SlowMotion

I am having the same problem - I bought the CMSF1 Big Bundle Upgrade. I activate it fine, but it shows me the activation splash screen with no visible text, but if I copy and paste it to a text editor, it says:
Game Title
Your trial has expired. We hope you enjoyed it!
You can unlock the full version by clicking 'Activate'
Instant Activation
When you enter your serial this app will be fully activated instantly. No Redownloading needed!
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After activation this application will be yours forever.
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People say you have to tell it about CMSF. Where and when do you do that? I have CMSF installed successfully on my PC already. And CMSF2 is a new install. Any tips are appreciated!

I see this same thing in Windows7.
Even though the activation says "Unlock Success", it doesn't remember this. I have reactivate.
And pressing Play does nothing.
Edit: my problem was that I had activated CMSF2, but not CMSF base game. Once I activated CMSF base game then starting CMSF2 became possible.

I have the same problem, but fear not, its all good.
Nothing is listed in your store account that was before the late 2007 shop rework. They totally changed the store in later 2007. So if you bought the game before the shop was reworked, you need to go to the helpdesk and open a ticket with it.
For me my CMBB, CMAK, Theatre of War, T72 BoF and CMSF1(i buy it few days after release) are NOT listed in my store record cause i buy them before late 2007. As said, you need to open a ticket, that is what i did and support will help you out. They dig up your record from a drawer or something and can verify that you purchased CMSF before the shop rework.

Yeah. Back when I was starting college, and all the years before that and for a couple of decades after, I was greedy to learn new stuff and quite facile in doing so. Nowadays, if I find myself having to learn something new and complicated, like a new OS, I groan and drag my feet and whine about "why couldn't they just keep using the stuff I already know?"

Michael

Can't remember, but I was (and still am) very pleased with it. But I agree, a small contribution. Small but effective. Our soldiers hated to leave there, but who understands politics...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Task_Force_Urozgan

I just love that Battlefront has been around for 18 years (since release of CMBO, I know they were around before developing it)  and continues to produce the Combat Mission line when they could have done other things, probably for more money. I have never been in combat but nothing else comes close to providing the, to me, realistic immersion that Combat Mission has.   Perhaps the dogfight sims would but I don't play those. I prefer time to think, which may be unrealistic I suppose. The shooters certainly do not provide the realism to me.

I would really like to see a Fulda Gap game show up sometimes. It should present the time of the seventees, because it would be very different to WWII and not showing all the software driven gadgets we see at CM:BS and CM:SF. There would be a very variable terrain, lots of interesting equipment of many different nations and lot of opportunities for add on modules. Even if it takes some years from now, it should definitively be on the roadmap. For me a must buy. And, additionally, many German terrain items could be reused from the end of WWII module already planned.
Man, I would love to initiate a counterattack using Leopard1, HS30, recon with Hotchkiss SPz Kurz or Luchs and all this other fancy equipment against hordes of Sovjet tanks.

I think part of the issue is adding time affects play balance for human to human and adversely affects one player while benefiting the other.  Balance is really tough considering the different play options.  Nice thing is if you really want it you can always open the editor and add time for play against the AI and save that separately.

You misunderstand. My main point was that being able to edit maps in 3D would help speed up the process of making maps, which would help speed up the process of creating scenario's and campaigns. 

Imo the one thing holding 'good' campaign design back is the HUGE amount of playtesting that is required. Even designing a small campaign with no force preservation, ammo concerns and the like is a big, big undertaking when it comes to playtesting. Many of the comunity made campaigns are made by a single guy i belive. If he is lucky he has a small number of volontary playtesters to help out. 
A Small campaign...mayby 4 or 5 'stand alone' scenarios linked together into a campaign with pretty much full replenishments between the battles resulting in pretty much a garanteed set of curcomstances for the next battle still requires testing, testing, testing...
To get a 'good' campaign
Add to this brancing scenrios, force preservation, ammo concerns and stuff...The need for testing increases drastically to be able to try out the different results the previous battle will have on the next one and the next one and the next....
'Good' campaigns is pretty much not doable by a single person...He would go mad 😉 by the need for playtesting...over and over  and over again...
Things like designing the maps takes time...sure...but it's nothing compared to the playtesting needed for a 'good' campaign.
The best improvement to the editor imo to simplyfy scenario/campaign design would be to be able to - load a save-game file into the editor - Tweak it and re-save it to be played again...
For example...You have designed a 60 minutes battle...You have playtested the first part of the fight...lets say up to minute 20 and everything is working fine so far. But as the battles continues somewhere around minute 35 things are not playing out as you have intended. Some stuff will need to be tweaked to get the second half of the battle to work the way you like.
With the current editor features you would need to tweak the second part of the scenario. Save it and start from scratch. that is minute 1 !. having to play through those 20 to 30 minutes again to get to the part that you just tweaked. Maybe it is working this time. Good for you ! but maybe it is not working this time either or you would like to try something else for the second part of the battle regardless. Tweak the scenario ones again. Save it and ones agian you will need to start playtesting from minute 1.....Uuuurghf !!!
What if you could take the save-game file you have from a few minutes before the playtesting showed some undesired results and load that file into the editor....Make your desired tweaks for the second part of the battle and save the file again. Now...when you begin your playtest of the tweaked version of your scenario you will begin playtesting at the same minute the game was on when you saved it...maybe minute 25...and start your playtesting from there. No need to play the first 25 minutes again.
Having something like this would be a feature i would really like...

Not sure about those numbers but yeah it takes a lot of work. My big issue is that campaigns are not playable H2H via PBEM. Since that is how I play this game I, sadly, have little interest in campaigns. Not that I am a very prolific scenario generator but if I could play campaigns va PBEM I would shift my effort to creating campaigns.
 
I honestly don't know how possible or likely some kind of auto generated campaign might be. One thing you can do is join in on some of the campaigns going on at TFGM. They tend to take a long time and a few have died slow and quiet but it is a possible alternative way to get your fix of playing a battle that matters more then just in isolation.

I cannot overstate how eagerly I am waiting for those modules! So many unique scenario opportunities, especially for CMRT.

I think the statement about CMBB outselling CMBO is incorrect.
I recall comments from Steve saying that Yes CMBB had great sells from the true war gamer (those that tend to seek such games) but that they had more sells for CMBO from the casual gamer market which is and by far a much larger market and that is a majority a American market and they only buy games with American forces. Thus almost every game company will always start a series with a match up with American forces involved.
I also remember each game had less sells. CMBO outsold CMBB which outsold CMAF (between code issue and declining sells, that was what brought about CMII)
If CM3 does ever happen, it will be for similar reasons.
I have a hard time not believing each release is declining in sales. There is nothing to show any growth going on that I can tell.
and second, its already been mentioned in many threads as to the limits they have hit in this engine and that they re not going to be able to do much more with it.
 
So at some point those two things will fuel a change if the change ever happens.
So if enough keep buying and can live with the present capabilities of the current engine. Then maybe more past the list I mentioned could happen. But from what I sense, we keep losing more and more players to other things and more players keep expecting improvements that will never come under the present engine.  So sales will continue to drop til they bite the bullet and start again or they just say, time to retire.
 
 
 

I for one would rather stick to the current engine. It is very solid! Why change a winning horse? Why throw so much that has been achieved over board (even if some aspects can be carried over, it would definitively mean a big cut?). And there are still patches coming out. Sure aesthetics could be nicer measured by today's standards, but they're okay for me.  What matters more is gameplay. With a few tweaks here and there (fortifications?  ), I think I will stay a happy subscriber of the current engine for a long time to come.  

What people should realise is that it is a two man team who are not getting any younger....
Unless there is a succession plan there might be no new engine? 
I will just be happy to get the update to fix the issues noted....
 

Dont get me wrong - I loved BFCs originally stated roadmap for all the CMx2 games.
However as time goes on its becoming more apparent that perhaps the games arent coming out as quickly as BFC thought and often mention of CMx3is made, the x2 engine is starting to show its age.
Which is unfortunate because I was MOST excited about whats really received the least love by far IMO - CMRT and the Ost Front.
Perhaps same roadmap plan with the newer games with a new engine bigger so theyre not modules but releases? Otherwise we.ll be using upgraded CMx2 even in 5 years JUST to finish all the modules IMO let alone start covering the rest of the Ost Front.
I really love CMx2 and really want some modules still to come out for it - but its going to be obsolete eventually.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-46200218
A group of Russian history buffs was surprised to find a reminder of Soviet resistance to the Nazi invasion in the form of an improvised minefield near a busy road.

Members of a club devoted to the history of the nearby Krasnaya Gorka military fort almost stumbled across the makeshift mines in a quiet stretch of woodland not far from St Petersburg, the local Kanal 5 TV channel reports.
Club chairman Alexander Senotrusov said Soviet forces stationed at Krasnaya Gorka had no mines with which to block German tanks on their way to Leningrad in 1941, so they improvised explosives from pre-revolutionary naval shells and laid them out in rows around the fort.

"One pound of pressure, and up you go," he told Kanal 5.

"It's a miracle that there's not been a tragedy here in nearly 80 years," marvelled TV correspondent Roman Ishmukhametov as he stood alongside a mine - all the more so as local people have been coming across occasional shells for seven years while out mushroom-picking.

from Rheinmetall
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHiqrgac1Ak
 

There are whole countries that have close to zero terrain that has >500m visibility and still use all these modern weapon systems. Example Finland.

I think it comes down to information and attitude.
In CM the player has all the information at hand right away. Even if you have to click around to get all the details. IRL for any decision above the platoon people have to talk, explain and discuss at least a little bit if only because there are multiple actual humans that need to be coordinated. In the game we need none of that.
The attitude of the pixel soldiers is the other big factor. Most humans spend a large amount of time taking care of their buddies. Once the pressing issue of someone shooting at you in the moment is taken care of people want to know their friends and colleges are taken care of. Not to mention when the bullets start flying those loosing the firefight don't want to stay in close contact - whomever is loosing the firefight is going to break contact and regroup. Then those that are moving forward are not going to just run across that field right away. They have no idea if the enemy is still there hidden away - we do. I think IRL there is a lot more shooting at where the enemy used to be to make sure before jogging across the field. I suspect there is little jogging either.

Like already mentioned map size and the quicker communication and command play a key role why everything plays out faster here.
Also most of the time in real combat operations there are no air or cavalry conveniently around the corner to provide support. You may stir up a hidden nest, call in support, and then hit the deck for several hours before they come to solve your problem.
Also many things in CM die alot faster, especially infantry in buildings or other cover.
To visualize this:
There was a night where nearly an complete operation was hold up because of incoming small arms from a five-story compound in high density urban territory. Hours of shooting at nothing and dark spots that may be somebody peeking or just NOD shenanigans, thousands of round were put into this building but they simply denied to stop shooting. Cavalry was called in and also put another pack of heavy ordnance into that building (many buildings don´t collapse that easy), even calling further support was considered. Silence. Then order to enter the building, enemy gunshots erupted on one of the higher floors. Again on hold. Took another half on an hour to find a solution in order to pacify it and nearly another half hour to clear the rest of the building and situation (which takes seconds in CM).
Turned out that this building was occupied by only two individuals armed just with one AK and one RPG and alot of ammo.
They´ve managed to hold up company sized elements, cavalry support, and futher to delay the operations of other elements for half of the night.
Imagine this in urban environment where you have dozen of such buildings.
Real warfare can also involve an unbelieveable amount of waiting and also "camping" to put it in video game terms.

Yes, playing a 3 day battle using one minute turns would make gamers fall asleep   Despite this time compression, I think CMSF2 and the other newer CM games are a great gaming experience.

Definitely.
One crew may aquire and kill a target in matter of seconds the other may struggle to do so. So many circumstances, you never know.
Also you´re probably right with the asumption that operations in CM play out fast. Some of the scenarios you´re playing would in real life not take hours but probably days and also the casualties rates in many CM sorties weren´t acceptable at all for many real commanders. I think this is a welcome abstraction for us gamers. Still CM is the closest to the real thing when it comes to ground ops.

It seems to me that because of this lethality most wars/conflicts on this century have been such where the other side is clearly weaker. Older gear, worse training etc. Whether it's air warfare or land based, the good gear rarely meet. So we have little actual experience of how well those things really work against same level opponent. 
BTW: Syria's situation may be changing now that Russia has brought newer technology. Anti-aircraft, electronic warfare etc.

We were instructed to not use laser rangefinders when possible. Because of time you lose by using it (around a second or two) and the new detection systems. CV9030s bushmasters APFSDS-T rounds are so fast (near flat trajectory) that you can set the guns range to 700m and hit any AFV sized target from 0-1500m when aiming center mass. We called this "battle sight".