sbg2112

Well deanco, since I mentioned you before, it goes without saying I'm glad to see you join in....I'm afraid I didn't follow what you just described, but I think I'd rather just kinda start from the beginning. To reiterate a previous post of mine, we have these visual cues: color, width, solid/broken (and maybe others?). We need to come up with a clever mapping of those cues onto all the different line types that CM has. You say you aren't fond of the thin lines -- what if they were applied more judiciously, such as just for C&C? (And we could use dashed lines for units that are out of C&C....) I've always felt that there just too many line colors in CM, and that was reinforced by taking a peek at 2020.bmp. That's why I'm so excited by this discovery.

Satisfying to whom? Speak for yourself -- I like it! But it would have to be judiciously applied..... Now we just need somebody who has the time to figure out how to polish this. DeanCo's demonstrated the right line of thinking: witness the color coding he used on his clipboard orders. We now have several cues we can use to differntiate the different lines: color, width, and solid/broken. This could be really cool.... [This message has been edited by sbg2112 (edited 02-25-2001).]

Actually, I mis-spoke: when I said "textured", I was thinking about line-effects such as dashed, etc. (To do this I guess you'd take a color band devoted to a particular color line and draw some pink bands across it; I realize these are thin bands, so maybe there's not much room to work.) Basically, use color and any other technique to develop a definite visual priority to the different kinds of lines. Your razor-thin lines look good, although perhaps a little too thin. Interesting how much more pronounced the waypoints are now.

Man, I thought this had to be a joke -- why wouldn't the game just render these with hardcoded colors like it apparently does the unit bases? Anyway, I looked at 2020.bmp, and it sure looks like it might be legit. Since I play with "Show all Paths / All Target Lines" on, this could help (give the illusion) of de-cluttering my orders screen. Hmm...I wonder if the engine allows these to be transparent (and if so, would it look good), or perhaps even textured???

Chris, One of the sites you have a link for (ASL WWII or some such) appears to have additional production data for at least some of the AFVs you don't have anything for yet. Don't know if the info is any good, but thought I'd point it out.

As for bombarding your own troops, this is why I set CM to Show all Movemement/Target Lines (or whatever it's called -- check the hotkeys). Makes for a cluttered screen during the orders phase, but it does avoid these kinds of oversights....

By the way DD, please e-mail me if you'd like to give my terrain gridder a try... I think it was your original terrain that made me want to write the utility in the first place. (To anyone else who may be interested in the utility, I'll make it available real soon now; first I'd like to get feedback from the modders.....)

I'm just the messenger -- don't shoot but http://www.gameai.com/ai.html has a list of games whose AI is considered in some detail, but has no mention of CM. I'm sure this news will completely shatter morale at BTS.

And for something somewhat different.... I had the two teams of a split squad embark onto the same tank. Several turns later, they were still on the tank and still had not rejoined. Either it's an oversight or it was a little too difficult to implement for seemingly little gain....

Like everything else (it seems) with CM, this has been discussed before. I seem to recall BTS saying that they couldn't do this at the time because it would up the requirements on video memory. And from what (relatively little) I know about graphics, there's a wee bit of work involved not so much in trying to slap the "decal" on, but making sure that it's clipped and everything. For example, what do you do when the round hit the front corner of a tank's hull? (For me, I'd say just pick one face or the other -- just give me an approximation of where the hole is.) But I'd also like to see it. I suppose there are gameplay issues as well -- would ruin AT ambushes if you could examine your newly perforated lead tank to get a sense of where the round originated. So it'd have to be done without adversely affecting FOW. Perhaps the holes wouldn't be visible until you're surveying the field after the battle.

Yeah, I s'pose Shift-V would work until you forgot to turn it back on and wondered why your men were levitatig above the ground..... Still, I guess it's the best we've got unless BTS changes the interface. I'd also like to hear whether this was the rationale behind the Shift-V command.... [This message has been edited by sbg2112 (edited 01-14-2001).]

Am I the only one who finds that selecting passengers riding on vehicles is a real pain? I find it very disruptive because it always seems to mean changing views and/or zooming in, and clicking the mouse once or twice. Perhaps a hotkey would work: since we have plus and minus to iterate thru all units, maybe we could have alt-minus or alt-plus to iterate thru units on the selected vehicle. Just an idea, and I don't care how it's done so long as I can select passengers without changing my view and losing my train-of-thought.

I've written a Java-based utility that will add grids to any terrain. It supports as many gridlines as you'd like, and you can specify the thickness of each so you can get major- and minor- grids if you'd like. You can specify the color for each elevation. Transparency is supported, and may vary either by elevation or by grid-line. I wrote this because I was using either DD's or DesertFox's terrain and missed the grids I'd had. Plus, I wanted very subtle grids that didn't distract from the scenery when viewed from view level 4 or higher. I'm very happy with the results; anyone wanna host a screenshot? I've sent it to MadMatt to get his feedback; while I'm not ready to release it to everybody I'm willing to let terrain modders have a look....just e-mail me, please -- don't clutter the forum. (Requires Java 2 plus Java Advanced Imaging. I have a readme I can post that has all the details, if anybody's interested....)

Actually, I think use of the withdraw command marks a certain level of experience with CM. As Peterk says, squads will not necessarily break when you have them withdraw. I don't know what the specifics are as far as the model goes, but if my squads are regulars are better, I don't hesitate to have them withdraw when warranted. I've had good luck withdrawing units without breaking, but that's because I make sure my squads are under their HQ's control before and after they withdraw. In a recent QB, I was attacking and one of my forward squads had just taken a two-story building when my opponent unleashed artillery. I immediately initiated an orderly withdrawal and lost only one casualty. I'm certain I would've lost the better part of a platoon had I not withdrawn. Over the next turn or two, that platoon moved past the building and into the woods, leading my attack. So, when attacking, don't assume that you can only go forward....And don't forget there are aspects of even an orderly withdrawal that can be exploited by your enemy, so use it judiciously.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>I think the only real issue here is the AI predictability of the hull turn.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I think you've nailed it; while this is an improvement in so many ways, it nevertheless seems like it can be exploited because it is so predictable. I can buy that it is more realistic and reflects actual doctrine, however, not every crew is going to fight by the book once the shootin' starts. BTS, why not make this less predictable? There's lots of factors that could go into the decision as to whether to rotate the hull, ranging from simple probabilities up to considering the crew quality or various aspects of a particular vehicle. Sure, people will still be posting anecdotes claiming bugs, but these are the same people who forget they are acting as a battlefield commander with "soldiers" that "think" for themselves. Like real life, your orders won't always be carried out the way you'd like, and your men won't always employ their weapons the way you'd like. C'est la guerre.

Sounds like a side-effect, possibly unintended, of one of the fixes. If I recall correctly, the readme mentioned that the file-saving logic would change potentially problematic filename characters into spaces. Sure sounds like the "\" is getting converted into " ". My guess is the logic probly does this for any non-alphanumeric. Do I win a slot as a beta tester for CM 2?

Man, if that's your definition of goofy..... Simply incredible!! The website is equally impressive -- check out the "historical documents" archive. http://www.horrido.org/radio.php3 There's a fascinating PDF of a German booklet called "Panzerknacker" -- supposedly it's about infantry engaging armour. Anybody wanna translate this? From the artwork, it seems to cover mines, demo charges, and 'schrecks. The original document was apparently 23 pages long. [This message has been edited by sbg2112 (edited 01-08-2001).]

Full, but only because that's the highest available. (In fact, I'm not sure I've ever played the other levels.) I've been among those hoping we'd get a higher level FOW. Do a search for all the things that've been proposed; one that comes readily to mind is not being able to see a unit's quality (regular, veteran, etc.) Now I'm not trying to resurrect a dead horse, because by now it's either not a priority for BTS or they've taken positions on why what we've got is all we need.

I have a half-track that got a little too far forward in my advance and lost one of its crew members. I managed to withdraw the HT without further damage, so I figured I could use it to bring up some of my other units. I ordered one of those units to embark the HT, and went to order the HT to pause to pick up that unit. However, it seems that while the pause command is still available (it's in the menu), the "SHOCKED" status is being painted where the "PAUSE <delay>" would normally be. My guess is that pause is working normarlly, it's just that I can't see the duration of the pause that I've ordered.

Any way to cross-reference or even integrate this with one of the unit databases? The combination of the two would give you the sim numbers with usage tips....

I'm using the Excel version but looking at it with StarOffice. Have to admit that it's not something I spend my spare time studying, but it is the first thing I look at when I want to play a canned scenario. I tend to key on the obvious stuff -- i.e., forces, scenario size, etc., but also like the recently added columns indicated whether the scenario is designed for 2 player, or against the AI. Great work -- sure would be nice if we could automate the maintenance of it....

John, It's there -- check the How to Guide about halfway down, note that it says that changes since the last beta are listed in italics.

The URL is http://users.pandora.be/aneric/index8.htm My CM buddy and I are playing the "campaign" by running thru the scenarios, although we're not playing them in their historical order. The maps are excellent and the battles have been memorable. We have one left (outside of the missing Stavelot scenario) -- La Gleize. I took one look at the map and said, "Good thing I just ordered a new computer...." By the way, there's an e-mail link at the bottom of the page... [This message has been edited by sbg2112 (edited 12-13-2000).]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The big thing we are thinking about is something that would remove the ASSURANCE that the other side has no more reinforcements.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I asked 'bout this in June. See http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/Forum1/HTML/005682.html. So I agree wholeheartedly with this.

And Steve, how about you and Charles playing a scenario and letting MadMatt post an AAR of it? You're probly too busy right now for such an undertaking, but surely you'll find yourselves needing a "non-violent" way to vent after a heated CM2 design session.... (I mentioned this in another thread, and several people seemed to approve of the idea.)