Holdit

I can bear out what people are saying about the desirability of limiting the anti-tank gun's FOV. In a scenario where I had three 88's, the terrain prevented my from given them all wide, mutually-supporting FOV's so the ended up with fairly limited scope. The one with the widest FOV destroyed one Chaffee before succumbing to return fire. The one with the narrowest FOV never got a look at anything. The middle one, with (effectively) two separate narrow FOV's destroyed 3 Stuarts, 1 HMC whatsit, 1 armoured car, and one unidentified something-or-other. In fact, what impressed me most was that it was a green crew. There was no direct fire brought to bear on the gun's position, but it became the target of what I think were a 75mm and 81mm FO for four moves. The last kill, a Stuart, was spotted 2.5 turns into the bombardment. The crew had been taking cover, but on sighting the target, they jumped up, trained the gun, brewed up the Stuart with the first shot, and promptly took cover again. The gun was destroyed during the fourth turn of artilley fire, but the were no casualties, and they made a dignified exit towards the rear. Worth an Iron Cross recommendation, do you think?

Since I live in a part of the world where we pay for our internet access calls, I'll definitely be playing mainly by PBEM.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tss: I'd say that is a _bad_ idea. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> You could well be right. I mentioned it because I've just done a course in basic C++ and I got that book to use as an extra reference, and I like the way it's written. Nothing too heavy to start off with.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tss: "C gives you enough rope to hang yourself. C++ gives you enough rope to make rigging on an old clipper and you still have enough left to hang your whole family and dog, too". <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Lol! I heard another version of this: "With C it's easy to shoot yourself in the foot. With C++ it's not so easy to shoot yourself in the foot but, if you do, you blow your whole leg off". Seeing as you've already got the compiler, you might as well have a bash at it. I'd start with something like "C++ for Dummies" and see how you get on with that first.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken: Now then, chaps. All nice, friendly, courteous fellows seeking PBEMs this way. All drooling, embittered, vitriolic wretches proceed downstairs immediately.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I'll go the courteous route, and will be honoured to accept challenges from those gentlemen present. Send your courier to me with your terms. Oops! Wrong period. I mean, send me your runner with the setup scratched on the back of a fag packet.

You mean you can't get Borland 5 itself to work, or you can't get your own program to compile?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by David Aitken: Oh goody, a My Hardware Is Bigger Than Yours thread.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Sorry Mr Touchy . Actually I thought it was a "CM is so good I upgraded especially for it" thread. The point being that it was Combat Mission that provided the impetus. Something that Fly! and FS2000 didn't manage to do even though my system was crying out for it, being nothing to shout about. Actually it was nothing to shout about a month after I bought it .

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Airborne: One would definately be humpin the radio. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> It's terrible what combat fatigue can do to a man.

"[brag mode] Athlon 750 running at 1.1 GHz. Inno 3d 64MB GeForce 2 GTS. 19" Iiyama TrueFlat monitor. 128 MB Mushkin 133 RAM." Wow, drool, slobber... You might well brag But there's hope for us all. I just upgraded my RAM from 64 to 128 MB and my VGA card from 16MB Voodoo2 to 32MB Creative TNT. Eventually the processor will get a leg up too, I hope. I'm playing All or Nothing at the moment, and there's no better scenario to be playing both pre and post-upgrade, because you really see the difference (I gave up playing it the first time round because moving round the map was such a drag). Plus I get to see proper smoke and explosions now too. A note to BTS: that's only the second time I've upgraded specifically for a particular game. The last time was for European Air War. Good work.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Colonel_Deadmarsh: I would settle for just a more detailed AAR. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> So would I. In fact, I'd give that priority over the full-length movie, but I have to admit that being, in effect, director of your own war movie is enough to start me drooling...

Considering that CM is the first proper 3D wargame, there's nothing wrong with the graphics. Even if there were no mods available, I'd still think the same. It'll be a sad day if Steve and Charles ever get more concerned about graphics than they are about realism. Comments like Swamp's merely suggest to that there's an individual who never should have bought the game in the first place (don't these people ever read reviews or look at screenshots?). By the way, where can I get these "see-through" tanks? I reckon they'd be brilliant for approaching enemy positions unnoticed.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Pillar: Ever wanted to play god? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I would, only I don't have his email address.

It's the 'Bugsy Malone' halftrack variant, with SG42 fast-firing Splurge Gun.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by patboivin: What about G.I. Barbie? That would be politically correct. They could sell the doll with vehicles, in an M2 Bradley, or something<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> A pink one.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Wayne: Has anybody heard anything about Hasro's Squad Leader? Is it dead or in a coma? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Neither. It's suffering the death of a thousand cuts.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by jdmorse: A whole group of people (former SL and ASL players) are a potential market. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> But are they? Even an (A)SL player who just happens on it in his local game shop will know as soon as he looks at the back of the box that this isn't the real McCoy. That's why the purchase of the name seems odd, because this game that's going to be produced could be called anything. It makes sense when you think about that marketing suits scenario, though...

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lane: I am downloading files now. have the big one done 24 megs and working on 16 megs file. I will backup my bmp folder with all my mods. Question? What happens to all my mods when I overwrite them with the GRU upgrade? And what happens when you run a night scenario.? Thanks for any info Lane<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I think your mods will just disappear, so you're right to back them up. I've kept the option of switching between the two by having three bmp folders in the main Combat Mission folder: one for various modified bmps, one for the GRU modified set, and one for the original as per the installation. Each folder has a name that reflects its contents, but the one I'm currently using is called just "Bmp". To change, I just rename that one to, in this case, GRU_Bmp and rename, say MOD_Bmp, to just "Bmp". To avoid confusion, I have a text file in each one that has a filename like "GRU Bmp folder.txt". I sounds a bit messy, but it means I can switch from one to the other much more quickly than by copying and pasting back and forth between different folders. Hope this helps.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Holdit: Oh yes, the CM Borg will be along shortly to do his thing...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Looks like we just missed each other...

Welcome! The last time anyone counted, I think the Irish score was at 5, which was pretty good when you worked out the % population average. You were unlucky with your delivery time, mine got to Dublin in only 10 days. I had mine delivered at work too, and getting through the rest of the day was murder. Funny that you use the phrase "brown envelope". You don't work in the Dail, by any chance? Oh yes, the CM Borg will be along shortly to do his thing...

Self-inflicted bad luck: Called in a smokescreen using "T" instead of "K". When the live rounds started going off among my advancing troops, the penny still didn't drop: "Wow, he's quick off the mark with his artillery, and where's my smokescreen anyway?...OH MY G....!!!" Half a platoon gone. I won't forget that for a while

Another point to bear in mind is that if CM had been published by the usual route, you might save some money on the shipping, you would get the box and packaging, but what you wouldn't have got would Combat Mission as we know it. Everything else is just tinsel. And GriffinCheng was right about saving money. I was going to buy all the CC games. No need now. I won't be buying the Squad Leader game either, and I haven't been in a games shop for weeks - what's the point? They won't have anything CM related. I reckon buying CM has saved me at least IR£120.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by GonzoAttacker: I have recently got my hands on the Waterloo map and it is Beautiful! <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Great! I'm delighted to hear that! Yours is the first feedback I've had. Any criticisms I should know about? I've since found acouple of sopts where a road is a bit warped by elevation changes, and another elevation change has caused one of the Papelotte buildings to disappear. I'll be fixing those up over the next few days. The approach I took with the Waterloo map was a bit similar to what you describe above. I worked from 4 different maps and set up the main features first, La Belle Alliance, La Haye Sainte, Hougomont etc, then all other placements could be worked out by reference to one or more of those. Then the main elevations were added, then the main woods, then the outlying farms and villages follwed by fleshing it out with finer details and elevations changes, most of which isn't on the maps, so I referred to the Battleground: Waterloo game for ideas. There was a lot of deleting and changing along the way, though. I reckon I must have razed more villages than Attila the Hun on a bad day...

Wonderful work, Gunslinger - thanks. Even the explosions SFX look a bit better on my Voodoo2 card.

I think Grisha's advice is sound. The way I do it is her TV time = my CM time, since she likes certain programs that I'm not really interested in. Sometimes we watch stuff together too, mainly films. If, however, I'm playing and she comes in with something she obviously needs to talk about, then I pause (or exit, depending on the weight of the issue) the game, and move away from the computer, letting her know that I am now paying attention to her only. It seems to work out fairly well. Oh and when you're playing, pop in to the other room every 15 minutes or so just to let her know that, while you love playing CM, it doesn't cause you to forget her existence (if I do this during one of her pet programmes, I get shooed out again back to the computer!). I must admit that I'm lucky with my partner, in that she reckons it's better for me to be absorbed in a computer game rather than out on the piss and/or chasing other women. "Other women? You're joking! I haven't got time! Look at all these scenarions I still haven't played..."

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Banshee: You could easily sell that pic to Hasbro for their upcoming release of Squad Leader <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Meeeowwww!!!! I agree, though. Nice one.