DasBaron

Yes, that's it! Thanks Kanonier Reichmann

Not that it much matters, but I recehcked. Yes, unrestricted was on. Either we are misunderstanding eachother or there is something strange about my CM setup, because each category, i.e. Armor, infantry, etc has a point maximum. For example Combined arms, 1500 pts you only have 300pts to use MAXIMUM for tanks. Furthermore. The Germans are outclassed in everything but infantry and support vehicles. I went over the stats very carefully and between that and common sense when determining strengths such as arty times, turret speeds, unit costs, it is obvious that the Allies definately have an advantage. Now all of this is just for arguements sake, because I play the Axis anyway. I was making a point and I was asking what I thought to be legit and respectful questions. I was not however trying to be "funny".

I don't know.... I don't think you should have a restriction. If someone took all FOs and MG jeeps, they would be doomed. The same if they took all tanks IMO. The whole idea of combined arms goes against loading up too heavily with one kind of unit solely because a variation will get you farther. But I understand the idea behind the seperation of the point into max numbers per category. I guess more than anything, I'm wondering where they came up with the max point totals and why. I would like to have a at least a 3 tank company if I wanted to without having a huge 2000-2500pt game. Still a great game and I guess I have to find ways around my idea of a problem, but I think it's something to think about. I'm not sure if it has been discussed before (I'm sure it has) and if someone knows of a past thread...I wouldn't mind looking at it. The Russian front is going to be ugly for the Germans. In other games I've played around the same time period, the Germans aren't quite so over powered. For example...Close Combat and TS's Campaign Series...except when depicting the Russian front. This game shafts the Germans the way they were Historically, I think, but I'm wondering if it's not just better to stay away from playing the Germans when thinking about ladder matches. Tactics, tactics...I know, but when you're up against an equal, if not better opponent, tactics really only go so far.

Thanks Lost water I'm pretty sure I was playing unrestricted, but I will check again whe I get home. As for the combined arms....I don't want to loose the option of having other units. I'm going to experiment with it a bit further. I haven't tried that route yet. I wanted the option of other units as well. Perhaps I'm not understanding combined arms correctly. Are the maximum amount of point per category (i.e. armor, infantry, arty) in accordance to standard real life military organization when using "combined arms"? I have always thought of "combined arms" as a combination of organizations. (i.e. arty support for troops and armor.) A company of armor might have supporting infantry and heavy weapons, but these are "restricted" to certain resources...while combined arms is a haphazard mixture. If indeed it is a haphazrd mixture, then why the maximum restriction per category for points? Why not just a point total that can be used any way you want? Now as I've mentioned before. I'm 99% sure I have been using "unrestricted". Am I not seeing something, or is there another explanation that I'm ignorant of? Any help is appreciated gentlemen, thank you.

Yes, I know Lars, it just seems a bit more than what I would think is all. The difference is a very large one and I understand the reasoning behind it, but for 1) It gives the allies a very profound advantage (and this is ontop of the large advantage of arty ammo they have)which makes for an unbalanced player to player game. and 2) It is only my opinion that the gap wasn't as tremendous, but I will do some more research on my own in admittance that I don't know everything about it. Anyone have any more comments on the number of tanks points you get? Unless you play a very large point game, you can't have a platoon of tanks, at the very best a half platoon of low to medium tanks.

So far, I have not seen any way to allocate a user defined amount of point limit to any one group. You begin by being able to buy units up to a predetermined point max, but there's no way to set that max for yourself. As it stands, I am usually able to buy a maximum of 2 main tanks (medium) or one heavy. Platoons are made up of 4 to 5, no? When depleted, there were considerably less, but in a CM quick battle we're assuming that we have a full strength company or battlion, yes? I have been playing around 1500pts. as the Germans At 300 points, I can't buy squat for armor. My standard are 2 PZIVHs with some vehicle support. Come to think of it, this b&$tch goes the same for arty too, but Arty I can understand given the time of CMBO. Although it is my opinion that the CM depicted Allies grossly outclass the Germans in this area, both in point cost and firing times.

Thanks gentlemen. I downloaded Chris's Excel sheet and been going over it for the last couple of hours. As far as I can tell: Allied: better artillary American: Overall better tanks German: Better infantry and support weapons German: better uniforms Thanks for the info guys. Fight well!

I had my 1st live match Saturday. I was playing Axis and I had my a$# handed to me. It was mostly my opponents use of artillary. Now I have a few questions for all you veterans. What's better? Allied or Axis. Personally I don't see much of a difference. Axis armor goes *poof* just as easily as any allied stuff (except for the Tiger and Panther) (but then you have the allied Firefly...nasty tank). Axis units have more FP, but Allied units have more men in squads. And allied artillary...jeez Does any Axis stuff compare? And I haven't played the Allies yet, but I'm sure that their unit point cost is lower. Also, does anyone know of a list for all the unit's info including their price? Maybe in an Excel or Access file? Man I wish I had more time for this game. Das Baron

Has it happened to anyone when the troops just will not listen? I think it's a slight bug. I know that it is intended for troops to have a sort of AI where they will think for themselves to some degree, but then there are the times where their choices are simply ridiculous. For example: There have been numerous times where I have been advancing and doing a sort of leap frog with my tanks. Infantry is close behind. Well suddenly enemy infantry pop up near the tank and behind. So what does the tank do? Turn around and fire at them while leaving its tail in the direction of enemy tanks. 1st of all, there is no way a tank crew is going to expose itself like that for real, second, how exactly did this buttoned tank see enemy infantry behind it? third, even if it did see the infantry, it would let the friendly infantry which is close by deal with the situation while it responded to orders (which in this case was to watch a sector in which enemy tanks were going to appear.) And this was a veteran Tiger crew! I have lost tanks because of this. There should be a command where the unit will try to stick out the command to the letter. As in the example above, if this command were available, that tank would have ignored the enemy infantry and stuck to the more important task of destroying enemy armor. Perhaps this strict command would be involved within the rotate command. If I tell armor to rotate to face a certain area, it should stay in that arc until either moved or changed. Exceptions might be of course...direct threats that may force the unit to disengage the strict order and conduct actions of immediate self preservation. Another example..AI side. I'm advancing with Churchills. Suddenly I am slammed by a Pak 20 some distance away. With its rapid rate of fire, it hits me about 4 times within the 60 seconds. Each shot bounces off of the front turret. Next turn, the pak keeps firing with the same result. It's obvious that the weapon is not going to penetrate the armor...so why fire? Shouldn't the AI have the Pak get into better coverage or have had it wait for less armored targets. or have it calculate that at its distance, it's weapon was no good directed at the front of the advancing armor? What was weird was that none of my tanks could target this AT gun which sat in an open field. Not even a Firefly could target it for some reason. And it shot through the bridge (i.e. at my tank on the other side of the bridge where it was completely out of LOS.) The AI is pretty smart....backing up when faced with a larger threat, trying to flank armor, using smoke, but other times, it simply seems foolishly heroic. Das Baron

Bought the game last week. I was getting my butt handed to me at first, but now I've gotten used to the game. I'm afraid that before long the AI will not be very challenging (I will go to PBEM soon). I want to set the AI experince and unit amounts a bit higher. Being that a scenerio takes quite a bit of time however, I don't want it set to unreasonable. Any sugesstions as to a good challenging level for the AI. I do play with total Fog of War. Das Baron

Excellent. Thank you very, very much. That was the deal. I guess it would behoove me to look at the short cut keys more thoroughly. Thanks again. Back to the action!

Concise version: I just bought the game. I installed mods before really playing. I installed realsmoke mod. I see fire on wrecks, but no smoke and shooting smoke shows nothing as well. Any ideas why I don't see smoke in the game?

Was informed that Mad Matt's Mod guide was a bit old. They way this game seems to attract user modifications, I don't doubt it. Does anyone have another list of mods I should go with? Any ideas which are the latest and greatest? The sugesstions Mad MAtt's guide gave look pretty damn good so far. Is the Combat MIssion site THE site for the newest updates, or are there others I should look into? Much appreciated Gentlemen Das Baron

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Subvet: Did you realize that you can use hotkeys to make this easier? "Shift-O" makes building walls transparent or completely removes them if you like while the building is occupied. "Shift-R" romoves the roofs. Nope, didn't. I just got the game yesterday. I will explore more indepth as soon as I get home. Thanks! Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Hello everyone. I'd like to start off by saying that I am not a "grognard", but I love strategy and any game which has the feel of a wargame, whether it's tactical or operational. I was a playtester for Talonsoft's Rising Sun (back when I had all the time in the world.) I even have an article printed in the manual on infantry tactics. At the time I was also following the progress of CM as well. I played the demo and really enjoyed the game. "Unfortunately" I was diverted by life to other pursuits and lost track of its progress until recently. Last week, I decided to come back and check in on this "up and coming" wargame. I have to say...OUTSTANDING! In a way, I'm glad I waited. I was skeptical about buying a game online in part because of old store habits and in part because of the unknown. What really turned me around was the community support this game has generated. It's like TS's Campaign Series only I have to say, much more invigorated and full flavored. No offense intended to my old comrades. That was an awesome community. One of the things I like the most about these type of games are the people. Cream of the crop in my opinion. And it seems this game has started a deep and interesting fan base. It is my lament that the industry has all but nearly forsaken these type of games for the more brain dead titles that appear on the shelves. After going through all of the Combat Mission site, I was salivating at the arrival of my copy. I installed and played it last night...complete with all the mods suggested by the MadMatt mod guide. Truly exceptional work people. The graphic mods and sounds are a vast improvement to the demo from what I remember of it. And the playability is just as good as I remember. Scrolling the map is still a bit cumbersome, but I will get used to it with practice. Practice I shall get plenty of with this amazing wargame. The game is revolutionary for the wargamming industry. It's like Close Combat up close and personal. I'm extremely excited for the future of this game. I have some opinions (as always) that I would like to share just for the sake of it. 1) The sounds, action and scenery almost make you forget you're playing a game. But, things only get better, yes? One thing I noticed was the clipping inside buildings. It's hard to see anything coherently once units enter a building. 2) The animation of units fighting is a bit slow and puppet-like. No offense and playability is the key, but this might be a future something to tweak. 3) People might think this too gruesome, but I have always disagreed with that. I think animating soldiers dying and lying dead on the field only adds to the excitement and detail of the game, not to mention the gritty realism. Games like Gettysburg and Close Combat have done it without a population uproar. I think the opinion of it being a bad selling point is not a bad opinion, but a unnecessary one. I understand that dead units are extra processing power, but IMO it would be worth it. And that's it. Not too bad was it? Lastly... Outstanding job to BigTime Software and to all the people that continue to support this game. The manual is one of the best manuals I have every seen for a game and the game itself is steadily making its way as one of my all time favorites. I found this site not too long ago. I think everyone will fully enjoy it: http://www.achtungpanzer.com Das Baron