Cameroon

It's in the manual, and purchasing a company (or whatever) is not proof against the variable +/- 1 level of experience. It's on Page 219, appearing in the changes from CMBO. It appears to be an oversight that it didn't appear in the QB section of the manual. [Edit to address busboy's comment] Also on page 219 is the manual entry about that. The example given is High quality Soviets early on will have a maximum (purchaseable) quality of Regular. [ October 28, 2002, 12:18 AM: Message edited by: Cameroon ]

And I thought Winterhawk's belief that infantry was "weaker" was soundly denounced The "problem" stems from the fact that CMBO made players believe that their infantry were supermen, when in fact they were just men. We've got infantry that behaves more as it should now. There are some issues (brush, wheat, similar not blocking LOS all the time, etc) that detract from their mobility, but I believe those are being fixed. Infantry shouldn't be able to run around in front of a MG or tank with impunity, just as the good Colonel found out. We could do it in CMBO and with little to dissuade us from doing so, and that wasn't right Oh, and I thought I'd throw in that the mortar likely killed the exposed driver. I hadn't considered that the AFV was unbuttoned, but that would definitely do it. I was, at best, an average CMBO player but I had little trouble transitioning to CMBB. I think the key for those having difficulty is as I said, don't try to play BB like you played BO. If you do, you'll just end up frustrated.

Apparently you didn't head the warnings that it wasn't the same game and that, yes, your infantry behaves realistically now I've not had trouble switching between playing CMBB and CMBO, except for cover arcs. I don't play much CMBO any more, BB's improvements are too legion for me to play BO without some disappointment. I think, in order to have fun and not be frustrated, the first thing you should do is FORGET the tactics you used in CMBO. Suppressive, area fire is a MUST in BB and running is hazardous in the extreme, if under fire. Advance is your friend Oh, and better luck in the future [ October 27, 2002, 07:34 PM: Message edited by: Cameroon ]

I have to agree with Engel with regards to guns disembarking themselves like that. Dragging a heavy-ass gun around the field is NOT the way to avoid incoming fire. I think guns jump ship too easily, after all they aren't riding on the GUN, they are inside the transporting unit, right?

If you know how to do pathing, then I hope you can go work for BFC, because their pathing AI is unbelievably weak. I am often struck by the massive imbalance in CM. They have gone to great efforts to get detail with some things, but left so many fundamentals, like pathfinding, and infantry behavior, so painfully underworked.</font>

Well, I believe that was one of the reasons that I suggested leaving both systems in place. Moreover, the pathing-/tac- AI for the "simplified" waypoint should not outshine a human (just as it does not now). In other words, once the fur started flying, you'd want to be specific about where to go and what to do. But "gross" movements would be easier to accomplish and less prone to disaster. And I'm definitely NOT advocating "Platoon A, take that hill." I would be loathe to see that introduced. While I'd like to play Airborne Assault, I don't want CM to be AA

Heh, well I'm not saying that its the perfect solution, but it is a step up (once you make use of it) from CMBO. And while I would love a better method of moving columns, I haven't yet jumped on the bandwagon of getting a "perfect" column movement command. I've read most of the threads where it's come up, and I'm still left with the plethora of car accidents that occur. I mean, even people just backing out of or pulling into a parking space. I bring that up simply because the common argument seems to be "Well, if I said follow Bob down the road, you would and would adjust your speed accordingly." Yes, unless there was an accident And traffic WAS a problem in WWII so... Basically, I like the theory but until I see a real good idea for its implementation, I'll remain skeptical on the overall good-ness of its inclusion. If you don't mind, since you seem to be awake and reading this thread actively, have you any thoughts on the suggestion for an additional movement system? [ October 27, 2002, 05:43 AM: Message edited by: Cameroon ]

This is a really good idea. How many times would you like a tank to put series of shells into the length of a treeline, for instance? Realistic, useful, and missing from the game.</font>

Heh heh. Yeah, inserting a spurious waypoint can give more fine grained order delays than the 10 seconds avail in the orders menu. Neat idea. But now it's starting to get pretty Ptolemaic don't you think?</font>

Ironically CMPlayer, the fact that extra waypoints increase the delay time actually GIVES the playler much more timing and routing control. If I want to move a column of vehicles in CMBO, I have to hope that experience delay + some combination of 15 second delays will add up to something useable. More often than not, this just doesn't work. However, in CMBB, since adding waypoints adds delay, then I can add two waypoints were there was once only 1 to increase my margin of error on the timing or orchestrate an even larger ballet. Furthermore, it is no longer (usually) necessary to plot more than two waypoints to accomplish a turn (one to the turn, and one away). Vehicles no longer slow to absolutely ridiculous speeds when performing such a manuever As a somewhat amusing aside, the removal of control (though, as I think I pointed out, this is perhaps not always true) is one thing that there is a vocal clamoring for with regards to instantly respond to threats anywhere on the map, or with regards to relative spotting. I believe this is an instance that BFC can point to reinforce the "see, be careful what you ask for, you may get it" Personally, I have absolutely never run into a problem that the addition of delay based on waypoints has caused. In fact, I have used it to SOLVE problems, such as traffic routing. Regarding what might be a creative or useful approach for a new waypoint system: What are people's thoughts on maintaining the system more or less as is (i.e. you can plot all your waypoints), BUT with the addition of a "Go here, use this SOP" waypoint system. My thoughts are this: You can choose to plot out your units waypoints. This would incur delay as it does now but it ensures that YOUR orders are followed as closely as possible. OR you could choose to plot a waypoint to some objective (say the other side of a pond) and select two "settings", for instance "Move to Contact" and "Use Cover", or "Run" and "Quickiest Route", or "Hunt" & "Remain on road". The two settings aren't locked together, though some combinations might not be available. In the second way to plot your waypoint, you plot it at the destination and let the AI plot the waypoints. HOWEVER, in order to avoid gamey abuse, those waypoints are not visible, or at the least not editable. This way you could choose to be particular about exactly where you unit goes and incure a penalty for exacting orders. Or you could allow the pathing AI to do the work. If you choose the pathing AI, you get no delay but you have to let it (the NCO, for instance) do the work. I realize that system would require the pathing AI to improve, but I think it would really allow you to remove a lot of the grunt work UNLESS you needed/wanted it. I do think that there might be some consternation about the not being able to edit the AIs waypoints if you choose the second method. But you essentially do that with the "Seek Hulldown" right now. Personally I think the compromise would be exactly right, since you COULD choose to plot the waypoints yourself. Anyway, food for thought. [Edit] And if BFC wants me to come work for them to build the pathing AI to do that... [ October 27, 2002, 05:19 AM: Message edited by: Cameroon ]

There was a posting not long ago about how crews could literally be driven crazy by the constant ringing of many non-penetrating hits. Since casualities in-game do not represent just kills, but anything that makes the soldier incapable of continuing, I think we might be seeing something similar with the tank crews. Even if they weren't driven crazy, perhaps they're unconscious, or otherwise injured from bouncing around inside after a 15 cm HE shell explodes against their hollow metal shell . And if the hardware (tank) is fine, then we'd not see a message. I was forced to do this to a number of PzIIIs with a KV-1 in a certain scenario, after I ran out of AP rounds. It worked just fine

My experience was exactly the opposite. After I figured out the errors in the tutorial, I trounced the AI. I gave a run-down in the Jaegermeister thread mentioned above.

You can also delete units during purchase that started on the map. I don't know if you can if the imported map is an autosave, but you definitely can if it's a scenario. Yeah, that's pretty trivial in the grand scheme of things, but it means you've got to be careful if you're purchasing your units and choose to delete what you've bought.

Hey, you brought it up and found out that we don't agree with you. I don't think that makes us angry Quite honestly, no I don't think the scenarios are at all worse. There are some that are absolutely evil, but none that are unwinnable (so far). Some, maybe even many, of the scenarios may only be suitable for play against the AI. I don't know of any that are specifically unwinnable. I think there was at least one scenario in CMBO like that, something to do with the Red Devils I believe. In short, I have a blast playing the CMBB scenarios. In CMBO I usually just walked over the AI unless the scenario was heavily influenced to the AI's favor. In CMBB, due to engine changes as well as scenario design, I actually have to perform well. To me, that's a welcome change. Some specific scenario examples below: [minor spoilers] . . . . Take Winter Wonderland, for example. That is an evil scenario that Berli built, but it is winnable. I think we badgered poor Berli when we talked about it, but he really did design a challenging scenario. I think he just didn't know it Regarding your comment about some with only one solution. Yes, some do seem to be limited that way (Winter Wonderland might be one, Cemetary Hill and Gefechtsaufklaerung probably). However, none of those are on big maps. They are small scenarios that inherently limit the flexibility of the player (and designer, for that matter). If you played any of the Byte Battles from over at Der Kessel, you'd see a similar situation.

I haven't come across any such for CMBB yet. The closest were the "live" quick battles, those have the autosaves. All you can see is the battlefield, though. You might want to check the AAR site that's in that list, it might have some. If I'm sent any or see any, the fact that there are "movie files" will be noted.

Actually, there have been a number of AARs. Mostly I think there's more gameplaying and less writing going on In any case, I've been trying to keep a list of AARs. If people send me URLs or I spot one in the forum, I update the list. See the link below for the list. Yeah, it looks like crap right now, but it's just a list. If I get motivated maybe I'll improve its look CMBB AARs

Asok, actually it can't This was mentioned specifically at _least_ once, though I couldn't tell you the thread... Basically, each unit has a "spotted" attribute. Either it has been spotted, or it has not. In order to even start affecting a change, each unit has to keep track of ALL the units it has seen. And it's got to be efficient. To get to the question... I don't consider split-squad recon to be "gamey" because there's NO way to do recon that doesn't incidentally take advantage of some game engine limitation. Even if we get real relative spotting with the re-write, you as the commander will still have all of the information that your units have. Ok, so now that my opinion on this is known, for those that feel split-squad recon is gamey, what is the suggestion for performing recon? To be honest, most of my games are at a level where any of my "scouts" are usually in command and almost always in LOS. If I'm giving a sharpshooter, sometimes I'll use him for that role.

*Re-reads his previous post* Heh, Abbott, I hope you redeploy your troops more logically than the structure of my other post. Maybe it's a sign that I'm tired. I follow a similar strategy, though I get a wee bit overwhelmed when I've got "too many". Then I'm likey to just grumble and hit go

Guess today's the day for asking about reinforcements in QBs Unfortunately (IMHO), one still cannot purchase reinforcements in QBs. I just tried adding them to a map for import into a QB, but they didn't appear. So it would appear that we still can't have reinforcements in a QB. Man, my list of things to clamor for in the engine re-write has been growing lately

Personally, I usually don't just stick with what I'm given. The short answer is, it depends I don't think I'd leave my troops where they start, unless I were playing a double-blind (neither side had played/seen the map before) game or trying to start from a "historical" setup. If someone's seen the map before, then it makes VERY good sense to move the troops.

Ok, I'm done worrying about the hex sizes The hex-grass on CMHQ has the same "flaws" as mine. Guess I should process the rest and then figure out what to do about putting them up for download.

Captain, if I had a PC I could Actually, I haven't had a problem having the hexes work (tesselation-wise, or lining up) which is probably a side-effect of building them by hand. The problem I'm having is that, while they line up properly, building them so that they do makes them different widths across their insides. </font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;"> -- --- / \ | This distance is 40m in-game. \ / | -- --- / / And that distance is 45m in-game.</pre>

Hopefully in a couple years (with the re-write) we can have the option to buy reinforcements in a QB. I'd like that too. Can't say I care much about the second though. Might be cool, might look really cheesy too

While I don't expect it to change, I do findn it a little odd. After all, many people want to re-create scenarios/operations that occurred and sometimes they rely on a specific set of weather conditions lasting over a given amount of time. Guess we can chalk that up as a request for the re-write, I don't imagine it will get changed this time 'round. Heh, you know, 2 years is just too long to wait [Edit] Good suggestion Tarqulene. [ October 25, 2002, 12:12 AM: Message edited by: Cameroon ]

86smopuim, that can't happen until relative spotting is implemented, which can't happen until the engine rewrite. The way it works now, a unit is either spotted or it isn't. "Fixing" that is a big deal, engine re-write big