Scourge of War Boards

I have one interface improvement suggestion.

Instead of laying down waypoints and then having to set the direction by using the "wheel left/right" buttons, it would be better to be able to click and hold on the spot, and rotate the arrow in the direction we want the unit to face, then let go of the button to set it.

Talking of many things in many threads so it's better I recap them here.
I am now tackling the first scenario after playing a few sandbox games I am at the very first scenario, marked (1) for USA which is essentially Gettysburg day one, the stand of Buford's boys against Heth's division.
I also went down to look at the designer's notes and I find the current choice the very best possible one for a scenario such as this. I played this scenario a few times and this is what I noted.

Couriers: There's a strange attitude by the couriers who are going to use roads as top priority in choosing their route to my intended recipient. For the records, I am playing with orders by courier at Bde level. This means Buford sends message to his 2 Cav subordinates and then they will act accordingly. The problem of couriers and especially at this level is that they basically take the road ahead of me where the CSA troops are coming from just to reach a guy who's no farther than 300 yds and in plain sight on either of my sides at the objective.

At this difficulty level you have no idea whether or not the courier has been intercepted and whether or not the recipient officer has received his orders. This is perfectly legit... Buford didn't have the read/receive notifications and he certainly didn't use MS Outlook 2007. However this problem with courier pathing is pretty serious because the way it is modelled it takes triple time and triple risk. I mean, the guy is in plain sight and there's nobody between the courier and him... yet the courier goes ahead just to use the road but there is an entire enemy division on that road and it IS in plain sight too.

I hope this can be addressed because it definitely spoils the courier ordering system (which is a cherry for me as I love it so much).

AI subordinate selection and ordering: As an example of the difficulties of manouvering, I found myself with an unidentified cavalry rgt in the woods just left of the objective (West South West). Forget for the moment the fact that if i want to tell that bde to advance and flank the guys who are fighting against me face to face I have to send a courier (or TC but TC is not the point of my analisys) with the aforementioned problem...

The best way to select this unit would be to click on its regimental flag, however this flag is not visible because of the woods. My only option is to look for its name in the minimap and once I do I know this unit's name. Now I can either look for it with the cursor keys (which is rather easy at the DIV combat level) or I can toggle the foliage so I can see its flag hence I can select it. I take this second approach but of course I don't like it.
This unit is in plain sight, so it should be on the minimap but I should also be able to select it from the minimap itself (It's useless to click on it to SEE it because I have visibility restrictions!) and I should also be able to give this unit orders from the minimap screen because there are times I need to send units to places I can't see from my current location.

At least the positive side of fighting a DIV sized combat is the fact you can see where your BDE commanders are going and they carry along the flags of their RGT. When you do this with the CORPS commander, you see the DIV generals' flags and their BDE generals but NOT the RGT flags.

RGT sizes: there's no way to resize the lines of a RGT and because of their spacing, CAV rgts are really huge entities on the battlefield. Very clumsy and their line is too long indeed. I think the spacing between the sprites is excessive both when the unit is mounted and when it is dismounted. If you consider the unit starts shooting only when it's fully wheeled and that I plan to mod these manouvers to be made slower this is going to be trouble. I would really love to have a spacing setting to be moddable for good solution of this problem.

Oblique/Sidestep: Take notes on the fact that these orders really work when unit is standing still. If the unit is moving the order won't be taken.

Move orders: As already said, at this courier level giving orders is a mess. I'd say we need a ghost set of flags on the ground and a SEND button so we can build the move/strat order the way and place we want with the exact facing and then by clicking this SEND button we can send only one courier. Be advised, things being what they are now, to move a BDE you must select the commander, double click on the ground (with the problems I listed) then GUESS the facing (because you can't see the ghost flag or the arrow), then hit the formation button and then eventually hit the use roads (AND/OR the quick step button).

E A C H of these orders is carried away by a single courier. You can imagine how crazy this is, especially with the current pathing of these couriers so I really think the SEND button and a single courier with the ghost flags and arrows would solve this problem once and for good. Remember, you have no idea of where you are moving troops in the meanwhile so if something goes wrong, if you click something wrong, you won't know but when you do, you'll need to send 20 more couriers for a single order basically... I hope this is addressed and for the moment that's all because it's time to play again.

And in here again between a game and the other. I spotted another problem...

Arty manual targeting/ units attaching: At the bde courier level, it is virtually impossible to use these 2 functions. When you click on the unit and give either of these orders, your cursor will only change to give you the option AFTER the courier has arrived. Since this usually takes a while and you can't just sit there doing nothing in the meanwhile, neither of those functions can really be used with profit. The problem is that the order is still open while you are playing and gets carried out only after the courier is arrived. Clicking here and there you either lose the cursor (which resumes to normal) or you even risk to attach a unit to the wrong command or, in the case of arty manual targeting, you are forced to send the order again to target the same regiment which in the meanwhile God knows where it's gone. It's yet again another issue that the SEND button would solve (order placed before a single courier is sent and executed only after the courier has arrived).

I just won the DIV tutorial again and lost the 1st Scenario (again). Loved it in both cases.

And the tests go on. Today I am trying to understand to what degree of delay the orders are being carried out in the DIV tutorial which is a good compromise in unit numbers and it's got artillery.

The points I highlighted are starting to be numerous so I have to screen out the things I already pointed out to focus on new things. I can confirm with absolute certainty for the moment that the strategic orders only work for bde generals but if issued to DIV generals they won't be passed on. There also seems to be the STRICT NEED to extend the courier servicing to ALL generals and not just to the player. I want to see the DIV general send the courier to the BDE generals and the BDE generals send couriers to each RGT in turn. When my general is giving a direct order to a RGT I see the courier so I want to see the couriers going from BDE general to regiments as well because that's the way it MUST work.

Unfortunately it appears that I ve discovered a new problem with Garney (I think that's his name?) who is the arty BDE leader of the DIV tutorial. We already know this artillery hits 0 for the whole battle. Too bad, but the new problem I found is that I was totally unable to move the leader and his guns from the spot he was. It appears that even if I TC this leader I can't make him move the guns and that's pretty bad. It looks like he's framed by some strategic order I didn't give him, I am going to try again making sure his strat orders are on NONE because they surely affect the mobility of leaders. What happens is that I give him an order to move, then to form line then to use roads but he simply doesn't and I don't understand why. I tried the WHOLE battle to move him and I failed.

There's another problem I verified, pointed out by another user: AI not using ground cover. This is unfortunately true both for the allied and for the enemy AI and it is also erupting into another problem to tackle: Details level.

I can move general Early around the field and manouver single regiments under cover using key 7. My regiments will do it and this means a much easier slaughter on the enemy. Considering I believe all muskets to be underpowered, once these are modded into more realistic kill values, the AI will be trounced so the logics here must improve or the game will suffer a big setback when the time comes.

The erupting problem with the ground cover is related to the graphic detail level. When the graphics are set on low, fences for example are not shown. This means the player has no idea of where the cover is but the cover is there and he can still use the 7 key to move the regiments in cover. Things here are very simple: ground cover must be linked to the graphic detail level. If fences are not shown, they must NOT be in the game and there must NOT be cover there otherwise we play with ghosts and when and IF the AI is patched to use cover, an AI that uses cover where the player CANT see cover is really an abominion. The ground cover bonus must be disabled if the detail level hides such cover. I can see no alternative to keep things balanced between players and AI.

There are no further issues to bring forth. The DIV tutorial shows with relative certainty that BDE commanders follow both the MOVE and STRATEGIC orders correctly moving themselves AND their troops in good fashion. It happens often with a strong delay but it DOES happen and this is very very good. I'm going to try to understand why I had this move problem with the arty BDE commander in DIV tutorial and will report later.

All right, there's no way to move the Arty BDE from the spot it is in and, considering the Union is coming and this arty can't hit anything it means you either send your INF there or the whole unit will be lost. It's not a big loss but it does affect your score by a lot.

I do not really understand why this happens, there could be a scripted behavior but the Arty BDE general simply doesn't take my orders. I made sure triple checking the minimap and I always see the green star exactly where the arty batteries are. He won't move them and he will insist in remaining in that spot. At this point I don't know how I managed to move him and his guns in the previous tests. Probably Arty logics need to be tweaked so that they do not have as priority to fire. Considering their very long engagement ranges they will always have units in tgt range but this also means they might never be able to move at all. This is a very serious issue as well.

GShock wrote:

The erupting problem with the ground cover is related to the graphic detail level. When the graphics are set on low, fences for example are not shown. This means the player has no idea of where the cover is but the cover is there and he can still use the 7 key to move the regiments in cover. Things here are very simple: ground cover must be linked to the graphic detail level. If fences are not shown, they must NOT be in the game and there must NOT be cover there otherwise we play with ghosts and when and IF the AI is patched to use cover, an AI that uses cover where the player CANT see cover is really an abominion. The ground cover bonus must be disabled if the detail level hides such cover. I can see no alternative to keep things balanced between players and AI.

Ground cover is linked to the graphic detail level for fences. There shouldn't be a defensive bonus if the fences are disabled by the detail setting.

Dukes I'd be really happy if you could take care of confirming/disconfirming the following:

1) Ground cover applicable/not applicable according to detail level.
2) Inability to move artillery BDEs because they prioritize shooting.
3) Inability to pursue strategic orders by DIV generals.
4) Total inefficiency of some kinds of artillery in some/all scenarios/tutorials.

An *official* statement such as: aware of the problem, added to "to do list" would be really candy!

1. I believe that the only ground cover that is lost on detail level is when you do not show the fences, then we lose the fence bonus. I do not think any other cover is discarded.

Did you check to confirm 2) 3) and 4)?
Is it possible it's me doing something wrong? I am sure I moved that arty without any problem before switching to bde courier system. Problem might be there.

Our test team has not had the issues with the arty that you have stated. We are discussing it, but they have been playing with it a long time and although we did many changes, they are happy with the outcome. We will continue to look into the issues that you raise, but this is core to our design and effects a ton of scenarios that were coded with the current model.