Operational Warfare Developer's Blog

Developer's blog for the Operational Art of War series

About the author

Ralph Trickey maintains TOAW III
I set this Blog up for fun, and for my own edication! Nothing is guaranteed, it's for my own use primarily, so even if I say that something may happen with the next release, please understand that it may not. I plan to post random thoughts and other things like that at random times here. I don't have a specific plan for what will be here.
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Recent posts

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Disclaimer

The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent my employer's view in anyway.

© Copyright 2010

Online resources

These are the ones I'm aware of.

English Forums
Official Forum
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tt.asp?forumid=225
Gamesquad
http://forums.gamesquad.com/forumdisplay.php?f=10
Blitzkrieg Wargaming Club
http://www.theblitz.org/message_boards/forumdisplay.php?fid=15
TDG
http://www.savemstateathletics.com/tdg/index.php

Chinese Forum
http://www.toaw.org/bbs/forumdisplay.php?fid=19

German Forum
http://www.si-games.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=167

Italian Forum
http://www.netwargamingitalia.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=38

Polish Forum
http://taktyka.net/phpbb3/viewforum.php?f=79

Developer's Blog
http://www.operationalwarfare.com/


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Sunday, June 06, 2010 10:54 PM
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Keyboard Shortcuts

Here's a full list of 3.4 commands. (I think(
Setting Menu Delay to 1 enables the 'Classic' mode, right click opens a menu.
Setting Menu Delay to anything else enables the 'Updated' mode, right click either moves or attacks. right-click and hold opens a menu.
Mouse Drags now works in most places like a right click.
Double-click on an enemy unit optionally opens up the combat planner dialog.
Left mouse click on some dialogs hides the dialog so you can see the map.

Mousewheel or extra mouse buttons - zoom the map in and out.
F1 - Help
F2 - Open the Group Composition dialog
F3 - Saves Map
F4 - If in OOB, saves OOB for both sides
F4 Shift Ctrl - saves OOB for current player
F5 - If in OOB, reads OOB for both sides
F6 - If not playing saves event file
F7 - If not playing loads event file
F8 - If not playing saves scenraio as 3.2
F9 - If playing does a quick save
F11 - Creates a NewGameText.xml file
F12 or \-Toggles Elmer Deployment Mode
Shift F12 or | Elmer moves your units
Arrow Keys - Move map
Ctrl Arrow Keys - Move micro map
Center Numpad Key Centers Map on Unit

1-9 Selects that entry on a dialog that has the entries above each other.
Space - Shows/Hides units for terrain analysis. Also hides some dialogs so you can see the map.
Escape or Enter - Closes mose dialogs
A - List Air Units
A/Shift - Air List
A - If in Editor OOB, calls oob_put_unit_equipment
B - Find Place
B/Ctrl - Find Next Place
C - Group Composition dialog
D - Dig in
E - End Turn
F - Formation dialog
G - Selects next unit in stack
G - If in Editor OOB, calls oob_get_unit_equipment
H - Moves HQs to top of stacks, second time  moves Artillery to tops of stacks
I - Toggles through the range circles options
L - Toggle through loss limit settings
L/Shift - Toggle the stack through loss limit settings
M - Shows remaining movement or attack/defense strength
N/+ - Next Unit
- - Previous unit
O - Brings up OOB (list of all Units)
P - Brings up combat planner
R - Refresh the display of the current unit
T - Tactical reserve mode
T/Shift - Theater options
U - Unit Report
W - Toggle Weather On/Off
Z - Undo
. - Disembarks the unit if embarked, else goes to next unit.
, - Integrates or splits units
/ Show formation Patch
? Show all formation paths


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Saturday, June 05, 2010 3:57 AM
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Disengagement

I may be wrong about this, since I didn't do any testbeds, but looked at the code instead which  may not do what I said.

Disengagement depends on a large number of factors in addition to what's in the manual. Disengagement is the process that causes the casualties in retreats, RBC (Retreat before combat) and disengagements, although there are slight differences. Airmobile has different rules.

First, there's a chance that you can just slip by, that depends on the following factors.

Special forces can always slip through, riverines have a 90% chance, and the rest of these cases are in the manual I believe.

If you have a big enough Recce scrren (including helicopters) compared to the opforce, then you may slip by. The recce screen includes any recce units in the hex that you are leaving.

If you have a big enough movement allowance compared to the opforce adjacent to you, then you may slip by.

If you fail those, you can still get by, but you'll take damage which depends on the relative gound, recce, air and artillery strength.

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Saturday, May 29, 2010 5:21 PM
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Sometimes I hate Microsoft...

I know that they were trying to be helpful, but... By default, Windows 7 will run at the resolution that the screen has and make everything bigger in software by changing some settings, that makes things less blurry. The fonts on my laptop were bigger than the fonts when I connected to my test machine. I spent about 6 hours chasing google snipes until I figured it out finally. I'm on 3.4.0.160, BTW. Each of those number is a change that I made, some major, some minor.

Ralph

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Saturday, May 29, 2010 5:20 AM
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Random semi-useful new feature

The B key lets you type in a partial name of a city and it will find it on the map. This would be useful for larger maps. For example, peter would find st petersburg, etc.

<Ctrl>-B finds the next city that matches that string.

It's helpful for me when someone says something like

Oh, it's the unit just below the Moscow...

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Sunday, May 23, 2010 4:54 PM
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Translation help needed

I need help upating the various translations to add the new strings.

Please help if possible.

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2469439&mpage=1&key=&#2470929

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Tuesday, May 18, 2010 4:30 AM
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Latest features...

Two minor things.

1) Dragging the minimap. This is amazingly useful. You can now drag the minimap instead of finding the little arrows. It's way faster, and a great way to navigate.

2) Double-Clicking on the map brings up the combat planning dialog. If you click on a unit, then double click on an adjacent unit, it will center the dialog on that unit, otherwise the rules are more complicated.

Ralph

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Thursday, May 13, 2010 10:10 PM
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iPad support (Sort of)

First, I haven't ported the code to the iPad, I'm using the iPad to connect to my main computer using some other software that I purchased.

I've been playing with an iPad lately. I wouldn't play FitE on the iPad, but I haven't played FitE on my PC either. Playing TOAW on the iPad is actually a decent experience.

I've found out that some of the features I just added work pretty well when combined with the iPad. It's an awesome experience, the screen size isn't as big a problem as it could be since you can easily zoom in and out using the iPad zooming.

I'm currently using the iTap rdp client, mainly because It seems to be the fastest of the ones I've tried.

I've made some modifications of the TOAW experience specifically for touch. These also work with Windows 7 Touch, and it's a better experience on a 16" screen. The iPad's 9" screen is a bit cramped. You can also connect from the iPad to a Windows XP computer, and everything works as expected, it isn't using anything specific to Windows 7.

Things that work with touch on the iPad (also using a mouse, or Windows 7 Touch)... They don't work in the editor, sorry. email me if you are working in the editor using an iPad and want this feature, someone has a padded cell reserved for you.

You can drag the map around using a finger. I don't repaint the map or do any of the nice experience things that are normal because they aren't practical without a major rewrite. Using the mini map for navigation works better for me, but when you want to move only a couple of hexes, it's a good choice.

You can drag the mini map around using a finger. I don't repaint the map or do any of the nice experience things that are normal because they aren't practical without a major rewrite. This actually works better than dragging the main map for me.

You can now drag units around using a finger. This does the expected things, move or attack or bombard or cancel attack, etc. You can still turn off the menu delay, and when you take your finger off the unit, it will pop up the menu just like you had clicked the right mouse button.

I've done everything I can to make the iPad remote experience as close to playing on a board as I could, and I think it's pretty darn close, I can't check the accelerometer and scramble the pieces when you bump it (yet.) Please understand that it does require some special software (I'm using iTap rdp client right now), and you need to be able to connect to a running PC, this isn't a native iPad app. There is a freeware rdp client for the iPod, but it hasn't been ported to the iPad yet, and I haven't tried it.

This presumably works from an iPod as well, but I think anyone trying that is a true diehard! You'd have to open a port and allow direct access from the internet. You'd also have to set up a dyndns.com account and hook it to your router so you had a known way to acess your PC by something like insane.dyndns.org. You'd also be working with a very small screen. I don't have an iPod and I'm not a masochist, but it's presumably there.

You could probably do it with TOAW 3.2, but the right-clicks required make playing it more difficult.

I may fine tune things a bit before release, but it's working pretty nicely now.

Ralph

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Tuesday, May 11, 2010 3:24 AM
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Toaw 3.4 Call for Scenarios.

Toaw 3.4 Call for Scenarios.

Please send me an email if you are interested in updating one of your scenarios in TOAW III or have a new scenario you'd like included.

RalphTrickey (at) OperationalWarfare.com

Thanks,
Ralph


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Wednesday, May 05, 2010 2:00 AM
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Feature Loss...

I had to kill a feature today. I had added code (I don't remember if it was 3.2, or 3.4) to allow for you to hold the <CTRL> key and use the ScrollWheel in order to switch to and from 3D view.

Microsoft decided that if using a touch screen, pinching would do a CTRL-ScrollWheel, so touch became less useful.

If anyone actually want's that feature, I can maybe add it in as Shift-ScrollWheel instead or something else.

Ralph

 


Posted by Ralph Trickey on Tuesday, May 04, 2010 2:16 AM
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