Mattias

Yes, see it too. Must be a bug. M.

Shug is right, IG's are primarily direct fire weapons and modeled only as such in CM. M.

What BTS really said was that, firstly, their plate is full for the time being and, secondly, that they do not feel they are enough in the know as far as the "CM level" details of combat in the PTO goes. Hence no plans for a PTO CM at this point. A humble and respectable enough answer if you ask me. M.

What exactly is the “slope” terrain type? It seems to me that it is not a standard terrain type but rather something that appears “within” other types of terrain, possibly when the gradient gets beyond a certain point. In any event, it causes a bit of a problem in the gold demo. Firstly, on the centre road leading down into the valley from the US setup area there are a number of “slope” spots in the middle of the road. These “spots” do not show up unless you pass them with the move cursor (in which case the line turns red, as in impassable), if on the other hand you miss them while plotting the move along the seemingly ordinary road you will find your vehicles laboriously rerouting. Secondly, on hill 216 for example there are within the ordinary “tall pines” terrain “slope” spots that, unlike the also present “tall pines slope” spots, seems to give considerably less cover (same as clear mayhap?). In a recent game I had a unit moving (crawl) to one such spot and hide. This unit was spotted immediately while others moving in exactly the same way nearby in the “tall pines “ terrain were not. If the “slope” spot indeed gives less cover this was not a chance event. Again, the “slope” spot is smack in the middle of a “tall pines” terrain tile. Now, I’m not really sure I consider this a bug or a serious problem most of the time, after all, out there in realty you never really know what can be seen from or seen into any minute piece of terrain. However, slope “spots” in the road terrain is a bit of a hassle. If nothing else Ill keep a lookout for these “troubles” when designing scenarios myself… M

What made the "spotted on board mortar fire" a little hard to grasp at first was the fact that I had no immediate way of seeing that it worked. It could be argued that the ability to now target a LOS blocked area with the mortar is clear enough but it still is less intuitive than it would have been if the line of sight was drawn from the spotter instead. What I would like to see is a "spotted" LOS line from the mortars with all the info that the "spotter" has instead of the standard, in this case, blocked and "blind" LOS from the mortar. It works as it is but it is a little less slick interfacewise and hence possibly confusing at first. M

Steve said <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>("nicely" circular blast shock waves being one of them. Actually, maybe the only one... I can't remember<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Aha! I have been wondering about that, thought the movie maybe was being "recorded" at a lower resolution... The shock waves are truly stunning now, a pleasure to behold and the secondary "building colapse wave" is perfect for bringing home the message to the enemy Just getting better and better the more you play it! M.

The fighting for the central parts of Hürtgen lasted from about the 6th of October (9th division attacks towards Germeter) to early December (CCR 5AD takes Bergstein on the 3d), two months that is... Lots of interesting opportunities for scenarios and even an operation or two. Not a thing you just slap together though... Go for the real battles instead of trying to recreate the movie. After all, is there any scene in there that is worth wasting CM´s capacity on? M.

What a nice thread to wake up to! Congratulation BTS, I hope this is the start of something really big M.

Bastard!

10 hours... 600 minutes... 36000 seconds... 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 .................

HA! Imagine the suffering of us Swedish wargamers! We haven’t had a war for almost 200 years! Not a soul in sight to relate to! And the last wars weren’t very good at that coming to think of it! M

Thanks Bill! Was there any way thought out to distribute it beyond downloading and magazine cover CD? Can I somehow have it sent by snail mail that is... Looking forward to trying out M.

Dumbo, They have simply had to deal with it because no one has asked them for their opinion on the matter. And had they indeed objected they would have been told to shut up and take it, on pain of being branded as neo/old nazis. The Germans have simply been free targets for the last decades. M. [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 05-01-2000).]

Hehe.. After installing my new SB Live card I fiddled a little with the sound controls at first but then started Mechwarrior 3. I almost fell out of my seat from the blast coming out of my speakers! Just setting up the game had had me covering, every little button "click" sounded like a massive portal of steel slamming shut. And once in the game... phew... In the end it turned out I had left the sound profile on "Hangar" and this turned out to produce a truly massive noise experience After getting a good sound card you will never look back, it’s like playing CM in software mode when compared to using good 3D hardware... A different world. M.

Gander & Chamberlain puts it at 30mm@100m and 25mm@500 when firing at a vertical plate. Since you will almost never find these conditions on the battlefield I would say its pretty safe to assume that the front of even the older (E/F) Pz III´s were safe from 14.5 mm fire. The same would go for the sides and rear beginning with, at least, the "H" model that was produced 40/41. However, it was hard to detect, mobile, easy to handle and, abov all, very common. The AT-rifle survived a long time in Russian service, if nothing else for lack of options. This is not to say that the AT-rifle wasn’t a problem. It was a constant nuisance as it seemed to dig into every little opening or weak spot, the commanders cuppola being a common target for example. A "tribute" to it’s effectiveness was the mounting of Schürzen on the German tanks which were intended to deflect, disturb or detonate incoming rounds, the 14.5mm AT-rifle being the main cause for this design solution. M.

Thanks for posting the review over at Boots & Tracks Bill, informative and entertaining. Just the thing to ease the last weeks of waiting So, was that one of the surprise features we saw? The tank overrunning infantry I mean. I don’t recall it being mentioned after a long debate some time back and I got the impression it was given an official NO at that time. Guess there is more to discover along the road M. [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-26-2000).]

Right you are friends! Wonder what other vital tactics I have missed M.

pcelt, In the beta demo: 1) Give the embarked unit a movement order. However, they will not disembark until the carrier has reached it´s final waypoint, hence it is not possible to disembark "en route". 2) Yes Easy enough M.

Cool, Sure, G2 looks like the king of video cards at the moment, but does it add that much for CM? BTS has said that CM’s graphics are maxed out with a 16 Mb card. More does not add anything significant. CM does not use much of the special functions that the G2 card offers, simply because it was not programmed to do so. The G2 is designed with DirectX 8.0 games in mind. When playing CM there will still "only" be software FSAA in D3D, just as you can get with an ordinary GeForce today. Nvidia’s hardware D3D FSAA solution is not backward compatible like the one used by 3Dfx. CM most probably being "backwards" in this context, like almost all current D3D games. As far as I can see CM looks to be much more dependent on the CPU, while not taxing the video card very much. This would mean that money could be much more effectively spent upgrading the processor rather than getting a fancy video card. CM2, CM3, CM4, who knows? But as far as this first CM goes I think that anyone with a good 16 Mb card has all bases covered. M. [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-26-2000).]

Once a post, now no more [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-25-2000).]

Double [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-23-2000).]

Aw common Steve You can´t compare two weapon systems out of context. I suspect this was not what you meant but the way you present your point, using a Panther would be sheer folly, while a Kübelwagen with a Panzerschreck is the pinnacle of efficiency Your arguments are of course absolutely relevant even for the actual combat situation (comparable with arguments in favour of the Sherman tanks vs. German armour), but they nevertheless are dwarfed by the much superior battlefield survivability and firepower of the StuG. Quite simply, no real comparison can be made between the vehicles as they had different tasks and capabilities. I like both, I just don’t compare them M.

Not trying to answer the question, sorry, but one thing I noticed was that my SB Live value worked much better with the DirectX 7.0a drivers. Can´t say why but it definitely improved the sound. M.

OBG, Completely disagree with you there… Steve didn’t say that most of us don’t care about realism in minute details. What he said was that a detail does not live it’s own life in CM and that if you raise the level of complexity in one area this could adversely effect the balance of the whole. Nothing can be added without considering it’s effect to the rest of CM and often you’ll find that a proposed change does not fit the CM “mould” or interpretation of reality. In my opinion the term “game” is not naturally connected with the term “simplicity”. If anything I think it should be connected with the term “playability”. There are those of us who really enjoy buying a special rule set add-on box cover the particulars of, say, the Normandy urban bird life “Caen edition” and plod through the 48 page rules covering things like plumage factors and sniper disturbance rolls (SDR’s). This group of players have a completely different view on what is desirable in a game and will not get that feeling of immersion from anything less. What is staggeringly boring for one type of players is eminently playable for another type. Now, on the other hand, the beauty of computer based wargames is that in a good design you can seamlessly integrate the exact number of feathers on the CGI bird that just flew by your Tiger. Those who are uninterested wouldn’t notice because the “CGI bird feather algorithm” is integrated into the code, while those who crave that level of realism to get immersed (key word on this context) will rejoice and say, now this is a great GAME. So, to get the pointy bit, who are you to deride those that have different preferences in regards to realism? They might have trouble expressing their thoughts in a civil manner but I still say you have to work a little on understanding their point of view, no matter what you yourself think is right. Finding myself somewhere in the realism middle ground I must say that “gamers” rantings are just as annoying as “grognard” rantings. One of the greatest aspects of CM is that it allows such a wide range of players to get that elusive feeling of immersion, all in the same game. Imagine PITS and AOE players joining hands all around the world and walking together into CM heaven. It’s a beautiful thought so just stop them negative waves. M

Last thing I heard, The VooDoo4 will have no FSAA for the reasons mentioned. 2x means double oversampling (i.e. two pictures are rendered on top of each other to get a smoother whole) which in turn means half speed for the card. 4x four times (4 pictures rendered) and quarter speed. The VooDoo4 isn’t fast enough to be able to effectively absorb that kind of performance hit. The VooDoo5500 on the other hand is supposed to deliver 32 bit colour with 4x FSAA in 1024x768 resolution at about the same speed as a VooDoo3 3000 does 16 bit none FSAA in the same resolution now. Which means that it should be four times faster than a VooDoo3 3000 when not running any FSAA at all... This is a simplified way of putting it and speed is a relative thing in graphics cards but this was the gist of it. I guess we will see in a few weeks how well it works. Oh, and this is harware FSAA, not to be compared with the software solutions used curretnly by NVidia. M. [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-18-2000).] [This message has been edited by Mattias (edited 04-19-2000).]