Trenches, foxholes, and slit trenches

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[salwon]

There are LOS effects (+1, +2 etc) on unit stance, but once a bullet is fired it either hits or doesn't. So, correct: no "hit modifiers" in any sense. It's harder to hit someone in a trench because it's harder to fire into the lower elevation, not because of a +3 to their cover rating.

[Redwolf]

What other game has FOW fortifications?

TacOps, but that's not 3D.

Panzer Command (CMx1 like game) doesn't have it and combined with the lack of entering buildings that's IMHO one of the reasons why people didn't jump on it after CMx1.

There just aren't enough other 3D wargames out there to judge.

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[flamingknives]

As far as I understand it, it will be a hit if the 3d mesh and the projectile cross at the right point. I don't know if this is how body armour is tracked, but it would make sense. HE, IIRC is more abstracted otherwise your computer would die every time something blew up.

I just remembered one other insignificant thing that you'd have to substantially update to use carpets - A.I.

[JasonC]

Several points.

First, slit trenches are emphatically *not* mere shell-scrapes. Slit trenches are deep enough that a man can get entirely below ground inside them, with minimal exposure upward. The whole point of a slit trench is to reduce the front-to-back vertical "signature" of the fortification to about 12 inches. That done, a man can fully protect himself in a hole as little as 2 feet deep, if he can lay on his side into it. If he expects to fight from it, naturally 3, 4 or 5 feet deep is superior. You start with one and work to the others.

Second, Michael is completely wrong as to the ease of spotting real field fortifications. Especially in the terrain conditions common in NW Europe generally, let alone in Normandy proper. Total lines of sight are not long, and most armies are physically out of sight of each other nearly all of the time. Only thin crusts of outposts might have visuals. All the fortifying thus occurs in locations the enemy can't see the work happening, and first acquires LOS to at ranges typically under 400 yards and sometimes as little as 50 yards.

The Germans in particular, but also any veteran force, employed very extensive camo of their prepared fighting positions. They dug them into existing relief, they covered them with foliage, they covered them with dedicate camo netting. It was not an afterthought for twenty minutes by overly tired men. Attackers gaining ground continually might be that cavalier about their field fortifications, insisting mostly on just getting all heads below ground before going to sleep - but not defenders. Hidden field works were the bread and butter of defensive schemes.

Third on the amounts of overhead cover and log bunkers and such. There was a standard formula to provide adequate protection against a direct hit from a shell of 105mm caliber. It was - 2 layers of logs set at right angles, covered by 2 layers of sandbags, the whole topped by a foot more of rammed earth. This formula was familiar to every major army from WW I to the Indochina wars of mid-century. It always worked. The difficulty is purely the amount of labor involved, including the labor needed to prep the materials (sawing wood most of all, filling sandbags secondary).

But a log bunker so built was a field fortification, and not the wooden shack we saw in CMx1. It was proof against 105mm HE direct hits from above; 155mm could destroy them but took a direct hit to do so. They were also readily camo'ed, by building them up against existing relief, with their firing ports flush with the ground or nearly so (just enough clearance to see over grass etc). In CMx1, you see them at a kilometer. In reality e.g. in the SW pacific, you saw them at 30 yards. A firing MG could be completely within the embrasure, 2 feet inside even, it did not need to project out and announce itself by sound and muzzle flash.

Destroying a located log bunker was not a matter of parking any direct fire weapon in its covered arc and firing 3-5 times, it was more a matter of dosing the thing with gasoline or emplacing a demolition charge. Fire at embrasures could drive the men inside to their interior cover (typically separate rooms or wall niches). But even killing those inside would not eliminate the position, since they were readily remanned if not reached and overrun.

[JasonC]

Pics of some typical field fortifications, different roles and eras

Log bunker with fire trench

http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/papua/papua4.jpg

Slit trench

http://www.strategos.demon.co.uk/D-Day/Slit%20Trench.jpg

forest log bunker

http://www.gaissmair.net/Kiestinki/kiestinki17.jpg

reverse slope shell dugout

http://www.mtmestas.com/Military/Italy/Apennines/NorthApennines_files/pic7.jpg

korean war MG bunker interior

http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/kw-stale/pic8.jpg

Nam era dugout

http://www.5rar.asn.au/narrative/7plt_bunker.jpg

Another Nam era bunker

http://www.diggerhistory.info/images/rar/bunker-op-coburg.jpg

[flammenwerfer]

So wait, the only gain from 3d foxholes and trenches is *visual*?? I didn't think the 2d foxhole tiles looked bad at all. Definitely not bad enough to give up *FOW* for. Isn't there some other advantage??

What's the gain if scenario designers refuse to use foxholes and trenches to preserve FOW and realistic gameplay.

[Battlefront.com]

I'm taking the unusual step of locking this thread up TEMPORARILY. I've been unavailable all day and this thing is already 4 pages long and, like the other threads, continually bouncing back and forth between what the real issues are and what the imagined ones are. But I'm not able to spend any time on this for a few more hours. I don't want to return and find this thing at 9 pages and have to start from there

So what I'm doing is sorta "freezing" this in place so I can return to it in a few hours, post, then open it back up for discussion. This will save everybody time since the tempest in a teapot thing doesn't do anybody any good.

Back in a few!

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Thanks for your patience guys! We've had several discussions about this in the past, and two very recently, so I wanted the opportunity to try and keep a couple of issues straight so this thread doesn't go off on tangents and the basic points get lost.

Despite what we all want, in fact it's impractical (read impossible) for terrain to be "spottable" you would need a super computer to determine what to show and what not to show based on any given circumstance. On top of that, the computing resources required to keep three separate "maps" (original, Player 1, and Player 2), even with all the programming tricks in the universe, is also quite large (and let's not talk about when there are 24 players!). On top of all these problems, the code has to be so good and so clean that all of this information can be accessed, manipulated, and displayed with unerring consistency and speed while still leaving computing resources to do everything else. That's why CMx1 doesn't have LOS terrain, nor any other complex 3D game that I can think of. First person shooters don't even need it because you can only see what your character can see, so that is the ultimate form of FoW.

What happens when something, like a trench, is put into a CM map? The underlying terrain mesh is deformed in such a way that a trench is formed both visually and "physically" (i.e. defined geometry). Unlike an object, such as a tank, a trench is literally defined by the terrain mesh, not an externally produced 3D model which sits on top of the terrain. As noted above, since a trench is terrain that means it can't be spotted since terrain can't be shown/hidden depending on variable circumstances. There are no simple work arounds (like 2D "lids") for this.

With me so far?

When we designed the game engine's primary characteristics in 2003 we knew that anything which we made a part of terrain would become terrain and therefore would not be spottable. We discussed the impact of this on fortifications, specifically, since they were the only types of objects affected by this decision. For reasons discussed further on, it was a no brainer that we had to sacrifice SOME forms of spottable fortifications.

As much as we wished we could have our cake and eat it too, tradeoffs are a part of the reality we live in as game developers. For us it's normal to make decisions where we gain various things and lose something else. We have to see the big picture because we have to make it. Gamers, on the other hand, can easily focus on one thing and dismiss all of the others as being of lower value even when they are added together. Gamers live in a bubble of their own making, without any possible way to be proven wrong because... well... because they never produce anything that can be tested. We're not so fortunate

What was gained? A 3D environment with rules which are consistent and reliable. This is definitely the most under-appreciated thing about CMx2 because so much that it does is taken for granted, yet it's not present in CMx1 nor any other wargame. Much of the benefits of the system are invisible to you in direct ways, but you still benefit from it. Bugs, for example, are both easier to find and easier to fix for real instead of making bloody hacks. New features are easier to add because there is a stable environment to add to which mimics the real world and not an abstract one. In fact, the lack of this environment and years of bloody hacks is why the CMx1 code base was chucked out in favor of the new CMx2 engine.

Aside from the coding and gameplay stuff, there is the visual qualities of the 3D environment which must be considered. Why? Because it's what the vast majority of our customers want. Yes, even the CMx1 customers. The number of you guys that could pass a lie-detector test and say that you would rather have the CMx1 graphical environment would amount to such a small number that it's not even worth considering. The number of you that would say you'd rather have the CMx1 graphical environment, but would flunk a lie-detercotr test, is probably a little bit bigger

However, as it so happens, trenches (specifically) are so tied into the physics modeling that Charles would have to make some extremely bloody hacks to have 2D trenches work in a 3D environment. The visuals, therefore, are the easy thing to change... it's the underlying game modeling that is impractical and undesirable to change. It's also extremely damaging to the overall game environment to have such exceptions jammed into it, so it's out of the question.

I'll let this sink in before you read the next bit

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

OK, so what do we have for defensive objects and how are they handled? We basically have three types:

1. Those that rely upon the terrain to give them definition (both visually and game properties).

2. Those that do not rely upon terrain to give them definition, but modify the terrain if needed.

3. Those that do not rely upon terrain to give them definition and do not modify the terrain.

Starting with the last first, things like barbed wire obstacles, roadblocks, sandbags, and other things which sit on top of the terrain mesh, and don't dig into it ever, can be treated like units. That means they can, theoretically, be spotted/hidden.

Bunkers are similar in that they are separate from the terrain and therefore can be spotted/hidden. However, bunkers are often "cut into" terrain and therefore the terrain has to be modified. Trees can't be growing up through a bunker, for example. When a bunker is put on the side of the hill, having it conform to the contours of the hill would be visually ridiculous, so the hill's terrain mesh is conformed to allow the bunker to remain horizontal. Since terrain, once modified, must be shown that way all the time you get a situation where the bunker can be shown/hidden, but the bits of terrain removed to allow it to be where it is must be shown "as is". This means you can use the camera to hunt around and possibly find where the bunkers are without actually having spotted them. The possibility depends completely on how obvious a bunker modifies the terrain (it might not modify it at all, remember).

And last but not least... things which are defined by the terrain itself. Specifically, trenches and foxholes. As is, these things can't be spotted/hidden, but instead must remain visible at all times once the game starts. The work arounds for this are not practical to achieve, for one or more reasons.

In CM: Normandy we'll add functionality that allows people to place trenches and foxholes using 2D representations (similar to CMx1). The difference is these 2D representations have NO GAME ATTRIBUTES and are, instead, identical to the little 2D icons in the Editor in terms of their functionality. As soon as Setup is exited the 2D icons are translated into 3D modifications and the changes are permanently made to the map used for the game.

It may be possible, and I stress POSSIBLE, to have foxholes retain their 2D representations in the 3D environment and then add hacked in 3D properties for them. Meaning, the foxholes will look pretty much like CMx1 foxholes, but will behave correctly in the 3D environment. This is something Charles will look into at a later date prior to CM: Normandy being complete. No promises, other than we'll give it a shot. I'm hopeful that it will work, and IF it does then foxholes will have at least some degree of FoW.

Trenches, unfortunately, are out of the question. They are too deep and too complicated to even consider making bloody hacks to get them to work in 3D without a 3D representation. Plus, on top of that they would look like crap. Based on feedback over many years from dedicated CMx1 players, and a sense of what the wider audience wants, looks do matter. But as I said, the looks are coming for free with the 3D game engine so this isn't about sacrificing spottable trenches for visual reasons, it's about the impracticality of having significant 3D objects represented in 2D.

And finally...

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

The realism problems associated with not having spottable trenches is, I think, overblown. Sure, the attacker will always know where trenches are once the game starts, and act accordingly, but I will remind you in CMx1 we had the opposite problem. That was where the attacker was always denied benefiting from intel gathered by previous encounters/attacks. Even if the attacker shouldn't know exactly where the trenches, he most likely would know a) that the fortifications existed, roughly where they were, and c) roughly how tough they were. Sure, units bumbled into thick defenses all the time, but usually those engagements were short and the attacker withdrew so that it could come at them again with a plan. Extreme circumstances, such as the Hürtgen Forest battles, this was done over and over and over again in fact.

My point here is to remind you guys that this isn't a one sided thing. In CMBB/AK trenches were unrealistically favorable for the defender to some extent, in CMx2 they are unrealistically favorable for the attacker to some extent. If you're displeased with one because it is unrealistic and has an effect on gameplay, keep in mind that you've somehow managed to live this long even though you've already experienced something similar in reverse Therefore, perhaps the negative effects aren't nearly as game wrecking as some think they are.

On top of this, we have the fact that in WW2 the options for attacking trenches were somewhat limited. Or at least vastly more constrained than they are in CM:SF's modern setting. Artillery was slower, less accurate, and less effective. Look at WW1 for Pete's sake... every inch of the enemy's trenches were known and attacked for MONTHS by heavy artillery and raked with MG and sniper fire... yet the side getting hit more often than not was able to fight off a massed attack against it. Which just goes to show that seeing the enemy's positions is not the same as being able to eliminate them.

It's also true that the more involved the defenses are, the more likely they are to get spotted. Therefore, the degree of effort to mask the defenses was somewhat proportional to the effort involved in creating them. Massive, well hidden fortifications like the Maginot Line, the Atlantic Wall, and even the Siegfried Line are outside of CM's scope and aren't part of the equation. Neither are defenses built in other epochs under similar long term conditions (like Pacific Islands, for example). The majority of defenses in CM: Normandy, therefore, should be of the hasty type that aren't heavily camouflaged. The big exception to this would be the Hürtgen Forest battles which are not within the timeframe of CM: Normandy and are, for now anyway, not relevant. Trenches in Normandy shouldn't even be that common, from a realism standpoint.

A reminder... there was aerial recon in WW2, in case you guys forgot. Not only from specialized aircraft, but also each US division had a dedicated aircraft at its disposal to check things out for themselves. Which means a field with a lot of trenches in it could indeed be known to the ground troops long before they got there. Not as likely as modern days, for sure, but definitely not impossible.

Now, don't get me wrong... I'm not saying that having trenches shown all the time isn't a break with reality. It most definitely is, no argument about it. What I'm saying is that we need to be careful about the Chicken Little effect that is so common about stuff like this. The downsides of the system, as we have it, are often highlighted, taken out of context, and blown out of proportion, while the upsides are downgraded and often cast aside. Others, like the problems CMx1 had with fortifications (like no trenches at all in CMBO) are even forgotten about because they really complicate the arguments that the sky is falling.

Well, I think that about does it. Thanks for being patient

Steve

[Skinnedpuppy]

Steve, thanks for taking the time to post it's clear you take the issue of fow seriously and what you are sugggesting for foxholes sounds reasonable.

One thing has ocurred to me on the trench/lid side of things. We are expecting bridges and water to be implemented and having thought about it bridges that can be passed under would seem to me to be a kind of lid, could this possibly be extrapolated(sp?) into some kind of trench covering?

[Battlefront.com]

Skinnedpuppy,

Steve, thanks for taking the time to post it's clear you take the issue of fow seriously

Very true. Sometimes it appears like we don't think things through, but by and large that's not the case. We're not perfect, and therefore miss stuff, but that's what we have you guys here for In this case, however, it's an issue that's been discussed to death both here and internally. I think Charles is contemplating taking out trenches and foxholes completely if I ask him again if there's another way around the problem

No, bridges and "lids" have nothing in common. Bridges are more akin to buildings with the walls missing and vehicles able to travel on the floors (plus tons of code to get the damned things to line up with river banks!). Lids are a completely different concept which has no parallel in the game at all. To do it right the lid would have to connect with all of the points of the trench/foxhole, which would mean the original map information (i.e. before deformation) would have to be retained. I forget how f'n big the terrain mesh is in RAM, but IIRC it's the single biggest thing stored. The game would also have to generate two pathing maps, two TacAI maps, two LOS maps, and I have no idea what else. Then the game would have to be able to selectively use information from one and dynamically integrate it in with yet a third representation, which is the way the game is at that present moment.

Oh, and that's not even including if Realtive Spotting were paid attention to. In that case you'd have to allow each unit in the game to specify to the system, when you click on the unit, which foxholes and trenches it can see then wait for the mesh to update (which may, or may not, cause the framerate to stutter). Personally, if this were the only thing holding up such a thing as "lids" I think we would all gladly have a return to Absolute Spotting for this one feature. But that's not the case, so it doesn't really help.

Mind you, in theory it can be done. It's just that Charles doesn't feel it's anywhere near worth the effort when it's compared to the other things on the list. For example, bridges and water He's also concerned that the resources it would hog up are simply not worth the net effect.

Steve

[Runaway!!!]

Wicked cool stuff you're talking about here Steve. Either I can see the fox holes and trenches, or I can't, I don't care. You give me the tools and I'll be as snug as a bug in a rug.

So, is this year going to be the best year ever for us krout killers?

[stikkypixie]

But this suggests to me that there is some kind of modifier:

"If there happens to be an intersection with his buttocks the system might not consider him hit (depends). "

Otherwise it's always a hit, right?

I guess this "modifier" is applied generally no matter where the guy being hit is in. That is to say I think the game engine can't make the distinction between a hole in the ground and a foxhole. All it sees is a deformation of the terrain mesh.

[c3k]

Steve,

Thanks for the in-depth response on the "why" and the "how". Can we get some more "what"? Meaning, it seems obvious we will have trenches and slit trenches (or shell scrapes, what are presently called foxholes in CMSF); you've also mentioned the possibility of adding sandbags around heavy weapons (would this be akin to a fighing dugout?). What about _true_ foxholes?

Will different bunkers be added? Each type with different levels of protection? Concrete vs. log and earth.

How about adding skins to bunkers to represent camouflage? Woodland bunker, bocage bunker, wheatfield bunker, etc? C'mon, you know it'd be cool! Maybe a unit spotted the bunker, but that doesn't mean the player needs to.

Fortified buildings? I envision flak tower scenarios... Tall fortified buildings with guns in 'em! Can guns be put in buildings or bunkers?

Thanks,

Ken

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[Steiner14]

Thanks for the detailed info.

Because vehicles can hide undulations in the terrain below them, maybe permanent and fixed "sound objects" for the enemy player could be used, to hide the undulations in the map?

They sit on top of the undulations. They would disappear as soon as LOS is established.

[Steiner14]

Thanks for the info.

Paraphrasing something here: "In an FPS game, you only see what your character can see. This provides FOW"

Is it possible you might implement a difficulty setting that only allows you to view the battlefield from the perspective of your units at their view height?

+1

Or as luxury option: viewing heights made selectable, so the player(s) can determine, if they want an additional map overview, for example.

Playing with those CMx1-iron man rules was very exciting, but it takes very high self discipline in difficult situations not to break the rules. Therefore i never had played them against human oponents, only AI. But those battles were the most exciting ones.

If that options could be made permanent as soon as the game starts, that would be fantastic. I'd love to play that way against human oponents, too.

[Lanzfeld]

Well I am just really happy that MAYBE you you guys will be able to do something with the foxholes to keep them FOW. The trenches being visible doesnt bother me as much because if I am going to use trenches I will use lots of them so the attacker will really not know where in the trench system my defenders are. With a foxhole you know exactly where the guy is. With a trench system you do not know where the guy is.

Whether or not you can get the foxholes to work, thanks for listening and trying.

[James Crowley]

Steve, a very good explanation as to the whys and wherefores - not much to disagree with there.

I, too, think that having some form of FoW for foxholes is the main priority. From my understanding of the bocage fighting, German defensive positions (infantry) seem to have revolved around small holes,pits and tunnels in, around and through the hedgerows.

Trenches, certainly trench systems, seem to have been much less common and probably, as you say, were fairly easily identified by various forms of aerial recon.

If wire, sandbags,roadblocks etc are subject to FoW anyway, then hopefully it is only down to finding a workable get-around for foxholes.

[kulik]

Thanks for the info.

Paraphrasing something here: "In an FPS game, you only see what your character can see. This provides FOW"

Is it possible you might implement a difficulty setting that only allows you to view the battlefield from the perspective of your units at their view height?

I think that is marvelous idea. Pretty hardcore, and probably only usable in wego mode, but still would make it unique experience. And maybe not so hard to implement, i guess.

When i try to picture it, i think it would be a little pain to play, but would shift the game towards realism.

[Sequoia]

I think that is marvelous idea. Pretty hardcore, and probably only usable in wego mode, but still would make it unique experience. And maybe not so hard to implement, i guess.

When i try to picture it, i think it would be a little pain to play, but would shift the game towards realism.

I posted something similar in the other thread. Copying here now:

I remember in CMX 1 multi-player games some players would use a "Honor" system of play called Iron mode (not to be confused with the Iron mode available currently in CMSF ). They would agree to only use ground level views from behind thier units.

Wouldn't an optional "extreme Iron" mode which locked this into play (i.e, no honor system required) effectively hide any foxholes or any other terrain not in LOS due to the way the graphics rendering works ?

__________________

[kulik]

The more im thinking about it, the more excited about it i am. But i just spended some time right now in CMx1 moving the camera at eyes level in editor created maps and its not easy to organize and plan things in that view, some minimap would help.