Some bugs to report

[amandus]

Noticed this one:

I captured "tons" of 6 pdr. and 105 mm guns and some bofors and even an operable M 10 during the German campaign and neither the statistic (ingame Map screen and after battle report) shows them as captured nor in the after battle report = soldiers who have actually captured the gun(s) or vehicle(s) show this in their personal records.

only once (1 out of app. 6 captured material appeared as captured once a time ) (Kasserinepass-scenario)

However luckily the trophies appear at the end of the scenario together with its new crew and at the selection screen at the beginning of the next scenario.

Downed aircraft does not seem to appear as such in the statistics either.

a bug? Or how can I capture equipment and getting credited for?

off topic: Great work! Absolutely the best wargame I've ever played so far!

[Sneaksie]

Like in TOW1, capture event noted only if soldier did that under enemy fire or there were enemies nearby. In other cases you get the captured unit by it will be not mentioned in statistics.

Downed aircraft is shown in the statistics if it was shot down by one of your units. If it's not shown, then it was shot by allies, friendly fire or crashed by accident.

[amandus]

@ Sneaksie: Thank You for Your answer.

This explains it.

I usually attack(ed) the guns with a 3 men team from behind or flanks using grenades (2 men and one covering the action with SMG/MG) therefore there are usually no enemy soldiers alive near the gun(s) when I finally decide to send someone in to take over the gun.

Or I took out the crew long time before with my indirect arty/air support.

Like to preserve the life of my men particularly those who served already in several scenarios and have gained high gunnery- / scoutingskills.

Did I already mention that I like this role-game feature in TOW and TOW2 where You can assaign the skills to the surviving soldiers as you like it ?

[Tartari]

there's probably a bug with the MainTex brush in the map editor, i only can see the result after saving and reloading...

[amandus]

While creating some missions with the battlegenerator / -editor I noticed that the penetration value for the german AT-grenade PWM is only 3 mm - in the original TOW it was much higher (I could not veryfy however if heavier armorded vehicles can be destroyed /damaged using it in the game anyhow, because I put to many units into the mission and the game crashed to desktop at some time during the battle.)

Noticed that the missing P40 skin too in a single player mission (created with the aid of the battlegenerator) implementing P40 ground support 2 planes, 250 lb bombload

[GoodGuy]

Issues found in the Battle Generator:

• 1) While tinkering with the battle generator, I found a bug when trying to place fortifications:
  
  After adding a new force item, when selecting the fortification, the user is stuck and can't press the next button, as the generator warns you that not all values for the fortification had been set (i.e. experience level {uh, for unmanned fortifications? lol}, type of unit, number of units). But the list of types (if you select "tanks" you can choose from several types of tanks in the 2nd column, for example) is empty, so the value can't be set.
  The user has to remove the fortification if he wants to proceed and save the new mission.
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• 2) While the mission area on a given map can be expanded to 2048 x 2048, the amount of units which can be fielded is capped. My PC would be able to handle additional units above the limit, easily.
  
  It looks like you can field 32 tanks on one side (i.e. player), and 31 tanks on the computer's side, IF both Armies are using British forces (Valentine tanks).
  If let's say the player wants to use British forces against the Computer's German force, he can give around 21 German tanks to the Computer Army - which would be the limit for medium tanks, while he can assign 32 Valentine tanks to his own Army.
  If the player wants to put tanks to the reserve (which can be accessed on the "order of the battle"-screen before launching the "single mission"), he has to take away the corresponding number of units from the "deployment" pool, which is the unit pool that is being fielded at mission start.
  
  If you want to field a pure infantry force, you end up with 14 squads.
  
  These limits are confusing, and they shouldn't be there, and finding out about how many units you can field is pretty cumbersome, there's no help text or bubble that would inform the user about these limits. It's not document in the manual either.
  
  No matter whether the limit would be a result of limited object/texture space in the engine or the result of a "political" decision, the battle generator or the manual should let the user know that there's a limit.
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• 3) Once a battle had been generated (with the Computer Army set to "Attack") the enemy units would just sit there and do nothing. They will only attack once you send a unit as bait, to lure them in your direction. After you pull back the bait, they will then track it down, even if it's out of sight. It looks like AI units in the game are cheating, means it looks like they know where you are all the time. Well I don't know what's under the hood, yet.
  
  Anyway, I understand, they're just sitting there because triggers are missing, and you can't define triggers in the Battle Generator (unless I overlooked something). I guess people who aren't familiar with (or can't be arsed to use) the Mission Editor, would prefer to use the Battle Generator, but the result makes one think what purpose a mission generator would have, if it would just create missions where the enemy (computer) units have to be kicked in the ass to get moving.

In the current state, the battle gen is "not fit for service" - at least not for single player missions. It may be the ideal tool for Multiplayer missions, but I don't know how to convert the missions.

[amandus]

Using the battle generator for single player has to be considered to be only the first step in creating a SP-battle. It's like a crude draft.

Choose 'black or white' attack or defense and the map - some units- some support - may be a time limit - that’s it.

It's great if You are done with the missions /campaigns that came with the game and want to get started with your own creativity and explore how the game works.

Fairly simple - even if You have to give the AI a 'bait' to trigger the attack by the AI as 'GoodGuy' stated.

To get a more sophisticated result You have to use the 'Mission and Campaign Editor' in a 2nd step where You can edit almost anything and change it the way You like it to be - e.g. ad more units (as many as Your system and the game-engine sustains) and additional equipment to the armies, add additional armies (and their status to Your force (alley, foe or neutral)) change the name, rank, experience, nationality, skills, 'backpack' = equipment / ammo of every single soldier , vehicle skin, numbering, even the faces of the soldiers are selectable and much, much more.

You can change the kind, number, extend of aerial / arty - support. The position and facing of every single unit, augment acquisition points and permissions, block units /crews.

- Everything without even slightly touching a single 'trigger'

3rd step is (would be) to add or change triggers using the Mission-Campaign Editor.

This is the step - at least for me - where fun ends and science starts

4th (or 3rd step if the above has been left out) is to link your missions together to a campaign. You can even change the sequence of the battles depending on the outcome of the former - Some kind of 'grand' campaign could be theoretically created that way, given a sufficient amount (lots!) of missions, time and ambition to create them.

The battle generator has some shortcomings and high potential though, if triggers could be installed in the same way the other parameters can be set already

I imagine some kind of 'mask' that could be wrapped around preset triggers where you insert only a few parameters or a trigger is being automatically created by the program guiding the author thru some questions e.g.

select unit(s) - author (player) selects the desired unit(s)

set action - author selects move, attack, sneak etc…

set or specify the target point / area where the prior action stops or changes or takes place

show message - author inserts text he wants to be shown and selects an appropriate audio-file ‘e.g. You have new orders’

Together with a video-tutorial how these triggers can be linked together to obtain the desired result would be great for all of us not familiar with programming.

[Tartari]

[*]3) Once a battle had been generated (with the Computer Army set to "Attack") the enemy units would just sit there and do nothing. They will only attack once you send a unit as bait, to lure them in your direction. After you pull back the bait, they will then track it down, even if it's out of sight. It looks like AI units in the game are cheating, means it looks like they know where you are all the time. Well I don't know what's under the hood, yet.

this point is wrong, when in attack, the AI-player send recon units in every direction for locating your forces, and then will launch its attack, (_Recon_Activate_Infantry and _Recon_Activate_vehicles). You can have the proof of that by changing side with the mission editor. In Tow1, you can speed up the AI reconnaissance by giving it a recon plane.

Anyway, I understand, they're just sitting there because triggers are missing, and you can't define triggers in the Battle Generator (unless I overlooked something). I guess people who aren't familiar with (or can't be arsed to use) the Mission Editor, would prefer to use the Battle Generator, but the result makes one think what purpose a mission generator would have, if it would just create missions where the enemy (computer) units have to be kicked in the ass to get moving.

give maybe more time to the AI (or a recon plane) 20 minutes are not enough, if you tick "time limited", as i suppose. In my opinion, the Battle Generator triggers are very powerful and challenging for the human player, I mostly play with this kind of missions.

[GoodGuy]

2 more bugs found:

• 
  
• The Campaign victory screen (German side, I think it's the same with the other sides' screen) doesn't display the entire text at 1024*768. It looks like it's in 16:9 format, with the text being over-extended on the left and the right side (thus these parts aren't visible on 4:3 displays).
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  -
  
  
• The last mission of the German campaign (Tebessa) won't finish properly, and it will finish prematurely, at least under this condition:
  IF the last layer of defenses (at least all the 105mm guns and AA behind the hill) had been destroyed early, or earlier than expected by the scenario designer, means right before or right after the 2nd wave of US tanks (which is the wave before that last wave of tanks coming from the north east hill) had been destroyed, the Victory Message will pop up, along with the Finish button. But then, with the last wave of US tanks starting to pour in, the player won't have time to destroy it, as the mission ends right in the middle of the battle (due to the short time frame players have when scoring a mission victory. The very next screen, where you assign the skills (experience/promotion) will then be completely empty, not showing a single unit. Note: this occured during a test run on Novice level.

I wonder what Beta testers are doing these days. Putting their fingers in their noses?

this point is wrong, when in attack, the AI-player send recon units in every direction for locating your forces, and then will launch its attack, (_Recon_Activate_Infantry and _Recon_Activate_vehicles). You can have the proof of that by changing side with the mission editor. In Tow1, you can speed up the AI reconnaissance by giving it a recon plane.

Well, it might have been that way in TOW1, but I'm not convinced that it's fully working in TOW2, yet. Both sub-scripts are there, I've found the routines after inspecting a mission (created with the battle gen) in the mission editor, before I posted here.

If I call in bomber support, the enemy units would just sit there for a while, while my bombers are pounding those "parked" tanks, then, in one of the missions i created, one of the 2 Daimlers I gave to the English computer force would move a bit. I still had to send some bait, all through the Kasserine pass, to the other side, so it's possible that the Daimler just moved because he saw my armored car.

An "Attack Zone" (just like the rectangle for deployment) would solve this already, once the attack zone would be tied to a trigger, during the setup process in the battle generator. Or the delay until a recon run starts has to be set to 1 minute or something (if the recon script works, at all).

What does the switch "time limit" do, in the battle gen?

give maybe more time to the AI (or a recon plane) 20 minutes are not enough, if you tick "time limited", as i suppose.

Correct me if i am wrong, but I didn't see any recon support missions. And the Computer player won't call in the airforce if there are no targets, that's what i gathered so far, at least.

Would this time limit set the delay until the enemy starts his bomber/support run, at least?

If the Computer player sees targets, he might at least move.

What should I enter as time / delay for the enemy support (air, bombardment). I mean, do I have to enter a time format (as in let's say 4 pm -> 16:00) or the time referring to time elapsed since mission start (say 5:00 minutes)?

In my opinion, the Battle Generator triggers are very powerful and challenging for the human player, I mostly play with this kind of missions.

In TOW1 i suppose? .

Can I influence/set the time delay when the Computer starts a recon run (with ground units, or aircraft) anywhere in the battle gen?

I might be blind, but I can't see it anywhere. As of now, with all the different missions I created, the Computer never moved his ass for around 20-30 minutes (that's where I got bored / frustrated and sent in my bait). So again, what's the purpose of the gen, or did I overlook a switch in the gen?

Does 1C expect people to wait 20 or 30 minutes (and get drinks and food ) until they can finally expect to be able to play a mission created with the battle gen?

[GoodGuy]

2 more findings:

1) Infantry will sometimes leave trenches even though HOLD is activated (this happens when right clicking on enemy infantry units), and even though the targets are not obscured or out of range (enemy infantry charged downhill, 60 meters in front of my trenched units, in fact).

2) Infantry will move around sometimes in trenches, even though a HOLD order had been issued. (Not sure if this deals with auto-pickup enabled mostly, but it happened when pick up was disabled too, at least once.)

[GoodGuy]

2 more findings:

• Panzer IVs with short-barreled gun will NOT stop to fire, once the player issues the command to fire SMOKE rounds at a given location (by using the "Attack Ground" command).
  
  
  
• Formations won't be memorized. Each time a squad or group of vehicles is being selected again, the formation button reverts to the standard setting, which makes for a good amount of click-ology. (This could be a feature, not a bug, though. I don't know.)

[GoodGuy]

One mo'

a single crew member with driver and gunner skills (87 driver skill, 98 gunner skill) can't move a given empty tank off the warzone, as the engine keeps placing the poor bub on the gunner seat. Moving the guy to the driver seat manually will only result in him going back to the gunner seat after a few seconds. (That seems familiar from TOW1 though)

[Tartari]

GoodGuy, I did' nt see any difference between both ToW regarding triggers but maybe the new maps with large non-passable areas make the things sometime different.

"Correct me if i am wrong, but I didn't see any recon support missions."

you are right, I miss the Storch! I hope that 1C will add it in a patch!

I'm not good at triggering, I hope that someone better than me will answer you!

"Does 1C expect people to wait 20 or 30 minutes (and get drinks and food ) until they can finally expect to be able to play a mission created with the battle gen?"

do you know the double speed time command?

[Tartari]

really, there is something wrong with the maintex brush, it changed in blue all my map texture:

[Gnasher]

Blue blue blue bap shoo wap de da blue blue blue bap shoo wap de da blue blue blue!!!!

Bummer dude hope you kept a backup!

[Oudy]

I can verify what Tatari said. Decided to try the Maintext brush and it made the whole map blue blue blue. Now, don't get me wrong, I like blue...but I don't think you see much of it in the desert unless you are hallucinating, at which point seeing blue is the least of your problems.

OMG, now even the winking icon is blue...

Oudy

[Oudy]

When the map editor saves changes to the MainTex.tga and farmaintex.tga they aren't the same size as the ones from the original map.

For example:

Original file sizes form africa_faidpass map

MainTex.tga 12,291 KB

farmaintex.tga 3,074 KB

After using the maintex brush and saving the map the files sizes change to

MainTex.tga 12,289 KB

farmaintex.tga 3,073 KB

Additionally, I could not open the original .tga files in Photoshop (and I tried them all, including opening as .dds) but once they are resaved by the map editor, I can open them normally as .tga files.

It would be nice to get a verification as to whether this is a bug or whether we are doing something wrong.

Oudy

[Sneaksie]

Maintex brush functionality was dropped during transition to new map format, so this command shouldn't be available at all (along with the old trees by the way, only far trees work). Don't use it:)

[Tartari]

Blue blue blue bap shoo wap de da blue blue blue bap shoo wap de da blue blue blue!!!!

Bummer dude hope you kept a backup!

hehehe!

fortunately it was just the clear map maintex!

[Tartari]

Maintex brush functionality was dropped during transition to new map format, so this command shouldn't be available at all (along with the old trees by the way, only far trees work). Don't use it:)

thanks Sneaksie for the reply, but that's too bad!

I miss the tree tool too (even if the trunks were ugly)!

Sadly too, we can't change the visibility range any more!

[Sneaksie]

Visibility range? In Mission Editor?

[Tartari]

yes, fogheavy/fogmedium/foglight, I did't found it.

regarding the maintex brush, there's maybe a way: starting the map first in the ToW1 map editor, and when finished taking only the .HF, maintex and farmaintex and then finishing it in the ToW2 map editor.

[GoodGuy]

"Correct me if i am wrong, but I didn't see any recon support missions."

you are right, I miss the Storch! I hope that 1C will add it in a patch!

I'm not good at triggering, I hope that someone better than me will answer you!

SNEAKSIEEEEE! Can you answer?

The question was how the triggers actually work in missions created with the battle generator, and if there's a delay for computer units (if the computer player is supposed to attack).

do you know the double speed time command?

Yes yes, but even with game speed on FF nothing happened, for 10 minutes real time, and the enemy units were just behind the next hill....

[Sneaksie]

It's difficult to say why AI didn't attack in your case. Maybe this hill was impassable? AI sends out small teams in several directions to find enemies, it's unclear why these teams missed you.

[GoodGuy]

.....AI sends out small teams in several directions to find enemies, it's unclear why these teams missed you.

No impassable terrain involved, I chose the sm_001 map (map from the 2nd training mission), and the Kasserine Pass map for another Battle Gen mission.

Ok, you say several directions...., what's the time frame for the AI sending out units? Does the AI usually start right away? Does it need certain units (i.e. halftrack, daimler or similar vehicles)?