Air Staff Assistant for PO?

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r6kunz
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Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by r6kunz »

Will the PO use the Air Staff Assistant? Especially in a ground support role.

Case in point is Operation Overlord 1944 or Two Weeks in Normandy, both are pure Air Units vs AA units. If played as Germans vs PO Allies, and the Allied air units are given Combat Support missions before the start of the game, the air units carry out the appropriate Combat Support missions the first couple of turns, but soon all the air units revert to Rest status for the remainder of the game.
Naturally the Air Staff Assistant is turned ON for both sides.

per the Manual:
"- Air Staff Assistant: The Air Staff Assistant can handle all of your Air unit orders for you. The Air Staff Assistant will place all Air units under computer control. As in the Standard Rules of the game, you may override specific Air unit orders for any given Turn; just select any unit and Mission as you would normally. The Air Staff Assistant can be toggled from the Advanced Game Options window as well as from the Air Unit Management window. If you turn the Assistant on from the Air Unit Management window, all Air units will immediately be assigned Air Missions by the assistant."

I have tried setting various Formation Orders, Order Emphasis, etc.

Is there a way to get the PO air units active for the entire game?


What has been the experience of others? Perhaps I am missing something here...
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by larryfulkerson »

Is there a way to get the PO air units active for the entire game?
What has been the experience of others? Perhaps I am missing something here...
I've had bad experiences with the Air Assistant. I've caught it putting planes that should rest on flight status.
I've seen bombers on AS missions. But all this experience is with the TOAW III version. I should really do some tests
with the TOAW IV version to see if these "features" still exist.

And I wasn't aware that the PO air units weren't active for the entire game. Have you seen some evidence that
they aren't?
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by sPzAbt653 »

What has been the experience of others?

I don't recall ever seeing that happen to the extent that it was very noticeable. I just checked a couple of turns from the most recent scenario that I played, at turns 43 and 63 the PO's Air Units appeared to have reasonable missions assigned and those on rest should be. So, sorry but I can't confirm your results. I suppose I should try the two scenarios that you have specified. I will try this weekend if I get time.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by r6kunz »

I've had bad experiences with the Air Assistant. I've caught it putting planes that should rest on flight status.
I've seen bombers on AS missions. But all this experience is with the TOAW III version. I should really do some tests
with the TOAW IV version to see if these "features" still exist.

And I wasn't aware that the PO air units weren't active for the entire game. Have you seen some evidence that
they aren't?


Here is the Air Unit Report, Operation Overlord 1944 (not yet in the Game, but same results with TWIN, beginning Turn One. Excellent support on Turns One and Two -
I will send Turn 3 Report shortly.

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r6kunz
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by r6kunz »

And here is Turn 3, with the Air Staff Assistant ON each time. The Air units stay at Rest for the remainder of the game unless I manually assign missions. A bit of a chore for 41 units.

This is not unique to TOAW4; the same result with this scenario in TOAW3.

In a "hot" air war that I am working on, Red Thunder II 1988 the Air Staff Assistant appears to be on duty and appropriate missions are assigned, but difficult to tease out which losses are A2A and which are A2AA.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by larryfulkerson »

I'll get busy and take a look at this problem.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by Lobster »

You guys are so sneaky. Thanks. [&o]
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by larryfulkerson »

So I fired up the latest beta and started a game of Two Weeks in Normandy and in T1 I turned on the air assistant
and it flew missions that looked reasonable to me. Then in turn two everybody was so beat up flying their missions
they were orange and yellow and a few were red, so all of them ended up on rest status. Then in T3 they were
still on rest status but a couple of them were green already. I was suspecting a problem. Then in T4 everybody
that wasn't orange was flying. Then in T5 all of them were. I checked out Overlord 44 and it was normal too.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by r6kunz »

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

So I fired up the latest beta and started a game of Two Weeks in Normandy and in T1 I turned on the air assistant
and it flew missions that looked reasonable to me. Then in turn two everybody was so beat up flying their missions
they were orange and yellow and a few were red, so all of them ended up on rest status. Then in T3 they were
still on rest status but a couple of them were green already. I was suspecting a problem. Then in T4 everybody
that wasn't orange was flying. Then in T5 all of them were. I checked out Overlord 44 and it was normal too.

Here is my screen shot from Brett Turner's TWIN400B1 in TOAW4 with patch .313, Turn 7, PO vs PO. All still at Rest at this point, although some in orange status. Not sure why.

Also note the test scenario in question is my Operation Overlord 1944 (similar to Brett's, but 2.5 km scale vs 1.5 km/hex, 30 days vs 12 days, revised TOE and OB, VP, etc.), but still pure AC vs AA.

Overlord 44, an older scenario that includes German aircraft, which Elmer's Air Staff Assitant seems to be able to handle.

Erroneously posted in wrong Forum
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by larryfulkerson »

Also note the test scenario in question is my Operation Overlord 1944 (similar to Brett's, but 2.5 km scale vs 1.5 km/hex, 30
days vs 12 days, revised TOE and OB, VP, etc.), but still pure AC vs AA.
Can I get you to send me a copy of your scenario? I looked on Gamesquad and Rugged Defense and neither of them had a copy
of it. Although I did see a collection of pretty good scenarios. I wonder how many of them work with TOAW IV.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by r6kunz »

Larry, thanks for your help. I should have clarified, Operation Overlord 1944 is a work in progress for TOAW4. I will send you a beta shortly!

Air Staff Assistant - he is not AWOL after all. He is out scrounging petrol, bullets and bombs. You see, the Logistics team forgot to lay track to the air field in the British Isles. So by 8 June the poor chaps on the airfields are out of supply, and sit there, in orange status. We fixed that oversight and running Overlord with air support. Stay tuned.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by Meyer1 »

ORIGINAL: Lobster

You guys are so sneaky. Thanks. [&o]

So I guess we finally got our first screenshots [:D]
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by larryfulkerson »

So I guess we finally got our first screenshots
I wasn't going to say anything about it so as not to draw attention to it. I'm pretty sure it was an accident.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by Meyer1 »

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson
So I guess we finally got our first screenshots
I'm pretty sure it was an accident.
I know... but, hey, I'll take it.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by Meyer1 »

Some things that stand out of the air units screen:

-New fonts that scale with screen resolution (I think). Nice.
-Scroll bar. Nice.
-Number of units present. Nice.
-It doesn't look that you could sort out units by clicking on mission/location/etc.
-Terrain looks similar of what we have right now. Or is it the same?. Counters too. I guess we have to wait for another accident to see the newer graphics [:D]
-Tool tip survived? [:)]

That's all I got.
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RE: Air Staff Assistant for PO?

Post by mllange »

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson
So I guess we finally got our first screenshots
I wasn't going to say anything about it so as not to draw attention to it. I'm pretty sure it was an accident.

I would be upset but the anticipation definitely trumps all other emotions. :)
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