Tarquelne

Because previous attempts to explain failed? I'll try. The game has no FO system. If there was an FO system, then it'd be good to distinguish between ones with radios, ones with wires, and ones waving their hats. An FO system of some sort would be nice, but not really for the radiomen. Beyond the scope of the game. Though maybe a special victory condition could be set up. But that's "Scriptable victory conditions", not radiomen per se. Beyond the scope of the game, and no CC system in the game anyway. Should the game get a CC system, radio men might become meaningful. As things are - and will be fore the foreseeable future - they aren't: Their effects are beyond the scope of the game. OTOH, given the "borg" effect of having one player control everything, you could pretend every unit in the game - every tank, every individual soldier, every gun - has a radio and/or radioman. (If you can't see them it's because they're so small - radiomenlets.) How's that?

I can't fit your time and place conditions, but you might find the quote below of interest: From Market Garden: An Opium Fiend's Story (Amazon.com link.)

Now you're scaring me. HMGs are in, according to Moon. Assuming the FOW isn't worse than I assume or the XML simpler, that's my list. My biggest concern at the moment is how well the game plays without tons-o-tanks.

Yay for me!

Denwad, "up" is only one direction. Even a shaped charge explodes in all directions. Just watched a "Yes, Prime Minister" episode and had to express my "Inner Wooley".

Not that I disagree with what I suspect your basic point is (Smoke should have been in the game - some loss in "unit detail" would have been worth it) but I'm reminded of a Dilbert comic. As I remember it, young Asok-the-intern opens up a meeting with a whiny question ("Why can't anyone around here make a decision?!"), and is congratulated with having "grown up." Gee, I wonder why they call them "grogs"?

I've been studying the informative video, and I think infantry will be able to "clothesline" passing tanks. Cool.

It started when an early version of CM presented the audible feedback "You will be assimilated!" whenever your units spotted a new enemy unit.

I read of that happening in Burma. But I don't remember it being a colonel or a .45. In fact, I don't remember the guy's rank or his weapon at all - 'cept that it was a pistol. OTOH, I do remember "Burma." I'd assumed it was a unique incident. It always struck me as being somewhat nightmarish, so maybe I'm just being optimistic. On French tanks, or any with C&C problems: I wonder of a poor spotting ability would do a decent job of reflecting the problems with French tanks. One of the chief aspects of no radio and an overworked crew would be, I think, slowness at reacting to new threats. Not seeing a threat for quite awhile would also result in slowness to reacting to new threats. Maybe 1C could install some Annoy-ware advertising an expansion that results in lots of pop-ups whenever you select a tank with C&C problems. I think that'd work, too. [ August 17, 2006, 06:28 AM: Message edited by: Tarquelne ]

Tarq's lawyer here: It is my clients claim that the above both sums up the previously referred to statements and resolves any apparent contradiction between them. But, as a firm upholder of civil rights, freedom of speech, privacy, and anything else I can think of that might be used as an excuse he will not provide documentary evidence at this time. If we receive a lawful court order we will of course comply with it to the fullest extent possible.

I found the reference I was thinking of. In fact, I found two somewhat contradictory statements. One plainly stated, one less plain but more directly applicable. One statement from Megakill, one from Moon. One raises a question of quantity, the other a question of definition... Ok, so I looked it up. But you can't make me post the links.

well thats what everybody else is thinking, I guess. </font>

I assume you are.</font>

Yay! If the Panzers don't have accurate long range fire it isn't nearly as much fun to plug them with a flanking T-34 at 75m.

Paths of blood marking out the kill zone! I guess the game will include SS occultism after all. Cool. Sacrifices.

Lets see if I can make up something sufficiently filthy to fit the often puerile interests of the board, but not so filthy as to get me banned.

I agree completely. The proper course is to examine each RTS game on it's own merits, because each one has it's own unique host of stupid and horrible flaws for which it should be publicly reviled. Well, OK, maybe not. I have found a few I like. I think the basic problem with RTS games has been that while they lack most of the qualities a wargamer values, we keep getting told they posses these qualities. This creates a certain amount of ill will. Most RTS games are action games with a few strategic elements rather than a bona fide "strategy" games. Even the decent ones are rarely all that hot as a plain strategy game, let alone as a wargame. If nothing else, the pace tends to be too fast for strategic thinking of significant depth so far as the heart of the game goes, the fighting. DoW is an RTS I'm currently playing. Out of the box it's got far more tactical depth than most RTSs, it's moddable, and the sound/graphics are a hoot. But it's no wargame. I play it when I feel like an action game - when I might otherwise play an FPS. Not when I feel like playing a strategy game. What BFC/1C seem to be promising is TOW will truly be a "real time strategy" game. The pace won't be too fast for interesting planning (of tactical nature), plus the units and terrain will be decently detailed. It still may not appeal to many CM fans. More often than not I find I want a "leisurely" game, too. It's easy for me to imagine seldom feeling otherwise.

Oh, the wailing and gnashing of teeth if it is like EYSA! The recriminations and the anger! It'd probably provide more entertainment than the demo.

Are you talking about the nudey pics again? I thought they said that was a no-no.

I've been running all his posts through Google's English-to-French auto-translator, and then back. It seems to help.

I'm pretty sure he means that the IL2 engine assumes Euclidean geometry, and not something more exotic. That is true, isn't it? Ah, I don't know why I even expect an answer. All my inquires about OS/2 are ignored as if they were a joke, or something. Good news about some infantry/infantry battles and the ability to make scenarios using XML. (Though I think that may have been mentioned previously, come to think of it.) Anyway, those are both things I'd been wondering about, too. Do the infantry-only battles tend to have the same number of units - as in individual TOW units - as the ones involving tanks?

Trenches are a part of the map like a house or a tree, yes? They'll always be there at the start of a scenario?

Of course. Quibbling is especially important now, when we don't have a lot of solid information about the game. And good point, re: MoH.

Sure... whoops, no. Strictly speaking, I think they're awarded for unusual performance, behavior, or outcomes. If by "circumstances" you mean the whole event, then yes the circumstances are unusual. But as far as I know the circumstances, in the sense of surrounding factors - such as the setting - aren't particularly unusual. I wouldn't want to make the case that a soldier should, as a rule, take on a house full of a dozen enemy soldiers all by himself. That's not "how to make war" in the general sense. OTOH, as far as I know a house with soldiers in it isn't all that unusual. Probably not the rule, but not as rare as a MoH or a VC. Is it? I'm not sure if you're simply quibbling about my use of MoH examples (You're right they shouldn't be seen as representative.) Or, maybe, you want to make the point that fighting in isolated buildings is rare and special and tends to lead to heroic behavior, and is thus over-represented in medal citations... or something like that.

Soldiers? Quite awhile ago I was researching MoH winners for some reason and I remember two involving farmhouses in Italy. I don't remember the names, but one involved an American attacking a farmhouse and shed housing multiple MGs, eventually taking the last Germans prisoners after throwing rocks at them. (!) The other one involved heroics that, had I seen it in a movie, I would have thought the movie laughingly unrealistic. IIRC the medal-winner spent several hours traveling multiple times between a couple of American strong-points, taking out MG nests. He finally fetched up in a farmhouse and single-handedly (or almost so) held off a German squad or two. Pick up MG, fire till empty. Pick up SMG, fire till empty, pick up rifle, fire till empty... Buildings outside of towns were used. Arty and tanks weren't ubiquitous, remember, and in an agricultural area a house might be the best cover around. I'm pretty certain both houses above were two story, and I wouldn't be surprised if the first stories were stone. By "these types of engagements" you might mean engagements featuring lots of HE. That may be. I hope all TOW scenarios aren't like that, though. No troops-in-buildings won't, I imagine, kill the game. It'll still probably be more than good enough. OTOH, it's a significant flaw: If nothing else TOW won't be able to a decent job of handling scenarios in towns, which would be a real shame. The sooner fixed the better. [ August 07, 2006, 12:44 PM: Message edited by: Tarquelne ]