kump

Yea, and what a pain in the arse it was to number all those bmp's in the game to find the shared ones. Ouy. http://members.shaw.ca/grossdeutschland/moduniform.htm Sorry andrewtf, beat you to it.

As it relates to other war games, yes, CM is light years ahead of everything else in the graphical department. Sorry, didn't mean otherwise. I should have qualified that statement with respect to the latest and greatest 3D FPS and RTS big titles and the use of the latest 3D special effects of the higher end graphics cards. By the way, almost all these games suck anyhoo. I would not keep coming back to this game without the gameplay. The graphics will never keep you interested for long, its the gameplay that ensures you keep playing. But the CM graphics do pull me in like no other wargame ever has, and still its the best out there. Sorry, I'm a greedy customer, I want even more of it! But you put my fears to rest. Not that I was in anyway really concerned. The CM series always took visuals seriously and gave it a lot of time and effort, as well as having the best realistic tactical engine to date. Now get CMAK out already. It looks fantastic!

I think the idea here is not a "limitless" turn length game till everything is destroyed. I think they just want to not know the actual end turn. Call it an option of the Extreme FOW or something. The only hint could be an implied time estimate in the briefing, but other than that, you have no idea when the scenario will be terminated. Note I mentioned "option". I don't much care for it and like they way things are, but I can understand and appreciate the suggestion.

Wait, wait, wait on there. Please, lets not bring up the gameplay versus graphics angle. It may be true, but it comes out as an age old defense for games that are behind the times and don't get the attention they deserve, which CM isn't. This reason is used for war games that just don't look that great. Smaller teams and budget, you need to concentrate on gameplay. I understand the "sacrifice" when it has to be made and agree that gameplay should always be the priority. However, CM is the one that bucked this theory, that you can't have BOTH in a wargame. Bless you, you've totally shown me the way. So yes, I demand good graphics as well as game play. Why not? CMAK is going to be a little behind the times in graphics because CMx2 will be the next face lift. There has been no effort to imply otherwise. However, CMAK fills a missing hole in the current CM series, and that is of course the desert front. My interest in the Africa battles is really small. But the changes to CM and the new graphics is enough to persuade me to purchase and own it. I'm thankful for the decision to come out with it. Those new Sherman models look fantastic. I'll be a desert fan in no time, I'm sure. But don't fudge on the textures to get out two months earlier, because visuals are important to your fan base as well. There, I said it. I like good visuals and I hope it is important as well in further CM releases. Don't scare me like that!

Not being a fan of the Africa front, I ignored the announcement of CMAK. Boring. Now that I've seen the screen shots and read a bit on the game, I must have been on drugs. I hate it when I have to admit my stupidity and end up wanting something this badly again. Terrain looks outstanding. The colors are right on, even the grass The new doo-dads are really impressive. Those new Sherman models are the "to die for" kind. I'm looking forward to putting my advance order in. I'm very impressed that the "old" CM engine can go another round and put out such impressive visuals. Excellent job. Only CMx2 could possibly top this.

Since I've recently had to "catch up" on the CMBB mods, I've had to re-introduce myself to the MODers work. One thing the mod fans try to do is not name favorites and "best" mods, because the MOD authors are all appreciated and some times, the more the merrier. But I'll break that rule this once and just give a personal opinion for what its worth (nothing). 1. German Tanks, Early Canon first introduced a set which I considered best, but you will need to try it out, because its really a matter of taste. However, Panzermartin introduced a some very good textures, followed by Limey who got the rest of the tank lineup to match. This became my current favorite. 2. Soviet Tanks There is quite a few here. Mr.Noobie got better at this and released some excellent mods that included winter snow covered textures, my favorite type of thing. However, I tend to lean to MikeyD whenever I can. As some point out, you want similairity on the battle field. And of course, anything by AndrewTF is worth the download and then some. You don't even have to "review" his stuff, just get it. 3. Terrain Things like grass, well, you just pick what you want. This really is a matter of taste and you just need to experiment here to find out what floats your bubble. For trees, the originals are fine. But for some of us, we like to "raise" them a bit, so you can see the troops a little better. You now have two excellent choices for this and just need to try them both. First out was Tanks a Lot which does a good job (who also has done some must have peasant huts). I was happy to find recently another excellent choice by Strontium Dog, my currently installed set. For other odds and ends, anything you see by JuJu is also a sure winner. 4. Miscellaneous For just about anything, I quickly download any vehicle I see from m_bergman, AndrewTF, and MikeyD. But this is not exclusive and I'm always impressed with work by GordonMolek, Limey, Mr.Noobie, Panzermartin, Canon, and a host of other MOD authors that I have currently installed and using but have left out. Unlike yourself, I have broadband and don't mind downloading mods and I have an extra game directory installed for observing MODs up close (screen shots are sadly lacking sometimes). No matter the artist, I give it a go and admire the hours they put into their work. Some less so than others, but all really appreciated. All the MODers, regardless if I use the mod or not, are heros and tops in my book. Now if Magua would one day return and make an appearance for CMBB, things would just about be perfect.

Beautiful addition. This was a sweet home coming gift. You shouldn't have! Glad to see your still at it AndrewTF, and you still amaze. One of those auto download must haves. Thanks!!!

-- deleted -- Got to learn this forum all over again. Oh, and hi Michael. Long time! [ August 26, 2003, 12:50 AM: Message edited by: kump ]

If they make CMx2 Real Time, well, I'll never come back, maybe. The current CM play style is what keeps me coming back, over and over. Every time people think I've vanished from the CM world, I get pulled right back due to having no, nadda, nothing, zilch, of any other strategy game out there that comes close to CM gameplay. Not that I would be against changes, to the better. But the basic mechanism works too well to opt for the over crowded "me too" RTS business. I'll play something else to get variety, but I've never returned and played a game as many times as the CM games. They have always exceeded my expectations. Now who ever suggested such a thing, wash your mouth out with soap. The prodigal forum lurker... [ August 26, 2003, 12:49 AM: Message edited by: kump ]

Thank you Tom. THANK YOU! The Ardennes mod blew me away for CMBO and was a welcome addition. When I saw the preview of a light snow mod for CMBB, I broke down in tears. Preview looks fantastic and I'm really hoping to see this mod come to completion. Beautiful and greatly anticipated.

Industrializer You and the target may have LOS and be at the same height, but the problem is a rise in the ground between you and the target. The target is "gun down" and the rounds keep hitting the rise. The best tactic is to cancel and manuever to avoid the ground rise, either advance or go around. 1.02 was supposed to fix this, I thought. But I see the same thing occur. Maybe it will be addressed in one more patch. If you don't notice this unfortunate tank behavior, you can throw all your ammo away. I wish we could get a message when targetting and the AI would just cancel the target if it can't hit it, period. For now, you'll just have to keep your eye open for this type of nutty behavior. CMBB is about as perfect a product I've ever owned. I hope this one flaw is buffed out so it shines even more.

I've been playing a lot of user made scenarios for early 41 war, especially June 41'. One of things that is surprising me is how the KV tanks and T-34 M41's are so numerous. I play one scenario, June 41, and I face 12 KV-1 M40, 3 KV-2, 1 BT-7 M39, 1 T38. Wow. I wonder what the two smaller tanks were in there for? A little recon, probably. Thank goodness for my infantry! It would have been impossible without them. Very next scenario, June 41, I face 3 KV-2, 16 T-34 M41, 8 T-26. Almost all the T-34 M41's are Veteran or better, 4 as high as Crack! I understand that some designers want to make it challenging, and I even succeed by using my infantry smartly. But this sure seems a little on the strange side. Still loving it. I imagine I'm there at the front, and I'm getting to experience all the best the Russians have got. Lucky me! On a side note, I don't know why some Russian players complain about the early war T-34 in CMBB, they are proving pretty difficult to take out with German tanks. I'm elated to get a gun damage result! I guess some folks want them to be virtually invincible. And a thing about CMBB. I didn't know if I liked the changes over CMBO. After some play and unlearning my CMBO playing style, I wouldn't have CMBB any other way. This is far and away a big improvement and everything, and I mean everything, just comes off so much better. The more I play, the more I appreciate it.

I also have to chime in. Mr Noobie, your mods are getting exceptional. The latest T-34 is very good and everyone should know by now I'm a snowed-on fanatic (thanks to Magua and Marco of CMBO fame). The decent T-34 snow effect is something I've been waiting for. Never happy with whitewash either, historical or not. Boy, there sure are a lot more models to do... Thanks!!!

"Ivan, you go up the center and take out any ATGs you sight. Peidrov, you go hail marry on the left flank. On two, go."

Thanks. This is great to see you posting news updates for CMHQ. A big THANKS!

Becket, I get the same with GeForce4 and AA enabled. If the text is gone, switch to desktop and then return to CM. It should be fine then. An annoyance, but its small. In the 3D portion, everything is fine and the 2D screens are fixable by doing the program switching jig. Give it a shot next time it happens and see if it helps. As to the cause. My guess its a screen refresh with the 2D text that happens when GeForce is doing something and we lose the refresh for some reason. When you switch from the desktop back into CM, the re-update of the screen gets the text rewrite that then works. Hmmm... Always a text thing with the working AA stuff... I've seen similar issues with other programs, but not all.

And I will take this opportunity to share some experience I have had with a host of graphics cards with Anti-Aliasing for CM. I currently possess each of the following graphics cards. Voodoo 5500 GeForce 3 GeForce 4 Radeon 9700 Anti-Aliasing This technique improves the beauty of CM in such big ways, its amazing. Some say turning up the resolution is just as good. NO, it is not. You have to see it. I've had resolution rediculously high and you still get the jaggy swim. AA gets rid of it. Voodoo5500 By far, the best AA I've ever seen. Nothing can compare to it. It was the most lovely CM ever. Folks who debated with me here two years ago just did not understand. You have to see it. Problem with Voodoo5500 was a real slowdown with lots of transparent smoke. It no longer has the speed or memory you want. But boy, it was beautiful! GeForce3 After 3dfx went out of business, this was my next card from the company nVidia who bought them out. Boy, was it great with other games. Good speed. But for CM, it stank. Why? Because it said it was AA, but it wasn't even done close to the Voodoo5500. The textures didn't swim and looked better with AA, but the model edges were still jaggy and suffered the jaggy swim as the cameral moved. Yuck! I sure missed having 3dfx around. GeForce4 I wooped with joy with this card. It was real AA! nVidia finally got it right! Maybe they learned from the 3dfx design? I do not know. All I know is that the AA support on this card is what I expect. The jaggies are now taken care of. I had such a hard time convincing people why I knew the 3dfx card was better than the GeForce3 nVidia card, but you know how religion is. Most people thought it was just a loyalty thing with me. NOT SO! I was now very happy with the nVidia, and mostly because of CM! Its still not as good an AA as the Voodoo5500 was (which is still the best looking CM I've ever seen), but it is getting close and AA works as it should. Radeon 9700 Man, this ATI card screams. It really made my new 2.8 GHz machine scream with even the most demanding games. Very impressive. But for CM, what a shame! It lets you set the AA up to 8xAA!!! But its just like the GeForce3 card, it does a good job with textures, but the polygon edges in CM still have the jaggies and you get that swimming mess. I love this card for what it does for other games, but Combat Mission isn't best with it. Sooo... the GeForce4 was the best for Combat Mission for me. The Voodoo5500 would be the best, but it comes up short in other areas due to being long in the tooth (smaller memory and slower performance). Speed counts too, and though the GeForce4 is a tad slower than the Radeon 9700, it does AA for Combat Mission much better and that makes a huge obvious difference to the eye. Can't wait for the next set of cards to come out. I hope the Anti-Aliasing works better for all of them. Trust me, you want AA with Combat Mission. Its a whole better visual feast. [ February 09, 2003, 08:06 PM: Message edited by: kump ]

A word about CM Outpost bandwidth... The reason there is good bandwidth at CM Outpost is the same reason there is no advertisement. I pay for the service. A continuous drain. But its my own small contribution to the greatest wargame series ever done. Even if I'm not actively updating it, I want it to still be available for those who are new to CM and may want some of the "old" stuff. The bandwidth is the main reason I no longer host new mods. I have a monthly limit and the fees for going over the limit is extreme. The browsing through the Catalogues and downloading the CMBO mods are already enough, though the average monthly bandwidth usage is still well below the "panic level" (about half). But I fear that monthly limit like the plague, so I tread with care. My hats off to any site hosting mods for the rest of us, even though it may be a free hosting site and have really slow downloads. You take what you can get. The real killer for maintaining a site is not the money, but the time required to do the work. It eats up a lot of it. Free site or not, you can't escape the time investment. So sites using free hosting services get my respect as well. A message from the sponsor...

CMBB Patch 1.01 Update Yea, I've been away for awhile. Like looking for a job. But I kept the site up and running. I've now finally got to doing some updates. The missing CMBB Patch 1.01 new models and textures have been added to the CMBB Catalogue. Don't count on a rush of updates, my time is limited, but I'll be obtaining the missing mods and adding them SLOWLY. I'll also update the broken links to the sites that no longer exist. Priority will be CMMOS supported mods. Sad about Gordon. I fell down and cried. [ January 30, 2003, 10:58 PM: Message edited by: kump ]

And don't take anyone's word for it, compare all the available faces on the same page. http://cmoutpost.net/lists/cmbo_odds_ends/faces.htm EDIT: And Mike Stewart's was the latest and greatest for hi-res detail, also at Tom's CMHQ. You have search for it carefully on the page, there is a link for it in the text somewhere... [ November 01, 2002, 12:54 AM: Message edited by: kump ]

The problem is the models themselves are hard coded into the CM games, as well as the stats. The current CM engine would not allow you to exchange models between games, or transpose them. The only solution I can see to this is buy CMBB and play with the Ferdinands on the eastern front. Besides that, will have to wait until future CM releases.

Hey ColumbusOHGamer! Is the site limited to number of connections and total bandwidth? I'm visiting now and tried a download and its crawling at 1.5 Kbytes per second, and that ain't fast enough to be considered a crawl. Its not just downloads, took forever to load the database pages as well. I'm going to consider its site rush hour and try again late tonight. Hope someone isn't turning down the spigot...

Hold on there pards. You can mod the textures all you want, but that would be a hot dog stand in the shape of a Jagdtiger. Models and internal game statistics (armor, speed, weight, etc) cannot be changed/modded. So using Ferdinand textures on a Jagdtiger would look just like a Jagdtiger, just a different paint scheme.

Paddington, I just dropped by the CMBO forum, which I do less and less frequently (CMBB posessed), and I just happen to see this post. How about using that little email link on the CM Outpost page and giving me a heads up on this type of thing? Lucky I just noted this post! I went and played with the link and for some reason, the FTP server was changed a bit. You will now find it works. You can now download the Gunslinger terrain mods. [ October 31, 2002, 04:23 PM: Message edited by: kump ]

-- Bump -- Well, well, well. This site is still up and running and I'm sure its been visited by many MOD Sluts sucking out of it as much as they can. So far, the bandwidth story has not been told. There is hope. Hope this site sticks around. When it really gets populated, just how much bandwidth per week is available? Seems quite capable so far. Excellent job on the database and letting MOD authors input themselves. Brilliant. Just what the doctor ordered.