TeAcH

Dear BTS, or anyone in the know, In CMBB, I was wondering if the type of ground and or ground conditions had any effect on the amount of damage (i.e. blast damage) of impacting artillery rounds? Does the same arty round that impacts into say mud have less of an effect than say when the same round hits rough or cement? Would the mud suck the round down further into the earth and lessen the radius (or something like that)? Thanks, TeAcH [ November 25, 2002, 02:09 AM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

yeah I agree. And just a couple of weeks ago (or less), Richard Harris died. Bummer.

Lighten up fellas. Just cuz the guy doesn't like the game, doesn't mean he has to be torn apart by the CM fanatics. I love CM too, have both versions, but let him rant alone if you dont have anything constructive to add.

183078

I third or fourth that request (or whatever the count is up to now).

You dont rate the cost of the stamp my friend.

I wholeheartedly agree.

Kingfish you hit the nail on the head when you said that. I feel your pain. The only thing I would add is AFTER you do all of that, the lead vehicle does "something" causing all of the vehicles behind it to collide like mindless dominoes and you have to start all over again. Start all over again AFTER you perform surgery to separate the conjoined AFVs that is. JKM, I hear ya. Seanichi, I guess I assumed you were being mildly sarcastic and I reacted to that. I don't need PENG101 in a discussion that means something to me for a game that I care about (and have bought twice). Anyway, let's hope there is some fix in the future that would help all fans of CM like myself to plot a line of vehicles easily. TeAcH [ October 10, 2002, 09:14 PM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

Seems real world to me too. Seani, Thanks for your input, but I frankly think you have spent way to much time in PENG threads which has honed your ability using lots of words linked together just to hear yourself talk (albeit see yourself type) without saying much of anything. I prefer the acronym KISS - Keep it Simple Stupid. I think you miss the jist of this discussion. Is it okay for vehicles to collide in your book? Why cant a vehicle that is told to follow another change its orders if it comes under fire? That happens in the game already. You set waypoints. Press GO. That vehicle begins to move until in encounters a threat or a problem. The AI replots. Its a simple concept really. Why do you turn this into some big PENG-thing? (Thats a rhetorical question). Anyway, lets agree to disagree. Ill keep on taking that 15 truck convoy and issuing overlapping waypoints to each one and then watch as they form one long writhing pile up as soon as the first one hits a PENG in the road. Cheers, TeAcH

Oh, BTW, I drove home from work today at 70 MPH amidst heavy traffic in downtown Seattle. Guess that makes me a Blue Angel right there Seanachi? Seriously, these vehicles ram each other even when not under fire and you know that. [ October 08, 2002, 02:43 AM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

Blue angels? Precision flying? You've got to be joking. Umm. Next time you drive somewhere, make sure you watch the vehicle in front of you. Blue Angles. C'mon.

With all due respect Sena, I think you totally miss the point and overstate the issue. You seem to think that vehicles following one another is impossible and I dont know why you do. If you and me and Mike each got into a truck on a road and behind one another, do you mean to say that you could NOT stay behind me even if I changed my speed a bit here and there? We do that all the time on the roads today. Do you drive? Why is this unreallistic on the battlefield? As it is now in CMBB and CMBO for that matter, despite one's best efforts at pausing and issuing orders to effect a convoy, your vehicles end up ramming into the vehicle in front of them at full speed one after another when the first vehicle merely slows down or drives off the road. They simply do not seem to have any awareness of the vehicles around them. Then, once your convoy gets into those big jumble of siamese-trucks (all joined at the hip), it takes the AI a looong time to try to plot each one of out of this mess...almost like a retarded slinky struggling to free itself in the toilet. It is really a simple concept. You make it sound like the drivers look at their laps when they drive so they can follow a map only changing course (and looking up at the road) when they crash into something. Thanks for your input, but I disagree. And besides, when you want to plot say 10 trucks in that scenario that says exit the trucks off the other edge of the map, to follow a winding road, do you really want to spend the time giving each one them the same 20 waypointed route one after another (10x20=a helluva lot) only to have the 2nd one collide into the first and screw up all that work? TeAcH

I see your point Michael. I wonder if the game would simply have the following vehicles just copy the same path of the lead vehicle and leave it at that. Simple and a basic "fix". So, you line all you vehicles up in the formation you want and plot the lead vehicle throughout the entire roadway with all of its turns and twists and then direct the 2 unit to follow the 1st (essentially copying it path but adding one initial waypoint to get vehicle 2 to where vehicle 1 was when it started its path). Again, very basic but a time saver. Now, a more advanced programming approach would be to line your vehicles up in your formation then plot vehicle 1. Then you goto 2 and tell it follow 1. Then you have 3 follow 2 and so on. The AI will moderate speed of the fastest vehicle so that all stay about the same speed and distance. If one the lead vehicle stops, the following vehicles stop where they are to maintain the gap. Either way, Id give it a big thumbs up. It would not only save time, but give the AI driving these rigs some semblance of intelligence. As it is now, they smack right into the lead at full speed. Thanks TeAcH

Thanks MadMatt. As a sidenote, it sure is nice that the dev team reads this stuff and takes it into account. I know you all have done this from the beginning. I for one don't take it for granted. I don't think most do here either (take it for granted that is). Anyway, thanks. TeAcH [ October 07, 2002, 10:42 PM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

I think he has the right to "whine" if he bought the game and this is the place for it. He can get the answer without being chided. Anyway, just my two cents.

1) Enable use of the mouse wheel (configurable to either change view, zoom in, or tilt camera) 2) Make the SHIFT key speed up the screen scroll speed. In other words, as you move around the battlefield you get the slow speed. When you hold shift, you get a fast camera speed like you do when you press the camera buttons. I know you can side scroll with the shift but this is redundant when you can side scroll with at the bottom of the screen edge. 3) Track down and squash the TCPIP Game data transfer lockup bug that is still present (happened the other day) 4) Question: Does arty falling in MUD (soft ground) cause LESS damage to nearby troops then arty falling on hard ground? It should. Thanks, TeAcH

Hey BTS, great job on CMBB. I really like it a lot. Especially the variable endings I was reading the CMBB manual and when I got to the follow vehicle command, I was hoping to find that this command would allow me to keep some of my convoys together or speed up issuing commands to multiple vehicles of mine by plotting the lead vehicle to a specific destination then telling all of the trailing vehicles to follow the vehicle in front of them. This would save a ton of time and add to the "intelligence" of these vehicle drivers by keeping them from crashing into the vehicle ahead of them when that vehicle has to make an adjustment in the move path. I recently played a game where I had to protect trucks and get them to escape on the opposite side of the field. The trucks took 3-4 turns to untie themselves from the knot they got into because of one truck's adjustment. Please comment and or put this on the TO DO list. Thanks, TeAcH

I like the new camera control that allows me to move the mouse to the bottom sides for lateral movement and to the upper 2/3rds of the sides for turning. Nice job. I would like to request that the SHIFT key when depressed would speed up the camera movement like that in Warlords and Medieval Total War. Thanks TeAcH

Well that was awfully nice of you guys to say. I'm touched and I appreciate the kind words very, very much. After playing a bunch of games and fearing (and experiencing) the inevitable flag rush, Brad and I spent a bunch of hours cranking this thing out (testing, updating, etc). It's nice to know that it was appreciated. Sorry if I came off like I was upset. I wasn't at all. I knew some people wouldn't like it. Although the BER site is down now, if anyone wants it, they can drop me an email and I'll send it to them in email or via ICQ. Thanks again for the comments. It means a lot. And thanks to BTS for adding something like this to CMBB. BTS, not that you need or want it, but you can have our source code for the BER for free. No strings attached. TeAcH

Sorry you guys didnt like the BADCO deal that BradleyH and I made. But hey, at least it was free (and worked well for us, but then again we made it). And hey, if it in some small way influenced BTS to incorporate such a thing into CMBB, great. But since there insnt a way to do that in CMBO unless you use this then... I don't play much CM without our BADCO BER but that's just me. Thanks again to those of you who donated a few bucks to us here and there. Now, back to staring at the calendar waiting for CMBB's release. [ August 15, 2002, 10:11 PM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

I have a save game file that crashes the game during the next German AI's turn every time (I am Allies). Who should I email it to so they can load it and then click DONE for the Allies to see it occur. Please email me with the answer as I dont check this forum often enough. Thanks, TeAcH d.teach@gte.net

Thanks Steve and Slap. I am certainly not as adept at WW2 history and as are the heavyweights around here. And when it comes to polling questions, yeah. I see your point. It is hard to get it perfect. Don't get me wrong, CM is one of my favorite games (computer or otherwise). Thanks again, TeAcH

Hmm..well perhaps and then again perhaps not. The question is "I think the MG units in CM with respect to fire rate, damage dealt, and area deniability are". Whats wrong with that? The answers are quite simple - Done well, undermodeled, overmodeled. I think the spirit of the question is right on target though. It is the spirit of the question that people can figure out. [ February 02, 2002, 05:25 PM: Message edited by: TeAcH ]

http://www.combatopinion.com/polls.php?view=1&thepolls_id=151&num_days=50&page_active=1 TeAcH

Yeah. Where is that file? Thanks