Leader Bug?

[TheGrayMouser]

  CuirVHussleader.jpg (Size: 208.09 KB / Downloads: 9)

  CuirVHussarNOleader.jpg (Size: 182.88 KB / Downloads: 9)


HI, possible leader bug?

I was testing the "Getting Started Scenario" as cavalry combat seemed really odd.  ( I was playing the Moy scenario and I noted that neither myself nor the noble AI EVER won a cavalry combat versus our respective cavalry when attacking.  Its like defending cavalry had a maxim gun when on the defense.!!

So,  in this scenario I attacked a stack of 3 C quality Prussian Hussars (with a melee bonus 1) with a stack of 3 Austrian Heavies C quality, no melee bonus but they are coded as heavy so get a 25% bonus to the man count.  One can see these repective bonus' in the "effective" men of the combat odds dialogue of each stack (although the Austrians had a strange rounding...).

The Prussians are defending with a leader and one can see that they get a 20 bonus in the bottom modifier ie:  */20


When the Austrians Attack with a leader the odds modifier is expressed as -40/20
Where if you leave the leader behind its is expressed as 0/20
Should it not be 20/20?


Basically, it appears if you attack with a leader in your stack,  you appear to get a massive negative to the attack.

[Gary McClellan]

Hrms, that's a new one on me. I will say, that I'm a bit dubious about that dialogue a fair bit of the time.

Could you do me a favor and send save files of this to JTS support?

[Gary McClellan]

One thing to notice though, is that the "effective attacking force" # doesn't reflect the shown modifier, which is one of the reasons I am dubious of that dialogue at times.

[TheGrayMouser]

As far as I know, its not supposed to

There are two types of modifiers for melee combat.

One are modifiers that directly increase or decrease the # of effective men: so melee bonus attributes per unit( new with the P&S engine) 25% bonus when Heavy cavalry(and dragoons its seems) are attacking, cavalry charge multiplier, the “has no bayonets” PDT flag. There may be a few more I missed.
These are all expressed as %’s

The second type referenced in the manuals are never expressed as %’s and just called “modifiers” ie 40/20 20/0 etc. These are the leader bonus, flank/rear attack bonus, terrain modifiers, has held shot prior to melee modifiers etc etc. What they actually do, I think , Is based on a very short paragraph in all the manuals, be it Nap, Civil war EAW’s etc.

Basically the attacker causes a range band of 20-100 casualties versus the defender, and the defender causes a 40-160 range band versus the attacker! As one can see, the game engine is biased heavily toward the defender. That is why there are quite a few “attack only’ bonus type things, as , all other things being equal, you need generally twice as many effective “men” to win a combat.

Anyway, I believe these second type of modifiers , somehow, modify the end ranges of these casualty bands. I experimented with this by testing 100 man size units with absolutely no modifiers and introducing 1 modifier a time to see if I could get a pattern on the casualties caused and inflicted but I would never be able to get a sampling size large enough to really figure it out.

[geoff]

Combat resolution needs to be more verbose. We need to know the fire and melee low and high combat values. In the OP example the attacking force is 125% actual and defender is 110% despite what the modifier expression displays. I guess (comparing with PzC design) that melee high/low range values are twice as severe for the attacker and you would need to attack with at least twice as many forces to arrive at a 'fair' fight.

[TheGrayMouser]

Hrms, that's a new one on me.  I will say, that I'm a bit dubious about that dialogue a fair bit of the time.

Could you do me a favor and send save files of this to JTS support?

OK, however I don't think you can send JTS support attachments?  ( at least I didn't see the option….)

[-72-]

Hrms, that's a new one on me.  I will say, that I'm a bit dubious about that dialogue a fair bit of the time.

Could you do me a favor and send save files of this to JTS support?

OK, however I don't think you can send JTS support attachments?  ( at least I didn't see the option….)

If you get stuck the regular email address that you can put in to your email client is:  support at johntillersoftware dot com    just write it as a regular email   -I am not sure that address is listed on their support page - but that is where when you fill out the form there it goes to.

[Gary McClellan]

I think I've isolated the problem, and I'm sending the information back up the line to Rich. This will have to be addressed on John's end in the next patch (and I have zero timetable on that.)

I hate to say it, but for now, my suggestion is to not use leaders as melee leaders.

Bleh.

[Gary McClellan]

Thanks for noticing this and getting it to us. I'm a hair frustrated that this got through, but I'm glad someone was eagle eyed enough to bring it to our attention :)

[geoff]

My gut instinct is that it's the combat dialog which is bugged and probably not the leader bonus. Combat dialog reports nothing correctly ever. I pretend that all the manual rules are functioning as I presume they do because otherwise I'd rage quit at every severe loss. Would be nice if the reporting were fixed. Was a staple of the early wargame software industry to supply the user with the arithmetic so, you could have a greater sense of a quality product. New wargames just cover their terrible code with 3D fire and blood spatter effects.