Teggy

GS, I think if people like GameSpot, and they're smart, they should pay for it or they'll lose it. People have been so spoiled by the free information available on the Internet, that when they are suddenly forced to pay for it, they act like they are getting a slap in the face. In fact, sites like GameSpot have writers, editors, designers just like a print magazine, but haven't been charging a price per "issue" and get nowhere near the ad revenue. What are they supposed to do? When IGN started their "Insider" section, I paid for it because I liked the information the site offers, and for goodness sake, it's $19.95 a year. I also pay $14.95 to hear all of the MLB games online. There are a lot of things on the Internet that I find of value, and therefore I don't mind paying for them. I hope other people start to understand this - they have to have noticed all the sites that have dropped off the map as time has passed.

And they would have survived longer if they stayed free?

wow, thanks so much for that quick reply. Pictures speak a thousand words...

So, I'm reading Ambrose's D-Day book, and have reached the part covering the initial glider missions. However, I'm not getting a good picture of what these things were all about. How did they come into being? How many people fit in them (it mentions them carrying jeeps sometimes)? How big of a landing strip did they need? If someone could offer a summary, I'd be grateful...

They need to add a status of "sleeping" for CM:BB Wouldn't that be great? A certain amount of noise might wake them up, and they'd have delay in waking, getting their rifles...

if you are using an e-mail client like outlook or eudora, you can actually just save as text right from the message using the program. Even if your opponent wrote a note with the message, CM will ignore everything outside the dotten lines.

thanks guys...

If I've moved a number of my units off my friendly map edge (empty mortars, crews, etc.) and I am later forced to surrender, have those units that have moved off the map effectively made it to a safe rear position, or will they still be counted as having surrendered?

Can someone explain to me how some of these matches end up with scores that don't add up to 100? I thought the scores had to add up to 100 in order to put the major/minor/tactical victory tag on.

It's command-shift-3 to take a screenshot on a mac. Pictures will show up on your hard drive numbered sequentially. Command-shift-4 will give you a cursor so you can specify a small area of the screen to get rather than the whole thing.

See, this is where my complete ignorance of much of the war (I'm learning as fast as I can!) comes into play. Thanks for the info. It would be great if they were modelled on-map and you could see 16 tiny rockets go firing off in quick succession, but I imagine they wouldn't have gotten that close to the action.

Forgive me if this is mentioned elsewhere, but I searched my little heart out and couldn't find any mention of it. I was watching an episode of "Battlefield" yesterday on the Russian invasion of Manchuria. They highlighted the M-13 rocket battery. I believe it the range listed would place it off-board, but will this be modelled in CMBB? BTW, this is what I'm talking about: m-13 rocket launcher [ February 27, 2002, 05:28 PM: Message edited by: Teggy ]

Strange, I reverted back to original graphics, reinstalled Tom's mod, and now it works. Needs some more work with houses and such, and there are some oddities among the road borders and what looks like stone that turns into bushes, but here it is:

aka_tom_w, I have the same crappy look on my computer (a desktop, tho), and I have a 32MB video card (G3 350). I also used MCM3, and I wonder what I am doing wrong. I do get nice fog, though. [ February 24, 2002, 02:33 PM: Message edited by: Teggy ]

That's just the VRAM for the built-in video. If you've got a free PCI slot you can buy a new video card. I believe they are suggesting 32MB of VRAM for CMBB. I picked up one of the new Radeon 7000s for around $100, but that's no good for you if you want to run OS X, and it has difficulty being installed in some beige G3s (the 8500 is one of these). But if you can use it, it is supposed to about match up with the full Radeon if you stay within 1024x768 and lower. Full Radeons are going for about $150 now. You can also get an Nvidia based card (GeForce), but I don't know much about them. You can get Voodoo cards cheap, but I wouldn't recommend it because they no longer have any support. [ February 22, 2002, 11:59 PM: Message edited by: Teggy ]

Or is something wrong with my computer? Picture below...

A few of you may have read my threads a while back about problems I was having playing PBEM on my upgraded Mac clone. CM would crash when I entered my password. I have had this machine for a quite a while and sunk a lot of money in upgrades into it, so I didn't feel like making another investment. I had upgraded it with a used Voodoo 3 that I had flashed with a Mac ROM. It didn't work perfectly, but it was cheap, and it enabled me to play CM. However, I was convinced the problem was with my upgraded CPU, not my video card. Well, I finally broke down and got one of the new Radeon 7000s. Not too expensive, more powerful, and best of all, supported by a company that's still in business. After I installed it, I had a great time looking at all the graphical improvements I had gained (you mean those white blocky splotches in the sky were actually clouds? ) and how much nicer the game even loaded up and navigated through the menus. On a lark, I figured I would try to open one of the old PBEMs that gave me so much trouble. Believe it or not, it worked! Hopefully it will be able to handle CMBB as well, but I have a lot to learn about this version. Too bad I have to spend the whole weekend on b-school application essays. Well, it will make for some nice little breaks.

I don't know anything about the guts of the game, but the movie is not video, persay, and filesize relating to video shouldn't apply. What it seems to be is a representation of data. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to view it in 3D. If I was to guess, as a minute plays out, the program records the x,y (and z?) coordinates of every unit as they move, and records changes in facing, angle, etc. Of course, if moving in a straight line, you only need to record the start and stop point along with the distance traveled. Also noted would have to be timing of shots, hits, and a great number of other things. Placed in a file, the program could then recreate the battle over and over again. What would be needed to play the whole battle would be to save the data from each turn. I don't know how much space 1 turn takes up. Of course, this all comes out of my a@# and could be completely wrong.

Thanks very much for the tips. I see I very much misunderstood how these assets should be used.

I'm definitely a bit of a newbie in understanding battlefield formations. I just purchased a copy of "The Oxford Companion to World War II," and was reading up on platoons, squads, etc. I don't have the book in front of me, but I believe it said that rifle companies often included a heavy weapons platoon composed of two MMGs and two mortars. If this is the case, how are these platoons used in battle? In addition, how were HMGs generally deployed? What about anti-tank teams? Artillery spotters? Lay it on me...

Thanks...that seems like a weird thing to do, doesn't it? Two different names for the same book? Well, as long as the inside is the same, I don't care Hopefully it will be along soon. Now, if I could only get PBEM to work on my computer

OK, I decided the Oxford book sounded pretty close if not exactly what I wanted. Here's the weird thing. The softcover $17 version was "The Oxford Guide to World War II" and the hardcover version was "The Oxford Guide to the Second World War". I picked up a "like new" hardcover copy of off half.com where they had hardcover versions with both names. The one I bought said 1995, but I just realized has a different ISBN. The ISBN listed above shows 2000. A little confusing, I just hope I got the right book!

Don, does the Oxford book also include info on the weapons, etc.? If it does, I should probably grab it now since I found a good price for it.

I was wondering if anyone could recommend a book that might give good, basic comparisons of WW2 armor, personnel, and equipment. Such as, what are Heer, and how are they different from Volksgrenadier (or however that's spelled)? What's the difference between a Sherman and a Tiger, etc. What are the different types of artilery, who used them, and how? Detailed armor penetration stats and the like aren't necessary, just basic descriptions and comparisons are what I'm looking for. Pretty pictures are always nice, too

1. Yes, I did reinstall my OS just recently. 2. I'm pretty willing to accept that my computer has just had it. I certainly is aging (it was purchased in 97, IIRC), and there's only so much upgrades can do, as witnessed by the fact that I've hit a wall regarding upgrading the OS. The part that just seems so strange is that regular gameplay and TCP/IP work fine, but PBEM, which one would think should be a simple matter, doesn't. Bottom line is a might have to buy a new machine sooner that I wanted to, or at least deal without PBEM.