Improvement suggestions

[Bulletpoint]

19 hours ago, Kaunitz said:

This also concurs with my "observation": Sometimes - not always - when you're zoomed in at an arty/mortar explosion, you can hear some bullet-whizzing sounds (might only happen if you use soundmods...). I suspect that this occurs when your camera is close to an actual "shrapnel projectile" that gets spawned by the explosion.  

I'm not using sound mods, and I hear no whizzing sounds. So I think you're just "seeing faces in the clouds" here

And I don't believe the CM engine tracks individual pieces of shrapnel. It wouldn't make sense unless they tracked thousands of piecs from each explosion, and the end result would be very similar to a basic traceline & probabilistic calculation.

[Kaunitz]

1 minute ago, Bulletpoint said:

I'm not using sound mods, and I hear no whizzing sounds. So I think you're just "seeing faces in the clouds" here

I'm pretty sure about that. I will see if I can get a video of it (I meant to say that the sounds may only occur IF you use a sound mod - which maybe gives you louder bullet-whizz sounds).

[Bulletpoint]

Just now, Kaunitz said:

3 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

I'm not using sound mods, and I hear no whizzing sounds. So I think you're just "seeing faces in the clouds" here

I'm pretty sure about that. I will see if I can get a video of it (I meant to say that the sounds may only occur IF you use a sound mod - which maybe gives you louder bullet-whizz sounds).

Another explanation might be that the sounds of the fragments whizzing by are part of the explosion sound file used in the sound mod. But that can be found out by listening to the .wav files outside of the game...

[Kaunitz]

Okay yes, so on closer inspection, I think it's just the sound of the artillery shell hitting the earth. Funny that it gets played slightly after/during the explosion sound. (I believed that this would be the sound of shrapnel projectiles hitting the earth.) You're right that "spawning" so many bullets would probably slow down the game. 

Edited September 27, 2018 by Kaunitz

[Michael Emrys]

2 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:

I'm not using sound mods, and I hear no whizzing sounds. So I think you're just "seeing faces in the clouds" here

Do you hear anything if a canister shell is aimed close to the camera?

Michael

[Bulletpoint]

20 minutes ago, Michael Emrys said:

Do you hear anything if a canister shell is aimed close to the camera?

 

Yes. Also all other shells and bullets. Because the game tracks those   Shell fragments - I seriously doubt it.

[Kaunitz]

Besides all the detailed discussions of some of the suggested points, I thought it would be usefull to offer a compilation of all the suggestions so far. If I missed something, please let me know!

Compilation of improvement suggestions so far (not including obvious bugs such as the "leave the trench"-issue)

 New orders/options for the players

• Ability to chain together several “target briefly”-orders in one turn. This should allow some weapons to suppress a larger front than just 8 meters per turn=minute (at the cost of reduced suppression intensity/reliability, of course). For some weapons (HE, MGs), firing at a 8-meters target for a full minute is an overkill  and waste of ammo. Giving these units the option to spread out their fire would make them far more usefull in supporting an attack. For vehicles only, a very tedious work-around is to use multiple very short waypoints and plot target commands on each of them. The suggested feature would would contribute to the game in a slightly similar way as the feature that allows us to split up our squads: it reduces problems caused by an imbalance between "unit size/weapon capability", "grid size/resolution of space" and "turn intervalls/resolution of time". [Idea for implementation: "clear target" --> deletes all target orders given so far; target briefly --> adds a new target briefly order that gets triggered once any former ones have expired. Visually, a number could be added to the "target briefly" text]
• Option to lock a stance in order to let an infantry unit keep its LOS on a particular area – soldiers randomly go prone, which might lead to a loss of LOS on an area
• Dis- and remount orders for crew-served weapons (uses: “Shoot and scoot” for AT weapons – don’t pack up if you see that the tank is aiming at you!; Seek cover in artillery shelters/dugouts for weapon-crews, etc.) 

Editor & Scenario Design

• Fixed artillery fire-plans, set by the scenario desginer
• Option to leave some "friendly" troops under AI-control (or at least immobilize them), so that the player takes control only over a part of the friendly forces present on the battlefield
• Some option for scenario designers to disallow the attacker to creep along the edges of the map (movement restricted zones?)

Quickbattles (including force selection)

• Ability to move units/formations up/down in the OOB
• Ability to copy/paste a formation/unit
• Right indent for units that are part of formations
• For modern titles: Electronic Warfare Strength should be chosen secretly by each player?
• A setting to give some initial recon to the attacker (not just in assault type engagements). Maybe the attacker could buy some “recce patrol” marker he could place on the map, and get a suspected contact if there is an enemy unit somewhere within the radius of the “recce patrol” marker.  The quality of a recce patrol could have an effect on the "radius" of the marker.
• Ability to buy reinforcements (the later they arrive, the cheaper they are)
• “Typical only” toggle  - if on, XP/morale stats of units are locked for the players. They need to deal with what they get
• Ability to create your own units from smaller pieces ("OrBat creator/editor for quick battles, and maybe even campaigns. / Make your own battalions, companies, etc. per point count and then use them -- like tabletop.")
• Option to save and load OOBs

 New equipment/units/mechanics/features

• Flares
• Trenches and field fortifications in general (narrow slit trenches, gun emplacements, pillboxes in more varied designs, hesco walls + nato wire for modern titles, fighting positions for vehicles, etc)

Fluff / Aesthetics

• Some way to evacuate wounded soldiers (and reward it)
• When zooming in (Z/X hotkeys), the game should render the zoomed-in area in high detail
• Unit-icon toggle (alt + I ) should also toggle on/off target reference points
• More visible fog if the weather condition is “dense fog”.
• Windmills for Final Blitzkrieg

 Minor stuff (specific to individual weapons, units, etc)

• M40 GMC should switch to 155 HE if out of HEAT rounds, but still firing at tanks. Even that  size HE shell would destroy enemy tanks.
• Ability to disembark from a bunker/shelter and let the unit move on in the very same turn
• Larger field or angle of fire for prone MGs – right now, the muzzle can only be horizontally traversed within a very narrow angle, which means that the gunner as a whole needs to move and reposition the gun. If prone, this takes lots and lots of time as the gunner is typically crawling to the new position.
• The shadow of the sandbags on top of the wooden shelter is missing/broken (?) in Final Blitzkrieg
• Slow velocity/curved trajectory weapons should be allowed to target reverse slopes (like mortars).

Edited September 27, 2018 by Kaunitz

[Bulletpoint]

• Let players type in the number of points freely for the battle they want to play, or at least rework the points system so that "tiny" battles are indeed tiny.
• Fix the light/shadow issue where terrain has light/shadow on opposite sides of the shading for houses and troops.

Edited September 27, 2018 by Bulletpoint

[JoMac]

18 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

Let players type in the number of points freely for the battle they want to play, or at least rework the points system so that "tiny" battles are indeed tiny.

Yeah, I remember when 'Tiny Battles' were in fact, Tiny, then Game Engine 3 came out making them more like 'Small Battles'...

[JoMac]

40 minutes ago, Kaunitz said:

M40 GMC should switch to 155 HE if out of HEAT rounds, but still firing at tanks. Even that  size HE shell would destroy enemy tanks.

Agreed, and HE Rounds of 105 and bigger should really Damage or even Destroy many types of Tanks...

[JoMac]

43 minutes ago, Kaunitz said:

Ability to chain together several “target briefly”-orders in one turn. This should allow some weapons to suppress a larger front than just 8 meters per turn=minute (at the cost of reduced suppression intensity/reliability, of course).

This...

[Mord]

If you could draw a line (like we can with arty and mortars) that would be the optimal solution. Call it "Target Line" or something to that effect. Then MGs could sweep from point to point along the line. As far as rifle squads go, they already have the ability to shoot in as many directions as they have men so I don't think it would be outside their ability. Each man would fire at an interval along the line or something.

 

Mord.

[RockinHarry]

I actually wanted making some more tests with foxholes and trenches, combined with the ditch locked AS, but just remembered why I had stopped playing the game since early 2017. The "AI proactively avoid incoming HE fire" feature introduced with V4. The worst **** introduced ever. So after the patch then.

Btw.. has the odd terrain shading with reversed lighting/shadowing in dawn and dusk hours mentioned already? More likely a needed bug fix than improvement suggestion I think.

With regard to trenches I came to the conclusion that the current ones are rather sort of a generic combat position, both combining more or less covered movements (from AS to AS) and fighting. Beeing that wide (and vulnerable) as they currently are is obviously a requirement for proper path finding and/or the pixeltroopers avoiding getting into each others way. Something like GT:OS/Mius would be preferable for sure, but what is the terrain mesh scale and how is FOW modeled?

[LongLeftFlank]

They are prefab mass graves or drainage ditches, not resembling any fighting position known to man.

This is what a slit trench and LMG bunker (foreground) looks like. These are dug by infantry in a few days using only basic local materials (sandbags, logs and earth).

South perimeter of Eliane 3 (A1) position, Dien Bien Phu (Viet Minh hills 'Chauve' and 'Fictif' are opposite)

Edited September 29, 2018 by LongLeftFlank

[JulianJ]

Editor & Scenario Design

• Ctrl-S
• Ctrl-Z
  
  That would make Scenario design a little bit less tedious, and I think, be  fairly simple to implement.

CMBS Air Defence (in particular- could be implemented in other CM games but not as necessary)

• Some kind of indication (animation, onscreen message) whether you have shot down, damaged, forced away, or missed enemy aircraft.  Currently enemy Air Power is a Big Angry God that you have no understanding of.  I think that is neither realistic, nor makes for a good game.  I note that Dr Phillip Karber of West Point says that the Ukraine war was a very hostile environment for tactical air power

[MOS:96B2P]

6 hours ago, JulianJ said:

• Some kind of indication (animation, onscreen message) whether you have shot down, damaged, forced away, or missed enemy aircraft.  

There is now some feedback on if you shot down an OpFor aircraft.  Sometimes you see the missile explode in flight (see first screenshot).  Also a downed aircraft will crash/explode on the map edge (sometimes causing more casualties).  The unit that shot down the aircraft will display Aircraft Destroyed (see 2nd & 3rd screenshots).  

 

[JulianJ]

Thanks MOS:96B2P

I'm not sure that's happening in my game, perhaps I've missed a patch, although the last game I played was from the demo.  Anyway that's good news, basically solved the problem as far as I am concerned.

[MOS:96B2P]

5 minutes ago, JulianJ said:

Thanks MOS:96B2P

I'm not sure that's happening in my game, perhaps I've missed a patch, although the last game I played was from the demo.  Anyway that's good news, basically solved the problem as far as I am concerned.

No problem my friend.  The "Aircraft Destroyed" text disappears fairly quick and is small to begin with so it can be missed.   Whenever there is a large explosion on a map edge for no obvious reason I rewind the turn and check my air defense units.  I also check the status of my aircraft in the support panel since the large explosion on the map edge may indicate somebody lost an aircraft.   Cool game.   

[Michael Emrys]

7 minutes ago, MOS:96B2P said:

Whenever there is a large explosion on a map edge for no obvious reason I rewind the turn and check my air defense units.

I may have had that happen in one of my last games. There was a single large explosion in one corner on my side of the map and I was puzzled where it came from and what it was all about. I didn't think to check my AD units to see if they had fired a shot. I'll be on the lookout for this in the future.

Michael

[JoMac]

This goes for all WWII Titles (maybe, Modern as well)...Having Direct-Fire from Vehicles & Field Pieces take a little longer to get the first round off..

As it stands now (I see it in all my games, Youtube vids, etc), a Tank can just move-up the road, stop, and fire at a previously undetected enemy several hundred yards away within roughly 3 secs or less...There should be at least a full Spotting Cycle, or more, before a Tank, Stops, Spots, puts a round in chamber, adjust gun, then fires.

I don't mind the actual ROF afterwards (thou, I only use 'Green' to slow down the ROF a bit ), but the first encounter with each New Unit should take a little longer.

Now, I remember others saying that a Round is always automagically in chamber before shooting at target, and it doesn't matter if target is Inf or Armor, and this contributes to the quick shooting of first round...if this is case, then it reinforces my belief on why things happen to fast upon first engagement of target.

Edited October 1, 2018 by JoMc67

[domfluff]

51 minutes ago, JoMc67 said:

Now, I remember others saying that a Round is always automagically in chamber before shooting at target, and it doesn't matter if target is Inf or Armor, and this contributes to the quick shooting of first round...if this is case, then it reinforces my belief on why things happen to fast upon first engagement of target.

I don't know if that's actually true. I've certainly seen a Stuarts fire canister rounds at enemy tanks before, which led me to believe there was at least some level of "chamber" logic going on.

Those wouldn't have been the first round fired though, so perhaps that's not the same thing.
 

[JoMac]

2 hours ago, domfluff said:

I don't know if that's actually true. I've certainly seen a Stuarts fire canister rounds at enemy tanks before, which led me to believe there was at least some level of "chamber" logic going on.

Those wouldn't have been the first round fired though, so perhaps that's not the same thing.
 

Well, I know for sure some of the Beta Testers mentioning that the best round is always loaded ahead of time, even before knowing what the exact composition of the enemy is...

Unfortunately, a round is already loaded ahead of time (blank Round, if you will) and when enemy is spotted that round is assumed to be automagically HE or AP, depending on enemy contact and ready to fire.

So, not having a round already loaded will, at least, add a few more seconds to the time it takes to fire (about an additional Action-Phase, if you will). Thou, if your Armor spots several enemy Armor Contacts, then you could assume the best round will automatically be loaded after each time it fires.

 

Edited October 1, 2018 by JoMc67

[Michael Emrys]

In the real war, tanks were usually loaded with HE on the premise that any contact come upon unexpectedly was much more likely to be unarmored. In the event that the surprise did happen to be armored, the quickest way to unload the HE round was to fire it at the contact. Besides, the HE might do some damage or at least ring the crew's bell.

Michael

[A Canadian Cat]

10 minutes ago, Michael Emrys said:

In the real war, tanks were usually loaded with HE on the premise that any contact come upon unexpectedly was much more likely to be unarmored. In the event that the surprise did happen to be armored, the quickest way to unload the HE round was to fire it at the contact. Besides, the HE might do some damage or at least ring the crew's bell.

Yep. But to avoid all the threads titled "WTF: my tank is firing HE at the enemy tanks, the game is totally unplayable" instead the tanks all have Schrödinger rounds that automatically resolve to the right type during the aiming process.

[Michael Emrys]

1 minute ago, IanL said:

...to avoid all the threads...

I've known about the Schrödinger rounds for a long time, but never saw the reason for them explicitly spelled out before. Steve was always a trifle vague about it IIRC.

Michael