Defect Name: Units do not move to new patrol zones

[Herman]

Defect Name: Units do not move to new patrol zones

Build: HCE 2007.000

Repeatable: Y

Operating System: XP

DB used: HCDB-070524

Scenario used: Units do not move to new patrol zones.sc1

Long Description: Units do not move to new patrol zones when size of zones is changed

 

Sequence to reproduce:

1. Change formation zone sizes to: 10nm, 20nm, 30nm, and 40nm.

2. Do NOT make any changes to ship assignments.

3. Run at high compression to allow ships to move to new zone

4. After formation is stabilized, check distances between ships. Type 42 has been assigned a zone between 20-30nm and should thus be 25-30nm from the ship at the centre of the formation (CVH)

 

Units do not move to new patrol zones [after].gif

 

5. Check range between ships in unit display and DDG is only 9nm from CVH.

 

Units do not move to new patrol zones [range].gif

 

Expected behaviour: Units should move to new patrol areas when zone size changes

Observed behaviour: Units do not move to new patrol areas when zone size changes

Units_do_not_move_to_new_patrol_zones.zip

[Gopher]

I guess it known to all that the formation editor is a little bit wired and from the tactical point of view with speed, sensor (and altitude) setting a bigger improvement would be good. While from my point of view there are other points with bigger effect on game fun.

[Axure]

Unfortunately, formation editor bugs are seem to be very old and very persistent.

Yesterday I've played HC 2002 and had same problems as Herman describes in his posts.

This is really surprising to see such obvious problems prevailing for so long in a product being supposedly the most sophisticated and accurate naval warfare simulation available to civilians... And to think that I've almost decided to buy the HCE+ANW pack.

[Herman]

Unfortunately, formation editor bugs are seem to be very old and very persistent.

Yesterday I've played HC 2002 and had same problems as Herman describes in his posts.

 

I agree. I remember seeing these problems in HC2002 and HCG. I never reported them at that time because I considered them relatively minor and didn't want to distract from the main effort. Perhaps I should have. Regardless, I still think that they are relatively minor.

 

Now, this isn't a personal attack or criticism of anyone, but no one else reported these bugs, either. The lists at:

 

ScenShare (http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/FilesOfScenShare/database)

GameSquad (http://www.gamesquad.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25815)

HarpGamer (http://harpgamer.com/harpforum/index.php?showtopic=169)

 

have been up for years. Anyone could have reported these behaviors at any time. The point is, no one mentioned them. They don't get fixed if someone doesn't report it.

 

It appears as though you've followed through all the various incarnations of this game and have kept track of the features and functions as they changed. That's really superb. Please feel free to add your base of knowledge to the current effort. No one's stopping you from reporting on any of these sites.

 

The rate at which things get fixed in HCE is positively mind-boggling when compared to other versions. A comprehensive list of problems hasn't even been started for HCE because they get fixed faster than the list could be edited. Other lists just grow, and grow,...

 

Of course, it would be nice if a patch was released so that the repairs could be confirmed...

[TonyE]

Hehe Herman, you know I'd like to have the patch in your hands and would if Matrix would play along.

 

Until then you'll have to live with the release notes (take a look Axure)

http://harpgamer.com/harpforum/index.php?showtopic=2395

 

The second post is what has been changed since the WestPac Beta

After that are the changes since HCE release (2007.000).

[Axure]

Herman, to some extent you're right, but

 

1) I'm not that frequent player of Harpoon, and so far not a member of the Harpoon player community.

(The above post is my first on this forum - together with the other one, very similar, on the other formation editor thread. Sorry for double-posting, for some reason I thought that other post didn't appear.)

 

2) I love how someone on the other thread said that HC 2002 was the most stable edition... As if not-crashing was something unusual . Maybe I'm used to a different standard of software, maybe I'm spending too much time with highly polished products, but to me "stable" is what makes a product releasable, and not "high-quality".

 

3) Some of these bugs make an impression that the creators of this Harpoon didn't even play it thoroughly before releasing. To me it is logical that if you had played, say, 10 scenarios of this game from start to end, you would HAVE to encounter such obvious things like formation editor bugs or bingo fuel bugs (that cause your aircraft to crash - HC 2002, dunno about HCE).

 

But, despite all my criticism, I really like this game, so I hope the development quality will improve over time and I still think I might buy the HCE+ANW bundle

(...as soon as I get my Visa to be able to purchase over the internet. Geez, I thought issuing a credit card is an obvious thing, but then, maybe banks also have a lot of room for improvement

[Herman]

If you play, you're a member of the community (whether you like it or not ). Your messages don't appear automatically since they first need approval from the site admins.

 

If you play more versions of Harpoon, I think that you'd find that some versions crash more than others. Perhaps there should be a new standard of reference -- "Harpoon-quality".

 

I don't think that it is reasonable to say that all the problems posted for HCE are easily noticeable. Take, for example, these Formation Editor anomalies. If a person sets up his patrols and just leaves things for the entire game, he won't notice them in the slightest. Only if he tinkers mid-game will he be in a position to notice something.

 

Since you are interested in both ANW and HCE, I strongly encourage you to try out the ANW Demo (ftp://ftp.matrixgames.com/pub/Harpoon3ANW/Harpoon_3_Gouge_Demo_1.exe). This is the public face of ANW since many folks will likely try it out before purchase. Go ahead and play it and see if you can identify some of the problems listed at:

 

* Known Harpoon [ANW] Issues http://www.gamesquad.com/forums/showthread.php?t=42076

 

You can decide for yourself if the problems are self-evident or if they are obscure. Since you haven't played it before, you would be in a perfectly objective position as to the seriousness of any problems you encounter; whether they pop out at you or if you have to dig hard to find them.

 

There are 8 tutorial sessions and 6 scenarios for you to try. That should be plenty to prove your theory of "things showing up if you play them all the way through".

 

Unfortunately, there is no HCCE demo available at the moment.

[Axure]

With regard to formation editing - I'm not a control freak, but there's at least one situation when formation editor is really needed - and that is when you cross very narrow straits. Maybe I'm too unexperienced and I'm doing something wrong, but for me the way to pass Gibraltar with a carrier battle group without running aground is to tighten the whole formation so that it really fits through Gibraltar.

[Digression: there also seems to be a serious bug in in ground collision detection mechanism, 'cuz I've crashed my ships a number of times, while on the map (big zoom in) they seemed far enough from the shore. But again, that's HC 2002, dunno about current versions.]

 

Anyways, I am aware of that ANW demo and I will definitely try it out. For the sake of objectivity (or laziness ), I will not read the new bug list and see what I can find

[Akula]

I addressed this one as part of this bug report, as I ran into the same problem when testing for the other.

 

http://harpgamer.com/harpforum/index.php?showtopic=2429

 

I've also noticed that patrols don't always start where they were ordered to in the SE.