Return Fire in Enemy's Turn

roffc · Post by **roffc** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 6:37 pm

Anyone know if anything governs or affects a unit's ability to return fire in the enemy's turn, such as unused action points or unused shots from their own turn? Or is it purely a random chance if they can return fire or not?

Post by **pipfromslitherine** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 6:43 pm

They get all their unused shots, plus a free one.

The logic for whether they fire is quite complex, and based on threat from the enemy, chance to kill, distance, etc.

Cheers

Pip

hidde · Post by **hidde** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 7:30 pm

Is there ane difference between having only the free shot or together with spared ones, two or three?
I mean, if you have three shot it could be reasonable to use one or two more freely.

Post by **pipfromslitherine** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 7:33 pm

That could well be a way to improve the logic, yes. That it will always chance it if it has more than the free shot left, or something more involved.

We're monitoring the feedback to see if we want to tweak it - but we don't want to rush into anything.

Cheers

Pip

SailingGuy · Post by **SailingGuy** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 8:41 pm

I assume that laying down suppressing fire also limits your ability to react to enemy moves during their turn. Correct?

Post by **pipfromslitherine** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 8:58 pm

If you lay down fire you burn all your shots. Suppression doesn't affect the ability for the enemy to fire back until they are suppressed.

Cheers

Pip

roffc · Post by **roffc** » Fri Aug 13, 2010 10:55 pm

Many thanks for the info, Pip.

LOGAN5 · Post by **LOGAN5** » Sat Aug 14, 2010 12:02 am

I could be wrong but, be careful because enemy tanks can fire back on their turn even if you suppressed them on your turn.

Post by **pipfromslitherine** » Sat Aug 14, 2010 12:04 am

Correct - they get a shot, although at heavy penalty. Prevents you chasing down a King Tiger with a Chaffee

Cheers

Pip

jomni · Post by **jomni** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 2:22 am

I suspect the chance to kill element is the factor which makes op fire happen less.
We might get better results if we eliminate this condition.
Why? Because if you manage to hit the attacker (even without killing), it can still lower the attacker's morale or suppress him despite being a bigger tank.

junk2drive · Post by **junk2drive** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 2:45 am

I have noticed that sometimes I take a low percent shot and get a suppressed and retreat from the enemy. jomni may be correct.

Post by **pipfromslitherine** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 4:33 am

I'm coming to the same conclusion, but we don't want to rush to change. The reasoning was to avoid being able to soak up shots with heavy armour then walk in and blast 'em.

Cheers

Pip

SailingGuy · Post by **SailingGuy** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 4:34 am

pipfromslitherine wrote:If you lay down fire you burn all your shots. Suppression doesn't affect the ability for the enemy to fire back until they are suppressed.

Cheers

Pip

I tend to use Suppression Fire as a real unit would use Reconnaissance by Fire. I shoot the square and hope to hear enemy infantry yelling. In RL, Recon by Fire attempts to get the enemy to move about, fire back, panic, or in some other way reveal their presence.

I'm not sure when the audio is triggered, but if a unit doesn't yell before reaching the suppression threshold, using Suppression Fire as Reconnaissance by Fire is not as effective. It would be nice (more realistic?) if there was a chance for a unit to trigger audio when hit by fire even before taking enough damage to be suppressed.

It would also be nice if a unit did not have to use its entire ammo load out for the turn when "suppressing" a square. Again, if using Suppression Fire as Recon by Fire, a unit in RL would only fire a portion of their rounds, not empty clip after clip into a potentially empty square.

Despite these minor complaints, I love the game and what the crew at Slitherine has accomplished. Great job.

hidde · Post by **hidde** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 8:23 am

I'm with SailingGuy. Recon by fire is next to useless. You have to be lucky and kill a soldier to get any information and at same time you reveal your own unit.
Also thinking that one burst uses up all ones ammo is a bit to much. I think you should have two suppression fire opportunities as well. Maybe if the chance was higher to get some info by the firing you should only get one shot since otherwise it might get too powerfull instead.

jomni · Post by **jomni** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 9:44 am

If you know an infantry is hiding in the woods or house, you can blind fire away to kill it or at least suppress for infantry to close in of make it retreat. This is a powerful tactic alredy and making a unit capable of doing it twice may just tip the balance.

hidde · Post by **hidde** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 10:19 am

Well, it's for the situations when you don't know but suspect (recon by fire).
If it's spotted I can get up and fire twice allready and it's indeed powerfull and a good way to suppress it.
I mean, why can I do it when I know it's there but not when I don't?
But the main question for me, and I guess for SailingGuy was that there should be a higher chance of reveal a hidding unit by fire blind into a building or wood.

Obsolete · Post by **Obsolete** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 1:30 pm

I think a small pop-up should have been displayed each time a man from an infantry is killed, etc. That way, you still know when you HIT something that's hidden, even if your volume was turned way down

Zonso · Post by **Zonso** » Mon Aug 16, 2010 4:25 pm

Lol, I play with sound off!! No wonder I have been caught in ambushes so many times

I will have to recon more now with the sound ON.

I agree, something really needs to be tweaked regards the shoot&scoot "tactic". As it stands now, especially with the faster Allied tanks, you can fast forward, fire a couple shots - maybe get lucky but suppress anyways, then retreat to cover - repeat ad nauseum for several turns. Even if you have stationary tanks on overwatch, they may fire a shot or two depending on range/facing etc, but the results do not compare to shooting & scooting so the player is forced to use the same tactic himself. The battle then becomes a repetitive game of cat and mouse. I think a partial solution is to make AFVs who fast move and fire to have an even lower hit chance and more importantly do considerably less suppression. In addition, make 'hunting' more attractive by perhaps increasing the hit chance slightly and the consequent 'opfire' opportunity.

jomni · Post by **jomni** » Tue Aug 17, 2010 2:29 am

Moving already has a chance to hit penalty. Are you suggesting a heavier accuracy penalty?
I guess we don't notice this because while moving you lessen the range which results into better accuracy.
Hunt is useful but it prevents you from doing shoot and scoot which can lead to the unit's death in the next turn.

I still think making opfire more frequent will be a good counter to shoot and scoot.

direwolf · Post by **direwolf** » Tue Aug 17, 2010 4:41 am

I have to agree with Zonso on this one...unless there's a tactic i haven't thought of i believe that the allies have too much movement allowance...while it may reflect accurately historically it makes playing as the germans almost impossible in MP. (Actually i guess i'm speaking specifically about the hellcats)

my .02 cents,

DW