Visibility under various weather conditions?

[Bally]

Generals,

With this fine series, you still learn something new almost every game you play? :bow:

I just took what I thought was a calculated risk, and moved my loaded trucks into open, after first having carefully check they should be out of LOS. They were in the plain open, in front of enemy, but one hex outside the visibility range. Got blasted for it, of course! :kill:

I have also noted that at times, every once and a while, one can spot enemy units that are in no LOS of friendly units. This occurs for a turn, after which they disappear.

There's more to LOS than meets the eye? (pun intended but I am not very good with it :smoke: ). Anyways, thought I would do the right thing and to have a look at the manual. Wow.

Section 5.12 Line of sight:

Weather (Visibility) – Each scenario has a Weather condition associated with it that limits visibility anywhere from a minimum of 1 (one) hex (if conditions list “night”) to a maximum of 20 hexes (if conditions are “clear”). A scenario’s weather and visibility limits can be found by displaying the Scenario screen. Weather will not change during the course of a scenario. See the following chart for the list of possible weather conditions and the visibility limits associated with each.

During the course of a scenario where the visibility is set at 19 or below, the computer performs a random check at the beginning of each player turn to determine if the visibility will change. If it does change, it will increase or decrease by one hex to a maximum of 19 hexes and a minimum of 1 hex. At night, maximum visibility still varies, but darkness (how far the unaided eye can see) will increase, decrease, or stay the same. Darkness can vary from 1 to 3 hexes. All of these changes reflect the weather, cloud cover, and other random sighting factors that occur on the battlefield. To determine the current maximum visibility, check the status menu under scenario information or press the keyboard shortcut U to access the Unit Menu; there, current turn visibility is listed.

Weather Condition / Visibility*
Light Rain / 10-14

Bold text mine. Wow. I was not aware of this.

Is this really what happens, and could it be the computer performs the visibility die cast (between 10-14 hexes in the case I am playing under light rain) per player turn, not per game turn?

So, two questions: does the game engine really perform a visibility check as how the manual describes. It would seem so, or that would explain why I was spotted. My side has the first move per game turn, that's why I was wondering would the visibility change per player turn.

Cool feature, actually (if it does it per game turn, that is. Otherwise I do not see the logic in it?) !!!

And another question: how come you can sometimes spot an unit out of LOS, for a turn, when there is no friendly unit with a direct LOS to that hex despite of visibility range?

EDIT: Well, the manual does say: per player turn. Why per player turn, why not per game turn, as it is supposed to be a parallel six-minute period both sides play in a sequential order. A bug?

Jason, a helping hand here to shed some visibility into this issue?

Hello Battle Cat,


Changing the visibilty (according to weather or whatever reasons) can be done very easy by altering the corresponding battle file (btl. btt. bte for 'normal', H2h Hotseat, and PbeM play). You can change at any moment; per player turn, game turn, after a number of turns or whatever. 'Normal' is: after a number of gameturns since the weather will change after a certain amount of time and not every six minutes. It is up to the conditions of the acting scenario that 'prescribes' the number of visible hexes.