c3k

More... That's turn 58-57. Next, my orders at 57:00.

A statement of outlook. In most battles, the opening exchange of fire can result in a few outcomes: it can be a desultory start, then ramping up; it can be devastating, winning the battle; it can open large, but be non-critical. We have the first condition. The opening exchanges are slow and ramping up. The battle will increase in pitch until one side or the other dominates. Then it will be a mop up. I will try to force the increase in tempo. I will expend my men's lives as the currency needed to pay for the increase. That's okay. For me. I'll let the pictures do the talking... (One or two my be out of sequence)

So, after running a scout team into Bil in a location I had not expected (my own fault: Bil had very politely requested that I examine the battle in the editor from both sides), I had a plan: ATTACK! Remember this: My plan was to hold up the two guys who survived the burst. They had a 10m LOS, so I area fired TARGET that far away, hoping for some long rounds to pin Bil's men. The rest of that platoon would push towards that area, but end up short of where they'd be visible from 10m. Here it is from my edge of the board: . Small item: on my left, my gamey edge huggin company is advancing in staggered bounds. They have QUICK and then HUNT, in alternating relays. I know Bil is in these woods. I found one Hun, time to find the rest. Ken

Lol. Cmx1 used a "probability cloud" for infantry. Cmx2 shows each guy.

Having peeked, perused, browsed through, and otherwise examined his forces, I then thought about his possible critical terrain. Yes, I do that. Not in pretty 3D powerpoint views like someone we all know, but in my own way. After I saw the setup zone, then I started looking at his forces, as I've already displayed above. We have near parity in maneuver elements. I have better close-in firepower. He has better long-range firepower. The burden of attack is squarely on my shoulders, with all that implies. I could sit my men down, develop the situation with more intel, freezing all movement; or push through the enemy despite the likelihood of casualties. I looked at my men. They had a plaintive look in their eyes. I knew what they wanted. Very well: we push!

You wound me. His bark is worse than his bite? All the above TO&E was unknown to me (my own doing despite Bil's requests), when I'd gotten this turn back: My original orders had been: I had not expected to see Bil this early. Hmm... That's when I opened the editor and looked at the battle from his side. This was what I saw: Trees are set to "Nearby Trees Off", or whatever it's called, so a lot of the woods look bare in Bil's backfield. Of course, Bil's backfield usually looks bare. (snare drum, please.) I thought about the purpose of the battle: to kill. Err, to have fun with SMG's. Excellent development. Now my men would not have to march as far to fight. They like when that happens.

Ach...I'll get to it. (Funny real life story got in the way.)

Here's another shot I took of Bil's forces. It showcases their equipment. 50% auto/semiauto, including an MG42. My note on the image speaks for itself. I also looked at his setup zone. AFTER I saw the replay...

After sending the turn, above, to Bil, I then opened the battle in the editor. Here's what I had: I nice SMG company. Well, I knew I had that, since I'd already sent a turn to Bil. (I was thinking about slipping an IS-II regiment into my OOB and then sending it to Bil. THAT would've been fun. ) It was a bit of an ethical dilemma for your (not so) humble correspondent to decide to look upon Bil's forces. I mean, fog of war is what the real battle is all about. But, I heeded his request. Here's what I found: Okay, Soviets attack, Germans defend and we have near parity? Hmm. Maybe he meant this as a meeting engagement? And fusiliers? Really? For those of you not so groggy, let me 'splain to you some stuff. The Germans had aggressive, highly trained, heavily armed recon troops early in the war. When you're advancing, those are the guys going out front and smashing through light screening forces to find out what's what. Studs. With big cojones. Well, once you're retreating, you don't need recon forces so much. Hell, the cooks know what's behind you. You need hole pluggers. No, this is not a double entendre about my brunette. But it could be... The fusiliers were the renamed recon guys. They had lots of auto weapons and were the crème de la crème of the unit. Their role was emergency firefighters, running from one hot section to another, sealing off penetrations (sorry, couldn't resist) and counterattacking. So, fusiliers are the nearest thing to a Soviet smg unit that the Germans have. This seemed more like a test of smg lethality rather than showing how tough a German line unit has it against a Soviet smg unit. I decided to ask my men if they were up for it. I knew it would be bloody. Then I laughed. "Ask my men?" Ooh, that was rich. They would die.

All that...and more. I took some screenshots and then annotated them, at the time they occurred. Bil told me to please look at the battle in the editor. "Open it up, check out both forces, etc., what?" I said, "Sure", but with my fingers crossed. I mean, I NEVER peek. Never. Nor do I peak, but that's another topic. I merely opened the turn he'd sent me, then sent a return. My forces had a tight setup zone all the way at the bottom of the map. I'd talked about the supremacy of the Soviet smg'ers in woods: this was a friggin' huge expanse. I figured that Bil, since he'd said something about a small battle, probably had a similar setup zone all the way on the other side of the map. That's where my plan, and my moves started. I -assumed- that I had to move to contact. I -assumed- I'd have up to the area of the village before we ran into one another. Bil's words were in my ears, much like the brunette's tongue had been.

As in all things, it is best that I begin at the beginning. We were relaxing in the beta-club after a particularly fruitful testing round. Bil pulled me aside at the buffet and suggested that, after we ate, that we should meet up in the smoking lounge. I agreed, trying to speak my assent through a mouthful of hand basted veal ribs, prepared with a particularly sweet rhubarb sauce. Apparently understanding the inchoate sound I'd made, Bil went to sit at his table, the one we call "The High Table", since Charles' brain has a reserved spot there. (It has the right sort of umbilicals that he needs.) I sat at one of the many Low Tables, off in the corner, beneath a drafty air conditioner duct. After I finished, I got up, weaving my way around the serving girls as I found my way to the exit. Just before I departed, I locked eyes with Bil. He nodded once, and then he ran his index finger alongside his nose. I don't know why he does that. No one does, really. We think it's an affectation he picked up from watching "The Maltese Falcon" and thinking that he's Humphrey Bogart, but with Bil, you can never be sure. I had been in the smoking lounge some time before Bil entered. I was sitting in my leather wingback, scotch in one hand, in the other hand a smoldering Quesada Tributo Manolin which nicely balanced the smoldering looks one particularly fetching brunette waitress kept aiming my way as she went about her duties. We don't call them "waitress"; they are more of a silent type of assistant. That's part of the job requirement for them. Meant to be seen, not heard. They don't speak unless spoken to. It's a high end joint, with perks. I was wrapping my mind around the possibilities when Bil intruded. As he eased his bulk into the adjoining chair, which aired its protests by uttering various sighs, creaks, and groans, I couldn't help but notice the au jus stain running down his silken cravat. He must've gone back for seconds. He leaned my way, conspiratorially, and said, "c3k, old chap, I've got a proposal, what?" Yeah, he speaks that way, but only in the smoking lounge and never after his third drink. It's best to humor him when he's in these moods, so I said, "Sure, Bil. Go ahead and give me your best pitch." He replied, "See here, good chap, my examinations have led me to believe that the denizens of the forum would be well pleased if we were to have another go at it, what?" I held up a finger, momentarily stopping the train wreck which was unfolding, and gestured my brunette over. She smiled a particularly evil, saucy, smile which held untold promises behind it as she approached our little tete a tete. With another gesture, I motioned to my drink, to Bil's empty elbow table and then held up three fingers. She raised her eyebrows and silently mouthed, "Triple?". I nodded. She winked and went over to the bar. I studied her as she moved. "...so that should do it, what?", Bil was finishing. "I'm sorry, Bil," I said, "I seem not to understand what you've said. Try me again." I didn't want to tell him my mind was on the brunette. His ego is easily shattered and I wasn't up to the repair job that particular evening. "Understandable, old chap, what?" he chortled. The chair protested at that, as well. Luckily, divine intervention stopped him. My brunette had returned. She had a tallboy filled with the house single malt scotch. She placed a napkin down on Bil's elbow table, placed the glass upon it, then replaced the napkin under my glass with a fresh one. She couldn't help but brush her chest against my arm as she did so. She left, back down the hallway they go to. Her scent lingered. I saw some writing on my napkin. Sigh. It was Bil. I chose the path of least resistance. "C'mon, Bil. Bottom's up!" "Cheers! What?", he said, as he raised his tallboy. Gurgling, he started downing it. Some poor Scot had worked in a peat bog, no doubt in the rain, then tended fires and filters and pipes and barrels for 40 years, according to the label I'd seen on the bottle, all for Bil to guzzle about a pint of it in under 4 seconds. No wonder the Scots are so damn miserable. He slammed down his glass, burped, then dragged his arm across his mouth. I merely raised my eyebrows, inviting him to continue. He bellowed, "A rematch, dammit! Prove your damn statement that Russian submachinegun units are unmatched in the woods. I'm sick of your drivel. Man up, or shut up!" "What?" I replied. Yeah, I was tweaking him and he didn't even know it. This could almost be as much fun as the brunette. Almost. He shouted, "I'll do ya in, I will! Publicly!" I put out my cigar, put down my drink, and picked up the napkin with her message. It made me smile as I read it. I stood up and told Bil, "Sure. Whatever. Set it up and send me a turn." I walked over to hallway where she'd disappeared. The rest of that evening? That's for another time, perhaps. What follows is the result of Bil's challenge. Ken

Pre-battle arty: meaning first turn strike? If you're playing multiplayer, it is considered bad form to bombard your enemy's setup area on the first turn. As always, there can be exceptions. Did that occur historically and is it part of the briefing? (Let the poor sap know that his men are under artillery bombardment BEFORE he starts the game.) Um, that's all I can think of. Otherwise very gamey and poor. (Okay, another exception: your opponent has a HUGE setup zone and you just happen to pick the likely spot to bombard and catch him in it. If he's confined at all, and out of LOS, and you nail 'em, you may not get a turn sent back.)

Yeah, a bit simplified. In actuality, I believe that if the POSSIBLE LOS exists, then it is checked with the unit in-game, in the manner I mentioned. It uses actual action spot location (not a generic holder for the 8m square), as well as ELOS for both parties in the LOS check. This is where the size of the vehicle matters. Collision detection applies for 3D items, with some fuzzy logic for vegetation, as well as vehicles. This is the "trace the ray" kind of logic you'd expect. It's done -as needed-, not continuously, and not everywhere. The lookup table provides the information for when LOS checks between units need to be checked. Spotting, the ability of the UNIT to use the LOS, is done at intervals. Again, to save cpu cycles. If the "owning" action spot (the one the game says the vehicle is in) is a non-clear LOS per the lookup table, nothing will allow your unit to see the enemy vehicle. Your location and his location have a blocked LOS. In the PzIV behind the building example, I assume the game has assigned the PzIV to be in the action spot which is blocked. Therefore, no LOS. Hopefully there will eventually be a workaround so that the PzIV would get spotted. Ken

^^^ LOL. TLDR. At least, not every post. LOS is abstracted. There are DEFINITELY situations that can/should be improved. Your PzIV butt-out is a perfect example. Here's my understanding of how the LOS system works. - Pre-game, the game creates a table of all POSSIBLE two-way LOS. In a simplistic model, let's call it a 10x10 grid, A->J and 1->10. Checking every possible LOS from one grid square to another (assuming reciprocity) gives 100 locations, each checking LOS to the other. Using a Sum function for the series 1-99 (the location does not check LOS to itself so only 99 pairs in the 100 location grid), gives 4,950 possible LOS's from one location to another. (The last location, J10 does not need to check LOS to any location, since every location has already checked LOS to J10. That's the benefit of assuming total reciprocity for this example.) If A1 can see J10, then J10 can see A1. At least, they POSSIBLY can. More on that, later. Let's just assume that every other LOS is blocked in that grid. (Go with it, please.) The game creates a table of 4,950 possible LOS pairs. In my example, only ONE pair has a (possible) clear LOS. This is the lookup LOS table. (It is more complex than that. Obviously.) - In-game, the engine now has a pre-made LOS table. That's all it ever accesses, the lookup table. - During your turn, you want your unit at B7 to area fire at F9. The game sees that B7 to F9 are the locations. It checks the lookup table. "Ahh," it says, "that LOS is blocked." No LOS, no LOF. - Next turn, you try A1 to fire at J10. The game checks the lookup table. "What ho? There MAY be LOS", it thinks to itself. It looks around at the grid squares which underlay the diagonal from A1 to J10. (That forms part of the table.) Smoke in B2? The POSSIBLE LOS is now blocked. You get no LOS. (If there were no smoke, etc., along the grids which the table has entered for possible LOS blockage from A1 to J10 (B2, C3, D4, etc, as well as the points of the other squares, such as A2 and B1 since they geometrically touch the corner of the diagonal line), then you would have LOS.) - The table is pretty complex. (Assume A1 and J10 have a base height of 50m. A 2 floor building is at E5, base height 37m, roof height 51m. Now the LOS is provisional based on the status of the roof at E5. It's in the table...) - Okay, so you've got POSSIBLE LOS. Now, the game looks at the ELOS locations. Is your tanker at 0m, .5m, 1m, 2m, or 3m elevation above the grid? It also checks more finely within the action spot, to see if anything blocks the POSSIBLE LOS. That's how it works. Using 8m grids to run the initial table calculation is an APPROXIMATION. Couple that with unit locations being accurate to less than 1m, and you have more than 64 sub-locations within each action spot. Remember, only the whole 8m action spot has been accounted for in the lookup table, not every sub-location. A 4km x 4km map has 250,000 action spots. (More for tactically important locations like each side of a wall.). My example used 99 pairs. Using a 4km map gives...31 BILLION pairs. Actually, more. That's with 8m resolution. (Using 1m resolution would have over 128 TRILLION pairs.) Every pair needs to be assessed, including every location under and adjacent. The game assumes a unit is at a point location for LOS purposes. If it has an LOS, then the entire model is used for intersection purposes to determine hits, etc. In your PzIV example, the PzIV is considered in an action spot behind the building. A "point" location for the vehicle. Since the Sherman, no matter the ELOS or status of the crewmembers, is in a location that cannot see through the building, then no LOS can exist. Hence, no matter how much of the PzIV sticks out, the Sherman cannot see it. The lookup table "blinds" the Sherman. Now, does that mean this is a GOOD system? It's a COMPROMISE. I'm told that computing the lookup table to a more fine resolution goes up geometrically and would bog down most computers for hours...or longer. I'd LOVE to have the lookup table resolved to a 1m grid. Hell, I'm lying: I'd like .1m. That way I can shoot that guy in the leg when he's not quite in cover. That's me. I'd also like the lookup table to apply an algorithm which takes into account terrain deformation. If I blow a crater in the top of the ridge, shouldn't that help my guys? Vegetation, buildings, rubble, terrain, and elevation all play into the complexity. I hope part of this was useful. Ken

With an AGP slot, the best you'll get is DX10.1. If your tech tested it and it's fine, then I guess that's that. Your motherboard, since you're not sure of the specs, may not even support AGP 8x. Migrating to a new mobo means a new cpu and ram (and possibly psu depending on what you're running). However, the benefit would be that you wouldn't be running over a decade out of date. (CM uses OpenGL, btw.) Good luck. Ken

It sounds like a bad video card or video card slot, possibly. If all your games have an issue with the card and one that runs uses software emulation rather than the card (hardware), I'd suspect your graphics hardware. What motherboard do you have?

I'll chime in with my DAR report later tonight or early tomorrow...

Thanks for bringing fresh eyes on this. I'd filed reports on it back in CMBN. Time to refresh those. (I forget what the reasoning for the APHE detonating on ground impact after ricocheting was, but there was a reason way back then...) Ken

? Abandoned it? I've been waiting for you to post the next turn! I assumed you'd surrendered. I have not read beyond your opening sentence. Shall we continue? My men have been asking for this. Ken

Performance: all v2.12 games are the same. So, CMBN base v2.12 = CMBN MG v2.12. (RT is NOT v2.12.) Graphics: The stock graphics in RT is about the same as the stock graphics in CMBN+. There have been a lot more mods made for CMBN, thus far, than for RT. However, the mods have been creating a lot of goodness for RT lately. The only graphic difference between CMBN and RT will be due to the mods you use. RT patch: There will be one, to fix some minor niggles. It is eminently playable. As good as, or better than, v2.12. Engine improvements: RT v1.00 (the current release) has some improvements over CMBN v2.12. These improvements will be made available to CMBN through a paid upgrade, at some point in the future. So, RT v1.00 is more advanced than CMBN v2.12. The decision should come down to which theater you prefer. The CW/MG modules add a lot to the CMBN base game, but if you don't like Brits or SS, then you won't see much value there. (Some great battles, too.) If you really like mid-'44 East Front, then RT is what you're looking for. It's a matter of personal taste. But who are we kidding? You know you need them all! Ken

^^^ As womble stated. For example, I could install CM:BN v1.00. Next, before I patch it to v1.11 (for example), I could copy it, and rename it CMBN OLD. Then move it back to the same install location. I would then have "CMBN OLD" and "CMBN" in my standard install location. I could repeat this for every iteration of patching and upgrading, renaming as appropriate so I don't have duplicates. I could have (made up examples): CMBN CMBN v1.01 CMBN v1.11 CMBN v2.01 (Was that released?) CMBNCW v2 CMBN v2.12 Etc. That way, if my patch/upgrade is messed up, I haven't lost the entire install. I just delete the bad patch/upgrade install and I still have the CM version I'd just tried (unsuccessfully) to patch/upgrade. As womble mentioned, leaving a bunch of older installs also allows backwards compatibility to play others who haven't patched or bought the upgrade. As much as many gripe about the CM DRM process, the fact that I could have a dozen installs on the same machine, each slightly different than the other, is a very powerful tool. Thanks, Ken PS: I've replicated this on my v2.12 install. Your screenshot appears to be from "Roadblock".

Greenbook on The Bulge has a VERY limited listing of AAA or 90mm. All I could find was one note. I have not looked up the TO&E of the units. p. 78, footnote: 639th and 413th AAA Bns;

LOL. Yes, "Bulge". That's what I get with trying to type on my smartphone.

LOL. I think we'd be more likely to hear from them the ranges at which they WEREN'T shot by machineguns.

How do you play "CMBN basic"? Based on your initial statement of, "I found this shapes only in CMBN basic (CW and MG look good) with shaders ON." I ask because it implies that you may have multiple installs. If so, that points back to my brz comment. Regardless, in order to replicate this, I'd like to know how to get to where you are. Ken