Freeciv auto-attack option does not work

[Ramon Casha]

Binary package hint: freeciv-client-gtk

The auto-attack option no longer works in Freeciv. Military units in cities should be able to go into auto-attack mode by pressing A, but this option is not shown at all.

[KarlGoetz (kgoetz)]

While freeciv won't autoattack by default in 2.1.10, I have confirmed that if you run '/set autoattack 1' in the chat window it'll enable autoattack on the server.
This can also be done by selecting the tick box at Games -> Server Options -> Military -> Turn on/off autoattack.
Does this fix the bug for you?
thanks,
kk

[Ramon Casha (rcasha)]

Thanks. I consider this a partial workaround, but not a solution. The server auto-attack option does not allow the player to choose which units should attack, like the previous auto-attack option did.

[KarlGoetz (kgoetz)]

On Mon, 30 Nov 2009 07:00:16 -0000
Ramon Casha <email address hidden> wrote:

> Thanks. I consider this a partial workaround, but not a solution. The
> server auto-attack option does not allow the player to choose which
> units should attack, like the previous auto-attack option did.
>

Ah, I see. I've had a look in upstreams changelog, and I didn't see
anything (in the last 4 years at least) that could be relevant to bug.

Any idea Which versions allowed the autoattack you described?

kk

[Ramon Casha (rcasha)]

No I'm not sure. I may have been running an older version under 9.04. Military units inside cities had the ability to auto-attack (by pressing A). The source code of some of the clients still refers to it (eg client/gui-xaw/menu.c - search for MENU_ORDER_AUTO_ATTACK).

[KarlGoetz (kgoetz)]

On Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:59:22 -0000
Ramon Casha <email address hidden> wrote:

> No I'm not sure. I may have been running an older version under 9.04.
> Military units inside cities had the ability to auto-attack (by
> pressing A). The source code of some of the clients still refers to
> it (eg client /gui-xaw/menu.c - search for MENU_ORDER_AUTO_ATTACK).

This bug may need to get forwarded upstream, I'll check their BTS[1]
tomorrow.
thanks,
kk

[1] https://gna.org/bugs/?group=freeciv
--
Karl Goetz, (Kamping_Kaiser / VK5FOSS)
Debian contributor / gNewSense Maintainer
http://www.kgoetz.id.au
No, I won't join your social networking group

[Jacob Nevins (0jacobnk-ulp)]

It is fairly clear that per-unit autoattack was deliberately removed upstream (it's not just 'stopped working'), although the reasons for this have been lost in the mists of time.
The only autoattack feature available in current versions is the 'autoattack' server option, which affects all units of all players.

Traces of its removal:
http://svn.gna.org/viewcvs/freeciv?revision=8788&view=revision (r8788 from 2004) is the addition of the 'autoattack' server option and removal of 'old autoattack code'
http://svn.gna.org/viewcvs/freeciv?revision=10742&view=revision (r10742 from 2005) is the removal of some client UI

I think this debuted in 2.1.x.

Unfortunately, both the bug tracker and mailing list archives for this period are not online, so we can't easily determine the rationale.

At this point, this is best treated as a feature request rather than a bug (and it is a reasonable feature request).

[Tobias Frost (coldtobi)]

Ancient version and upstream feature request.