PBEM - strange behaviour

[Izver]

Hello,

I'm playing CSA in a PBEM game, it's may of '62 and I put a line of gunboats from forts Henry & Donelson to Lower Cumberland, protecting weakly garrisoned Memphis while bulk of my army is busy getting slaughtered elsewhere.

I was not particularly amused when I saw that my opponent first sent a cavalry, and then in a next turn a whole corps over Lower Cumberland. I've read somewhere that there is actually a small chance of succesfull river crossings despite the presence of gunboats - but the strange thing is that my opponent says that he never saw the gunboat in Lower Cumberland while he plotted his move. And I'm positive that I never moved it out of that river space in last four or five turns. Now, is this behaviour normal, or should I sent the files for bug checking?

Thanks in advance,

Nikola

[Pocus]

Can you show us a screenshot of your plan?

[Izver]

Can you show us a screenshot of your plan?

Ok, here it is:

Before:



After:

[Gray_Lensman]

deleted

[Izver]

Believe it or not, I had trouble earlier this summer figuring out how to do a screenshot... Here's how...

Thank you - in the meantime I found this nifty freeware screen grabber called MWSnap (http://www.mirekw.com/winfreeware/mwsnap.html) - and it worked perfectly.

Cheers,

Nikola

[Guru80]

A little program that I LOVE is FRAPS and it works wonderfully as well.

[GShock]

/me seconds fraps also useful to make movies...

[phandukto]

Hi, Izver - I think your gunboats need to be set to "offensive" to block the river. I've done that consistently as the yankees and it's worked.

[Gray_Lensman]

deleted

[chainsaw]

Gray's tutorial should be stickied!


[ATTACH]1337[/ATTACH]

Nice work - thanks!

[willgamer]

Hi, Izver - I think your gunboats need to be set to "offensive" to block the river. I've done that consistently as the yankees and it's worked.

I'm not sure this is correct. When I play the Union and use many gunboats in defensive mode that seems to be blocking cross river movement.

In Izver's screenshots, however, I see only transports, not gunboats.

[denisonh]

As the aformentioned PBEM opponent, I will go back and load the turn that I plotted Thomas' corps move over the lower cumberland. (It is subjest to available time and the fact I have no internet connectivity in my hooch)

If there is a naval presence there, the game will not allow plotting through a river passage with an enemy presence. Is "combat power" a factor in determining if they can cross? For example, if the the gunboat has "0" combat power or no ammunition, does that undermine the ability to block movement?

[denisonh]

Here are the three turns preceeding Thomas' Corps crossing the Cumberland.

Thomas and Buell actually crossed at Gallatin Ferry, based on the turn plot.

Thomas had been plotted to move across the Cumberland starting in Late March, but did move and cross until Early May, most likely due to gunboats preventing his crossing the Cumberland.

Notice the absence of the gunboats that show in Izver's pics of the same situation.

I would ask what was the combat strength of those boats and if that may have been a factor in not preventing the crossing. Or was it I crossed at a point when there was no gunboat in Gallatin Ferry?

There is a possibility that the game file is corrupted as well.

[Izver]

In Izver's screenshots, however, I see only transports, not gunboats.

I just checked the screenshots again, and that are, to my best knowledge, gunboats, not transports?

I can see three or four possible explanations for this:

1 - a single, low cohesion gunboat is not enough to stop a whole corps - but we'll need the data from developers, so that in the future we know what exactly to place in the river crossings.

2 - Bug that I experience from time to time (probably due to my oldish graphic card) - icon of a unit we'll be pictured in a wrong place - so maybe gunboat was actually in the port although it looked to me that it's in the river (I doubt that one - I distinctly remember that I didn't tinker with those gunboats once that I positioned them in the Cumberland)

3 - Defensive/attacking posture of gunboats, as somebody suggested (Developers, could you please confirm this?)

4 - Some other bug.

[Pocus]

As long as you are the sole who have non support ships, in non passive posture, the crossing should be interdicted.

[willgamer]

I just checked the screenshots again, and that are, to my best knowledge, gunboats, not transports?

Oops! My bad .

I had just been playing my Union game for several hours and didn't notice what side you were playing. All I can say is you weren't using Union gunboats !