4 player E-mail: AAR

[AllenK]

The Gabbiano, thanks.

[Orm]

And one aborted fighter.


Picture from Mar/Apr '41 Impulse #6 (Allied) - Naval Combat

[Orm]

Nice. We managed to roll 11 three times in this air combat. Allies abort.

Edit: I somehow managed to screw up this picture and posted the same as for last round. Allies rolled 11 and cleared the final bomber and Axis rolled 12 for no effect. Allies then aborted.

[Orm]

Will you spend any surprise points at this stage?


Picture from Mar/Apr '41 Impulse #6 (Allied) - Naval Combat

[AllenK]

No thanks.

[Orm]

About as much effect as expected.

[Orm]

Now?


Picture from Mar/Apr '41 Impulse #6 (Allied) - Naval Combat

[AllenK]

Yes please. X on the Queens.

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: AllenK

Yes please. X on the Queens.

And how will you spend your surprise points?

[AllenK]

Sorry, all points to increasing damage. I think that should give us an X to target the Queens with.

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: AllenK

Sorry, all points to increasing damage. I think that should give us an X to target the Queens with.

It did. And The Queens sunk with a die roll of three.

However. There was some malfunction behind the controls so there is a need to recreate the results from this combat. And, unfortunately, the hour is getting late so I will recreate this tomorrow, or so I hope.

If you could decide on which Allied ships gets the abort it will assist me when I 'fix' this.

[AllenK]

Put the abort on the CV with planes on it, thanks.

Good night.

[Orm]

Good night.

[brian brian]

ORIGINAL: rkr1958

ORIGINAL: Orm

By rerouting. The computer uses less than optimal convoy lines.

But the trouble is that the program often seems to revert to the less than optimal route when another resource is added to the transport net. So when I have freed up enough convoy points to transport another resource from USA to UK and I order it transported the program decides on a less than optimal route and thereby 'stealing' cps from another transported resource and that one either goes idle or 'steals' more convoy points. At several points I have decreased production by adding another resource that I have enough convoy points to transport.

Routing convoy points just shouldn't be that hard!

OK, don't have time / access enough to figure out where to post this but I have been meaning to ask the crowd and Ronnie / rkr1958 in particular about an idea I have.

Experienced WiF players can figure out how many CPs are needed to produce how many BPs where. The MWiF program frequently disagrees.

If the "Saved BP" counters can be located in the Game File, couldn't the value of those counters be simply modded at almost any point to create the BP totals that are correct?

So on the first turn of the game, every power saves one Build Point. Then whenever the players need to over-ride the MWiF decisions, they just edit the value of the Saved BP counter, which I believe is stored on the map as a counter. ???

I would not suggest trying to create / add / remove / take-to-zero one of these counters. But if the value of the counter was changed when needed, I would think the other programming logic & routines wouldn't notice, perhaps?


Might get to be in town one night later this week, we'll see. Thanks for feeding the jones in the mean-time, when I get out to the side of the job-site where the phone works.....

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: brian brian

ORIGINAL: rkr1958

ORIGINAL: Orm

By rerouting. The computer uses less than optimal convoy lines.

But the trouble is that the program often seems to revert to the less than optimal route when another resource is added to the transport net. So when I have freed up enough convoy points to transport another resource from USA to UK and I order it transported the program decides on a less than optimal route and thereby 'stealing' cps from another transported resource and that one either goes idle or 'steals' more convoy points. At several points I have decreased production by adding another resource that I have enough convoy points to transport.

Routing convoy points just shouldn't be that hard!

OK, don't have time / access enough to figure out where to post this but I have been meaning to ask the crowd and Ronnie / rkr1958 in particular about an idea I have.

Experienced WiF players can figure out how many CPs are needed to produce how many BPs where. The MWiF program frequently disagrees.

If the "Saved BP" counters can be located in the Game File, couldn't the value of those counters be simply modded at almost any point to create the BP totals that are correct?

So on the first turn of the game, every power saves one Build Point. Then whenever the players need to over-ride the MWiF decisions, they just edit the value of the Saved BP counter, which I believe is stored on the map as a counter. ???

I would not suggest trying to create / add / remove / take-to-zero one of these counters. But if the value of the counter was changed when needed, I would think the other programming logic & routines wouldn't notice, perhaps?


Might get to be in town one night later this week, we'll see. Thanks for feeding the jones in the mean-time, when I get out to the side of the job-site where the phone works.....

warspite1

Twice in the last two days I have written out a post asking for something along these lines - but have stopped myself each time as I know the answer and its just going to annoy people. But yes, there should be a routine in the program where the resources and build points can be manually entered '0' if you are happy with the program and 'x' if you cannot get the program to give you the correct number.

We lost a whole day and more gaming because of this - and Keith finally got it, Bjorn was close and I could not even get close. That experience is not fun, that is the very opposite of what a computer game is supposed to do, and it sucks the fun right out of playing. I would love to have played the CW in this game - but with the convoy system as is, there is just no chance.

[rkr1958]

ORIGINAL: brian brian
OK, don't have time / access enough to figure out where to post this but I have been meaning to ask the crowd and Ronnie / rkr1958 in particular about an idea I have.

Experienced WiF players can figure out how many CPs are needed to produce how many BPs where. The MWiF program frequently disagrees.

If the "Saved BP" counters can be located in the Game File, couldn't the value of those counters be simply modded at almost any point to create the BP totals that are correct?

So on the first turn of the game, every power saves one Build Point. Then whenever the players need to over-ride the MWiF decisions, they just edit the value of the Saved BP counter, which I believe is stored on the map as a counter. ???

I would not suggest trying to create / add / remove / take-to-zero one of these counters. But if the value of the counter was changed when needed, I would think the other programming logic & routines wouldn't notice, perhaps?

That's a great ideal! Yes, that would be simple and that would work. It would literally take a minute or less to modify that counter. Much less frustrating than spending an hour, or even more, on trying to get the last BP or two that you should be able to get from the convoy routes that you have set up.

[Dabrion]

Or just change the interface to be able to point-and-click route? Should work like this:

1) click on resource/oil/factory
2) click on a port (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 2) to 1), if 2) is a minor port decrease port capacity)
3) click on a series of sea zones, starting in a sea zone the port 2) is adjacenton to (MWiF assert there is a convoy chain, then decreases that chains capacity)
4) click on a port in the last sea zone of 3)
5) click on a factory/port/city (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 5) to 1), or 5) to 4), if 4) is a minor port decrease ports capacity)

Would be nice to be able to save entire and also sub-graphs. For example, I usually design my convoy graph in a composite way, one for India, one for Africa, one for Americas, etc. And they can have different layouts depending on what stage the game is in.

This could be implemented on top of whatever logic is already in place to make the ridiculous suggestions.

[Centuur]

ORIGINAL: Dabrion

Or just change the interface to be able to point-and-click route? Should work like this:

1) click on resource/oil/factory
2) click on a port (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 2) to 1), if 2) is a minor port decrease port capacity)
3) click on a series of sea zones, starting in a sea zone the port 2) is adjacenton to (MWiF assert there is a convoy chain, then decreases that chains capacity)
4) click on a port in the last sea zone of 3)
5) click on a factory/port/city (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 5) to 1), or 5) to 4), if 4) is a minor port decrease ports capacity)

Would be nice to be able to save entire and also sub-graphs. For example, I usually design my convoy graph in a composite way, one for India, one for Africa, one for Americas, etc. And they can have different layouts depending on what stage the game is in.

This could be implemented on top of whatever logic is already in place to make the ridiculous suggestions.

Yes, of course that would be nice. Unfortunately there are also the rules which have to be taken into account here.
Trade needs to be added to your solution and several US options doesn't make things easier too.
And to be honest, I'm fed up with the convoy system too. It needs a complete overhaul and I think your option is the thing I would like to see too.

[AllenK]

ORIGINAL: Dabrion

Or just change the interface to be able to point-and-click route? Should work like this:

1) click on resource/oil/factory
2) click on a port (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 2) to 1), if 2) is a minor port decrease port capacity)
3) click on a series of sea zones, starting in a sea zone the port 2) is adjacenton to (MWiF assert there is a convoy chain, then decreases that chains capacity)
4) click on a port in the last sea zone of 3)
5) click on a factory/port/city (MWiF asserts there is a railway connection from 5) to 1), or 5) to 4), if 4) is a minor port decrease ports capacity)

Would be nice to be able to save entire and also sub-graphs. For example, I usually design my convoy graph in a composite way, one for India, one for Africa, one for Americas, etc. And they can have different layouts depending on what stage the game is in.

This could be implemented on top of whatever logic is already in place to make the ridiculous suggestions.

You already can manually set routes by pointing and clicking as you suggest.

The only differences are you first have to tell MWiF the resource and destination factory. Delete the route MWiF has proposed. The computer checks for 1) and 2) when you click on the first sea zone in the chain and then checks 4) and 5) when you click on the last sea zone in the chain. If there are problems you get an error message, otherwise the route is set.

As long as there are CP's in the sea-zone that aren't either being used to fulfill trade obligations or already allocated to existing manual over-rides it works pretty smoothly. If there aren't enough CP's, it doesn't work.

[AllenK]

A couple of observations regarding this particular problem with convoying.

The problem was that Orm and myself started assigning the routes on the basis MWiF was working as specified in RAC. This wasn't the case. The implementation of Option 32 appears to be faulty. Trying to force a computer to do something it isn't programmed to do is always going to lead to frustration. I wonder whether it is similar issues that have caused others to experience frustration at MWiF refusing to route as desired.

The process that took time was determining what MWiF was actually doing, rather than what it was supposed to be doing. In doing this, I checked many routes and almost all were sent on the optimum path, using the fewest number of CP's/sea zones. The only consistent 'error' was two of the three US traded BP's were sent on a 5 sea zone route rather than the 4 sea zone route the other BP was sent on. This was easily adjusted using the manual over-ride.

Once the parameters under which MWiF was actually working were established, the routing was relatively straight forward as long as those parameters were adhered to. In the end, Orm did a better job at it than I managed.