Pak40

"Hopefully in CC2 we will have objective flags in operations." OOPs- I meant to say CM, not CC2.

Placing the CC2 maps in a larger environment is the best thing to do, I've found. The CC2 maps were too small ever for CC scale. This means that they are way too small for CM scale. Taking the CC maps and placing them in a surrounding environment is the way to go, either if it's done as an operation or a battle. Unfortunately the operations don't let the designer place objective flags which really makes the computer AI screwy when dealing with an objective oriented operation like Arnhem Bridge. Hopefully in CC2 we will have objective flags in operations.

Hmmmm, I see it quite differently: System + lots of hours spent with CM = No Life

I have posted two operations which have CC2 maps directly incorporated into the overall operation map: Arnhem Bridge Operation: uses Arnhem Bridge map and loosly interpreted Arnhem West map Son Operation: uses Son Town, Son Bridge, and Son South maps I might also do a Nijmegen Op soon. Jeff Roland

The briefings are brought in by using three text files. It's in the manual.

Hummer, I havn't had that problem with 1.05, but I can tell you that many people, including me, had that problem with the Team Desorby operation (back with version 1.01). I don't know the solution to the problem, but it may have something to do with no man's land being set to 400m(bug that was fixed in 1.04)

I accidentally wasted a self made scenario also this way. Not only is the folder for saved games the same but so is the file extension! Couldn't they just change the file extension to something like .csv or .sav ?

Many thanks for the complements. It was tough judging distances with the few sources that I had. But there were two sources that had great high altitude aerial photos of the city which allowed me to layout the basic street system. I think I quoted the titles of these books in the briefings. But, like you said, compromise compromise. I had to make lots of them. Some of the blocks are bigger or narrower than I'd like them to be and obviously the streets were very hard to do because of all the odd angles. Also most of the smaller streets in Arnhem are very narrow which tends to distort the city blocks in the editor. and to put my two cents in on about the railroad tracks- it is on an embankment one elevation higher than the surrounding terrain- if that's what you were refering to when you said "being level with the town"

The setting "Attacker" will make one side the attacker and the other the side the defender. , obvious enough. The defender I belive get the benefit of being "dug in" at the start of every battle during the operation. It also may determine if the computer AI is defensive or offensive in nature. The setting "Attacker comes from" will determine where the Attacker's friendly territory is. In the setup of each battle, the attackers setup territory will be traced back to this side. This in turn, will determine where the defender's friendly territory is.

Yea, I know. But I put landmarks on each edge of the map showing the true direction.

Jeff, I hear your cries. I'm wondering if switching the British to the attacking side will help. The attacker in CM is the one who gets the free land, even though he didn't have to fight for it.

JeffRaider, Here's the Genereal Briefing which lists some of the changes. I highly recommend playing this version over the Beta version. You will see a big difference from which direction the Germans attack. Version 1.0 (see changes below) Arnhem Road Bridge Arnhem, The Netherlands September 17, 1944 Allies- As allies you command Lt. Col. Frost's 2nd Parachute Battalion+ and try to hold the Arnhem road bridge for several days until XXX Corps arrives. Germans- As Germans you must use Ad hoc units and SS reserves to try and wrestle the bridge from the British Troopers. ***** VICTORY CONDITIONS - ignore the computer's point total at the end of the operation. The winner of the operation is whoever controls the block of houses(or rubble) at the north end of the bridge by op's end: Draw - If the Germans have only one unit in any of these houses and the British have the others, then the operation is a draw(but considered better than the Historical result). German Victory - If the British contol none of these buildings or are totally wiped out. British Minor Victory - If the British hold all of the houses surrounding the north span of the Bridge. British Major Victory - If the British hold all of the houses surrounding the north span of the Bridge AND have at least 3 uncaptured and unbroken units on the south side of the bridge within 40 meters(two tiles) of any part of the bridge span. ***** This operation, if played vs the computer, should be played as the Allies. If the computer is set to the Allied side, then I doubt that the AI will even attempt to capture the bridge since there is no way to assign victory flags in an operation (serious design flaw in the operation editor, IMO). However, this should play great as a two person game. This battle is a test to see if the British side can hold out better than they did historically. It is not meant to play out until XXX arrives, which was many days behind the planned schedule and way out of scope of this operation. ***** This is a beta version of the op. It has not been tested yet. It is quite possible that at some points in the operation, there will A LOT of units on the map. You may need a powerful computer or just be patient as the computer crunches the numbers. I have no idea at this point if this is even a very play balanced operation. All I can say is that it is historically accurate, for the most part, which was my goal. Feedback is welcome and encouraged, good or bad: jroland2@home.com ***** DESIGNERS NOTES (blah blah blah): If you're wondering why I made an Arnhem Bridge Operation when Combat Mission came with it's own version, the answer is simple: Historical Accuracy. I guess I'm kind of picky when it comes to creating these historical battles and I was appalled when I first loaded the CM version of the Arnhem Bridge Op. There isn't much historical about the CM version, either in the order of battles or the geography. Aside from the river and the fact that there's a bridge - the geography of the city of Arnhem is completely wrong. The order of battles for both sides are lacking many important units that participated in the battle. My version of the Operation is as historical as I could get it with the resources I have: A Bridge Too Far (Ryan) and It Never Snows in September (Kershaw). Both provided excellent aerial photos around the bridge. Kershaw's book was excellent for the German OOB and a great high altitude aerial of the entire city, which is how I derived the layout of the streets farther away from the bridge. Ryan's book was great for determining appoximately how many units made it to the bridge perimeter and of what type. This is very important because there were some important units ommitted from the CM version that should have been included in the operation (I wont list them here because it will spoil the battle for the Germans). Other sources include a table of organization for a British parachute battalion in 1944 that I photo copied from some book several years ago and two Close Combat maps: Arnhem Bridge and Arnhem West Approach(loosly used). How my Arnhem city is more accurate than the one in CM: 1) First off, the layout of the city in the CM version is totally wrong. The streets are layed out in the midwest grid pattern which is never seen in Europe. I got the basic city street pattern from carefully studing the photos mentioned above. There are lots of curves and places where streets meet at odd angles - mine is much more accurate although I was quite limited with CM's tileset. 2) The park area extending from the brige is much too short in the CM version. Also, I made the park angle off to the left at about 45 degrees. The church should not be at the end of the park either. The two churches that I found in the aerials are off of the parkway. 3) The CM version has the houses and other buildings way way way too spread apart. Arnhem is a very urban area (although in reality a small city) with buildings jumbled and adjacent to each other. The typical streets are narrow, sometimes too narrow to even show up on the aerial photos. I have tried to emmulate this jumbled mass of buildings as best I could without making the map a computer resource hog. This will greatly reflect the close street fighting, hopefully. However, this may make the operation a real pain when it comes to finding all of your men on the map. 4) Tried to simulate the dense gardens and backyards that are usually found in the center of every city block. The 2nd Parachute battalion used these gardens with great success to reach the bridge and also to defend against. Remeber the sceens from the movie A Bridge Too Far? ******************* VERSION 1.0 CHANGES ******************* After some feedback from players and a purchase of a new book "A Tour of The Arnhem Battlefields", I had enough info to release a new version. Most of the changes are in the Allied Order Of Battle, of which this new book has an excellent recording. Here are all the changes (If I can remember them all): 1) I wont ruin the surprise for either side but I added several units that were missing from the Allied OOB. I also named every British Company HQ unit, not after their commander, but after the unit name. (due to CM defaults, you will see something like "Capt HQ 1st Para Bgd"; the "Capt" part I cannot delete, CM puts it there automatically. 2) Made Frost's unit Padlocked, so that you can find him easier in the setup. 3) Deleted a German 75mm Pillbox that I accidentally left in the corner of the map. Added two german units (again, I wont spoil the surprise) to the setup and one of the reinforcements. 4) Due to a bug in CM 1.03, the No Man's Land was getting reset to 400m. This bug is fixed in CM 1.04, the no mans land is now zero to reflect the close street fighting. and major infiltration that occured on both sides. 5) New aerial photos have revealed a tree blvd along the river, so I added some trees. 6) A few minor cosmetic things on the map. 7) Changes to all briefings. 8) This Operation is now CM version 1.04 or higher only. 9) Changes direction in which Germans attack from. 10) Grouped British soldiers better in the setup. 11) Providing text files of briefings and screen shot of British setup so that the British player can be more organized at setup time. (See ARNHEM_README.TXT)

This is a more historically correct version than the one provided by CM. The Op can be downloaded at the CMHQ site: http://combathq.thegamers.net/ Check out some screen shots: http://www.members.home.net/jroland2/arnhem_bridge.htm

This is a more historically correct version than the one provided by CM. The Op can be downloaded at the CMHQ site: http://combathq.thegamers.net/ Check out some screen shots: http://www.members.home.net/jroland2/arnhem_bridge.htm [This message has been edited by Pak40 (edited 08-26-2000).]

Wild Bill, Nevermind, they have fixed this in 1.04 - was still designing in 1.03 but now I'm current. I have a question for you since you're the scenario designer guru: At the end of my first battle on my Arnhem Op, I had a two or three platoons reach the bridge, but the bulk of my force was still 300+ meters away. On the setup for my second battle I got two setup zones, red and white. The red one contained the bulk of land I had traversed and all my units. The white one was near the bridge but contained no units. Why does the operation even make a white area if it's going to put all of my units back in the red zone? Any clues? Any rememdies for this? (I do have the no mans land set to zero meters now.) thanks

Well, I am still designing in Version 1.3 but I have the executable for 1.4 also, so I can actually run both. I'll have to try and load my operation in 1.4 and see if it saves the no mans land. thanks for the info.

Bill, One more thing before you play: It has just come to my attention that the editor resets the size of no mans land to 400 every time I open the scenario. Therefore, the Beta version will not be very playable. I intended to use zero to simulate the close action of everything. I wish they had a 40 meter option, that would be perfect. I think we ought to post a warning to scenario designers about this bug. What do you think? Jeff

Hey Kwazydog, you know, I could have sworn I put that no mans land to zero, so I went in and checked. It was 400. so I set it to zero (again) and saved it. I exited and re-loaded the scenario in the editor and guess what it was set to: 400 Every time the Operation is oped in the editor, it is set to 400 - I think I found a bug!!!

Does anyone know what a RASC unit is in the British Army? What do the letters stand for? Maybe Royal Artillery ..... thanks

This is one of my gripes about the editor. The answer is no, it can't be done. It would be nice if you could load maps independent of the OOB, kind of like how Steel Panthers has it, but I think there were some difficulties with this. I'm not sure why.

Hi Bill, here are some answers to your questions: I thought long and hard about Graebners famous attempt to cross the bridge from the south on the second day. If the editor gave me the power to restrict reinforcement deployment to certain sides of the map then I would be in great shape. But, as you know, there's no way to do this in an operation. One of the historical inaccuracies we'll have to live with. For people who are historical nuts like me, you can (if you're the Germans) force yourself to deploy your units historically. One word of note: Playing as the germans against the British computer AI wont be very good. There is no way set the Bridge as the objective in the Operation. Therefore, the Brits wont make that dash for the bridge. Another shortcomming of the editor. Another fellow(actually two different guys are in the works of and Arnhem Op) emailed me today stating that he was also in the process of making the Arnhem Bridge Op. He, however, is starting his Op with the Brits alredy in control of the bridge. I might make a version like this, but I kind of like having the Brits rush to the bridge within a limited time. This will be a nice little challenge for most people on the British side. Yes, there is a section of the map on the lower left side (north east) that I left out. I wanted to see how much CPU power all of these buildings ate up before putting these in. At one point in the operation, there will be a lot of units on the board. I want to make sure that most computers wont't chug when playing. The section of map I left out is a part where there shouldn't be any fighting. It didn't play much of a roll in the real battle. oops, that pillbox is still there? I forgot to delete that sucker. I'll get it next time. It shouldnt cause any harm in that area. I bought a new book tonight that has very detaild OOB for the Brits and it differs a little bit from what I have, so I'll be making some tweaks to their ranks. I'll probably post version 1.0 this weekend. thanks for the feedback and complements. Jeff

The exact link is: http://combathq.thegamers.net/

Now available at CMHQ This is a more Historical Arnhem Bridge Operation than the one provided by the game. More Detail in regards to the layout of the city and OOB for both sides. This is a Beta version and User feedback is welcome, good or bad. email feedback to me: jroland2@home.com thanks, jeff

Now available at CMHQ This is a more Historical Arnhem Bridge Operation than the one provided by the game. More Detail in regards to the layout of the city and OOB for both sides. This is a Beta version and User feedback is welcome, good or bad. email feedback to me: jroland2@home.com thanks, jeff

Hi Kverdon, answers to your questions: "1. I WISH I could get the 88's to stay put, the AI seems to like to move them. Did you mention that you could accept the default setup and this would happen?. How do I do that?" Unfortunately, as I've recently found out, the AI does relocate the 88s after the first battle no matter if you stick to scenario defaults or not. I don't think the editor gives control to the designer for making fixed units. The only alternative is to place Pill boxes there instead of 88s, but that would make things unfair I think. "2.Did the Panzer Bge really have that many Panters?. I would normally expect a few MkIV's in the mix. This could also be a playbalance consideration." Actually more. 'It Never Snows In September' is the source I used for this info. It actually states that they used around 40 battletanks and every mention of the type of tank is a Panther. This is consistent with German doctrine - they keep the same type tanks within the same battalions. The book goes on to state that they were only able attack with a few tanks at a time because of the narrow appoach to the bridge. So what I've done in the new version of my Operation is put some trees on the German side of the canal so as to give the troopers some cover and restrict the German tanks to narrow appoaches. This should make the tanks a little more vulnerable. "3. while this a fun opperation playing the allies against the AI. I don't think that it would make a good PBEM scenario. I don't see how a allied player could force a bridge crossing and hold the far side of the river against a competant German commander." Hopefully, the new version I put out tonight will balance things out. But, Let's put your theory to test. How bout I play as US and you play as Germans in a PBEM with my new version , starting tonight? Thanks for the info on the books, Im always looking for new material. Jeff