Andreas

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Echo: This board is full of a bunch of over educated, limp wristed pussys. Go field dress a deer this season and maybe a few red pixels in a bitmap wont make you so squeemish. As for Germany not selling it, that sounds like a problem YOU the people of Germany should do something about. Your freedoms are obviously being trampled on over there. We dont tolerate that **** here in the States.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Always nice to have the considered opinion of what is obviously a well-educated, capable of independent thought person with an amazing level of tolerance.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Warphead-: Lindan is the specialist for Hessian dialects (or better Nassauisch), but I guess "Mer mache uns de Gass nunner!" is even more incomprehensible. But different accents and maybe Austrian (which is not German of course! ) would be a nice mod.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Not Austrian for God's sake - I think BTS should adopt a policy of being tough on Austrians, and tough on the causes for Austrians!

The really good ones are the Pommy soundfiles... 'Shove that pineapple Fritz!' is my all-time favourite. For the Germans we should have regional mods, as Andrew suggested, along the lines of the regional Asterix & Obelix comics: - Schwaebisch (Moi aam, moi aam - Mein Arm) - Niederbayrisch (Dea hot gsessa - Ja Volltreffer) - Hessisch (Wir machen uns weg, als die Strasse nunner - Nichts wie weg hier) - Berlinerisch (Ick hab die Schnauze voll - Kamerad) - Latein (for officers) - (Alea Iacta Est - Los los los)

I am having a bad bad case of deja vue here... Apart from the sensible comments from Slappy, has anyone thought about how it would look like if someone wrote a review of the game that carried pictures which 'unfortunately' had the Blood&Gore mod done on them? Or would write in the text 'Yeah unfortunately the game comes without the splatter, but you can DL flying limbs and torn intestinal matter.' That maybe would not please BTS, and could also negatively affect their sales in what I assume to be their prime target market, mature war gamers. Quite apart from the effect it might have on the BPS in Germany, one of the largest markets for CMBO, AFAIK. Just a thought. Apart from that, this whole debate just emphasises the need for a working search function. Some people simply do not comprehend how CM works in terms of casualties. Whether that is actual stupidity and denseness or sheer bloodymindedness I am not sure and leave up to those who waded through this whole thread.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: [QB]a) Do infantry know that they hit a mine (maybe that depents on the type of the mine?) How do they know the exact position of the minefield after hitting ONE mine? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> a) Yes, because they observe it much more closely, since they are not locked in a steel cage. they don't, they know they are in it, but they don't know the extent, shape, or whether it is all one type of mine. Endless games were played by the Afrikakorps with tin-cans, when they retreated. According to one book I read a long time ago it worked like this: put in some mines, that stops the pursuit, when they start digging, they find very few mines, and many tin cans. After 30 yards of tin cans they decide it was just the few mines, get back in the truck, drive 50 yards, hit mines. Lather, rinse, repeat.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeff Duquette: It does my heart good to hear someone else is actually sitting down and reading Von Mellenthin. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Standing, most of the time. I read it on the commute into London (Connex South Central anyone?) Commissar, unfortunately I am no arty expert, but my grandfather (who was a German CBF observer with Heeresgruppe Nord) told me that they would register (spotting round) by firing an airburst onto the target quite high up, so that the target would not notice and would not move out to avoid the fire. Tabulating whether this airburst was correct could take 1-15mins, according to him.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Dr. Brian: I suggest further reading on this material, but open it up to Red Army/Soviet accounts, not those written by western or german observers, especially accounts before 1980 which are heavily german biased. Great topic for discussion.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I agree with the latter, but despite the former here is a footnote from von Mellenthin's Panzer Battles (p.297): <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>The Russian artillery was very formidable in quantity but somewhat lacking in its methods. Accurate survey and 'silent registration' had little place in their system.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Lateron he is going into a bit more detail, mentioning the creation of small lanes up to 100yards wide, leaving room for the infantry to advance while the Germans still thought the barrage was in process, and the mistake by the Germans to create hard shoulders and counter-attack at the point of breakthrough, instead of taking into account the fact that the farther advanced Red Army elements would no longer have artillery. Basically all what Jeff in his quote said. Very interesting on an operational level, but all really a bit outside the CMBB scope. What von Mellenthin suggests is that in the same battle, you could have situations where the Germans would face lots of arty (counter-attack at the point of breakthrough) or very little (counter-attack at the spearhead). Regarding methods, registration is clearly outside the game, CBF is outside the game, barrages are really outside the game, so not a lot to do there, except for thinking about the price in relation to flexibility and weight carried by a single FOO.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by John Kettler: I believe the answer is that they won't be in because implementing them requires Dynamic Lighting, which in turn is a huge hit on graphics in a game which is already pushing boatloads of polygons, many many more than a typical first person shooter has, in fact. Expect BTS to not do anything like this until the engine rewrite, by which time the necessary graphic processing power should be cheaply available. BTS wants to keep the game playable on most PCs and Macs, rather than requiring everyone to go out and buy a cutting edge computer. Hope this helps. Regards, John Kettler<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> To quote Angus Deaton: 'Is the right answer!' Flares are dynamic lighting, so you can't do it in this engine. If you want to simulate an illuminated battlefield, fog and dawn/dusk will have to do.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Colonel_Deadmarsh: Are there any meta campaigns getting ready to start that are in need of players? This is something I'd like to try.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> CMMC always needs reinforcements, but you may end up with a staff command and some training for a time before you get to actually fight. It also is a long-term affair. Turn two has just ended after about eight weeks. Lots of fun though. Email jbailey@resolutecapital.com

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Maximus: Fionn was very unstable at the time in question.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Is that the pot calling the kettle black here or whatever funny expression the English use? Nice style Maximus, just go and slag off people who can't defend themselves. A notch down from your usual behaviour of slagging off people like Rob/1. Agree with Bil completely.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jarmo: Waaaahh! Come back boys, I was only kidding! My thread is sinking! :eek:<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Since you were whinging, I took the liberty to email the suggestion to Steve.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Simon Fox: I'm an Aussie you know not a septic. We only crow after we've won not before. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Lucky you, you might have to live in a septic tank otherwise... Heading over to the mysterious General Forum now.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Simon Fox: Well now we've had a jolly old time slagging off Mace you can send me a turn cos no one has bothered today and I'm sitting here playing the AI while a bunch of women are jabbering away in the kitchen. Help!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Nah, I leave you to the women's mercy (now there's an oxymoron). Have to wait until tonight matey. What do you figure is the probable scoreline for the Aussies at the next test? I predict 970:0 with two innings and nine wickets to go. Or somefink.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Simon Fox: Geddit?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> What's the point, Mace won't geddit anyway? Now if Finns were such Ubersoldiers, why did they need trenches??? Seriously though, this is a good suggestion. Did BTS say anything regarding whether both sides could have trenches? Apparently the Red Army at least sometimes created emplacements very close to the German frontline, to shorten the distance the assault would have to go.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by aaronb: If it worked, it would be brilliant, but my test just now says 'nope'. So you have to get a company or above, then scoop the company HQ's. Or leave a platoon leaderless - not a good idea.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Aaron, still the old signline, eh? Those were the days... I think there is a misunderstanding here. When designing a scenario you can delete single squads, but keep the HQ. When buying in a QB, you can not do that, you have to buy the unit as a whole. And yes, the 3" mortar is shaggadelic. It was one of the few pieces of kit that the Germans envied the Commonwealth for, since it is far superior to the 81mm mortar they had. The other being the 'automatic' field guns, the 25pdrs with their high ROF.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Runyan99: I was wondering about this too. I almost never read about German security forces. I too assumed they were kind of like the NKVD, and were responsible for rear areas and such. Maybe they played a larger role on the East Front?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I think that is correct. They were used to fight partisans and guard rear areas and important installations, e.g. bridges. Of course with the disintegration of the German frontlines in 1944 they often found themselves plugged into the line as a stopgap.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by PzKpfw 1: Australlian tales of killing German paras in the air, are just that tales. Regards, John Waters<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Oh John, will you never learn? Good tale vs. reality - which one do you think will win???

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: About the coding : I propose we don't discuss this. I start this and other threats to deliver and discuss ideas. If some of them find the way into CM2, great, but that is an decision of BTS anyway, so we can spare us the time - agree?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> That makes it a bit difficult to answer your questions and c), since the answer is (you guessed it) 'coding'. Maybe it will be changed, and Steve (IIRC) has acknowledged it is not realistic, but it is fundamentally coding related, so how can you not discuss this? Regarding abandoned weapons, I believe there is a misunderstanding here. IIRC Steve said over a year ago that abandoned means 'slight damage, can be repaired between battles in operations, but can not be used again within a single battle'. Knocked out means 'can not be used again, since the damage is either terminal, e.g. tank brewed, or so heavy that field workshops can't help it'. Gone. Using enemy equipment, it is all well to 'I could imagine' that this happened on a CM battle level. I am not so sure, and I have read precious few references to it. Again, the abandoned would mean that the weapon is out of action for this battle anyway, and since it is an enemy weapon, you would not have the spares to repair it between battles in ops. If you can show somewhere that in fact enemy weapons (guns/mortars) were turned around on the enemy on a regular basis, I am sure that BTS will be most interested in this kind of evidence. But the burden of proof would be on you. If a gun crew routs, it was SOP to render the gun useless, by getting rid of some part of the breech, so even if the crew just ran away, the weapon would still be unusable. Bidermann in 'In deadly combat' relates one such instance, where they were driven off their PAK, but rendered it useless.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Slapdragon: By the way Torsten, I have this great multilevel marketing scheme that I need some really sharp pegs to participate in, and you sound like just the type I need. You send me 5 dollars, and then sign up 5 people to also send me 5 dollars, and you 2 dollars, so that you double your money. Let me know if you want to be one of my first salesmen.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> You are not trying to sell that bridge again, are you Slappy? Anyone want a Volvo 340, 87k miles, needs a pit of spit and polish, good runner? Two in this thread and counting...

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: It was a post by Redwolf in this <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Ah that's what I thought. I would second 'Panzer Battles' as a good read. Reading it at the moment, and it tgives you a good overview of the major battles. Mellenthin has a bit of an axe to grind, but seeing when the book was written, that is not surprising. Regarding crews bailing, just in case anyone is interesting, I found a few references to crews not bailing when the tank was hit in 'Tank tracks'. It is in the appendix, more correctly in the citations for decorations awarded. The equation is roughly: Tank was hit, crew did not bail, TC got an immediate MC or MM, if he survived. There were about half a dozen of these in the whole regiment throughout period 1944-5. There is also an MC for a Sergeant whose tank was shot up at Maltot, and who continued hanging around, directing infantry and some tanks. For some reason the fact that they awarded medals to these guys indicates to me that it was not expected behaviour.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: It said something like, for example, a normal infantry soldier counts 3 points, a crewman 2 points. Is that right? If so, then it would be a very big error, a tanker (gunner?) should be at least double so valuable like a normal soldier.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Interesting - where did you read that? I thought it was the other way round?

I totally agree with Clubfoot. Feedback, particularly constructive feedback is most appreciated. I had not done anything for a while, but after I mentioned this elsewhere, some people came back with feedback on my scenarios, and that got me to start on some new ones. At Der Kessel, we have a system whereby we class scenarios either as 'historical' or 'semi-historical'. The latter are the sort of 'Anyday, August 1944' scenarios that should still be based on realistic force compositions, but are on home-made maps, and with no historic background. The DL figures for these (so Grego told me a while back) are a lot lower than those for historical ones. I think that all of us at Der Kessel would be open to criticism of a scenario billed as 'historical', regarding force composition etc. But as always it is the tone that maketh the music (German proverb, my Granny again) If you find fault with anything, you can email me and tell me about it. State your sources, be reasonable, and I'll change it. Come in saying 'what a bunch of horse-manure, you suck as a designer, and your mother was a hamster', and surprisingly I would be less inclined to listen to you. Manx, I can well understand the feeling of frustration. Been there, done that, got a medal, and smarter in the process. If you need to take some time off, do it, and come back relaxed if you feel like it. It is all for the fun of it, and not worth getting all worked up. Keep up the good work.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: Do the AT crew know what they hit? I mean, in battle conditions?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> They have Zeiss glasses (either their own or 'liberated') and they would see the tank retire or stop and brew. But seriously, from the memoirs of Bidermann ('In deadly combat', Kansas University Press 2000, a must read) who started as a Panzerjaeger on the 37mm At gun in 163 ID in Russia, I think they would know what/if they hit. Their life depended on it, and the crew commander is there to observe the fall of shot.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: [QB] An interesting point - it seems to me that the guns in CM are able to fire a special spot, it looks more like lottery what they hit. Of course, that could be a problem with the - often and easy forgotten - game abstraction. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Good point - you could e.g. see the 'Gun damage' message as an indication of a turret-ring hit. While the gun would still be functional, it would also be aimed at one point only, so it is technically not correct, but the effect of either would be that you retire and draw a new tank.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Scipio: Maybe I'm wrong with this, cause I think the normal AT gun wasn't used for infight, more on distances of 1000m and above. On close distance like in CM they are much more lethal.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Distance is a huge issue. The Germans were able to take out tanks at very long ranges using the 75mm and 88mm AT guns. Previously (and to do the turret ring stunt) when encountering medium Soviet tanks with their light AT guns, they had to hold fire until the tanks were less than 500m away. Not very nice. Later-on they upgraded, and the consequences were felt by the Western Allies. If a heavy AT gun has a bead on you from say 1,500m away, you are powerless in your Sherman. It is almost certain that you will not even know what hits you, and the chances of taking out the gun before it gets you are very slim. If you have not been hit, you pop smoke and make yourself scarce. If you have been hit, you thank God that you can still think about bailing, than do it, and make yourself scarce. That is why bailing is better than dieing. You live to fight another day (or later on the same). The Allies had vast stocks of tanks, but they had a serious lack of crews for them in the bridgehead, as somebody else remarked. The US had to draft in infantry, and the UK had to disband regiments and merge them, to provide replacement crews after GOODWOOD. That is also why crews normally would not be expected to take their place in the line and fight as infantry. They were expected to go back, get another tank and try again later.