marka

I am playing a scenario in CMFB that includes mine fields in the initial setup. I don't know if they are anti-personnel, anti-vehicle, or mixed. In any case, is it safe to move men and vehicles through a friendly mine field, or do they risk detonating the mines as the enemy would? Another way to ask would be, do mine field know which side they're on?

I am playing the training campaign for CMFB. There is a terrain type for light woods, around the more dense woods along the South edge of the map. When plotting moves for my tanks, it allows me to place waypoints within the light woods, with a final destination in an open field beyond. However, when the turn starts, the tank is in the process of going around the woods, and crossing through them at a narrower place than the path I plotted. Is this one of those "the AI will figure the best way to get the tank where you want it to go" situations? The tank hasn't made it into the woods yet, and the Tiger has just made its appearance, so all my plans for my tanks are about to change, anyway. On a similar topic, is there a way to tell how a vehicle is going to move before the turn starts? I am in a PBEM game of Huzzar!, and I ordered one of my StuG IIIs to cross (what I thought was) a low hedge into a field. When I clicked the Big Red Button, it went rolling merrily down the road toward a gap in the hedge, taking it right in front of the Allied tank I was trying to flank. The Allied tank was kind enough to turn it into a burning wreck. Yelling, "NO!!" at your computer does not stop them when you realize they are not following the path you have laid out.

I have had tanks with a small red spot under "Tracks" when viewing the damage report, yet they seem to move normally. What does that mean? Are they more prone to immobilization if they run over a wall?

Good to know. I don't really understand how mines and barbed wire work in CMBN. Regarding mines, it seems that you can't mark them until someone gets blown up by one, first. Then, a red sign appears. You can Fast/Quick move some engineers to the adjacent square, and use the Mark Mines command into the square where the mine was set off. Once they are done, the sign turns white. After that, troops can move through the mine field at Move speed without getting hurt? I thought the same applied to vehicles, but you are telling me that is not the case. Bummer. Does moving a vehicle through a known mine field at reduced speed lessen the chances of hitting one? It seems that there should be some way of lowering the risk for vehicles, even if you cannot eliminate it entirely. Regarding barbed wire, the manual says that it will slow infantry, but every time I try to order them to cross it, the computer plots a path around it, instead. I know I can make a hole through it in the usual ways: engineers using Blast, or drive a tank through. I haven't tried blowing a hole in it with a tank main gun. Would that work? There is a barbed wire fence in Hard Knocks that is within panzerschreck range of the German defensive line. Also, is there a risk of a tank being immobilized from driving through barbed wire? I have had that happen when driving over a low stone wall.

I just won, on my second try. My failure on the first try was due to not conserving ammo, and underestimating the strength of the enemy. Also, understanding the range limits of different weapons is important. I was trying to shoot at German positions from the North side of the river using M1 rifles, not realizing that their effective range is only 400 meters. So, you need to get your troops close enough to the German defensive line to shoot at them. You can't do that without tank support. You can't move your tanks forward until the AT guns have been knocked out. So, you need to send a few squads forward to make contact, and hopefully tempt the AT guns into firing at them, and reveal their positions. Then, you fire on the AT guns with mortar, MGs, and tank main guns until you are sure they are knocked out. Then you can move the tanks up to the engagement line to cover the infantry as the German MGs chew them up. You lose a lot of men, but eventually, you knock down the German defenses enough that you can replace your men faster than the Germans can shoot them up. I also had to practice using smoke from different sources to get adequate protection. I needed all the smoke I could get: mortars, tanks, and the 105 battery, to get the job done. I concentrated the smoke in the center, and used my long range MG's to fire on defenders on each side of the area of engagement. I lost 2 tanks, one to an AT gun while it was still sitting on the ridge, and a second to a mine in front of the bridge (after they were marked by the Engineers!). I almost lost a 3rd to a panzerschreck, but I was at the edge of the schreck's range (200m), and he missed. The 3 tanks left were just barely enough to get the job done.

Thanks for the support. When I am learning a complex, new topic, I find it helpful to have a short summary on hand for reference. Thank you for the blog posts, BTW.

Bil: I just read through all the posts in Tactical Problems, and put together an brief outline that summarizes the major points. If it is OK with you, I'd like to make it available here for anyone who is interested. TacticalProblems.CMBN.txt

I'm currently using H2HH 2.10.7. Should I switch to CMH? What is different between the two?

I am at the end of a LONG PBEM game. I have no units left, and the time limit expired several minutes ago. I have pressed "Cease Fire", but my opponent apparently hasn't, as the game keeps going. He has not answered several emails asking him to also press Cease Fire. Is there any way I can force the game to go to the AAR screen? I would like to see the points tally, but until he checks his email, I get the feeling the game won't end. If I press "Surrender", will it bring up the AAR?

I respectfully disagree. The Combat Mission series appeals to a niche market of dedicated enthusiasts, who recognize that Battlefront relies on their monetary support to stay in business. The people who would pirate the content and never pay for it would never have become paying customers to begin with. OTOH, there is a chance that some of them would discover the game, who might not otherwise have heard of it, and become paying customers. I have heard testimony from several musicians who distribute their content free on the Internet. They just *ask* their fans for financial support, so they can keep making music, and they wind up making as much as they would if they went through a traditional distributor, with DRM restrictions, etc. The vast majority of people do have a very keen sense of fairness, and if you are giving them something of value, they are more than willing to give their financial support in return.

Sorry if this was answered earlier in this thread, but given that you will not be able to "replay" to action in wego TCP/IP, will it be possible to at least record the video so it can be viewed/re-viewed outside the game? I don't see any technical reason why that should be too hard. If the program can send the video action to the screen, it could send it to a data file just as easily.

The issue of copy protection for computer software has always been a contentious one. The argument in favor is that people won't pay for something if they can easily steal it, instead. The counter-argument is that if people respect a company and it's product, they won't steal from it, as they recognize that they would hurt themselves in the long run. The vast majority of people do have a sense of fairness they won't ignore. It seems to me that the Combat Mission family of games appeals to a very specialized niche market. The people who are regular players recognize that they need to send Battlefront their $$$ if they expect to see continued development and support. OTOH, people who don't really care about the game are unlikely to purchase it anyway. However, when it is widely and freely available, it may be discovered by people who would not otherwise know about, and they may become paying customers. With the impending release of Red Thunder, it would be interesting to see Battlefront release it with no copy restrictions at all. I suspect that revenues would increase if they did.

I just started using a grid terrain mod. It makes it much easier to see the terrain contours without having to pan the camera over every square inch.

Thanks for all the replies! I've been away from my computer for the past week, and never expected the question would generate such a lively and informative discussion. Regarding the "blind scenario" question, I am a relative newbie, so I have only played a few scenarios. However, I avoid the temptation to play a scenario against AI once I have started a PBEM game, as that DOES seem like "cheating" to me. That being said, my son just started a PBEM game against me, using a scenario that I just finished (and won) against someone on the forums. He has kicked my ass in the last two battles, so I'm not volunteering that I know what his OOB just yet....

I have a PBEM game going (I hope my opponent doesn't see this!). I have one of his tanks spotted, and I zoomed in on it during "playback" to see if it had fired its weapon during the turn. I noticed that when the camera was close to the tank, I could hear the sound of a nearby mortar firing. Even though it wasn't spotted, I could figure out where the mortar was firing from by moving the camera around, and listening to the sounds during playback. It seems that you shouldn't be able to hear, up close, an enemy unit that hasn't been spotted. Perhaps the developers could put that on the list of small improvements to be made?