Disappearing Units?

[Grim.Reaper]

Not sure if a bug or something is happening that would cause this situation.

I'm fighting a battle as the Confederates and I have two units on the side of the hill with no obstructions in front of them. Enemy Union troops at the foot of the hill advancing. As they are advancing, the unit disappears and then reappears many times as it advances. During the whole time, I have the same unit of mine selected which again is on a hill with nothing in front of it. As best as I can tell, clear line of sight. At first I thought maybe somehow loosing the LOS, but this happened many times in my battle and to my eye, I can't see anything that would have blocked the unit's view, especially since my unit never moved.

Any ides or is this a issue?

[norb]

I've heard about this a few times, but we never saw it in our own testing. So when you see it, grab a save, zip it up (or 7-zip or rar) and send it to sowsupport at scourgeofwar dot com. We'll get all these bugs fixed or explained and put them in a patch.

[norb]

One of the guys reminded me that this could be based on one of the view options. This option only allows the player to see certain units while playing. It's one of the many things we do to make the game more realistic (although disappearing does not seem realistic). The idea is that they somehow have gone out of a certain distance from your player or in other cases those under his command.

This is used by the realism option for mp games. The idea being that only the higher level officers can see the entire battle. The lower level officers have limited views. So they have to depend on the higher level officers for strategic orders and do not have the information to make those orders themselves.

[pcelt]

Hi Norb--re units disappearing out of view suddenly-just seeming to vanish.This does look a little strange and very unnatural---is there any posibility such "going out of sight" units could disappear gradually --grow fainter in the way the trees gradually disappear . I think this would look less strange but might involve 5 more years programming ...... and Im only free to advise you on Thursay evenings after trombone practice .
Great game by the way. Been sandboxing round the suburbs of Gettysburg --really atmospheric and immersive battles----please just stop those suicidal confed officers ,after much intensive fighting, from individually riding casually down the road to commit hari kari and die on my line. It has happened in almost all the battles and it is having a bad effect on my clean-cut young officers.....

[norb]

I think that this will have to be addressed in the patch somehow. Not sure how yet, but I agree that it takes away from the battle feeling. Need to find another way to address this feature.

[Grim.Reaper]

Norb, are you saying this might be due to some setting in Multiplayer? If that is the case I just wanted you to know that I have not played MP, I have only played single player.

For me, I also had multiple units on the side of the hill with a clear view and they still came and went. All units should have had a complete LOS the entire time.

Hoping your able to track this one down and thanks for looking into it.

[RebBugler]

Grim.Reaper wrote:

Norb, are you saying this might be due to some setting in Multiplayer? If that is the case I just wanted you to know that I have not played MP, I have only played single player.

For me, I also had multiple units on the side of the hill with a clear view and they still came and went. All units should have had a complete LOS the entire time.

Hoping your able to track this one down and thanks for looking into it.

OK, narrowing it down. Was this play sandbox? Which one? Did you change the beginning time, if so, what to?

Just remembered, if it was the scenario 'Greene's Alone', then it's not a bug. It's dusk, visibility is very low...units appear and disappear, this is normal and realistic.

[Grim.Reaper]

It was Sandbox but not sure of the options selected. I believe the objectives were Line of Sight and I just left most everything else default including time of day.

[norb]

Yes, there is a realism option in MP that could cause this behaviour. Otherwise it's a bug or just visibility distance.

You could get a saved game and send it to our support email and that might help us find out and fix in a patch if possible.

Thanks!

[RebBugler]

Think I found it. Played a Culp's Hill sandbox and yes indeed, had a unit appear and disappear. Did not change the default time, but think that map automatically reverts to PM, or dusk, with low visibility (note the late evening sky).

Will discuss this with the team, however, I conclude presently that this is really not a bug, just a low visibility situation caused by dusk, and should be labeled better as such, so players will know what to expect, and can better prepare by scouting ahead and finding those enemy ghosts before they are in their face. :woohoo: