SirReal

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Well, that certainly puts a damper on my enthusiasm... :/ It's clear Paradox goofed, then, as I do indeed have the copy. What drivers are you talking about regarding the dual CPU problem? Unless I put it on single CPU affinity, I have weird graphics glitches, where the guys in the strykers and the stryker slats keep flickering and changing. Really ugly. I'd very much like to run both cores... so which drivers need updating? I'm running XP Pro SP2, btw.

And here's a screenshot (no spoilers) I made just for you. It's a special formation, I call it For Uranus, or FU for short:

As far as I can see, there isn't one. I had to postpone my first bottom-smacking session for a few minutes, turns out the latest Radeon drivers are at 7.6, and I only had 7.2 installed.

pad152: Yes, it does. It's allergic to dual core, too. I had to switch it to single core affinity, or stuff flickers. Could be the video drivers, I suppose. I have a Radeon X1900, so I'm expecting a bit of choppy seas in the graphics department. The game did automatically adjust to my monitor though, runs in 1920x1200 with no complaints. I'll refrain from posting screenies until I've updated my video drivers, things keep popping in and out of view when zoomed close in.

It seems to work! The eLicense thingy is nowhere to be seen, and I'm about to start the first scenario of the campaign. Only one problem: It's designed by Rune. Can't be good. Here goes nothing...

Oh dear... I have a bad feeling about this: Theatre of War? Huh? Someone needs to practice their proofreading skills. Also, I'm getting a sneaky suspicion this may end up being a tease--- what if the eLicense thingy stops me from playing?? I will surely kill myself, which would be bad, because you lot would enjoy it all too much!

All your bile is belong to me! Now go away and bother me no more. I have better things to do than enjoy your greenish glow of hate. Next up: Installation!

Not a joke. I didn't expect it until the 27:th, so I'm just as surprised as you are. My guess? Paradox has so many preorders they have to start shipping early to ensure that everyone has it by the 27:th. I sincerely doubt that ordering from them NOW (I ordered a month ago) would get it to you earlier. Yes yes, I realize you're all green and spewing bile with envy. Buy look at it from the bright side: That's what I intended. Now, be sure and let the bile soak into the keyboard good and proper before putting it in the tumbledryer.

Got it by mail today. I pre-ordered from Paradox, and tonight I know what I'll be doing while all you losers are still playing CM1 games. Except for Rune. That bastard always has the goods first.

How people miss that Battlefront did not develop this game is beyond me.

We don’t have preceding fire in game. Aiming is made on spot where enemy is present in the moment of shot. I hope that is clear. </font>

AI uses the same code for area fire – it aims in certain spot that you’ve told him to. So you can try to make such experiment as I’ve already told you. </font>

Here is a little experiment for you. Take any gun you like and give the command AREA FIRE for about 700meters away. Wait for about 5 shots and you will see aiming system in action. But don’t forget that gunner is aiming better with each shot he provides. Such system works for AI also. It doesn’t have any lasers as I often hear here from forum members. It’s absolute nonsense if I can say so. </font>

Well, how much harder is it to hit a moving target than a stationary one, at 700m, given an initial velocity of 760m/s (which, of course, drops quickly) I'd say a flight time of about 1.5 to 2 seconds. Given a target speed (which is really hard to estimate at that distance) of between 20 and 30 km/h, that means that the tank will move between 8 and 17 meters in that time. And a PzIV is only 6 meters long. So hitting it on the first shot would require a really skilled gunner. REALLY skilled.

What do you mean by saying that??? Could you please make it more clear for my future clarifying this issue. </font>

As far as I can tell, accuracy isn't modeled; T34, BT-7, PzIII, PzIV, StuG are all pretty much the same. What really makes a difference is the crew skill set - which in turn is set by the scenario designer to make a challenging mission given a piss-poor AI.

Ah, yes. Well, the enemy tanks are AI controlled, meaning they'll be driving on a straight line through the town. So it is an ambush for moronic enemies. Works fairly well. Now, had the "AI" had any "I" in it, things would be different indeed.

Yeah, you need to micromanage a bit. The AI (Actual Idiots) believes that the best course of action is to aim straight into the building wall, so you'll have to order the tanks to target the enemy.

Once they have drunk enough they will fight anyone. And once you have the Finns, any other nationality would just be a terrible disappointment by comparison. So its probably just best to let them fight amongst themselves... [/QB]</font>

I would guess that the trigger rod would ignite the charge rather than snapping off? In other news, I ran it with Absolute Micromanagement now (my personal replacement for the Actual Idiots routines), forcing the tanks to select HEAT rounds, target only visible parts of the enemy tanks, don't move an inch, and press the little red button. Result, all soviet tanks dead, one Pz lost to russian infantry (at 25m!... damn those russians throw a mean satchel charge!).

Impossible. I've checked the entire stock of schnapps bottles, and they're all empty. There's no way they could have gotten hold of alcohol. Oh wait... During my plays, I have not ensured they load HEAT, I'll try forcing them to do that and see if I get better results.

Yeah, but my feeling is that even when they do fire and hit, the effects are less than impressive. They do seem to want to use the HEAT rounds against the T34's, though, which is a plus to the AI. ...On another track, to what skill would a german gunner during Barbarossa in '41 be trained, on a scale of 1-100? For reference, the game considers a stock SS elite gunner to have a skill of 80 (that's what they get if I just auto-add that an SS elite crew in the editor), while a gunner that survives three or four engagements during the campaign should easily reach 100.

None of the tanks had zero HEAT rounds.

How do I use the Defend order? Clicking on the defend icon seems to expect me to click on something on the map. But if I do so, the Defend icon doesn't stay lit.