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Breach operations scripting questions


Maj.Hans

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Out of curiosity, Sam, have you been able to beat that scenario yet?  If nobody has been able to win maybe I made it too hard...

 

I was able to "win", but of course, the problem is that when I planned "Red"'s actions and defense I was trying to plan against "Blue"...But I am also Blue...So I'm trying to plan against myself and then BLAAARRGHH!

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2 minutes ago, Ssnake said:

So, you lost ... as Red.

 

"What a strange game. The only winning move is not to play." ;)

 

No, it's more like this...


I'm concerned that when I made Red difficult for myself to beat, I made it too strong for others to beat.  I want people who download and play that scenario to be able to beat it.

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52 minutes ago, Volcano said:

AFAIK, this should be fixed now for the next update.

 

Grand job. I rarely get a solid play session, so the ability to save and resume is handy.

 

21 hours ago, Maj.Hans said:

Out of curiosity, Sam, have you been able to beat that scenario yet?  If nobody has been able to win maybe I made it too hard...

 

I've had a few attempts at it now, and each time I'm learning a way to improve my approach, so I'm finding it very valuable. It has a nice mix of units, and a large size, but I can just about keep up with all the units, maybe. I'll keep at it and let you know if I ever get there...

 

I am by no means a good measure tho, I have no military background. I'm still learning the map symbols and capabilities of much of the kit. Mostly I need to learn how to get the AI units to not kill themselves too :/ I'm having a hell of a job getting a good breach. The AI seems intent on not even trying, or trying and then hitting mines anyway, or my favourite yet, not trying to breach, and drowning in the nearby water feature while skirting the edge of the minefield ><

 

It's a great scenario that I think will keep me entertain for a good while, so many thanks for making it B|

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1 hour ago, samtheeagle said:

 

I am by no means a good measure tho, I have no military background. I'm still learning the map symbols and capabilities of much of the kit. Mostly I need to learn how to get the AI units to not kill themselves too :/ I'm having a hell of a job getting a good breach. The AI seems intent on not even trying, or trying and then hitting mines anyway, or my favourite yet, not trying to breach, and drowning in the nearby water feature while skirting the edge of the minefield ><

 

It's a great scenario that I think will keep me entertain for a good while, so many thanks for making it B|

 

A few tips on that breech process then...

 

1. YOU have thermal sights, Red does not.  You have a royal ass ton of artillery support.  Use HE/ICM in combination with smoke (Or HE-Smoke Mix) to pound them to dust and blind them while you breech.

 

2. You can try a conventional MICLIC, Plow, Mark breech, or try skipping straight to plow and mark.

 

3. Once you have a marked breech, give units orders to "March", in "Column" formation, with "Close" spacing, and move them as far through as you can before deploying them into other formations to secure the area and fight off any infantry still hiding in crevices.  Get your tanks through in force first, then APCs.  Once you're through in force get ready to start using your recovery assets to drag damaged vehicles to the immediate eastern side of the breech to be repaired and refueled and sent back into the fight.

 

 

You might try running it as a coop with a dedicated artillery spotter, or someone to help manage some of the units as a team.

Edited by Maj.Hans
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Thanks for the tips :)

 

(1) I was aware of the thermals advantage, so I've been doing my best to keep the smoke screen up to milk that.

 

(2) I've tried the MICLIC several times... I set a breach path for it, and it often fires off the charges at an odd angle from what I requested. It sometimes manages to traverse the breach, sometimes not. Ploughing has been better, tho generally I've driven that unit myself to get it "just right". 

 

(3) Marking the breach is the real issue I'm having... I breach, and I've got an ENG M113 (I think) unit there, I ask it to "breach" afterwards. Is that the wrong way of doing it? The marker flags aren't getting placed, so I figured I must be doing it wrong. I knocked up a quick test in the mission editor and managed to breach and mark using the same approach, but I'm getting no joy when attempting this mission. <shrug/> I've even let the INF use the metal detectors, but boy will that take a loooong time!

 

As and when I get time I'll keep plugging away, I have a plan which I think should work, but I'm having errrr "fun" getting the units to execute it quite how I'd like it to happen :P 

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4 hours ago, Gibsonm said:

If you have a look in the Guide I wrote, there's a section devoted to breaching.

 

Pages 55 - 61 of "Specialist Tutorial.pdf" in the Docs folder.

 

Thanks Gibsonm, I've already read your excellent docs, but I shall certainly revisit them to make sure I'm not making a daft error.

 

3 hours ago, Ssnake said:

Breaching ops are definitely at the upper end of tactical task complexity in SB Pro, particularly for a single player. Things going mildly wrong are probably the norm for that constellation. In any case, from what you describe you don't seem to be making gross errors. It probably boils down more to a question of fine tuning and, possibly, working around the one or other quirk in the behavior of computer-controlled units in SB Pro.

 

A possible simplification would be to just send a MICLIC first and then a Wisent AEV; the Wisent with plow will proof and mark the lane in a single pass. That said, sending an M113/Eng on a breach route through an already cleared lane should definitely make it place the flags to mark the lane. If it doesn't, it'd be a bug. Let us know.

 

That was my thinking too. I probably just need to adjust the spacing / routes / timing of things. I don't believe it to be a bug, as I knocked up a breaching test in the mission editor which ran just fine.

 

Thanks for the input.

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I'll be giving the original scenario file an additional play-through myself to look for bugs, and if I am satisfied that it's bug-free, I'll be releasing some versions late next week meant to make it a little easier for Blue...

 

I'll probably add the new Wisent AEV with plow so a single player has the option to just plow and proof in one go, offer up one or two versions featuring better but still era appropriate equipment for Blue (IPM1s, M1A1s), and a third version meant mostly to allow Blue to practice his tactics with very modern equipment on his side (M1A2 SEP, modern Leo2s, M113/Marders replaced with M2s and ULANs, etc.)

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8 hours ago, Maj.Hans said:

I'll probably add the new Wisent AEV with plow so a single player has the option to just plow and proof in one go ...

 

???

 

That isn't "proving".

 

The 2nd vehicle confirms the clearance and likely gets anything the first one misses.

 

One pass is certainly faster but it doesn't "prove" it - even if it puts down flags.

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I'm making progress! I managed a nice clean breach with a plough, and then the engineer marked it out for me, no probs. I then did a bit of experimenting with Assault routes, as I have had issues with units not managing to cross the breach. Planning an Assault route across the breach seemed to work just fine. Initially I set the formation of the route to column, which was fine, and then I risked one of my units by just plotting an Assault route to see what they did. And what they did was form a nice column to cross the breach, without any special input required.

 

I might go back and retest this, but I think maybe the problem I was having was down to having a breach route that the primary unit went through to clear, and then the proving unit, and then I told the other units to cross by routing them to the exact same breach route. They didn't seem to like that. I often had them queuing up, and refusing to cross a proven breach.

 

Now I need to figure out the best way to deal with those pesky infantry positions, the AI seems to utterly ignore enemy bunkers, and just gets chewed up if I don't take over manually to gun the bunkers to dust.

 

Still providing me with plenty of entertainment Maj.Hans! :D

Edited by samtheeagle
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That said, sending an M113/Eng on a breach route through an already cleared lane should definitely make it place the flags to mark the lane. If it doesn't, it'd be a bug. Let us know.

 

To be efficient, the M113/eng has to be send on the same breach route than the plug or roller.

But it does not cross and mark the breach lane if the plug or roller has not reach the end of the breach route (the route if not considered safe and markable until the breaching unit has reach the end waypoint of the breach route.)

 

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AFAIK, in Pro PE right now it is safe to sent a plow tank through straight away without bothering to MICLIC the lane.

This means that if you want to, you can just plow it and mark it.

 

In reality this method isn't safe for several reasons.  But I suppose in an era where some casualties were considered acceptable, it could have been done.  Probably the best way to plow and go would be with several plows in an arrowhead shape to widen the lane, remembering that each additional plow can only widen it by a bit less than a 1/2 width...

 

 

 

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3 hours ago, CharlieB said:

Whats the scenario for this one - might have a go tonight...

 

Counter Stroke at Hunfeld

1. Get ready to face some serious resistance

2. Get ready to use your repair and recovery assets to scrape up every last tank you can

3. Bring a friend and make it his sole job to call artillery, because it's going to be your biggest force multiplier and you have tons of it.

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6 hours ago, Maj.Hans said:

AFAIK, in Pro PE right now it is safe to sent a plow tank through straight away without bothering to MICLIC the lane.

This means that if you want to, you can just plow it and mark it.

 

In reality this method isn't safe for several reasons.  But I suppose in an era where some casualties were considered acceptable, it could have been done.  Probably the best way to plow and go would be with several plows in an arrowhead shape to widen the lane, remembering that each additional plow can only widen it by a bit less than a 1/2 width...

 

Well at the moment a plough can miss something - but up to you. Speed vs risk trade off.

 

Also the AI wont support multiple breaches close together - basically one AI controlled breach per minefield. If you want multiple lanes you need several small minefields close together (break the one big section up) and have one lane per smaller minefield.

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36 minutes ago, Gibsonm said:

 

Well at the moment a plough can miss something - but up to you. Speed vs risk trade off.

 

Also the AI wont support multiple breaches close together - basically one AI controlled breach per minefield. If you want multiple lanes you need several small minefields close together (break the one big section up) and have one lane per smaller minefield.

 

I wasnt suggesting multiple breaches, but rather one single breach widened with multiple plow passes.

 

I realize the AI won't support that but I suggest that as more of an "IRL" thing.  I also understand that the lanes need maintenance.  If the lane was plowed and it resulted in ridges on each side of the lane, mines can (and have at least once during Desert Storm) slide down the side and damage vehicles.

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Good scenario.  I made the school boy error of forgetting the recover asset at the breaching site and the lane got clogged.  The actual breech was messy but successful.  Break out was messy and unsuccessful.

 

Look forward to trying this one again.

 

Mine field is in a pig of a position.

 

I also think that 5 Btys might be a touch generous...

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3 hours ago, CharlieB said:

Good scenario.  I made the school boy error of forgetting the recover asset at the breaching site and the lane got clogged.  The actual breech was messy but successful.  Break out was messy and unsuccessful.

 

Look forward to trying this one again.

 

Mine field is in a pig of a position.

 

I also think that 5 Btys might be a touch generous...

 

The minefield is supposed to have been thrown down by NATO in a spot to stop the Reds from mobbing through.  Must work both ways huh?

 

Yes, you have a whole royal ton of artillery, but this is a tricky operation.  You're also short on actual forces to be making an attack...Think of it as an equalizer.

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