and other problems without a vast improvement in the TacAI? Remember, moving troops on congested roadways was a sticky problem for real life armies as well, one that they didn't always have an elegant solution for.

For my part, I seldom have problems moving groups of vehicles (knock on wood) using the existing rules. For one thing, I almost never move them in larger groups than platoon sized. Secondly, I give them fairly large spaces to occupy (at least 20-40 meters between them (which is historical, BTW)). Thirdly, I seldom try to plot more than two or three turns in advance. I usually use a mix of speeds and delays to keep things sorted out. I monitor movement during the turn and will intervene in the next orders phase if it looks like a potential problem is brewing.

I am comfortable with playing that way, but I realize other players have different temperaments and playing styles, so YMMV. I offer this only to show that it can be done.

Michael

[Sytass]

Keeping distances between the vehicles, e.g. having the ones further behind wait 10 seconds is something I never even thought of. Good hint!

What I find a bit more annoying is when you plot, say, 15 vehicles to move, and have all their movement paths displayed - I often times forget one which blocks all the others when they try moving past. (I go to overhead view as it's easiers to follow the road line in bird's eye.)I've taken to disable the display of all move lines and then select every single vehicle twice to make sure I haven't forgotten one.

[Michael Emrys]

One thing I do—and if this suits your style, fine—is to take them in the order that I want them to be in the convoy. That is, plot the lead vehicle first, and so on down the line. That way it is clearer, to me at least, which ones I have given orders to.

Your idea of turning off "Show Paths" is excellent, BTW.

Michael

[Pascal DI FOLCO]

I play it like Michael mostly, I select lead vehicle, plot, and check delay.

Then I plot following vehicle, if it'll start too early add delay

Repeat..

Problems arise when there is several TYPES of vehicles, having different speeds...Then I've to plot Moves and Fast moves, and jams occur anyway.

IMHO the simplest fix would just to get some kind of "fixed speed" (in kph) order available, so bumping will be far less frequent.

BTW that's how traffic is regulated IRL !

[TeAcH]

I see your point Michael. I wonder if the game would simply have the following vehicles just copy the same path of the lead vehicle and leave it at that. Simple and a basic "fix". So, you line all you vehicles up in the formation you want and plot the lead vehicle throughout the entire roadway with all of its turns and twists and then direct the 2 unit to follow the 1st (essentially copying it path but adding one initial waypoint to get vehicle 2 to where vehicle 1 was when it started its path). Again, very basic but a time saver.

Now, a more advanced programming approach would be to line your vehicles up in your formation then plot vehicle 1. Then you goto 2 and tell it follow 1. Then you have 3 follow 2 and so on. The AI will moderate speed of the fastest vehicle so that all stay about the same speed and distance. If one the lead vehicle stops, the following vehicles stop where they are to maintain the gap.

Either way, Id give it a big thumbs up. It would not only save time, but give the AI driving these rigs some semblance of intelligence. As it is now, they smack right into the lead at full speed.

Thanks

TeAcH

[Michael Emrys]

I've noticed in playing BB that vehicles still collide under all sorts of circumstances. I don't know how difficult it would be to program greater awareness into vehicles' AI, but I would love to see them begin to take some kind of pre-emptive avoidance action as soon as they get within, say, 10-20 meters of some vehicle in front of them, whether stopping or steering around. As it is, they make contact, reverse, and then alter course. This often requires a considerable amount of time-consuming backing and filling.

One can say it is one more good reason to keep your vehicles dispersed, and to some extent that is in fact historical. But I think the game overstates the problem sometimes. Not all vehicles suffered bad visibility or were that hard to control, at least at the modest speeds they normally travel in the game.

Michael

[ October 08, 2002, 01:05 AM: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by Michael emrys:

In asking for this command (and I agree that something like this would be nice to have) I wonder if we have sufficiently considered some of the problems that might be associated with programming it....

...Is there any way to solve these and other problems without a vast improvement in the TacAI? Remember, moving troops on congested roadways was a sticky problem for real life armies as well, one that they didn't always have an elegant solution for.

Michael

Grog Emrys, you raise some of the most interesting points on this that I've seen discussed.

Beyond the whole 'difficulty in programming' (which you detail rather better than people who simply assume this 'order' would be restricted and understood as only applying to vehicles that are already all in a row, and travelling over the same terrain), you hit upon the idea that 'convoys are difficult'.

I've certainly experienced (lately, and despite my knowledge of the problem and attempts to avoid it) the phenomenon of vehicles coming to grief in attempting to move up a road in convoy.

But why should the game model convoys moving up a road in wartime like the Blue Angels performing precision flying routines over an admiring crowd?

Road traffic doesn't work like that. It doesn't work like that in peacetime, on paved surfaces, and without any more concerns than if the HP have a car up ahead monitoring speeding. And no matter how many MPs are out there, and no matter how good the road discipline, there are, in the Real World, going to be stalls, vehicles bogging, drivers doing the wrong thing, or drivers being overly aggressive.

If you plot your movement points correctly, keeping in mind all the delays, and pay close attention to vehicle movement, you're rewarded with good convoy behaviour. If you don't, you get the much more Real World™ phenomenon of everything going into the toilet.

For those who don't want to have to 'micro-manage' vehicle movement: Neither did MPs, Security troops, and Road Wardens. But the idea that every convoy of vehicles proceeded down every road as though they were exercising a Busby Berkeley dance routine is completely other-worldly. Even on the tactical level, it took serious concentration of effort and attention on the part of TCs and drivers to keep things from turning into a horrible snarl (and dead vehicles, in combat).

I think that a 'precision flying' command for vehicle convoys in the game would be not only unrealistic, but completely fatuous.

Why further burden the AI and game engine with commands that are both intrinsically and realistically the concern of the commander?

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Seanachai:

For those who don't want to have to 'micro-manage' vehicle movement: Neither did MPs, Security troops, and Road Wardens. But the idea that every convoy of vehicles proceeded down every road as though they were exercising a Busby Berkeley dance routine is completely other-worldly. Even on the tactical level, it took serious concentration of effort and attention on the part of TCs and drivers to keep things from turning into a horrible snarl (and dead vehicles, in combat).

I think that a 'precision flying' command for vehicle convoys in the game would be not only unrealistic, but completely fatuous.

This is what I have been hinting at gently and diplomatically, being as I am that kind of fellow. But yes, I suppose it was time you came along, un-Grog Seanachai, and delivered the fish slap in your usual brisk style. That's why we love you to death.

Michael

[TeAcH]

With all due respect Sena, I think you totally miss the point and overstate the issue. You seem to think that vehicles following one another is impossible and I dont know why you do.

If you and me and Mike each got into a truck on a road and behind one another, do you mean to say that you could NOT stay behind me even if I changed my speed a bit here and there? We do that all the time on the roads today. Do you drive?

Why is this unreallistic on the battlefield? As it is now in CMBB and CMBO for that matter, despite one's best efforts at pausing and issuing orders to effect a convoy, your vehicles end up ramming into the vehicle in front of them at full speed one after another when the first vehicle merely slows down or drives off the road.

They simply do not seem to have any awareness of the vehicles around them. Then, once your convoy gets into those big jumble of siamese-trucks (all joined at the hip), it takes the AI a looong time to try to plot each one of out of this mess...almost like a retarded slinky struggling to free itself in the toilet.

It is really a simple concept. You make it sound like the drivers look at their laps when they drive so they can follow a map only changing course (and looking up at the road) when they crash into something.

Thanks for your input, but I disagree. And besides, when you want to plot say 10 trucks in that scenario that says exit the trucks off the other edge of the map, to follow a winding road, do you really want to spend the time giving each one them the same 20 waypointed route one after another (10x20=a helluva lot) only to have the 2nd one collide into the first and screw up all that work?

TeAcH

[TeAcH]

Blue angels? Precision flying? You've got to be joking. Umm. Next time you drive somewhere, make sure you watch the vehicle in front of you. Blue Angles. C'mon.

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by Michael emrys:

This is what I have been hinting at gently and diplomatically, being as I am that kind of fellow. But yes, I suppose it was time you came along, un-Grog Seanachai, and delivered the fish slap in your usual brisk style. That's why we love you to death.

Michael

Well, ya' see, without any special 'Groggly Knowledge' (which can only be acquired by sleeping for 3 nights on a bull's hide with a post by JasonC on your belly), I have to rely on 'common sense'.

And 'common sense' tells me that, if I you were to take any 12 Forum members that want a fool-proof 'convoy' movement command, put them in a beat up truck on a muddy road in the middle of nowhere on a cloudy day, and ask them to follow each other down the road at exact intervals, but demand that they maintain a good rate of speed, and tell them that you might randomly give an equal number of Cesspoolers the right to open fire on them with heavy weapons, the lot couldn't make 50 meters befor running into serious problems.

In the bickering that would then ensue over who needed to backup first, or drive forward soonest, I figure 5 of them would die before the rest went to 'flee in all directions' mode.

Seriously. A 'follow vehicle' mode.

Sort out your own tactical nightmares, you lot.

[TeAcH]

Oh, BTW, I drove home from work today at 70 MPH amidst heavy traffic in downtown Seattle. Guess that makes me a Blue Angel right there Seanachi?

Seriously, these vehicles ram each other even when not under fire and you know that.

[ October 08, 2002, 02:43 AM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by TeAcH:

Blue angels? Precision flying? You've got to be joking. Umm. Next time you drive somewhere, make sure you watch the vehicle in front of you. Blue Angles. C'mon.

Well, I might be over-stating for satirical effect, but you're ignoring what the implementation of this command would be like in game play terms.

If BFC were to implement a 'follow vehicle' convoy command, we would see trucks, tanks, ACs, HTs, etc, proceed precisely down a road, across a field, through woods, etc. (because how do you limit this command and make it 'realistic', eh?), and despite the differing rates of speed of all these vehicles, and capabilities on different surfaces, we would see them hold precise intervals, and not run into each other, even in a mixed column, and proceed precisely to their destination?

Okay, perhaps you could put several of us into vehicles of vastly different capabilities, over different terrain, and then, what? How will you constrain us to know how to exactly proceed in different terrain? On a paved surface? On a muddy road? You're asking for 'precision flying', lad, whether you're willing to acknowledge it or not.

Okay. Mr. Emrys is driving an HT, and I'm in a Pzkw IV, and you're in a kubelwagon (intentional slight, cope), and you have the con, lad. We're all supposed to proceed across a muddy field. My AFV bogs. What does your sodding kubelwagon do, eh?

Or, perhaps, we're all three in AFVs on an unpaved road. Visibility is ****e. We start out, and should we proceed unhindered through the fog or snow, without an hesitation or moment of dilemma, as though we were in a 'precision air display'?

You're not thinking this through.

You're asking for a command that allows vehicles, on a road, one behind the other, without taking into account any variables such as 'quality' (as in Green, Regular, etc status) to proceed without fail, problems, or hindrance, to the destination you've set for them, and without regard to terrain.

Your request not only strains the game engine beyond the possibility of performance, it ignores reality.

In point of fact, I often drive bumper to bumper in traffic, a simple game of follow the leader, but the conditions encompass massive familiarity, good road conditions, and intense traffic control devices.

And even then, I constantly witness, and am slowed down by traffic accidents, aggressive behaviour, and stupid behaviour. And with no more pressure than getting home from work.

Your claim that any group of individuals could exactly maintain station and speed on well-paved peacetime urban roads isn't borne out, let alone the concept that drivers on bad roads during wartime could do the same.

Also, you lot fail to address the concept of how this 'command' is to be executed in terms of the game. Only on roads? Only on certain roads? Only for vehicles directly behind each other (and how do you code that recognition?)

Think about the coding. What prevents someone from telling the engine 'I want trucks/vehicles X, Y, Z to maintain precise intervals and speed across the map', and the vehicles are 100s of meters apart, and facing different terrain.

Of course, you'll answer, 'well, we only want vehicles that are obviously together, and proceeding together, to maintain this pattern of chorus line precision'. How will the engine determine that?

Your requirement is not logical within the game engine. Your belief that even vehicles that could be logically somehow 'grouped' together is no more representative of reality.

You want to translate your ability to 'follow' a vehicle directly ahead of you in peacetime highway traffic that allows no other options than linear movement to wartime, varying conditions is fatuous. It's as simple as that.

And, if you were to impose your 'peacetime, linear movement' model to Combat Mission, you'd all be screaming bloody murder the first time the ****e came down, and your vehicles didn't react as you'd expect them to react given a sudden, massive change in status, such as the vehicle in front of them suddenly exploding because they'd run over a mine field (Oh, look, TeAcH, the vehicle in front of you just died; no matter, we have our orders, proceed ahead), or they'd suddenly come under fire (hell, TeAcH, the front of the column is pulling 88 shells; no matter, our orders are to follow the vehicle in front of us).

Real World, Game Engine. All these things lead one to believe that a command that instructs vehicles to precisely follow the vehicle in front of them isn't necessarily a good thing.

Of couse, you could argue 'well, I want it to do exactly what I want it to do, until I don't want it to do exactly what I wanted it to do anymore, and I want it to know exactly when I don't want it to do what I wanted it to do, and I want it to know exactly when that is'. But that seems like a fair load to place on the AI, as opposed to letting the AI get on with coping with the unexpected, while leaving the player to cope with the desired.

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by TeAcH:

Oh, BTW, I drove home from work today at 70 MPH amidst heavy traffic in downtown Seattle. Guess that makes me a Blue Angel right there Seanachi?

Actually, I've already answered this at some length, and the fact that you can't distinguish between this experience and the conditions of a column of vehicles in wartime doesn't speak well for your cognitive abilities. For that matter, it doesn't speak well for your honesty regarding normal traffic. So if some pillock had shifted lanes suddenly and caused an horrendous accident, you feel that traffic wouldn't have been slowed at all, if all the commuters had been issued a 'follow vehicle' order?

Originally posted by TeAcH:

Seriously, these vehicles ram each other even when not under fire and you know that.

Rather like vehicles on the freeways, eh? Or like vehicles troubled by varying road conditions, or vehicles poorly driven by nervous drivers, or vehicles concerned with having their arses shot off, or vehicles troubled by weather conditions?

In fact, vehicles troubled by every sort of Real World™ condition except your UnReal condition of having nothing more to worry about than the vehicle directly in front of them and the orders you issued all of them en masse as a tactical command going into battle.

[desim8]

I would like to see vehicles slow down / stop if the road ahead is blocked by a slower vehicle.

Seems very real world

[TeAcH]

Seems real world to me too.

Seani,

Thanks for your input, but I frankly think you have spent way to much time in PENG threads which has honed your ability using lots of words linked together just to hear yourself talk (albeit see yourself type) without saying much of anything.

I prefer the acronym KISS - Keep it Simple Stupid. I think you miss the jist of this discussion.

Is it okay for vehicles to collide in your book?

Why cant a vehicle that is told to follow another change its orders if it comes under fire? That happens in the game already. You set waypoints. Press GO. That vehicle begins to move until in encounters a threat or a problem. The AI replots. Its a simple concept really.

Why do you turn this into some big PENG-thing? (Thats a rhetorical question).

Anyway, lets agree to disagree. Ill keep on taking that 15 truck convoy and issuing overlapping waypoints to each one and then watch as they form one long writhing pile up as soon as the first one hits a PENG in the road.

Cheers,

TeAcH

[Seanachai]

Originally posted by TeAcH:

Seems real world to me too.

Seani,

Thanks for your input, but I frankly think you have spent way to much time in PENG threads which has honed your ability using lots of words linked together just to hear yourself talk (albeit see yourself type) without saying much of anything.

I prefer the acronym KISS - Keep it Simple Stupid. I think you miss the jist of this discussion.

Is it okay for vehicles to collide in your book?

Why cant a vehicle that is told to follow another change its orders if it comes under fire? That happens in the game already. You set waypoints. Press GO. That vehicle begins to move until in encounters a threat or a problem. The AI replots. Its a simple concept really.

Why do you turn this into some big PENG-thing? (Thats a rhetorical question).

Anyway, lets agree to disagree. Ill keep on taking that 15 truck convoy and issuing overlapping waypoints to each one and then watch as they form one long writhing pile up as soon as the first one hits a PENG in the road.

Cheers,

TeAcH

We are arguing at cross-purposes to our own points.

I wouldn't deny that it is annoying, and in some cases, unrealistic, for the current level of 'vehicular inability' to occur. Gods know I hate it when they muddle themselves up.

However, I think that your desired fix would represent an unnatural level of precision and ability on the part of a convoy moving during wartime.

I also think that your desired fix would be an utter bitch to program, in terms of the AI getting it right.

Because you'd have to make sure that 'follow the leader' behaviour only took place under appropriate circumstances and terrain, and you'd have to program the units to recognize exactly what that was. Which seems to me, at best, difficult.

It would be nice, of course, and somewhat more realistic, if vehicles moving through certain terrain types, in convoy, could behave a whole lot more intelligently. Certainly this would seem more likely on paved roads, and on other surfaces if weather and ground conditions permitted.

But, frankly, from what I'm reading of War in the East, vehicle convoys were more likely than not to come a cropper. Perhaps if the 'follow' command wasn't necessarily linked to a whole 'column' for example, but restricted simply to the vehicle directly in front of a following vehicle, giving the whole column the opportunity to lose it if one came under fire, and the 'domino' effect of 'loss of ability' resulted?

As for 'keeping it simple', I might answer that your approach is aimed at 'keeping it simplistic'. And, as I've pointed out, I very much doubt that the sort of behaviour you want coded in would prove 'simple' to do.

In any case, I think that attempting to mock my argument on the basis that I participate in the Peng Challenge Thread does not negate it's validity, but certainly belittles you.

As to why I'm making a big deal out of it, well, I'm not. I'm maintaining my original point without necessarily lying down at your feet and giving them a quick smooch. Apparently, in your book, anyone who argues against what you want or believe is making a 'big deal' out of it.

Agree to disagree? Obviously. We could have just as easily have agreed to agree on some points, while varying on others. But you'd prefer, it seems, to avoid addressing any point I've made, and go off on tangents that haven't anything to do with the original disagreement.

After all, if you can't make your point, the next best option is to attempt to discredit your opponent on the basis of something completely unrelated.

[Cameroon]

What I really get annoyed with is when the AI replots, but the replotted waypoints are BELOW ground level. Which means I've either got to let the AI alone (GAH, another WHOLE TURN while it figures it out) or delete the whole thing and replot myself (sigh, delays). I don't recall this happening in CMBO. Though if it did, I was still able to select and move the waypoints because I never ran into this problem.

If a save-game showing this is necessary, I'm sure I can manage it

Oh, yes, the other thing that is annoying is when the AI replots around a vehicle after hitting it. And hits it again. Now, far be it from me to request Blue Angels perfection , but if it's going to replot it'd sure be nice if it got it right the first time

[jKMkIII]

I read thread and for some reason I am missing point why it would be bad thing if you could tell all types of vehicles in all types of terrain to stay X meters behind previous vehicle? Or better yet have orders like:

- stay X meters behind vehicle A using same route as it

- stay X meters to direction B from vehicle A

Then if vehicle A gets out of LOS then you have to continue on your route as long as you get vehicle A back in your LOS and then you can check if distance is correct.

With these commands I could make that truck convoy move on road quite easily. And I could also make group of different kind of vehicles move off-road in formation I want. Sure tank commanders can tell driver to slow down if lead tank they are supposed to follow slows down.

If other vehicles not in this formation drive to same area then they could bump into each others like they do now. Same with unexpected stops (enemy firing), just react after see leader stopped and don't crash first and then start to think what to do.

[Kingfish]

A while back I suggested a possible alternative to the follow command, that of a 'stay on road' command. I envisioned a feature that let you choose a vehicle (or window a group), choose movement order (move, hunt, etc) then a destination, and then 'stay on road'.

This allows a player a way of getting a batch of reinforcements up to the front line with a minimal amount of effort.

Picture yourself playing one of the 3km long maps in CMBB, and you've just recieved a reinforcement group of 3 tanks and 6 HTs. Depending on the terrain / weather / ground conditions that could mean up to a dozen waypoints for the lead vehicle, all the while having to scroll along the length of the map, just to get him near the action. Ok, now repeat for the other 8 vehicles.

However, with 'stay on the road' those 100 individual commands are now reduced to 4.

In addition, it is less of a strain on the AI than a simple follow the leader command, as each vehicle is not concerned with keeping up with the one in front, but is free to move and act independently.

[TeAcH]

Picture yourself playing one of the 3km long maps in CMBB, and you've just recieved a reinforcement group of 3 tanks and 6 HTs. Depending on the terrain / weather / ground conditions that could mean up to a dozen waypoints for the lead vehicle, all the while having to scroll along the length of the map, just to get him near the action. Ok, now repeat for the other 8 vehicles

Kingfish you hit the nail on the head when you said that. I feel your pain. The only thing I would add is AFTER you do all of that, the lead vehicle does "something" causing all of the vehicles behind it to collide like mindless dominoes and you have to start all over again. Start all over again AFTER you perform surgery to separate the conjoined AFVs that is.

JKM, I hear ya.

Seanichi,

But why should the game model convoys moving up a road in wartime like the Blue Angels performing precision flying routines over an admiring crowd?

Why further burden the AI and game engine with commands that are both intrinsically and realistically the concern of the commander?

Well, ya' see, without any special 'Groggly Knowledge' (which can only be acquired by sleeping for 3 nights on a bull's hide with a post by JasonC on your belly), I have to rely on 'common sense'.

And 'common sense' tells me that, if I you were to take any 12 Forum members that want a fool-proof 'convoy' movement command, put them in a beat up truck on a muddy road in the middle of nowhere on a cloudy day, and ask them to follow each other down the road at exact intervals, but demand that they maintain a good rate of speed, and tell them that you might randomly give an equal number of Cesspoolers the right to open fire on them with heavy weapons, the lot couldn't make 50 meters befor running into serious problems.

In the bickering that would then ensue over who needed to backup first, or drive forward soonest, I figure 5 of them would die before the rest went to 'flee in all directions' mode.

Seriously. A 'follow vehicle' mode.

Sort out your own tactical nightmares, you lot.

I guess I assumed you were being mildly sarcastic and I reacted to that. I don't need PENG101 in a discussion that means something to me for a game that I care about (and have bought twice).

Anyway, let's hope there is some fix in the future that would help all fans of CM like myself to plot a line of vehicles easily.

TeAcH

[ October 10, 2002, 09:14 PM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]