Bruce70

Well to me at least, that is the least important reason. The only thing that concerns me is the extra complexity of movement, spotting and ZOC that you mention. These issues will need careful attention if tiles are used.

Personally I would allow any two units to stack in any hex including sea hexes(or possible any open hex, for example not mountain, city, or swamp etc.), and draw them side-by-side to improve gameplay (as stated elsewhere). I beleive that the most suitable way to implement this for SC is to keep everything the same, but have the strongest defensive unit defend each attack. ie. No combined attacks or combined defenses and no special stacking rule, like different unit types for example. IOWs the game plays almost identically to SC with no stacking. For a more complex game I can see advantages to all sorts of stacking rules, but this is SC.

I don't claim to know too much about game programming, but I have dabbled enough to have a lot of respect for Hubert. I believe Hubert pretty much answered your question about Eiffel. Eiffel is a very nice truly object oriented pragramming language, not a game engine. I haven't done any programming in Eiffel but I had thought that Hubert might be using someone elses engine written in Eiffel. Apparently that is not the case, which means I still don't understand the tile decision, so I'll just have to wait for the demo.

Been a while since I posted on this (Battlefront) forum, but since I feel a need to procrastinate (from writing my thesis) I will now. SC2 will probably be a great game, and I will assess it when a demo is available. (Loved SC1 BTW) However, if it is successful, it will not be because of the change to tiles. None of the reasons for changing to tiles really adds up to much. All of the improvements, supposedly made possible by tiles, could have been applied to hexes. For example: Larger map size: Hubert himself has said that this is nonsense (though he didn't put it quite that strongly). Anybody approaching this subject with an open mind can see that. The fact that some people blindly agreed (or thought they agreed) with Hubert clearly demonstrate the sycophantic attitude common on these forums. 3 units attacking front: Actually, with an attack range of 1 tile, only one unit can attack the front with a square grid. The only reason 3 units can attack in the system proposed by Hubert is that he has increased the attack range to sqrt(2)=~1.41 tiles. You can achieve exactly the same thing with hexes by increasing the attack range to sqrt(3)=~1.73 (In the context of this thread, you might call that a squirt attack for hexes). Isometric view: No reason this cant be done with hexes. Programming difficulties: While there may have been some efficieny issues in the early days of computer games, in todays world hexes have a negligible effect on performance. From a programming viewpoint, hexes are a very minor annoyance. Only a very lazy programmer (which I know Hubert is not) would make a decision on this basis. The one possible programming reason is that Hubert has found an isometric engine that he likes and it uses a tile system. If that is the case then I understand 100%, it is a pretty big task for a one man team to write his own engine, and if you are still using Eiffel then I guess your options are limited Hubert. If there is any argument for tiles that I have missed then please let me know. As for arguments against tiles, they are mostly that it increases complexity slightly, and this is something that we are told SC tries to avoid. While this added complexity is not a "game-breaker", I still find it difficult to understand the decision. For example: Extra complications with movement to allow diagonal moves: 2 APs, 1.5 APs, 2:3 APs or 5:7 APs? Extra complications with spotting ranges: Same as above. Extra complications with fronts: This one is a little more subtle. If a diagonal front is allowed then you have to introduce extra ZOC rules, which isn't necessarily a bad thing but it is a slight added complication. Furthermore, with this rule you can now build a zig-zag front with the same number of units it takes to build a straight front. Or put another way, a diagonal front covers 1.4 times the distance of a vertical or horizontal front. Hopefully the diagonal will run N-S, but even so this will lead to strange artificial tactics, and IMO this is the worst feature of a tile system. Finally, I would like to say a few words about stacking (Probably should put it in another thread). Firstly, this is not necesarily a good solution to the static front problem. Secondly, I have not heard a good argument not to include stacking. It does not have to increase the game complexity at all. The stack does not have to be literally a stack, simply put two units side-by-side in the hex. Force concentration is one of the fundamental principles of warfare, to not allow this is quite strange to say the least. Although, I must say that it didn't really bother me in SC1, so again it's not a game-breaker for me I just don't understand the arguments against it. The same could be said for a retreat rule, but I don't believe Hubert has said one way or another whether that is in or out. [ July 14, 2004, 07:44 PM: Message edited by: Bruce70 ]

Actually I haven't had time to download the demo yet, so thanks for the info. I didn't expect any major changes (as pointed out - I would have heard about it), I just thought there might have been some subtle differences. Oh well, I can still hope for something in X2.

Very funny. You know very well what I am talking about... I hope Just in case it was not meant to be a joke (unlikely on this forum, but you never know), I am after information on any changes (apart from consmetic - I had better be specific this time ) to the Quick Battle system or to the battle results screen.

bump Perhaps I shouldn't have used the word campaign in the subject line. Really I'm only interested in the QBs and AARs . Or perhaps no-one has got their copy yet, or more likely those that have are still too busy playing it.

Actually in my experience asian people have no trouble pronouncing either 'r' or 'l', they simply tend to get them back-to-front. I have a Korean friend who pronounces Robert 'Lobert' and laptop 'raptop' for example.

User-created manual "campaigns" were very popular in CM:BO and CMBB and I currently play a spreadsheet-based one of my own making for CM:BB. This is possible thanks primarily to the excellent QB generator, but it can be a little tedious to get battle results and so on. So, are there any improvements in CM:AK in this regard? i.e. have there been any changes to the QB generator? and especially have there been any changes to the AAR (a detailed table of losses, kills etc, that could be printed or screen-dumped would be very nice)? Also, have there been any changes to the operations system? Now for a short rant ... While I really enjoy the operations and single missions of CM:BO and CM:BB I feel that they are unrealistic because there is not enough incentive to preserve the life of your troops. I find it quite ironic that realism is the main reason why campaigns have not already been implemented. There are many ways to make a realistic campaign and I am still hopeful that we may see something in CM:X2 but until then I would be happy with any improvements to QBs and AARs.

I recently heard that an Aus/NZ version of TacOps was developed for the armed forces of those countries. Since I may be able to obtain a copy through my unit, can you tell me what differences (compatibility?) there are between that and the commercially available TacOps4. An while I'm here, can anyone recommend a Company or Platoon level simulation similar (in depth and concept) to TacOps.

I don't mind it taking that long if they (infantry) are going to move but they should be able to fire in any direction. The firepower should be reduced if firing to the flanks and possibly the rear but they should still be able to do something.

Yes, but then we would have to get on BFC's case about how quickly it stops! </font>

Thanks for all the replies. I think this quote by redwolf sums up my feelings: Oh, I agree about the guns too, they don't even move very fast on paved roads... downhill! On a gentle downhill slope on a paved road even a moderately heavy gun should move at walking pace.

a) Are tank turn rates way too slow? What information was used to determine appropriate turn rates? [i think this has been discussed before but I don't know what the final concensus was and searching the forum is rarely productive since no-one uses sensible thread titles. So if someone could just sum up what was said before I'd be very grateful]

[bump] Could we have a separate forum for CMX2. Now is the time to discuss the new engine, not after most of the design decisions have been made. I realise many people have had their say already in other forums but I think it would be best to get all the ideas together in one place. I do not think that BFC should bow to our every wish with regard to CMX2, rather I think they should be true to their own vision for the new engine. A good community debate, however, could uncover new ideas that BFC have not thought of or old ideas could be seen in a new light.

If this is true (and I am not yet ready to believe that it is) then they should at least create an FAQ or something explaining their position. There is another option for those that want a campaign mode and that is to look towards other games. I am not that loyal to CM that I am not prepared to consider the oposition. CM filled a niche in the market and filled it extremely well, now they must be prepared to consider new ideas. There are sound strategic reasons why BFC will not make the editor practically open source as some are suggesting. But I have not heard any reasonable argument why they should not consider a campaign option (not necessarily the Panzer General type) for CMX2.

There are a lot of knockers of the CC series and rightly so. Personally I only played the first 3 after which I became completely disatisfied with the series. The first 2 of those, however, were quite good IMO, especially CC2. The campaign in CC2 was very, very good. It didn't cover the whole war and that was probably one of its strong points. It did cover several mini-fronts and that kept the game interesting since you had to juggle resources betweeen the fronts. IMO something like this would work very well in CM. An alternative campaign for CM would follow the career of a *single* officer throughout the war. This is in no way unrealistic and could even be based on the career of an actual WW2 officer. Obviously you would start off at a low rank and build your way up. A little bit of fudging may be required to make sure that you dont end up commanding too many troops. Also in the early part of the war you could still be involved in large battles by having the AI handle most of the friendlies with you giving orders to your platoon only. Furthermore a Coy CO should in general only be able to issue orders to his platoons not to individual sections/squads. I think many people would find either of these two campaign options to be very enjoyable and no more unrealistic than any other aspect of the game.

I like the 5 minute turns idea but only if the friendly AI is significantly improved and more autonomous. If the AI is improved (and in the spirit of some sort of campaignm ) the ability to command only some of the friendly units on the battlefield would be good also. eg. 'You are in command of a tank platoon following the orders of the coy commander' or 'you command one coy in a btn assault'. There would have to be some penalties for not following orders and/or failing to achieve objectives. This would be one way of being involved in larger battles without having to wait forever for your opponent to issue his orders. And still on the subject of improved AI, you should be able to give orders to a unit and allow that unit's CO to give the appropriate orders to units under his command (and so on) ala Airborne Assault. Again this would speed up large multiplayer battles. Maybe it would be a good idea to say that you can only alter the orders of X units per turn, that way you would need to concentrate on giving orders to the units under your direct command and could only take direct control of some small number of sub-units. PS I think CMX2 needs its own discussion forum.

Well many moons ago (no pun intended) people were asking for a Close Combat (or insert Title of your choice) style campaign. Battlefront rightly claimed that it was unrealistic and would not be considered. I got the impression (perhaps incorrectly) that this was the major argument against a grand campaign of any type. Now personally I could live with an unrealistic CC style campaign (well like CC1 or CC2, I never cared much for the rest) because it would be fun, but if they must make it realistic then there are many other options to consider.

My biggest wish is for some kind of grand campaign. And don't tell me its not realistic because a) I don't particularly care, and following the career of one officer throughout the war is perfectly realistic

Yeah, you could do that, except it doesn't work. Units can only be strategically deployed within the provinces you own. </font>

Or you could just put all the planes you want to move back into the force pool and then relocate them with a couple of clicks to the province you want. Carriers are for air combat not air transport.

I like province based. With hex based you warp the terrain to fit the hexes; with province based, you can think of it as warping the hexes to fit the terrain. A much better solution IMO. BTW it is not surprising that a lot of people here are not happy with HoI, or are not planning to buy it. It is a completely different game to SC, and while some can stretch their mind to play both, most will have a preference one way or the other. Don't know which I am yet, still waiting for my copy. [ December 01, 2002, 09:10 PM: Message edited by: Bruce70 ]

I have fears about HoI but my copy shipped today. As others have said: it won't replace SC but rather complement it (I hope).

An air fleet would have a number of troops assigned to it for protection that are presumably abstracted. So it does make sense for an air unit *on the ground* to gain entrenchment. I completely agree with the interceptions analysis however, hope its not too late to make it into v1.6.