[MyIS] Buffpuff

I had never heard of it until I saw this topic. Checking it out now!

Great broadcast. Broke my heart to see the RAM crash rear it's ugly head and corrupt the save game file!!

Pfft. I remember my first game on the PC. An old relic by the name of "Silent Service II" by the now defunct Microprose (and Red Storm Rising by Microprose). Now THAT'S old!!!

Keep 'em coming Chris. I've thoroughly enjoyed watching your videos. The wife keeps asking me "Who's the dorky guy you're watching on the TV every night"...

Any plans for a campaign? I'm trying Pontine Patrol now and I'm having a blast (despite getting my butt kicked a bit!!!).

Thanks for the response Tiger. I had typed up my earlier response hours ago before you posted this but hit submit just now seeing as I'm up at 1:30 in the morning (grin). I felt like I had to rush. 25 minutes isn't a whole lot of time so I went hard and fast out the gate to try and get into a good position. Even wanting to push up and hard it still took time. By the time I got in a position to take out the concrete MG bunker I had 5 minutes left. You mentioned smoke was your friend but maybe I missed something but what smoke? The 81mm mortar had 4 smoke rounds. Are we talking about mortar smoke or are we talking about the smoke nades the infantry squads carry (I will admit I didn't think about that). As to the HMG teams either I'm losing my mind or I ran into 2 HMG teams. I respect the time and effort that you put into this campaign (I wish I had the time and talent to do the same thing). It HAS been fun for me. I feel like I'm beating a dead horse here but I felt there just wasn't enough time to accomplish the goals at hand. I may go back and try again!

Well I've read this entire thread and threw myself (again) on the Lock Bridge scenario. The highlights: - I managed to get my 2 platoons (minus their platoon leaders, attached mortars, and my MMG) up to the left side ditch with what I deem "acceptable" losses (basically they weren't decimated down to like 4 members) - Again got unlucky with a pre-artillery smoke mission and the smoke missed covering the concrete MG bunker - My MMG kept constantly hitting the concrete MG bunker. Apparently suppressing the bunker with an MMG just doesn't work. The concrete MG bunker didn't seem to have any issues with firing at my squads rushing across the open left side. - A 81mm strike ordered on the spotted PAK gun. Made it a linear strike starting at the gun and then extended it 8m to the right to catch an infantry icon spot. Heavy ROF and Maximum duration. I didn't want a cockroach to live through it. The results: The PAK gun survived. - 60mm strike to the HMG on the 2nd floor of the building next to the PAK gun. Heavy ROF and Maximum duration. I had no misconceptions that the 60mm mortar strike would bring that building down but I sure hoped it would put that HMG hiding or out of action. Mission failed. - 60mm strike to the building on the north side (if that's not the right direction then it's the building behind where the concrete MG is placed). Heavy ROF and Maximum duration. Again no misconceptions that the strike would bring the building down but I wanted life to be miserable in there. Mission failed! - So with the mortar strikes on the way and dialing in I hunkered my 2 platoons down and waited. The end result was the PAK gun lived and I wasn't sure of how effective the 60mm strikes did. Either way it was time to take out the bunker and cross the bridge. This time I had a squad get within 20 meters to the left of the bunker just in front of the barbed wire and the boys lobbed nades at the bunker. The Germans got spooked (thankfully) and made a run for it. They got cut to pieces. Phase 1 complete. - Phase 2. Run like the wind across the bridge. The PAK gun dinged some rounds off the bridge but my squad didn't take a casualty until they crossed the other side of the bridge. And then those 2 buildings I had just shelled the mess out of came to life. With my other platoons pouring constant fire into the closest building I advanced a squad into an assault position. Again the Germans seemed to have the most uncanny luck and were able to fire on my men setting up on the riverbank for their final assault. This was with 5 squads using area target commands and my MMG area targeting this building. I was banging my head against my headset at this point. What am I doing wrong I asked myself. How much more suppression can I get on this thing minus another artillery strike on top of forces I have there. - But I did manage to clear that building with some casualties. I sent them up to the second floor and my boys took out some of the rage I was feeling by killing everything hiding on the back side of that building and across the ditch bank. - I looked at the mission clock. I'm at -2:00 in the mission. I'm already past the 25 minute mark and I'm at 27 minutes now. How much time do I have left? Whatever I have left it's not much. - Feeling the heat on the clock I did something that I KNEW would cause casualties. I sent two platoons at a quick movement to cross the bridge and to go straight for the trench line closest to the next building. - A minute later I have some casualties from the HMG in that building and the PAK gun got some of them when they were crossing. My boys who cleared the first building are pouring as much lead as they can into the MMG position with area fire. - I assault the back side of the building and catch a squad of Germans trying to leave but I make it inside the first building by the end of the turn. - Time runs out. The next building in front of me has that pesky HMG along with the HQ on the first floor. I've denied them total control of this area. But deny is good in my book. That's 100 VPS they can't have. I may not get it either but the Germans don't have it. I have the lock portion (50 VPS). The Germans don't have control of the middle building but they do have the last VPS location. The end result: US Tactical Defeat. 81 men OK 5 dead and 7 wounded. (Or something close to that) I have never had a scenario frustrate me to this level. You know it's bad when you're cursing and there's not a soul around to hear you. But I was literally cursing this game. I've had 24 hours to look back at it now. The anger bunnies have gone away. But I just can't shake the feeling that all I needed was more time. I felt like I did everything I possibly could to make the objectives in the time allotted but either I lack the skill to do it or luck was just not with me. It upset me. When I make an error I try my best to learn from it. I like challenging scenarios and I'm not looking for cake walks. If the game was easy then I don't think it would be the game that it is. But I just can't shake the feeling that it's a much more advanced level scenario than I'm capable of (at least at this point). And I felt punished. Punished because I'm not good enough. But again I said to myself "That's war". I don't expect to be a Captain Winters. But I don't expect to be a Lieutenant Dyke who freezes up in open ground and doesn't know what to do next. So I've taken the tactical defeat and moved on to the next scenario. If this experience has done anything for me it has given me a good perspective as to what I think is enjoyable and what is just mind-numbingly difficult. And on top of that it makes me want to design a campaign more suited for the novice player because this campaign is for the big boys! Again I'm not bad mouthing Paper Tiger. It's a kick butt campaign. But if you don't have the skill level for it (and that would be me!) it'll put a lump in your throat!

First of all I'd like to thank Paper Tiger for the "interesting" campaign. And by interesting it's been extremely fun and extremely frustrating at the same time. I've watched the Armchair General videos countless times to help my train of thought as the biggest issue I have is mostly coming up with a viable attack plan and then executing that plan. With this campaign I've taken some lumps here and there but I thought I was doing well until I hit the Lock Bridge scenario. And it was there that I have hit the proverbial brick wall. ** SPOILER ALERT ** A concrete MG bunker and an HGM out there. So I told myself to find a good line of sight to see the other side of the river bank and have my MMG suppress the MG bunker and fan out infantry to get in close to take it out. It was an utter disaster. The PAK gun, the concrete MG bunker and 2 other HMGs shredded my squads (which I hadn't split) to pieces. My MMG guy constantly penetrated the the concrete MG bunker but the Germans seemed to be amused by it more than worried. So I regrouped and said to myself "Some smoke on that MG bunker would probably help". Reset and I put a smoke screen point target in the area in front of the MG bunker. As luck would have it one out of the 4 smoke rounds actually hit where I wanted to. But only 4 smoke rounds. I'm thinking "I need more smoke to make this work" but decide I'll deal with the cards I've been dealt (as war sometimes does...grin). I took one platoon and put them on the left side near the buildings and then took my second platoon and put them on the fence line area near the middle of the map. And then it was the 200 meter quick dash for my men in different directions. The PAK gun decimated 2 of my squads on the left platoon (even though I had them separated by about 50 meters) with one shot. My right squad took some casualties from the concrete MG bunker but I made it to the wooded area with acceptable losses. And then I moved up that squad to see what was up ahead. Hello PAK gun, HMG squad in a building, and a rifle squad in another building. Thinking I had good cover and concealment with the woods I laid on the fire thick and heavy and followed up with an 81mm mortar strike on the PAK gun and my remaining 60mm mortar strikes on the identified HMG in the building and the rifle squad in the building. Suppression was great (or at least it looked like it on my end) but the 81 strike didn't kill the PAK gun and the 60mm mortars ducked the HMG and may have caused a few casualties but they still prevailed and didn't high tail it and run. So I couldn't clear the right side. Focusing on the left side squad I pushed them up to the riverbank on the left side of the concrete MG. And then discovered another HMG squad and a rifle squad in a building behind the concrete MG bunker. I laid the fire on thick and heavy and "thought" there was no way anyone would survive the amount of lead I had just put in that building. I had a squad approach from the left side of the concrete MG bunker to take it out but apparently I had brought my men to far back and that gave the MG bunker a side shot to lay on them. MG bunker 1 My poor squad 0. So then I hugged another squad as close to the river bank as I could and got within 25 meters of the concrete MG bunker. This squad had a bazooka and 8 AT rounds. Let em have it boys. The concrete bunker took bazooka round after bazooka round on the left side but the Germans decided to lower their heads and drink coffee and say "Look at the dumb Americans trying to drive us out with bazooka rounds". So now out of AT rounds I moved them in closer towards the front. My squad started tossing grenades but the Germans apparently didn't take too kindly to that and opened up again and ripped my squad apart even though 10 seconds before they were quivering down looking at their boots yelling "Mommy make them stop". A stalemate on my right and my assault on the concrete MG bunker was ripping my squads apart. Okay time to rethink things. Smoke check. MG hitting the concrete MG bunker check. Split squads check. Short rushes for 30-50 meters in different directions check. And that didn't work. This time I managed to get the MG bunker knocked out but once I crossed the other side of the bridge it was a disaster. And then I've replayed this scenario I'd say at least 8 times. Trying different things and none of them had led to a victory. Just not enough time and, in my humble opinion, not enough heavy weapon support to get the job done. But I don't consider myself a great player. Though I think I'm getting better (and it's about time) this particular scenario has had me up at night thinking of what am I doing wrong and how can I fix it. So like I said. Challenging but frustrating at the same time. I'd love to hear from someone who's been able to beat this scenario with details on how they did it.

I'll put my 2 cents in here and say a big thank you to as well Jon. For as long as I've been playing CM (and CMBO still has the record for longest game ever on my hard drive at 3 plus years) I've always left the "story" telling and design aspect to people who, in my opinion, are much more knowledgeable and talented than I would consider myself to be. With CMBN I found myself turned off by the lack of small campaigns. Personally I like battles on the company level with primary infantry forces intermingled with tanks/artillery support at times. Getting company plus (battalion) size battles gives me a headache in the setup phase and then it's a matter of keeping track of everything. So, for me, the smaller is better is my mantra. Because of my opinion that there weren't that many campaigns (not scenarios...just campaigns) that fit to my tastes I decided to give the scenario editor a shot. Like a baby lost in the woods would be a fitting description. I built one scenario and because of my lack of confidence in map editting and really not knowing what I was doing I cheated and used a quick battle map tailored for my one scenario. The questions you've posed (Why this battle? What led to this landmark? etc...) I pondered but I didn't give it the attention/detail that it deserved. And when I got to testing my creation I felt it was missing. Maybe I was my own worst critic and that's not a bad thing. But the notion to plan my own campaign died with my feeble attempt in just making one scenario work right in my book. This creative process you're going through has rekindled my spirit to tackle a campaign process again. And I'm hoping that by learning how to handle those AI plans (hoo boy did I bang my head repeatedly trying to figure those things out), making my own maps, tailoring units, etc. that it will make my creation worthy of something that other players will like and enjoy to play. Thanks again for doing this.

I vote for a sticky for this thread!

I personally like "frappe" Schultz. It leaves no indication at all of what you have placed in the blender. Cheers!

You need to have whatever units you want to use as "core" units purchased in ONE battle scenario (I'd use your title scenario that sets up the campaign). After that it's a simple process of importing campaign units in to the various battles you've made for the campaign. Good luck to you as I am currently doing the same thing in building a mini-campaign designed around infantry company level battles. Even with using QB maps (hey I'll admit it...Map making is HARD work) it's been a challenge to figure out AI plans and trying to find a balance of what works and what doesn't work.

Very nice AAR Dork...Much better than that mess of an AAR I made (though I did have fun doing it).

Should be fixed now.

Yes that's the reason I posted them in our forums thinking that because it's a "public" forum everyone would have access to view them. I'll have to check with our forum guru and see what the permissions are set at.

Hello guys and gals and a merry early Christmas to all of you. I posted up an AAR for "The Bells are calling" on my squad's website. They probably wouldn't care about reading it (since FPS is the main thing) but I knew someone here wouldn't mind. Feel free to critique all you like as I'm sure better players here would have done things much differently than I did (and with probably better results). Enjoy! http://www.dflsquad.com/index.php?/topic/4025-combat-mission-battle-for-normandy-aar/

Same here. Stumbled upon it from a PC Gamer article if memory serves me correctly. Tried the demo and I got hooked. It remains the one game in my memory that stayed on my hard drive the longest (a record of 3 years).

Call it nostalgia but after years of putting CMBO to rest I decided to re-install this masterpiece back on to my hard drive. Hell I don't even remember what I was running as to hardware when I got this game years ago. But I ran into a problem of getting the dreaded "exception" error and not being able to see the load screen. I decided to try running the .exe file under a compatibility mode (using Windows 2000 as the selected mode) and viola...I'm running CMBO with a DX10 card and the latest drivers without a hitch. Here's my specs: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 @ 2.40 GHz 2 MB Corsair DDR2 800 RAM BFG GeForce 8800GT with 169.25 NVIDIA drivers Hope this helps some of you who may be running into compatibility problems

Updating my video drivers fixed my issue of not being able to left click on units. I haven't seen a FPS issue but unless it goes below 30 FPS I'll never be able to tell!

That worked for me. I can't believe I pulled an old mistake by not checking to see if I had the latest video drivers!

Thanks for the info! :cool:

Is anyone else having an issue where when you left click on a unit with the mouse that it does...nothing?

LOL...Great stuff. Will Ferrell is the man!

I'm one of the many who's been monitoring the progress of this game over the past few months (and longer). Salivating like a dog who's starving for the past few weeks I saw the "deal" with the pre-order: </font> A chance to download the game before anyone else</font>A boxed version arrives in the mail after the option to download</font>And $10 off</font> First of all, I'm not a fan of pre-orders. I'm not quite sure why I don't like pre-orders. Maybe it's because everytime I go to EB the sales associate tries to cram a pre-order down my throat. Or maybe it's because a pre-order just isn't worth it in my opinion. I pay $45 for a pre-order and get it on the release date and have to drive to pick it up. Or on the release date I just go and pay $45 without a pre-order and walk away with the same thing. I just don't consider a pre-order "worth it". But I read on this website "the deal". I've watched Battlefront grow since the days of the original Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord (insert senseless plug for a modernized version of that CLASSIC!!!). And said to myself "This is a damn good deal...What the hell...I'm going to pre-order for a change". I will admit that the idea of "getting" the game before the actual release was a factor in my decision but it certainly was not the pivotal point that made me decide to go with a pre-order. I would have loved it had the game been downloadable today or last weekend. It certainly would have helped me get my mind off what I experienced this weekend in losing a fellow police officer in the line-of-duty (http://www.reflector.com/local/content/news/stories/2007/04/15/4_15_07_fatal_wreck.html). But the fact that I can't download the game yet or now it's been announced that we'll get it one day early hasn't stirred my emotions enough compared to what I've seen in some of the posts in these forums. It's a game people. Plain and simple. I'm sure there will be a gazillion posts when the downloads start (The inevitable "Download speed sucks!" and "I've got the game!!!"). In the meantime I'm enjoying my time with my family, watching movies, and just plain sitting on my lazy butt while I wait for TOW to be released. Last I checked it's April 16. That's 3 days before the official release. That's 72 hours. That's 4,320 minutes. That's 259,200 seconds. Let's start a spam post of how many more seconds or hours there's left before this GAME gets released versus posting in this topic of "I'm pissed off with Battlefront because I don't have my game like I thought I would early". I'll start off... 258,900 seconds left until TOW is released...

Will there be an open-beta test for this project?