Kobal2

That's not just in Normandy. Every now and then people find WW2 (or WW1, for that matter) stuff all over France, be it unexploded shells or mines, shrapmetal, bits and pieces of vehicules or equipment (shovels, helmets, boots, rifles, grenades, spare tracks etc...), even hidden ammo and weapon dumps - in working shape too. It's been said that during the shooting of "The Longest Day", the film crew dug out an english tank from one of the beaches, had been buried under the sand all that time. They put it back in shape and it was used in the film. Also, you can pretty much find German bunkers everywhere, all across France. There was one overlooking a park, in one of my ex-GFs town (a few clicks north of Paris). Mostly now they're all covered with graffitis and are used for housing by bums. As for signs of battles, many many old buildings in Paris still bear the traces of the war, riddled with bullet holes etc...

While direct firing at ATG, tanks use AP rounds ??

What about the rest of Africa then ? most of it was colonized by the British, the French, the Belgians...

I know where the guns are, but logically, if I can see where they are (to area fire at them), they know where I am too

Russians would never have lost, even with Moscow and Stalingrad down. First of all, Russians were downright fanatic about the Motherland at that time (and probably still are - it's something that goes far far back in history), as was seen during their defense of Stalingrad etc...They would probably have fought street by street right up to the Pacific. Then, there is the sheer size of Russia. Germany would never have been able to occupy it all, they just didn't have the population for that kind of feat. Combine widescale guerilla with the "series of natural disasters" that is the Russian weather... If all else had failed, the Russians would have probably done what they did to Napoleon : scorched ground tactics. Leave nothing behind, burn every ressource you can't take with you, be it natural or mechanical, retreat as far as possible, and let Mother Russia do the job itself. And lastly, like one said in another post, while the early-war Red Army was laughable, in 45 they could probably have defeated the US and British combined if they had wanted to, they were that good. The fact is, they almost did with the Germans all by themselves. I don't believe Stalin would have attacked Germany though and if they had done so they would have been easily pushed back at the time, what with the purges and inexperience of Russian troops in 41 - IMHO Barbarossa was a big, big mistake.

Ye Gods...No, better still, Ye Me, there's goths *here* too ? CessPool indeed.

**** EVIL NASTY STINGY BITING SPOILER. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. PLUNDERER WERDEN ABGESCHOSSEN. **** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This kind of battles has always left me frustrated - although I haven't played "A Series of Misfortunes", I tried and tried and tried "Battery Overrun" over and over again, which according to your description is really close : 3+ platoons of German tanks (plus a couple of scout cars) against 5 clustered sandbagged british 25 pounders and a wee platoon of Inf., small ridge next to the german starting position, big ridge smack in the middle, no arty whatsoever. I tried everything I could think of : - sniping at the guns from hulldown positions on the starting ridge - rushing to that middle hill, then all tanks hull-downing at the same time at the top - rushing to that middle hill, then form two groups, each group rushing from a different side of the hill to divide their fire - having a couple panzers and scout cars rush the map's right side to get behind them, then, when all brit guns are aimed to the side of the map, rushing them from the front, as they turn ever so slowly - having my panzers zig-zag full speed across far away open ground, shooting wild HEs at the guns while always being on a 75° bearing from them so that it's hard for them to shoot precisely Results : nada, nichts, nothing, rien. Every single time I get all of my panzers brewed up, no time at all. Hence my deep fear and despise of ATGs alltogether. They are almost impossible to knock out, hard to suppress and come back up fast (but maybe than an effect of the sandbags ?). The proper way to deal with them is obviously infantry and/or arty, but a "full tanks vs ATGs" seems unwinnable to me, unless they're really scattered across the map... I also thought "what the heck, I'll give the AI a 50% bonus and see how it does". Result 15 turns later : dead panzers everywhere, not a single brit down. AI rushed.

Now that you mention it, I do remember hearing a couple "tvoy' mat !" in CMBB (meaning "...your mother !") and "tchort !" ("Devil !") Since we're on the topic of units sounds, does it mean anything when my infantry goes "Have you seen this ?!?" or "Heard that ?!?" ? Is it just a random sound like "Secure the bloody flanks", or is it a real incentive to stop all movement and watch for hidden ennemies ? [ June 03, 2004, 07:58 AM: Message edited by: Kobal2 ]

Now that you mention it, I do remember hearing a couple "tvoy' mat !" in CMBB (meaning "...your mother !") and "tchort !" ("Devil !") Since we're on the topic of units sounds, does it mean anything when my infantry goes "Have you seen this ?!?" or "Heard that ?!?" ? Is it just a random sound like "Secure the bloody flanks", or is it a real incentive to stop all movement and watch for hidden ennemies ? [ June 03, 2004, 07:58 AM: Message edited by: Kobal2 ]

That reminds me of something I wanted to post : the French units in-game sounds are great (to my knowledge, it's one of the only original version games (or films for that matter) to use real french voices to do the job, and not an french-speaking american/british/german with a horrible horrible accent who'd make you want to slaughter your own troops in anger.), and (until now) I thought they were the only ones to use profanity. I can't recall any American or British units using swearwords, Germans neither but then again I learned German in high school for only 4 years, so I don't understand most of what they say (actually, since those high school years are far, far back, all I understand is "Vorwärts...MARSCH !", "Aufgeht's, LOS LOS LOS LOS !", "Sani !" and the word for "Reload !" which I can't for the life of me remember right now). Is there any sound file where they use the (at the time) famous "Schweinhund !" ? Anyhow, French units use many cusswords in-game, (which definitely fits the French military. I don't know about your grunts, but our soldiers are well known here for their everyday use of the worst profanity), as in "Allez, allez ! Bougez vous le cul !" (Go on, go on ! MOVE YOUR A*S !). They even use Arabic expressions , as in "En avant, yallah ! yallah !" ("yallah !" being the Arabic word for "Forward !"). Although common Arabic words slowly crept into French language during and after WW2 (and the Algerian War), the Foreign Legion was known for being mixed with Arabic culture very early on. (I know, that sentence doesn't make much sense, but I couldn't think of anything better. HEY ! I'd like to hear *you* speak French 'round these parts !) I was truely impressed by the extent of BFC's research regarding foreign languages when I first heard those.

That reminds me of something I wanted to post : the French units in-game sounds are great (to my knowledge, it's one of the only original version games (or films for that matter) to use real french voices to do the job, and not an french-speaking american/british/german with a horrible horrible accent who'd make you want to slaughter your own troops in anger.), and (until now) I thought they were the only ones to use profanity. I can't recall any American or British units using swearwords, Germans neither but then again I learned German in high school for only 4 years, so I don't understand most of what they say (actually, since those high school years are far, far back, all I understand is "Vorwärts...MARSCH !", "Aufgeht's, LOS LOS LOS LOS !", "Sani !" and the word for "Reload !" which I can't for the life of me remember right now). Is there any sound file where they use the (at the time) famous "Schweinhund !" ? Anyhow, French units use many cusswords in-game, (which definitely fits the French military. I don't know about your grunts, but our soldiers are well known here for their everyday use of the worst profanity), as in "Allez, allez ! Bougez vous le cul !" (Go on, go on ! MOVE YOUR A*S !). They even use Arabic expressions , as in "En avant, yallah ! yallah !" ("yallah !" being the Arabic word for "Forward !"). Although common Arabic words slowly crept into French language during and after WW2 (and the Algerian War), the Foreign Legion was known for being mixed with Arabic culture very early on. (I know, that sentence doesn't make much sense, but I couldn't think of anything better. HEY ! I'd like to hear *you* speak French 'round these parts !) I was truely impressed by the extent of BFC's research regarding foreign languages when I first heard those.

Never seen "Saving Private Ryan" ? - I wonder what he said... - "Look ! I just washed for dinner !"

Never seen "Saving Private Ryan" ? - I wonder what he said... - "Look ! I just washed for dinner !"

So what's Rule Number 1 ?

(could someone explain this French the meaning of "horsefeathers" ? "Something that just doesn't exist" ?)

Always remember that "one in a million" chances crop up 9 times out of 10. Anyhow, I think a german-speaking japanese ought to be required to post in Swahili. Just for equality's sake. @Bone Vulture : hey, come in lad ! That's definitely one language I'm short. I already know some English, Russian, Polish, Spanish, German, Japanese and Chinese swearwords (no regular, everyday words of course. When I travel abroad, I'd rather know how to say "get the feck out of my way, idjit !" than "where's the bathroom, please". That's the French for you. I do know how to say "I love vodka" in Russian though. Very, very important phrase.). A little cultural complement might come in handy.

Always remember that "one in a million" chances crop up 9 times out of 10. Anyhow, I think a german-speaking japanese ought to be required to post in Swahili. Just for equality's sake. @Bone Vulture : hey, come in lad ! That's definitely one language I'm short. I already know some English, Russian, Polish, Spanish, German, Japanese and Chinese swearwords (no regular, everyday words of course. When I travel abroad, I'd rather know how to say "get the feck out of my way, idjit !" than "where's the bathroom, please". That's the French for you. I do know how to say "I love vodka" in Russian though. Very, very important phrase.). A little cultural complement might come in handy.

(and to think dalem had the spine to tell me "we don't like arguments" when I first stumbled upon this refuse pile, this collection of God's mistakes.) @Seanachai : Was that a "royal us" ? A "schyzo us" maybe ? EDIT : Oh and Joe ? That Lars isn't even on the map, is he ? [ June 02, 2004, 11:54 PM: Message edited by: Kobal2 ]

CM:VietNam ? You mean as in "the whole map is Deep Jungle type, with hidden bunkers everywhere and a 10m line of sight" ?

Is it really modelled in CM ? That "hitting a wall will send it in the defender's face" thing ?

Well, like I said, that mission was in a sandstorm, so all fights were at pretty close range. But the ACs weren't killed, their crews just bailed out of good vehicules, the Italian pansies. All in all, I think that out of the 10ish vehicules that were bagged by HMGs (be it Italian or English), only three were really knocked out, the rest were just abandonned. But yeah, I was pretty pissed off by that counter-performance Arty is not good with single tanks - by the time the shelling lands, the tank is already halfway across the map. Plus, unless you're firing really HEAVY stuff, nothing but a direct top hit will do much. I did a field test of german rocket FOs on a quick battle (I think the rockets were 168mm, +/- 20mm), no FOW, two FOs against one Sherman, one Sexton, one M10, with prepared barrages. The first wave got a lucky direct hit on the open-top M10, killing two of the crew and immobilising it and ruining it's gun, but the Sherman had a rocket land right next to it that only killed the TC - even large HE won't kill a good tank. Same goes with mortars, though they can kill TCs, which is a good thing, and sometimes panic the crew if they're green.

So, this picture is kind of like those chain-letters, those who mention that "If you break the chain, your wife will run away with your sister, your dog will eat your children, you'll catch smallpox, your penis will become gangrenous and your lawyer will grin at you in a calculating way" ? Lars, watcha waiting for ?

In other words, AC rounds and bazookas are little better than a sling when dealing with grunts. Still, seems odd that very-heavy AC rounds won't do that big a hole in the ground - the TNT charge of a 158mm or 105mm AP round must be close to that of a 50mm HE, no ?

I still miss the "Anything happens, you know what to do." command from CMBO.

He ain't all there, is he ? As to that one true thing, I've always smiled when hearing that old Hindu tale. There was a time, long long ago, when the world was young, a time where all men were the equals of the Gods, sharing divine power with them. But man abused of his power so much, that the Gods became angry, and Brâhma, the Lord of Gods, decided to take away the divine part of man from him, and hide it where he would never reach it again. He gathered his council of minor gods, to adress the question : Where should they hide it ? One said "We shall bury it deep inside the Earth, where he will never find it", to which Brâhma answered : "No, because Man will dig, and dig, and dig again, and will find it." Then another said "We shall throw it away in the deepest of seas, where he will never find it.", to which Brâhma answered : "No, because sooner or later, man will explore the sea, and will find it." A third one said "We shall fling it away towards the sky, through space, to the edge of the Universe, where he will never reach it.", to which Brâhma answered : "No, because sooner or later, man will know how to fly, and will find it." "Then what shall we do, if neither the Earth, nor the Sea, nor the Sky is the answer ?" chorused the gods. Brâhma thought about it, then smiled a wily smile. He said "Here's what we'll do with man's divinity : we shall hide it deep inside his heart, for it is the only place where he will never think of looking for it". And ever since then, man has traveled all around the Earth, and climbed mountains, and explored the seas, and dug the ground, always searching beyond the horizons, looking for something that's buried within himself. Pretty little story, isn't it ?