Macisle

Thanks, Ben! Yeah, "cascade of horror" sounds about right. There are actually one or two sections of road that I made some design choices with early on that I now regret (can't remember my reasoning, either). However, they are in finished areas and would likely require days of work to redo. So...prolly not gonna' happen. Thanks! I'm certainly dying to have folks kill each other on it. Thanks! One of the goals of the project is to give players a sandbox that will let them really take the arty tools that BF has given them for a spin. In tandem, is wanting to give the keys for the primary barrage to the player and let him take control, make the choices, and "terra-form" as he likes. The trade-off is that players will have to spend the time in turns to let that happen and that realism may have to be allowed some elasticity with regards to the amount of arty a player has at his disposal vs. the tactical situation just at hand. In other words, normally the primary barrage would have happened before the start of the scenario and the player would have access to a reasonable amount of additional on-call support during his mission. In this project, the attacker is going to get both during the game and the defender is going to have a hand of arty cards balanced relative to the attacker. Additionally, the scenarios are meant to be the equivalent of multiple standard scenarios and will feature multiple waves of forces coming onto the map over long time periods. That makes for A LOT of artillery. So, the first time an attacking player experiences a scenario on the map (currently, four 4-hour scenarios are planned), he may feel like he has an insane amount of arty during setup. However, as the scenario goes on, he will likely come to see it as about right, or maybe even a bit low. His choices will matter a lot. He can flatten a small number of key areas, or degrade larger areas. He can use it to harrass enemy rear area movement, or lock enemy units in place. Depending on his preplanning work, he can do a combination of several things. But, because the scenarios are so long, he still has to keep an eye on supply and adjust based on the results he's getting and what he'll get with reinforcements. And, of course, the enemy will be responding... Testing vs the AI so far shows that modular constructions like I'm doing are very resilient against artillery and offer a lot of protection to hiding troops until the building section itself collapses -- which takes awhile. This goes for both medium and heavy howitzers. Heavy rockets can destroy small modular sections in single hits, but still require a number of direct hits (unreliable) to take out larger building sections. Anything less than 105mm is mainly useful for knocking out ATGs, laying smoke or attempting to top kill tanks. To take down a larger building complex, about 20-30 minutes of point/tight line medium or heavy howitzer fire on medium rate (heavy is less accurate and produces fewer building hits) seems to be required. In those cases, hiding troops will take light casualties until their actual building section collapses or a lucky hit knocks out a wall right next to them. When I test, I have the AI setup hidden on the bottom floors and be triggered to unhide and move higher by my actual approach. That way, I can get a feel for how much damage my opening artillery does. So far, I've been impressed with how much fight they have left in them after a 10-20 minute opening barrage. Of course, this is intended for H2H play. I can't wait to get play testing going on that. Alas, it will be awhile. But, that's probably good as it will be done after any changes made by the patch.

Thanks! Yeah...boy, was I but a babe in the woods when I started this thing. It's beginning to feel like LLF and I may have shared the Man Called Horse initiation. Though it looks very cool, I'm not planning on using the angled road mod. At this point, I don't want to redo anything unless absolutely necessary. Also, I'm not sure how it affects pathfinding and/or other. I don't want to introduce any unknowns. I've been pretty impressed with the TacAI getting around so far. I'm maximizing the number of roads on the map and also threading them inside blocks using non-paved styles. Quite a lot of the buildings have roads near/adjacent to both their front and secondary doors and that seems to help. With good waypoint plotting, vehicles are getting around quite well, too. Some alleys only allow infantry, but that is on purpose. Many will still allow vehicles. Some juicy potential play with the variables there. Another thing I've been pleasantly surprised with is how the TacAI displaces/routs. With the nature of the map and complex building structures, the troopers often get away and actually choose smart places to set up in. Quite a few times, I've found the AI has run away to the one spot in the building where I can't get a good LOS on them, but they can still engage me if I try to send troops in close to dig them out. Cool stuff. Of course, there is the occasional suicide rout (AI ignoring the 1-4 safer paths and choose the deadliest one). But that only happens every now and then. More often, the enemy gets away because there is so much cover around. Players will be looking to find and secure inside-block-facing building positions that allow them to whack enemy troopers retreating out the rear of buildings that they are hitting with heavy fire from the front. You can definitely rack up some kills that way. Players will need to spread their teams around to cover the area with eyes, lest they be ambushed by sneaky counterattacking troops as well. And, with lots of heavy arty, the battlefield will be constantly changing shape. Where will the next Pavlov's House be? That's one of the things I'm most excited about. At the beginning of a battle, you don't know which buildings will stay standing, how they will change, and how that will affect the combat. In one battle I did, I reduced about half of one of the biggest building structures with preplanned howitzers. Then later, as I got closer, I discovered that the AI had two surviving HMGs in there and they managed to displace to cover exactly my two vectors of approach. Ranged fire exchanges went badly for my guys (they were higher quality troops than mine) and my attack was failing. Finally, I ended up working my way from smaller building to smaller building out of their LOS. Finally, I managed to get a team behind them (the whole rear of their building was gone and they had no cover from the rear) and that fire got them. It felt very realistic and is exactly what I want for this. It won't be everyone's cup of tea, but for those that dig it, I think there will be many an hour of fun in store for them in Kharkiveskya.

Hey, guys. It's been awhile. I thought I'd drop a screenie and let everyone know that the project is alive and well -- if moving along rather slowly due to RL time demands. I had to take a long break or two again, but have knocked out a number of blocks on the map since my last post, along with a sizable chunk of elevation refining. Here is a screenie showing a bit over half the master map: This is East to West, with the Southern half of the map being largely visible. The SE corner is done, but wouldn't fit in the picture. There is a little more that is finished, but it wouldn't fit without showing skeletal areas, so I kept things to what is complete (well, other than final tweaks, flavor objects and elevation refinement). Alrighty, that's it for now. Macisle out!

I agree as well and definitely want BF to improve things like infantry's choice of doors, how they react to coming under fire, and assault tactics (being able to split off as many two-man teams as you want would help). On the other hand, at the macro level, there is the sticky problem of how the resulting extention of game time would effect overall player enjoyment. I'd very much like to see the obvious rough eges removed, but think there is a wall there on how far BF can push adding realism in terms of game assets being lost in relation to real world game time spent before it pushes overall game enjoyment down for most players.

Working on my dense urban map for CMRT (to be released after the CMRT module comes out), I've found that artillery feels underpowered on that kind of map. Building type matters a lot. Independent building types offer far less protection and durability than modular building types - even if they are similar in size. A large, tall multi-section modular building can hold up to a pretty massive amount of artillery. I've seen regular (with reg motivation) platoons hiding on the bottom floors of that kind of building take very light casualties from standard medium and heavy howitzers until the building section they are in actually collapses (then they get wiped). With say, 122mm howitzers, that usually takes 20-30 minutes of point arty at lower fire rates (which overall bring the building down more efficiently because they hit more often due to higher accuracy). So, it really depends on the map type, design and tactical situation as to whether arty is overpowered or not. On my urban map, medium mortars feel like pop guns vs the buildings and a full battery of point 81mm probably won't cause any noticeable damage to even a small modular building (still useful for other things, though). Players are going to get to use arty types and amounts they normally don't have access to because the map provides enough protection to facilitate it. But, like I said at the beginning, I've been suprised at the durability of the modular building constructions vs artillery. I feel like they hold up too well (and the independents are a bit too weak). On infantry, setting aside the unrealistic level of aggressiveness the player demands from his pixeltroopen, which is a BIG factor, I'd say that the current casualty rates are by design choice to facilitate enjoyable scenario lengths for most players. The more realistic the combat becomes, the slower it becomes. And that, while pushing up the enjoyment level for a smaller section of the player base, will push it down for a much larger section of the player base. My guess is that quite a few folks who think they would love slower, more realistic play, would find themselves playing less often for some reason. I think this is one of those cases where BF, in their experience, knows what most customers really want, even if the customers don't (rough edges, like rout paths, still need to be improved ). Having said all that, I'm one of those nuts that likes to push the realism side, so with my map project, you're going to get 4-hour battles. The concept may flop (and that's okay), but it should be a good testing bed for the community and hopefully will be good fodder for design discussion and ideas. Looking forward to the patch and CMRT module!

Didn't have any free time until today and then only just enough to test some things. Here's what I found: Modular buildings in the Stalingrad mod seem to all work. Only using Stalingrad buildings 1-18 in isolation from the rest of the mod also works. Have tested before, but testing again, using stock buidlings 1-8 in a clean Z folder, with building 8 files duplicated and renumbered to 9 to make buildings 1-9 does not work past 8. Building 9 does not show up. Doing a clean game installation from v2/4 master download does not fix the problem. So, the Stalingrad mod working would point to the issue being related to file structure, but the fact that stock files themselves don't work past 8 adds hassle, since they can't be used as a control. I didn't have time to try tagging the Stalingrad files to see if that makes them stop working past 8. Will try that next, but I may not have time until next week. My game time is very limited these days.

Very tasty looking, but the name sounds like something the lads order at the late-night diner after an unsuccessful evening of carousing.

I did try the Stalingrad mod way back when and to my knowledge, it worked. I always have buildings 1-8 present in the mod folder, so alas, that isn't a fix. Yeah, logic would point there, but I've tried things based on that in the past and no joy. I'm tied up until mid-week, but will retest the 8-9-10 transition and Stalingrad mod on my day off (Tues). I'm thinking of doing a fresh test with "clean" stock files 1-8 and then renumbered duplicate stock files for 9-10. That, plus a full test of the Stalingrad mod, followed by Stalingrad buildings 1-10 to see if there is a drop off after 8. I'll report back in after that. In the meantime, if anybody wants to suggest a specific test, feel free to post your idea. Thanks again, guys!

It's set on Soviet Union. Thanks for taking the time to post that graphic, Ben. None of these files are missing as far as I can see. Maybe it would be helpful for me to post a few graphics to show what's happening and what my files look like. Here is a screenshot taken when my personal Z is loaded. That includes all the mods I use for CMRT when I play the game or work on the master map for my project. No files are tagged and more than 8 modular building textures work -- except number 9. IIRC, nothing in that slot has ever worked and way back when I had to renumber Kieme's 9 texture to something higher to get it working. Now, here is what happens if I copy-paste exactly the same modular buidling files into an otherwise empty Z. Nothing works beyond 8, causing texture mismatches. Here is a screen of the full list of modular building folders and a sample of the files in one of the folders. The sample is number 12. Like I said, if I have my full personal Z installed, 12 shows up. If I copy-paste only the building files, 12, along with everything past 8 disappears. Tagged modular building files never work past 8. That includes both these mods and fresh rezexploded stock files renumbered above 8. Non-tagged fresh renumbered stock files past 8 will also not work. The only thing that always works is installing my full personal Z. But again, those same modular building texture files will not work past 8 in isolation in a clean Z. The only files that have worked that way are a few CMBS mod files from Kieme used as a test. And those stopped working when I tagged them. Pretty weird, huh!

Thanks, Ben. I've tried that with both mod buildings and renamed stock buildings, but no joy. I even created a set of 16 building textures with numbered walls to test with. That is what is so infuriating. The same files stop working if not used with the full Z. However, at this point, I've done so many things that it is all a blur. Since I'm coming off of a morale reboot period away from the game, I'm inclined to start fresh. Yeah, I did some testing and thought I was onto something by adding some pieces from stock that seem to be missing in Kieme's, but still no joy. Like I said above in response to Ben, I need to restart testing from scratch using solid controls. I haven't seen anything that would point in that direction. When my full personal Z is installed (buildings, vehicles, terrain, etc.), everything works fine. Otherwise, nothing I do can get me past 8 modular building textures, except for those few higher-numbered CMBS Kieme files (just added as a test), which stop working if I add tags to them. As I'm working, I usually flip the 3D model quality between Better, Improved and Balanced as needed (mostly stay on Improved). All other graphics settings are maxed. I've never seen the graphic settings noticeably affect what textures show up. The logical thing would seem to be MikeyD's suggestion that the Engine isn't finding all the files it wants and is thus ignoring numbers beyond 8. That might explain how my full personal Z works. Perhaps it is finding something it needs in a place I'm not aware of. However, I've tried so many things and been through all the files pretty thoroughly. As mentioned, I've even used stock files in a clean Z and started added stock files beyond 8 with changed numbers from 9 on. That didn't work either. I just had an idea for a new test, if anyone is up for it. If someone could test a group of more than 8 modular building textures in an otherwise clean Z at their end, confirm that they work, then dropbox them to me to test the same way on mine, that might tell us if we are looking at a problem with my install. What do you think?

Thanks for the reply, Ben. That's good to hear on no engine limit on the number of textures. That was my understanding and I've been using 16 Kieme textures in my personal Z forever. I still can't get things to work, though. Like I said, if I install my full personal Z, the 16 Kieme/custom textures work. If I remove the entire Z and only install the same 16 textures, they don't work beyond 8. Even if I do a fresh download of Kiemes and install them into a clean Z, I can't get them to work beyond 8. Nor does adding fresh-from-rezexplode renumbered stock textures to a clean Z. The only luck I've had getting beyond 8 textures with anything but my full personal Z is a few Kieme textures from CMBS. Those will work as long as I don't tag them. If I tag them, they stop working. It's very frustrating and has thrown me into a burn out break for a number of weeks. I have to get it sorted because the only way to make the player see the map correctly is with tagged custom textures. Testing shows that building the map to use the eight stock textures will create a texture vomit if the player is using mods. And, without a tagged texture pack, players using stock or non-targeted mods will also get a texture vomit as well. By that, I mean modular building sections will not have uniform matching textures. So, I need a custom pack and really want it to have at least 16 textures (Kiemes as base, with some custom additions). I'm wondering if it might be time to try uninstalling and reinstalling the game. I haven't tried that yet. -Just about everything else, but not that.

Yeah, the pancake look is definitely not ideal and I like your idea on the stories destroyed vs. stories of rubble created. That sounds like a hard coding job though, and maybe not doable for the current Engine, since it would mean altering a fundamental map elevation state during the course of a battle. I was trying to think in terms of the easiest way for BF to get a more natural state after section collapse. I've no idea how hard the coding would be, but since the knocked-out wall end state is already in the game both graphically and functionally and would solve the problem by simply applying it to any levels that were touching a now collapsed level (no matter what their initial state was), that would seem to be the way to go. If it were doable, that would sure be great to get into any upcoming patches/updates. CMRT Fester Platz Polozk is another good example of well-done "baked in" rubble. I may tackle some of that myself for the setup areas for battles 2-4 on my map (4 total planned currently) to show combat progress. But, like you say, it's very time intensive. Not sure if I'm up for it. We'll see.

Hi, all. I'm trying to put together a texture pack for my CMRT map project and am having trouble attempting to use more than 8 textures for modular buildings. Does anybody have any ideas or info that might help? Here is my experience so far: If I have my usual full Z folder contents (uses Kieme's) installed as a complete group , more than 8 textures work. If I isolate the exact same modular building textures and install them in a clean Z, the Engine stops at 8 and won't see past that. Tagging doesn't help. Duplicating the stock texture set and renumbering (to 16 in this case) doesn't work. Adding some textures numbered past 8 from a Kieme mod for CMBS does work if I don't alter the file numbers/names. But, if I tag the same file names, they no longer work. My understanding is that there is theoretically no limit on the number of textures allowed and I'd really like to have at least 16 for the modular buildings (I don't notice a performance difference between 16 Kiemes vs. 8 stock). Anyway, any help on this would be great.

Since this is where the eyeballs are are right now and the topic is relevant to some of the buildings in the CMSF2 demo, I thought I'd post here. I'm working on a map for CMRT that has a number of very large multi-section modular buildings and have a question/suggestion about how the Engine currently handles the remaining sections and their walls after a modular section collapses. As things stand, the Engine will maintain whatever original wall choices were made for the remaining connected sections. Meaning, if you had say, 13 levels of single doors, you will see a column of 13 levels of single doors. Here is an example from the CMSF2 demo (the top two levels had their walls knocked out by post-section collapse arty): Obviously, this is very unnatural - both visually and tactically. With large buildings like this, internal connecting section walls are sometimes removed by designers. This has a number of benefits, but in regards to section collapse, it creates a more realistic tactical situation in that remaining modular sections now have an open wall against incoming fire. Thus, for example a defending unit might have full protection from fire coming across intact outer walls, but much less protection from fire coming through sections with removed "internal" walls that were connected to the collapsed modular section. See the example below: From the front, this building offers full protection, but much less from the rear. Thus, a realistic and juicy tactical situation is created in that the attacker could try to flank the strong point and take it from the rear. I've tested this on my map and it works a treat. However, the downside is that the visual aspect is still not ideal. Sometimes it looks okay (like in the above pic, IMO). Others, very unnatural, depending on the building design and damage results. Like these magically floating buildings for example: It seems to me that an obvious, low-investment solution would be for the Engine to simply swap out the wall sections on any remaining formerly-connected sections with the graphic and functionality of the current knocked-out wall section, whenever a connected modular section collapses. So, instead of a column of single doors or nothing, you get a column of knocked-out walls. That would both solve the visual issue and provide a realistic tactical situation (less protection and easier spotting, but still more than a removed wall). Here's a quickie graphic summing things up: Anyhoo, would love to see this addressed in an update/patch. Until then, I think case B is best for tall/very large multi-part buildings and I'm favoring that mostly on my map.

Thanks, Ben! I'm one of your many fans, so that means a lot.

Wow -- thanks! Here's hoping the map delivers. It pretty much is wall-to-wall ambush country. I would really like to see how well RPG guys do against US/1st World armor in this environment because there are so many spots from which a unit can fire off a round and then displace to safety. Of course, that also means that it isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea. The workload on the player is by necessity maximized for him to make effective use of the more realistic terrain. He will often have to spend time at the soldier's view to judge each room of a building to determine how to tackle things from the standpoint of coordinated multi-team tactical maneuvers. Very meticulous use of waypoints and timings will be a must in those situations. Naturally, this will slow play down a lot. The slow, meticulous play, combined with the 4-hour multi-phase battle concept may end up being too much for some players. Also, I'm not at all attempting to soften potential fire lanes and hard points. So, the attacker may well find himself stymied more than he is used to -- in a very realistic way that rings true to stories of war. But then, he will have a lot of time...and...BIG ARTY. The defender will also get his share of beefy arty. Between the two, the battlefield will change a lot of the course of a battle. Testing so far shows that if players use the terrain well and hide, the arty will not be overpowering. Well, until the buildings are all gone! (The large buildings can take A LOT of artillery to bring down -- maybe too much ). For porting into CMBS, the vast majority of the buildings being modular potentially means the workload may not be so bad. However, if the door/window layouts don't port over, then it will be a MASSIVE amount of work to redo them. That is a lot of what makes the map what it is (and why it's taking so long). Combat would be largely nerfed if default windows and doors were used. I'm looking very forward to Berlin, too! It looks like the stock map for the module will be bringing a lot of what I set out to do in this project to the table. Since players will be experiencing that before they get my map, Kharkiveskya may not be as impressive as it would have been if they played it first. But, you can never have enough maps and they will be different enough to each offer a large amount of unique, enjoyable play, I think. Oh, almost forgot, my full master clocks in at 1,440 x 1,440 meters. So, it's not the biggest map out there (Berlin might be quite a bit bigger?), but the level of detail makes it feel larger than that. The current slice I'm testing is 864 x 832. With that size, I am able to get acceptable frames with Model Quality reduced to Improved and everything else maxed. So, the slices will likely be around that big, give or take. That may seem very small for 4 hours, but...well...maybe not. It sometimes took days to cross the street at Stalingrad. So, a few hours for a few blocks may be about right. Looking very forward to the playtesting! Yeah, the Ramadi map looks amazing and top notch! That is going to offer a lot of the same kind of combat environment I'm going for, but of course in a modern context. Super work there!

Thanks! It's not a historical map, but I think the nature of it will make for some interesting, memorable play. I look very forward to hearing about players' experiences on it!

Well, truth be known.... And I managed to flank and spank the raging Panther: With one hit, that mother took out nine men and TWO machine guns. Grrrr! Now, I gotta' see if I can save my insurance AT grenade team, uh.. whose arses are now hanging out in the wind close to my heavy arty, and when the smoke clears, perhaps in the LOS of the second Panther .

Thanks. Yeah, I know that one. If it's an AI-only scenario, giving the AI groups a demo team or two each (reduce if H2H also), along with such orders (as you know, they sometimes use them without orders) can really keep the player guessing and throw him some curve balls! Of course, if you have something very specific in mind for a scenario, you can get very detailed with the AI. Speaking of AI, again, I really encourage folks to give the Editor a whirl. Once you get comfortable with it and learn some techniques, you really have a goldmine of unlimited play value. I put in the AI plan for my current SE slice map test as fast as my fingers would go. And yet, without consciously anticipating it in the plan, I've now got an enemy AT gun thwarting my only chance at flanking a Panther holding up my attack. Along with that, a second Panther just bolted in outta' nowhere, skipped past my flanking fire and proceeded to take out 9 soldiers holding a jump off point in buildings at the center front line, waiting for heavy arty to finish working on the objective buildings across the street. That finished off the morale of that platoon...and thus that company as well. -Finishing up the first hour and getting ready for fresh troops to take over -- at least on that section of the front (not playing the whole thing, just sections of the slice). Of course, this is just map testing for the H2H campaign. But this is user friendly, helps me spot map issues, and gauge force levels vs. scenario time and gaining a feel for the "phases" in the 4-hour battle concept. So far, I think the concept is going to work. Of course, should I end up doing a solo-campaign, it give me ideas for that, too. But I'm not committing to that...yet.

True, but I think the unknowns and potential issues like pathfinding make it best avoided. A better technique for simulated basements is to have no windows on the bottom floor of a structure. This "faux basement" provides a refuge from LOS and small arms fire, along with very high protection against arty. A very large percentage of the buildings on the map have at least one area like this, with some structures having them extend across a number of modular pieces. The faux basements have a huge impact on play and really add realism, as buildings can stay contested for much longer, with both sides occupying parts of the building. One thing I've noticed in testing... If a structure has a long extension of door-connected similar pieces, like say, 4-story blocks across 3 to 7 modular extensions, routing troops will most often displace inside the structure, rather than going out of the building. In one part of the current test, the AI displaced multiple units inside the structure to exactly the points where I had the hardest time getting fire superiority on its displacing units. I was quite impressed! As I've tested the map, I've noticed this a number of times. With structures that have a lot of vertical levels, but not many horizontal module pieces, routing units are more likely to run out of the building -- even if they have excellent cover right next to them inside the current structure. However, I still think they are most often staying in the buildings if there are safe modular connections. It's just the occasional rout bug that kicks in and gets them killed when they should have used a safer spot in the same building, rather than running outside. My guess is that's why the patch is taking so long. The rout bug is incredibly hard to reproduce (in this environment, at least). It's definitely an issue, but I still can't identify exactly what triggers it. However, overall, I've been very pleased with the combat on this map. The level of urban density I'm creating seems to often mitigate against problems from the rout behavior, as there are so many places to run out of LOS to. Green troops do seem, unsurprisingly, more prone to the behavior, though. I was originally intending to give the Soviets more manpower, but with a lot of green troops. However, I think I'll dial that back to a bit less troops, but more Regular units as base. Both sides will get plenty to work with, though!

Funny you should mention that. Over the last couple of days, I've been testing the SE corner of the map, where the first battle will take place. That has some buildings with exactly the problem you mention -- elevation blocking movement through doors. In these cases, soldiers haven't run outside -- just stopped moving. I can plot the orders, but they just move as far as they can and stop. Sometimes, one level will be blocked, but not another (like ground is okay, but 2nd doesn't work). I'll be taking care of all those by locking in the same elevations for all parts of the buildings. In previous work on other sections, that's almost always been the solution (and the buildings look much better that way). Just once or twice, the modular pieces I chose didn't like each other and using other shapes solved the problem, rather than it being an elevation issue. An odd thing on elevations and multi-part buildings is that sometimes, the elevations don't look bad, but block movement. Other times, they look pretty extreme, but don't. It seems like a steep drop between modular sections can also sometimes provide cover. Last night, a lone enemy MG42 guy shrugged off 2-3 HE rounds from outside his building (no windows on that side) and then proceeded to slaughter 2/3 of a squad advancing on him, expecting him to be suppressed. He later survived the wall being shot out and was finally taken out by a second squad assaulting with supporting supressing fire from a nearby 2nd floor MG through the new hole in the wall. I'm pretty sure he would have been taken out by the earlier HE had the building pieces all been flush.

Thanks! Yeah, knowing how to use the Editor gives you a whole equal second hobby (actually multiple hobbies...map-making, scenario design, modding...) and essentially provides you with an unlimited pool of fresh battles. The more you use it, the faster you get. At this point, I can spend 30 min to an hour in the Editor and give myself 4 to 20 times that in CM gaming goodness. Even 10 minutes might yield a couple of hours of fun, depending on the particulars.

Philip Morris, this is YOUR fault!

Hidden schreck guy takes out my lead tank. The crew bails with the loader giving the tube guy something to think about with his pistol before making his escape down the safe side road. Alas Mr. Loaderavich is more courage than cunning. Having forgotten his cigarettes, he returns to the tank and gets dead.

Yup. BF's prices are very reasonable for what they are delivering. If folks understood how much work is involved, they'd never complain again. On the other hand, for people reading this who have never used the Editor, it doesn't take that much time to get to the point where you're creating your own enjoyable private content. The big hours come in when you're going to make something public. But, if it's just for you and you use house rules (like, don't go where the enemy isn't), you can take a ready-made map and be going with something fun to play in quite a short time. But be careful. Once the Editor has you, it may not let you go...