Blanar

Bail and Hunt are the same key? Well, that explains a whole bunch! I told that Sherman to hunt forward of the hedgerow and when I looked back the crew had jumped from the tank and been mowed down. I figured I'd missed something exciting but then artillery started falling and I promptly forgot all about it. Guess I'll have to be a might more careful in the future and start working on those alternate keys!

What? You didn't get the rules for your red and blue guys? Stick them in shag rug on opposite ends of the living room and then roll golf balls back and forth knocking them down. Use tennis balls for larger artilley. Rollong only, no thorwing! Last man standing wins. You could also use Stratego pieces for the same thing but the Action Battle Set had more pieces. Hours of fun had by the entire family including the dog who chased the balls and caused the creation of the infamous Godzilla rule.

Forget the beer. Offer to shovel their driveway and there'll propably be 3 or 4 previews in the Northeast.

I was in the Glasgow airport the morning after the Celtic-Porto match picking up friends from the States. It was their first trip out of the country let alone to Scotland. They arrived to an airport filled with thousands of green and white clad, hung-over, still drunk, sun burned, hadn't washed, changed, or slept for 3 days, singing Celtic fans. Needless to say, my friends, whose main goals were to find the nearest pub and try the local brews, were very impressed! Carl

Interesting topic and one that has actually forced me to come out of lurk mode and ask a question. Looking at the sketches from Gpig and Nosieman, I noticed that the only one who is doing anything even remotely left-handed looking is the “hero” going over the wall. Typical lefty, always causing problems. Now, myself being a hard core lefty, I couldn’t shoot right-handed to save my life or that of my squad mates. If I ran holding a rifle in my right hand, I’d probably trip, fall, and knock over the two guys next to me. Hurling a grenade? You’d best not be in my fox hole if I have to chuck it with my right arm. So, what was the training regimen for the forces in WWII? Did they force lefties to shoot righty as many schools did with hand writing? Did lefties on the battlefield shoot lefty anyway, have the expended cartridges ding off their helmets so they could shoot straight? Willl 15-20% of the 1:1 representation be shooting, hoisting, throwing, and carrying left-handed? Do you save coding effort by reversing 1/5 of your graphics so that they look like their different from a righties? Does it complicate things because you have to code whether a weapon can be shot left-handed or not? Or did all lefties just become frustrated paper pushers constantly being written up for smudging paper work as they secretly wrote from the left side? Any handedness grogs out there? Carl P.S. I did a search and surprisingly this important subject seems not to have been discussed before.

The problem is there is no command that does what we'd like it to do with the shoot-n-scoot. A move command actually works best. It moves to that spot, stops, shoots, and reverses. A hunt command would move forward, see the enemy, stop and shoot (on a two gun tank, one of the guns may not even be clear to fire yet), it would lose LOS due to dust continue forward to the end of the hunt command, possibly shooting the entire way and then finally reverse. This would lead to a much greater exposure. I thought actually the first half of shot-n-scoot was a fast move? You want to get to that spot as quick as possible and then get the heck out. This would lead to a bigger dust cloud than just creeping into position. Myself,I've had good luck with the command and when it works correctly it is a thing of beauty. Of course, I've also had all of my first shots miss and every enemy first shot hit. Later, Carl

I still have all three on my drive as well. Plus about a Gig of CMBB mods, another 1/2 of CMBO mods, 1/4 of my personal mods in various forms of completeness, and a second full version of CMBB with Voidhawk's annotated bmp's. Hopefully we'll see an annotated version of the CMAK bmp's as well. Hmmm, looking this over I think it might be time to back some of this up before my hard drive (which has been making some funky noises lately) decides to go on a permanent vacation... Later, Carl

I pre-ordered and completed my Christmas shopping all at the same time. I hope my wife and kids like their copies of CMAK Now to try and sneak out of work early and download the demo. Later, Carl

Well, abandoning would be fine. I'd often like to save my mortar crews who tend to get slaughtered as they drag their empty mortars across that open field. But, recrewing would open up a whole world of complications. The health status of the abandoned equipment would have to be calculated and tracked. If you abandoned in that artillary barrage, did the machine gun survive or is a twisted piece of rubbish now? If I over run an abandoned site, can I target that mortar sitting there? My Stug's just taken a pot shot at the crew running away and as usual the shot lands short, did it take out the gun they just left? And what if a lefty machine gunner tries to recrew a righty machinegun? Oops, ignore that last one, it's been a long week... Carl

Krazy, While your mileage may vary, I got quite a boost from the CPU upgrade. I've got an old Voodoo5 card and have never had any real complaints with framerates. But upgrading from an AMD 800mhz to an AMD 1.2ghz, made that blue line during calculation phase of each turn move significantly faster. If your not having framerate problems my vote would be for the CPU. Carl

I doubt it, but then in a way I really hope they don't include a campaign system. One of the best things about this game is the ability for the many dedicated fans to invent their own versions to play. Besides the obvious TCP/IP or pbem tourney's, you've got the biltong rules, the RobO Quick Campaign system, the Franko Iron man rules, and numerous other suggestions that have appeared over the years. A great gaming system should not be limited to what's in the box. Would you never buy another deck of cards just because the rules to Old Maid are not included? Later, Carl

Parachu, I usually just turn bases on and off. Once a gun is knocked out or abandoned, it loses its base. Many a curse has been uttered upon the disapearance of a colored square. Later, Carl

Kip, I definitely agree that these stand out and can often times look out of place. One of the other problems is that you reach a stage where the dirt, grime, and paint chips are as distinctive as numbers, unit markers, or slogans. If you have five of a single vehicle, it looks like five little clones running about the battle field. But, this can also lead to stunning drama on the battle field. You read the description of the battle you want to fight and then head off to CMMOS or just unzip your favorite mod. Now when that single Tiger, T-34, or Panther arrives as your lone reinforcement in turn 12, it stands out in comparison to everything else around it. It seems all the more exciting as it leads the charge to turn the tide, but also, all the more disappointing when you rush it too far forward and lose it to a hidden shrek. Think of Gandalf leading the Riders of Rohan at the end of The Two Towers. Would I really want to say, "Nah, he stood out to much, he should have just been wearing that drab armor like everyone else." Of course, this is all coming from someone who has downloaded gigabytes of mods and probably spends more time in CMMOS choosing what the combatants will look like than I do in the setup before a battle. Later, Carl

Thanks guys, I'm glad you like it. I love this game, I get to have all the fun painting models like I used to many years ago, but then I get to actually blow them up over and over again. And, even better, they actually get to blow up other things as well! Most of the mods I've done so far are determined by the models I built back in high school. I'm not sure what's next but it may take some time as the snow around here is finally melting and the golf courses are opening. But, if you see it's raining on the weekends in New England, I'm sure something will appear. If you haven't already, check out my PZ III J, it was done with a similar technique. MikeT asked to put it out for CMMOS and plans to throw in some add-ons as well. I know I'm looking forward to it. It's over at CMMODS , of course. Later, Carl

Yes, numbers are optional. I couldn't decide if I liked them or not, but since the D model has both sides of the turret as seprate bmp's and I didn't have to number it 808 or 888, I had to include them. Later, Carl

Ok, I was in the middle of a heated battle the other night and just as things are getting tight, my reinforcements arrive on the scene. Cresting the hill, in the nick of time, comes a factory fresh Panther D, still with that new car smell! Well, the enemy just laughs at this obvious rookie in their midst and my troops panic as they see help in the form of a never seen action tank. This wouldn't do, so a few hours in Photoshop later and we have this: Guaranteed to make the greenest crew look fierce! Pick it up at a CMMODS near you! Later, Carl

Came home and installed a new router. I needed something to test the network and this download was just the thing. Installed and looking good. Thanks guys, Carl

Well, if I'm winning I like Edradour. Smooth, tasty and puts you in a nice celebratory mood. But, if things are taking a turn for the worse a sip of Talisker will either wake me from tactical slumber or punish me for getting there in the first place... Bottoms up, carl

dd, At least some of the terrain elements can be swapped. I'm using my favorite roads, rivers and train track sets from CMBO in CMBB. You can always save the originals, try them and see if they work. I haven't tried moving the other way, from CMBB to CMBO, but the higher resolutions might cause problems. The vehicles in CMBB have more complex (and better looking) models underneath, so they use more .bmp's and can't be swapped. Although I'm sure some of the talented modders will be using some of those great CMBO mods as a starting point for new CMBB mods fairly soon. I haven't noticed if the sounds are saved in the same format, but you should be able convert them fairly easily it they're not. As for places to get the mods for CMBB, Tom's has one of the largest selections out there right now. I think the larger file sizes and resulting band width problems when all us modsluts download the newest PZKW II mod are keeping the number of mod hosting sites down at this point. Best way to find new ones is to follow this forum and see what crops up. As for Mod managers, CMMOS and all the associated downloads over at CMHQ are the only way to go for CMBO. (Unless you have a MAC.) It has not been setup for CMBB yet, but I'm sure that must be in the works by now. One place to be sure and visit is The Scenario Depot. Plenty of new scenarios for both CMBB and CMBO are showing up all the time. Welcome to CM and prepare to say goodbye to friends and family. Carl

New Turret. It's written out if you click on the thumbnail to see the larger picture. Later, Carl

Gordon, Great work as always. If you've still got room for more suckers, er, I mean modders, I'd like to help. Later, Carl

While slightly off topic, this post reminds on a story told to me by an old Soviet tanker once. When he was a lad he used to love listening to the tales and adventures of Ivan Bocageseed. Ivan was born and grew up near Moscow where he worked in the local Bocage nursery. When he was in his twenties, he struck off on his own to the rich and fertile steppes to bring bocage to the local inhabitants. He spent the rest of his life planting bocage seeds across Russia and earned the nickname the Bocage Man or Ivan Bocageseed. By the time of his death in the mid-1800’s bocage was a common sight across the steppes and tales had it, that it had may spread as far as France! Certainly, his fame did, for the name of Ivan Bocageseed is known throughout all of the former Soviet Union and elsewhere in much of the world. People continue to improve their environment in Ivan Bocageseed’s manner whenever they plant a new bocage!

Well, after cursing the Post Office, it turns out they left it on they front porch! Woohoo! But, now there's the problem of the in-laws coming for dinner in 15 minutes. Maybe if I accidently spill that pitcher of ice tea the dinner may be cut short....

Have you checked your system for viruses lately? I was having a very similar problem, and it turned out the wonderful Klez virus was busy running in the background on a regular basis. Finally got Norton Antivirus up and running, killed the virus, and the lags went away. Most apps didn't notice, but it was very noticeable in CMBO. This may not be your problem, but it's worth taking a look. Good luck, Carl

Looks like they changed the title of the article, it was originally "Combat Mission arrives in Afghanistan".