CarlWAW
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Posts
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Joined
Posts posted by CarlWAW
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10 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
My two bits on the German defense budget. Contrary to views of people who live in a caves, Merkel has been slowly increasing military spending:
https://www.thelocal.de/20170301/this-is-how-much-german-military-spending-has-grown-over-time
There's lots of reasons why things have apparently been getting worse. The primary one is what PzKraut brought up... scale. If you're going to have a military budget for what amounts to a local defense force, then have a local defense force that fits that budget. Most of the militaries in Europe have scaled their capabilities way back since the Cold War days. Especially on logistics end. Germany, on the other hand, outwardly appears to be in the same league as Britain and France in terms of range of capabilities. In reality it isn't because the money isn't there to keep things running.
The reasons for the decline of the Bundeswehr can be traced back to the 1970s. I had a friend who served in the late 1970s and another who served in the late 1980s. Both of them said they didn't think the BW was ready for war. It's only gotten worse since 1990 when Reunification happened and Germans were faced with huge costs of reintegrating East Germany AND saw no immediate threat from the east. Couple this with decades of anti-war sentiment country wide, it's not difficult to see why things fell apart so badly.
The political will in the German government to address the underlying problems of the BW and society seems to be lacking. However, the attention focused on this seems to finally be shaming Germans, of all political stripes, to at least talk about the problems. Will something significant change without a war happening? I don't know, but I hope so. Germans are wasting their resources trying to do too much with too little.
Steve
Aren't you any longer one of the owners of the company? Only a kolkhoz working stiff?
I ask because although the development speed of you rproducts is fast as a snail you ignore customer questions but instead prefer to "invest" time in making political statements. Just lLike a kholkoz worker who does not care about business.
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14 minutes ago, General Liederkranz said:
I don't see the problem here? Moving up behind smoke and hoping to spot first once the smoke clears--with a slight advantage since your crew has been told the enemy tank is there and will be looking in the right direction--seems like a valid tactic. Also a risky one, though, because they might spot you first when the smoke clears. But it's certainly better than just moving up without smoke, as I imagine it would be in real life.
No. Total gamey.
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5 hours ago, Vanir Ausf B said:
Play a night battle in CM and it will become apparent very quickly.
99% of all scenarios are during daylight my friend.
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11 hours ago, semmes said:
So it's "better" to move as a cloud of smoke because they cannot see you?
Yeah, it's one of my best tricks for tanks, but also one which shows how flawed the spotting model is:
Say you have an enemy tank which must be removed.
1. Make sure that the spotting info is received by your tanks, who are assigned to attack it.
2. Instead of simply moving into hull down and attacking: drop smoke in front of the attacking position.
3. Move the tank(s) into hull down position without the flawed spotting model allowing your tank to be seen immediately because of the movement.
4. Once the smoke disappears, your tank is stationary, but it has the advantage of the spotting info.
Whenever a tank moves the spotting system seems to put a huge "HERE I AM!"-sign on it.
But the assumption that a moving tank under any cicumstances can be spotted better than a stationary one is unjustified and therefore the model does not work - especially when it comes to the crucial aspects of only partially exposed tanks.
I assume the whole spotting system is based on certain basic (not always correct) assumptions, like the one described above. And they seem to play into spotting hidden or camouflaged infantry too easily, too.
Sadly, because they decided that everything must be available for realtime play, the spotting calculations must be cheap. So they can't correct the basic spotting model and use a much more sophisticated one. That's probably the reason why, after years, they couldn't solve certain spotting problems but only can tweak nuances. But the foundations of the model are severely interwoven with the realtime contraints of the engine.
It seems they developed CMx2 to have an engine that could be expanded and developed - but instead of having a totally flexible engine by now, they bound it on a rock called realtime and therefore need to make all calculations as cheap as possible.
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1 hour ago, Amizaur said:
I'm amazed by lack of comments after your experiment, too :).
The "experts" here fill page after page discussing unimportant nuissances, but when really big flaws of the sim are discovered and raised, they lose any interest...
A car can work perfectly 99% of the time. But if the air-bag system does not activate when needed, then the best car with all the huge design efforts, to improve safety of the passengers, becomes the worst car because it fails in the most important situation.
The problem CM still has:
Spotting overall works quite well. But then it comes to the most important situations, the model does not work correctly.
Probably the most important flaw of the spotting model always becomes obvious when tanks are involved.
One example is mentioned above.
Another one - and maybe even more severe, because it prevents the player from using realistic tactics with tanks: it's not possible to use the tank commander for spotting witht he tank turret down.
What makes it worse:
The spotting model seems to weigh movement (of tanks) over anything else: with the following effect: if one tank moves and one stands still, the tank moving into LOS will be spotted first by the stationary tank.
Therefore in CM it works better to use smoke to move a tank into position, than to move it without blocking LOS.
And in reality if a a battlefield is controlled by enemy tanks/ATGs? The tanks are placed turret down and the TC is spotting - during the attack he is mostly looking for muzzle flashes (which are not modelled at all, btw).
In reality once a flash is detected the TC often also gets a sense where the enemy ATG/tank is. He instructs his gunner and the driver moves the tank hull down and the enenmy is engaged immediately.
After 2-4 shots the tank drives back into safety and changes its position and DOES NOT sit like a duck!
In CM, because of the spotting behaviour, it is better to create pressure by pure firepower and use tanks like sitting ducks because of the flawed spotting system.
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"Motherland?"
It's fatherland and motherlanguage.
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Card is Nvidia GTX960M.
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Here's a comparison of ReShade and stock graphics (wintersun in the back).
ReShade ( Clarity.fx + SMAA.fx + Curves.fx + MXAO.fx):
Without:
Pay attention on the right to the snow on the ground into the woods. With Reshade the snow really feels like lying on the ground, while without Reshade is is just white, that could also come from the bushes.
And the trunks of the trees. Either to the right of the StuG or to the left into the dark wood. The texture of the trunks create a feeling of depth which the unprocessed graphic does not show.
But the important aspect is, that it doesn't only look nice on a screenshot, but it works for gameplay the same way.
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46 minutes ago, JohnO said:
Great.
I either use
Technicolor.fx + Levels.fx (or without Levels.fx, if I want less contrast and brighter blacks).
And shaders from @HerrTom's bundle (without the depth of field shaders):
Clarity.fx + SMAA.fx + Pirate_Depth.fx + Curves.fx + MXAO.fx
I tried them in different settings, too and I think they give a nice analog film touch and make flames stand out nicely.
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Aspire V17 VN7-791G, Nvidia driver version: 382.05 here.
But I don't have CMBS. Make sure that CM runs fine without reshade: rename opengl.dll and opengl.ini in CM program folder to something else and see if it works.
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@HerrTom
What is the "UI mask" texture good for? Here the UI is blacked out. Is that its intention?
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@HerrTom, thanks for the tip.
A personal ReShade-preset didn't get saved, too.
Running CM in Admin mode solved the problem.
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On 7.1.2018 at 2:32 PM, Marwek77 aka Red Reporter said:
I have problem with this... After install when i start CMBS it never start, just error message some windows crash...
I repost my comment from the RT screenshot thread, where I adressed this problem.
I just installed it and have got it running. I haven't played with the shaders, but with two out of the box preset shaders that come with reshade, I got very good results in replacing the ingame movie mode with better colors and with fully working anti aliasing.
System: Win10, Nvidia GTX960m
Here's what you do:
Download Reshade 3.1
Install
When asked during installation download fx-shader presets? YES
Running reshade it asks for the executable of the game you want to work with. Choose one. I chose FB.
When starting FB it crashed.
Go to the CM game data folder (usually in "Documents"). There you should see a "reshade-shaders" folder.
Rename "Shaders" and "Textures" in that folder to something else (e.g. Shaders_ Textures_)
Create a new "Shaders" folder. Into that folder you only copy those shaders you want to work with.
To have an instantly better looking movie-mode with working anti-aliasing, from the renamed "Shaders_" copy to "Shaders" folder:
ReShade.fxh
Levels.fx
Technicolor.fx
For fun you can also copy other shaders, like Nighvision.fx or Monochrome.fx
Start CM.
Press SHIFT + F2
Now you should see the ReShade config menu as an overlay within the game, where the shaders you copied into the folder, should be listed.
Choose one, i.e. "Monochrome".
The changes take effect immediately.
The game becomes b/w.
If that works, deselect Monochrome and select "Levels" and "Technicolor".
Voila! A good looking movie mode with fully working anti-aliasing.
When you are satisfied with your settings, go into ReShade's SETTINGS menu and switch from "Configuration Mode" to "Performance Mode". Which allegedly gives an even better performance.
With these two shaders activated I do not recognize a noticeable performance hit (ReShade allows to display the frame rate!).
Amazing software!
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3 hours ago, Ts4EVER said:
I think the effectiveness of the PPsh41 in Red Thunder compared to other smgs comes down to rate of fire and the fact that it is used en masse.
Look at the chart. The MP44 is performing even slightly worse than machine pistols...
Have you played Red Thunder? You don't feel that machine pistols are totally sniping miracles beyond 30 meters, while the assault rifle doesn't deliver a better hit rate? My impression from playing CM is exactly what these charts show. The MP44 is modelled as a (bad) machine pistol, but not as assault rifle.
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Quote
Why not? Trajectory was flat enough to hit full height targets (running soldier) up to 300-350 metres. If you aim in head with sight set on "2", you hit legs. 0,5 m height targets - up to 200 metres. Actually 230-240 metres, but there was no such sight, only 100 and 200.
@DMS
I guess thats the reason why today every army uses PPSHs and machine pistols and not assault rifles?
Explain to me one thing, if the PPSH (or other machine pistols) was modelled correctly:
Battle for Berlin, the Russians:
Total operational dominance? Check.
Air superiority? Check.
Outnumbered the defender operationally and on the tactical level by multitudes? Check.
More than enough artillery? Check.
All that remains, to prevent a total wipeout of the defender and have a walk in the park, is at the tactical level things could go wrong.
And here comes CM's machine pistol model into play: lets assume the model was correct. So the side which has more machine pistols, has a huge advantage. That's what CM shows. Correct?
If the machine pistol model in CM was correct, that a squad equipped with them is quite easily capable to wipe out any other infantry within 50 meters without machine pistols, how is it possible, that the Russians suffered MUCH HIGHER LOSSES at the tactical level despite their CM-modelled PPSHs? Were the German Volkssturm and Hitlerjugend superhuman? I don't think so.
Let's have a look at the numbers: from roughly 34 million men and women in the Russian Army 84% (eightyfour!) fell, were wounded or captured! 84%!
Can anyone imagine Eisenhower, Patton or any other western commander, presenting himself as glorious victor, his army and his doctrine superior to all others, like the Russian commanders did, if an Eisenhower or Patton would have lost more than 80% of their men? Unimaginable. From a military standpoint IMO the numbers reflect a total disaster.
While German eastern front fighters reported, that the Russian Army in 1944 was more capable than in 1942, one thing didn't change: the Russians EVEN AT THE END suffered much heavier losses against outnumbered and undersupplied Germans. Even in the battle for Berlin, where the Germans lacked almost everything, the Russians bleeded out like a bucket with holes.
How is it possible, to suffer higher losses than the defender under the mentioned circumstances, if the CM machine pistol model was correct?
You can't get the real world results in CM, even if you try, as soon as machine pistols are involved.
Another argument that shows, that something is off with CM's machine pistol model:
If the model was correct, why were machine pistols abandoned all over the world for assault rifles?
The simple answer: the PPSH/machine pistol model in CM currently is not reflecting reality.
If I would guess, I'd say that machine pistols are WAAAY to deadly. They should be good for supressing only (and quickly running out of ammo, which I think is modelled correctly). But they should be awful for hitting anything further away than a few meters.
Shooting more bullets into one direction does not make the bullets hit better! Therefore the HANDLING of automatic weapons is significant. How good are they to get more than one bullet on the target (and also hit with single shots)?
THAT's why assault rifles are so much better than machine pistols!
CM does not seem to model that.
That brings up my third argument:
Btw it's also the reason, why the MG42 was such an incredible weapon for that time. Not because of the rounds it fires, which everybody focuses on, but because it gets the rounds on the target! Even more with the great tripod. With the tripod it is almost an insult to compare it to a Maxim! Nobody can aim with a Maxim and get a few bullets on a target - but even rookies can shoot with a MG42! It's like night and day.
I guess the difference is as big as machine pistols to assault rifles.
Quality of weapons does matter.
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22 hours ago, Drifter Man said:
First of all, some more notes:
- there is no discernible difference in MP44 and Sten effectiveness whether it is fired by a Leader or a Soldier. I am showing Leader data only.
- similarly, there is no conclusive evidence that Sten Mk II and Mk IV are any different. I am showing Sten Mk II data only.
- MP44, Bren and B.A.R. switch from full auto to semi-auto fire above 150 meters, so there is a step change in the results between 120 and 160 meters where I ran the tests
- the statistics may still not be good enough for weapons achieving few kills at long distances, so the results for rifles at the edge of their range are indicative rather than accurate.
Firepower
First note: the vertical axis is in log scale, otherwise the drop in firepower with distance would drown out all detail. I'll post the excel file so you can make any graphs you want.
Bolt-action rifles are at the bottom, Lee-Enfield appears to be superior to Kar 98K. Semi-auto rifles are better, both M1 Garand and Gewehr 43 are on the same level together with the MP44 (when fired in semi-auto mode). All SMGs are better than all rifles over their entire range up to 200 m. MP40 and Sten have very similar performance, Thompson is the most powerful SMG. MP44 is less powerful than SMGs but is in the same league with them until the 150 m mark. Bren and B.A.R. are generally in the league with SMGs as well but, of course, keep going beyond 200 m. The B.A.R. is inferior to the Bren, apparently due to its smaller magazine, and therefore lower average rate of fire. MG42 beats everything by a wide margin except the sniper rifle. The scoped rifle benefits much less from closing the range than the other weapons.
The only problem from my perspective is that SMGs keep their high performance out to 200 m. Their firepower does not fall much with distance in the outer part of their range, and as we will see, their accuracy (on "bodies per round" basis) is constant or even rises between 120 and 200 m.
[more to come]
Wow, these are excellent tests.
They reflect quite well what I always thought does not feel right in the game. A modern assault rifle like the MP44 should be combining the best of machine pistols and rifles, but the model in the game does not reflect that.
I think Red Thunder begs for these tests. The PPSH models seem totally off (how can such a machine pistol be more efficient than highly accurate rifles and the german assault rifle?).
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@JohnO
I changed nothing in Nvidia Control panel.
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1 hour ago, Erwin said:
+1 pleeeze - crayon level instructions re what to do after downloading.
I just installed it and have got it running. I haven't played with the shaders, but with two out of the box preset shaders that come with reshade, I got very good results in replacing the ingame movie mode with better colors and with fully working anti aliasing.
System: Win10, Nvidia GTX960m
Here's what you do:
Download Reshade 3.1
Install
When asked during installation download fx-shader presets? YES
Running reshade it asks for the executable of the game you want to work with. Choose one. I chose FB.
When starting FB it crashed.
Go to the CM game data folder (usually in "Documents"). There you should see a "reshade-shaders" folder.
Rename "Shaders" and "Textures" in that folder to something else (e.g. Shaders_ Textures_)
Create a new "Shaders" folder. Into that folder you only copy those shaders you want to work with.
To have an instantly better looking movie-mode with working anti-aliasing, from the renamed "Shaders_" copy to "Shaders" folder:
ReShade.fxh
Levels.fx
Technicolor.fx
For fun you can also copy other shaders, like Nighvision.fx or Monochrome.fx
Start CM.
Press SHIFT + F2
Now you should see the ReShade config menu as an overlay within the game, where the shaders you copied into the folder, should be listed.
Choose one, i.e. "Monochrome".
The changes take effect immediately.
The game becomes b/w.
If that works, deselect Monochrome and select "Levels" and "Technicolor".
Voila! A good looking movie mode with fully working anti-aliasing.
When you are satisfied with your settings, go into ReShade's SETTINGS menu and switch from "Configuration Mode" to "Performance Mode". Which allegedly gives an even better performance.
With these two shaders activated I do not recognize a noticeable performance hit (ReShade allows to display the frame rate!).
Amazing software!
Now it's up to you to share your stunningly looking shaders!
Are they well suited for gaming or is the contrast too high?
Levels.fx + Technicolor.fx is well suited for gaming. I think it's a good compromise between a better look with not too much strain on the eyes.
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2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
Unlike RealTime, WeGoers have the time to study the big picture information and are predisposed to do so. It is a basic component of why they play WeGo instead of RealTime. Therefore, hiding this sort of big picture information from WeGoers serves only to annoy, not shape gameplay like it does in RT. And that is most likely what we found out while testing and that is also the reason 10 years later this has not been a burning issue for WeGoers.
For someone who always boasts about his logical abilities there are quite a few logical errors.
QuoteUnlike RealTime, WeGoers have the time to study the big picture information and are predisposed to do so. It is a basic component of why they play WeGo instead of RealTime.
Correct. But there are two reasons mentioned. And you chose the wrong one:
QuoteTherefore, hiding this sort of big picture information from WeGoers serves only to annoy
Wego players appreciate the TIME to think about a situation.
They have no problem with restricted information. What they appreciate is, to make the best decision from the available information. Two completely different things.
If the big picture was the most important aspect for wego players, contrary to realtime players, they would prefer that spotting information was shared among all units equally. Better big picture! Which obviously is NOTwhat wego players want.
Wego players do NOT want or need a big picture. They form the picture from all information that is available. If that information is severely restricted and doesn't allow a big picture, wego players are fine with that.
I even believe that wego players CHERISH the challenge to make the best out of PARTIAL, not perfect, or even faulty information.
Not big picture but TIME TO THINK is what wego players appreciate in that mode.
And therefore the conclusion, that reducing available information to Wego players was per se annoying is completely wrong, based on the wrong assumption, that the big picture was central, while time to think is central for wego players.
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Transparent in a technical sense = not visible to the customer!
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48 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:
Nah, if I were thin skinned I'd just ban you
What you fail to understand
a fragile ego
what you're doing now small, petty, and not a little bit vindictive
look like a right fool
spreading disinformation and negativity
you move from one deadend, flawed argument to another
as a child you threw some pretty epic tantrums
what would convince me that you're a well adjusted adult?
move on
the stuff you pulled out of your backside.
But I'm the one with the ego problems...
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18 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
First of all, we sell other products than Combat Mission. Our sales spike MASSIVELY when a new product is released, then tapers off. You haven't a clue how to interpret those order numbers even if you had a huge sample of them. Which you don't.
People with axes to grind and a history of combative behavior even less.
For a person who is hitting hard, you're quite thin skinned, aren't you.
The transaction numbers of your shop are simply a continuos counter of all sales, aren't they. I don't want to go any further into that, but if you don't want that to be able to be analyzed from the outside, I'd recommend to change the numbering nomenclature. Just a nice, free of charge tip, despite your not so nice behaviour.
15 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:Over the course of play, especially in Real Time, this disjointed view should make the game more difficult to play.
Do you play realtime only?! Now I begin to understand, why you don't really support wishes that could lift WEGO to a new level. Or why you didn't initially understand my criticism of iron-mode.
That you as realtime player see an advanced iron-mode with a somewhat "fixed" unit view as 1st person-feature and therefore not as something good, I understand now! But you are correct only for realtime. For many WEGO-only players it would offer a very different mode to play, that would offer them many new features they otherwise could only dream about, while no realtime player would touch that mode.
I am somehwat surprised, that you do seem to ignore the big differences there are between those two kinds of playing styles.
Realtime players give a f.ck about fine tuning the positions of every tank to the very last meter. Playing H2H and waiting for a PBEM turn? Unacceptable!
Not immediately knowing the result? Unbearable! Patience is a virtue? A shameless lie! 
Maybe forum members should add a signature, how many percent everyone is playing realtime? It could give you a better picture, too. And it could make it visible how the wishes differ between the two playing styles.
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2 hours ago, Sailor Malan2 said:
Your analogy is flawed. Windows 10 doesn't have all the features of previous versions. They don't all count as 'removed'.
No, ofcourse not! They are still there. I am so sorry for calling a half empty glass not a full glass.
This is becoming silly.
QuoteCM2 is a completely different product from CM.
Software development is a TRANSPARENT process to the customer.
How many parts of the software can be reused or not, how many parts are new in a new revision of a car is not of interest for the customer. It is of interest for the producer.
Do you understand there are inherently different interests of customers and of producers?
Example? Price. The producer wants the highest possible price, the customer the lowest possible price. The market is where they meet and creates the equilibrium.
I am confident you are clever enough to expand the example on other aspects...
99% of all scenarios are during daylight my friend.
Not immediately knowing the result? Unbearable! 
The patch?
in Combat Mission - General Discussion
Posted
Its absolutely clear, that its run now by people with no understanding of how to run a business.
The original creators probably were bought out with a NDA and are long gone. People running their business usually become better and better. Here they want to make the customers believe they turned into totally incompetent "managers"?
It also explains why the current US-government controlled team running this op, is not capable getting the most simple things into the code within two years - because it was written by someone else...
During that time the old team had developed a whole new game and game engine...