Units Transiting Bridges

[pmaidhof]

During a playtest last night, and on a couple of other occasions, I have multiple units getting hung up on umpire-placed "engineering" bridges. In this instance these are 80-rated bridges "carefully" placed on the "river" connecting "roads" that end on both sides of the "river". I am careful to plot the unit's waypoint just short of the bridge icon, on top of the bridge icon, and just past the bridge icon, but still getting whloe battalions (in company markers) hung up at the bridge. It becomes even more problematic when trying to synchronize movement with a time-sensative smoke screen.

Has anyone else experienced this? What has been your work-around?

Thanks in advance.

 

[GCoyote]

I think the bridges have a "capacity limit" of some type. Not sure exactly what that limit is though. You may have to sequence your units so that one clears the bridge before the next moves on to it.

 

[dhuffjr]

I seem to remember something about damaged units/wreck markers blocking them too.

Hopefully Major H will be along to give us the scoop.

 

[pmaidhof]

I think the bridges have a "capacity limit" of some type. Not sure exactly what that limit is though. You may have to sequence your units so that one clears the bridge before the next moves on to it.

They definitely started with 100-200m between each company, but all got hung up in one big cluster you know what.

The fact that it was company sized markers may have contributed to the friction at the bridge and exceded the bridges capacity.

Either way, the Opfor commander has an oh-"beep" momment when the smoke started to go away and they were all still hanging out at the bridge. :shock:

They had every battalion mortar that could reach the area pumping smoke rounds in to conceal the goat-rope at Thorpe Bridge.

 

[MajorH]

There is a routine in TacOps that slows down movement across a bridge to conceptually represent vehicles usually having to move across a bridge in single file.

Do an experiment at a bridge involving moving a single vehicle marker across the bridge - it should zip across. Then repeat the experiment with a marker representing fifteen vehicles. Then repeat the experiment with a series of multi vehicle markers. You should see some pile up occuring.

The remarks above assume that a bridge has been placed correctly so that it does in fact actually "span" the water obstacle. I have checked more than one problematic saved game file for users where it turned out that the problem was not the pile up routine but rather was that the user had mispositioned a bridge marker so that there was still a bit of unbridged water at one or both ends of the bridge. When placing bridge markers, it pays to use the Terrain Analysis map view to ensure that the bridge marker accurately matches the coding/position of the underlying 100 meter (10 pixel) water terrain cell.

 

[pmaidhof]

There is a routine in TacOps that slows down movement across a bridge to conceptually represent vehicles usually having to move across a bridge in single file.

So it is entirely possible that while one company was queing up, the other companies piled into to one, big-fat artilley target.

The remarks above assume that a bridge has been placed correctly so that it does in fact actually "span" the water obstacle. I have checked more than one problematic saved game file for users where it turned out that the problem was not the pile up routine but rather was that the user had mispositioned a bridge marker so that there was still a bit of unbridged water at one or both ends of the bridge.

I'll check to terrain code beneath the graphic to ensure it, but asthetically, it looks like the yellow circle covers both edges of the "river" with some room to spare.

The fact that some of these companies, often platoons after the ATGM's and Tanks have their way with them, do "break free" to the south leads me to believe that it is the pile up routine going through its paces for lining up a the 14 or so vehicles of each company while the acordian effect leads to the follow on companies arriving before they really should. Time for me to put on an S-4/MTO hat to keep these units units moving :crosseye:

 

[dhuffjr]

Major H so it would help to have platoon sized units crossing instead of companies?

Pete, you could use the delay function in the orders to help sequence the crossing.

 

[pmaidhof]

Major H so it would help to have platoon sized units crossing instead of companies?

Pete, you could use the delay function in the orders to help sequence the crossing.

Dennis, based on MajorH's discription of a experiment with one then more vehicles, I believe that the smaller the unit, the quicker the transit time across the bridge.

Regarding the delay, yes I do use it often to stagger/separate units. In this case the units were already 100-200m apart but I did NOT (edit) take into account the "pile up routine".

 

[pmaidhof]

There is a routine in TacOps that slows down movement across a bridge to conceptually represent vehicles usually having to move across a bridge in single file.

Do an experiment at a bridge involving moving a single vehicle marker across the bridge - it should zip across. Then repeat the experiment with a marker representing fifteen vehicles. Then repeat the experiment with a series of multi vehicle markers. You should see some pile up occuring.

Said experiment:

1 single Tank crossed an 80-ton rated bridge and continued within a single turn. Elapsed time less than one minute.

A tank platoon of 4 vehicles reached the bridge in the first turn, moved slightly (still within the bridge icon) the second turn, and broke free during the third turn. Elapsed time less than three minutes.

A tank company of 14 vehicles reached the bridge in the first turn, remained on the bridge the second turn, remained the third turn, remained the fourth turn, progressed somewhat on the fifth turn, remained on the sixth turn, broke free during the seventh turn. Elapsed time less than seven minutes.

Interesting is that while it costs around seven minutes for a tank company counter to cross, if it were in platoon counters, that same unit (three platoons of 4 and a section of 2) would take at least 12 minutes, not counting any interval between platoons. (EDIT) COMPANY VS PLATOON IS INCORRECT! SEE DHUFFJR MSG BELOW.

These ares very important planning considerations. Also to consider in addition to the time to que up and cross, is the amount of smoke necessary to obscure the crossing site and keep it obscured during the 7 minutes minimum needed to cross a tank company.

Hmm...

MajorH, is there any friction built into unit symbols overlapping - too many vehicles/people trying to occupy a small space?

Thanks,

 

[dhuffjr]

Pete,
I just did a quick check and four markers, one of two vehicles and the other three of four vehicles, made it over a bridge in under 4 minutes vs the seven you observed for a unit of fourteen vehicles. I sent the first marker straight across, and added two clicks of the delay button for the second unit and four for the third and 6 for the fourth unit.

Platoon sized units are a good thing when crossing a bridge.

 

[pmaidhof]

Pete,
I just did a quick check and four markers, one of two vehicles and the other three of four vehicles, made it over a bridge in under 4 minutes vs the seven you observed for a unit of fourteen vehicles. I sent the first marker straight across, and added two clicks of the delay button for the second unit and four for the third and 6 for the fourth unit.

Platoon sized units are a good thing when crossing a bridge.

Dennis, thanks for experimenting further - make sense! So much for extrapolating.:nuts:

 

[MajorH]

MajorH, is there any friction built into unit symbols overlapping - too many vehicles/people trying to occupy a small space?

Only at bridges. I have thought about extending the "pile up" routine to other areas but always decided that the threat of enemy arty finding huge stacks of unit markers was an adequate deterant.

 

[pmaidhof]

the threat of enemy arty finding huge stacks of unit markers was an adequate deterant.

Agreed. That is what I was getting at.

 

[Rattler]

In a recent CPX (VORTEX, aar + replays see http://www.xtreme-gamer.com/forums/tacops-after-action-reports/62854-vortex-cpx-after-action-reviews.html ) we as RED had real problems especially as the bridges were combined with mines in front or behind sometimes to the point where the rollout of the scenario got unpalayable w/o umprie help in the time frame of the scenario (180 turns), all this detailed in the AARs and the replay files even better:

Seveal times (with sometimes not more than 5 or 6 plns stuck on bridges) the transfer times would get reported by the units as 18 hours, 170 hours, I think in the max case with a whole BN stuck on a bridge even 700 hours).

We had run tests and were aware of the problem ahead and had tried to split into platoons and space at least 500 mtrs, still this happened frequently.

Personally I feel this routine needs to be reworked (maybe introducing max crossing times according to units size? a BN should never eve take 170 hours to cross a bridge to take the medium case... :->) as it tneds to disrupt gameplay and is not in line with the usual elegant abstractions that TacOps provides for almost everything.

My 2c

Rattler