Paper Tiger
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Posts posted by Paper Tiger
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Hi Dave
no arguments with ANY of that. I just don't see that Syria would be THAT much better. They won't ever have any air/helicopter or REAL artillery support in any future conflict with Western conventional forces because the big boys will take it ALL away from them before anybody crooses the borders.
I'm pretty sure we'll never see Israel in the CMSF series. I'd like to see them but I think that there's a LOT of resistance to their inclusion.
Conventional Open style combat with China or Russia would require huge maps. I can run 1.5x 1km maps without any problems on my rig as long as their reasonably open (ie desert), so that's another reason why it probably won't happen.
I don't think CMSF has as much longevity as CMx1 if it's all street fights with insurgents and second world armies. My opinion only.
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"Building resistance to fire has been increased overall. Hopefully that will fix things up
Steve"
Woo hoo! Can't wait
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Slaphappy: hey, that's good to hear. Sounds like I'll be giving MOUT a go again when the Paradox patch arrives.
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Oops, hit the wrong key and my post got sent early...
Conventional open is more to my taste and WW2 does it better. Especially Russian Front stuff. All the major participants in WW2 have their unique strengths and weaknesses. It's very easy to create balanced, interesting and exciting scenarios in EVERY flavour, open, closed, MOUT, whatever. Not to mention being able to play as those Uber Finns!
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'Card:
"Give me hypothetical stuff. Near-future US versus China. Mid-80's NATO versus the Warsaw Pact in the Fulda Gap. Israel versus Egypt. The European Union versus Microsoft's evil corporate goons, for all I care. Just anything other than another WW2 simulation. Hell, let's figure out a way to let the Brits slug it out with the French or something."
However, the US and British casualty figures from both Gulf Wars (NOT the ensuing 'peace") speak volumes about the challenge of realistic combat in the Middle East between these two groups. Yeah, Syria would be a better opponent than the Iraqi's but they're not THAT good.
I too, would love to see these options. However, battlefront have been fairly clear that they're not going to expand CMSF in this way. It's Syria v US, Brit, possibly Canada and Germany too, if we're lucky.
Syria just doesn't have enough to keep this interesting. Russia, China? Woo Hoo, bring it on man!
The US and British casualty figures from the active periods in the two Gulf wars speak volumes about the challenge that Middle Eastern opponents present to Western armies. I have no doubt that the Syrians would be better than the Iraqi's but they're not THAT good.
Conventional open is more to my taste and WW2 does it better. Especially Russian Front stuff. All the major participants in WW2 have their unique strengths
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Yeah, I've watched footage of real combat operations for scenario ideas too. It takes hours, largely static, mostly area fire and hardly anybody gets hurt. Woo hoo!
Only joking. As I mentioned earlier, I prefer the conventional scenario and Blue v red is difficult to balance and make realistic. When I return to MOUT after the patch, maybe I'll try my hand at an urban fight with little or no air/artillery support but plenty of special vehicular goodies for the US.
I don't have a finished copy of that scenario yet. The map is stunning and I want to use it in my current project, a Syrian v Syrian campaign. It would be a shame to waste it on a US v Syria turket shoot.
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It would be nice if we could have some heavy/reinforced buildings to deploy in the scenario editor, somthing that would give real cover to small arms.
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aka_tom: yeah, I got that impression too since Steve has been so reticent to post about the patch until today. Maybe later today or tomorrow?
Please Battlefront, don't wait to release it until next weekend. I bought my game from Gamersgate and I don't want to wait until the New Year for Paradox to get their copy of the patch ready for downloading.
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Cpl Steiner:
"I'm beginning to wonder that Blue on Blue Rural might be the true sweet spot. You could do a scenario like that and call it a military exercise."
Blue on Blue is LETHAL, man! When you spot something it's DEAD! I have no problem with the military exercises idea. I'm sure that's how the army trains but I rarely QB that way because it's very short and bloody. Syrian military exercises are better fun to play though.
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Philip:
"That said, how do you avoid MOUT in CM:SF? Many of the scenarios in the game involve some form of building-to-building fighting.
Any enlightenment would be much appreciated. Cheers."
That's easy. I design all my own scenarios and as yet, I haven't done a city one. I spend all my SF time in the scenario editor or playtesting my creations and rarely play any of the scenarios.
I don't care much for MOUT operations but I fully accept that this is the reality of combat in the 21st century. When I can blast my way through house walls and move from house to house without leaving cover, I'll start playing MOUT again. Also, it's the vehicles pathfinding in cities/dense villages that frustrates me the most. One example from a scenario I was designing follows:
Played as Red you have a small force of insurgents and technicals to defend a village to the last man. I ordered one technical to hunt about 10-15 yards ahead up the road to a junction. It really was just short of the junction. It about-turned, drove back down the road away from the junction and turned off to drive out of the village and back in. Of course, it didn't complete this little excursion. Hmm. It was only supposed to be peeping round the corner to see if there were any US forces in the road.
I don't save games while I'm playing them unless I can't finish them in one sitting and I REALLY must finish it. So reloading is not an option when the AI pathfinding really screws up.
And when I do design MOUT operations, I use Stryker MOUT infantry. They break into three groups, not two which is much better, and I give them very short movement commands with as much overwatch as I can manage. But I can't mount a full platoon into their Strykers which means that a MG team has to run to catch up... hopefully, this'll get sorted quickly.
Don't misunderstand me, I LOVE this game and play it every day. Out of the city, it's awesome! Actually, my favourite CMBB scenario was a Stalingrad factory fight that I designed for myself. I've played that one probably 100+ times... it was just SO difficult, but not impossible, for the Germans to capture the factory and hold it against a determined Russian counterattack. I've been thinking of a way to do it for CMSF but will wait to see what 1.05 brings in the way of fixes first.
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Hi Dave
you gave some very good advice there. I haven't played it yet but it sounds like you're describing Hammertime. The US forces actually outnumber the Syrians but they have a hard time winning because they have to negotiate their way through a well prepared Syrian position in just 2 hours.
I don't really like being forced to follow a path that obviously leads to an ambush that I can't avoid. In real life, a US commander would probably plaster any zone with artillery or air power before sending his boys into such an obvious kill zone.
To make BALANCED scenarios, you have to take options away from the US player that probably wouldn't happen in real life.
What's missing from my original post is that I really love encounter type battles. I guess I'm just playing this game until WW2 comes along and then I can get back to work on designing the kind of WW2 battles I really enjoy.
I CAN do WW2 encounter battles with Syrian v Syrian but the US side is just too powerful for that kind of action, especially if they have M1s.
The battle I was describing above has very long LoS and the US player has an almost unlimited choice in how he wants to approach the objective. The US side is AI controlled and I gave the M1s movement paths that would largely help them to avoid taking flank shots, just like a real life commander would do. The M1s are almost indestructable in situations like this and so they should be.
Now MOUT is a different thing altogether but there's a thread in the main forum about that so I'll save it for there.
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Bigduke6:
"First, Steve is absolutely right, BFI is an example of a company that really gives a damn about its customers. They responded to customer gripes in the past in a way that I wish most companies did, BFI's past record is an example of how to do that stuff right."
Thanks for posting that man. It can't be said often enough.
"Second, with all the respect and love for BFI products that I have, if the pathfinding - that's vehicles AND people - isn't fixed, the game is going to be a dog."
Are you playing mainly MOUT situations? I rarely play them and I rarely see any problems with pathfinding. When I do play MOUT, I do see problems though. Fortunately for me, I don't like MOUT, didn't like it in WW2 either.
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webwing: some very good points there. I would really like the 'turn off Fog of War' option too to watch what the AI is doing. That was one of my major frustrations when I started working with the scenario designer.
also to turn off Plan 1. Okay I can set it to used rarely but it's surprising how often it gets picked when you're trying to playtest plan 3 or 4. Aargh!!!
Highlighting your AI plan? I don't think we'll get that but I've been there, done that and felt the pain too! I think we're just going to have to be more careful when we're programming
I would like to see the AI artillery planning improved though. I'd like each AI plan to have it's own fire plan. I find the randomly chosen fire plan which is fired off 20-30 seconds after the scenario a bit of a waste of AI artillery. Unless you target the other players set up zones it often has no effect. I can't imagine how some people would react if I created a scenario where the human player gets dumped on in his set up zones.
I really think we need the 'AI can't acquire javelins' thing cleared up. I suspect this'll be a 1.6 thing though as there's no hint of changes to the scenario editor in 1.5. PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong about that!!!
ps. Webwing, how do you find time to play other peoples scenarios and design a campaign at the same time? Congratulations on getting that done.
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Whew! You weren't joking when you said that there was a lot of reading to do :eek: I'm not sure I'll ever get the time to wade through all that.
Anyway, when I saw the title of the thread, I was hoping that it would be a discussion about how to create realistic missions. This is something I would be very interested in hearing other peoples opinions about.
At present, I feel that it is possible to create BALANCED scenarios pitting US forces against the Syrians but these situations are (at least the ones I've made) very unrealistic. In a realistic situation, the US should blow the Syrians away with ease. When I designed "In Harms Way" I was astonished at how powerful a single US infantry platoon was. They had no artillery or air support (how realistic is THAT?, just a couple of Stryker ATGM vehicles in support and they could annihalate the Syrian AI force.
I have been trying to design a scenario where the US AI attacks a Syrian held village in very hilly terrain. I gave the US four M1 Seps and gave the Syrians lots of AT-14s and the M1's blew them away. One M1 took 10 (yes 10!) consecutive hits from Kornets and continued to fire back at the ATGM teams. It was immobilzed, big deal, but in such a good firing position that that was unimportant. The ATGM teams were knocked out for no real loss, game over. I dropped the M1s straight away from the OB.
I'm not complaining because the US forces are clearly superior in every way to the Syrians but it does make it hard to design interesting scenarios with lots of cool stuff for the US to use without creating a turkey shoot. (Hard, but not impossible if 'Hammertime' is anything to go by).
Anyway, I've started work on a Red v Red campaign because it's easier to get balanced battles with cool equipment for both sides. The Republican Guard units ARE still very tough to beat though.
Well, that's my 2p worth. By the way, how do other scenario designers find time to play other peoples scenarios?
I spend all my CMSF time either in the scenario editor OR playtesting my creations. -
Now I'm really impatient to get my hands on this patch. I was fine before this ...grrr... (only joking)
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Wow!
This is going to make waiting for the patch even more painful. As it happens, I've been working on a Red v Red scenario that takes place at night. Does this mean that flaming wrecks are going to make units in their illumination zones easier to spot? :eek: That'll change the complexion of night combat for sure. -
Best movie of all time mate. With a cracking sequel to boot. Not so sure about no3 but still love it.
Yup, agree with that sentiment. I travel back to Indonesia tomorrow and I'm very happy about that. It's too dark and cold here and that's not helping my mood. Lots of sunshine, tropical heat and friendly, smiling people for another year, lovely.
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Kip: Happily there is to be an Eastern Front CMX2 so lets hope the engine has matured enough by then to more than equal CMBB .
Wow, that's the best piece of news I've read on these boards in a long time.
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acrashb
I'd like to publically apologise to you for coming down a bit hard on your post. I was rude. I have hit a bit of a rough patch in the real world and the negativity here gets me down and makes me feel a bit defensive. No excuse though for being publically rude.
Actually I do agree with a lot your post but I feel a bit protective of the scenario editor as I think it is a superb improvement over the CM1 model.
I hope there's no hard feelings. Of course, you're entitled to your own opinion.
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Yeah, I'd have to go with CMBB too. However, there's another old Amiga title called 'Action Stations' that simulated WW2 Naval combat really well. Can't remember who published it though. That one really blew me away too. I'd still be playing it now if I still had my Amiga.
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Mark: Look what they did to my boy.
A fan of the Godfather perhaps?
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Ah, I think the training campaign is called Boot Camp. I'm away from my home computer and can't check it just now. It consists of four simple training missions designed to introduce us to some of the important features of the game; mission 1, move a Stryker platoon through a number of phase lines, deploy and attack a Syrian trench line,
mission 2 how to use javelins,
mission 3 how to call in artillery/air support, and the last, attack a small village. The last is good fun.
I missed this one when I started because I thought the campaigns were for the seasoned players only.
The scenario editor in this game is a beauty. With a (serious) commitment of time, you can create some stunning maps. It's a whole other game. Enjoy
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Wow, I'm REALLY confused. Who are you Abbott? Are you another incarnation of Dale? If you're not, my 'dumb' questions were addressed to him and not to you so if I've somehow offended you by doing so, I apologize.
If you are Dale, please note that 'dumb question' no 1, the most important one was ignored. Also, you have also been attacking another beta tester, Sixxkiller I think, in the Fed Up thread. You seem to find Beta tester's imagined arrogance/swagger offensive. I have no desire to protect Huntarr, he's a tough guy and can look after himself.
I would like to point out to you that I am relatively new to these forums and I do not understand the complex nature of the relationships that already exist between the old timers on these boards. So I'm not going to know why you're pissed with somebody else here.
I am also probably somewhat older than most of you guys and probably have a different value system from you, not necessarily better, but definitely different. I feel a certain responsibility to Battlefront when posting on their boards not to post anything that might drive away potential customers. And, for that matter, make their forums an unfriendly environment for others. Posting here is a privilige, not an entitlement just because I bought the game.
This is not from the intellect but from intuition but it's my FEELING that there are a very small group of people who are so PISSED with Battlefront that they are trying to drive people away from buying or supporting this new product. Perhaps they want to want to hurt Battlefront for not giving them the game they wanted. Or they are disgusted that Battlefront has stated that they are prepared to lose a few of the old timers to go in this new direction and they're not going to let them get away with it.
Well, it's up to Battlefront to regulate their own forums. I promised to myself when I came here not to get involved in negative slanging matches with others. Yesterday, I made a mistake and let my feelings show and I slipped. Time to back off and just post hopefully helpful posts again.
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acrashb: I'm not going to get drawn into a negative debate with you about this. If you want to riposte what I'm about to post, fine but I'm done.
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"1) only as crap as the programming; there's no evidence that it need be crap."
Have you any idea how long that would take to programme? Let's be realistic here: Battlefront need to have some income to survive. To hold back publication of a title for 6 months+ to develop a frankly unnecessary and massively complex piece of programming is unrealistic. You REALLY need to look at the scenario editor to see how complex it is to qualify your opinion here. Lets see if anybody else jumps in here to back you up on this one.
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"2) that's part of the point - having to hand-develop an AI plan in some detail is undesirable - but certainly a map generator could also develop an AI plan if that's what it takes."
undesirable for you maybe but not for a lot of us. I actually find it an exciting step forward with plenty of potential for more sophistication. And you want to add to this random map generator a planning generator too? No doubt, it would have to be a good plan to to keep you happy. Whew, nobody's going to accuse you of having low expectations. Good luck getting support for that too.
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"3) true, I only have the demo. Having said that, between studying the demo and reading here, it's easy to have a lousy AI plan and game it. It looks like some very well-made scenarios act OK from the strategic perspective, but a lot of them don't. The fact that the game requires an AI plan, rather than being enhanced by them, strikes me as "fundamentally flawed" because of the ripple effect on QB's."
Would you care to qualify your statement that a lot of them don't? Which ones? And if some well designed scenarios do work as you admit, then your point is invalid. You're just floundering here. You said at the end of your first post that you would welcome factual correction because you probably needed it. I don't think you want to be corrected at all.
I spend all my CMSF time either in the scenario editor OR playtesting my creations.
Am I the only guy here who is sick of WW2?
in Combat Mission Shock Force 1
Posted
It's funny but I feel that WW2 IS modern combat. Apart from new weapon types, body armour and high tech equipment, it's all there. Some of the gadgets were fun to play around with, personal favourites being Infantry Guns and light armour facing AT Rifles.
Apart from the restraints of my current kit, there's no reason, in my opinion, why we can't do modern conventional open between the big boys. It would be necessary because there would be no MOUT if the countryside wasn't captured first. It's a necessary precondition to MOUT operations. The Russian forces in the 80's were trained for that and I'm sure they're training for that now. And, for that matter, are the Chinese.
I think a lot of us really like the modern setting but would like to have a more 'worthy' opponent for the US than the Syrians.