When a unit flee for repair, she lost the hability to obey one second (the software immediately close the orders window). If the unit is blocked at this moment, a single ennemy MG can block her forever and make her killed.
Can we change that ? If WE say to a unit "go to repear if your are heavily damaged", we can order her other thing even when she is attacked, no ?
So much unit lost because that...
Let the fleeing unit obey...
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Watermelon
- Code contributor
- Posts: 551
- Joined: 08 Oct 2006, 09:37
Re: Let the fleeing unit obey...
the interface is very hard to use sometimes,auto-close order window is intended i think because the game gives the droid return to repair order constantly and overrides the interface it seems to me...D.Durand wrote: When a unit flee for repair, she lost the hability to obey one second (the software immediately close the orders window). If the unit is blocked at this moment, a single ennemy MG can block her forever and make her killed.
Can we change that ? If WE say to a unit "go to repear if your are heavily damaged", we can order her other thing even when she is attacked, no ?
So much unit lost because that...
tasks postponed until the trunk is relatively stable again.
Re: Let the fleeing unit obey...
actually, no. after playing this game a whole lot, i'll tell you exactly how it works (and there is no "autoclose", actually):
if you set the unit to repair when it gets down to 2/3 or 1/3 hp, or if a repair facility is not available, to retreat to hq, that unit will continue to obey orders fully until it is hit while its health is below that threshold.
in other words, if your tank is retreating because its hp is too low, you can still give it orders, and it will follow those orders until it is hit again -- the difficulty arrises in that the unit is a high priority target, and thus will get hit quite often, and that is why it will appear as though the game is deselecting the unit as often as it is selected (usually because an enemy with a very high rof is firing at it -- in the case of a machinegun, it will pretty much get hit 3-4 times a second). there is no bug associated with this problem that i've ever heard of: it works exactly as expected every time (if you know how it works). the only real way to get past this problem is to select the unit, open the options menu, and set it to "do or die" before the unit is hit again (this can be done quickly if you have a hotkey for "do or die", in which case you only have to select the unit and activate the hotkey).
my thought on why this behavior is there at all has always been that it's due to ignorance: the original programmers did not take into account the idea that if you want to do something with a retreating unit, then you're accepting the risk that it'll be destroyed. a simple fix for this: once a unit is damaged below the specified threshold, it is not only given orders to retreat, but it is also set to "do or die", so that, in the case that the player orders that unit to do something, it will not present the problems we have currently. when done, the player can always select the unit and press the repair key ('r' by default) to have it retreat once more. a not as simple solution, but one that might be prefered by some users: when a unit is set to retreat based on the above criteria, set it it to "retreat at 1/3 damage" if it was set to retreat at 2/3 damage, and set it to "do or die" if it had already been set to retreat at 1/3 damage: this would allow for a "stepping" approach so that a unit set to retreat at 2/3 damage can be recalled by the commander to be used, but will still retreat automatically if damaged enough to go into "the red", yet, can once again be used after retreating a second time, without any interruption after this point. the two algorithms are simple enough, and it would quite possibly be beneficial to have either available to the player on a unit-per-unit basis (which a global default set in the config file, perhaps), in the form of a 4th button right next to the 3 that specify the "retreat at damage" thresholds -- i've already got a decent idea for the artwork comprising that two-state button.
although slightly off topic, there is another issue with retreating units that is related: with the exception of cyborgs (which aren't very effected by this), ground units that retreat will often do so through the bulk of your army, and often has little success (if it's lucky, it might get half way through before it's destroyed). to fix this problem, either the pathing of all units in the way should attempt to "make a hole", or the retreating unit should try to find a way that doesn't involve trudging through an uncooperative crowd. the first option is probably quite harder (and will be difficult to "scale" to handle more than one retreating unit simultaneously), but is prefered, since the unit will be much safer going through a group of friendlies than it will going a seperate path alone, and, if done, the first solution could potentially have a lot of reusable code that can be applied towards automatic advanced combat manuevers and a few other things.
if you set the unit to repair when it gets down to 2/3 or 1/3 hp, or if a repair facility is not available, to retreat to hq, that unit will continue to obey orders fully until it is hit while its health is below that threshold.
in other words, if your tank is retreating because its hp is too low, you can still give it orders, and it will follow those orders until it is hit again -- the difficulty arrises in that the unit is a high priority target, and thus will get hit quite often, and that is why it will appear as though the game is deselecting the unit as often as it is selected (usually because an enemy with a very high rof is firing at it -- in the case of a machinegun, it will pretty much get hit 3-4 times a second). there is no bug associated with this problem that i've ever heard of: it works exactly as expected every time (if you know how it works). the only real way to get past this problem is to select the unit, open the options menu, and set it to "do or die" before the unit is hit again (this can be done quickly if you have a hotkey for "do or die", in which case you only have to select the unit and activate the hotkey).
my thought on why this behavior is there at all has always been that it's due to ignorance: the original programmers did not take into account the idea that if you want to do something with a retreating unit, then you're accepting the risk that it'll be destroyed. a simple fix for this: once a unit is damaged below the specified threshold, it is not only given orders to retreat, but it is also set to "do or die", so that, in the case that the player orders that unit to do something, it will not present the problems we have currently. when done, the player can always select the unit and press the repair key ('r' by default) to have it retreat once more. a not as simple solution, but one that might be prefered by some users: when a unit is set to retreat based on the above criteria, set it it to "retreat at 1/3 damage" if it was set to retreat at 2/3 damage, and set it to "do or die" if it had already been set to retreat at 1/3 damage: this would allow for a "stepping" approach so that a unit set to retreat at 2/3 damage can be recalled by the commander to be used, but will still retreat automatically if damaged enough to go into "the red", yet, can once again be used after retreating a second time, without any interruption after this point. the two algorithms are simple enough, and it would quite possibly be beneficial to have either available to the player on a unit-per-unit basis (which a global default set in the config file, perhaps), in the form of a 4th button right next to the 3 that specify the "retreat at damage" thresholds -- i've already got a decent idea for the artwork comprising that two-state button.
although slightly off topic, there is another issue with retreating units that is related: with the exception of cyborgs (which aren't very effected by this), ground units that retreat will often do so through the bulk of your army, and often has little success (if it's lucky, it might get half way through before it's destroyed). to fix this problem, either the pathing of all units in the way should attempt to "make a hole", or the retreating unit should try to find a way that doesn't involve trudging through an uncooperative crowd. the first option is probably quite harder (and will be difficult to "scale" to handle more than one retreating unit simultaneously), but is prefered, since the unit will be much safer going through a group of friendlies than it will going a seperate path alone, and, if done, the first solution could potentially have a lot of reusable code that can be applied towards automatic advanced combat manuevers and a few other things.
Re: Let the fleeing unit obey...
Thank you for your answer