37mm

Presumably this is the modern version of seeing the Virgin Mary in a slice of toast or whatever.
There's nothing there but a 2d map of a crossroads.
Anything else is in your own head.
 

It really is... amazing ingenuity.
Now they just need a "metallic building" mod!

Some screenshots, just for you my friend. 
The assault ship USS Wasp.

View inside the well deck of USS Wasp looking towards the stern.  The well deck is made possible by the bridge inside of a building trick discovered by @RockinHarry. 

The USS Wasp deploys a USMC beach assault unit with the USS Ticonderoga in the background.  


US Marines watch from the starboard hangar of the USS Wasp as the USS Ticonderoga engages attacking aircraft. 

 

Thanks Ithikial.
Your mod sounds understandable & reasonable enough... although there are practical concerns with how many "optional sets" are going to be part of the final mod (it's already pretty ugly with z's & double z's everywhere).
I'm starting to think the finalized version should come with a mod enabler... perhaps OvGME (I probably should be using one anyway as I'm always switching between my various mod compilations & sub-mods).
Why don't you put the dropbox link here in the mean-time, that way other players can try it out?
 

Loving this mix of effects. I was just finding Vein's tracers difficult to see in most situations particularly in the day. I've adjusted the tracer to be a touch bigger. Takes up about 2/3's of the BMP canvas size but doesn't have the 'laser beam' effect in game. Let me know an email/dropbox location if you want a copy.
Cheers

I was never particularly pleased with it, but the improved muzzle blast for tanks is growing on me...
 

+1  Looking good. 

Really nice work!

Here's a video of the second beta in action...
 

My Special Effects compilation is now ready for beta testing.
Download link is here...
https://www.dropbox.com/s/0k0l1qdhqlcle7f/ME Experience.7z?dl=0
This Special Effects package is based, almost entirely, off of previous work from Vein, Herrtom, Barbarico, Drakenlorde, Aris, Scipio, "Pro-effects"(?) & Battlefront.
I have, for the most part, just reordered, renumbered, resized, renamed & rethought the work of those fellas.
 
 
The special effects modding options for Combat Mission are rather limited.
We can change the textures but not the animation sequences or timing. Nor can we create alternate sets of effects for different events (say a fiery explosion when a Tank explodes or a smokey explosion when a grenade goes off). I do suspect BFC plan to move in this direction (why else would they name their current explosion set "explosion a").
Either way, for now, I don't think there is a 'one size fits all' solution to improving the SFX in CM... although Veins effects come pretty close.
Therefore, I created these optional 'effects sets' which players can choose from based upon the CM game they are playing, the time of day, the environment, type of scenario, equipment present & personal taste etc.

TIME OF DAY SETS (place two zz's before either DAY or NIGHT)
DAY effects, these are the standard effects I've chosen.
Drakenlordes flames are, in my opinion, the best looking flames available.
Improved Muzzle blast, I had hoped to create a blisteringly fast muzzle blast however that doesn't seem possible because of how the animation is actually sequenced. Still this should look a little quicker.
Realistic muzzle flash, When combined with Barbarico's gray smoke these look far more realistic & subdued compared with stock or all other effects packages.
Smoke, after Barbaricos gray smoke, I've chosen Veins black smoke.
Vein style tracers, I've created colour coded versions to match the stock effects colours introduced in engine 4. These are smaller & less 'lazer beam-ish' than stock effects however I wanted to keep (indeed expand) the visibility of ricochets as otherwise firefights can look very stale.
 
NIGHT effects
I had hoped to create a much larger range of night effects but may pick that up in future. Either way, I did create a few night effects & these will mostly just make muzzle flashes & the initial flash of your explosions brighter & 'sparklier'.
 
EXPLOSION SETS (place one z before either of the four options)

Herrtoms smokey explosions... based on his earlier works, I find these work great for smaller explosions. Probably would be fine for most WW2 action.
Veins subdued explosions.... quick & effective, these work for nearly every situation. Although they're perhaps too quick for breaching charges.
Scipio's subdued explosions... small & firey, these too work for nearly every situation.
Veins explosions... perfect for when that Abrams platoon meets a T-62 Company.
 
VEHICLE DUST  (place one z before either NEEDED or NOT NEEDED)

The 'smoke dust' effect is used both during combat & for vehicle travel in dry & very dry conditions. Obviously this is important for CMSF2 but, if there are no vehicles or conditions allow it, you may prefer a darker dust effect more appropriate for most combat actions.
Although I've absolutely loved using them, one of the side effects of using Veins (or Aris's) smoke is a faint, but annoying, 'ghost square' halo around battlefield smoke (presumably because they've used the whole of the bitmap with no transparency). So I created new smoke bitmaps myself using some free images off the internet merged with the old, but reliable, "pro-effects" smoke... this seems to have eliminated the 'ghost square' issue.
 
WHITE PHOSPHOROUS SETS (place one z before either WHITE, BALANCED or DARK)

Initially I assumed that the white smoke effects were only used for smoke screens & such like. They are not. Indeed there is an argument to be made that they are the most common CM smoke effects of all & appear to be used for all manner of explosions, building & vehicles impacts.
This being so, I've created a selection of 'white smoke' effects...
"White White smoke" is great for representing WP smoke screens.
"Balanced White smoke" is noticeably darker yet can somewhat represent both WP smoke screens & combat smoke.
"Dark White smoke" is much darker still & excellent for smokey combat scenes... but very poorly represents WP smoke screens.
 
 
As per usual download the mod & place in your mod/z folder. Play around with the different options to your hearts content & give us some feedback.
 

Here's a video of the second beta in action...
 

Here's a video of the second beta in action...
 

Here's a video of the second beta in action...
 

It's no problem, I plan to create a major project sometime (which will require a lot of model swaps) so I wanted the practice.
Here's the link...
https://www.dropbox.com/s/f2kghuf4lc122e5/ak74m to M16.7z?dl=0
This only changes the AK-74M, the modern version of the ak-74, used by the Special Forces.
All other ak-74's are untouched.
The normal rifle is an m16a1, the grenade launcher version is an m16a4 (I had to keep the optics, I'm afraid).
 
I changed the icons, the script & the default shot sound (that will affect all other ak-74's).
Obviously I can't really do much about individual sound mods people might be using.
 
I've had a quick play around &, combined with Sir Lancelots excellent mod, they do look pretty cool.
 
NOTE
The squad leader still has the AKS-74U... I'm not sure if I should keep that, change it to an M16 or, perhaps, an m4 carbine?
 
 

My apologies.
For not even bothering to hint at what the purpose of the experiment might be.

I am tempted to work on a Afghan National Army mod to finish my Afghanistan pet project, but really if someone is already busy working on one, I'd rather spend less time in the editor and in photoshop and just play instead. That's why I am asking the community.
Now I am not even sure if I am going to take on this project or even if I can pull it off, it is just something I am pondering. But let's say someone was to do it, what would make the most sense to use for the conversion?
My first idea was to use Syrians for the job.
But then I remembered that Blimey made an ANA mod for SF1 using Dutch infantry and I can see why. The Dutch use the C7 which is similar to the M16A2 that the Afghan Army transitioned to around the year 2009. The biggest difference being that the C7 has a full automatic fire mode and also optics.
On the other hand, Syrians field rpg-7's (it feels weird to have ANA soldiers with a panzerfaust), rpk's, have worse optics (I haven't seen too many pictures of ANA soldiers with an M-16 equipped with a scope), worse C2 gear etc.
What do you guys think?
And if you go with Syrians, what's better? Reserve infantry? Regular mechanized?
 

For IanL...

Different angle.

All hurting.

 
Walk in the park now...

Explosions provided by @37mm... and Abrams on overwatch.

Okay I have no idea if calling them v4 is the right nomenclature, but they do have green, orange, red and white tracers. I forgot where I found them, don't think it was on CMMOS but in a thread somewhere.
But when you said in your previous post  "for all intents & purposes, are Veins tracers updated to work with engine 4 games".
Do you mean updated by Veins? In that case this is what I am using. Or updated by you?
I'll send you a dropbox link.
(To clarify, the rar file has v4 in the name, but I am pretty sure it was me who added that in order not to overwrite the older tracers I had in the same directory.)

Nice, glad I could help. At one point I thought maybe I was just tripping and imagining things.. This is going to give me a little sanity boost.🙏

Okay, the intermediate muzzle fire effects are now ready for testing...
Download from here...
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ntbnhkih24eceov/Intermediate muzzle blasts (small arms).7z?dl=0
 
 

Few tips for turning Syrians into Russians from what I've learnt from a few experiments.
Euroscape is great for converting vehicles, terrain, buildings, voices, roadsigns, UI & a some gear (weapons primarily) however a few things have changed between CMSF & CMSF2.
-CMSF2 features new vehicles (mortar vehicles esp.) and some altered vehicle names (For instance, there is now an "early" & a "late" BMP-3... instead of just the one standard version of CMSF). So you might have to duplicate & rename a few things &/or put up with a few gaps.
-Do NOT use the Euroscape Script.txt... you'll need to edit the script from CMSF2 if you want the Syrians renamed.
-Infantry uniforms will not work. For now, you'll have to use the default Syrian one's &, for the Western militaries, currently available mods (perhaps renamed & used for another Nation... i.e. Germans in Marine Corps woodland camo).
-Fighter & combatant uniforms will not work & modding them in CMSF2 is proving tricky. I've had some success using Blimeys Insurgent mods from CMBS for fighters (again renamed) but they aren't a perfect fit & there's no normal bitmaps.
-When playing scenarios, you might want to created a Euroscape edited version with different conditions... Europe's not particularly famous for its extreme heat & very dry, dusty conditions.

Yes... plus some extra Afghan voices from HQS 3.1.
Although it took me a while to get it right (there are still arabic voices present in the first few scenes).

No... I do not see the Virgin Mary.
At all.
However, I am able to figure out what you think you see based upon the 2d map of the crossroads, your thread title & your OP etc.

Presumably this is the modern version of seeing the Virgin Mary in a slice of toast or whatever.
There's nothing there but a 2d map of a crossroads.
Anything else is in your own head.
 

I am going to give this a try, it looks neat.