CobaltTiger

Reading this thread, it occurs to me that some of the things I see Steve made to answer for on these forums I can't imagine any other game developer being grilled over. For any other game there would be a FAQ stickied and one of the questions would be "Q: Are ATGs going to be in the game? A: No." and the conversation would be over. There certainly wouldn't be a dev on the forums debating the issue with us. That conversations like this one even happen just goes to show how ridiculously spoiled we all are by CMx1 and by BFC in general.

Nope, a track hit doesn't necessarily mean immobilized.

I have not played the Gefechtsaufklaerung scenario but just looking at in the editor I can see why you might have had trouble. You're outnumbered roughly 4 to 1, are more or less flanked from the outset, and have a limited setup zone that looked to be under fire from the word go. Having to work with scattered trees as your cover in those circumstances is hardly ideal. Scattered trees hardly count as cover at all in my mind and from looking at the scenario it doesn't surprise me that your troops spent a lot of the time pinned. As for some of the points you mention... until you get a feel for what you can safely ask your infantry to do yes, they'll be spending a lot of time pinned, shaken, or what have you. I used to hate infantry because they would spend most of the game face down on the ground getting shot at. Eventually I learned and it's gotten a lot better. There is a lot of helpful advice on this forum, but far more valuable is time spent with the game seeing how it works for yourself. Given the miniscule map for that scenario I can also understand the russians being able to charge you. It's not *that* far of a sprint and given the weight of fire your guys were taking they probably just were unable to fire back enough to stop it. The same goes for the molotov that got your tank. It was probably more than one guy (not sure what fog of war you're using, but usually seeing just one man running doesn't mean there's only one man in the squad) and they got lucky. That's all. Most of the time a molotov will make a pretty glow but that's it. I've had vehicles far less sturdy than the StuG you get in that scenario have 3 or 4 molotovs tossed on them with no effect. I suggest you play some quick battles until you get acquainted better with the game. If you're having trouble with infantry do something like an infantry only force mix, 300 to 500 points, mid day, random year, random terrain, until you find yourself annihilating the AI. Alternately, you can try playing scenarios hotseat against yourself. This is how I taught myself, and it's a good way to get a feel for the game without having to worry about losing terribly and getting frustrated. You still might lose terribly, but at least you'll be winning at the same time.

Cannon-fodder, if you're right that it's just a moral modifier I must have just been using up all my luck in one battle. Perhaps the game was just making it up to me for my PzIV getting brewed up 5 seconds into the game because I got a little careless checking LOS during setup. Regardless of it was luck or fanaticism, that panther still got a commemorative screenshot. Usually when I put a panther into close range against T34/85s I get a dead panther, not a platoon of dead T34s without them firing a single round.

Well, I did say perhaps it was just lucky. I've certainly never had a vehicle make me think it was fanatical before. But when I have a unit singlehandedly save the day three or four times and with unerring accuracy, I start to wonder. Especially the way my luck usually goes. Of course a panther is going to win against T34s most of the time Jason. I've done panthers vs T34s on both sides of the coin plenty of times and I know how things are usually going to turn out. The point is that for whatever reason, this was the single most deadly panther I've ever had. Veteran crews miss a signifigant amount of the time even under 100m. This tank had two misses very early game while fast moving but otherwise never missed a shot. We all know that point where both tanks point the barrel at each other and you wonder who is going to shoot first. You hope it's your guy and you hope he doesn't miss. This is the only tank I ever had that not only fired first every time it was in that situation but hit and killed the target so that it never fired back. That highly unusual speed and accuracy is what made me think it might be a fanatical unit. Not the fact that it won battles it should have.

I think vehicles can go fanatic. I'm pretty sure I had a fanatical panther last night. That or he was extremely lucky. The panther was veteran experience, and it singlehandedly destroyed a platoon of T34s and a platoon of T34/85s over the course of the game. The six T34s had a total of one round fired in return. It was pretty much one shot one kill on all of them, at ranges from 200-500m. The panther missed twice vs an armored car at about 800m but otherwise I don't think a single round was off target the whole game. It also managed to rack up 23 infantry kills and capture a Russian officer. It was somewhat awe inspiring. :eek:

I have a large game in progress (~12000 points) and when loading the final autosave into a quickbattle I am not given the option to import troops. All of the map damage is as it should be, but the troops are absent. Anyone have any suggestions?

Steve, believe it or not I'm happy with that answer. :eek: I think you were correct that I was looking more at those rare exceptions than at the broader picture. Or perhaps you simply bonked me over the head enough that the gears started turning again. In any case, thanks for taking the time to explain your view to me. It's deeply appreciated. My last comment about "how the grogs will hate it" was just drawing a paralell between you telling the grogs they're wrong and me telling you you're wrong. But since you've won me over you can feel free to disregard that bit.

Steve, believe it or not I'm happy with that answer. :eek: I think you were correct that I was looking more at those rare exceptions than at the broader picture. Or perhaps you simply bonked me over the head enough that the gears started turning again. In any case, thanks for taking the time to explain your view to me. It's deeply appreciated. My last comment about "how the grogs will hate it" was just drawing a paralell between you telling the grogs they're wrong and me telling you you're wrong. But since you've won me over you can feel free to disregard that bit.

Battlefront.com The double standard is that it is possible to give a stationary AFV a precise order related to its primary function: "Fire on that house over there" but it is not possible to give a stationary transport (regardless of type) a precise order related to its primary function: "Don't move until the troops are on". The potential ramifications of the first are much greater than the second, so why must the second be brushed aside? Comparing the transport capabilities of a tank or a truck is irrelevant. They are both transports and they should both be able to wait until the troops are on before moving. You make a good point, but "Wait for troops" has nothing to do with a second unit. There might not be a squad coming. The vehicle might sit and wait indefinitely if the player forgets to tell a his squad to hop in the truck or if the squad gets shot to pieces on the way there. The vehicle simply checks a flag -- Am I loaded or am I not loaded? Don't make it more complicated than it needs to be. Now you're just being silly. Nobody is asking for those things and nobody in their right mind would expect them to be considered. All of your examples are talking about a much much finer level of control than I am proposing. I doubt I would be playing CM if it was that complicated. Just because it's deliberate doesn't mean it is the best way to do something. Did you forget all those posts you made about how the grogs will hate it but the change is for the better?

Battlefront.com The double standard is that it is possible to give a stationary AFV a precise order related to its primary function: "Fire on that house over there" but it is not possible to give a stationary transport (regardless of type) a precise order related to its primary function: "Don't move until the troops are on". The potential ramifications of the first are much greater than the second, so why must the second be brushed aside? Comparing the transport capabilities of a tank or a truck is irrelevant. They are both transports and they should both be able to wait until the troops are on before moving. You make a good point, but "Wait for troops" has nothing to do with a second unit. There might not be a squad coming. The vehicle might sit and wait indefinitely if the player forgets to tell a his squad to hop in the truck or if the squad gets shot to pieces on the way there. The vehicle simply checks a flag -- Am I loaded or am I not loaded? Don't make it more complicated than it needs to be. Now you're just being silly. Nobody is asking for those things and nobody in their right mind would expect them to be considered. All of your examples are talking about a much much finer level of control than I am proposing. I doubt I would be playing CM if it was that complicated. Just because it's deliberate doesn't mean it is the best way to do something. Did you forget all those posts you made about how the grogs will hate it but the change is for the better?

I'd just like to restate that I'm in favor of more command delays when we're dealing with transporting units. And you have to admit that it's a bit hypocritical to say that we're making weak arguments and then turn around and say something along the lines of "Oh, they shouldn't be there anyway so you guys should be happy with what you have." Dismissive answers like "Your arguments are weak" or "You shouldn't have transports anyway so be happy" are not real answers. I'm also not in any way saying that if it can't be realistic, why bother trying. Please. I'd be off playing one of the Command & Conquer games if that was the case. I understand that the realism line has to be drawn somewhere, and I'm glad it's as high as it is. What I'm getting at is that if we're able to give "unrealistically precise" commands for other vehicles, why the double standard with transport? If we're able to give targeting commands to AFVs, why not transport commands to transports? Cpl Steiner summed it up beautifully. Rather than just telling me I'm wrong, please explain to me why a "wait for troops to board before moving" order is so over the line?

I'd just like to restate that I'm in favor of more command delays when we're dealing with transporting units. And you have to admit that it's a bit hypocritical to say that we're making weak arguments and then turn around and say something along the lines of "Oh, they shouldn't be there anyway so you guys should be happy with what you have." Dismissive answers like "Your arguments are weak" or "You shouldn't have transports anyway so be happy" are not real answers. I'm also not in any way saying that if it can't be realistic, why bother trying. Please. I'd be off playing one of the Command & Conquer games if that was the case. I understand that the realism line has to be drawn somewhere, and I'm glad it's as high as it is. What I'm getting at is that if we're able to give "unrealistically precise" commands for other vehicles, why the double standard with transport? If we're able to give targeting commands to AFVs, why not transport commands to transports? Cpl Steiner summed it up beautifully. Rather than just telling me I'm wrong, please explain to me why a "wait for troops to board before moving" order is so over the line?

So let me get this straight. It's unrealistically precise for someone to bang on the roof of the truck and shout "We're all in!" to the driver so the truck can take off? And yet it is not unrealistically precise to, say, issue a specific target to a unit? What is so terribly wrong with making it less difficult to do something that is already largely possible in the current engine? Again, we are not advocating "precision drops" or anything like that. Yes, if a mishap occurs we can stop the troops, stop the truck, issue new orders to get them back together, then issue new orders to have them resume going wherever they were going. But why not save us the rare headache when troops decide it's a good time to bail out for no reason (and I've seen it happen before in a hotseat game, so I can assure you they weren't under any kind of fire) and let us say "Stay in that truck until you get where it's taking you, the truck becomes disabled, or you come under fire." Apparently they are issued maps, because I can already order the trucks to drive to a specific destination within a meter already. Along with any other vehicle in the game. You can't call having precision control over one vehicle unrealistic when we have it over all vehicles. If we can order a tank to fire on a specific target, why can't we order a truck to take off as soon as everyone is loaded?

So let me get this straight. It's unrealistically precise for someone to bang on the roof of the truck and shout "We're all in!" to the driver so the truck can take off? And yet it is not unrealistically precise to, say, issue a specific target to a unit? What is so terribly wrong with making it less difficult to do something that is already largely possible in the current engine? Again, we are not advocating "precision drops" or anything like that. Yes, if a mishap occurs we can stop the troops, stop the truck, issue new orders to get them back together, then issue new orders to have them resume going wherever they were going. But why not save us the rare headache when troops decide it's a good time to bail out for no reason (and I've seen it happen before in a hotseat game, so I can assure you they weren't under any kind of fire) and let us say "Stay in that truck until you get where it's taking you, the truck becomes disabled, or you come under fire." Apparently they are issued maps, because I can already order the trucks to drive to a specific destination within a meter already. Along with any other vehicle in the game. You can't call having precision control over one vehicle unrealistic when we have it over all vehicles. If we can order a tank to fire on a specific target, why can't we order a truck to take off as soon as everyone is loaded?

It seems to me that almost everyone is arguging something other than the points brought up in the first post. Really he was only asking for two things: 1) Vehicles: Stay here until troops are loaded, then move 2) Troops: Stay in vehicle until you reach disembark point (unless under fire etc) Is that really so unreasonable? He wasn't arguing against command delays, or asking for a way to make everyone arrive at a destination at the same time. He just wanted a way to smooth out the endpoints a bit. If you want to argue for realism, having a truck sit there for 40 seconds after the infantry finishes mounting or having troops jump out short of the destination (or arrive at the destination and sit around until the next turn) isn't particularly realistic. Sure, you can minimize the delays by fiddling around with pauses and having a knowledge of how the engine works, but, the argument is, why should that be necessary when command delays and similar should already be factored in? If you're worried about troops jumping on and off a vehicle too quickly, by all means add in a embark/disembark delay. I've always felt it silly how troops will plop down onto the ground immediately and then move off after their command delay anyway.

It seems to me that almost everyone is arguging something other than the points brought up in the first post. Really he was only asking for two things: 1) Vehicles: Stay here until troops are loaded, then move 2) Troops: Stay in vehicle until you reach disembark point (unless under fire etc) Is that really so unreasonable? He wasn't arguing against command delays, or asking for a way to make everyone arrive at a destination at the same time. He just wanted a way to smooth out the endpoints a bit. If you want to argue for realism, having a truck sit there for 40 seconds after the infantry finishes mounting or having troops jump out short of the destination (or arrive at the destination and sit around until the next turn) isn't particularly realistic. Sure, you can minimize the delays by fiddling around with pauses and having a knowledge of how the engine works, but, the argument is, why should that be necessary when command delays and similar should already be factored in? If you're worried about troops jumping on and off a vehicle too quickly, by all means add in a embark/disembark delay. I've always felt it silly how troops will plop down onto the ground immediately and then move off after their command delay anyway.

Thank you for the video, I enjoyed it. Does anyone have a translation of the text for us poor english speaking types? General Colt: You might need to upgrade Media Player, with the latest version I had no problems playing it.

One thing I should add: I didn't take into account tied scores. That was a bit too much to get into for 3am I guess. Theoretically you would take the total points and divide them up, i.e. a tie for first between two people would be 100 + 93 = 96.5 points each. So my results would be off by a couple points here and there.

I'm not involved with ROW in any way so perhaps I'm way off base here, but why make it so complicated? What not just use a points system for each scenario and then total up the points? Rank each side by total score, then assign points to each player based on how they did. That is, the two players who score highest for each side on a given scenario receive, say, 100 points. The second highest scores for each side get 93 points each, 3rd 87 points, and so on. The system scales in such a way that players who do very well are rewarded more than players who do poorly. There are 7 points between the first and second best scores while only 3 points between fourteenth and fifteenth best scores, for example. While rewarding players who do well, a system like this is also good at rewarding consistency over one or two good scores. It is impartial to how balanced a scenario is because each side receives the same number of points. Your score in a scenario only determines how many points you get compared to other players playing the same side. Since I can't help myself when it comes to crunching numbers, I put together an Excel sheet to see how things would have changed. In half of the groups the top 3 players remained identical, and in three groups first place changed. All three of the changes were instances where the first place player had more than +1.5 (using nabla) on Push to Maleme playing as allies, and they dropped to second place under the points system (usually by just a few points). I'd be happy to share the spreadsheet if anyone is interested.

As someone who doesn't like ops, I think I fall into much the same thinking as JonS. I really tried to like ops, and spent hours making custom maps for them, but since I prefer PWTL myself it's difficult, mostly because of the unpredictable setup zone lines. I dislike the map movement in some Ops and would rather have a see-saw battle over a set piece of ground, so I prefer static ops. Of course this only makes the setup zone problem worse. Any sort of breakthrough which is able to seize a flag deep into enemy territory is completely negated as soon as the new lines are drawn... it's suicide to leave any kind of force out on it's own like that. I think the final nail in the operation coffin was when after a bloody battle I was able to take 3/4 of a sizeable town away from the enemy, only to see ALL of my units in the town be outside of my setup zone in the next battle. To make it even worse, due to a quirk in how units are handled between battles infantry frequently will get bumped out of buildings, usually into the street. Unless I wanted to see many of them gunned down right away by a few lingering MG nests and armored cars I couldn't even leave them there and hope to hang on until reinforcements arrived (Among the house rules used is that reinforcements only arrive along roads at the map edges). So now I use the QB trick, where you import old troops into a new game. I solved the setup zone problem with an honor system wherein certain flags must be all held by a side to use the corresponding setup zone. It's far from a perfect system, but at least when I push the russians out of a forest I'm not fighting for that same ground again the next battle.

In the book "Panzer Battles" by Mellenthin a footnote about the panther on page 259 caught my eye: This was the first I had heard of such thing, does anyone have more information? I would be inclined to think the author is confusing the panther and the jagdpanther, but that just seems like too glaring of an error.

This post is probably in the wrong forum, but I can't pass up a tech question. Having built a few computers and upgraded a few others, my personal advice would be to use a site like newegg.com to order the whole computer at once. Oh, and research, research, research before you do so. To start with, decide which brand and speed of cpu you want, find a motherboard that is compatible with it, and then pick out everything else, making sure it's compatible with the motherboard. For "important" things like the motherboard / cpu, if you aren't sure what you're looking for in particular, a good place to start (if you are using newegg) is by looking for items with both lots of reviews and a high average score. See what both the good and the bad reviews have to say about it. When you've narrowed it down to a few selections, do some more research using Google. Cutting and pasting the item name into the search bar and adding the word 'review' is a good place to start. The rest of the computer you don't need to be so thorough with, as long as you make sure that everything you are getting will work with the motherboard. This really shouldn't be much of a concern once you have the cpu and ram picked out. One thing I would recommend you splurge a little on is the case. It might seem silly to spend $100 on the case when you can get by with less than $30, but the case I bought for this computer was not only a breeze to work with when assembling, its also runs 20 degrees cooler than my old computer and is quieter to boot. Having worked with cases where removing a drive is an epic battle and things get so hot you can't touch them unless the computer's been off for awhile, that's a big relief.