M249 transforms into M4 mid-turn

[c3k]

Gents,

Watching through a replay I noticed something new. My 6 man US squad had a single M249 (plus the various M4's). With just a few seconds left in the turn a flicker on the Team Info Panel (the green or yellow weapon icons) caught my attention. The M249 gunner, in green, changed to an M4A1, in green. They were in the midst of firing on an enemy unit when this happened.

Has anyone else seen this?

Is this supposed to represent a weapon breakdown? If so, is it normal for M249 gunners to also carry an M4?

If it's not a weapon breakdown, what was it?

Savegame available.

Thanks,

Ken

[purpheart23]

249 gunners do not carry an m-4. Probably a bug.

[c3k]

Yeah, that's what I thought. But...I wanted confirmation.

So, any BF.C rep or beta tester want to look at the replay file?

Later,

Ken

[slug88]

Did that squad happen to perform buddy aid during the scenario? Perhaps the SAW gunner acquired an M4 that way.

[c3k]

I don't recall an earlier turn with buddy aid. For the several turns prior to this event there was no buddy aid. Your suggestion could cover the additional weapon, but I would like to think slinging an extra rifle would count as an icon in the Special Equipment section.

As I stated, the squad had six members. One was yellow. The M249 gunner was green. They were in a building and spotted an enemy squad in an adjacent building. Firing ensued. No U.S. infantryman was hit. In the midst of firing, with just a few seconds left in the turn, the M249 changed to an M4A1. There was no movement, there were no men repositioning. The icon changed. There were NO other units in the building. They squad had started with an M249. From that point forward they did not have one.

Replay available.

Thanks,

Ken

[MarkEzra]

C3k...please send me the save file...Thanks

[c3k]

MarkEzra,

Unable to email the 14MB file. Here is a link to where I uploaded it on mediafire: http://www.mediafire.com/?mabwnndw420

The M249 belongs to 1st Squad, 2nd Platoon, A Company, 2nd Battalion. The event occurs at 1:40:02.

Let me know if you'd like any other information.

Thanks,

Ken

[MarkEzra]

C3K: I received your save file and confirmed the changes you noted. A bug report has been made. Thanks

[c3k]

MarkEzra,

You're welcome, and THANK YOU!

Regards,

Ken

[Peter Panzer]

Another little bug taken out of the mix - well done. It really is a pleasure to see the community, testers and developers working together to advance the game!

Beta Testers/BFC:

I am genuinely curious, is an error like the one c3k reported considered an "aesthetic" or "cosmetic" issue?

To be up front, I recently reported a bug dealing with AFV gun elevation not reorienting, but was informed this was a low priority item and a bug report would not be submitted.

Can someone please help me understand the bug report "chain-of-command?" If an issue is reported and confirmed shouldn't it be passed along to the developers? Shouldn't the developers decide the priority of bug fixes with the Beta Testers serving as the community contacts and "proofing" agents?

I am not looking for any drama here, rather I am looking for a touch of clarification and consistency in the process.

As always, my thanks.

[George MC]

It's not for us as testers to yay or nay bugs. We just post em and BFC make the call as to their priority. So yes it is the developers, BFC, who decide on what issues have what priority, not us as testers.

[Peter Panzer]

Hello George:

Thank you for the quick reply.

I am not trying to embarrass or "tattle on" the tester I was working with as I found him to be a friendly and devoted fellow, but I believe he may have slipped up in protocol if what you state is correct.

Please let me know what I can do to help and my thanks to all of you for your work.

[Battlefront.com]

Charles checked into it and it appears Buddy Aid is how that guy came up with a M4. We can absolutely assure you that the M249 gunner isn't equipped with one by default, nor is it possible for a soldier to magically acquire a weapon out of thin air. In the 4 years or so that I've been testing the game such a thing has never, ever been seen or reported by anybody, so I think it's pretty safe to rule that out

BTW, Charles said it is very rare that a M249 gunner would pick up a M4 via Buddy Aid but it is definitely allowed for variety's sake.

To answer Peter Panzer's question:

Can someone please help me understand the bug report "chain-of-command?" If an issue is reported and confirmed shouldn't it be passed along to the developers? Shouldn't the developers decide the priority of bug fixes with the Beta Testers serving as the community contacts and "proofing" agents?

Beta Testers have no "authority" in the sense that they don't decide what we do, or do not, fix. What I suspect you saw was a tester, or perhaps just a customer, speculating that the issue noted was minor enough that it wouldn't be addressed. Testers act as contacts, as you suggest, with Charles and myself deciding which things to focus on. There are literally thousands of things people think should be changed, fixed, improved, etc. so prioritization is very important for everybody.

Steve

[c3k]

Steve,

Thanks for the response, but you've missed the point of my post.

My SAW gunner was actively engaging an enemy unit approximately 20 meters away with his M249. They were returning fire. It was a close range firefight. He had the ONLY M249 in the squad. Here is the salient point: WHY did he switch from his primary weapon (belt-fed, excellent close range effects) to a weapon he may or may not have picked up from a wounded buddy?

He was an M249 gunner, firing his M249 in the midst of a firefight, and somehow switching weapons was the TacAI solution. What happened?

So, to beat this down, thank you for postulating how and where the M4 may have come to be part of my M249 gunner's equipment, but the please let me know why he switched weapons.

Thanks,

Ken

[Battlefront.com]

Because the M249 needed reloading and it's far quicker to switch to the M4 than it is to reload the M249. Otherwise he wouldn't have switched.

What you found was a very unusual, but perfectly reasonable, situation. If you were seeing this all over the place then I would suspect there is a problem to look into. Remember, this is a complex simulation and one of the GOOD things about that is cool, unusual things like what you found.

Steve

[slug88]

Wow, actually that is a pretty cool effect! Hats off to Battlefront, the game is still surprising me with its detail.

[c3k]

Steve,

Wow. Thanks for the speedy response.

If my gunner did choose to toss the m249 down in exchange for an M4, I guess he needs better training. Hell, how long was he running around with a 200 round magazine which was almost empty? His lack of reloading cost his squad a lot of firepower. I think I'll jump his **** when they get back. What kind of gunner lets that much time go by during a battle, is told to assault a building, and doesn't ensure he's got a full mag?

Which, begs the simulation question: does reloading ONLY occur when the current magazine is empty?

Obviously, a lot of short-changing occurs in real life; if _I_ were about to enter a building, I'd put in a fresh magazine, regardless of which weapon I had.

Thanks,

Ken

[Cpl Steiner]

..does reloading ONLY occur when the current magazine is empty?

This is a good point. The simulation should take into account the loading of full mags during lulls in the fighting, if it doesn't already.

[c3k]

Addendum:

The other BIG issue, why, in the many turns since the firefight has my SAW gunner not started using the M249?

I'll grant the TacAI a win in the conditional firefight's immediate need for firepower: the time taken to reload a belt-fed M249 compared to unslinging an M4A1 may have been too long compared to the relative firepower differences. So, I'm not arguing about the use of the M4A1.

I will argue 2 points.

1) The gunner never again got his M249 into operation. The game lasted 10's of minutes more. The ammo bar never dipped again. That seems to be a legitimate coding concern: once a weapon is grabbed, it is never un-grabbed.

2) And this is minor, but, as I touched on in my post above, is ALL reloading based only on an open-bolt weapon status? Meaning, the pixel-troopers will not reload until the weapon is empty? There is no interim, reload when you have a moment coding?

(I must also give credit for the coding that produced this weapon change. Very cool. Very detailed. Even if I do think the underlying reasons causing it need to be examined. Also, I note that the animations would show if there WERE interim reloads. That's cool too.)

Any thought to items 1 and/or 2?

Thanks,

Ken

[Battlefront.com]

Let's make sure we aren't making a mountain out of a molehill. How many times has a situation like this come up from the thousands of players playing over the last year? First time I can recall, though I'm sure it's not the first time that it's ever happened. Therefore, no matter what this issue isn't a big deal. Still interesting to discuss, I admit, but on a scale of 1-10 in importance in the Big Picture I'd rank it a 0.025

Not swapping back is likely due to some other factor (see below) since we have several soldier types who have two weapons as standard equipment. In the Marines Module every single Marines Rifle Squad has 3 such guys (M32 and M16). They switch back and forth all the time so I know that there is currently no problem with switching. I have no idea if there might have been a problem in v1.08, though I doubt it since there are other weapons that are swapped back and forth (some Syrian RPG guys, IIRC) without issues.

There is another possibility for the switch to the M4 which I hadn't thought of. It could be that the M249 was out of ammo. Or at least the gunner was out of ammo on his person and, since there were apparently no other M249 gunners in the same unit, wasn't able to redistribute from a buddy. Yes, yes, yes, I know that the same ammo is used for both the M4 and M249, but this isn't relevant to a tactical combat situation like this. I also know that the M249 can theoretically take a M4 magazine, but I'm pretty sure we didn't code that. Apparently this isn't a great thing to do in real life because jamming is too common.

The answer is that reloading does not happen until the weapon is empty. Simple reason for that, really. The AI necessary to intelligently decide when a premature ammo swap is a good idea vs. a very bad idea is significant. Think about it for a sec. Should a M249 gunner with 100 rounds in the hopper reload before going into a building he thinks is unoccupied? How about 98 rounds? How about 20 rounds? Where to draw the line? How to figure out what is going to happen based on soldier intuition? How to deal with the thought that having a bunch of mostly empty mags/belts is going to cause problems later on? I mean, really... you're in the firefight of your life and you find you have nothing but 10 mags with an unknown variable amount of ammo in each... how good is that? "Oooo... I'm about to be overrun, time to reload. CRAP, I only got 4 shots off now I have to reload." etc. etc. etc.

The real life grunts can pipe in here, but my understanding is that by and large you expend the rounds in your mag completely before reloading except under very special circumstances.

In any case, it's simply not productive for us to spend time on some details at the expense of others. Trying to figure out a way to get soldiers to realistically prematurely reload is not a good idea for us to spend time on. Almost all the time it's better to expend all rounds in the mag and then reload, so almost all the time the game works just fine and without a ton of programming and testing. Therefore, better to spend our time on something that currently doesn't work so well or isn't even in the game at all

Steve

[c3k]

Yeah, I agree with your points. I'm following up on this for the interest, not any gripe about playability.

If M249 ammo is tracked separately, as it appears from your post that it is, that is news to me. I try to ensure all my squads are full up - all green bars in their ammo status - before they dismount.

How does the linked M249 ammo get distributed? Is it a ratio of the total rounds? I.e., if I grab an extra 1,000 rounds, is that 800 loose, and 200 linked?

How would I, the PLAYER, know that my squad support weapon is getting low on ammo? (By the way, I've NEVER seen a squad with an M249 not fire it while it had ANY ammo left. Are you sure linked ammo is tracked separately?)

I agree that coding at a hard ammo count would create many more problems than it would solve. Adding a button for the player to do so wouldn't really be worth while either, IMO.

So, for my curiosity, if nothing else, I'm still a bit mystified about losing an M249 for the rest of the scenario. If the ammo count is the reason, how come there is no feedback to the player?

Of course, if you just tell me that the game codes for jams, broken firing pins, etc., and that the gun got busted, well, it's all moot.

Thanks,

Ken

[Battlefront.com]

Er... time for an "oops!" I guess there was a reason I initially didn't think about the M249 being out of ammo. I forgot that we wound up *not* differentiating between linked and magazine ammo if its the same caliber. As soon as I read C3K's questions I remembered why! It's an organizational hassle for us and a UI problem for the player. Unfortunately, both Charles and I sometimes forget the difference between original designs and final implementation (and things inbetween and modifications after!). Toss in 4 years of development, a few Belgian beers along the way, and there you go

What happens is each soldier starts off with a specific ammo count based on the specific soldier type (there are hundreds in the game). M249 gunners, for example, start out with 2 "units" of ammo, 200 rounds per "unit". When a full "unit" is expended the soldier will attempt to reload. If he's under intense pressure, and has a secondary weapon, he'll go for that one instead. If ammo runs out completely the soldier will need to get some either from buddies or from something like an APC/IFV. When more ammo becomes available the soldier will attempt to grab full "units". If not, then partial is allowed. Incoming ammo is distributed based on need.

Hope that helps!

Steve

[Lee]

Well, what can I say, Steve? As usual, Steve and Charles continue to impress with the superb level of detail in the CM design.

Name another wargame where an individual soldier grabs an M4 off his buddy who's wounded, and will thus not be needing his weapon for now, then gets in a shootout with the bad guys, fires his MG until it's out of ammo, doesn't have time to reload, so instead he switches over to the short barreled M-16 he just happens to have now and empties some magazines at the enemy with it? I mean, how cool is that??! Talk about detailed, I don't think I've ever seen an AI controlled soldier do all those things even in a first-person-shooter game! It just goes to further prove that CMII is the most realistic and detailed tactical land combat computer wargame ever.

[c3k]

Lee,

Don't forget to add, they also included the animations so you could SEE all that happen (most of it, anyway) in cool detail.

Steve,

Thanks for the replies! (Now I'm going to reload that turn and run that squad into a vehicle for a reload and see if the M249 pops back up. Trust but verify. )

Wow.

Thanks,

Ken

[c3k]

Steve,

Further testing did not support your post.

Here's what happened: the initial 6 man squad with the disappearing M249 had these ammo bars: 1 red; 2 orange; 3 yellow; 4 green. This was AFTER the M249 disappeared. Although, seemingly, plenty of ammo, per your post about internally tracked units of ammo, perhaps the M249 gunner had fired off all his ready units.

There is a Stryker near the squad in the savegame. I drove it up to them and loaded them into it. It had 2360 rounds of 5.56 ammo. I ACQUIRED 500 rounds. This brought the ammo bars all the way up, by adding 4 bars of light green. There was no change in weapon status. I then unloaded the men and had them run around. No change. I then reloaded the men into the Stryker and ACQUIRED the remaining 1860 rounds. No change. I ran them around outside again. Still no change.

Now it got cool. Those Syrians they were shooting at? Well, since I ran my men into a Stryker, instead of finishing the fight, some were alive. As luck would have it, the Syrians nailed the M249 gunner. Red dot! Excellent. I eradicated the Syrians. The remaining 5 men rendered buddy aid. Remember the whole, collect your buddy's weapon?

Didn't happen.

The man rendering aid was the 1st team's M203 rifleman. (Note: the mouse hovering over the M203/M4 combo only lists it as an M4.)

After rendering aid, he maintained his M203, not either of the M249 gunner's weapons; the currently carried M4 or the retained M249.

Of course, an argument could be made that the M203 is thought of as being a "better" weapon by the TacAI then the M249.

In summary; acquiring 2,360 rounds of ammo did NOT get the M249 back in operation. Buddy aid to the M249 gunner who was red-dotted did NOT show the M249 back in operation.

Any thoughts?

Regards,

Ken