The ongoing JG42 war

[Nephris]

1: M15. We cleared that town out at the start of the first mission and at the start of the second mission it was shown as in back in Red Territory. We then swept the roads and eliminated the convoys heading to that town but now its switched back to Blue. Can you explain why ?

Actually Volokolamsk (M15) wasnt conquered by any side during the past 2 missions, but contested.
I just checked the flag markers.In mission 1 the blue flag marker is on top of the red one, second mission the red flag marker is on top.I guess the next mission the blue was on top again, as there is no reason to swap the colour.
I dont know in what chronologics the flag markers get set in the mission file, at the end that is the reason that some locations seem to be conquered, as the game cant set white flag e.g.

Maybe it would be possible to read the territory.dcg in a php script, that way we got the actual strenght of each location. Same belongs to the squadron.dcg, that way we get the present numbers of planes (if interested).

the territory.dcg would look like this. It is build like:

Location side allied=troop count axis=troop count

Code: Select all

Panzer_Grp.IV_Depot 2 allied=0 axis=50
Ruba_Bridge73 2 allied=0 axis=50
Rzhev 2 allied=0 axis=50
Zubtsov 2 allied=0 axis=50
Pogoreloe-Gorodische 2 allied=0 axis=50
Shakovskaya 2 allied=0 axis=50
Volokolamsk 2 allied=0 axis=20
Chismena 1 allied=50 axis=0
Novopetrovskoye 1 allied=50 axis=0
Istra 1 allied=50 axis=0
Dedovsk_Depot 1 allied=50 axis=0
Vyazma_Depot 2 allied=0 axis=50
Mozhaysk 2 allied=0 axis=40
Dorokhovo 0 allied=30 axis=0
Vyazma 2 allied=0 axis=50
Vyazma_Airfield 2 allied=0 axis=50

2: M10 Mozhaysk. I checked this sector and I can see no Blue in the town or nearby. Escorted multiple Red convoys (including fuel trucks) to O10 where they stalled and were attacked by Stukas(minimal damage). This is at least the third mission where by convoys arrive at O10 stall and never move forward. Why

I attached some screesn of the situations at the beginning of each mission.M10 has just no german statics, thats why u dont find any. For that reason Moshaysk is very hard to defend as soon as red tanks will be able to breakthrough the bridgehead of Dorokhovo.The column movin at 1st mission to Moshaysk that got destroyed by us, was comin from O10 the sunday before, means at that time the bridge was clear for at least 1 mission or one of the train delivered it.





trains:



Imho everything correct here, I cant see any irregularities or things that couldnt be explained.

[:FI:Blue2]

Thanks for all the responses and answers, guys! Would still like an answer to this one:

- 9/8/13, 2nd mission: all Blue tanks except 1 enroute to P7 transport point were killed (so just ONE should have arrived safely at L7)
- 9/15/13, 1st mission: P7 transport point is still Red @ misssion start (as expected); however there are FOUR Blue tanks at this point now, not just 1!?

basically we try to avoid attacking AAA, as it is almost never worth what is paid for it when attacking.

Really buddy? Well I haven't looked that deeply yet, but last Sunday's mission summary shows your side killed 4 of them compared to just 2 for us - and you got 2 of those yourself!
I did about 2 hours of offline testing against AAA from both sides. Will share results later on if they seem worth sharing.

generate a DCG stock campaign and generating 10 missions in a row.

Great idea for anyone still skeptical. I'm no longer skeptical myself, though, now that I'm starting to understand troop strengths & front markers better. Now just want to learn how DCG decides whether pilots may take off at an airfield or not.

old squadron setting from mission 4.4.1942, which then fixed the problem but changed some squadron positions and numbers. We had the same problem

Thanks for explaining; don't blame you for not fixing this in the 2nd mission. My guess then is that you're expecting to have the airfields available again 2 Sundays from now. If not, we just need to know which airfields WILL be available to us, so we can request squadron movements appropriately.

maybe this is what you are looking for.

Yes, thx for the reminder! Discovered that I had already downloaded Tailspin's guide to DCG way back in March! Will be doin' a little more reading in there.

The Yukhnov is actually a T-Crossing.

OK, just as I thought. Then I believe this means Blue MUST capture Yukhnov (where our toughest troops are, apparently!) before they can advance up the road from there toward Medyn. Thanks again!
More later... need sleep now.

[:FI:Armitage]

Voted.

Send me the dcg files and I will have a look.

[Nephris]

Here some answers by Lowengrin of your questions:

1)Can you point me again to how DCG is counting losses of static planes at airfields

.
If you have three static aircraft of one type and one squadron with that type, all three will be subtracted from that squadron. However, a squadron will never fall below one plane.

2) we noticed in our running campaign certain tanks facing to the wrong site.

DCG sometimes gets ground unit the facing wrong. I just don't know why, but it does.

3) just to be sure: if a vehicle got no fuel anymore, it keeps stoping on the last location until fuel is on again?

Units without fuel will still move at the location, but they will not advance to a new one.


source

Really buddy? Well I haven't looked that deeply yet, but last Sunday's mission summary shows your side killed 4 of them compared to just 2 for us - and you got 2 of those yourself!

Those aaa will be attacked if it is a real thread when attacking a certain location, or it is part of the truck column, But making hunt on it costs just too much , like the last words of a ground attacker "...i just go in there one last time ...". The priority is 1)tanks 2)columns 3)static trucks 4)everything else what got a "colour"

[Graf Zahl]

I did about 2 hours of offline testing against AAA from both sides. Will share results later on if they seem worth sharing.

Was this the blue AAA giving you troubles?



If it was: I remember having troubles with this unmanned 20mm turrets quite some time ago. This was probably not with HSFX 6 but with Ultrapack or SAS Modactivator.
They were invincible against rockets and bombs. Not always, but very often. Obviously this was a bug. If this bug is present in HSFX, we should definitely substitute these guns. They are butt ugly anyway!

Until than, you should not bite your teeth out on these things!

So what were your testing results?


BTW...last mission I blasted an AAA at the very end of the mission because I realized I could not reach my target. It punched some holes in my Ju-88 though!

Oh and about my "blue is also working so hard" post...don't get that wrong please. I know everybody feels he is putting at least as much effort in this than the respective enemy - and that was the simple thing I wanted to say.

Cheers
GZ

[Nephris]

I did about 2 hours of offline testing against AAA from both sides. Will share results later on if they seem worth sharing.

Can u give me the coordinate of the AAA?
I would simply replace or delete it.

[Nephris]

Here some info about the plane couting problem we expiereinced several times.
I asked Paul Lowengrin who wrote the DCG, if he has any idea what can cause that.
After some testing, the mod itself is the one to blame.

As soon as a mod plane either for humans or AI got added to a mission/campaign, all "human only" squadrons
receive an "AI shadwow". As soon as stock planes throughout are used that problem disappears and everything works as intendend on DCG side.
Using a default campaign without mod planes adds no "AI shadow" to each "human only" squadron.

I will have to test if or in what manner the server commander affects the plane counts.

Just wanted to let you know, what the reason for some counting errors was/is.

[Nephris]

See ya again tomorrow evening!

[:FI:Gadje]

Not sure I'll make it back from the Highlands in time for this Sunday, if not have a good one gents.

[:FI:Blue2]

"WHAT!?!" "All leave for tomorrow has been CANCELED, you sloucher! Back to your squadron immediately, or your next plane will be a Siberian salt mining car!"

Political Officer Vladimir is on another of his tears, I see. Don't worry, Graham, we'll give him a "blanket party" if he gets out of hand. Enjoy your time in the Highlands! (Hope this is a trip for fun and not work.)

[:FI:Armitage]

(Hope this is a trip for fun and not work.)

he is visiting the HIGH lands so of course its fun

[Nephris]

Map and reports up2date.
Thx to all pilots.

[Graf Zahl]

Gentlemen!

Last fights were rough. Not because many targets were destroyed, but because fighting reached the red bases once more.
We attacked some airfields and struck them hard, especially Kubinka Airfield in the 2nd Mission. While fighter bombers took out the AAA and than provided high cover, Zerstörer Pilots such as myself attacked every soft target visible. While doing so, I repeatably shot planes trying to take off or even just spawning (but at least I spared the landing planes...).
Now this situation is something I predicted a while ago (red territory shrinking, airfields becoming prime targets), but I still feel bad about it - at least after the mission is over and I can rethink the events.

While I can definitely understand these acts are no joy for you, please understand that there is no other way since more than one of your fields now is part of the very front line.
I hope you don't feel to offended by these 'unfriendly' attacks, as there is no way around them from the blue point of view.

Cheers & good night!

GZ

[:FI:Gadje]

Hi Zahl
Well it was discussed in the past and no decision was made other than pilots do as they wish. I think this was a mistake myself but it will play out this way now it seems.

We vary as a team on this growing spawn killing issue but for me It is a concern that how this map ends will effect the mentality of how the next one is fought. It is not for me to say but the obvious fun of blowing up players planes on the ground with 30mm cannon (1942!?) is going to have repercussions eventually and I doubt you need to to win. Blue will win soon it seems anyway. It may possibly cost an attacker or two to let enemy planes takeoff in a mass attack but.....?

However in truth although I'd prefer not, I don't mind it being ruthless if that's how it goes. No more breaking off damaged planes to allow them to bail (and the danger of chute-killing and all that brings), no more ignoring spawning planes until they are airborne and a danger, a 'win at any cost' attitude much like most of the online wars of the past I've flown. 'Competitive but fun and friendly' as refreshing as this has been, can't survive that ruthless attitude for long though in my experience.

I'd suggest a wee step back now and some serious thought to putting guidelines/rules in place we can all agree with for a next map.
S!

[Nephris]

The moscow map was once written as coop campaign, as human vs Ai.
We used to play it like that in our squad years ago, mds wasnt released in those times.
So of course we never got in the situation that an airfield of us got overrun, or attacked by AI as Dcg automatically transfers threated squads early enough, we use to transfer manually atm.

In the upcoming map, I adresses to that issue and left working airfields out off the battle area.No airfield needs to be attacked to conquer a location.Nevertheless there are 4x2 static trucks and 3 static planes only located at each airfield as designated targets.
The chance for any attacked starting or landing plane will be much higher than for the attacker.
The flak protrction at each airfield is 3x4 (3x(88+37+12.7+7.76 mm) which is around 4 times of moscow.

But as the campaign is coming to end and I guess the situation isnt very joyfull for red anymore,we should consider to start with the new one.This is completely in red hands, as blue accepts each decision.


We still need to talk about a few points in the Bessarabia thread, but basically the map is rdy.