MikeyD

Battlefields are lethal. I recently read that WWII Germans on the Eastern Front were losing an average of 200 Panther tanks a month on a pretty consistent basis.  More recently, a report on Abrams in Iraq (from the middle of the conflict) reported that a thousand Abrams had been wrecked to the point of needing a complete rebuild. One famously had to have the two halves welded back together! When Israel talks about only six Merkava out of 50 hit being 'totally destroyed' do not underestimate the level of damage implied by 'not totally'.

There are certain 'nice to have' features that might get used a couple times for novelty sake then largely ignored afterward. Like battleship artillery, minefield belts, marauding aircraft and corps-level artillery rocket barrages. And Sturmtigers. Everyone wanted Sturmtigers in the game but the novelty wore off pretty quickly.
Imagine the framerate hit if half the map in CM was billowing flames and black smoke. The BFC guys have been bending over backward to increase framerate, not slow it.

A CMBB (game engine 1, eastern front) player back-in-the-day once stated that newbies tend to play Tigers versus IS-2s while veteran players preferred Hungarian infantry vs Finns (or some similar combination).   If you're burned-out on Ubertanks then leave the Ubertanks behind. Infantry with-or-without light armor makes for very different gameplay than clashing Ubertanks. Or if you want your  Ubertanks purchase the ones without Active Protection System. There's also playing in heavy rain, muddy conditions, anything that'll blunt effectiveness of IR optics.

One thing that does help is the new 'hull down' command. Park your vehicle hulldown to a line of approach and just sit there. You should at least get one good shot off before they react. If you try maneuvering into position within sight of the enemy try doing it behind a cloud of smoke, then hope as the smoke dissipates that you spot him before he spots you.
I read something interesting awhile ago. During one training exercise at a gunnery range the vast majority of Bradley gunners failed to hit their target with TOW, and a sizeable  number failed to launch at all! TOW doesn't seem to exactly be a 'magic bullet'.

Here's Taiwan's CM11 tank circa 2015. Wow, when they said refurbished M60s, the REALLY meant M60s!
 

Lets recall ATGMs are EXPENSIVE! Ukraine has severely restricted ATGM use by its troops along the front, hoarding them for when/if they genuinely need them. During the battle for Pisky up the road from Donetz airport Rapira guns did yeoman service repelling Russian tank assaults. I believe Russia still employs AT gun as flank protection, leaving tanks and ATGMs free for other duties. It also helps if the gun can serve double duty as an artillery piece.
 

We're holding our breath on the Africa mod. Steve says solider models are being updated. Only time will tell to see if old face mods will fit new models.

CMRT module? ...I started typing then remembered 'non-disclosure agreement'. So I can't actually tell you much. Let's just say its in the queue and all of the up-front work was completed months ago. The number of in-progress projects competing for attention is larger than you may think.

CMRT module? ...I started typing then remembered 'non-disclosure agreement'. So I can't actually tell you much. Let's just say its in the queue and all of the up-front work was completed months ago. The number of in-progress projects competing for attention is larger than you may think.

CMSF2 will have (does have) the new FOW-friendly trenches and foxholes. The old sunk-in-mesh trench has been renamed 'ditch', I believe. The new trenches were in one of the dozens of screenshots submitted that didn't get selected.

Tucked away in the general topics forum Steve dropped a nice preview of the coming CMSF2!
 

Hmmm... I had thought StuG behavior had been changed awhile back so the crew wouldn't pop up unless explicitly ordered to unbutton and given a 'target light' command. The late types of Stugs have MG42 embedded in the gun mantlet for proper coaxial 'target light' when buttoned. The earlier types don't and need to unbutton and man the MG for 'target light'.

If memory serves, uncons weren't considered appropriate 'basegame' material. BFC isn't recreating current Ukraine but a fictional future Ukraine conflict (thought up before the current Ukraine conflict). Lets recall, they've got 1-2-3(?) additional modules left to fill. Which means all sorts of stuff is likely to show up someday. Marines (both sides), NATO, reserve units, fighters and mercenaries. This title still has a lot of growing left to do.
About helicopters. Watch an on-map SAM missile streak faaaaar off-map to knock down an approaching aircraft and you will understand why nobody in their right mid would fly troop transport helicopters over the front line. The closest (and most appropriate) you could get is reinforcements appearing on the map edge with the type-written orders explaining that they had humped in across country after being offloaded a safe distance away.

Y'know, when you're in the real world nobody is going to hand you a sheet of paper with hard numbes listing relative levels of concealment for the surrounding terrain. Reality doesn't work like that. The whole point of providing a detailed 3-D environment is the 'willing suspension of disbelief'. You're not juggling numbers and algorithms, you're lying in a muddy field in the middle of the night not 500m from people who want to kill you. As to not being able to tell orchards from tall pines in the game. The presence of tall pines ought to be a giveaway on that score.

One problem with good ideas is there have been too many of them!   I have my own wish list for new/different orders, myself. But the game currently is pretty much at the saturation point for number of orders/menus/buttons/commands that can be reasonably juggled at the same time. Maybe they could add one more, maybe two more, but soon the commands menu starts looking like a wall of text. I'm reminded of a survey some years back on healthcare options. If you give people a choice of five or six plans they're happy with their choices, if you give them an option of forty plans they're numbed into inaction. Sensory overload kicks in.

One problem with good ideas is there have been too many of them!   I have my own wish list for new/different orders, myself. But the game currently is pretty much at the saturation point for number of orders/menus/buttons/commands that can be reasonably juggled at the same time. Maybe they could add one more, maybe two more, but soon the commands menu starts looking like a wall of text. I'm reminded of a survey some years back on healthcare options. If you give people a choice of five or six plans they're happy with their choices, if you give them an option of forty plans they're numbed into inaction. Sensory overload kicks in.

Y'know, when you're in the real world nobody is going to hand you a sheet of paper with hard numbes listing relative levels of concealment for the surrounding terrain. Reality doesn't work like that. The whole point of providing a detailed 3-D environment is the 'willing suspension of disbelief'. You're not juggling numbers and algorithms, you're lying in a muddy field in the middle of the night not 500m from people who want to kill you. As to not being able to tell orchards from tall pines in the game. The presence of tall pines ought to be a giveaway on that score.

Things aren't so simple in CMBN. Your units no longer occupy a single point. Take a 12 man squad, place them along a ridgeline. A couple men will be on rocks, a couple men behind a bush and a couple men in tall grass.
Basically the terrain is what-you-see-is-what-you-get. If the ground looks like sand its probably sand, if it looks like rocks its rocks. If you're REALLY confused about what terrain type you're looking at the spend a couple minutes in the editor to familiarize yourself. Once you know you know. Though if you've been playing since CMBO days I can hardly imagine CMBN terrain could possibly throw you.

Things aren't so simple in CMBN. Your units no longer occupy a single point. Take a 12 man squad, place them along a ridgeline. A couple men will be on rocks, a couple men behind a bush and a couple men in tall grass.
Basically the terrain is what-you-see-is-what-you-get. If the ground looks like sand its probably sand, if it looks like rocks its rocks. If you're REALLY confused about what terrain type you're looking at the spend a couple minutes in the editor to familiarize yourself. Once you know you know. Though if you've been playing since CMBO days I can hardly imagine CMBN terrain could possibly throw you.

Except, of course, the price of the game *isn't* high. Steam is a parasite company. Why do people keep suggesting BFC attach a parasite to its neck just to suck its profits? BFC prefers to keep its own profits for itself.

Except, of course, the price of the game *isn't* high. Steam is a parasite company. Why do people keep suggesting BFC attach a parasite to its neck just to suck its profits? BFC prefers to keep its own profits for itself.

Except, of course, the price of the game *isn't* high. Steam is a parasite company. Why do people keep suggesting BFC attach a parasite to its neck just to suck its profits? BFC prefers to keep its own profits for itself.

If you come at the game out of the model hobby end of the spectrum, a single quality plastic hobby kit will cost you as much as this entire game. Depending on the title, CM might give <>150 different vehicles to play with. There's a chance you've just paid your cable TV bill for the month. How much did that set you back?

One thing that makes a BIG difference in map design in recent years is the combo of Google Earth and the game's editor map overlay function. Its hard to overindulge in certain terrain features if you're exactly matching a real world location. Reproducing actual locations, its less likely you'll arrange your buildings just-so for 'optimal' tactical game play or place copses of trees in precisely the 'optimal' spot. The real world is not often so cooperative. On the flip side, if you decide to reproduce a real-world village in the middle of a dense forest then you're going to have lots-o-woods to contend with!

One thing that makes a BIG difference in map design in recent years is the combo of Google Earth and the game's editor map overlay function. Its hard to overindulge in certain terrain features if you're exactly matching a real world location. Reproducing actual locations, its less likely you'll arrange your buildings just-so for 'optimal' tactical game play or place copses of trees in precisely the 'optimal' spot. The real world is not often so cooperative. On the flip side, if you decide to reproduce a real-world village in the middle of a dense forest then you're going to have lots-o-woods to contend with!