Specs

Wow -- kudos to BD, as well, for asking such a good question. That's one of those things I long ago stopped wondering about, like why the AI isn't hardcoded to avoid purchasing that flak truck with the backwards-facing gun, or wave/particle duality. Does anyone know the origin of the custom? I went scouting around on Google to see if I could learn anything, and it was noted in a site about the German navy that L allows one to express the length of the barrel in multiples of the diameter of the projectile. This seems like something that might be useful if you're shooting in indirect mode -- perhaps it somehow feeds into the math that the gunnery officers had to do to hit their targets? Or does it go waaaaay back to some long-lost Teutonic cannonsmith?

All I want to know is whether BTS will bring their development schedule to a crash stop in order to accomodate my whim. I'm dangling my credit card in front of my monitor by two fingers, waving it about in a teasing fashion, and double dog daring them to disappoint me. Witness ye now my stunning command of militariana. Behold: the DAK M39 Luftrad! If this baby ain't in the game, I ain't buyin'. 'Nuff said.

Be thoughtful when considering hull-down positions -- if you go hull-down and leave a poorly armored turret exposed, then every hit will penetrate. It can actually be advantageous to expose the entire AFV if its forward armor can stand up to whatever's shooting at it, as most hits will strike the AFV's hull (which has a larger cross-sectional area than the turret) and ricochet off. It's counterintuitive, I know, but c'est la guerre. Trouble seems to be that the reduced silhouette of a hull-down tank doesn't incur a sufficiently large "to hit" penalty to offset the poor pretection of a thinly armored turret. Better to give the enemy gunners a bigger target, most of which their shells can't penetrate, than a small target that's vulnerable everywhere.

Bumped for the night shift, because ROQC puts the fun back into playing against the AI.

Many happy returns, one and all.

The game seems to model encirclement perfectly adequately for my money. If you get a chunk of your force into the enemy's rear, the question is whether or not the CO -- that is to say, the other player -- panics. If so, the enemy formation on the game board will disintegrate; if not, you inflict panic one unit at a time by taking full advantage of local tactical superiority, as Redwolf and others observed, and proceed to take apart the enemy formation the old fashioned way. At any rate, it certainly wouldn't be much fun if the game automatically forced a surrender or inflicted a massive morale penalty (presumably panicking or breaking most of one's troops in a single turn) simply because the Black Hats slipped a company of infantry or a platoon of tanks behind you. The question of whether "Sneak Attacks" are worth the time and trouble depends, I think, on whether such an attack is considered to be an end or a means to an end. I have managed this sort of thing, myself, on a few occasions back in the CMBO era, but I never expected the enemy forces to fold simply because I managed to pull off something dastardly. I expected that the opposition would demand a demonstration of the full dimensions of my dastardliness -- and then fold. But, of course, sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it doesn't. When this sort of tactic goes south, it does seem to lead invariably to complete and abject failure -- usually the total loss of my Sneak Attack force and, because the other guy now knows that I'm not holding the "missing mass" in reserve, loss of the battle, as well. C'est la guerre.

Omigawd -- It's... It's... It's Lulubelle! Now, will CMAK track unit hydration levels, d'y'think?

Oooooh-ho! So that's how it is, eh? Not enough that we play the game, but it has to be the first thing we fire up every day. Clever, lads -- fiendishly clever! ...And on a serious note, thanks for the tip. I'm running CMBB on the stock graphics card in my G4, which is no doubt barely adequate to the task.

I'm not sure why my comment was interpreted as detracting from or disparaging ROQC... Too breezy, I suppose. My intent was to suggest that, in addition to appealing to players who miss having some level of "ownership" over their force, a simplified campaign is potentially a useful teaching tool for newbies and less experienced/less hardcore players. Exploring the possibilities and problems that come up as formations and hardware change throughout the war can be kind of intimidating, as there's an enormous amount of information to keep track of outside whatever's going on in any given battle. A campaign encompassing the entire war in 40 or 50 battles provides a context in which to consider, and hopefully understand, one's changing options.

Stranger things have happened, ah reckon. <shrug> I'll try to remember to turn off the flags next time it happens and see if I get the same result. Nope. Come to think of it, I believe the only CMBB mods I have installed to date are the terrain grids. Anything like the Paisleygrenadier, or do your fashion-forward troops have their own thang goin' on?

Odd little graphics bug: Not Photoshopped beyond cropping, shrinking, and saving as JPEGs, I promise -- this has popped up maybe half a dozen times, now, with no discernable pattern. It can appear spontaneously during a game or at startup, in a PBEM turn or vs. the AI. Happily, it goes away if I quit and restart. The flags are not fixed and will appear and disappear as I move or rotate the viewpoint. Running 1.02 on a stock dual-533 Mac. But the flags always seem to appear in areas of cover, so I can't help but wonder: do you suppose this is how the AI "sees" the game board and plans its movements?

Ah, the EZ version of Biltong's full-on 1040 with itemized deductions and Schedule D attached. And it's conveniently functional with the dice from my Monopoly game! Just the thing for us lightweights. Regardless of BTS' stand on the topic, I believe the great virtue of the campaign concept is that it's a device that takes players through the entire war, offering a chance to experience the changing technology and its impact on the ebb and flow of battle. A condensed, simplified version of BCR is a useful tool for broadening one's experience base if new to the game -- of if, like me, you don't harbor a great deal of fascination for the Second World War. It's easy for casual players to slip into a "comfort zone"... Rattle your cage with ROQC!

If you don't feel like spending any money, use the forum's search function to look up posts in the "Tips and Tricks" section by member #5490 since the beginning of the year. Also, the links here are helpful even though the discussions all relate to CMBO. To help get in the mood, this site may be of interest, and perhaps this one, as well. I'm sure someone can suggest similar sites for the Axis, as well.

I've noticed this, as well, as I spend a lot of time at View Levels 6 and 7. It has, on rare occasions, caused me to lose track of where one or two units are, but it's basically just cosmetic so I don't worry about it too much. This is just a WAG, but I theorize that roads are separate graphics overlaid onto terrain tiles; the unit bases are in a lower "layer" than the road graphics and are therefore obscured. But then again, I've been working with Photoshop for a long time, so no doubt my mental model of this is influenced by my workflow there.

Why? Because they care about what they put their names on. craftsman (n) 1: a professional whose work is consistently of high quality; "as an actor he was a consummate craftsman" 2: a creator of great skill in the manual arts; "the jewelry was made by internationally famous craftsmen" 3: a skilled worker who practices some trade or handicraft Thanks very much, gents. Wish we had more like you.

Holy cats -- Fionn and JasonC both posting to the same thread! I feel like I've just plunged into a Las Vegas swimming pool after being lost for weeks in the desert... One thing I didn't notice anyone mention but which, I think, deserves to be stressed to every newbie until it sinks in is to start playing against another human ASAP. Eighteen months ago or thereabouts, I foolishly reasoned along the lines of, "Gosh, I guess I should play against the CMBO AI until I can beat it soundly, then I can apply what I've learned to human opponents." I'm still paying for that stroke of genius, and probably always will... The CMBB AI is an improvement, to be sure, but still no substitute for the real thing. Not much of a conversationalist, either.

It crossed my mind that it might not have been obvious to the manual's author that leaving out a proper alphabetical index was something of a violation of etiquette in this situation. You know, being that it's a 250 page manual covering a bewildering array of topics from land mines to airstrikes, and all... I don't know if Martin is a professional editor or not, so I offered a definition of the word from a neutral third party to establish that what was labeled "Index" in the manual was no such thing. And as it turns out, I'd never heard of definition number six, so I couldn't bring myself to cut the text short. I guess that was your tough luck, Michael, but it wasn't done with malice. If you're not a paid employee, you're a customer. Of course, I can't stop you or anyone else from spending your valuable time correcting the oversights of the nice people who make this game I enjoy so very much, but by your logic if I were to purchase a new car that turned out to be defective, I would be somehow remiss if I merely brought the defect to the manufacturer's attention instead of bombing around the country fixing all the other cars suffering from the same defect. All of which, I suppose, could be expressed a bit more succinctly as: Dude -- get a grip!

Ah, found it -- Sept. 20, 2002: Hire an editor, lads... Hire an editor. By way of comparison, Charles Carey's A General History of Oregon is just over 800 pages long and has an index that itself runs to 100 pages and change. For a 250 page manual covering a game with CMBB's steep learning curve and insane... er, obses... um, let's just go with "meticulous" attention to detail, 25 pages sounds like a good start.

A quick search turned up no references to this issue, so let me be the first to register a complaint... Lads, I love the game and all, but Appendix D of the CMBB English manual is a Table of Contents, not an Index. A proper index, as the CMBO manual had, would be much appreciated in future editions of the game. INDEX (in·deks) n. pl. in·dex·es or in·di·ces 1. Something that serves to guide, point out, or otherwise facilitate reference, especially: (a) An alphabetized list of names, places, and subjects treated in a printed work, giving the page or pages on which each item is mentioned. ( A thumb index. © A table, file, or catalog. 2. Something that reveals or indicates; a sign: “Her face... was a fair index to her disposition” (Samuel Butler). 3. A character used in printing to call attention to a particular paragraph or section. Also called fist, hand. 4. An indicator or pointer, as on a scientific instrument. 5. (a) Mathematics. A number or symbol, often written as a subscript or superscript to a mathematical expression, that indicates an operation to be performed, an ordering relation, or a use of the associated expression. ( A number derived from a formula, used to characterize a set of data. 6. Index Roman Catholic Church. A list formerly published by Church authority, restricting or forbidding the reading of certain books.

Keyboard shortcuts -- right! Much obliged, Rickovich. Guess I panicked when the Halt order didn't show up on the screen -- I've gotten into the habit of driving the game with a drawing tablet, not a keyboard. Perhaps it's time to reassess this practice... Still, I would suggest this qualifies as a bug. Probably too minor to warrant fixing, but something to keep in mind for the gnu engine. In a perfect world, players should not be constrained in their choice of input devices.

From the manual: Human Wave - available only to Soviet units in command range of an HQ. Unit will begin with a brisk walk (for at least 10 meters) and cover the last 80 meters of the way to the waypoint running (or less if the distance is smaller). Increases morale. "Human Wave" order has to be cancelled before other orders can be given. There can only be one "Human Wave" waypoint, which also can NOT be adjusted once set. It explicitly says I have to cancel the Human Wave if I want to issue other movement orders, and yet that's precisely what I can't do...

In order to mitigate command delays of 30+ seconds and maximize my potential Human Wave distance, I tried issuing Pause orders to my troops so they'd start Waving a few seconds into the following turn. This proved problematic in the demo, as the Human Wave order is truncated into a short (10-20m) Wave followed by a long Run... but I don't expect the lads much care about that. Much more troublesome, though, in both the demo and game I find that in the order phase of the second turn, I cannot cancel Human Waves before they start. The Halt command is simply not available: What gives?

I'd like to see the lads license out the game engine next year to allow the development of all of the above while they spend the next 3 years working on a gnu engine that will really knock our socks off, and which will cover all of Europe and perhaps North Africa, as well. And I want Betty Grable on the splash page.

Soldiers seem to become braver when firing a weapon at something or someone -- it's as simple as that. This phenomenon was observed as early as the American Civil War (and quite likely earlier than that) and IIRC it also comes up more than once in the "Lessons Learned" publications.

It's probably an issue with v2.4 of the nvidia driver, which is what the System 9.2.2 update installed on my drive. As noted, v3.0 fixes the Paisleytruppen thing -- I didn't try v2.6, as I found 3.0 first. No, the earlier diagnosis of driver trouble seems to have been on target, as the paisley uniforms disappeared without touching any of the game's files. Cross-platform weirdness! FWIW, the Paisleygrenadiers were the only problem I noticed on my Mac -- my brave Russian soldiers wanted nothing to do with such bourgeois decadence.