Scourge of War Boards

It's so hard to determine this sort of thing. Usually when something like this happens, we go through and check all the variables, which it looks like you did, then if it's still a major issue I step through it in the debugger. 80% of the time, it's working as designed and we figure out the reason, the other 20% it's some bug.

Davinci wrote:

This question pertains to the Sand-Box game, and the reason for asking is that the Massachusetts Regiments appears to keep marching forward before firing, while the other regiments stop and fire?

Personally, I hope this is working as designed. It is just this sort of unpredictable behavior that makes the game so good. My most memorable games are those where I think I know exactly what the AI is going to do and then it does something completely different and hands me my head. :S It's good to know that even at the individual regimental level there are surprises to be found.

Well, I’m not complaining, but they should work on a sort of weigh system , to determine if the advancement is logical, or practical.

This is a sort of suicidal approach when the rest of the brigade holds the line, but one regiment walks into the open trying to assault multiple regiments.

Example Photo .


davinci

on the other hand, I kind of enjoy having to deal with my subordinates' incompetence. Plus it's not like regiments never historically got lost in the fog of war or made disastrous, suicidal charges and maneuvers by accident. One of the things about this engine I like best is that decisions made by both sides aren't always optimistic, but overall the AI can still survive and recover from those blunders.

It also seems like adding another set of decisions to the already complex AI to cycle through would kill frame rate, which is already lower than it probably should be.

There's no doubt that the AI in the game is mental. It runs too often because in some cases it has too. But if I had the time to really nail down and break it apart into the required sections, I'm sure that I could make it even better. But there is randomness in the game and I never want to lose that. It makes it much more realistic, rather than an RTS where you know exactly what's going to happen.

Hey, did you ever finish the school that you were attending, or has my mind gone off into the woods again?
I thought that you mentioned something to that effect on the other forum!

Back-on-topic !

Son of an Irish Noble wrote:

Plus it's not like regiments never historically got lost in the fog of war or made disastrous, suicidal charges and maneuvers by accident.

Yeah, that’s true, but I really did want to know if any of the regiments had any special programming, that we were not aware of!

You know something like the 20th Maine – being able to endure enemy fire longer than say another regiment with equal attributes.

Son of an Irish Noble wrote:

It also seems like adding another set of decisions to the already complex AI to cycle through would kill frame rate, which is already lower than it probably should be.

I’m sure that this will get better when Norb finds the time to go back over the game, without having to deal with all of the Patch work, and etc…

davinci

Davinci wrote:

Yeah, that’s true, but I really did want to know if any of the regiments had any special programming, that we were not aware of!

You know something like the 20th Maine – being able to endure enemy fire longer than say another regiment with equal attributes.


davinci[/quote]

Ah. Sorry about the misunderstanding. For my two cents, I kind of hope not outside of maybe the scenario. The great part of the little round top story was that Strong's brigade wasn't an especially noteable unit before the battle, yet still withstood the assault. I honestly wasn't too happy with Sid Myer's Gettysburg's designation of 20th Maine as "crack" troops, since they really wouldn't have been considered that before round top.

Like norb said, to an extent the randomness is one of this game's biggest strengths. Sometimes in open play elite units will get caught with their pants down and break, while inexperienced men will find themselves in a crucial spot and somehow come through. It's remarkable how the game engine recreates what was a very real mechanic of civil war combat, and to an extent all you can do is do your best to tip the odds in your favor; it's nearly impossible to actually control the field. Beyond the given stats, I really hope there isn't any unit specific special programming or anything along those lines, because it takes away from that immersion.

This is kind of preachy and it's not directed at Davinci or anyone else in particular. It's more just my view of what works in this game, spun off of Davinci's post.