Disable stacking in map window

Technical Support & Bugs
1

Again - using 3.1.17 (seems like we have a lot of bugs now that didn’t use to exist a long time ago…)

The option to disable stacking in a map window no longer works.

Best illustrated with the picture attached, editor view is on left side, in game resultant view (after saving and restarting of course…) on right. As you can see the pieces are clearly stacking

[attachment=0]stacks.png[/attachment]

2

Tim,

What exactly do you mean by ‘no longer works’. I checked this module with 3.1.0 and the behaviour is exactly the same. This module has never worked as you suggest.

The problem is that you have created these sets of counters as At-Start stacks and so stacks are what you get regardless of the setting of the disable stacking setting. The same thing happens if you drag and drop a stack of counters onto a stack-disabled map, the counters do not magically destack. I can see an argument for the behaviour you suggest, but it is a non-trivial problem.

  1. The Piecemover would need to de-stack stacks when dropping pieces onto a non-stacking board.
  2. The code that creates an at-start stack in a new game will need to check the stacking flag and de-stack if necessary.

The work-around in your case is probably to create the counter setup as a pre-defined setup rather than at-start stacks. Another option is to create each set of 4 counters as 4 separate at-start stacks.

Still looking at the other bugs you reported.

Rgds.
Brent.

3

I didn’t mean in the module - I meant in Vassal in general

Ok, understood - I was going by what the reference manual says which suggests otherwise - “Disable stacking: If checked, then pieces will never form stacks in this window” (emphasis mine)

Knowing this I actually see 2 possible solutions -
1: we call it a manual bug and correct the wording so it’s understood that it does not apply in whatever cases specified or
2: Call it an RFE to make it behave as it is described which you say wont be easy

I think 1 is the quick and easy solution right now - up to you what you want to do with this

I used 16 decks instead as that also solved the STL bug I found as well for now :slight_smile:

Thanks

Tim

4

Hi Tim,

I think it’s reasonable to call it a bug :slight_smile:

What do you think should happen if a Deck where to be created on such map?

I’m thinking that perhaps At-Start stacks and Decks should be an exception to the non-stacking rule, but the PieceMover should de-stack pieces in a Stack when moving to a non-stacking map.

Brent.

5

That sounds good - I would say Decks are definitely exceptions at all times. The At Start Stacks exception should be an initial set up condition only. Can they de-stack once they move within the map or would we have to move the At Start out of the map and then back in? Either way that occurs would be fine - The Map Stacking dialog can denote however this works when the option to disable stacking is checked

Tim