naval detection
There was some concern last game that evading naval contacts was too easy. That concern turns out to be partially correct, but the situation is more complex. It turns out that when a group of ships (possibly only one ship) is moving into a sea area, and encounters another group of ships (also possibly only one ship) then if all the moving ships wish to evade they always succeed, but if the all encountered ships wish to evade, they always fail.
This seems wrong, primarily because the two groups of ships should be treated symmetrically; in reality both of them are sailing along and see each others topsails at (more or less) the same time. If one can evade, the other should be able to also.
I believe the problem last game is that the British frigates searching GOL did not have orders to sail (because the British were trying to get the detection chance for ships which don't move, which is also broken, but that's another investigation) and so whenever a French frigate sailed towards them, since the French ship was moving, evasion was automatic. Had the British ships been moving, evasion would have been impossible, but then the British would have sacrificed the no-movement detection option (which turned out to be no big sacrifice since it wasn't working, but after that's fixed, will be a major one).
I think the solution is that whether the moving ships or the encountered ships are the ones that want to evade, evasion should usually but not always be successful.
If the ships are in the coastal waters of a port, my guess is that the same problem will exist (though I haven't looked yet) and the solution will be the same except that when the winds are onshore, the chance of successful evasion should be somewhat lower.
More news as it develops.
I will also take the opportunity to note that I am substantially revising the messages printed when ships move in PATE and I hope it's going to be a lot clearer who's moving and why in the next PATE game (in September, I hope).
Steve
Who's new
- koolguy66
- Sakkal
- David Adams
- rkimler
- AZTiger98
Life gets more random
When a ship moves to a port, either coastal waters or harbor, there is no evasion or pursuit at all. The ship shows up, wham, that's it.
Perhaps this is the right thing, but more likely not. I dunno. This code is getting very random. It was definitely produced under deadline :)
Gonna think about what to do. Suggestions welcome.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Harbor or Coastal
A) I suggest that if a player enters port, he has a reasonable chance to know who controls the port, the coastal guns and the allied ships. So the evade command should be ignored since you have reasonable intelligence about the situation at the port. Therefore the current code seems correct.
B) If we treat coastal waters as single TACLOC, then I presume we have three choices. The evade command nullifies entry into enemy occupied coastal waters leaving you in the Sea Area (SA), the evade command is ignored and you enter coastal waters, or there is a random factor and the ship either enters coastal waters or it does not. I personally favor the latter, with an appropriate message indicating that the ship did/did not enter coastal waters due to a random roll. My view is that the random roll should be treated as follows:
1. Each entering ship in evade mode is treated separately (separate rolls).
2. The more enemy ships in coastal waters (of the appropriate type), the more likely that your ship enters coastal waters and is there for battle on the next turn. The thought here is that if there are many enemy ships in coastal waters, the chance of evasion back to the SA is lower.
3. Damage counts against your chance of the evasion working.
Evasion, if it succeeds, restores you to the associated Sea Area, were perhaps another "evade" condition may occur if there are enemy ships in the SA.
I presume based on the order of entry into Coastal Waters may mean your ship (with evade orders) may enters first - and enemy ships then enter (based on which ship happens to move first). The random rolls above should be made after the movements are all made.
If both enemy and your ships all are in evade and are to enter a Coastal Waters location during a turn, then the first ship in determines who makes it - the other side staying in the SA.
John Vanvark
thinking on it
I think it is correct that there is no evasion or pursuit from ports. Reason being: When you are in a sea area, say GOL, and you evade, you move to a different part of GOL. But you're still where you were ordered to go. However, if you move to a port, say Toulon, but you see an enemy ship there and you evade, you'll have to leave Toulon. I think players will perceive that as the Wrong Thing. They will say "I ordered my ship to move to Toulon, why didn't I go there?" Further, if you are in WMD and want to sail to GOL, then to Toulon, then: if you are in evade mode you will evade contacts while in GOL but will be unable to approach Toulon if a hostile ship is there. Conversely, if you are in accept mode you will be able to approach Toulon but will pick up any ship you stumble into in GOL. This seems wrong.
The same is true for ships already there. You are in GOL and you order your ship in Evade mode to go to Toulon. Fine. After you get there, an enemy ship sails up. If you evade that contact you'll have to go back out into GOL, which is not where your orders say to be.
If there is no evasion when ships approach, then we don't need any pursuit in that case either. (If two ships are in Toulon at turn start and one sails off, pursuit will handle that normally.)
So I think the simplest thing (certainly from the coding standpoint! but from the players' also) is to say that there is no evasion when you go to coastal waters of a port. By definition, if you are ordered to a port, you are ordered to accept contact with any enemy ship that is there. As opposed to a sea area, where you can be ordered to a sea but also to find some part of that sea with no enemy ships in it.
The fact that I have never, in five years or so, been asked why a ship in coastal waters failed to evade an enemy ship, suggests that the way it is now is the right thing.
Thus, this is the ruling: Contact orders only work when you are moving into a sea area. When you move into a port, or when another ship moves into a port whose coastal waters you are already in, there is neither evasion nor pursuit. They arrive, and you all sort it out later.
I will have to update the rule book to make this explicit.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
thinking on it
Coastal waters for a particular port cover a lot of coastline when you look at the landing areas associated on the GITM maps. Coastal waters for some cities cover miles of coastline.
There were many conditions when coastal patrols did not pick up ships that darted into coastal waters. So I see a Business case for a ship that enters coastal waters darting out to the SA again when it detects enemy ships.
For a port, this seems quite unlikely.
John Vanvark
evasion chance
Two groups of ships are sailing at sea and encounter one another. All ships in one group wish to evade. At least one ship on the other side wishes to pursue. What should determine the chance that the evasion succeeds?
I can see several possible answers:
1) None. Straight 80% chance (or whatever number seems suitable). Easy but boring.
2) Quality and experience of the ships. Probably rely on the average Q/E of the evading ships and the average Q/E of the pursuers. I can see a case for using minimum or maximum, but average is probably better all around (and already used for other things).
3) Number of ships. Bigger groups should pursue better and evade worse.
4) Wind direction. Evaders should have a higher chance when downwind. (Problem is that wind direction is not well defined since the sailing group is moving from one sea to another and the wind directions are probably different in the two seas.)
It's a question of complexity vs. features. I am inclined to use Q/E and number but not wind direction. For the moment I'm going to just go with the straight chance but I'll broaden it based on responses to this.
When the encounter happens in coastal waters of a port, evasion should be much less likely if the winds are onshore. Problem for slightly later as that is handled in separate code.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Evasion Chance
Number of ships and Q/E seem right to me. Damage should be figured in to the Quality part of the equation - since a damaged ship should have less chance of evading. Undermanned ships should also have a disadvantage.
It should make little difference if a ship is upwind or downwind in an open SA since large numbers and well managed ships should move equally well in catching the ship.
John Vanvark
evasion
The previous note assumed at least one ship wished to pursue. As I work on this I'm not so sure that's right. Consider this case: 5 British ships in Evade mode sail and meet up with a group of 5 French ships in Accept mode. Clearly the British ships are going to make some effort to sail off. Should that chance always succeed, since the French ships are not pursuing? Or should there be some chance for the two groups to end up together even though the British are trying to avoid that and no French ship is pursuing?
My head is beginning to hurt too :) This is really a conceptual question about what "Accept" mode means.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
What Accept means
For now, at least, here's what Accept means.
You are sailing along. Suddenly you detect sails on the horizon (or maybe closer, if it's foggy or the sun is just coming up). In all cases you hang around long enough to get a count of ships. Then:
If your contact order is Evade, you turn tail and flee.
If your contact order is Pursue, you sail after them and don't stop until you make contact.
If your contact order is Accept, you do neither of those things and go about your business.
So the ruling at the moment is: If a group of ships all evading, approaches a group of hostile ships all accepting, then the evaders always get away.
I think (not 100% sure but close) that if a group of ships, all evading, approaches a group of hostile ships, one of which is pursuing and the rest are accepting, then the evaders will go away, the pursuer will go after them, and the accepters will end up elsewhere. This seems like the Right Thing to me.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
What Accept means
My interpretation as well. Accept is you will fight, but not actively look for a fight.
John Vanvark
One new problem
Consider a frigate crusing the seas, looking for enemy frigates. The frigate finds one and wishes to pursue it. It moves to a port and the frigate pursues. Then, however, a squadron of 5 enemy frigates appears. The given frigate would probably like to evade this group, but cannot because it is in contact with the frigate it's pursuing. It is prone to being trapped against the coast by the arriving squadron and destroyed or taken. (It will have the usual chance to evade battle at the start of the combat next turn.)
I think I can live with this as long as we have a "do not pursue into ports" option, which I think we do. If a frigate captain chooses to run into shore, he should know he's prone to get trapped against a lee shore and that's the risk he takes. As long as we give him the option to remain in the open sea in all cases, that should be sufficient. He knows that the enemy frigate he was chasing went into the port even if he doesn't follow it there. (He won't know if it leaves the port again, unless it happens to sail back into contact with him on the way out, but that's what he gives up.)
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
One new problem
Agreed.
And there are also the chances of encounters with port guns.
In fact, the "do not pursue into ports" should be the default condition. I would prefer if the box read "pursue into ports" so you would have to consciously check the box and risk the consequences.
John Vanvark
terminology
Just to make 100% sure everyone is with me on this: There is "coastal waters" and "harbor" which are separate. So there is the harbor of Marseilles and the coastal waters of Marseilles. The "port" is both of those things put together. So the "port" of Marseilles means the harbor and the coastal waters.
If a ship is pursuing, it will never under any circumstances enter the harbor. If it enters the port at all, it will go only to the coastal waters. If it has "do not pursue into ports" checked, it will not even go into coastal waters but will stay in the open sea area (eg, GOL in the case of Marseilles).
Coastal defense guns can only shoot at ships in the harbor, not in the coastal waters. The original game design was that the coastal waters were limited to the sea area within sight of the harbor, possibly including relay from a frigate, so something like 40 or 50 miles around. Later, the amphibious rules (which used to permit landings from sea areas - that was a problem) changed so that all landings are made from coastal waters. This has stretched the concept of what the "coastal waters" are. This is a little design inconsistency that we kinda have to live with at this point.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Another problem needing resolution
This post is at least in part just my way of thinking out loud, but if anyone has any suggestions or comments I'd be glad to have them.
Consider a British ship and a French ship in contact with another. The British ship has Evade Contact orders, the French ship has Pursue orders. A second French ship sails to their area. As the program stands, the British ship will evade the newly arriving French ship and neither of the French ships will be allowed to pursue it. This seems like the Wrong Thing (and I am pretty sure this problem occurred and was remarked on in NWOL-3).
The problem is what correction to make.
It seems to me that whenever hostile ships are in contact and a third ship approaches, the hostile ships in contact generally should not be allowed to separate. My question is whether there should be any exceptions to that rule. Pursuit maybe is one. Example: France is at war with Britain and Spain. One French ship has orders to pursue exactly 1 hostile ship, not more. That French ship is together with two British ships. A Spanish ship shows up and evades. Should the French ship abandon the two British ships it has, which it does not want to pursue, to chase the single new Spanish arrival which it does want to pursue? I think yes. But what if the single Spanish ship is accompanied by ten Dutch ships, allied with Spain (otherwise they couldn't move together), but France is not at war with Holland? Does that count as pursuing one ship, or pursuing eleven? At the moment I think it counts as pursuing eleven, so the French ship would not pursue.
Multi-sided wargames pose... challenges.
We do, at least, have the advantage that a group of moving ships is necessarily all allied. If hostile ships are pursuing them, then the pursuing group makes a separate move. So we do not have to worry about the moving group containing hostiles and getting split up via evasion. (We do have to make sure that any pursuing groups move to the same place as the ships they're pursuing but so far that seems to be working correctly.)
I think I am going to go with this:
When a group of moving ships (necessarily all allied to one another) encounters a group of ships containing at least one hostile pair (and possibly some neutrals, and the moving ships could be neutral or allied or hostile to either ship in the hostile pair they encountered) then no ship in the encountered group may evade. In such a case, all the encountered ships stay where they are unless the entire moving group evades, in which case any ship in the encountered group that wishes to pursue them may do so. (If some of the moving ships evade and others don't, then the encountered group always sticks with the ones that don't, regardless of numbers and diplomatic relationships.)
I can see at least one oddity that this might produce. France and Spain are at war, Holland and Britain are at war, the pairs in each war are neutral to the pairs in the other. A French, Spanish, and Dutch ship are together. The Dutch ship has evade orders. A British ship arrives. The Dutch ship is not allowed to evade the contact because it happens to be sitting next to a French and Spanish hostile pair. If the French and Spanish were not at war with each other, then the Dutch ship would be allowed to evade. It is... unusual... that the state of hostilities between the other two ships should affect whether the Dutch ship can depart.
Perhaps a ship in the encountered group should be banned from evading only if it is hostile to another ship in the encountered group. Maybe that can be coded without too much effort.
Aren't you all glad you didn't volunteer to design and program a wargame? :)
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Another problem needing resolution
Too many scenarios here for me to process and comment on.
The first one which reads:
"Consider a British ship and a French ship in contact with another. The British ship has Evade Contact orders, the French ship has Pursue orders. A second French ship sails to their area. As the program stands, the British ship will evade the newly arriving French ship and neither of the French ships will be allowed to pursue it. This seems like the Wrong Thing"
Agreed - it is the wrong thing.
The second one that I would like to comment on reads:
"France and Spain are at war, Holland and Britain are at war, the pairs in each war are neutral to the pairs in the other. A French, Spanish, and Dutch ship are together. The Dutch ship has evade orders. A British ship arrives. The Dutch ship is not allowed to evade the contact because it happens to be sitting next to a French and Spanish hostile pair."
This is the wrong thing. The possibility of evasion should work based on the number of enemy ships pursuing, not the presence of ships you are not at war with.
John Vanvark
Worked
I wrote:
> Perhaps a ship in the encountered group should be banned from evading only if it is
> hostile to another ship in the encountered group. Maybe that can be coded without
> too much effort.
It could be done without too much effort. It is so.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Worked
Agreed.
Steve, when you "work" these changes into the rules, can you add a relevant permanant statement at the same time into PATE rules - or have a separate "more rules" page linked into the Pate rules?
Thanks.
John Vanvark
rules changes
There is a "Rules Changes for NWOL-4" page at
http://holf.org/NWOL/ruleschanges.html
It's also linked from the main Rules page. It's not 100% current but it's close and I will have it completely current before the naval test game begins.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Actually
It is possible for a moving group of ships to contain hostile warships, if each side is allied to a third side. Example: France and Spain are at war with each other but both are allied to Britain, and there is a group of three ships together, one from each side. All have orders to move to the same destination; the British and French ships have pursue orders, the Spanish has evade orders. If the British ship moves first, both the Spanish and French ships will go along with it. If it encounters a Dutch ship, Holland at war with Britain and the Dutch ship not evading, then the Spanish ship will evade, the French ship will not, and the French ship will not go after the Spanish ship.
Any player who gets his country into such a situation deserves whatever happens to him :) I am not going to worry about it.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Ouch! My synapses.
This makes my brain hurt. Just change it and we'll test it ;)
Solved this one too
I have added code so that a ship in the moving group that is hostile to another ship in the moving group cannot evade (unless all ships in the moving group evade, in which case it will still stick with the hostile one - that seems unproblematic). So even though it's unlikely in the extreme to occur, the code will manage it correctly if it does.
Steve
I am a wizard. I make things using magic. SJS
Evasion!
The evasion issue in the GOL sounds a bit like what happened in the last turn of the summer games, when we were able to sneak into Hamburg after the units in the fort (who were not issued any orders, I believe) marched off to battle, as per the default support instructions for units without orders.
Is there any way of putting into the code something like IF MOVE DESTINATION = CURRENT DESTINATION THEN DETECT BONUS = + WHATEVER?
(I really have no clue how the code looks). You'd have to alter it to make sure ships that left and came back in the same turn didn't get the bonus, but you get the idea.