A More Realistic Iron Mode?

[HerrTom]

Thank you for taking the time to respond so quickly. I'm still not sure I understand but at this point I'm not sure I ever will haha.  I'll keep playing iron  since I always have, even though it doesn't seem to really do anything . Clearly I'm in the minority here.

[CarlWAW]

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.

Quote

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. 

Correct. But there are two reasons mentioned. And you chose the wrong one:

 

Quote

Therefore, 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.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

[CAS]

 

The reason why I play more WEGO lately is that the game performs way better in the big scenarios. (on my system at least)

And I enjoy the replay feature which unfortunately not is possible in Real time.

And yes in real-time there are phases in the battles where i hit pause bottom every 10sec.  (i do not have replay, so I have to know what is going on)

Having played both Real time and Wego I do not think that the implementation of the fog of war from real-time to WEGO would have any down sides (you only have to click once to get the big picture) But well it takes programming time and probably it is not essential.

 

In my opinion the combat mission series has one of the best C2 systems I have seen in comparable games.

It is a hidden gem that I would love to see improved upon.

 

In no way I wish a game that is more clumsy to play or more cumbersome to select units.

I do not have the time or interest to have a stack of papers besides the game with self limiting rules (used and proposed by other players)

My wish is to use the implemented C2 system to full effect.

A unit out of C2 should not even be able to react to the threats it does not see. (that´s why  you should not be able to give orders to them)

A unit out of C2 should not be able to give you  (as the commander of the operation) information about the enemy.

In the modern games  loss of C2 is not as big an issue as everyone has radios -but in the WW2 era it would make a big difference.

 

Just to round up the discussion from my side, as I do not think we are going anywhere.

And if Steve does not even play in iron himself I think we have a lost case...

 

And of course I am still supporting your product as it is still unique on the marked.

(just a shame for the hidden gem)

 

[Machor]

For the record, I've been playing Iron WeGo ever since I got into CM in 2015 (thanks to CMBS), and like it just the way it is.

58 minutes ago, HerrTom said:

I'll keep playing iron  since I always have, even though it doesn't seem to really do anything .

May I venture to guess that you don't play WW2 titles? If so, you're seeing far better contact sharing in modern titles, which may explain why Iron doesn't seem to really do anything - though there's still the very important point about friendly visual contacts that @Vanir Ausf B mentioned.

13 minutes ago, CAS said:

And I enjoy the replay feature which unfortunately not is possible in Real time.

This is a big reason for me - to be able to capture gaming 'moments' on video. 

14 minutes ago, CAS said:

I do not have the time or interest to have a stack of papers besides the game with self limiting rules (used and proposed by other players)

I don't know how other folks do it, but I ain't got no stack of papers anywhere around me - nothing CM related, that is.  For me, it's simply putting myself in the boots of a particular unit or formation's commander and deciding what he (or she, with some Ukrainian commanders in CMBS ) would do with the given information. I wouldn't be able to do that without the Iron mode.

20 minutes ago, CAS said:

A unit out of C2 should not even be able to react to the threats it does not see. (that´s why  you should not be able to give orders to them)

A unit out of C2 should not be able to give you  (as the commander of the operation) information about the enemy.

With this, you're missing the point that Steve and others have made, that CM is not a command simulation. You play the role of not only the force commander, but of every decision maker on your OOB. You may find it informative for better understanding CM to compare it to Battlefront's TacOps or HPS Sims' Tigers Unleashed.

[JoMac]

It would be great for me If CM had a WEGO System with Auto Pauses to give Passive Sub-Orders (evade, adjust an Action-Spot, Hide, etc) every 15 or 30 seconds (quarter or mid-turn increments for issuing Passive Sub-Orders feels better then say 10 seconds or whenever you feel like it). If you don't want to issue orders during that Auto Pause, then click continue.

Basically, this would be a combination of WEGO & RT...Thou, I can only amagine how hard this would Code or Implement, especially a PBEM.

 

 

Edited October 26, 2017 by JoMc67

[BletchleyGeek]

5 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Well, there's an unnecessary comment... you're Australian, so of course you are English as a Second Language.  As a former Colonist who lived in London for a while, according to some I am ESL too

Well, according to the department of Immigration here I am a "permanent resident". I am actually Spanish... or Catalan, I am not sure

I take your comment as a signal that people here can understand me even with the occasional convoluted sentences I manage to come up with.

Thanks for the overview you gave @Battlefront.com, as @slysniper I do too appreciate such posts very much.

[IICptMillerII]

This thread is proof that an updated/enhanced iron mode is more trouble than its worth. 

I would much rather BFC spend time on adding new features to the game instead of trying to enhance a negligible feature already in the game. DPICM artillery for the modern titles anyone?

[sburke]

2 hours ago, CAS said:

 

The reason why I play more WEGO lately is that the game performs way better in the big scenarios. (on my system at least)

And I enjoy the replay feature which unfortunately not is possible in Real time.

And yes in real-time there are phases in the battles where i hit pause bottom every 10sec.  (i do not have replay, so I have to know what is going on)

Having played both Real time and Wego I do not think that the implementation of the fog of war from real-time to WEGO would have any down sides (you only have to click once to get the big picture) But well it takes programming time and probably it is not essential.

 

In my opinion the combat mission series has one of the best C2 systems I have seen in comparable games.

It is a hidden gem that I would love to see improved upon.

 

In no way I wish a game that is more clumsy to play or more cumbersome to select units.

I do not have the time or interest to have a stack of papers besides the game with self limiting rules (used and proposed by other players)

My wish is to use the implemented C2 system to full effect.

A unit out of C2 should not even be able to react to the threats it does not see. (that´s why  you should not be able to give orders to them)

A unit out of C2 should not be able to give you  (as the commander of the operation) information about the enemy.

In the modern games  loss of C2 is not as big an issue as everyone has radios -but in the WW2 era it would make a big difference.

 

Just to round up the discussion from my side, as I do not think we are going anywhere.

And if Steve does not even play in iron himself I think we have a lost case...

 

And of course I am still supporting your product as it is still unique on the marked.

(just a shame for the hidden gem)

 

you split off a scout team and order them to an overwatch position to observe.  The overwatch is 200 meters away. The team loses C2 in 50 meters.  So they go the the OP (assuming they don’t immediately stop at 51 meters sit down and say hmmm I am out of C2 guess I gotta stop) and start observing. They see a tank platoon coming. They are out of C2, what do they do?  According to what you said above a unit out of C2 can not be given orders and you can’t react based on their info. 

Are you saying that because they had an assigned mission you can now have them react because it is in compliance with their orders?  How does the game determine that or is it simply your choice now as a player. One implies that you have the ability and choose what to do or not based on your feelings which is exactly what Peregrine and Bil have tried to formalize in a set of rules. You don’t need the rules. You can decide based on your feeling about how they’d react.  The second implies as you said that you are completely unable in which case your units are now restricted to actions that don’t entail getting out of C2.  That seems even more artificial than what we do now and far from realistic. Units would have no capability for personal initiative 

you don’t seem to be willing to think out exactly how what you are asking for would actually play out. 

[Battlefront.com]

5 hours ago, slysniper said:

Boy, it sure would have been nice to get to this response much sooner.

I always like it when you give clear statements as to why the game is designed in its present state, this does that.

For me anyway, it is a good insight as to how you think of it as a designer, and for seeing the logical decisions you are making for why things are as they are.

Thanks.  Sometimes it takes a while to remember why something was done 10 years ago.

5 hours ago, IanL said:

Spot on analysis.

According to CarlWAW, not so much

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

For someone who always boasts about his logical abilities there are quite a few logical errors.

You are, if nothing else, consistent with how you present yourself.  Specifically, you're unnecessarily insulting and you're also wrong.  Not a great combo, IMHO.

There's no logic errors in what I laid out.  None.  However, there are all kinds of different players out there and it is IMPOSSIBLE for one set of logic to apply to every situation equally well.  It's like me explaining the best and most efficient way to make a pie and you say "that's illogical because I want cake".  Sorry, but the chip on your shoulder isn't helping you any.

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

Correct. But there are two reasons mentioned. And you chose the wrong one:

You totally and completely missed my point.  Not too surprising since you're apparently not interested in anything anybody else has to say if it conflicts with your position.

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

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.

Please, for the love of everything that is good on this Earth... would you PLEASE stop making the mistake of thinking your opinions are facts?  It's really getting old.  There's several people who have directly contradicted what you just said, yet you keep going on and on as if the way YOU view the game is the ONLY way to view it.  You pretty much lose every argument you make if you approach things that way.

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

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.

Oooo... you *almost* phrased this as an opinion.  So close.

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

Not big picture but TIME TO THINK is what wego players appreciate in that mode.

No kidding.

5 hours ago, CarlWAW said:

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.

No, it's very much correct for the majority of our customers.  Obviously not for you, but we can't please all the people all the time.  Sorry you have such a hard time accepting this for what it is.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, CAS said:

The reason why I play more WEGO lately is that the game performs way better in the big scenarios. (on my system at least)

And I enjoy the replay feature which unfortunately not is possible in Real time.

And yes in real-time there are phases in the battles where i hit pause bottom every 10sec.  (i do not have replay, so I have to know what is going on)

Sure, and I bet if you thought about it you could come up with a bunch of other reasons why you prefer WeGo to RT.  There's lots of things to like/dislike about both play modes, but that's getting too off topic.

4 hours ago, CAS said:

Having played both Real time and Wego I do not think that the implementation of the fog of war from real-time to WEGO would have any down sides (you only have to click once to get the big picture) But well it takes programming time and probably it is not essential.

The collective memory here is it used to be this way eons ago and was changed to its current state.  And 10 years later this is the first serious discussion we've had about it.  So it's not about programming time per se, it's about the relative importance of making a change.

4 hours ago, CAS said:

In my opinion the combat mission series has one of the best C2 systems I have seen in comparable games.

It is a hidden gem that I would love to see improved upon.

It is also a source of frustration for some and definitely a big drawback for appealing to customers outside of the traditional hardcore/serious wargamer crowd.  Again, control vs. realism are inherently in conflict and so where to draw the line is always going to come down to personal preference.

4 hours ago, CAS said:

In no way I wish a game that is more clumsy to play or more cumbersome to select units.

I do not have the time or interest to have a stack of papers besides the game with self limiting rules (used and proposed by other players)

My wish is to use the implemented C2 system to full effect.

No you don't   You say you do, but really you do not.  We've had hundreds of threads about this before and it always comes down to players not having enough imagination/experience to understand how unworkable some of the ideas are.  Here's the first and most common one...

4 hours ago, CAS said:

A unit out of C2 should not even be able to react to the threats it does not see. (that´s why  you should not be able to give orders to them)

Never going to happen because It's totally unrealistic without massive amounts of AI programming and a brand new interface to communicate "intent" and "plans" to individual units on-the-fly.  Without that, there's absolutely no way the game gets more realistic by cutting off control of units out of C2.  Zero.  And I've had this debate about 1000 times already so please trust me that nobody has ever shown a work around to it.  Because there is none.

 

4 hours ago, CAS said:

A unit out of C2 should not be able to give you  (as the commander of the operation) information about the enemy.

That sorta happens in CM right now, except that you do get that information when you click on the unit in question.  And that is mandatory because you are not the overall commander when you click on that unit, you are the Team or Squad Leader of that unit.  It's nonsense to suggest that the Team or Squad Leader shouldn't know that there's a tank right in front of it just because it can't communicate with its HQ.

 

4 hours ago, CAS said:

In the modern games  loss of C2 is not as big an issue as everyone has radios -but in the WW2 era it would make a big difference.

Right, but there's no practical way to portray what really happens with breaks in C2, WW2 or Modern, because we can only simulate the break and not the effects of it.

4 hours ago, CAS said:

Just to round up the discussion from my side, as I do not think we are going anywhere.

And if Steve does not even play in iron himself I think we have a lost case...

No, that's never true.  I've said this several times already... I never have, nor never will, make design decisions based on my personal play style.  That's a horrible way to design a game.  Unlike CarlWAW I *fully* understand that my personal preferences are not necessarily what the majority of people want.

What is true is you've "lost the case".  But it's because it's not workable, not because I personally wouldn't play with it.

4 hours ago, CAS said:

 

And of course I am still supporting your product as it is still unique on the marked.

(just a shame for the hidden gem)

The C2 is how we get Relative Spotting, which IMHO is the core of the entire game's realism.  While many people don't appreciate how much of an impact that has on the game, we're OK with that.  People should be able to play a game and say "wow, I really enjoyed that" without necessarily knowing why. 

Steve

[HerrTom]

5 hours ago, Machor said:

I wouldn't be able to do that without the Iron mode.

I told myself I was going to leave this thread - but this keeps coming up and I'm going to try one more time to clarify this.  People keep saying that - how does Iron mode let you do this compared to the other modes?  I'm genuinely curious here.  I'm not sure what will help it get through my thick skull - a couple of screenshots or something detailing how you do it?  If you don't want to bother, no worries! 

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

That sorta happens in CM right now, except that you do get that information when you click on the unit in question.  And that is mandatory because you are not the overall commander when you click on that unit, you are the Team or Squad Leader of that unit.

But only with enemy units unless you're playing Real Time in which case this will happen with friendly units in Iron mode.  And that isn't supposed to happen in WeGo, correct?

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

The C2 is how we get Relative Spotting, which IMHO is the core of the entire game's realism.

Out of curiosity, does C2 affect anything else, like morale for example?  Or is it solely an information pipeline?

Sorry for all the questions, Steve.

[IICptMillerII]

13 minutes ago, HerrTom said:

Out of curiosity, does C2 affect anything else, like morale for example?  Or is it solely an information pipeline?

Check out this thread of video's and analysis of how morale and C2 effects units in the games:

 

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, HerrTom said:

I told myself I was going to leave this thread - but this keeps coming up and I'm going to try one more time to clarify this.  People keep saying that - how does Iron mode let you do this compared to the other modes?  I'm genuinely curious here.  I'm not sure what will help it get through my thick skull - a couple of screenshots or something detailing how you do it?  If you don't want to bother, no worries! 

When you click on the unit you get to see what it sees/knows.  You are not forced to use this information as part of your play style, but that's not the issue to focus on.  There are many features in CM that matter to some, do not matter to others based on personal play style.  There is no one way to play CM, there is no one way to enjoy it.  It's not important for the rest of us to understand why any more than I should wonder why anybody likes Adam Sandler movies

1 hour ago, HerrTom said:

But only with enemy units unless you're playing Real Time in which case this will happen with friendly units in Iron mode.  And that isn't supposed to happen in WeGo, correct?

Check it out for yourself.  I did this briefly last night to remind myself what is what.  In both WeGo and RT when you click on a friendly unit the rest of the units not in C2 or LOS disappear.  The difference is in WeGo this only happens during playback.  Orders Phase in WeGo does, however, provide this same information by dimming the floating icons of those which aren't in C2 or LOS.  So what you get in WeGo is the same information as RT, but in a less restrictive way.

1 hour ago, HerrTom said:

Out of curiosity, does C2 affect anything else, like morale for example?  Or is it solely an information pipeline?

The thread Cpt Miller linked to helps out, but it also affects the ability to call in air/artillery for those units capable of doing so.

1 hour ago, HerrTom said:

Sorry for all the questions, Steve.

That's what this Forum is here for, so don't apologize for being curios

Steve

[HerrTom]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Orders Phase in WeGo does, however, provide this same information by dimming the floating icons of those which aren't in C2 or LOS.  So what you get in WeGo is the same information as RT, but in a less restrictive way.

Man, I feel dumb now.  That's the missing link!  I for some reason had it in my head that that happened in all the other modes too... shows what I know! 

[sburke]

8 hours ago, HerrTom said:

Man, I feel dumb now.  That's the missing link!  I for some reason had it in my head that that happened in all the other modes too... shows what I know! 

Iron mode rulzzz!  Other modes droolzzz!  

[A Canadian Cat]

On 10/26/2017 at 3:55 PM, JoMc67 said:

It would be great for me If CM had a WEGO System with Auto Pauses to give Passive Sub-Orders (evade, adjust an Action-Spot, Hide, etc) every 15 or 30 seconds (quarter or mid-turn increments for issuing Passive Sub-Orders feels better then say 10 seconds or whenever you feel like it). If you don't want to issue orders during that Auto Pause, then click continue.

Oh yuck. Sorry - hard pass on that.

 

On 10/26/2017 at 4:07 PM, BletchleyGeek said:

I take your comment as a signal that people here can understand me even with the occasional convoluted sentences I manage to come up with.

Heck ya. I thought you were a Brit living down under given your forum handle.

 

23 hours ago, IICptMillerII said:

This thread is proof that an updated/enhanced iron mode is more trouble than its worth. 

I would much rather BFC spend time on adding new features to the game <snip>

LOL +1 to that.

[Freyberg]

I think it's a shame that much of this thread has descended into incivility (that's the thing that so often keeps me off this forum) - and it's particularly unkind that peevish things are said about the developers. This is a niche game, from which I get a great deal of pleasure and have done for many years, and I feel lucky that Battlefront have continued to improve and expand on it. No other game I have ever played has held my interest upgrade after upgrade the way Combat Mission has.

The pity is that this an interesting thread. It's made me interested in playing Iron Mode again; some of the ideas suggested don't appeal, others are a bit far-out, but fun to think about, and others would be really interesting to try.

I agree with the point made that maximum 'realism', in the absence of a super-AI with human-like ability, would be less realistic. The abstraction in the AI balances out the abstraction in the command interface pretty well, in my opinion. However, I like the idea of increased immersion, to enjoy the feeling of the commander's experience without trying to recreate every aspect of it. I think Iron Mode can be quite immersive and I'll probably get back into playing it (It's been mostly Elite for the past few years); and I hope this experience is something the developers continue to improve.

[Battlefront.com]

5 hours ago, Freyberg said:

I think it's a shame that much of this thread has descended into incivility (that's the thing that so often keeps me off this forum) - and it's particularly unkind that peevish things are said about the developers. This is a niche game, from which I get a great deal of pleasure and have done for many years, and I feel lucky that Battlefront have continued to improve and expand on it. No other game I have ever played has held my interest upgrade after upgrade the way Combat Mission has.

Thanks for the thoughts.

5 hours ago, Freyberg said:

The pity is that this an interesting thread.

I think we got it back on track after a bit of effort

5 hours ago, Freyberg said:

I agree with the point made that maximum 'realism', in the absence of a super-AI with human-like ability, would be less realistic. The abstraction in the AI balances out the abstraction in the command interface pretty well, in my opinion.

Correct.  There's lots of discussions about this over the years.  One of the major proponents of it is a very long time tester, Bill H.  It's what I call a "command level" game.  As a long time recovering strategic wargamer, I totally get why people want to sit up high and issue commands only one level down.  Oh, say a BN commander telling Companies (for the most part) what to do instead of telling Teams where to set up their MGs.  But CM is not that game.  Never was, never will be.  That sort of game has to be designed from the get-go to be that and only that.  Function follows design, and CM was designed to be a multi-level tactical wargame.  That said...

5 hours ago, Freyberg said:

However, I like the idea of increased immersion, to enjoy the feeling of the commander's experience without trying to recreate every aspect of it.

We do try pretty hard to give players increased immersion.  The prime example is the detailed units and terrain.  Not just their simulated effects but also their graphical representation.  If CM were focused on being a higher level wargame we wouldn't bother with such details as they are very expensive and relatively difficult to pull off.  Likewise, if we really wanted the game to be solidly focused around first person perspectives we'd have a very different approach to the scope and scale of the game environment.

Steve

[kraze]

On 10/26/2017 at 9:32 PM, CAS said:

And I enjoy the replay feature which unfortunately not is possible in Real time

Speaking of which that is one feature the lack of which always bothered me to some degree. A lack of real-time replay feature. Clearly facilities to make that happen are already in the game - to a point that a whole minute of it is saved in a WeGo savegame - so why no separate full battle replays? This would've been especially important for the real-time play, as a sort of AAR - since in real-time you miss a ton of important events as they happen and learning from where your focus lacked would've been very useful. Not to mention that a replay in itself is a very fun feature (chill out and watch the awesome battle you just had).

So if anything - this should be fully realized in the game. Especially since it relates to situational awareness topic we have here

[HerrTom]

On 10/26/2017 at 7:38 PM, Battlefront.com said:

Orders Phase in WeGo does, however, provide this same information by dimming the floating icons of those which aren't in C2 or LOS.  So what you get in WeGo is the same information as RT, but in a less restrictive way.

Wait a minute... isn't that just showing the other units at that organizational level?

Maybe it's the icon mods or something but you can see it in my CM:A screenshots (behaviour is the same in CMBS and CMFB)

Mister T-62 has good contact with the two BTRs along the road, as well as his buddies.  But in orders:

There is no dimming for units out of contact... all the BTRs are the same colour.

I completely understand if you don't want to spend the resources fixing it - since it's quite a niche problem (that clearly only a select few care about!), but it regardless doesn't appear to do what you're saying.

Cheers!

On 10/27/2017 at 5:25 AM, sburke said:

Iron mode rulzzz!  Other modes droolzzz!  

 Don't drool too much now... it's hard to clean from your keyboard!

 

Edit: @kraze I think the "replay" bit is a bit more nuanced than that - it appears it precalculates everything for we-go and replays it.  Spitballing, but it probably simulates where all the units go, makes rolls for whatever it needs to, then records whatever results it gets to replay it back.  In real time mode, this is happening, well, real time.  To get a replay there'd have to be a lot of swapping or disk writing or something to get that when I don't think the engine is set up for that kind of action!  (I agree, full replays would be awesome, though I dread to think about how big they'd be.  Each turn I sent for Road to Odessa was like 40 Mb!  Imagine that over 120 turns - 5 Gb!)

Edited October 28, 2017 by HerrTom

[kraze]

Turn save files are huge because they are separate - replays would get rid of most of the redundant data (no need to write every thing all over again each minute). Plus we have Total War as an example where it saves actions of every single soldier (out of thousands) on the battlefield in really small replay files and you see exactly the same battle when you watch the replay. Also DCS World with its glorious replays.

But yeah yeah I know - it's of course more of a question of dev time and resources on Battlefront's part and whether they can spare them for something like this.

But it's certainly doable with little performance hit (if any)

Edited October 28, 2017 by kraze

[Freyberg]

I have to admit, it was the lack of replay that stopped me from using Real Time. I kept looking round and finding one of my tanks a flaming wreck or one of my squads a mass of red crosses and wondering what had happened.

The same thing happens to me in WeGo, too, of course, but at least I have the fun of watching the explosions.

The other aspect with Real Time was that CM requires giving quite a number of commands. In Real Time, I was stopping so often to give them that I was losing the feeling of the action. In WeGo, the replay can be more exciting.

[Battlefront.com]

6 hours ago, HerrTom said:

There is no dimming for units out of contact... all the BTRs are the same colour.

I don't have time to check this in detail, but the BTRs are next to the T-72 so they are considered "in contact".  Remember, the rule is C2 communications *or* LOS.  So as far as I know what you just posted is consistent with what I described.

6 hours ago, HerrTom said:

Edit: @kraze I think the "replay" bit is a bit more nuanced than that - it appears it precalculates everything for we-go and replays it.  Spitballing, but it probably simulates where all the units go, makes rolls for whatever it needs to, then records whatever results it gets to replay it back.  In real time mode, this is happening, well, real time.  To get a replay there'd have to be a lot of swapping or disk writing or something to get that when I don't think the engine is set up for that kind of action!  (I agree, full replays would be awesome, though I dread to think about how big they'd be.  Each turn I sent for Road to Odessa was like 40 Mb!  Imagine that over 120 turns - 5 Gb!)

It is impossible for CM2 to have replay in RT.  It is technically not possible without rewriting the whole game engine.  That's simply the way it was back in 2004/2005 when that part of the game engine was written.  We do understand it's a major downside for players to not have playback in RT, but it is what it is.

Steve