SlowMotion

I tried your update and I think all three sound good. But: I won't be using your recoiless rifle/schreck sound simply because it is too similar to other big guns. At least to me, being able to hear which weapons are being used is a big help during the fight.

Try low res grass of Desertfox. I can't remember where you can download that. You could use Valley of Trouble (that demo scenario) before and after installing it to see the difference in elevations.

If you're asking how to make some troops appear to the battle later as a reinforcement, instead of participating in the setup phase when the game starts: in scenario editor, before selecting a unit you have to first decide if it's part of the initial setup or reinforcement1-5. Select the group first, then the unit.

The same for defense. Some new tools for assisting the AI without the human player knowing, would be great. Generalizing from what Bobbaro wrote, it would be cool if scenario designers could set locations that should be used for certain action in certain conditions. This way the strategic AI (or whatever decides on troop movement) could consider some map position for ambushing tanks, but only until say turn 15. Or a group of defenders would try to hold location1, but only until own troops have arrived to location2. After that, location1 wouldn't have any specific meaning. The way point system for attack could be done the same way. [ 08-10-2001: Message edited by: SlowMotion ]

2) I think this idea of reinforcements arriving to one of several predesignated locations would be really useful. Maybe the player should select the place or maybe the computer just randomly picks one of the locations?

And even better: why not allow tweaking the play balance for BOTH sides? Then you could for example play using the same map, but with twice as many troops. Just give +100% to both sides.

I add one: scenario file sizes are so small that having some extra scenarios on my HD waiting doesn't matter.

I do agree that in some scenarios setting the background can be important. But I wouldn't want to rate a scenario low if the briefing of a fictional scenario isn't 4 pages, like some of the historical ones have. I suppose most people use reviews to find certain kind of battles: say, a small infantry fight for TCP/IP or a huge historical tank battle against AI. I think it would be great if the reviews could help in finding those categories where a scenario is at its best. Some scenarios are designed to play well in some way and play awfully in other way, so it would be nice if scenario designers could mention this and other possible playing instructions in their briefing.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> Admiral Keth: Rune, In addition, I'm already working on the idea of some value not counting towards the rating. Simply due to the fact that a particular reviewer may not have utilized some aspect of the scenario, such as PBEM, that reviewer may have no opinion/experience regarding that aspect, thus should not be counted against the rating. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I think this sounds really good. Some aspects are more important than others, so it's nice if a reviewer can pick the aspects that were important in some scenario and thus produce the kind of overall score that he had in mind. IMO the briefing quality isn't nearly as important as map design and force selection, so I'd probably leave that one out if the scenario was good otherwise.

Oh, so those ratings would be a sort of Administrator Rating that has nothing to do with the possible reviews? Well, I can't say much more than IMO the current rating with 1-3 panzerfausts in three different colours is not as clear as, say 1-5 stars or those numeric values. The categories are good. BTW: If we just get enough reviews, this system can be really valuable. Just tried Nachut! based on the Scenario Depot rating and it was indeed a good one.

Hi Admiral! I just checked some reviews at your site and there's one comment about score calculation: In many cases reviewers gave 0 points to PBEM playability. I assume this means they haven't played the scenario by email. In such cases, shouldn't this zero excluded from the average? In Wiltz one reviewer gave nines and tens, yet the average is eight. Ok, another one, actually this is a question. On the review page there's a link to RatingDefinitons. There are 9 graphical symbols with descriptions. But where are those symbols used? Do they mean scores from 1 to 10?

I haven't played CMBO for a whole year yet, but I also think that the game is a lot better now. All the great new mods, some of those Scipio sounds and the huge number of great scenarios has made it unbelievably good. BTW: has anybody tried replaying some of those first scenarios you played when you received the CD? Some days ago I retried Far From Over Paderborn and in many ways it was very different now. Who changed the map?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Colonel_Deadmarsh: As for historical accuracy, I'm assuming you're talking about the scenarios. Why not simply have 2 sections: one for historical and the other for non-historical.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> ..or add historical/non-historical type to each mod, just like most scenarios have. Then everybody just picks the ones they like. But it's a great site already!

Ok, thanks for all the answers!

I'm glad you liked the idea! That 850+ is exactly the reason why I thought about this. Many scenarios take several hours to complete, so I'd rather use that time for playing those good ones first. If you do implement this somehow, I'm ready to recommend some that I've liked. BTW: I wonder if that list of scenarios / operations in Excel-format is still being updated? I think that was very useful, especailly for those that don't have net access.

Ok, I checked out Scenario Depot. I noticed that most scenarios hadn't been reviewed yet. I checked the scores of some scenarios that I've played and saw that some that I've liked got pretty good scores, so those reviews could be helpful. In Amazon.com one of the features I like, is that "People who bought this book, also bought ..." Something similar would be great for scenarios as well. If someone wrote a good review about scenario X, which others did that person like? Of course, people don't buy scenarios, but if people could write a list of recommended scenarios, that would do the trick. Typing such list is much faster than writing a whole review, so maybe people would actually type those?

Hi! I was wondering if any CMBO web site has made a list of user recommended scenarios? I think it would be nice if people could list, say top five scenarios (not just the best). There have been similar lists on this forum, but I think it would great if some site had such section permanantly, a bit like those guest books. That would make it easier to find those gem scenarios among all the hundreds out there.

I don't know what kind of HW resources a 2000 tank CMBB scenario would require, but I came across this story that hints that maybe this 100 000 tank simulation is still too much to ask http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/97/military.html

I don't know what kind of HW resources a 2000 tank CMBB scenario would require, but I came across this story that hints that maybe this 100 000 tank simulation is still too much to ask http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/97/military.html

Colonel_Deadmarsh: That's pretty much what I had in mind in my earlier message. The ultimate solution would allow mixing predefined troops and bought troops in the same scenario.

Colonel_Deadmarsh: That's pretty much what I had in mind in my earlier message. The ultimate solution would allow mixing predefined troops and bought troops in the same scenario.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>James Crowley: It would be nice to see a range of possible respones from the AI i.e sometimes cautious, sometimes extremely aggressive, just to keep you guessing. After all not all human players are the same, so why not variations in the AI player? Couple this to a more fully randomised QB set-up (with some more map size variables) and you have a near unlimited supply of battles of the size you want, without any bias towards one side or the other.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> This AI non-predictability (and thus scenario replayability) would also increase if scenario designers could define new randomizing elements like: -reinforcement arrival chosen from a list of places, not always the one same place -some of the troops could be bought, not always preselected. One could for example define that 75% of the 1. reinforcement (worth X points) would be AI selectable, 25% predefined.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>James Crowley: It would be nice to see a range of possible respones from the AI i.e sometimes cautious, sometimes extremely aggressive, just to keep you guessing. After all not all human players are the same, so why not variations in the AI player? Couple this to a more fully randomised QB set-up (with some more map size variables) and you have a near unlimited supply of battles of the size you want, without any bias towards one side or the other.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> This AI non-predictability (and thus scenario replayability) would also increase if scenario designers could define new randomizing elements like: -reinforcement arrival chosen from a list of places, not always the one same place -some of the troops could be bought, not always preselected. One could for example define that 75% of the 1. reinforcement (worth X points) would be AI selectable, 25% predefined.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> Germanboy: Scenarios are best designed from scratch, based on historic knowledge and events. The weapons used in the Soviet-German war were so different from those used on the Western Front (except for the 11 months following D-Day) that I don't think that there would be any value in having that. YMMV.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I do understand your point about historical scenarios. Still, many of the scenarios I've played most, were not historical, just fun. Like the two demo ones that got me buying the game at first place. From the little scenario design I've done, I've noticed that making a good map takes time and I'd like to try those new CMBB features, not from scratch, but using existing maps. I assume that such converter wouldn't take that long to write, since most of the stuff has already been implemented. If it took more than some days, then I'm sure there are more important things to use the effort for. Maybe after you've read enough grog books, the fictional stuff doesn't feel good anymore? Fictional vs Historical becomes like comparing CMBO to SuddenStrike?

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software: Barleyman: Huge discussion on this recently. I have nothing more to add other than a quick and dirty converter is NOT possible from a technical standpoint. So what you suggest will certainly not be able to happen. For more details try a Search on something like "compatibility" or "backwards" and look for a large thread from about a month ago. Steve<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Was the topic: Will CMBO Become Obsolete Upon The Arrival Of CM2? If scenario converter is not possible, how about scenario extractor? Many CMBO scenarios will be used as a starting point for making CMBB scenarios anyway, like all the ASL conversions for CMBO, so anything that reduces the amount of work would be nice. So, I have in mind a program which could read a CMBO scenario and extract from it: 1. the map 2. briefings 3. list of troops (just a text file) (and maybe mark those troop positions in the map somehow Then people could use files 1-2 in CMBO scen editor, print file number 3 and use that as a help when deciding which CMBB troops should replace the CMBO troops. IMO the huge number of user created scenarios and mods is the number one reason that keeps CMBO as great as it is. Immediate access to all the CMBO stuff would make CMBB sooooo good the moment it is released.