Assault vs AI - too many mines ?

[serg3d]

Mine map size 97 -77
And I'm not telling that amount of mines make game impossible. It's not even difficalt to make marginal victory. I'm telling that mine-clearing game is tedious and not much fun. Look up my first post. It's just clean-clean-clean , small fight at the end, victory. No tactical depth. If you try any movmnet not along straight path made by minecleners you end up with immobilized armor. And the amount of turns not enough to make long infantry marches. If someone want insane amount of mines, my be it would be a the good idea to make option - "AI mine heavy"

[DRG]

OK, we have games being played on 100x80 maps and it looks like the assault is being played with anywhere between 5000 and 10,000 points for the attacker. If you want to see EXACTLY what the AI's doing ( with variations, the mine belts are not laid the same way twice ) all you need to do is set up that map size in a generated battle and set player 1 ( you ) points to 5000, 7500 or 10,000 ( whatever you like ) and P2 to XXX then allow AI purchase of both sides and HUMAN deploy. When you press continue you will be offered to deploy the P2 side. Press AUTO DEPLOY then take a look at the map and you will see how many mines the AI buys when it's defending against the type of assault force you are using in the campaign. The AI deploys and buys the same way in a generated battle and it does in a generated campaign.

Once you've had a look around exit the game then start up another one once again with both sides set to auto purchase and HUMAN DEPLOY then when the option to deploy is give choose AUTO DEPLOY. Look at these maps closely and observe the way the AI deploys the mines when defending against an assault with the points you have chosen and, I think you'll agree those mine belts look less formidable when viewed this way

Don

[serg3d]

I did the test, and that is not a picture I was getting in the generated campain, at least some battles. I the generated battle there was only one belt of mines, not even complete. In the generated campain there was at least five belts of mines (but may be more) - as I told mine belts were passing through victory hexes.

[desh44]

DRG
A few quick questions concerning mines. What is the percentage chance of a unit setting off a mine. when I play if there is single mine marker in a hex it almost always will kill a vehicle if each marker represents 10 mines does this mean that there are 10 of each type of mine (anti vehicle and anti personnel). Also when a mine had detonated does is the number of mines reduced in the hex. and one last question does artillery fire into a hex have a chance of detonating mines (how about FAE's or napalm)?

Thanks for any info
Tom D

[Mobhack]

desh44 said:
DRG
A few quick questions concerning mines. What is the percentage chance of a unit setting off a mine. when I play if there is single mine marker in a hex it almost always will kill a vehicle if each marker represents 10 mines does this mean that there are 10 of each type of mine (anti vehicle and anti personnel). Also when a mine had detonated does is the number of mines reduced in the hex. and one last question does artillery fire into a hex have a chance of detonating mines (how about FAE's or napalm)?

Thanks for any info
Tom D

The percentage chance of a unit setting off a mine is relatively low. It goes up considerably per hex travelled, and if the mine is undetected. Scout car 15 hexes along a road and trip over mine is usually a BOOM. Engineer unit travelling a Hex or so is usually a "detects minefield" event.

But this is basically already covered in the game manual, section on "Mines and field engineering", as is what you are otherwise asking.

Artillery fire does not clear mines, or barbed wire. Clearing mines is as per the above section in the manual.

If you are not sure about how mines work, then create a training assault scenario for yourself. Leave the AI defender with just the HQ and set the V-hexes to him and 100+ points. Leave these on one side of the map. Buy mines etc and place near your assaulters. Set turns to 40 or so. Since you built the scenario - you will know where they are. Try charging things across them, various engineering techniques etc. Quit the training scenario and if necessary, restart, or edit in the scenario generator to buy different troops, change the defensive layout etc.


Cheers
Andy

[DRG]

serg3d said:
I did the test, and that is not a picture I was getting in the generated campain, at least some battles. I the generated battle there was only one belt of mines, not even complete. In the generated campain there was at least five belts of mines (but may be more) - as I told mine belts were passing through victory hexes.

Next time you see this attach a save game and we'll look at it. If you are attacking with X number of points the AI should be buying approx the same number of mines in a generated battle or a generated campaign. However, let me clarify.... that does not mean it will for example, by 50 points worth of mines each and every time. It might be 30 one time and 80 the next then 50 the time after but you shouldn't be seeing a single belt of mines in a generated battle and five belts of them in a campaign.

As with all things in this game we need to SEE what you see. Just telling us about it doesn't help us in our investigations much

Don

[serg3d]

In this save there are no five mine belts, more like three, but still to many IMO, especially on the north

[Mobhack]

serg3d said:
In this save there are no five mine belts, more like three, but still to many IMO, especially on the north

OK - that save was very useful.

I have debugged this, and there was some extra code which kicks in during a campaign game, and this was selectiong mines as 1/50th of the assaulting player's force value. So with your almost 10K points of core, you were always going to meet 198-200 mine points when assaulting. (This bypassed all the normal AI points buy routines !

I'll fix this little buglet now.

Cheers
Andy