Bivoj_MatrixForum
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Joined: 12/13/2010
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After finishing first few small custom scenarios to get into the game (which was quite fun, but they were simple scenarios with a few units on rather simple terrain), I jumped into the pre-made scenarios provided by the game.
I tried "Who Will Stop the Rain" first (third scenario), where you have a column of Bundeswehr units parallel with major river and only few crossings (bridge on north, where most of your units start and 2 bridges + frod? at south, where your recon units starts). I gave orders to whole platoons - most of the units were ordered to cross the northern bridge and one platoon was ordered to go south and join the recon platoon.
What happened was a total mess - as the first APC entered at the bridge, the tile become "blocked" and other units (instead of waiting in a "traffic jam") planned their path via southern bridges and the frod; even after the bridge was abandoned by the first unit, the other units stubbornly continued marching south, making their path longer and more dangerous.
So the units were completely disordered, disobeying any formation in total mess. I just quit the scenario.
Maybe it is just a bad scenario, so I tried the Winter Desolation (second scenario), where most of your force starts isolated north behind a river with two bridges. Again - I gave orders to platoons to cross the river and assemble on the other bank to counterattack the soviets.
It was the same as in the previous scenario - as the first two APCs "blocked" the bridge, the rest just cancelled all orders and I received a notice, that they "Cannot reach the destination" (or similar excuse), so the platoon was "split" - first unit (a squad in APC) on the other bank, following all pre-arranged orders, but the rest of the platoon (2 squads in APCs) just sitting idle even after the bridge was cleared and open. Horrible.
I tried the mission again, fiddling with every single squad, babysitting it to get it across the bloody bridges and re-assemble the platoons on the other bank. I spent more than 30mins of this horrible fiddling without any feel of actually commanding a battalion of competent soldiers.
OK - this game cannot simulate rivers (and I may avoid any scenario with major river in future), but as I spent some time and effort, I will now execute the counterattack south. I gave orders to (now re-established) platoons and... horrible again.
It is not only rivers: as several platoons wanted to find a way through the difficult terrain of forests in Finland, it become very similar to the "bridge" issue. The first units "blocked" the viable roads through heavy forests and the poor late-comers arranged a path beyond my imagination. Instead of expected traffic jam, where units would be going slow and waiting for a clear path, they try to get into the waypoint via any other long/difficult/dangerous way possible, acting like retards.
This game cannot handle river crossing on platoon level, it cannot handle traffic jams in difficult terrain on platoon level and it forces you to do squad level fiddling.
I know, that it may be difficult to implement proper AI and pathfinding, but when it is so half-finished:
Why the very first pre-made scenarios include river crossing?
Why there is a map of high-terrain-density Finlad? Even Germany has too difficult terrain for this game...
The game as-is would work very well on low-terrain-density theatres like Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Sinai etc.
Also, I hate the design decision to have the "tiles" and limit the number of units per tile to just 1. Increasing the limit to at least 2 would make it little bit easier (for example unloading infantry from transport is pain as well), while getting rid of the tiles would be best.
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First impressions - disappointment - 
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