Conceptual Bug with QB plans - no not the usual ranting about random maps, etc.

[Yair Iny]

Hi,

Just tried a couple of QBs with the US on defence (attack, open). The syrians deploy but don't move out the the deployment zone. I opened the file in the editor, and can see that the blue side does indeed have a plan to attack the objective, but the red side is meant to defend. However, the QB selector selected this map for a syrian attack in the open (there aren't any open maps where the red side attacks).

It seems to me that the "red" and "blue" side in QB maps should really be the attacking and defending side, regardless of them being syrian or US. Right now, the map, being an Attack map can be selected for a red attack, but the red plan calls for defense...

Thanks.

[Paper Tiger]

Hi

I think this might be your problem. The maps in the QM map file have a set-up, Village Attack, Village Meeting, Village Probe etc, same for open, wooded, hilly blah blah.

You want to play US defence against a Syrian attack and as you noted, there is an attack plan in your map for blue. But there is none for the red side as the map is really a BLUE attack map. Therefore, the Red side will just defend.

If you want the Red side to attack, you'll have to make a plan for the Red force. Whew. It's a lot of work but once you get the hang of scripting the AI, it can be a lot of fun.

[Yair Iny]

I understand what is going on behind the scenes. The problem to me is that if the map is, as you say, a blue attack map, then it should not be selected for a red attack. Or, for QB maps, "blue" could be the attacker, regardless of if it's really the US, and that would also solve the problem. As it is though, it is working incorrectly, and thus is a bug, IMHO.

BTW, a red plan does exist, and it is a defensive plan for that map.

[benpark]

The main problem is the removal of the selection for which game type is desired (enemy attack, defend, meeting engagement etc). How is the gamer to know what plan the scenario designer has set from the UI as is now without opening each of these in the editor? The QB is the weak link in the game as it stands for me as is. This is due primarily to the above problem.

Although the title of this post says that it's not about "random map ranting", the main issues are tied to just that problem.

QB's should really also have the above choice selection back, as well as the ability to load a specific file from a folder/map to be used. Forget the force selection arguments, this is where the heart of the problem with the QB's lies. The enforced randomization of the maps is obviously aimed at MP map balance, but it kills the single player QB with the above problems.

[Cpl Steiner]

This sounds like a very important discovery. BFC should take note as it sounds like it would be an easy, albeit time consuming, fix.

[Paper Tiger]

Yep. Being able to select a predesignated Red Attack map or a Blue Attack map would be nice and we might get it later. There are a lot of people asking for some improvements to the QB option and I'd be surprised if they don't make some changes further down the road. Maybe as part of an expansion module, not a patch.

For a Red Attack just now, I use a Meeting Map and handicap the Blue force -30%+. That works well because there are attack plans for both sides.

BTW, I have removed all the stock QB maps from my QB map folder and have been slowly creating my own maps for use. I have one Blue Attack Open, one Meeting Open and one Blue Attack Village map. Whan I'm creating a new map, it goes into the QB folder with an unused designation, say 'hilly' and a simple AI plan and I playtest it like that. Then expand it a bit etc...

[Yair Iny]

Hi Steve, et all,

Any chance you can address this? As it stands QBs can only be played as US, unless it is ME.

Cheers

[Cpl Steiner]

It seems to me there are two ways BFC could resolve this.

1. Ensure that A "Red Attack" QB only picks up Red Attack QB maps, and a "Blue Attack" QB only picks up Blue Attack QB maps. Unfortunately this would mean doubling up on all the QB maps other than "Meeting Engagement" ones.

2. A far simpler solution: For any non-ME map, Blue is considered to be the attacker and Red the defender for the purposes of setup zones and AI plans in the Editor. However, in the QB selection process, if a "Red Attack/Assault" is selected, the QB automatically switches the sides around so that Red starts in Blue's setup zone and uses Blue's AI plans, and vice versa. It may be confusing at first - but only for people who make QB maps. For people who just want to play QBs it would just be a behind-the-scenes process they wouldn't need to worry about.

[Yair Iny]

I completely agree, and hope that the second option is viable and is implemented, it is far better than the first, IMO.

[rune]

As a mattre of fact, #2 is how the QBs are supposed to work. Attacker sets up in blue and defender in red, would be a bug if this is not happening. Let me know for sure.

Rune

[Yair Iny]

Hi Rune,

I ran a few tests, including creating my own map for a QB and have arrived at the following conclusions:

1. First and foremost, you are right and I was wrong. The attacker does indeed use the blue plan regardless of his real "colour", so there is no bug at all. The reason I thought that the red side didn't use the attack plan was simply that it hardly moved at all, as described in the following points.

2. I created a simple map, and a simple plan for blue side to follow, which basically makes it attack to the other side of the map. In my first test, the attacker hardly moved. I changed the plan from max assault in the movement part to quick, and lo and behold, they started moving finally. It seems that the assault and max assault modes cause the AI to use slow and assault movement exclusively, even when not under fire or direct threat, resulting in exhausted troops who barely move, and when moving, do so very slowly.

3. There is only one open attack map. The other one, while named open attack, is actually a village map, as can be seen in the editor.

4. I ran a test using the single open attack map, with tiny forces, US as defender, resulting in me having a single stryker platoon. I hid the vehicles behind the building, and put my inf in the orchard overlooking the bridge, with hide commands and very very short arcs. In 20 minutes + 20 minutes overtime (would be interested in an explanation of that, btw), the AI, which hardly took any fire at all, didn't cross a single unit over the bridge. All its foot units were exhausted and had barely moved, as far as I could observe. Its two BTRs made some token movement but never even got close to the bridge.

The combination of the above seems to be causing the phenomenon many have reported, of the AI not moving out of the setup zone.

Sorry for posting the above misleading information, and I hope you will be able to improve on the current situation.

Cheers

[Paper Tiger]

Yair

You'll probably find that they were crawling. In most of my QB games, the AI starts crawling when they receive even a SMALL amount of incoming fire. It seems that the key to avoiding this is to keep the distance between the waypoints as short as possible. Hopefully the Operational AI will get tweaked to prevent this crawling very soon.

Rune: thanks for that clarification about battle maps. I hadn't noticed that.

[tc237]

Hi,

I ran some test's on the AI movement options.

Setup a very small map with a few Blue observers hidden in buildings and a woodline.

Setup 4 Red plt's on a 400m long "runway" with an objective 350m away.

Gave each Red Plt a different AI movement option (Max Assault, Assualt, Advance, Quick)

Advance and Quick plt's moved via "bounding by squad" with squads running in each bound. They reached the objective in 3-4 minutes.

Max Assault and Assualt plt's also moved via bounding but used a "crawl" not a run.

In 5 Minutes the Max Assault plt advanced 50m, the Assault plt advanced 100m.

[ August 22, 2007, 07:37 AM: Message edited by: tc237 ]

[Mishga]

I tend to use Max Assault for when troops are on the objective, coupled with active and troop dismount.

This means they stay put, kick out firepower and are hard to shift.