Los

Exactly, Basically RT is just different, you trade the ability to rewind and enjoy everything in minute detail for the experience of having to think more on your feet and make decisions outside of you comfort zone (friction and not marching to your own comfortable time frames). RT works well in smaller battles. I play both modes and they're both enjoyable. We can have a huge battle in RT...but with multiple players controlling smaller forces. It would be a new, different and for (hopefully) many, a fun experience. We had the same flak thrown up in the GB:SOW forums, but now that it was sensibly implemented, it's really one of the best ways to experience the game.

I can draw to similar experiences from our Gettysburg Scourge of War games That are played Withnthe kriegspeil crowd. These can take place within the context of a campaign and theres almost a nihtly event going on. Even though one can command an entire multi corp army in SOW, during the nightly multiplayer coop and head to head battles (sometimes you have up to 20 players on a side) players are perfectly content to each handle a brigade or two which equates to about 4-5 units you have to manage per brigade. There is so much going on in these battles that handling smaller forces does not create a feeling of lessor action. So if you have a coop op battle with say 4-5 players on a side it each managing a platoon with maybe a few assets, this is basically dealing within 7-8 units per player ( before splitting them up). That's hardly an imposition in real time. ESP since you can make the games longer so there isn't some artificial rush. The coordination between forces would make up for any perceived feeling of not controlling larger forces. In fact in out SOW battles often they are played with a setting called HITS ( headquarters in the saddle) where you can only see from the viewpoint of the commander on his horse, none of this 500 yards in the sky view. This limited intelligence option can make things that much better. In coop mode it would be good for the overall commander to be able to view. A larger map perhaps with a grid marking system superimposed on it. This way artillery requests and contacts could be called in without all this all knowing intel. Los

Coop x 1000 for me! Los

I too have Ken Tout's Tilly book. I read it a few years ago and came to the exact same conclusion. All the gritty detail but little big picture to put it into context and more importantly, no decent maps! A shame as I really am interested in this battle and there is so little about it out there. Los

The other cool thing would be realistic moms between the players, either written Messages, runners, wire, or crappy radio comms. Los

Definitely I like the multiple players per team in multiplayer. Gettysburg Scourge of War from Norbsoftdev has this and IRS a fantastic command experience when played with all the options. Los

Very good Bill, thanks. No loud bangs and I don't have to watch people's hands any more... Los

Just to borrow an idea from another great game....but have any of you guys ever played Scourge of War Gettysburg by Norbsoft development? It's a civil war game where the units get down to regiments and batteries )and the AI can certainly run command very well at any level) but has many of the concepts bandied around here. That game can have any number of players and we have often had battles with up to 20-30 players, most commanding brigades with some being division corps and even army commanders. (They have a online campaign mod too) There are two other interesting features they have that would be applicable here. One is a feature called Headquarters in the Saddle. In that mode you are basically limited to an eyeball view of the commander. In coop mode you can also allow normal views (meaning you can see things from above as in CM, but you are limited to only the units you command up to a certain radius in meters. The other cool feature that is available as an option is couriers only messages. So you have to send a message via courier (you can select from a menu but I think there is also a mod for free text, and the courier has to ride over to wherever you are sending the message. These features really transform the game experience into a command simulator of that era. So I guess another cool feature would be the various communications options between players. Obviously comms were very much better than in the ACW but certainly were not skype-like by any imagination. It would be neat to impose comms limits as an option, say face to face, wire comms, and some various radio comms, the higher up in command the better the radios. These features can make for a great game experience in SOW. Los

Thin red line o' heroes an all that...

Just so there's no confusion, your standard infantryman views all other servicemen with derision as well. Always has always will... Los

If you want civil war look no further than Scourge of War Gettysburg by norbsoftdev..... Los

One thing they can do with animations to give a more realistic effect: German soldiers, if they have their rifles in hand and not slung, almost always carry them at something like trail arms, meaning they are holding it low in just one hand. It seems culturally, for what ever reason, this is how they typically carry their rifles unless they are actually shooting them. IIRC in CM (and in most other games) they are carrying them in port arms or even more unrealistically up high w butt tucked in like soldiers do today. Any cursory inspection of Germans in ww2 footage will confirm this odd habit. Here's a representative look: http://youtu.be/5p0RzGIdGes Los

OK I'm back at this silliness again. I had to reinstall the OS (win7) on this new machine. Installed CMSF licensed it and started it, it worked fine. Then installed NATO bundle per directions and licensed it apparently without issue. WHen starting it had Marines and UK forces greyed out. Copied over the DLLs per above to module directory, selected each module executable to allow run as administrator. WHen I try and start game it keeps asking for Marines and British license then hangs. (Oddly enough CM:Normandy has none of these issues) Los

No luck, w patch reinstall. in fact I cant even unlicense CMSF so I cannot reinstall w/o screwing myself. I have no security software and windows firewall is disabled. All this was working perfectly fine until I installed 1.31 update. In each case I ahve carefully selected the correct components to install.

Ok so on another machine I have CMSf-Marines-BAF patched to 1.21 and working fine. So I decide to patch it to 1.31 so I can play LAN with my other machines (the win7 from the other thread, already successfully patched to 1.31) I run the 1.31 patch (selecting the appropriate modules) afterward I try to start CMSF ... and nothing happens, game fails to start. I had previously already gone through the DEP rigamarole to get it to work so it is already configured. I have virus or security software on his machine. Do I have any recourse here or uninstall and reinstall? Los

That worked! Thank you... Los btw for the record this was a windows 7 install

Howdy, I purchased a copy of CMSF and the CMSF marines-brits-nato bundle. I installed CMSF and licensed it, it worked fine. I then installed the bundle and then licensed it. It starts up and works fine except all the Marine scenarios/content is greyed out, though I observed the Marine setup executable installing. Apparently the single bundle ;license code took for everything but the Marines. Any advice? I only have two license here CMSF and bundle Los

BTW this is totally true. Stupid as this sounds, when the war started (I'm retired now), because I was master of PPT in my unit, I was able to ensure my guys got some of the most critical operational tasks on some of our missions because I made the slides. The CO would come by and see me working on them and I would carefully insert our names where I thought all the critical action would be. he'd see the snazzy animations and say sure this looks great and then we were in. After a few ops, we had established ourselves as utterly reliable and we were off to the races by then. Eventually the time it took to make these stupid PPTs became an obstacle given the tempo of ops. They and the stupid very long op orders that went behind them were dumped in favor of an execution matrix when we got a more right thinking commander. Also I knew the CO at the time was prione to rants about getting what he wanted, so I was careful to keep a wav file ready to play up on the PPT PC that I could invoke at just the right time from Austin Powers regarding wanting the sharks w frikken laser beams on their foreheads. Los

Just to echo... My mom and both sisters live in Branford,CT so I spend a lot of time there and know it well. It's a nice town...on the water, with plenty of rural woodsy parts too. It's also right near New Haven, which is an outstanding little city, the home of many colleges and Universities, including Yale, and a place with many outstanding culinary options, most importantly real top notch pizza. It's a little over an hour from both Boston and New York. Connecticut is a great state. If you need more info or a place to hold up for a night let me know. Los

Yet somehow air assaults were and are still carried out....In Vietnam there were upmteen air assaults carrier out into very hot LZs. Vietnamese w/ PKs RPGs, and RPDs, Afghans/Iraqis w PKs, RPGs, RPDs. (Granted don't assault SAM sites and Shilkas.) There are plenty of scenarios to be played out. Though as APocal says I usually start out those types of scenarios with the guys on the ground in their post landing perimeter.

Amen to that!

Better to have a counterbattery program which forces the enemy from being with the weapons they are operating, thus making the attacks less accurate and less frequent, than allowing the operators to be on the weapons, making adjustments or taking their sweet a** time to recover their weapons or set up properly. If the program reduces the effectiveness and saves lives, it worth a couple of 155 rounds. BTW I liked the nice reverse slope position, on the second (mortar team) video, making getting good hits on CB a little more challenging. Every little bit helps when trying to stay alive... Los

This is standard selective morality. There's still victims from WW2 all over the place but I guess this doesn't hinder you're enjoyment of combat mission. If you think it's immoral feel free not to play it. No doubt there are plenty of people that would recoil in horror at the thought of you playing a game out of WW2. But that's OK though... The whole irony of your post pretty silly.

Apologies is someone has already posted this. A new film directed by Dale Dye: http://www.nobetterplacetodie.com/

Lets see Hamas launches hundreds or thousands of rockets over the past few years into Israel each with the intent to kill as many israelis as they can.. Just because most of them missed, doesn't mean we should be somehow more forgiving of them than of Israel. Los