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Well, how many times can one replay the battle of the bulge, or the assault on monte cassino? it just started to seem somehow pointless to me at some point...

of course, YMMV...

a hint regarding release schedule would be very welcome indeed....:D

The US suffered 90,000 casualties in the battle of the bulge. Every casualty has a story...

:-)

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Well, how many times can one replay the battle of the bulge, or the assault on monte cassino?

Over and over and over and over and over and over and..... I just don't ever get tired of WWII

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Can't wait until get CMSF2 in my hands! BTW Dev could tweak some features from SF, not only improve graphics;). Some of them: "Adjust mission" option for CAS, its irritating I can't just drop all ordnance in one sortie on different targets. Tank gun elevation should be more realistic. Russian made tanks have had problems engaging close targets on 2 and higher floors of buildings in Grozny( Chechen War) but here they just don't...

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Not sure if it was mentioned in this 36 pages thread but what can BF say about the upcoming MP modes ?

The MP mode we have got is unplayable in RT when it comes to medium/big maps with many units as CM is the most complex RTS available.

So the question is: Will WEGO return or at least the possibility to play a game 2vs2 or 3vs3 ?

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  • 3 weeks later...
Well, how many times can one replay the battle of the bulge, or the assault on monte cassino?

I agree, although I think Cassino hasn't exactly been done to death. The Bulge and Normandy though... From that perspective I desperately want the game to go somewhere else, like the Pacific.

On the other hand WWII tactical combat has far from been perfected on the computer so there's still room for new games to offer improvement. In the case of the Bulge I think this game's modelling of armour, artillery, and air support is so far ahead of the rest that the game will actually offer a substantially better Bulge experience given how pivotal those elements were to that battle (well they were pivotal to almost all WWII battles, but you get the point in terms of late war hardware inflation).

So while it would still be the same tried and tested "panzers and paratroopers" formula (and who can blame them, considering that's also the version of the war made marketable by books and movies) it could still appear somwhat fresh. However it will also depend on getting the weather and terrain factors right, which of course played a huge part in that battle.

Anyway, about that PTO game...

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Please BFC do not waste your time with the Pacific at this time... besides that theater is meant for naval wargames and aircraft simulator's imo. In other words I have no interest in that area for Combat Mission.

I would rather your resources go towards the Eastern Front. Hopefully (begging) you will venture towards the early war years as well... Eastern Front Barbarossa-late 1943, North Africa 41-43 for example. These are the theaters that I would appreciate (I am sure I am not alone) the most, way before the Pacific is even considered.

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I think you need have no fear of the PTO usurping the Eastern Front's place in BFC's production schedule, if for no other reason than Steve's stated adamant opposition to such a move. However, it is incorrect to suppose that there was no ground combat worth modeling in CM's system. The Philippines, Burma, and New Guinea all had extensive fighting on the ground and the movement of army-sized forces. Even airborne attacks!

Michael

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... However, it is incorrect to suppose that there was no ground combat worth modeling in CM's system. The Philippines, Burma, and New Guinea all had extensive fighting on the ground and the movement of army-sized forces. Even airborne attacks!

Michael

Oh I know that, however imo it should be last on the list, like after the periods I listed.

I like my German armor /combined forces /blitzkrieg type forces. I rarely use the Allied stuff in CM... and I have no interest in the Japanese ground forces.

Just my two cents.

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Oh, you'll be getting some trench warfare all right. Just not WWI. I am finally starting work on my CMBN Dien Bien Phu master map this evening....

I'd guess the same CMers who dislike PTO are the same ones who also hate bocage (and probably urban combat too). In all these environments, you're fighting the map as much or more than the defending army, which is usually either heavily outnumbered (German) or plagued by obsolete tactics and equipment (Japanese, early Russians), and using the terrain as an equalizer.

Add to that the fact that after mid 1942 the Japanese forces were simply no match for a first line Western army (the British Indian Army didn't count until early 1944) and were simply annihilate in stand-up fights between equal numbers. Other than the occasional ambush of a patrol, the only way the Japanese "win" is on points, i.e. making the Allies bleed. (Shades of much of CMSF!). So it really isn't that much fun to play the IJA side more than once or twice for novelty value -- it's the setup of the defences that primarily determines how they perform, not the use of the forces. In fact, any substantial Japanese tactical movement generally results in a bloodbath.

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Depends. In my experience, Fanatic Regular (modded British) infantry will reliably execute a Fast move across open ground into enemy positions; guys will still Pin but rally pretty fast. As in RL, the success of the charge depends on defending firepower. And as in RL these charges rarely succeed

The primary threat to the defenders is actually hand grenades, not (abstracted) bayonets and rifle fire. If the attackers get that far....

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And as in RL these charges rarely succeed

Right. Banzai attacks tended to prove counter-productive, more so as the war dragged on. Yet they remained a prominent feature of Japanese warfare until the bitter end. So... given their documented uselessness the CMPT player, as the Japanese commander, would be compelled by an intrusive game mechanic to use them?

The point of the original question is that CM cannot do do justice to Japanese tactics w/o some kind of artificial rules. This may partly explain BF's lack of interest in the theatre. Along with invisible, buried defenders and the relative absence of sexy AFVs.

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Right. Banzai attacks tended to prove counter-productive, more so as the war dragged on. Yet they remained a prominent feature of Japanese warfare until the bitter end. So... given their documented uselessness the CMPT player, as the Japanese commander, would be compelled by an intrusive game mechanic to use them?

The point of the original question is that CM cannot do do justice to Japanese tactics w/o some kind of artificial rules. This may partly explain BF's lack of interest in the theatre. Along with invisible, buried defenders and the relative absence of sexy AFVs.

Again, not necessarily the case. The Japanese were very good at infiltration tactics, whenever they remembered to use them. That goes a long way to explaining their victory in Malaya and their early successes in Burma.

Michael

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My $0.02 on this subject is as follows. CMx1 modeled armored combat beautifully, and infantry combat in an abstract, but fully believable way. CMx2 continues the high fidelity armored combat tradition, but the improvement is not as dramatic as the change in the way infantry are handled. The infantry fight in CMx2 feels so much better then in CMx1, the 1:1 representation of troops makes such a difference IMO. My favorite CMx2 scenarios feature a company of infantry and maybe a platoon of armor, as a reverse to my preference in CMx1 which favored armor over infantry, and much larger numbers of both.

The CMx2 engine is just begging to be used simulating the ground combat in the PTO. Not only do we have battlegrounds like New Guinea, Guadalcanal, Okinawa, and all of the China-Burma-India area, but many many islands and atolls in the Pacific and Dutch East Indies that all saw battles that were won and lost in the scale CMx2 does so well at. And it's not like a game that is asymmetric in the strength of the forces involved can't be fun. Both CMSF and CMA feature opposing forces where one is far more powerful in firepower then the other. The Japanese towards the end of the war used many of the same tactics used by guerrilla forces today, such as adapting aircraft bombs for use as what we now call IEDs, ambush tactics, and suicide attacks.

Granted, the folks out there who swoon over fast moving armored thrusts supported by infantry in half tracks might not like the idea, but the game would be awesome. The vicious short range fire fights that typify PTO combat would make for some amazing CM replay moments. And when you do have armor at your disposal, dealing with the almost impossible terrain will force you get the most out of each tank and support the infantry you need to secure victory. The Battle of Okinawa alone could be a base game, with that one island representing almost every type of terrain WWII in the PTO included.

Again friends, all of this is my opinion and I am welcome to feedback. I am fully aware of Steve and the rest of BF's position on doing any type of PTO game. I think CMA is the closest we're getting to Asia any time soon, I just wish some 3rd party group would come in to pick up the torch like was done for CMA.

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1. CM: Battle for Normandy Module 2. This Module picks up where CM:BN and Commonwealth left off... with the September push out of France to the German border. The content centers around Operation Market Garden, though it covers more ground than just that. The game includes a number of new vehicles, formations, and new terrain models/textures. Adding new terrain, a first for any Module so far, ensures that you feel like you're fighting near Germany and not still back at the beacheads.

2. CM: Eastern Front 1. The first of four Eastern Front "families" starts with Operation Bagration (June 1944) and eventually covers through to the end of the war (May 1945). For many tactical warfare enthusiasts, this period is considered the most tactically interesting since both sides were at their peak of their military technology, organization, and experience. The scope and scale of the combat offers plenty of subject matter to explore.

We have more games planned for 2013, however we are making no formal announcements at this time. These three mini-announcements should be enough to keep you busy for a while.

I'm been playing CMFI busy for a while... :D Please, It will be possible to put some pictures, some news,AAR or somethig about the two future CM? Thanks

Ah! And about Banzai attacks... It is not the old "human wave" order? :P

Regards

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I am waiting for the CMBN upgrade to be compatible with CMFI.

Now that's worth waiting for. Along with a numbering of lingering issues like the barbed wire and setup bugs. BF's oh-so deliberative approach to patching is beginning to get annoying.

Re: Human Waves. This tactic is actually known to have worked given vast disparity in numbers and cold hearted commanders.

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What about a WW1 game with CM engine? :rolleyes: Early tanks, lots of artillery, a bit of trench warfare. Probably not as exciting as WW2 combat, but I would love to play that (in a way, the Italians do feel like WW1 forces already).

I think the real issue with this is that it wouldn't be as interesting at CM's squad level scale (with maybe a few exceptions). You want to play a wargame at a level where the decisions you make make a difference in the battle. With a small handful of exceptions (late war infiltrations, maybe tanks), what your company does won't make much difference at all. You need to be at the battalion or regimental or division or corp level to be able to really affect things in WWI. (This would also be generally true of the Napoleonic wars or US CW - Pickett's charge was, after all, an attack by 3 divisions).

The reason, of course, is that by WWII (and this is even more true today), smaller elements had a lot more firepower, but were also forced to spread out more because everyone had more firepower. Normandy had lots of company level battles in the bocage, for example, and the Bulge had a lot of instances of companies (but also platoons and even squads) fighting independently in significant battles. And despite the larger scale, this also happened in the East as well - Pavlov's house was held by a platoon for two months.

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