Eden Smallwood

Hmmm I see what you're saying, but I think you see what I'm saying too- this maybe should qualify as a low priority quasi-bug or something. I don't have the feeling that leaving my tank on Area Fire of foxhole is as directly affecting the AT Gun as, well, targeting the Gun. Id est, it really is an "Area" fire, and the Gun is more free to blow my comrade tank away... Next time I will try just giving a tiny little Cover Armor over the foxhole, with *no* Area Fire. That should "work", but still, we have to feel that it should be possible to give the command "Fire at that Gun until he's eliminated, whether you can currently see him or not, tovaridge." Eden

In Yelnia, it has happened a few times that an Axis HMG will draw my wrath very early, maybe first turn, and I will bring to bear on him six tanks (main ammo), at least that many mortars, and a bazillion MGs... so many yellow lines I can't see the ground anymore! Yet for all that, HMG may very well remain at "Cautious" or even "OK"!!! That seems to me so much firepower that the foxhole itself will not be "OK"!! Earthmoving, Russian style! That hasn't happened since I've been doing EFOW, though- those days were Partial. Matters? Anyhow, Eden

... and troops could go into "Bullet Time"? Somebody has been playing Max Payne Eden

I will third them, if it helps. Without cover fire, the entire Russian army gets "squirm fever" really fast... At least for me. But there's one thing I've had a problem with concerning "Area Fire" which y'all must have seen too. Suppose my tank is firing at an AT Gun, eg. Then the Gun "disappears", replaced by just a symbol, say a Maltese cross. Well I'm not about to forget that gun... I want my tank to flatten that whole section of forest, so I command it to give "Area Fire", possibly right where it says "foxhole". So I do. Then the Gun *reappears*. OK, fine. But the tank I've ordered to give Area Fire CONTINUES to do so- it just ignores the Gun which is now out and firing!!! It will give Area Fire until the end of the game, or until it is fired upon. Have you seen that too? I've tried everything, like giving arcs and whatnot. Surely the enemy in the foxhole is more important than the foxhole itself!! Eden

I don't know if this would be "help", but I do have a different idea which seems to work fine. I think about this scenario thusly: the mission is to STOP ALL TANKS AT ALL COSTS- if there is one PzIV left and my guns are gone, then I've lost this whole part of the Motherland. So. To try to make the One Perfect Kill Zone has a high *variance*. Maybe this ATGun will take out zero tanks, maybe four. By the mission statement, I don't have that option if I can instead almost *guarantee* that I will trade an ATG for at least one tank... See what I mean? So instead of one massive kill pocket, I arrange my guns in a "herringbone", or like a zipper- I want every single gun to have a seriously good chance of contacting *only* one or two tanks at a time, and I want every gun to be hidden from the Axis approach point of view, (so that it can't be seen by a dozen tanks at once), and the approach to each gun to be *covered*, at least a little bit, by some other gun, probably one on the opposite side. The desire is to chew away at the Axis, bit by bit as he advances; my job thus becomes easier as time goes on. This is because the fragility of these guns is kind of a constant- once one starts firing, why... it's got just a little while to live, in the "normal" case. The Rifles, as you've noticed, are completely worthless as far as taking out a tank. But aha- they are not completely worthless, completely(!), if used for what they *can* do. They can bother, pester, button up, and *draw fire* as a prelude to letting the big boys open up, now that Panzer boy is preoccupied with something in the other direction. Therefore, I stick these rifles where I can guide Axis' attention, sometimes even the tanks themselves. Anyway. It works. Here's a pic, (I can't stick the pic right in this post, don't ask), but here you can see one of the "rungs" on my zipper-ladder strategy. This is Total Victory on turn 31. Many of my big guns have not even been encountered yet- Axis can start to go nuts, at which point I'll just open fire with everyone, regardless of position, and move both tanks in for the final death throes. But only if it's "safe"! http://www.angelfire.com/mac/programming/cmbb/Cluster.html Remember to ShootScoot your tanks as much as possible, but only if they will not be staring at the front of multiple panzers!! Hth, Eden

It is evident to a newbie who doesn't have the manual that the ones that say "crater" are actually pretty good- my Russian conscripts and Greens can hang out in them for long periods and be "OK", in a region where a step to the left or right would have them Routed!! What I *can't* really tell is whether the ones that *don't* say "crater", but obviously *are* craters, of a lesser sort, are providing SOME cover...? Shadows are our only clue to this? Or just move the poor b*st*rd in there and see what happens!? Eden

Please help; me no understand. In CMBO::CE, there were Germans on one side, US on t'other. Now someone transmogrifies scenario to identical thing for CMBB... Wherefore all this talk about Russians and Bolsheviks??? I'm serious, I don't understand. Thank you, Eden

How do they play differently in CMBB? Either of these get my vote for next Public Battle, if there is one... We all know exactly what the terrain looks like!! It will be very interesting to see how much CMBB changes the tactics in these, if it does...? Eden

Not trying very hard, either. Apologies for my possibly bass ackwards to the left of upside down writing style. Ah, ok- counterintuitive, I think. So that would imply very strongly that the autosave file is in fact cross platform, and also that people with full install will be able to read autosaves which represent QBs. Quite so. Abundantly clear. OK, so finally, assuming I'm not the only one to find this interesting, we have two points which you're asserting, which you need not reply to unless I'm wrong here... #1) Autosave is cross platform #2) Autosave of a QB is readable by other CM owners. The next thing we might wonder is how to make a movie of the *entire* battle- after all, this is standard fare for most driving sims, flight sims... Would be neat, of course, but how to decide what to focus on? Anyhow, thx, Eden

Did anyone try to load the uploaded Autosave.cme file? It seems curious to me that y'all are not excited about this possibility and discussing it...? On reflection, because the Autosave file is typically less than 100K, it seems clear and understandable that the game state described therein points to, depends on, refers to the *other* files which are part of the game install. Exampli gratia, Joe General and Max Lieutenant decide to PlayPublic a scenario part of install, call it, um, _The Pilsner Pinch_. ( I don't have the game yet). We would expect that anyone with the full game would be able to load an Autosave posted, since they also have Pilsner Pinch.Scenario Description file, and also all the graphic files of BigAssGermanGuns and stuff that are in that scenario... The only possible complication there is that we are not sure Autosave file is cross platform!!! But clearly people with just Demo are SOL. Now suppose Joe & Max play a QB- I suppose there are temp files created by the game which describe the scenario. A complication which exists this time for everyone except Joe & Max- noone else will have these files. I imagine that in case of QB noone will be able to read Autosave unless Joe goes fishing around and posts temp files or somesuch...? In case of Charity To People W/Out Game, clearly we'all would only be able to follow in case of Demo scenarios. While those *with* game probably have Yelnia as *last* thing they could possibly want to play, it also might be the most interesting in that, since we have all played it, we all know what's up there, we could meaningfully compare and witness others approachs to tactics. Anyway. These thoughts brought to you courtesty of Eden

Oh, is *that* all? In Yelnia, as Axis, I have given up on them ever taking out a tank, and have opted instead to let them do what they do best, (dying), in an aesthetically pleasing manner. Helps morale, you know. If you have some tricks to "get em in close" could you expand on that? Or are the games you mention more urban types of things...? Tia, Eden

No, it's not. I've only got the Demo, so it wouldn't help me, I suspect, but wouldn't it be alot more satisfying if the Autosave file were posted each turn..? Then "we" could actually peek and zoom and spin and everything else, no? It might even be smaller than some of these files...? The Autosave.cme for my last game of Yelnia (Total Vic, thank you, thank you) is only 32K. Eden

I also found that BB:sneak seems to exhaust the troops very severely, to the point that I think they are literally trying to crawl across Russia... I really want them to "exercise all reasonable caution in attempting to arrive at point B undetected". Also, Move To Contact I have found not as useful as I hoped- I want my T34 to advance around the bend just until it sees PanzerMan; But T34 doesn't go anywhere- what happened? Oh! There's a routed crew guy over there!!! Similarly, the Scoot 'n' Shoot disappoints me. Sorry if this all sounds neg- of course it is a wonderful game. But my intention as commander in giving an SnS command is that Tank should advance just until something to shoot, then shoot, then reverse. So it is really a combo of MoveToContact and SnS as it exists now... but you just can't get it to work that way. See what I mean? You either guess how far perfectly, or Tank advances past point of contact, or never reaches point of contact in existing ShootScoot... If MoveToContact took as a parameter a specific unit and/or type of unit, and then ShootScoot were an embellishment of MTC... Ahhhhh... dream, dream. Eden

I will admit to being a "fairy pansy flitting about" or what was it... I *had* only played on "partial", since I tried that for my first game(s), and since, after Saving a game, one *CANNOT* go back and change that stuff, my "Citadel Setup Before Turn One" et cetera were all "stuck" on partial. Then of course, I read how googly everyone here was about EFOW, so I had to go back and change it- I thought all my games would be like Yelnia-Only-Worse but actually I don't see much difference...? Eden

Oops. Also, does the manual have at least a little blurb on what all these units are, like an "Auwfklarangs"(sp?) et cetera? Eden

What entries are under "Game Length" please? CM seems to enforce end-of-game always...? Eden

The scenarios made by third parties, for either CMBO or CMBB, the ones uploaded to the web to be used by others... can they be played solitaire? Or is it like TacOps- the AI is only available for "in house" scenarios? Eden

I think that neither of you knows haiku from twinkie. It's three lines, of five, seven, and five syllables, respectively. Additionally, the last line will typically invoke some feeling for the season, or the weather. I've got both demos. I shouldn't procrastinate... but it's hot outside. Eden

I posted asking about hiding Russian teams in Citadel- the Germans seem to find them with vastly greater facility than my laymen's knowledge can credit, unless I am mistaken about steppes, foxholes, binoculars, or all three. I posted it; it said fine. I posted "this" one, and the other one disappered. Much like the POWs in CMBB sometimes do! Eden

Will the "registered" version of CMBB be able to run the scenarios which are part of the registered CMBO package? Eden

Ok, this sums it up I think- I was thinking that it said "Area Fire" because it had failed to be implemented, but y'all are saying that it's simply that indirect can only be locational, not specific at some unit. Makes sense. Over. As followup... By "standing", I meant "not hiding"- platoon guy is indeed "not hiding". But then, being relatively hidden is the whole point? It's true I can't expect spotter to be *completely* hidden, but all I want from him are his binoculars and his radio, *not* his Walther... Otherwise, why not just stick mortar guy out there in the highly open spot? It seems to me that for spotters there should be a "MostlyHiddenButPeekingAtInferiorMongols" setting, having much of benefit of "Hiding", just not completely. Am I wrong? Or is this in game already but doesn't seem like it? Eden

I swear it's not working. I tried Yelnia as Germans yesterday; the mortar guy is standing, the platoon guy is standing, there is a "line" between them, which only appears if they are pretty close ( what are they doing, yelling?!? "MovenLeftenMeterSiebens!!" ), but the mortar guy can't target specific targets that the platoon guy can see. What am I missing? Eden

Ok, I'm not being nitpicky here, but... A bundle of rods bound together around an ax with the blade projecting, carried before ancient Roman magistrates as an emblem of authority. [Latin fasces, pl. of fascis, bundle.] ...in fact fasces is an English word directly. The important point not yet mentioned is that the fasces is demonstrating strength through unity- the bundling of wimpy wimpy wimpy twigs together gets you something hefty hefty hefty you can beat your enemies with. Ooh.. ahh... * symbolism * Until 1941(?), this same exact Roman fasces was on the back of our, excuse me, the US dime. "United States"... get it? The back of this coin was then changed for pretty obvious reasons to... to whatever the heck it is today. Eden

In one of those little forests I had immobilized a panzer, and I sent one of the local hunter teams after it. To my disappointment, I found that they couldn't even handle *that* job, and got themselves blown away. Disappointing AI, in that case, I think- he can't move, you can. How could you screw that up? But while I was trying to clue them in on what to do, I noticed that there was a command called "Follow Tank". Aha! I thought. Goddamnit, Aha! Now I see how they are supposed to be effective- just follow the last guy in the caravan across the tundra and he picks the best time & place to shoot something up the panzer's poop chute. But no. I have never again been able to get that "Follow Tank" command to come up. You? Eden

It looks like I'm just a bit late; I'll echo what "Demoss" said, I think. Can't read it now that I'm posting.(?!?) I play all scenarios with "equal" settings, and "let computer put stuff where it wants" and FOW at "partial". Anyhow. I tried a couple times as Allied with the stuff where it was already setup- it just really looked, well, nice, you know? I think I got about 1 Axis gun damaged with that setup! So then I setup myself yesterday in spartan crossfire arrangements with tanks behind hills playing peek-a-boo. Major victory, which seems misleading, because I had one tank left and a gaggle of stray crew and flumoxed AT people. At least I finally stopped those damn panzers! My AT units aren't for sh*t. I haven't taken out a tank with one yet. There was one guy who was stuck staring at one tank, and he went through all 23 of his ammo without making a dent. ?!? Every single angle and distance I've looked at, the screen says, "Kill: none". Excuse me?!? WTF are we DOING out here, COMRADE!?!? Sure, I love the party and everything, but you're arming me with a squirt gun? Ah well. Coherent questions and comments later, Eden