busboy

I've got enough Kiwi acquaintances that tell me what the deal with sheep is out there...

Sorry to keep posting folks, but the discription/history that went with those photos was just too funny: "God bless the men in this machine! In 1940 war hysteria gripped New Zealand and an effort was made to produce a home grown tank. It was decided to armor an International Harvester* farm tractor to make use of equipment on hand. The result was an amazing "tank" called a "Bob Semple" after a politician in New Zealand. Bob was a popular, colorful, Labor politician (just like an American Democrat - only worse). Backing this wonderful idea (probably because Bob was) were the Prime Minister and Minister of Defence (who was Bob). Bob must have been impressed by the U.S. Disston "Tractor Tank" and the idea that a tank would actually be named after himself! Bob probably had visions of Semples storming the beaches and taking Berlin or Tokyo! Rube Goldberg himself could not have designed it better. Apart from being just plain ugly to the bone, the front gunner actually had to lay on a mattress on top of the engine in order to fire his weapon! The Semple had a searing top speed of 24 km/h but had to slow down or even stop in order to shift gears. The "tank" was highly unstable in movement and top heavy. The Public Works Department tried to give this "white elephant" to the army and even offered to convert their entire fleet of 81 into Semples (at a cost of only 4200 pounds sterling apiece)! The army took them, tested them, and even paraded them around the country in an effort to whip up morale. After the laughter subsided, and in an rare display of military intelligence, the army returned them (I am sure that they only needed to have knocked on Afganistan's door to find a buyer as Disston did). Only 4 units** were built before public ridicule stopped the production. The Bob Semple was armed with 4 machine guns, it was 12 feet tall had had a crew of 8 men. 8 men? I can understand 5, but 8? 5 were probably soldiers, 1 was a shop steward, another fended off the birds trying to roost, and the last took out the trash once a day and waved to the people. There is a rumor that after the war Bob took a job with Ford and helped to design the Edsel and fuel tanks for the Pinto. He later went to Yugoslavia and influenced the design of the "Yugo" but this is not confirmed. The reported weight was from 20 to 25 tons. The extreme swing in reported weight may have been design differences between all 4 units** produced or incomplete historical data. The production of this tank was not New Zealand's "finest hour". *Janes reports that the type of tractor was an International Harvester. The book "Pictorial History Of Tanks Of The World 1915-45 by Peter Chamberlain & Chris Ellis state that the tractor was an International Harvester. Another source, "New Zealand Yesterdays" by Hamish Keith, printed in 1984 by Readers Digest Australia reports that a Caterpiller brand Cat DH-8 was used. ** Janes reports that 4 units were produced. Another source, "New Zealand Yesterdays" by Hamish Keith, printed in 1984 by Readers Digest Australia report 3." Oh, and just for kicks, also from Kiwiland: The Schofield!

My God! The horror... The horror... Your Kiwi monstorcity wins hands down!

here's a pic of a model of my nominee: Who honestly can't like the Sherman? Its so cute! Now you want REAL junk (suprised I didn't think of this first) try the Matilda Mk 1.

I always thought the M3 Lee looked kinda neat...pointy and dangerous (but not something you'd like to be in when the 88s start flying) We must remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, however, some things are just really stanky! My vote goes to the (POS) Japanese medium tank type 89. Pictured below: (note, due to size, and the fact that I don't want to downscale the image and upload it to my archive, I'm just posting a link) Japanese tank, indian origin. Ugliest of war! did you click the link? No? Then do so real quick! (unless you have a 56k, then it won't be so quick...) . . . . . . . . Ok, if ya clicked it you found out my bad joke. Thats ACTUALLY the Elite SS Elefantroopen that...pfft. Kidding. Maybe later I'll dig through my links and find a real picture. Until then, think of pretty tanks...

I like it for one, and I personally think one has to LOOK for something to complain about in this, though I don't think a curmudgen is worth complaining about. For what its worth, here's a poem written by George S. Patton about the Belgian town of Houfillze (sp?) which was utterly destroyed by bombing during the Battle of the Bulge. To the tune of "Oh Little Town of Bethlehem" Oh little town of Hoffilze How still we see thee lye Above thy cracked and battered streets The aeroplanes sail by. And in thy dark streets shineth Not any Goddamned light Thy hopes and fears through all the years Were blown to hell last night.

Now from what I understand here the issue is that CM doesn't use openGL, it uses RAVE? Is this correct? Thats pretty strange if true, as when CM was made there was an obvious shift toward OpenGL and away from Rave. I dunno, there's something I'm not understanding here. I'm not understanding why OS X wouldn't run CM. At any rate, I hope CM2 has OpenGL support and OS X capability. For a side note, I don't have OS X yet but will upgrade eventually.

Hmm, none of my problems have been fixed. I've got the 2.3 versions on all of 'em, including the 2d one that you say I should have the old version. I'm running on OS 9.2.1 so it was updated automaticly. If you could send me the 2d one I'd appreciate it. I can live with the black sky, but the text is killing me. In the unit info box there is a small "distortion" where the text has been condensed into, its a nothing more than a virticlal line. Other than that there is no info in the unit box. If I hit enter to get the detailed stats, or if I hit the hotkey lookup, all text is warped into lines and that bears no hint at text, and the "ok" buttons are simply not there. Again, I can put up with gameplay in pure night, but when I can't tell unit strength, and other critical things... owwwww....I WANNA PLAY! What is the problem anyway? What IS causing this. ( I dunno who remembers this, but I've dropped in and out of the message board community here to try to get this fixed for a good while)

Well, I DLed the entire 9.2.1 installer just for the NVIDIA stuff, and it hasn't fixed my graphic oddities. (those are the horrific distortion of in game test, such as landmarks and unit info screens, and a completely black background rather than the "sky.") Is problem that I am missing some kind of RAVE driver and have only openGL? Arrgh, I want to play CM and I want to be able to play CM2!

my God my GOD I haven't been able to play CM in ages due to NVIDIA glitches! I have Mac OS 9.2.1 and I still have problems, but I'll try installing those drivers again. Can anyone tell me where I can find 'em (I've scoured the apple website and can't find the ones you're talking about) or could someone send 'em to me? "busboy@integtechnology.com"

I will add that there is no address that I know of to the alledged mod site, and many people in the WW2OL community are skeptical of the authenticity of this. Still, I felt it worth the risk of signing something worthless than to not add my number if it was real. Until I can offer proof, I know its hazy, and your free choice. -bus

I know this does not apply to Combat Mission. I apologize, but I think ya'll will understand. I'm not a board regular, but ya'll know I'm not just comming here to spam or randomly gather support for this cause. I hope the moderators will allow this off topic thread to be viewed for atleast a few days. It has been brought to my attention that a group of sick people are making a Cloumbine mod for Half-Life which re-creates the atrocities of the Columbine school shooting. It also includes "bounus" missions that re-create other similiar acts of violence. If this mod is released it will no doubt recieve tremendous amounts of media cover once again blaming video games for Violence and surely cause problems for the entire game community. There is a petition crusade against it, I dunno if it'll do any good, but for the sake of computer gaming, particularly "violence" themed games, that this sickness NOT come to pass. We need to try. The petition site is here: http://www.petitiononline.com/stpcgame/petition.html Again, I apologze forr blemishing the CM boards with this, which shouldn't have to exist. I see it this way; we are continuing to fight an evil that once brave men defeated and we reinact in the scope of CM. However, it is our duty to fight such evil when and where we can. The evil today does not invade nations, although sometimes it does rally under the swastica. Freedom of speech is a nessesary thing, however, the oposition to something clearly twisted against mankind itself should be fought against. I think you for your support, and I again ask the board moderators to have sympathy to my posting this here. Thank you.

Mac user here! I used to be playing on a G3 350 mhz, 192 RAM, and NO 3D card! :eek: I have a new mac now, a G4 466 Mhz, 256 RAM, and an NVIDIA 32 meg card. Great graphics ability, but currrently it has some major flaws with CM. Hopefully some up-and-comming drivers'll get me back into CM. I do love this game!

Javol mein kommandant! http://www.afv-uk.net/cmoutpost/ I love this site. The gentleman who runs it does a great service to the CM community. Also, http://www.combat-missions.net/ They probably have a more complete Tiger archive over there. Colonel Klink, would you happen to be the same klink in WW2OL?

Hello all, remember me? I'm something of a lurker now, I can't play CM until my current graphics problems get fixed (I'm hoping NVIDIA will release some new drivers for the Geeforce2 card soon... my Mac needs to see exploding Tigers on it again... ) Anyhoo, if anyone recognizes me they'll probably remember I am a huge Patton fan, I have to chip my vote in for him. Now, that is NOT to take away from others though, Patton was good, but I don't think anyone can be "the best" in a broad sense. "Most sucsessful" can be said, so thats why I always say Patton. I won't start a Patton-Monty pissing contest (I don't like Monty...) In studying Patton, I have read a bit about other commanders. Lucian Truscott was an outstanding commander. I'd put him on the list in a heartbeat. I'd like to throw in Abrahms of the 4th Armored division too. Great thread, btw.

Knights of the round table quake in fear at the aproach of the knightts who say... Ni!

I really appreciate the words of wisdom posted here. I've been over the Apple site plenty of times and I don't see ANY drivers unfortunately. Maybe I just don't know where to look. As for the setting suggestion, unfortunately there are no graphics card settings on the computer itself, however some games do have an option regarding antialiasing or whatever its correctly called CM however has no graphic options screen. Again, thanks.

I like the origional explosion effects, but I think I'm using new ones now... Hmm, I dunno what the "best" is. Probably the buttons in the game menu, they're the most enduring. After all, has anyone made a mod for the "load game" or "build scenario" buttons?

Thanks for your words sir. The thing thats been frustrating me is that there have been no driver updates that I can find for the Mac. I mentioned that "green screen" problem in WBs above, lots of folks are having that problem and iEN says "they are working with mac to fix the problem." I just hope that when the fix for that comes out, CM mysteriously works perfectly too...

Hmm, I've been told that, but I appreciate hearing it again. I'm checking out those websites you were kind enough to give me as I write this. I have oddities in other games as well. In the "Warbirds III beta" that iEN is testing is suffer from a green tinted screen and text doesn't show up. In a little violent viking game called "Rune," my card doesn't show transpariencies correctly, instead it looks like a yellowish tinting. Is it possible that the software doesn't know how to properly "use" the cards, or is it purely a card problem that can be fixed when-and-if the appropriate drivers come out?

Hello all, its been a long while since I've posted, let alone played CM. The reason I've been away is because ever since I got my new Mac I have had some graphics glitches, and I was hoping that maybe someone knows the solution to my problem. I've got a Mac G4 433 mhz, 256 megs RAM and an NVIDIA 32 meg graphics card. In CM, graphics in the game have some bad problems because of my graphics card. While it works well, I suffer from the following VERY distracting problems: -sky and horizon are replaced by black -text in both boxes (such as the hotkey list) and in the game (such as landmarks) are horribly distorted. -unit info text is warped and/or vanished to the point of uselessness. The only way I have found to play CM without these problems is to disable my graphics card and run with a very crappy software rendering that doesn't allow transparencies and pixelates everything to HECK. I've been all over the NVIDIA site and I don't see any new drivers. Is there any way I can fix my problem? If anyone needs pictures I will gladly take them and send them to someone who could host them for me. Thanks in advance for your help...

I'm pretty sure you can't change it, just like the panzershreik, pistols, airborn berets ect. "Hard coded" I believe is the term used most often here.

After disabling my graphics card in the extensions, I have confirmed its a graphics card issue. I checked the NVIDIA site and found no drivers for this card whatsoever. Is there anything I can do? -bus

A few other things I have since noticed: (I forgot to mention that the "sky" and "base background" are black specificly) As a further symptom of the fuzzy lettering, I tried looking at the keystroke menu, and that was an absolute mess of black and static. The "done" button was obscured it was so bad. Any other ideas? (I am currently looking to see if I have the new drivers)

Hey all, tried to do a search on these questions, but it wasn't working for me for some reason. Anyhoo, today I just recieved my brand-spanking-new Mac G4 466 Mhz, 256 megs RAM, and an NVIDA 32 meg graphics card. After running CM with a computer that didn't even have a graphics card... I was waiting in breathless anticipation. And it is better too, but there are a few problems. I was wondering if they were compatibility problems that I just have to live with or if I can fix 'em. The main 2 symptoms of problems that I can see is 1. No display of a "background" scenery, or no sky in other words. This isn't the result of a mod mixup, as the "out of box" graphics do the same thing. 2. Text on the game screan is blurred. (i.e. landmarks) I'd appreciate any help, and thanks.