Lee

Hey guys, since the topic is new monitors I thought I'd chime in with my top pick if you're looking to get a 17 inch monitor (as I will be soon). Here it is: NEC Multisync E700 After considerable checking it is my opinion that this is the best overall 17 inch monitor you can buy without spending a lot more money. It delivers top quality colors and is ideal for reproducing the kind of graphics that gamers need all the time. It uses an invar shadowmask, which I think is better than those aperture grille type monitors (trinitron and diamondtron), because on those grille monitors you can actually see the wires (which are behind the screen) on your screen sometimes. I find any such visual artifacts like this unacceptable in a monitor. But with the E700 this isn't a problem. And it's .25mm mask dot pitch gives plenty of sharpness to show off that King Tiger you are so proud of. You can pick up one of these E700 monitors mail order for under $425 US if you do some shopping. I guess the best endorsement I can give this monitor is that it's the one I'll be buying when I replace my monitor in the very near future. [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-17-99).]

Simon: Hehe, I realize it wasn't exactly a common thing for the German ground troops on the western front to have air strikes available to them. But it's nice to have as great a variety of aircraft as practical available to the scenario designers to put together unusual battles. I mean, Jagdtigers weren't exactly common (and something like a Pershing would be super rare) and yet they are in CM because they are cool and because they can be very deadly when used properly. Something like an Hs129 is in the same boat, rare, but a cool and unusual ground attack plane that would be a lot of fun to have make attacks on allied armor. If it was indeed used on the western front, I hope it is included in CM. It would be one of the few (maybe only) dedicated ground attack planes on the German side modeled in CM. And I think it would be really fun to see how it's need to get rather close to it's target to strafe accurately would match up against allied AA fire. If the 129 can bring those 20mm cannon to bear look out, but first it has to get past that hail of AA fire... To me, that sort of head to head battle is really intriguing. The plane can do a lot of damage but has to get in closer than most planes to be highly effective (200 yards, eh Steve? ). Plus, the 129 is armored, so it might well survive that AA fire (well, maybe the first pass or two ). So, if the 129 did serve on the western front I think it would be a neat plane to have in CM. So, there's my pitch.

CM would be one cool game to test, but I didn't even bother applying for a tester slot, as I was already quite busy testing the greatest Star Trek game ever released on the PC (Star Trek: Starfleet Command, for the uninitiated ). Oh well, just bad timing I guess. But I'm sure BTS has a great bunch of WW II nuts to test CM out with. I'm confident the game is in good hands. [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-16-99).]

Very nice. Those Jagdtigers look *fierce*. I definately wouldn't want to tangle with one of those.

Arggh! Rhet, where did you read that about the Hs 129? We must know! Without some documentation all is lost. HELP! 8)

Ebaker makes a good point. If BTS is going to require the CD be in the drive for authentication (which I don't mind), then it would be highly desirable to have the CD checked only at game launch and game end. This way, those that like to listen to their favorite music CD while playing a game can do so. The game is still protected and the player can play "Ride of the Valkyries" as his panzers storm into battle, hehe. 8) [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-15-99).]

Hey Steve, did you look up that info. on the Hs 129? If it was indeed used on the western front after D-Day, that would be a nice consolation prize in the ground attack area to have in CM on the German side. Sort of ease the pain of not having those cool Stuka G's included in CM1. And while they might have been a pretty rare sight, it would be historically accurate to include them if it can be determined that they were used on the western front.

Thomas, apparently none of this will be an issue, as Steve has already indicated that they are heavily leaning toward requiring the CD be in the drive as the means of protection. So, you can have your backup copy and BTS can protect their product from the majority of abuses all at the same time. Seems like a good solution to me. [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-15-99).]

Thomas, I think your concerns have just been addressed by BTS. Steve said that if your CD wears out from normal (albeit heavy ) use that BTS will replace it at no cost to you. Can't ask for more than that. So, even if they did make it difficult to make extra copies on your own, you would be at no risk of having to buy another copy, ever. Not bad, eh?

I think Steve has it right. By increasing the quality of the scout units in the editor, you get scouts that not only fight better than an average unit but get all those bonuses we have been discussing. Things like spotting and reactingly cooly and smartly if they run into the enemy unexpectedly, all these things come along for the ride when you increase troop quality for that scout unit. This very nicely simulates the extra training that a scout unit might receive.

Good news. I tried opening the CM forum in it's own window (by right clicking on the forum area of the screen and selecting "open in new window") and seeing if I could get my new posts to be updated for me right away. Well, it worked. when I opened the forum in it's own window (as opposed to leaving it in a frame), I was able to force a full reload (by holding shift while clicking reload) of the forum. And when I checked my brand new posts, they were right there to be viewed just seconds after posting them. So, that is how you fix the slow-updating-post problem if you are having it. Update: You don't even have to do a full reload of the forum. After you post your message and you get returned to the thread, just hit reload (no need to hold shift) while you are still in the thread you just posted to. This will update that thread and you will see your post. Also, I noticed that when you view the forum in it's own window you have more room for text in your post on each line. This means when typing your posts you can type maybe two full lines before having to hit enter to jump to the next line so that your post's spacing doesn't get all goofed up. This is much better than the one line and a few letters you have to use when posting to the forum from within the framed environment. I wondered how in the world some guys could post long lines of text and have the forum put in a little scroll bar so you could read the whole post, but if I tried it I would end up with my sentences all broken up. Now I know how they did it. They were typing their posts while they had the forum loaded in it's own window. DARN, I wish you guys had told us about that little trick! It would have made typing posts much less of a hassle. Anyhow, now I'm telling everyone. So everyone go load the forum in it's own seperate window and you'll be a lot happier. [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-14-99).] [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-14-99).]

Yep, Steve, Glide is the native 3DFX API.

Hehe, I was going to suggest that very thing, Steve. Just make some sort of automated script and fire it up every night before bed time and just let it crunch numbers all night. If Charles does that every night for weeks on end, he should be able to have every conceivable gun/armor matchup in CM pre-calculated and available on the CD with no problem.

I think LOS makes a good point. It would seem logical that units specially trained as scouts would get a bonus when doing spotting checks for enemy units. That is, after all, what their main job is; skillfully sneaking about and finding out where the enemy is hiding and reporting back what they see. I would think they might even get a bit of a bonus added to their ability to hide well, and thus avoid detection by enemy units. I would like to see scout units be known for more than riding around in unusual vehicles. I think their special training and abilities should be modeled, as well. Los, as far as your point about the scouts being better fighters than an average infantry (or light armored) unit, I suspect you may be right about that. But that is easy to simulate in CM, just up the unit's troop quality level in the scenario designer and you're all set (well trained scouts ready to go ). [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-14-99).]

Johnnymo, in order to use the cable company's cached files on it's servers, you have to use a special version of the browser made to work with the cable company's system. I don't use this special version, just normal Netscape. So that can't be the problem. But good thinking. Also, like I said, this doesn't happen on other boards, just here, so that would also rule out the cable company cache thing. I think it may be as Ben said, these dumb frames might be goofing something up. It would be nice if when you clicked to come to the CM board that it automatically loaded the messsage board into another seperate window. This way you could force refreshes of the CM forum specifically. I know of another board that does it this way and I can always see my posts immediately after posting and hitting reload there. [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-12-99).]

Hey Fionn, try doing some screen shots in .bmp format. They tend to be big but the quality is usually quite nice. I'd like to see a couple .bmp's in the AAR's. Just for comparison's sake. You can get .bmp's easy by using the "print scrn" key and pasting that image into your graphics software and saving the file. I think most of the people reading the reports want the best quality pictures possible, regardless of size (as you have mentioned they keep telling you). So, don't worry yourself about the file size.

How could a cable modem not be fast enough for posting short text messages?! I didn't know you needed a T3 line to do that reliably. Seriously, I don't think that is the problem at all. These messages don't appear for days sometimes. So, speed isn't the problem. And like I said, this is the only board I can think of where this happens. I think it might have something to do with the fact that on this board you can't force refreshes on specific threads. If you hit reload it just takes you back to the main CM page. On other boards I can force fresh reloads of the specific thread I'm interested in. On those boards I can always see my posts right after I post them.

Well, just thought there might have been a few out there sneaking about on the western front. Darn, was looking forward to seeing what those 20mm and 37mm shells would do to allied armor. *sigh* I guess I'll have to wait for the eastern front to see that. At which time I will look forward to seeing every significantly different model of stuka (from a payload, cannon and/or protective armor standpoint) modeled. Look out russkie tanks! 8) [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-10-99).]

Oh well, maybe when the Netscape 4.62 rev comes out the problem will go away. Odd thing is, this is the only board I can think of where this happens. Go figure...

I'm using Netscape 4.61 with the check page every time option on for cache. And I even tried holding shift while I hit reload as was recommended to force a fresh reloading of the page so I can see new posts that have been put under some threads. And yet I can't see the new posts, this seems to happen in threads where I post a new message and I can't see my post or any of the others after it. For example, the thread might have 10 posts in it but I can only read 6 of them, my post will be the seventh post in the thread. Then even when I reload I won't be able to see my post or posts number 8, 9 and 10. Any ideas why that happens and what can be done to remedy it? On other message boards I don't have this problem and as soon as I post something I just hit reload and the thread updates immediately and I can see my new post. But that doesn't always work on this board and I don't know why. It's very irritating. Any ideas would be appreciated. BTW, when I post new topics like this post here I can see my post right away, no problem. I don't even have to hit reload, it shows up as soon as I submit the topic and get taken back to the board automatically. It only happens when I post to an already existing thread, whether I started the thread doesn't matter. For example, if I were to post another message in this thread, I may not be able to actually see it until a day or two later (after a couple days pass usually the thread will update for me and I can read what I have missed). [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-09-99).] [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-09-99).]

Oh come on, where are all the stuka fans? There has to be someone on this fine board that knows for sure whether or not stuka's were used on the western front any time after D-Day. Let us hear from you.

Yeah, it's nice to know that whatever may happen to be suggested that Charles and Steve will only put in the stuff that will benefit the realism and/or gameplay (but generally not gameplay at the expense of realism) of CM.

Well, the Me-262 was the sort of fighter that used boom and zoom tactics. Come in fast, lay down heavy fire and soar away to come around for another pass if need be. It wasn't agile enough to get into turning fights very often. The U.S. used the same sort of tacics in the pacific since our fighters couldn't turn with a Zero (then again, what could? ). Our fighters would try to make high speed firing passes on the Zero then pull away fast and come around again. Getting into turning fights with Zero's is known to be hazardous to one's health. So, the Me-262 is in a similar boat to aircraft like the F-4U Corsair. Which were at their best when hitting the enemy at high speed and avoiding close-in dogfights. The difference is that the Me-262's could do those firing passes at 100 MPH faster than an F-4U, plus those 30mm cannon are deadly.

Certainly the luftwaffe had suffered serious losses by the D-Day invasion due to the hordes of enemies they faced (fuel shortages didn't help, either). But surely they had some of their fighter-bombers and ground attack aircraft available on the western front to help support local counter attacks and also soften up any allied columns that were caught in the open. Any of you luftwaffe specialists know of stuka use on the western front from the time immediately following D-Day and/or later? [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-06-99).] [This message has been edited by Lee (edited 09-06-99).]

I was wondering if the Stuka Ju-87G-1 and G-2 variants will be included in CM. These are very cool aircraft and I think they would be good candidates for inclusion in the German list of ground support aircraft available in CM.