Myles Keogh

Yes, subbing the old captured French tanks was the first change I made. The original Montebourg campaign was developed while the base game was in development so I wasn't able to use them first time around. IIRC, there was no allied air support when the game was first released either which is why there's no air support in the base campaign either. That's changed too. 
The Vehicle Pack will be necessary because I'm using flamethrowers this time as well. The Airborne and Glider Infantry both get them in their missions in phase 2. I've yet to see these in action as I've been importing the new core units and placing them but that work is all done now and so proper playtesting begins today. 

Some of you may have noticed that I've poked my head up again after a very long absence. I've just been very busy with real life and wanted to spend some time playing games rather than designing content. But this game is a bit like crack for me, it's just so addictive and watching Usually Hapless play this campaign on Youtube got me back into it. (Yes, it's ALL your fault Hapless  )
I've done a bit of work fixing things and now want to turn my attention to my first campaign for CMBN, the Montebourg campaign. It's the oldest and was made using v1.0 of the engine meaning that there are only 8 AI groups and no air support. There have also been a number of changes to the game which mean that I can experiment with some of the new stuff while reworking this one.
It's not going to be a total overhaul but it will no longer work for players with only the CMBN base game so it's a Repository jobbie. I'll let you guys know what you'll need but it will probably require the full Monty as I want flamethrowers in it. It's also worth saying that anything new in it will be historically accurate and not just added in for the laughs. So no SS with JgPZIVs. Pity.
So, I'll keep you up to date with my progress on this. I'm not looking to do a LOT of work. It's mainly to reacquaint myself with the scenario designer and writing AI plans.
 
Mission 1
I have no plans to change anything at all about the opening mission at all. It's fine as is.
Mission 2
There is a 'new' short 'Brecourt' mission. It's not really new though as it was in the revised version on the Repository. I'll need to tweak this one as the game seems to have become more lethal since I last played it but otherwise, it's good to go.
Mission 3
The first mission to get a full rework is Turnbull's Stand. I'm reworking the AI attack as there were only two AI plans and they were terrible. I've made a number of revisions to the map itself to reflect the reality of the day so it's a bit more open with less bocage and more hedges.
I've spent pretty much all morning and most of the afternoon learning how to script an AI attack using the new tools and the first AI plan is almost done. I want a second one with an entirely different focus but it should be much faster to do as I'm not 'learning' anymore. Then, I'll mix it up so that there's four attack plans.
 
And that's where I'm up to. There's no timetable on this. I'm not in any hurry but by posting about it here, I've kind of declared my intentions and am far more likely to stick with it.

There has never been tank riders in BN. I think they were introduced in Red Thunder. Perhaps you´re mixing BN up with CMBO (CMx1)?

You're full of Christmas cheer aren't you.  Der Ring der 5 Panzer you got for free in the first place as @George MCreleased that as a community scenario .  So let's say 30% is 'old content.'  Looks like you're owed $3.  Let me know where to send the money to or maybe we'll set up a crowdfund.

I think you misread that. It's not about technical feasibility. Of course this is technically doable.
CM is a niche game and as such has a small player base. Now let's assume someone comes up with a rather popular "realism mod". Some weapon stats were tweaked because someone read that those weapons were super awesome (like the Panthers example but less exaggerated). Somehow those tweakes favour just one side. Now you have one half of the player base who will refuse to play without that mod. They will argue fiercely because it is a "realism mod". The other side argues equally fiercly and refuses to play with the mod.
What you have gained now is splitting the player base, effectively reducing the number of available pvp players by a large amount and on top of that you have poisoned the forums because you have the next religious war on your hands.
You can do such things with large player bases and rts like games yhat aren't realistic anyway and get balanced such that all factions are equally viable. A mod that negatively affects balance in such a case will die quickly. But not in CM. You'd have to forbid that kind of modding for multiplayer at the very least.

I don't even think of Combat Mission as a game anymore. It's like some indispensable program like Outlook or Excel. You rage at it but could never imagine yourself without it. It just is.

The campaign briefing for Five Days One Summer mentions a PDF file with information about the campaign (presumably similar to the ones included with KG von Schroif and other George MC work).
However, I can't find it.  Neither in the main CMRT files nor in Documents CMRT game files.  Does anyone know where to find it?  Or was it not included with the download?

Also confirming that the 22.8 AMD driver breaks the game.
It's worse than last year's AMD driver issues.  With last year's issues, one could still load and play scenarios with small to mid-sized maps.  This one screws-up the entire game making it completely unplayable.
It is getting worrisome that updating AMD drivers now feels like playing Russian roulette when it comes to the CMx2 games.
Fortunately, I was able to roll-back to 22.5.1 to get the game working again.

@Free Whisky has got his own thread about his video here:
 

With the latest 22.8 series of drivers for an AMD GPU, the game won't work.
With the current recommended driver (22.5.1) everything is fine.

Hi everyone! I've put out a new video where I compare a combat mission scenario to both the historical events that are portrayed and the actual real-life location. I thought I'd post this on the General Discussion board as it's also kind of about Combat Mission scenario design and research in general.
As it's about a Market Garden scenario, I've slept a quite few hours less the past few nights in order to get this video done in time for Operation Market Garden's 78th anniversary on saturday the 17th of september. I hope you'll find it interesting; spending the day basicly giving myself a battlefield tour and filming the locations of the scenario that I just played was amazing. Geeky, for sure, but amazing 😁.
Props to @Pete Wenman who is the author of this scenario for his excellent research and scenario design.
 
 

Aye hopefully it will be 'all good fun'  thanks Steve.
Aye, this battle pack is set during the fighting between the German and Soviet armies in eastern Poland during the summer of 1944. This fighting was some of the heaviest on the Eastern Front during the entire war. This battle pack presents a series of actions recreating key moments in this fighting through the perspective of the forces involved during July and August.
It’s been a real labour of love. The genesis of this battle pack was the  series of images in the photo book Kampfgruppe Mühlenkamp published by RZM and authored by Douglas Nash and Remy Spezzano. On the back of this I started work on what became the Five Days One Summer campaign which is the key campaign of this battle pack.
This battle pack would never have got anywhere without the help and support of a whole bunch of others. I would like to give a huge shout out to all those including the BFC beta testers for all the playtesting, feedback, advice and support. I am also indebted to Mr Douglas Nash for his freely given help and support in clarifying some of the details involved in several actions involving ‘Wiking’, notably the fighting around Tluszcz in mid-August 1944. If you’ve not checked out his recent trilogy “From the Realm of a Dying Sun” its well worth doing so for the background to this battle pack. Also worth having a look at is the “Operation Bagration 23 June-29 August 1944” by the Soviet General Staff which gives a ‘big picture’ view of the Soviet operations in this period.
I hope you all, as the players enjoy these scenarios and campaigns as much as I did researching and creating them. As always, I’d appreciate any comment and feedback and I look forward to seeing how this collection of scenarios and campaigns plays out for yourselves.
Cheery!

I've played without those unsightly grid squares ever since Shock Force was released and don't miss them one bit. If it was that big of an issue to that many players during all these years of development I'm sure they would've been added back in. Like others have said, mods here are your friend. 🙂

That's a good laugh. 

WeGo or NoGo...
One of the primary USPs for me is the 1 minute turn and infinite replays of the turn results. If it doesn't have that, it's not a competitor to CM, in my lexicon.

What does this have to do with the CM games?

If you all expect any good to come from a Semmes topic...well, prepared to be disappointed. 

I'm up to Mission #9 (Poteau the Priority).   It's been a lot of fun and am just amazed at the amount of work that went into making this.  It's spectacular!
Thanks to the very generous time allotments, I've been able to win one Total Victory after the next, but the losses are starting to pile-up.  By the time I got to #7 (Butchers of Baugnez) the Spitze had been reduced to a single 4-man PzIV and an empty halftrack.
A few notes: SPOILERS!!!!
 
 
#2 Leaving Lanzerath: An American marksmen team was able to inflict 10 casualties with a lot of them KIA.  Who was shooting that sniper rifle?  Sergeant York?  It took me a while to find that team and then had to use up almost an entire platoon's worth of ammo trying to suppress/kill them.  Those stone Belgian buildings are tough!  On the other hand, Lt. Bouck's platoon didn't put-up much of a fight.  Of course, I knew where he was because the story of his I&R platoon has been featured in almost every Bulge narrative since David Eisenhower made it famous in "The Bitter Woods."
#3 Minen the Gap: this was a neat scenario and an example of how of this was a clear labor of love.  Creating that fantastic map just for the player to experience some of Peiper's frustration in navigating the poor Ardennes roads.  (I chose the "correct" path and, as a result, only lost one Panther to mines.)
#6 Bullingen China Shop: Didn't expect much of a fight especially early on.  So, I blundered right into the ambush.  This was the scenario that whittled the Spitze down to almost nothing.
#7 Butchers of Baugnez:  Massive map!  My tanks destroyed Battery B from a distance.  Unfortunately, I found myself cursing CMx2's inability to provide a "follow-the-road" or "convoy" feature.  Laboriously plotting every single vehicle's road movement and having to use the pause key to avoid traffic jams.  Ugh!  I've hated that since CMx1.  I know BF tried to get a "convoy" feature into one of the CMx2 upgrades, but they had to throw in the towel on it because they couldn't get it to work.  A shame. 
 
Speaking of CMx1, there was a scenario designer for that game, "McAuliffe," whose passion was the Bulge.  He designed a host of well-researched CMBO scenarios with beautiful maps based mostly on the fighting around Bastogne.   This campaign reminds of those scenarios: a labor of love by someone truly passionate about the subject.  That's one thing I miss about CMx1: its scenario editor's ease of use encouraged similar passion projects.   I miss the plethora of user-designed scenarios that one saw with CMx1.  CMx2's editor provides vastly more tools, but it's clear that's proven intimidating to would-be scenario designers.  Thankfully, The Forger wasn't intimidated.

I'm up to Mission #9 (Poteau the Priority).   It's been a lot of fun and am just amazed at the amount of work that went into making this.  It's spectacular!
Thanks to the very generous time allotments, I've been able to win one Total Victory after the next, but the losses are starting to pile-up.  By the time I got to #7 (Butchers of Baugnez) the Spitze had been reduced to a single 4-man PzIV and an empty halftrack.
A few notes: SPOILERS!!!!
 
 
#2 Leaving Lanzerath: An American marksmen team was able to inflict 10 casualties with a lot of them KIA.  Who was shooting that sniper rifle?  Sergeant York?  It took me a while to find that team and then had to use up almost an entire platoon's worth of ammo trying to suppress/kill them.  Those stone Belgian buildings are tough!  On the other hand, Lt. Bouck's platoon didn't put-up much of a fight.  Of course, I knew where he was because the story of his I&R platoon has been featured in almost every Bulge narrative since David Eisenhower made it famous in "The Bitter Woods."
#3 Minen the Gap: this was a neat scenario and an example of how of this was a clear labor of love.  Creating that fantastic map just for the player to experience some of Peiper's frustration in navigating the poor Ardennes roads.  (I chose the "correct" path and, as a result, only lost one Panther to mines.)
#6 Bullingen China Shop: Didn't expect much of a fight especially early on.  So, I blundered right into the ambush.  This was the scenario that whittled the Spitze down to almost nothing.
#7 Butchers of Baugnez:  Massive map!  My tanks destroyed Battery B from a distance.  Unfortunately, I found myself cursing CMx2's inability to provide a "follow-the-road" or "convoy" feature.  Laboriously plotting every single vehicle's road movement and having to use the pause key to avoid traffic jams.  Ugh!  I've hated that since CMx1.  I know BF tried to get a "convoy" feature into one of the CMx2 upgrades, but they had to throw in the towel on it because they couldn't get it to work.  A shame. 
 
Speaking of CMx1, there was a scenario designer for that game, "McAuliffe," whose passion was the Bulge.  He designed a host of well-researched CMBO scenarios with beautiful maps based mostly on the fighting around Bastogne.   This campaign reminds of those scenarios: a labor of love by someone truly passionate about the subject.  That's one thing I miss about CMx1: its scenario editor's ease of use encouraged similar passion projects.   I miss the plethora of user-designed scenarios that one saw with CMx1.  CMx2's editor provides vastly more tools, but it's clear that's proven intimidating to would-be scenario designers.  Thankfully, The Forger wasn't intimidated.

I'm up to Mission #9 (Poteau the Priority).   It's been a lot of fun and am just amazed at the amount of work that went into making this.  It's spectacular!
Thanks to the very generous time allotments, I've been able to win one Total Victory after the next, but the losses are starting to pile-up.  By the time I got to #7 (Butchers of Baugnez) the Spitze had been reduced to a single 4-man PzIV and an empty halftrack.
A few notes: SPOILERS!!!!
 
 
#2 Leaving Lanzerath: An American marksmen team was able to inflict 10 casualties with a lot of them KIA.  Who was shooting that sniper rifle?  Sergeant York?  It took me a while to find that team and then had to use up almost an entire platoon's worth of ammo trying to suppress/kill them.  Those stone Belgian buildings are tough!  On the other hand, Lt. Bouck's platoon didn't put-up much of a fight.  Of course, I knew where he was because the story of his I&R platoon has been featured in almost every Bulge narrative since David Eisenhower made it famous in "The Bitter Woods."
#3 Minen the Gap: this was a neat scenario and an example of how of this was a clear labor of love.  Creating that fantastic map just for the player to experience some of Peiper's frustration in navigating the poor Ardennes roads.  (I chose the "correct" path and, as a result, only lost one Panther to mines.)
#6 Bullingen China Shop: Didn't expect much of a fight especially early on.  So, I blundered right into the ambush.  This was the scenario that whittled the Spitze down to almost nothing.
#7 Butchers of Baugnez:  Massive map!  My tanks destroyed Battery B from a distance.  Unfortunately, I found myself cursing CMx2's inability to provide a "follow-the-road" or "convoy" feature.  Laboriously plotting every single vehicle's road movement and having to use the pause key to avoid traffic jams.  Ugh!  I've hated that since CMx1.  I know BF tried to get a "convoy" feature into one of the CMx2 upgrades, but they had to throw in the towel on it because they couldn't get it to work.  A shame. 
 
Speaking of CMx1, there was a scenario designer for that game, "McAuliffe," whose passion was the Bulge.  He designed a host of well-researched CMBO scenarios with beautiful maps based mostly on the fighting around Bastogne.   This campaign reminds of those scenarios: a labor of love by someone truly passionate about the subject.  That's one thing I miss about CMx1: its scenario editor's ease of use encouraged similar passion projects.   I miss the plethora of user-designed scenarios that one saw with CMx1.  CMx2's editor provides vastly more tools, but it's clear that's proven intimidating to would-be scenario designers.  Thankfully, The Forger wasn't intimidated.

On to mission #6.  Peiper again delayed by what in english is called "my day job", also my new guitar and NFL football, all conspiring to suck the time away.  Which reminds me, I hope BFC shows some compassion and releases some new stuff before the playoffs end.
Anyway, battle #6.  Says I start w a Spitze group with reinforcements coming later.  Usual great big map, which again THANKS to the author for the effort in making it really feel right.  I send two PZ4s (on hunt) a little ahead of the main column, thinking I won't get hit until I reach more defensible terrain later.  But it's 1900 hours, very dark, so anywhere is liable to provide an ambush.  And it does....


Where is all this coming from??  someone is tossing grenades onto my engine deck.  Kinda wish I had those side skirts, maybe would block the low throws. 
And what is this?  Satchel charge?  --- dang Ami engineers!  (note artificial brightness turned on here, alt-B for new folks, you don't have to play in the dark the whole time)


Tank #2 moves up to support, not understanding the threat is RIGHT THERE IN THE BUSHES!  It's knocked out also.

This is not a good start, to say the least.  I don't have cheap armored cars or other recon assets so I am very vulnerable to this sort of thing.  And did I mention it's really dark out?  Most WW2 armies did not like night ops unless they had a good reason or no choice, here's great example of why.  Few engineers in the bushes just knocked out two expensive vehicles and killed most of the expensive crewmen. 
I don't mind losing the Ardennes as the germans because I actually should lose considering the whole thing had zero (less than zero?) chance of success.  But I don't want to lose just 36 hours into the fight!

It's russian sh1ttalking.

So, in other words, a typical JK post. 

I love opinions which don't provide any rationale.

Still in awe that a single programmer could pull off something like CMx2.
Best regards
Thomm