SurlyBen

Yeah, feel free to use any and all maps I had a hand in for any purpose you like. I'm not sure whose is whose in that pack, except that I think mine was map one. Have these maps been uploaded to the Scenario Depot?

I just tried a test... there are two troubles: the back side of the textures isn't drawn (so you couldn't see the grid on opposite side of a hill), and at least on my card, having transparent grass messes up the way everything below the horizon gets drawn. Nothing erases, so you end up with this unplayable spirograph pattern...

OK, that was cruel. And funny. But cruel.

Um... Moon? This is the CMBO forum... No covered arcs...

You can get the buildings that close together, but you are right that the pavement thing looks new. Or if it's possible now, I certainly don't know that trick. You can get the corners of large buildings to overlap a road tile, but those city pavement tiles stay building free.

Sure, sounds like a piece of cake.

You could, of course, get towns that dense in both CMBO and CMBB by using the scenario editor... I have a few CMBO maps and a scenario with that kind of density on The Scenario Depot (Scenario is Knifefight at Cannes, maps are SB_IlBagno and SB_tuscanhilltown) I did a CMBB map with a reasonably dense city for a tournament I ran (which can be found on this page. File name is Boy Named Sue... it's tournament locked. I'll put an unlocked version up in a few days...) Of course, random cities never had that kind of density. The picture with the pavement also looks like a new trick. Buildings on a pavement tile... Hmm... What I wonder is are there going to be more building types? I was always struck by the disparity between CM's 100s of unit types, and its five building types. Seven in BB. I know, I know, CM is about fighting, not designing cities, but still... [ November 09, 2003, 12:09 PM: Message edited by: SurlyBen ]

Wow. The board is a lot faster now. I can open threads and not have time to go get a cup of coffee while it's loading... Thanks!

Hmm good question. I'd like to see a Brit vs. Vichy battle in lebanon in 41, although I have no idea if that's possible. Long Range Desert Group attacking an airfield or supply dump behind the lines would make for a cool small battle. I'm almost positive one will be on the CD anyway, but I'd like to see one of the battles for the Maleme airfield (which would involve New Zealanders, and make atiff happy). Something of the failed German attempts at Heraklion and Retimo. Overall I'd like to see a lot of roughly company sized battles, and I'd like the briefing to say whether they are intended for PBEM or play vs. the AI.

For my CMBO skies I used the photoshop 'add noise' filter before I reduced them to 8 bit bmps. This made the dithering look better, in my opinion, and definately reduced the "banded" look. It's important to reduce them to 8 bit bmps yourself so that you can control how they will look in game. If you don't, CM does it for you... Also, if you want to make the dithering look even better, try making your skies bigger. I think it has to be even multiples of the original size... my high res skies were 2048 by 1024 instead of the orignal 1024 by 512. Keep in mind that bigger skies use up more memory (mine used four times as much vram as the regular skies...) and at least in those days, not all video cards could handle large textures (the 3dfx cards were limited to 256 by 256 pixels...) Ben

That looks like one of my CMBO skies... Surlyben.

Well, if you really want to be mad, let a basic infantry squad get that close to your tank. Those grenades'll knock it out in no time at all. As for your question about the realism of flamethrowers knocking out tanks, I'm sure a flamethrower grog will be along in no time to answer your question in a comprehensive manner. IIRC, it's not just a matter of the flames getting into the engine compartment. It also has to do with fear of being cooked alive, the fact that the flames consume nearby oxygen, and a lack of total airtightness on the part of tanks.

Regarding the banding in the skies, IIRC that's caused by CM using 8 bit textures. (In BO it was, anyway, not sure in BB). When I made my BO skies, I added some gaussian noise, then I reduced the color depth to 8-bit with dithering on and saved that. This gave me a sky that was speckled instead of banded, but I preferred the speckled look. The reason for adding noise was to help the dithering look smoother.

Here's my newbie tip (and it's as simple and concrete as I can make it): keep your armor at least 200 meters behind your infantry, and farther back is better. Obviously there are times when violating this rule is ok, but keeping the armor back means never losing it to close assaulting infantry so it's a good rule of thumb. Other than that, practice, learn what all the numbers mean, and if you get to buy your own units, make sure you know what you are buying. Make an effort to relate non CM knowledge to CM are spot on. I tend to think of CM battles in chess terms IMO, Fionn's comments about the headgame are pretty much spot-on. Between good players of roughly equal skill, the fight is likely to go to the one who doesn't lose his nerve. One second guess, or overcautious (or uncautious)move and suddenly the guys are all over the place, dying in detail. I'd say that most losing players defeat themselves. Once they start losing they stop caring about the fight, or they just make bad moves. I guess I try to take the view that any given fight on the CM battlefield is a sideshow to the overall fight. Losing any one fight doesn't necessarily mean the battle is lost. Surlyben

The part about CMBB looking better than the CC games might need some clarification. IMO, the average CC map looks prettier than the average CMBB map, provided you keep the scale of both the same. The CC maps are hand painted and to a casual observer this will make them look better than CMs more modular maps... Being able to see the indivual soldiers gives graphical points to CC as well. However. CM tanks look way better than CC tanks, CM is 3D, and a well designed CM map can approach (and surpass, IMO) a well designed CC map for shear jawdropping beauty (some of clubfoot's maps come to mind). You just can't do panoramic vistas in CC. Of course, You can probably pick up any version of CC for discount prices these days, so why not get both?