CMSF2

[sburke]

15 minutes ago, Sequoia said:

Well I'm going to take the thread back to a wish Sburke made anyway. Maybe it's not an additional feature beyond v4 if Black Sea has it. So I'm asking therefore does Black Sea have IED's and if so can they be cleared? I remember one scenario where I just knew a IED was in a spot and had a Stryker fire 40mm at the spot hoping it would detonate, but no. No dice until a vehicle approached closely.

Black sea doesn't have any IEDs and highly unlikely I'll get my wish for being able to disarm etc  Reality bites   

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Bummer. 

[Combatintman]

14 hours ago, Thewood1 said:

Since this is wishes and dreams...How about making new module for CMBS that is CMSF2, or vics versa.  I would like to think that moving the OOB from CMBS to the new CMSF2 would be a lot less than developing a new module for CMBS.  I would gladly play a full game price for combining CMBS and CMSF.

Not as easy as you think - the timeframe in which the two titles are set are at least a decade apart. While I can't speak for other TO&Es, as the person that researched, provided and formatted the majority of the data for the British forces in the CMSF British module, I can tell you that the work that is involved in writing a TO&E to BFCs standards is an enormous undertaking. Bear in mind that this does not include the work that BFC then does with that data to turn it into code and all of those other fancy ones and zeroes that computers need to make the thing perform.

The British Army for the CMBS setting is very different to the British Army of the CMBS setting and in terms of TO&E implementation would probably require about at least about 50% of the research effort that I spent last time around plus whatever time it takes for BFC to code etc. Rinse and repeat for all of the other TO&Es in CMSF (ie Germans, Canadians, Dutch, Syrians etc ) and it becomes bigger than Ben Hur.

11 hours ago, Thewood1 said:

I actually think that is very doable.

I'm not denying that it is not doable but like everything else in relation to these games, it is a question of how much effort or how many resources Battlefront are prepared to throw at the problem. My guess is none, because their plan would not include CMSF 2, it would be CMSF type content added to CMBS or vice versa. As none of the announced development roadmaps/bones have stated that they intend to do this then, in all likelihood, it isn't going to happen.

[Thewood1]

I went back and looked at my post and saw nothing about me saying it was simple, so I don't know why that is the first point you're making.  At the same time, Steve and others have talked about how the OOB portion is one of the biggest issues in developing new modules.   So my question would be, why is developing CMSF2 as a standalone game any more or less work then developing it as a module.  I would also find it odd that IED capability can be developed for CMSF2 and not for CMBS.  My reading of BFC's statements is that CMSF2 and CMBS are on the same CM engine.

So again, since I didn't say it was easy to begin with, I know it might not be easy in absolute terms.  But in relative terms, why is developing CMSF2 as a game, any easier than developing it as a module?  There is a bit of cross over in units, especially for the US side.  It would really eliminate the hassle of the DRM and install.  Plus it would give players a little more of a sand box to play with.

As to development of new OOBs for other countries, I suspect we might be years away from the British ever showing up in CMBS.  So that OOB work will get done when it gets done.  Meanwhile, with CMSF as a module for CMBS, all your modern CM gaming is under one exe.  Other than having two sets of dates for playing, 2008 and 2017, I Don't see a gaming downside or much of a development downside.  If BFC doesn't want to upgrade the NATO OOBs, that's fine, just use the same OOBs as in CMSF.  I thought that was what we were getting in CMSF2 anyway.  If BFC decides to upgrade the NATO OOBs for CMSF2, then there is no harm in using that in CMBS.

Now if the purpose is to charge for a full game in CMSF2 over a module approach to CMSF2, I have no issue paying full game price for CMSF as a module in CMBS.  Again, just trying to understand why CMSF2 couldn't be an expansion of CMBS.  It is the exact same question I had about CMFB and CMBN.

[Combatintman]

12 hours ago, Sequoia said:

Well I'm going to take the thread back to a wish Sburke made anyway. Maybe it's not an additional feature beyond v4 if Black Sea has it. So I'm asking therefore does Black Sea have IED's and if so can they be cleared? I remember one scenario where I just knew a IED was in a spot and had a Stryker fire 40mm at the spot hoping it would detonate, but no. No dice until a vehicle approached closely.

The IED problem in CMSF is mostly a tactical problem to solve. As @Sgt.Squarehead said above, you're going about it the wrong way. There are also nuances to the IED problem in terms of how the scenario designer has implemented them in the scenario. Like most things in the military there are heaps of acronyms related to IEDs and this is why I talk about nuances which I shall try to explain.

In CMSF terms, I would start with the manual definitions of IED and how they operate (pages 104-106 of the manual refer) in simple terms they boil down to:

• VBIED - this comprises a vehicle and a triggerman.
• Cell IED - this comprises the device and a triggerman (range 600m and 10% failure rate)
• Radio IED - this comprises the device and a triggerman (range 300m, LOS from the triggerman to device and 20% failure rate)
• Wire IED - this comprises the device and a triggerman (range 100m and 10% failure rate)

A point to note is that although it only explicitly states that LOS is required for radio IEDs, my experience is that LOS is a requirement for all of them.

Additional relevant factors are the experience and skill ratings of the triggerman plus the level of suppression/panic.

Taking all of the above into account, defeating IEDs listed above generally involve the following (which, by the way, are real world tactical solutions to the problem):

• Analysing where you think an IED might be and consider avoiding that area.
• Denying the triggerman LOS.
• Killing or suppressing the triggerman.

Otherwise, if you have platforms with ECM, you can risk manage situations because ECM (page 206 of the manual shows you the ECM icon) will increase the device failure rates for  Vehicle, Cell and Radio IEDs, although by how much in game I do not know.  

So this is all fine and dandy but what about mines?  Mines are in essence what are called in the COIN environment VOIEDs (Victim Operated IEDS). Indeed many VOIEDs, or their components started off as military specification anti-personnel or anti-tank mines. Now (and here is the nuance I was talking about earlier) what if the scenario designer has mentioned an IED threat but has implemented that threat by using mines to replicate VOIEDs? Well the obvious solution is of course to use engineers or pioneers to look for them or mark them. However, you are never going to know how the scenario designer has implemented the 'IEDs' until you either play the scenario or you cheat and peak in the scenario editor. That I'm afraid is that enduring characteristic of warfare called friction. So your solution here is one I've mentioned earlier which is to work out where you think the device might be and avoid it.

As to your desire to have a means to physically clear devices - engineers/pioneers can identify and mark mines already but identification without detonation is, in my experience, rare in CMSF. It also takes time ... slow move, pause, slow move pause. This is reflective of real life - there are plenty of documentaries/combat footage of Afghanistan and Iraq that will verify that it is a slow and hazardous process with no guarantees of success. Bearing in mind that the maximum length of a scenario is three hours (plus possibly some added time - I'm relying on memory here) then you can see that your approach to the problem will require analysis and risk management. As to a physical clearance feature well again I would refer you to documentaries/footage because in many cases that requires a specialist EOD team which may have to be called in from a FOB and could take a couple of hours to rock up.

All of that said - it would be nice to have the capability but if it is to be implemented realistically (which is how BFC does things) then I would still expect EOD clearance to be a time consuming process which would soak up a lot of scenario time.

Edited November 1, 2017 by Combatintman

[Erwin]

"The British Army for the CMBS setting is very different to the British Army of the CMBS setting..."   That clears thing up a lot.  

Re: mine-clearing.  That seems to be a different game requiring much more time.  In the game some designers mark minefield "areas" so the player has a chance of having a "Mark Mines" objective if desired.  

IED's are such a nasty surprise - but that seems like RL.  The problem is that it makes for a horrible game experience to have a squad and/or valuable vehicle KO'd when in RL one would stop the op and deal with the mess.  Having to stop and replay the mission kinda ruins the whole point.

Edited November 1, 2017 by Erwin

[Combatintman]

40 minutes ago, Thewood1 said:

I went back and looked at my post and saw nothing about me saying it was simple, so I don't know why that is the first point you're making.  At the same time, Steve and others have talked about how the OOB portion is one of the biggest issues in developing new modules.   So my question would be, why is developing CMSF2 as a standalone game any more or less work then developing it as a module.  I would also find it odd that IED capability can be developed for CMSF2 and not for CMBS.  My reading of BFC's statements is that CMSF2 and CMBS are on the same CM engine.

So again, since I didn't say it was easy to begin with, I know it might not be easy in absolute terms.  But in relative terms, why is developing CMSF2 as a game, any easier than developing it as a module?  There is a bit of cross over in units, especially for the US side.  It would really eliminate the hassle of the DRM and install.  Plus it would give players a little more of a sand box to play with.

As to development of new OOBs for other countries, I suspect we might be years away from the British ever showing up in CMBS.  So that OOB work will get done when it gets done.  Meanwhile, with CMSF as a module for CMBS, all your modern CM gaming is under one exe.  Other than having two sets of dates for playing, 2008 and 2017, I Don't see a gaming downside or much of a development downside.  If BFC doesn't want to upgrade the NATO OOBs, that's fine, just use the same OOBs as in CMSF.  I thought that was what we were getting in CMSF2 anyway.  If BFC decides to upgrade the NATO OOBs for CMSF2, then there is no harm in using that in CMBS.

Now if the purpose is to charge for a full game in CMSF2 over a module approach to CMSF2, I have no issue paying full game price for CMSF as a module in CMBS.  Again, just trying to understand why CMSF2 couldn't be an expansion of CMBS.  It is the exact same question I had about CMFB and CMBN.

Simplicity is implied here:

'I would like to think that moving the OOB from CMBS to the new CMSF2 would be a lot less than developing a new module for CMBS'.

Otherwise, I refer to you my original post in which I have presented an evidence-based answer to your question.

[Combatintman]

6 minutes ago, Erwin said:

"The British Army for the CMBS setting is very different to the British Army of the CMBS setting..."   That clears thing up a lot.  

Before things get out of hand (and I don't think that you meant it to go that way), I don't want my post to be interpreted as implying that there will be a Brit module for CMBS. I have seen no statement from BFC to that effect.

[Thewood1]

Again, you implied that from my statement.  As I said, its all relative.  Nothing is ever simple.  I am not sure what I can say beyond what I have said to keep you from thinking that I think its absolutely simple.  You are reading things in my posts that aren't there.  If you want to interpret that as me saying something is simple, that is something you need to deal with.

You haven't answered any of my responses...how is developing an OOB for CMSF2 any more or less difficult than doing it for CMBS?  I will come back to the relativity of it in that most of the 2008 theoretical US/Syrian war OOB work has been done.  So RELATIVELY, the OOB work for CMSF2, whether in CMSF2 game engine or as a CMBS module should be less resource intensive.

I will be explicit in that comments are in relative terms.  I don't want someone to think I think its simple.  Is that explicit enough?  I really didn't expect the discussion to be about how simple or not simple its is.  But why is one way of doing it harder than another...relatively.

[Erwin]

While am sure that we can all agree with the preceding statements, the relativity of the discussion is quite simple and yet complex.  While the explicit comments are unassailable in the relative sense it can be argued in the reverse directions as well.

This may help: 

 

[sburke]

1 hour ago, Thewood1 said:

Again, you implied that from my statement.  As I said, its all relative.  Nothing is ever simple.  I am not sure what I can say beyond what I have said to keep you from thinking that I think its absolutely simple.  You are reading things in my posts that aren't there.  If you want to interpret that as me saying something is simple, that is something you need to deal with.

You haven't answered any of my responses...how is developing an OOB for CMSF2 any more or less difficult than doing it for CMBS?  I will come back to the relativity of it in that most of the 2008 theoretical US/Syrian war OOB work has been done.  So RELATIVELY, the OOB work for CMSF2, whether in CMSF2 game engine or as a CMBS module should be less resource intensive.

I will be explicit in that comments are in relative terms.  I don't want someone to think I think its simple.  Is that explicit enough?  I really didn't expect the discussion to be about how simple or not simple its is.  But why is one way of doing it harder than another...relatively.

They are equally difficult. BF first has to assess the ToE then review what that implies in the game regarding new models etc. the work for a 2008 game will have some overlap with a 2017 game, but also a lot of changes so I wouldn’t be too sure what any relationship between the two might be.  The OoB battle for CMSF as Steve has noted is mostly set with some minor changes that he stated. CMSF2 is simply an effort to bring CMSF up to the 4.0 engine and to do so without expanding the scope (I.e. project creep). I think conflating the ToE as a basis of making CMSF a module misses the point that BF is loathe to expand a game family beyond a specific scope. That is the main issue with your suggestion and the ToE has little to do with that. This is no different than asking why CMFB was not just a module for CMBN. It is a non starter. 

[Sequoia]

Okay I'm sold that IED removal by specialist is probably beyond the main scope of Combat Mission which is, after all,  front line combat. Would my attempted solution of peppering the suspected area (which was in the scenario an obvious choke point) with 40mm or mortar fire have had a chance of working in real life?

[MOS:96B2P]

5 hours ago, Combatintman said:

Taking all of the above into account, defeating IEDs listed above generally involve the following (which, by the way, are real world tactical solutions to the problem):

• Analysing where you think an IED might be and consider avoiding that area.
• Denying the triggerman LOS.
• Killing or suppressing the triggerman.

Otherwise, if you have platforms with ECM, you can risk manage situations because ECM (page 206 of the manual shows you the ECM icon) will increase the device failure rates for  Vehicle, Cell and Radio IEDs, although by how much in game I do not know.  

Good information for dealing with IEDs.  The ECM effect on IEDs is also very interesting but I'm not sure how effective the ECM is. 

 

5 hours ago, Combatintman said:

A point to note is that although it only explicitly states that LOS is required for radio IEDs, my experience is that LOS is a requirement for all of them.

Yes, this is one of the parts of the manual that provide only part of the story.  This is how I think they work:  Only radio IEDs need LOS between the IED and the triggerman for the trigger to physically work.  However, wire, radio, and cell all need to spot when OpFor are in the kill zone.  The triggerman will not detonate the device unless he can spot OpFor in the kill zone.  So in practice all three need line of sight to the device / kill zone. For small and medium IEDs the triggerman must observe the OpFor in the same action spot as the device.  For large and huge IEDs the triggerman must observe the OpFor in the same or adjacent action spot as the device.   

In theory I guess a cell triggerman could spot OpFor in the kill zone, duck down behind an obstacle, breaking LOS and then detonate.  Where the radio triggerman would need to keep LOS until the device detonated (no ducking for him).  But for TACSOPs - break the LOS between the device and the triggerman and/or break the triggerman.     

[Sgt.Squarehead]

6 hours ago, Thewood1 said:

As to development of new OOBs for other countries, I suspect we might be years away from the British ever showing up in CMBS.  So that OOB work will get done when it gets done.

Nope.....That work will get done when @Combatintman does it. 

[Erwin]

Very useful summary of IED operations, MOS.  Finally I understand how they work.  Thank you.

[MOS:96B2P]

5 hours ago, Erwin said:

Very useful summary of IED operations, MOS.  Finally I understand how they work.  Thank you.

You're welcome.  Maybe someday we'll figure out the mechanics of the ECM part of it.   

[Mord]

Thought of another one; Amphibious vehicles, at least the AAV. I asked about it.

If Ammo Dumps are allowed that would REALLY add some flavor to scenarios.

 

 

Mord.

 

 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

I believe both should come as a matter of course with the new engine.....Makes you realise just how much it's been tweaked, upgraded and improved over the years (Can't wait to see what we get TBH). 

Edited November 2, 2017 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Mord]

Yes, it has come a long, long, way. Really makes you cringe thinking about all that waiting we did now that we are here. I think I only have one thing left from my original (old engine) wish list, and that would be full fire effects. We are half way there. I hope that comes around eventually.

 

Mord.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Persistent map damage for me.....One of the things that got me into CM1 was the ability to 'make your mark' on the map in campaigns (Do you remember that humongous city map in CM:BB at all?).

Edited November 3, 2017 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Sequoia]

I wonder what the top priorities on Steve and Charles list are.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Finding some magic formula to stop us nagging.....At a guess! 

[General Jack Ripper]

16 hours ago, Mord said:

Thought of another one; Amphibious vehicles, at least the AAV. I asked about it.

If Ammo Dumps are allowed that would REALLY add some flavor to scenarios.

Both of these should be in.
I'm just getting so darned excited!

[sburke]

27 minutes ago, SLIM said:

Both of these should be in.
I'm just getting so darned excited!

Amphibs was confirmed by Steve in another thread.  Ammo dumps am not sure of as that would probably entail a ToE change. Fingers crossed. I want it for arms cache search missions.  

[General Jack Ripper]

51 minutes ago, sburke said:

Ammo dumps am not sure of as that would probably entail a ToE change. Fingers crossed. I want it for arms cache search missions.  

Any truck or Humvee type vehicle carrying ammo set to 'Dismounted' status in the editor should change into an Ammo Dump on 'Elite' difficulty or higher.

CMBS features Ammo Dumps, so we should get them in CMSF2