Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: Legun

Hi all, Friends!
I'm back after some months of heavy engagement on other fronts. I'm glad to see new and new wishes on the list. Thanks for care for the enterprice, Bob. I would like to add one more point to the list:
11.24. Support different unit graphics for each side (you can't see type of infantry or colour of formation of enemy units). Just make possibility to add next graphic file to a scenario graphic directory: f.e. units_1_grey_1_side2.bmp. The file is used instead of units_1_grey_1.bmp when the P2 is making his turn.

Additionally, I would like to make a long-ego planned step. We could ask Ralph (Let Him Life Forever) if he could tell us his "price" of each of the points (primary and secondary only) - an approximated amount of time needed to implement such change. Next we could ask about time projected for next patch. Then we could ask all members of TOAW community for they preferences. Each one could select points he would like to "buy" for next patch. If we add such individual selections we could create a ranking of demands, taking into account "prices" of specifical wishes.

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ORIGINAL: Karri

Or, we could threathen to crush his kneecaps if he doesn't do everything.

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ORIGINAL: Legun

Hi all, Friends!
I'm back after some months of heavy engagement on other fronts. I'm glad to see new and new wishes on the list. Thanks for care for the enterprice, Bob.

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I would like to add one more point to the list:
11.24. Support different unit graphics for each side (you can't see type of infantry or colour of formation of enemy units). Just make possibility to add next graphic file to a scenario graphic directory: f.e. units_1_grey_1_side2.bmp. The file is used instead of units_1_grey_1.bmp when the P2 is making his turn.

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Additionally, I would like to make a long-ego planned step. We could ask Ralph (Let Him Live Forever) if he could tell us his "price" of each of the points (primary and secondary only) - an approximated amount of time needed to implement such change. Next we could ask about time projected for next patch.

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

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Additionally, I would like to make a long-ego planned step. We could ask Ralph (Let Him Live Forever) if he could tell us his "price" of each of the points (primary and secondary only) - an approximated amount of time needed to implement such change. Next we could ask about time projected for next patch.

I still say that's a colossal waste of Ralph's time. Let's keep him making code changes.

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ORIGINAL: Legun

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

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Additionally, I would like to make a long-ego planned step. We could ask Ralph (Let Him Live Forever) if he could tell us his "price" of each of the points (primary and secondary only) - an approximated amount of time needed to implement such change. Next we could ask about time projected for next patch.

I still say that's a colossal waste of Ralph's time. Let's keep him making code changes.

Why colossal? I was thinking about a really rough approximation - one hour rather than one day, and never more than one day. I'm sure that such poll could allow to select points to future improvements rationally. We could make a simpler poll, without approximated weight of specific proposition. It could be really less useful. If Ralph refuses cooperation, we could try a group wisdom. There could be two steps - at the first one each of participants should try to estimate "cost" of such improvement. Next we could add these estimations and count average values. Next we could "buy" them to create the evaluated wish list. There is a probability, that each one participant could underestimate cost of his favorite wishes, but it's much more better way, I think.

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ORIGINAL: Legun

This is one year old discussion about the problem.

http://www.tdg.nu/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1166276725/30

Ralph's declarations leave no doubt - the question is if they are still valid. Hello, Ralph! Are you there?

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
Now, Jarek, you know the list was much smaller then.

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay
I don't see why such estimates are even desirable, much less necessary. Wouldn't a pure popularity measure be more useful to the team than a confusing amalgamation of popularity and dubious cost estimates? Why don't we just do a "top ten" or similar?

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ORIGINAL: Legun
Cost is very important parameter of a decision process, isn't it?
My "top ten" places for holidays:
- New Zealand
- Tobago
- Thailand
- Hawai
- Italy
...

My present holiday plans:
- Italy
- Rumania
- Slovakia
...

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
1. A volume-based supply system

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2. A naval warfare engine that more accurately reflects the dynamics of naval warfare and its interaction with air war. This should not be confused with the wishes for more detailed warship types, etc -- not a need I feel particularly acutely.

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3. The possibility of having more than one EEV track. Like, ten tracks would be nice.

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4. The possibility of having editable terrain. One often has well-roaded woods, for example. They definitely should have the combat bonus -- but there's no reason that they should slow movement.

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5. 'Super' clear terrain. The current OPART clear terrain nicely simulates the open bits of Western Europe. It doesn't do justice to areas like the Don Steppe and other utterly flat surfaces that can render unentrenched infantry almost helpless in the face of armor.

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6. The ability to remove the hex conversion penalty in the editor.

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7. More severe penalties for artillery and mechanized units that have run out of supply.

8. More severe penalties for units that have run out of supply and are attempting to attack

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9. Deal with the mouse unit problem by making the supply and readiness drain upon defending units proportional to the strength of the attacking force.

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10. Deal with the mouse unit problem by permitting encircled units to 'attack' all surrounding stacks -- not just those participating in the attack.

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11. Deal with the mouse unit problem by causing units falling below a certain strength of active equipment to automatically RBC if attacked. These strength should be proportional to the hex size, and if possible be an editable value.

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12. Restore the real possibility of early turn ending. Again, ideally this should be an editable value. In theory it is now, but the theory doesn't seem to work.

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Of course, this reopens the can of worms about what to do about those minor attacks that risk shutting down the offensive all along the Eastern Front. Not make the attacks? It'd be good to work out some entirely new mechanism -- like the turn ends for all the units in the attacking unit's formation?

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13. A correction of the currently inflated effectiveness of AA. As usual, having an editable coefficient would be nice.

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14. Better still, a correction in the way AA operates. It's primary effect should be to diminish the effectiveness of strikes -- not shoot down planes.

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15. A similar mechanism might be considered for air to air combat. An intercepted raid may not lose a lot of planes -- but the mere fact of it being opposed will substantially reduce its effectiveness. This -- parenthetically -- would also make players handle their fighters more realistically, as the penalties for withdrawing them from combat entirely would be quite severe. If at all possible, you'd always want at least a few fighters intercepting any close support mission.

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16. A change in the way interdiction strikes work. They should should be heavily weighted
so as to hit units that are attempting to use the greater part of their movement allowance. In other words, you can crawl along at about half speed in reasonable security. Try barreling along full speed in march order and you will get pounded.

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17. The addition of another catagory for unit quality so that it becomes possible to discriminate among all the characteristics currently lumped into 'proficiency.' This is a real can of worms, and one could certainly argue for more than one additional value -- but for starters, how about 'will to fight' and an actual 'proficiency' value in place of the current 'proficiency' value? Units with a low 'will to fight' would tend act as if their loss setting was considerably lower than it was -- like, if you're the Axis at El Alamein in 1942 or the Germans in the last part of 1918 you can pick wahtever loss setting you like -- your 1942 Italians or 1918 Germans are still very likely to retreat/quickly break off attacks. They'll still have a good enough combat value -- but they won't do well under heavy pressure. Conversely, your basic Japanese unit might have a rather modest actual proficiency value but a very high 'will to fight' number.

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...and of course other things I haven't remembered. I'm sure most of the above is already in the list, but not necessarily in the form I would advocate -- and the devil is in the details.

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
1. A volume-based supply system

5.15 or possibly 5.13, depending on what you mean.

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2. A naval warfare engine that more accurately reflects the dynamics of naval warfare and its interaction with air war. This should not be confused with the wishes for more detailed warship types, etc -- not a need I feel particularly acutely.

Sorry, but that counts as multiple wishes. Most of section 9.

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3. The possibility of having more than one EEV track. Like, ten tracks would be nice.

That actually counts as less than one wish: 11.1.11

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4. The possibility of having editable terrain. One often has well-roaded woods, for example. They definitely should have the combat bonus -- but there's no reason that they should slow movement.

2.23

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5. 'Super' clear terrain. The current OPART clear terrain nicely simulates the open bits of Western Europe. It doesn't do justice to areas like the Don Steppe and other utterly flat surfaces that can render unentrenched infantry almost helpless in the face of armor.

2.6, sort of. I'll add that characteristic next time.

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6. The ability to remove the hex conversion penalty in the editor.

6.7

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7. More severe penalties for artillery and mechanized units that have run out of supply.

8. More severe penalties for units that have run out of supply and are attempting to attack

Probably about the same as 5.10 Exhausted Units

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9. Deal with the mouse unit problem by making the supply and readiness drain upon defending units proportional to the strength of the attacking force.

5.2

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10. Deal with the mouse unit problem by permitting encircled units to 'attack' all surrounding stacks -- not just those participating in the attack.

7.19 or 7.20

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11. Deal with the mouse unit problem by causing units falling below a certain strength of active equipment to automatically RBC if attacked. These strength should be proportional to the hex size, and if possible be an editable value.

?? Not in the list. This is basically RBC as it now stands, just making it automatic. Personally, I don't like the word "automatic" when applied to combat.

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12. Restore the real possibility of early turn ending. Again, ideally this should be an editable value. In theory it is now, but the theory doesn't seem to work.

1.9

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Of course, this reopens the can of worms about what to do about those minor attacks that risk shutting down the offensive all along the Eastern Front. Not make the attacks? It'd be good to work out some entirely new mechanism -- like the turn ends for all the units in the attacking unit's formation?

See 1.15 as a possibility.

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13. A correction of the currently inflated effectiveness of AA. As usual, having an editable coefficient would be nice.

8.13 - first part done already (just not made available to the public yet).

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14. Better still, a correction in the way AA operates. It's primary effect should be to diminish the effectiveness of strikes -- not shoot down planes.

8.12

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15. A similar mechanism might be considered for air to air combat. An intercepted raid may not lose a lot of planes -- but the mere fact of it being opposed will substantially reduce its effectiveness. This -- parenthetically -- would also make players handle their fighters more realistically, as the penalties for withdrawing them from combat entirely would be quite severe. If at all possible, you'd always want at least a few fighters intercepting any close support mission.

Not in the list. And I'm not sure if it isn't already the case.

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16. A change in the way interdiction strikes work. They should should be heavily weighted
so as to hit units that are attempting to use the greater part of their movement allowance. In other words, you can crawl along at about half speed in reasonable security. Try barreling along full speed in march order and you will get pounded.

Not in the list. Of course, using only half your MPs cuts your risk of interdiction in half now. Why is a greater effect justified? Now, one thing that would be useful would be to calculate when it is night for interdiction purposes - if this isn't already the case.

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17. The addition of another catagory for unit quality so that it becomes possible to discriminate among all the characteristics currently lumped into 'proficiency.' This is a real can of worms, and one could certainly argue for more than one additional value -- but for starters, how about 'will to fight' and an actual 'proficiency' value in place of the current 'proficiency' value? Units with a low 'will to fight' would tend act as if their loss setting was considerably lower than it was -- like, if you're the Axis at El Alamein in 1942 or the Germans in the last part of 1918 you can pick wahtever loss setting you like -- your 1942 Italians or 1918 Germans are still very likely to retreat/quickly break off attacks. They'll still have a good enough combat value -- but they won't do well under heavy pressure. Conversely, your basic Japanese unit might have a rather modest actual proficiency value but a very high 'will to fight' number.

7.16

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...and of course other things I haven't remembered. I'm sure most of the above is already in the list, but not necessarily in the form I would advocate -- and the devil is in the details.

Tell me again your excuse for not viewing the list. Even if you don't want to download the free Word reader, it can still be viewed (just without all the formating) in WordPad.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

As with my other wishes, I wouldn't be surprised if this is already on there, but I really think there should be separate 'truck' units that can pick up and carry units.

OPART tends to assume either that a unit has organic transportation, or that it has no access to trucks at all. Actually, my readings are convincing me that neither one was the norm (pun not intended).

Italians, Britons, Germans, Japanese -- all spent most of the war without enough trucks to haul all of their infantry all the time. Rather, there were so many trucks, and these could be shifted around to move this or that unit to some position where it would thereafter be limited to shank's mare. The trucks, meanwhile, would have gone off to perform some other function.

This was the norm -- far more than the feast or famine TOAW requires. Since the game's focus really is on World War Two, shouldn't it at least allow the possibility of reproducing this situation. Truck units that can provide a long distance strategic movement capability to otherwise foot-bound infantry?

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

As with my other wishes, I wouldn't be surprised if this is already on there, but I really think there should be separate 'truck' units that can pick up and carry units.

OPART tends to assume either that a unit has organic transportation, or that it has no access to trucks at all. Actually, my readings are convincing me that neither one was the norm (pun not intended).

Italians, Britons, Germans, Japanese -- all spent most of the war without enough trucks to haul all of their infantry all the time. Rather, there were so many trucks, and these could be shifted around to move this or that unit to some position where it would thereafter be limited to shank's mare. The trucks, meanwhile, would have gone off to perform some other function.

This was the norm -- far more than the feast or famine TOAW requires. Since the game's focus really is on World War Two, shouldn't it at least allow the possibility of reproducing this situation. Truck units that can provide a long distance strategic movement capability to otherwise foot-bound infantry?

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ORIGINAL: Legun

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

As with my other wishes, I wouldn't be surprised if this is already on there, but I really think there should be separate 'truck' units that can pick up and carry units.

OPART tends to assume either that a unit has organic transportation, or that it has no access to trucks at all. Actually, my readings are convincing me that neither one was the norm (pun not intended).

Italians, Britons, Germans, Japanese -- all spent most of the war without enough trucks to haul all of their infantry all the time. Rather, there were so many trucks, and these could be shifted around to move this or that unit to some position where it would thereafter be limited to shank's mare. The trucks, meanwhile, would have gone off to perform some other function.

This was the norm -- far more than the feast or famine TOAW requires. Since the game's focus really is on World War Two, shouldn't it at least allow the possibility of reproducing this situation. Truck units that can provide a long distance strategic movement capability to otherwise foot-bound infantry?

You could remember - we discussed the problem on TDG. There are 3 different ways: present-rail-like trucks (6.9), present-aircraft-carrier-like transport units (6.13) and one of effects of composite units 4.8.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

Another change I'll add to my 'greatest hits' list: designer-editable density levels.

I was reading further about 1918. It would appear that while OPART allows about one regiment-plus per five km hex, in 1918 attackers routinely put in at least a division, if not two, into such a frontage. Moreover, I'm talking about the actual assault wave -- not the divisions that 'pass through' and continue the assault.

They -- and they're not alone -- would probably have been horrified had they been restricted to the kind of densities TOAW will permit to be feasible.

So we need designer-editable density. Doesn't seem like it would be that hard to implement. As matters stand, I was thinking about doing a 1918 scenario -- and realizing that the first thing I would need to do would be to divide all authorized equipment by at least three. Not an impossible work-around -- but the change I've proposed would be preferable.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
It's just that I see two possible paradigms for what improvements get made and what don't.

The first is that Ralph Tricky et al carefully comb all the various 'TOAW improvement' columns for the past two years and judiciously pick out the most meritorious ideas to implement.

The second is that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. There are a hell of a lot of suggestions out there. I feel it's quite right that I single out those for which I think the need is particularly acute and reiterate the request.

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ORIGINAL: Legun

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
It's just that I see two possible paradigms for what improvements get made and what don't.

The first is that Ralph Tricky et al carefully comb all the various 'TOAW improvement' columns for the past two years and judiciously pick out the most meritorious ideas to implement.

The second is that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. There are a hell of a lot of suggestions out there. I feel it's quite right that I single out those for which I think the need is particularly acute and reiterate the request.

OK. We could use both of them. I'll try to prepare poll as well as my own favorite wishes - just like a campaign before voting.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

Another change I'll add to my 'greatest hits' list: designer-editable density levels.

I was reading further about 1918. It would appear that while OPART allows about one regiment-plus per five km hex, in 1918 attackers routinely put in at least a division, if not two, into such a frontage. Moreover, I'm talking about the actual assault wave -- not the divisions that 'pass through' and continue the assault.

They -- and they're not alone -- would probably have been horrified had they been restricted to the kind of densities TOAW will permit to be feasible.

So we need designer-editable density. Doesn't seem like it would be that hard to implement. As matters stand, I was thinking about doing a 1918 scenario -- and realizing that the first thing I would need to do would be to divide all authorized equipment by at least three. Not an impossible work-around -- but the change I've proposed would be preferable.

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ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright

Another change I'll add to my 'greatest hits' list: designer-editable density levels.

I was reading further about 1918. It would appear that while OPART allows about one regiment-plus per five km hex, in 1918 attackers routinely put in at least a division, if not two, into such a frontage. Moreover, I'm talking about the actual assault wave -- not the divisions that 'pass through' and continue the assault.

They -- and they're not alone -- would probably have been horrified had they been restricted to the kind of densities TOAW will permit to be feasible.

So we need designer-editable density. Doesn't seem like it would be that hard to implement. As matters stand, I was thinking about doing a 1918 scenario -- and realizing that the first thing I would need to do would be to divide all authorized equipment by at least three. Not an impossible work-around -- but the change I've proposed would be preferable.

Item 7.10.

It also covers the other part of the problem, which I still consider to be a bug-fix, not an enhancement: apply density penalties to unstacked units, not just stacks. WWI scenarios routinely use regiments @ 2.5km/hex, etc. So a single unit can violate the limit - but won't suffer unless it stacks with something.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
After all, you will have then eliminated one of the work-arounds that permit plausible World War One scenarios. After all, as matters stand, you can have World War One scenarios. You just can't stack.

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ORIGINAL: ColinWright
You're welcome to have a go, but perhaps fights like the one Curtis and I are waging over volume-based supply are more useful. They're not especially pleasant, but at least they do lay out some of the arguments pro and con for any given change. A poll can't do that.