It has been brought into question recently whether I properly understand the purposes and functions of some of the game settings and "special" key commands... and indeed, I have been operating under certain assumptions about several of these settings and commands in particular, because I never found much other than a cursory description of them. It is very possible that I am misunderstanding the purposes and/or effects in these cases.

 

So, my question is, does complete documentation of the game settings and commands exist in one place somewhere - that fully describes the purpose, application, and effects of the various game settings and commands - along with any "side effects" or nuances they may have, that might not be obvious nor particularly "intuitive"? If so, please direct me to that full documentation - just so I can be sure whether there is any "user error" involved here.

 

Thanks.

Joe,

now I understand why you asked this question.

 

I was just reading a thread that talks about ALT+ R...indicating some sort of refueling evolution. I wasn't aware how to organize this...

 

I think there are many in the Harpoon community that know the commands and "shortcuts" and have learned them thru various means.

 

While that is great and allows them to operate the game more seamlessly, there are those like Joe, and myself who are still trying to figure it all out.

Joe, now I understand why you asked this question. I was just reading a thread that talks about ALT+ R...indicating some sort of refueling evolution. I wasn't aware how to organize this... I think there are many in the Harpoon community that know the commands and "shortcuts" and have learned them thru various means. While that is great and allows them to operate the game more seamlessly, there are those like Joe, and myself who are still trying to figure it all out.

 

ScottoT, you can find keyboard command layouts in the Downloads / Tools section here.

 

I can only assume that folks are also aware of the 153 page manual (in PDF) that comes with the game?

Brad,

maybe my response earlier came across as sounding like no assistance has been offered.

 

That is entrirely not the case. I have found myself being treated as a lost friend, and been offered help at every turn.

 

I can only speak for myself to say that I am aware of the manual, but the 153pg manual isn't something that I have printed out in its entirety, or have handy as I am finding my way thru various scenarios.

 

Scott

I personally detest the idea of including manuals only as PDF files. I got lucky on that one and got the game with a hard copy included.

 

To be honest, that's one thing that's held me back from purchasing the Ultimate Edition of the game. I have little knowledge of Harpoon 3, and the idea of fighting the learning curve by switching between windows and trying to enlarge the PDF enough for these tired old eyes isn't very appealing.

 

Buddha

Brad, maybe my response earlier came across as sounding like no assistance has been offered. That is entrirely not the case. I have found myself being treated as a lost friend, and been offered help at every turn. I can only speak for myself to say that I am aware of the manual, but the 153pg manual isn't something that I have printed out in its entirety, or have handy as I am finding my way thru various scenarios.

Scott

 

I didn't take it that way at all, but I am interested in making sure that everyone who reads the thread (and doesn't necessarily join in) can gather something from the discussion. So that means pointing to the sources available.

I personally detest the idea of including manuals only as PDF files. I got lucky on that one and got the game with a hard copy included.

 

To be honest, that's one thing that's held me back from purchasing the Ultimate Edition of the game. I have little knowledge of Harpoon 3, and the idea of fighting the learning curve by switching between windows and trying to enlarge the PDF enough for these tired old eyes isn't very appealing.

 

Buddha

 

I still have the paper manual from Harpoon 2 that I bought somewhere around 1996 or 1997. However, I still find the PDFs to be very useful to skim for details, especially for Platform Editor, etc.

I personally detest the idea of including manuals only as PDF files. I got lucky on that one and got the game with a hard copy included.

 

To be honest, that's one thing that's held me back from purchasing the Ultimate Edition of the game. I have little knowledge of Harpoon 3, and the idea of fighting the learning curve by switching between windows and trying to enlarge the PDF enough for these tired old eyes isn't very appealing.

 

Buddha

 

I still have the paper manual from Harpoon 2 that I bought somewhere around 1996 or 1997. However, I still find the PDFs to be very useful to skim for details, especially for Platform Editor, etc.

 

One point I will concede on PDF manuals. The Edit/Find function can be something of a godsend when looking for something.

 

Buddha

Brad, maybe my response earlier came across as sounding like no assistance has been offered. That is entrirely not the case. I have found myself being treated as a lost friend, and been offered help at every turn. I can only speak for myself to say that I am aware of the manual, but the 153pg manual isn't something that I have printed out in its entirety, or have handy as I am finding my way thru various scenarios.

Scott

 

I didn't take it that way at all, but I am interested in making sure that everyone who reads the thread (and doesn't necessarily join in) can gather something from the discussion. So that means pointing to the sources available.

I have recently gotten back to looking up the manual (after a game) in order to check something that caught me a bit by surprise. It isn't always in enough detail for some questions, but it does have the basics of just about every aspect.

I've sometimes asked questions in these forums, only to think later of the manual and find the answer there (then feel like a goose )

And as Brad says, a look over the topics in tools/mods/docs can uncover good info.

...

I can only assume that folks are also aware of the 153 page manual (in PDF) that comes with the game?

 

Perhaps you are not understanding my question - or perhaps I am overlooking the sought-after information somehow - but, in any case, I don't find the level of detail that I was seeking in any of the documentation that I'm aware of.

 

There are several other cases as well, but the one in particular that finally prompted me to ask is about the game settings for AAW auto-fire range, surface SAM fire rate, etc. Specifically, I do not understand what the scope of these settings is, nor even what they actually affect or apply to (the brief descriptions notwithstanding), but more particularly, the details of how they are used together to affect "full control" of the "automatic" player's defensive anti-missile operations. Indeed, subsequent discussion has led me to believe that the AAW auto-fire range actually has nothing to do with the automatic anti-missile defenses, but instead has some bearing on the behavior of player's air groups.

 

But the bottom line question that I was trying to fathom, in this particular case, was how to configure the player's "automatic" anti-missile defenses so they would behave comparably to the AI's anti-missile defenses, in the sense of magnitude of response. After reading what little I found in the manuals about the matter, and even after subsequent discussion, I still do not know the answer to this.

 

But, that particular question is not an isolated situation; I've also had trouble finding details that describe the specific functions and applicability - and nuances - of many other settings and commands, too. There are very nice charts and summaries of the commands and so forth, but I'm not finding any full descriptions of purpose and function of all that stuff, so I'm wondering if that sort of documentation exists anywhere, and if so where.

 

Of course, the underlying concern is whether some game settings - or perhaps some unusual combination of them - might be leading to some or all of the apparently abnormal behaviors that I observe during play. Irrespective of that, though, I really would like to properly understand everything the settings do and what all they really apply to or affect.

But the bottom line question that I was trying to fathom, in this particular case, was how to configure the player's "automatic" anti-missile defenses so they would behave comparably to the AI's anti-missile defenses, in the sense of magnitude of response. After reading what little I found in the manuals about the matter, and even after subsequent discussion, I still do not know the answer to this.

 

To your specific question the AI uses "Normal Surface SAM Fire Rate" and uses the "AAW Auto-Fire Range = 3/4 max" though the latter is a bit of a misnomer since often it is 100% of range for the player case and always 100% of range for the AI case.

 

To your more broad question it is up to volunteers at present to assemble better documentation. VitP is the only person currently doing that and his keyboard command cards and BS Builder documentation are very much appreciated and more is on the way as you can see in the Manual/Help forum

...

To your specific question the AI uses "Normal Surface SAM Fire Rate" and uses the "AAW Auto-Fire Range = 3/4 max" though the latter is a bit of a misnomer since often it is 100% of range for the player case and always 100% of range for the AI case.

...

The thing that puzzles the begeebies out of me is why platforms on the AI side fire so much more defensive stuff than when they are on the player's side. Since both are "automatic" responses, I figured there might be some sort of settings that would bring the two responses to a more similar level.

 

I run the default settings in these cases, but my overall observations indicate that the player's side normally fires only 1-2 SAMs at each incoming missile (per volley), while the AI side fires more on the order of 5-10 SAMs per incoming missile (per volley), and the AI side fires more volleys per attack than does the player's side... all of which is "bad" in the sense that the Player's missiles don't have much chance of getting through, but "good" in the sense that the AI's platforms expend their complement of SAMs more quickly, and so I can then go in and kill 'em while their rails and magazines are empty.

 

I do wonder whether this is the "normal" relative behavior of the AI's and player's missile defenses, or if there is (are) some other setting(s) that I need to adjust... or if, as has been suggested, this is abnormal behavior, and just another symptom that reportedly exists only on my installation (in which case, I won't bother trying to tweek anything).

This is a perfect opportunity to use the scenario editor to build a representative scenario for analysis and then provide the scenario and saved games from just before the SAMs start flying for play as each of Blue and Red sides. Such as scenario will have a ship on one side and a plane and launching platform on the other, plane attacks ship & missiles fly.

 

Barring that, like every issue, now is the perfect time to provide the saves showing the behavior.

The thing that puzzles the begeebies out of me is why platforms on the AI side fire so much more defensive stuff than when they are on the player's side. Since both are "automatic" responses, I figured there might be some sort of settings that would bring the two responses to a more similar level.

 

Give us some test scenarios to prove you can duplicate what none of us have seen in the game. If you can't do that because you're still playing the demo, then, maybe you should invest in the game a little, or maybe think about where the real issues are. Document what happens, compare the classes that are firing said ordnance, and go from there; i.e. a VLS Tico is going to fire more missiles than a Perry, and a Kirov can manage more than a Kiev.

 

Posting paragraphs like the quoted one above does *nothing* to help anyone, least of all you.

The thing that puzzles the begeebies out of me is why platforms on the AI side fire so much more defensive stuff than when they are on the player's side. Since both are "automatic" responses, I figured there might be some sort of settings that would bring the two responses to a more similar level.

 

Give us some test scenarios to prove you can duplicate what none of us have seen in the game. If you can't do that because you're still playing the demo, then, maybe you should invest in the game a little, or maybe think about where the real issues are. Document what happens, compare the classes that are firing said ordnance, and go from there; i.e. a VLS Tico is going to fire more missiles than a Perry, and a Kirov can manage more than a Kiev.

 

Posting paragraphs like the quoted one above does *nothing* to help anyone, least of all you.

 

 

 

Why is it that nobody will simply answer the questions? That is, is it normal behavior? And is there any way to make the player's auto-defenses work comparably to the AI's defenses?

 

If this is not normal game behavior, then one of two things must account for it:

 

1. I am missing some setting that's needed to make this work as expected, or

2. It is yet another manifestation of things that foul up locally only.

 

The "solution" for case 1 above is self-explanatory, while case 2 is no longer worth pursuing.

 

On the other hand, if this is normal game behavior, then one of two things must be going on:

 

1. My expectations are incorrect (for reasons that remain unexplained), or

2. Something isn't working realistically.

 

Again, the "solution" for the first case here is self-explanatory (for instance, someone could explain the error of my expectations).

 

The second case here is the only one of the cases which warrants any investigative efforts. That's why I wanted first to find out which of the cases is true - because only one case of the four warrants any investigative efforts.

 

BTW, in regards to the question of different platforms, I guess I didn't state clearly that in some cases I have compared the behavior of the same group or ship from the player's side and from the AI's side, with the results materially as described, depending on which side the group is being played. In other words, I don't see any indication that it is a platform-related effect - at least to the best of my ability to achieve an apples-to-apples comparison, as it often isn't easy to induce directly-comparable behavior on the AI side. Further, these particular observations have been pretty consistent here since at least HCG, if not before... so I seriously doubt that it is just due to some quirk of the Demo version.