Ranger33

I think the big thing missing from CMx1 is that there was an option called "Mixed" or something like that which would always give you a balanced force that consisted of a core of infantry plus some support elements with a splash of armor. It seems to me from my experience playing PBEM QBs that this is how most people like to play the game. In CMx2 this option is thrown out the window and you must either choose from infantry/mech/armor only, or the random option that gives cruddy results. All I know is that I played hundreds of CMBB quick battles against the AI back in the day, and maybe ten across all CMx2 games, as it's usually clear that it will be total mismatched mess once you make contact with the enemy.

As far as QB force mismatches goes that's pretty tame. The only one I tried so far in CMBS I ended up with a company of purely anti-armor vehicles vs a few MG infantry companies. There should be a "Random-but-not-totally-nonsensical" option for QB. It seemed to work so much better in CMx1, I guess the way force selection is set up in CMx2 is to blame.

This thread has inspired me, I think I'll take a stab at making a scenario this weekend. I'll skip the map making and just grab one of the QB ones and tweak it. As mentioned above, when one doesn't have to worry about historical accuracy you can just jump in there and make something fun. As for giving feedback on user made content, I blame the repository itself. Finding a given scenario after it leaves the first page of the relevant sub-forum is an often frustrating task. Even if you know the name of the author or scenario it's not guaranteed to be found by the search function. I think some fresh formatting over there, making it easier to find what you want, highlighting popular trending content and creators would go along towards getting people involved. Just go look and notice how the "most popular" stuff is almost all from 4+ years ago. This should be based on trending popularity, not all time hits. I realize that it says "Most popular from last 90 days" but that's because those are the only downloads that are easy to find, being the first thing you see. On that note, also notice that far and away the most popular item of all time is Devil's Descent, a very small scale campaign featuring a real storyline with characters and branching paths based on player choices. Not some unwieldy behemoth of a campaign based on rigid historical accuracy with 6 page long briefings, that only a few dozen people will ever actually finish.

Downloading now, this sounds like EXACTLY the sort of campaign I want to see more of. Leading a medium sized force through a campaign that has a personal element to it, with an actual narrative. So much more enjoyable to me than the ones where it's Mission 1: Company A and B attack town X, Mission 2: Company C Attacks crossroads Y, yadda yadda. Those can be fun, but the game greatly benefits from having some emotional attachment to what's going on. Also, bravo on using the mod tags and it seems including everything needed in one download. Thank you!

Hurray! I was afraid it would be a few more months of waiting to get all the building entry stuff fixed. Thanks BFC! I was also hesitating about ordering CMBS because of that bug, no longer a concern now!

I was thinking something similar but maybe more along the lines of a "Scenario Pack" that includes numerous scenarios and campaigns for maybe like $10-15. The big draw for me with CM is campaigns, but these seem to be few and far between, especially official ones. I guess the big problem here would be making sure everything in the pack is of a certain quality level.

I'm seeing the same thing as Rake on the first map of Blunting the Spear. Some buildings they will go in, some not. I don't have time this evening to test things out but I can check some more maps this weekend maybe. I fired up one urban map and didn't see any issues there, it seems to only affect certain types of buildings.

Awesome! Been waiting a long time to take another crack at this game (had the building entry bug). I'm on the last mission of the German campaign from MG, soon as that's over its off to the Eastern Front.

That's the thing, if you could reasonably expect a community member to come up with this in their free time, wouldn't it be reasonable to discuss the game developer integrating it into the game? I'm not demanding it or anything, but after a decade or two one might expect some upgrades to be made. Also, if you don't want to play with randoms, you can create a password locked game and still have it appear in the lobby. I for one much prefer asynchronous play since I don't have hours and hours of free time, plus it's nice to be able to take your time with each turn, especially with big scenarios.

I think a great way to generate some buzz in the community would be if Battlefront offered one copy of each new game/module as a tournament prize in the months before release. Maybe with the requirement that players create AAR's in the final round or two, which would make things even more exciting.

In case it wasn't clear from my post (upon rereading, I could see how there might be some confusion), all of that is done within the game. You have a screen that shows all new games waiting for opponents, games that you are waiting for your opponent to play their turn, and games that are waiting for you to play your turn. Easy peasy, no messing around with files outside the game.

I ask this because I recently picked up Battle Academy 2 from Matrix and saw how their PBEM++ system works. Just imagine if you could fire up Combat Mission, hit multiplayer, create a nice little meeting engagement of size and type to your liking, post it, then wait until you get an email letting you know it's your turn to play! This is how Battle Academy works and it's awesome. You can browse games posted by others, decide on one that suits you and one-click later you are playing. I haven't played CM multiplayer in over a year, but last I checked it involved using Dropbox and a third-party program to handle moving files around for you, which I suppose is convenient enough, but still feels clunky. Not to mention, in BA you can browse and download new community scenarios from within the game. I know this is unlikely, but just something to think about. I wonder if they could just lease the whole system from Matrix? Edit: And before anyone says "Most people don't play multiplayer so it shouldn't be a priority" I would pre-emptively counter that by arguing that few people bother with multiplayer because it's a PITA to setup and play.

I'm really wanting to pre-order Black Sea, but I still have yet to play CMRT due to the troops not going in buildings bug. It would be kind of crazy to essentially have two new CM games at the same time!

So, I'm just popping in here for the first time in awhile. Still no patch? I haven't played since the first week CMRT came out due to the infantry-not-entering-buildings bug. I love Combat Mission, but I don't see myself buying anything else in this series. The months and months (and months) between patches, which will only get worse with the release of future titles, is wearing out my patience.

Took your advice and tried out the 1918 Megiddo campaign, came away with a major victory as the British! I actually managed to completely wipe out the Ottomans and Germans. Probably just beginners luck

Thanks for the info! I look forward to really getting into this game. It really has a nice balance of depth and playability, plus a ton of scenarios. As an experiment I put the Gallipoli campaign in Breakthrough this morning and it loaded fine, but I suppose problems could crop up later.

Well, I grew impatient and went ahead with the installation. No problems, as I expected. I'll ask a couple other questions so this thread isn't a complete waste: There are several campaigns in the base game which I don't see when running Breakthrough, are they compatible? Could I just move the files over to the Breakthrough folder? Seems odd to not have them all together. My base game appears to be version 1.07 and Breakthrough is 1.02, so do I just need the 1.05 patch for Breakthrough? Any tips on how to get started with the game? I'm reading a couple AAR's, is there a good starting campaign to get a grip on the basics?

Hey guys, I ventured over here from the CM forums after listening to the recent, excellent WWI podcasts from Dan Carlin, which really upped my interest in the conflict, and decided to take the plunge into the world of SC. I bought the WWI+Breakthrough bundle, but when I downloaded it, Chrome immediately flagged it as malware and gave some pretty strong warnings when I considered running it anyway. I've never seen this pop up before from any website, including Battlefront, which I've downloaded other stuff from recently. I'm assuming this is a false alarm, but just to play it safe I thought I would ask here first if there is some kind of issue going on.

Haven't really been able to play CMRT due to having the troops-can't-enter-buildings bug, but I've enjoyed the handful of battles I played. That said, I rank all the WW2 titles as roughly even, just different flavors of the same tactical goodness. I'll be playing them all for years to come. I would rank CMSF slightly above them all though. It just feels more complete when you have all the modules plus all the possibilities of Red vs Red scenarios. Each NATO force has completely different sets of gear that force your tactics to be radically different.

I still don't understand why all of the titles run on separate engines which must be patched/upgraded separately, despite being 99% the same as far as gameplay, sharing the same features, and all depicting the same era of warfare. Wouldn't it make more sense to just have one engine and add content for various theaters to it via modules? Like the way DCS World works? It just seems like the most logical way to organize this series. You could even allow third party modules just like DCS does for more exotic stuff.

This conversation has been had here dozens of times over the years. BFC pretty much always delivers in the end, BUT the lack of communication can't really be excused by "they are more interested in working than in talking about it." There are literally hundreds of other small developers out there who manage to communicate with their players on a regular basis while developing their product. They don't have to be on here every day, put a brief weekly "This is what we've been working on" post and maybe a screenshot or something would take all of 10 minutes to do. It's obvious to anyone who follows PC gaming that more communication = more interest generated, it's a form of marketing. Going quiet for months at a time causes interest to nosedive. That's bad for a company that is completely unknown outside a small circle to begin with. I used to come here every single day for years, now I just check in maybe once a month.

Just for fun, the Google trends chart for the search term "distant worlds". Notice how the interest in Matrix's game is quite literally off the charts since releasing on Steam.

First off, I'm happy with every penny I have spent on CMSF and it's modules. I've sunk hundreds of hours into and haven't come close to playing all the scenarios and campaigns out there. My idea that will never happen: I think they should use it as an experiment with selling on Steam. See if there is any interest for such a game in the wider gaming community. The game with all the modules for $30. I know that's huge drop in price, but we are talking about a game that's almost 7 years old, and you aren't going to attract anyone outside the hardcore wargaming market with a $50+ price tag on something that old, with so-so graphics to start with. Literally millions of people browse the catalog on Steam every day, some of them are bound to be curious and pick it up.

Would like to add my praise here! It's taken a few years of waiting, but CMx2 is steadily having all those wish list items we've yammered for added to it, not to mention looking and running better all the time. Can't wait to have 3.0 applied to the other titles, and really can't wait to see the new modern era game. I'm making my way through the tutorial this evening and having a blast!

I was totally out on CM earlier this year. Not sure why but I just got frustrated with the bugs and lots of little things that have since been tweaked (urban combat stuff especially). Now that I can play the game on my nice little laptop with all the cool new features and everything I think I'm back in all the way. I would still argue that CMSF is the best bang for your buck in the history of gaming. I have a massive stack of scenarios and campaigns I'm yet to complete. If CMSF had that much content over time, I can only imagine how much will eventually be available for the WW2 CMx2 games. Especially with the continuing rollout of nifty new features that keep the older titles fresh. There really isn't anything else out there that scratches the same itch. The one big thing I wish was different is that all the content launched from one platform and units/maps could be interchanged, patched all at the same time, that sort of stuff. It seems like that would just be easier all the way around, and make so much sense for the "packs" but I guess not.