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I think his point is that a sniper wouldn't be able to call in the guns at all. WWII snipers did not generally carry radios, and I assume that, just as in CMSF, lower level units without radios won't be able to access artillery support in CM:N.

You are absolutely correct. On the other hand, 16" guns usually had spotter planes directing their fire, weather permitting, who could call in fire on anything that looked interesting.

BTW, are we talking about real snipers or just sharpshooters in this thread? I'm not sure the distinction has been made clear for WW II.

Michael

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Yes, for US Rifle Companies they were held at Company level IIRC.

We definitely have to do a better job with H2H for WW2 than we did for Modern simply because the weapons of WW2 weren't all short automatic weapons like Modern. This does change the dynamic of H2H.

Steve

Pleased with the bone, but very pleased about H2H. It's those gritty moments that add huge flavour and immersion for me. I hope that it gets trickled back to SF or at least kept for SF2, because while rare it still happens often enough to be there IMO.

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Steve,

I'm still not entirely clear on rarity points. What would make up it's rarity value?

Say, a King Tiger. Very useful and in this period, fairly rare. Would this cost more or less rarity points then a solid gold Kettenkraftrad? Less useful but REALLY rare.

Also, in regards to the variable value according to the scenario: Is there an option to turn that off ? I just don't like the idea that this "smart" system would limit my freedom to be a fool. I don't see the value of charging more for units that are the right pick for a particular scenario. To me, making the right picks should be rewarded in gameplay. With adjustable values, there'd be a surcharge for making the smart choices. I just can't see that making me happy.

And one last note on the subject of Quick Battles, I've been a critic of the CMSF QBs for quite a while, as you may have noticed. And have been advocating a return to the points system of CMx1. You've made it clear you thought points were a distraction, and asserted that CM wouldn't return to points based system. But now it looks that we not only get the points back, we get TWO sets of points. A double whammy to argue over. ;) How did that happen?

Now, for the bit where I get petulant and disgrace myself.

Maybe I'm suffering from "beta tester withdrawal syndrome' and I'm simply missing the inside scoop, but I think that lately there's been an unusual dearth of information.

Bones have been few and far between. Now, I've in the past been pretty outspoken that you guys don't owe us a bone. If you guys don't feel you should share info, that is your call. But dear god, did you have to take me that literal? What's worse, you've been less tight with promising bones then delivering bones. That's where I get a bit annoyed. I've got relatively low expectations in relation to being given bones. but whenyou raise those expectations, I'm not going to lower them for you again.

In relation to getting a bone on QBs, we were told in August:

Soon, though, I'll be presenting the details. Before coding starts.

Well, those goalpost sure got moved. Has coding on the system you described been started? I hope so, I really do.

In the last couple of months there's been an expectation of a bone given by you that just hasn't been met. A few "soon" and a "I'll try and make amends this week" that was a few weeks ago. Then at long last a "this weekend" and by god, you did it. On Sunday 23:40, and only if you live in the western part of the US. It's like you were taking the mickey. And I was kinda expecting more, given the seeming effort that required several days to produce a bone. I expected screen-shots, a website or, oh my goodness, a forum. But no. Text only. And mighty fine text it was, and thank you for it. But I expected a wee bit more, given the song and dance that preceded it.

I fully understand that informing the customer of future products isn't the no.1 priority for BFC. But I kinda want it to be somewhere in the top 10. And I'm definitely not feeling that right now.

We've been told next to nothing recently. I thought the recent and spectacular sliding of the release date would have warranted some sort of comment. Even the games title hasn't been made public yet! Bit by bit it's no big deal at all. It's not even a small deal in some instances. But the overall trend makes me :(

I really don't get what's going on, and why communication is so very hard all of a sudden. It's not what I'm used to around here and I hope you change tack because I don't like it one bit.

I told you I'd be petulant.

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I was initially quite disappointed in this thread... its title led me to believe you were taking pre-orders!

Along with the other improvements you've announced the game sounds like it will flat out rock! Thanks for taking the time to share development news with us.

There really is no one else making titles like this. While you're not solving any of the world's many ills (trying to keep things in perspective...), you guys are definitely doing something that no one else is doing, and you are clearly doing it with passion and commitment.

As one who values the games you make for many reasons I just want to express my thanks to all involved for their efforts. My friends (some of whom I've met through this fourm) and I have had great and memorable times facilitated by playing your games.

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Ah! There he is :D

I'm still not entirely clear on rarity points. What would make up it's rarity value?

Say, a King Tiger. Very useful and in this period, fairly rare. Would this cost more or less rarity points then a solid gold Kettenkraftrad? Less useful but REALLY rare.

Rarity is a squishy concept because, of course, there is no one "right" way to do it. Usefulness is irrelevant to the Rarity concept. The Price Points represent usefulness.

At the moment we have it setup so that everything is on an absolute scale with certain things used to gauge "normal". A King Tiger will always have some amount of Rarity Point cost because it was never, even at its height of use, common. Something like a Panther G might start out with a fairly high Rarity Point cost, then get down to practically nothing over time. Other things, like a Panther D, go the opposite way by having their Rarity Point cost increase over time as they became less common.

Also, in regards to the variable value according to the scenario: Is there an option to turn that off ? I just don't like the idea that this "smart" system would limit my freedom to be a fool.

It is my intention that it can be switched off, yes. The intention is to offer this feature for those who are obsessed with the notion of "fairness" and "balance", which I personally think is not the way to play the game. Like you I think the player who makes good choices should be rewarded and the one who makes bad choices punished.

I don't see the value of charging more for units that are the right pick for a particular scenario.

There are two reasons for this, both of which came as a result of years and years of consistent and sometimes highly emotional complaints:

1. The Auto Picker choosing forces that no sane player would ever have selected for a given set of battle conditions.

2. Battle conditions favoring one side's strengths more than the other's. This means that point for point spent one side has an inherent advantage or disadvantage. Even if it is only a perceived one.

Again, I'm like you in that I don't expect the game to make up for my own bad choices. However, I do sympathize (to a degree) with situations where a German defending force simply can't muster enough forces to defend against a US force armed with 75mm Shermans. Sherman 75s are "cheap" compared to the German things that kill Shermans at ranges over 300m or so.

I also think the Auto Picker improvements alone are worth implementing this option. Personally I like the challenge of trying to work with what I have, even if it sucks, but I'm pretty sure the bulk of people playing QBs do not.

And one last note on the subject of Quick Battles, I've been a critic of the CMSF QBs for quite a while, as you may have noticed. And have been advocating a return to the points system of CMx1. You've made it clear you thought points were a distraction, and asserted that CM wouldn't return to points based system. But now it looks that we not only get the points back, we get TWO sets of points. A double whammy to argue over. ;) How did that happen?

You misread my quotes :D I said I was against a SINGLE point system like CMx1 had and we had no interest in going back to it. And we didn't :D We now have a 5 point system, though 4 of those points are under the hood and only summarized. More importantly, however, the points are not fixed but rather dynamically determined. I don't doubt people will complain about specific point spreads when they experience them, but the next time they play the point spreads will be different. Since the primary arguments about our points were based on arguments of relative effectiveness, I think we've effectively dealt with the source of point complaints at the root.

Now, for the bit where I get petulant and disgrace myself.

Maybe I'm suffering from "beta tester withdrawal syndrome' and I'm simply missing the inside scoop, but I think that lately there's been an unusual dearth of information.

Bones have been few and far between. Now, I've in the past been pretty outspoken that you guys don't owe us a bone. If you guys don't feel you should share info, that is your call. But dear god, did you have to take me that literal? What's worse, you've been less tight with promising bones then delivering bones. That's where I get a bit annoyed. I've got relatively low expectations in relation to being given bones. but whenyou raise those expectations, I'm not going to lower them for you again.

Noted. Things have been exceptionally busy for us all for a variety of reasons. A downside of having three games in development is that my already overworked day is under that much more strain. Something has to give so I have been shaving on bone tossing. I haven't intended things to go as long as they have between major bones, so I'm trying to do better. I was prepared to go live with this info last week... but we know what happened to those good intentions.

So I hear you and agree with you. Hopefully this thread, and the next one (I'm doing right after this response, BTW), will get things back to a better balance.

Well, those goalpost sure got moved. Has coding on the system you described been started? I hope so, I really do.

We have about 30 testers on Normandy right now. A very diverse bunch, too. The feedback they gave us about the QB design was deemed sufficient to begin coding, so I saw no value spending a very big block of time/energy having a public free-for-all discussion about a design that wasn't likely going to change much. The design, as implemented, is significantly different than what was initially proposed. They seem quite pleased with it, which is good since the changes in the design were their suggestions :D

As for the coding, the system is coded and working for scenarios purchasing already. QB parameters and lots of grunt accounting work has yet to be done. That's happening now as I speak. Well, except for the parts I'm supposed to do because I'm typing this instead.

Then at long last a "this weekend" and by god, you did it. On Sunday 23:40, and only if you live in the western part of the US. It's like you were taking the mickey.

In case you were not aware our sever was seriously hacked. I have been spending between 3 and 6 hours a day on this crap alone (Martin put in two back to back 20 hour days, so I count myself lucky). I'm already working 10+ hours a day nearly 7 days a week, so the time had to come from somewhere. Server security should take priority. This bone would have gone up Sunday late afternoon except just before I went to post some guy who thinks he's really funny decided to do something that caused me to be on the phone until nearly 2am Monday morning making sure we weren't under attack again (we weren't, but we can't afford to let our guard down).

So in short... life ain't perfect.

And I was kinda expecting more, given the seeming effort that required several days to produce a bone. I expected screen-shots, a website or, oh my goodness, a forum. But no. Text only. And mighty fine text it was, and thank you for it. But I expected a wee bit more, given the song and dance that preceded it.

I think you have a major underestimation of the effort that goes into these bones. It took me nearly 4 hours to write up that bone. Fortunately a good portion of that will wind up in the manual, so it's not just a one time PR shot.

I fully understand that informing the customer of future products isn't the no.1 priority for BFC. But I kinda want it to be somewhere in the top 10. And I'm definitely not feeling that right now.

Honestly, I'm too tired to care. I wake up, I go to work making games, I take a little time off during the day, I go to sleep. Repeat each day of the week for several years in a row. All so that we can deliver the games instead of just talking about them. So yeah, I do agree I can do better about communicating stuff to you guys, but I think it should be kept in context with what our primary mission is... to finish the game.

We've been told next to nothing recently. I thought the recent and spectacular sliding of the release date would have warranted some sort of comment.

We have no release date. What is sliding is the usual estimates which we always say are just that... estimates. You all know that if it were up to me I'd say nothing about it at all, but there's apparently no way to avoid that.

I really don't get what's going on, and why communication is so very hard all of a sudden.

Mostly because when we're in pure design phase I have more time and need to communicate with you guys. But we're out of that phase and into "get it done" mode. This means I spend more of my time "coding" and managing things than I do talking about how to "code" and what to manage. That and we're doing 3 games now instead of 1.

Again, I will try to do a better job with bones and what not, but for a while now I wouldn't expect things to go back to the way they were last year. While you might see that as a bad thing, it is actually a very good thing because it indicates we are getting closer to release. Which is, after all, what we all want.

Steve

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recent and spectacular sliding of the release date....

If you read posters, BFC is apparently expected to release a game every time a historical anniversary rolls around. "Its VE Day! Why no new title?" "Its the anniversary of the Torch landings! Why no new title?" Actually, I do half suspect Snowball may have originally hoped to release CM: Afghanistan in time for the 30th anniversary of the war's start. And I half-suspect BFC was hoping they would too. ;)

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I was initially quite disappointed in this thread... its title led me to believe you were taking pre-orders!

heh... damn, I never thought of that when I made the title. I'd love to have it ready for preorders, but we're not quite there yet.

Along with the other improvements you've announced the game sounds like it will flat out rock! Thanks for taking the time to share development news with us.

Thanks. If we didn't know there were people like you out there we would have stopped making wargames eons ago despite our personal wishes to keep going. Fortunately, there are enough of you who care about this dusty part of the game biz to keep us going, both financially and personally. I can think of a tons of jobs less stressful that take less time and pay better. But I don't want those jobs :D

Steve

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It took me nearly 4 hours to write up that bone. Fortunately a good portion of that will wind up in the manual, so it's not just a one time PR shot.

Steve

I was surprised to hear it took you this long. Why isn't the BF blog used much? We could use mini-bones, quick PR shots of like a few sentences every now and then, only takes a minute. This would shut us all up and put a smile on our faces. :)

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Unfortunately, it takes a lot of time to explain complicated things in a way that is easy to understand. When I used to work for Impressions we had two writers working full time making manuals. The layout stuff was the smaller portion of their time. It was distilling game features into sensible text that took all the time.

For complex things like this there's no shortcut. If I just said "we have two different types of points" and "you can select any unit you want using a hierarchical menu" there would be a mountain of questions. Worse, there would be a lot of speculation about the details that would be wrong, which would cause me even more things to deal with.

Yup, quite time consuming.

Steve

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Dear Mr battlefront , may i suggest you to keep on producing the following bone instead of trying to explain why the fact of explaining something is difficult?.

I thought i could disconnect a little from the forum, but if those we suppose to be responsible people begin to act as a young rascal with attention problem.....

Focus Steve, focus on giving us another bone ;)

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If you read posters, BFC is apparently expected to release a game every time a historical anniversary rolls around. "Its VE Day! Why no new title?" "Its the anniversary of the Torch landings! Why no new title?" Actually, I do half suspect Snowball may have originally hoped to release CM: Afghanistan in time for the 30th anniversary of the war's start. And I half-suspect BFC was hoping they would too. ;)

But that wasn't the point I was making at all.

I think you'll find I've been backing BFC to the hilt on the issue you raise.

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Dan Dare,

Dear Mr battlefront , may i suggest you to keep on producing the following bone instead of trying to explain why the fact of explaining something is difficult?.

I don't pick the questions I have to answer :D

I thought i could disconnect a little from the forum, but if those we suppose to be responsible people begin to act as a young rascal with attention problem.....

First off, Elmar is not young and he doesn't have an attention problem. Now, as for possibly being a rascal... he is Dutch, so the chances are quite good that he is. As well as standing in his tulip garden in wooden shoes stoned out of his mind ;)

Steve

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First off, Elmar is not young and he doesn't have an attention problem. Now, as for possibly being a rascal... he is Dutch, so the chances are quite good that he is. As well as standing in his tulip garden in wooden shoes stoned out of his mind ;)

Show you how much you know. Sjeez! :rolleyes:

There's not been tulips grown in a Dutchman's garden since we found a strain of cannabis that would stand our ****ty weather. :D

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OK, but I was right about the shoes and the stoned part, right? US news coverage of Europe wouldn't lead me astray.

Steve

No, I'm sure they wouldn't, them being fair and balanced.

Say.. now that I've distracted you from my whinging nature, any word on kill stat tracking?

Also, it's been month since I pestered you about tracers bouncing off terrain. Please consider yourself pestered. ;)

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I like the sound of the new system. When I did my first pbms it felt a little 'gamey' that much of the battle could be won in the buying screen. Not that this is necessarily bad, just not what I played for. Sooon learnt to counter those svine smg platoons in close terrain though, yah!

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