As far as I understood, shadow dislikes having to enter tactical and pressing CTRL+.
He preferred if mercs being on assignments like training in a sector with water present,
1. they would not drink from their personal inventory but directly out of sector so that their canteens need no refilling at all (but they still drink automatically when thirsty),
or
2. they drink from personal inventory, but this gets refilled automatically without player having to issue any refill command,
or
3. that there was a button for "refill all canteens" in strategic UI.

Sounds like a convenient idea to me, but I have no clue about feasibility (and since flug dislikes messing with UI, 3. is probably no option here )

3. is definetly out. Adding a new button to strategic would require redoing the sector boundary stis and whatnot.

Ordering the mercs to refill canteens automatically is trivial. However, I'm not sure this would be good, as it would effectively make this feature almost completely obsolete (apart from putting a stack of food into the inventory every so often).

Ordering the mercs to refill canteens automatically is trivial. However, I'm not sure this would be good, as it would effectively make this feature almost completely obsolete (apart from putting a stack of food into the inventory every so often).

optional feature - a feature that is not compulsory. It is up to you to use it.

I'm currently putting together the biggest single commit I did so far (as far as code lines go). Until that is done, me no touch anything.

I'm currently putting together the biggest single commit I did so far (as far as code lines go). Until that is done, me no touch anything.

Yes, though I don't see why. Just don't give them food in that case.

#1--BUG: When in an occupied enemy sector, you can still auto refill canteens so long as you're in real-time mode. This doesn't make sense, since in most sectors the enemy is between you and the water.

Yeah, but wouldn't it make more sense not to allow it in enemy occupied sectors than to allow it?

Why? I don't see your point, if you'd walking into a battlezone, you're still out of the enemy's sight. Then you notice your canteen is almost empty and you're about to cross a small stream of clean and pure water, wouldn't you stop real quick to refill your canteen?

So it's basically a design decision...

I think there are more severe problems with occupied sectors that are still not solved. Things like flying there and then start to repair, train or .

I completely agree. If we could walk up to the water source and then have the option to refill, I'd agree with you that this is the way it should work. But more often than not, there are enemies between you and the water source (Example: when you're attacking a SAM site, and the water is in the bathroom of the SAM facility. Or how about when you deploy on the outskirts of a city sector and there are enemies in/around the buildings? Doesn't make sense.) If we can't access sector inventory in an occupied sector (because we're not allowed free movement, lest we run into enemies), it doesn't make sense that we can access sector water for the same reasons.

--But this is all just my opinion. I'm in the minority, so be it.

But if I understood silversurfer right, as long as there are no open bodies of water in the map, then you're not able to refill your canteen anyways and on the most other maps, the bodies of water are quite big stretching from on edge to another.

Calling open bodies of water poisoneous, is a bit far-fetched.

The only poisonous water is the one taken from swamps, or heavy industrial sectors. Sea water cannot be consumed, water from lakes/rivers is okay.

The only poisonous water is the one taken from swamps, or heavy industrial sectors. Sea water cannot be consumed, water from lakes/rivers is okay.

Two things:

#2--Suggestion: Auto drinking in sectors with a clean water source. It's kind of a hassle that I have to 'water' my mercs when they're in city sectors when they can otherwise refill their canteen with clean water at-will. Buying them food is one thing--because it costs money, and I control the purse. But water is free, and so when it's readily available, and clean, and I still have to 'water' them, it just seems like they're completely helpless to help themselves (maybe Larry would still need help, though?). I think it's a great system, and the player should still have to manually refill their canteens before going out into other sectors. But IMO, it seems really goofy that mercs can't take care of their own needs when they're in a sector with a clean source of water. (This came about by not having enough canteens to go around at the beginning of the game. I can't split my mercs up between city sectors because they all die of thirst). Also, I'd suggest mercs ought to be able to eat out of sector inventory if there's free food to be found there (for the same reasons)--but maybe that's already implemented? From a game perspective, it makes sense that even if mercs don't have canteens, they can still move around the map as long as they plan their trips from one CLEAN watering hole to another. Otherwise, the beginning of the game is broken on harder difficulty levels, since many mercs don't deploy with canteens, and it might be days before you control the Drassen airport, with an additional 24 hours minimum on top of that before you can get the canteens you need from BR's. At least, that's been my experience.