Lucky_Strike

Yes, trees that I've looked at from other games are usually done in the same way.
The thing that a lot of players complain about with CM is the draw distances - the hard line that appears so quickly and how it affects their enjoyment of the game. The trees flick in and out of the various LOD stages very noticeably, though the actual models are quite gradually changed until we get the poster / billboard type. I did a load of experiments looking at how the Tree LODs are used and to see if there was much room for improvement, sadly there's not really much we can do. Where a lot of modern games use some additional methods, mist, muted colours etc to deal with distance CM only has the one very intrusive method, and otherwise everything is always in sharp focus, which is quite unnatural, and lacks any change to colour for distance as well as the lack of shadows under things like forest even on dull overcast weather to anchor the landscape. My list of criticism of how the game handles distance is quite long, mostly because I see it as one of the major weaknesses of the graphics engine, but I know that this is mostly down to the engines age and lack of things like multi-processor access, lack of optimisation for modern GPUs etc etc.
I chop and change my settings whenever I see this or that new tip to improve one's game experience, better frame rates, better draw distances blah blah blah; but really these tweaks make barely any perceived difference when one has tried nearly everything. The biggest boost I got to my framerates, at least on my PC, was over-clocking my processor, better framerates meant I could up the graphics quality a little. But yes, balanced is mostly as good as it gets for gameplay. And we wait for the fabled engine update which would add optimisations reputedly...
 
Thanks for these links I shall read all about it with interest.
 
 

Just quickly - yes it's in a 2m deep ditch IIRC (I'll need to check that) - I did some tests with indirect medium mortar using a TRP next to the PzIV bunker, heavy, full barrage with 3 tubes - no direct hits, the commander closed the hatch after about three rounds and they just sat it out, no damage inflicted. Next did some direct light mortar fire - two tubes with good LOS, left the commander buttoned up, both tubes emptied their ammo stocks, the PzIV took at least four direct hits and sustained minor damage to optics and radio, crew remained calm and returned fire eventually, taking out one mortar and suppressing the other though they'd both already fired all their rounds.
Overall, not too bad, heavier artillery would no doubt cause more damage, a direct hit could take it out, in the same way as a normal medium tank. The biggest difference between this and normal tanks is that it can't take evasive action. Oh, and the crew were rated crack with high motivation, this was so that they would have a chance and stay put when under attack from the Russian tanks.

For sure the fine tuning part of CM takes way too long. Everything ideally should be done in a 3d editor similar to arma 3 (And even Arma 2 had one, it was just a hidden secret).
I'm not even talking about 2 houses connected to each other. I'm talking about fighting inside a single modular building, simulating rooms (In this case not a modular building):
 

Some people post such incredible content that its hard to believe we're playing the same game. This is outstanding. What a delicious flavor to add to the game. 

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Yes you're right. With carefully designed maps and very precise use of the walls, windows, doors and obstacles it can be done to an extent, and this is where you rightly point out that the original game maps were a bit short - my tuppence is that they simply don't have the budgets for all of this, you get what you pay for. I have no idea how much BF pay someone like BenPark but whatever it is I bet it's nowhere near enough to recompense for the real time that he spends on this stuff, and even with that it's still not enough to get everything into the maps. Which IMHO says more about the overly complex map system than the people using it. I know a good workman shouldn't blame his tools for a less than ideal outcome, but if the tools themselves are a limitation ...

Rummaged around in my previous experiments box and found the burnt tree - it's not really finished and would really need some other burnt textures to go with it for best effect. I made a quick and dirty crater mod that gives a nice burnt hole in the ground, works quite well with a large crater but ALL the other craters will be burnt as well. In the long run it may be better to have a flavour object that represents some burnt stuff. Anyway it does make me wonder about a new landscape mod ... Total Destruction®©™ - War is Hell®©™ - type of thing, lots of burnt terrain textures, destroyed vehicles and smashed buildings ... here's a few pics of what I've mashed together ...

Small tree type - kinda works, texture a bit smeared. Would be nice with some of @JM Stuff's burnt wrecks...

Tall tree - works well for this one, textures can be renamed for any of the tree models - just a case of experimenting ...

Large tree type - mmm that's better, big craters as well ...

It burns us ...
More work needed but it's getting there. 
These are all set for Spring with the spring mod tag so they show up in Berlin 1945, again more tweaking could have them show up for any time of year other than snowy winter.
That's as much as I can manage for now folks - not long till I'm fixed and back to it I hope ...

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Thanks Nigel. I really like the smiling Hitler Youth girl in the last shot, adds a real sense of the delusional!
I'm using ReShade on all these so it's in-game post processing, the depth of field is a specific effect in ReShade. Works really well with the backdrop of your mod set.

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Brutal! I don't play other games - I just don't have the time - so I couldn't comment on how they compare - I don't live in a bubble and have seen plenty of other games in action on YouTube etc just haven't played any, so I take your word for it. But I totally agree that there's stuff that we should be able to do in the Editor that's a bit more sophisticated than pushing a few flavor objects around and placing our forces - and for Christsake where's the blo*dy control/command-Z who forgets that when making this stuff?????
I reckon there's stuff we could do to mod certain flavor objects that would add a bit more to the interiors - not furniture and the like, but walls - a fountain could be made into a wall and several in a row would make a decent wall that the pixeltrüppen would have to go around rather than through, not sure what cover or concealment they would get but it would be something. At the end of the day though I think that BF never really intended house-to-house combat to be much more than the abstraction that it is, not that they don't care, it's just not part of their vision for the game IMHO. And I doubt their professional customers are not interested in it either - they'd use real training facilities or VR to simulate it. So, sadly, we are a niche of a niche ...

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Brutal! I don't play other games - I just don't have the time - so I couldn't comment on how they compare - I don't live in a bubble and have seen plenty of other games in action on YouTube etc just haven't played any, so I take your word for it. But I totally agree that there's stuff that we should be able to do in the Editor that's a bit more sophisticated than pushing a few flavor objects around and placing our forces - and for Christsake where's the blo*dy control/command-Z who forgets that when making this stuff?????
I reckon there's stuff we could do to mod certain flavor objects that would add a bit more to the interiors - not furniture and the like, but walls - a fountain could be made into a wall and several in a row would make a decent wall that the pixeltrüppen would have to go around rather than through, not sure what cover or concealment they would get but it would be something. At the end of the day though I think that BF never really intended house-to-house combat to be much more than the abstraction that it is, not that they don't care, it's just not part of their vision for the game IMHO. And I doubt their professional customers are not interested in it either - they'd use real training facilities or VR to simulate it. So, sadly, we are a niche of a niche ...

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Just posted a load of pics of the Panzer IV bunker in the screen shots thread, it's very close to release, this week all being well ...

It adds quite an interesting feature for a small scenario. I ran a quick scenario against the AI with one by itself against a large armoured frontal attack and it lasted enough time to inflict serious casualties. So one or two of these on a junction supported by a few squads of heavily armed, well placed infantry can cause mayhem.

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Yes you're right. With carefully designed maps and very precise use of the walls, windows, doors and obstacles it can be done to an extent, and this is where you rightly point out that the original game maps were a bit short - my tuppence is that they simply don't have the budgets for all of this, you get what you pay for. I have no idea how much BF pay someone like BenPark but whatever it is I bet it's nowhere near enough to recompense for the real time that he spends on this stuff, and even with that it's still not enough to get everything into the maps. Which IMHO says more about the overly complex map system than the people using it. I know a good workman shouldn't blame his tools for a less than ideal outcome, but if the tools themselves are a limitation ...

So, I'm nearly finished working on a new mod for fans of late war urban environments - Berlin defence primarily but could be used in any Festung. It's an emplaced, dug-in Panzer IV inspired by those employed in Berlin by Panzerkompanie (bo) 'Berlin' which had 12 of these issued along with 10 of the more famous Pantherturms (already available in the game). The Panzer IVs were classed as Schadpanzer - damaged tanks beyond economical repair. Some were emplaced in a concrete base others were hastily dropped into holes which were then back filled and reinforced. The game doesn't allow me to easily dig a hole so I've used a ditch and an huh hum generous amount of rubble plus some artistic licence. The model is a stripped down Panzer IVG (Late) and is given an immobilised status - don't want these things driving around ... got no wheels anyway.
Without further waffle:

... waiting

 Feuer!

 ... erfolg!




He took out four Russian tanks and damaged three more before the inevitable - all without support ...

Change of shader here - using ReShade - fantastic cinematic goodness, but I spend far too long making pretty pictures!
Night fighting in Berlins shattered streets ... 




Got to say thanks to @NPye for his massive Berlin mod pack and encouraging all this misbehaving ... also to @RockinHarry for planting the seeds of ideas. Hopefully the mod will be out this week so look out for it if interested.

Happy accident 😄
So true. War is a very messy business! George's maps are excellent; I just spend hours wandering around his maps enjoying how well made they are. I'm always thinking about ways to add more detritus to maps, simply can't get enough of it! 🚯

I have to say, the Berlin maps are nice, but the attention to detail for the scenario "A Night at the Opera" is lacking. The museum has no inside doors, so the whole thing is entirely useless. And there's another building to the front right across the empty field (From the Soviet perspective) which also has a room with no doors, making it inaccessible.
I'm not blaming Ben because the number of hours that went into that map is probably mind numbing. But SOMEONE should have proofread his work and tested the scenario.
Were the buildings barricaded? Probably not, considering there were no defenders placed inside these rooms.
I had the same criticism of NPye's maps too.

Leaving modding aside (which is or became this thread´s main topic bits of unintentionally) I´m fully aware of what goes into mission/campaign and map creation. I spend about 70-80% my game time in editor then mostly playing or play testing my own crap. Here´s my main interest, thus I rarely look at or play of what it´s in stock game files. And when I do occasionally I feel little impressed with quite a number of things. (happened last time after launching CMFB for the first time). Not considering how many hours went into things by mission creator X or Y. But as said, that´s my personal opinion and POV.
And yep, the past ~40 years I visited a number of WW1 and WW2 battlefields myself, so know what to compare with when it comes to "beeing there" feel in CM. But you can use 50% of current CM games capabilities or a bit more, which I think is or became this thread´s main topic as said. Off course still with focus on Berlin 45 and @NPye ´s personal vision of it. 😎
 

Just posted a load of pics of the Panzer IV bunker in the screen shots thread, it's very close to release, this week all being well ...

It adds quite an interesting feature for a small scenario. I ran a quick scenario against the AI with one by itself against a large armoured frontal attack and it lasted enough time to inflict serious casualties. So one or two of these on a junction supported by a few squads of heavily armed, well placed infantry can cause mayhem.

Too true, I wish we had secret sauce, but in the meantime it does encourage us to think out of the box.
Yes LODS ... can be a real pain to get right. For tanks and the like I tend to just make copies of the main mdr and rename for LODs works pretty much as expected. Can't do that for trees and stuff though, just cripples the CPU/GPU.
Yes - it would be very cool if in CMx3 they could introduce permanent destructibility in landscapes for campaigns. It really adds to the emersion. One only has to look at some of the scenes in Ukraine (Slava Ukraini) revealed on our TVs to see what war does VERY quickly to a landscape. Just having a touch of that in game can really enhance a scenario.
Great - you're joining the children to the parents mesh? You can still edit them if needs be, just carefully selecting will allow you to move them etc; wireframe mode is your friend and limiting the section to what you can see.

Have to point out for balance that GeorgeMC doesn't use any mods to enhance for his maps but they do have a fantastic natural feel to them regardless. After playing one of his scenarios and wandering around his maps they stick in my memory like real life places.
I personally appreciate the amount of time and effort it takes to leverage anything out of the game that is natural looking when frankly the graphics are not about that. Guys like Ben and Pete have put an inordinate amount of time into these games and are respected for that, and there's no doubt in my mind that given the tools they would produce stunning work, but that's not their remit. We all know the game has limitations in its appearance but some players - myself included - find that augmentations for a slightly more realistic environment provide added enjoyment to playability, whereas playing on stock maps, which lack these enhancements, is not what we want. I personally wish that BF would devote a little more time to this.

@Lucky_Strike @RockinHarry @NPye Hold down guys you are making a lot of beauties here, supporting by @Warts 'n' all comments and infos.
I don't need news paper in Holiday I have the CM Forum.
There is so much to read and to check only of this threat that I hope to don't missing nothing, but hope also that a mod pack will see the light one day.
@Aragorn2002 yes I am working on the dead bodies don't worry but is difficult to apply some textures because the models dont have any, I will let you a view after the holidays.
Crossing fingers to yours job's  guy's ✌
JM