Paper Tiger
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Posts posted by Paper Tiger
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While I'm really looking forward to the arrival of 1.06 I'm also worried that my current kit might not be up to the task of running some of these scenarios with the new ELoS. I was already pushing my computer to the limit with these scenarios and even a small drop in performance will make them unplayable on my computer. A shame as I had some really cool ideas for some of the later scenarios, especially the finale.
At present, there's not a map that's less than 1kmx1km and there's usually about four or five companies in action (both sides combined) in some of the bigger ones :eek: , three in the smaller. But they all run fine on my single core 3Ghz intel processor which is a lot less than some of you guys have.
But my wife has already given me permission to upgrade the processor (what a sweetie!) so I might be able to make them even bigger and better.
But until I see what happens when I install 1.06, I can't inspire myself to do any further work on these scenarios. -
Are you the guy who designs those scenarios that bring the computer to it's knees? If you're able to play these scenarios with decent frame rates then I want YOUR kit.
Sounds like I'll be going with a quad core then. Thanks for the reply. -
I seem to recall reading a thread somewhere a long time ago that the schedule was Shock Force first, then after about 6 months, the Marines module and then work would start on the British Army module (hurrah!). WW2 would arrive about the same time as the Brit pack, perhaps about Aug or Sep later this year.
However, it's been nearly 6 months since SF was released and there's been no word on the Marines module so I'm not expecting it to arrive for at least another 2-3 months, possibly even later. And that probably means a later release for WW2. I've seen early 2009 mentioned somewhere.
However, don't get depressed. I could be wrong. Corrections are welcome gentlemen.
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I'd be more than happy for a deep blue coloured impassible terrain tile if it's going to be THAT difficult to code it properly. It would be better than the deep ruts we have to use to simulate rivers at the moment.
Water HAS to be in the game for Europe. I suspect it's not in just now to prevent us from making Syria look like it's replete with waterways. The scenario editor only allows us to create missions during the months of May-July, the hottest, most arid months of the year there so it's an acceptable limitation FOR Syria.
The splashes effect would be COOL though, bullets, shrapnel etc really kicking it up.
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I don't have a problem YET, but I'm anticipating having to upgrade my processor when the new Enhanced LOS is introduced in the next patch. My budget is around $300US, more if I'm ESPECIALLY nice to my wife.
I have Vista 64bit operating system so I'd like a 64 bit quad processor but I don't want to stuff up my CMSF experience. I play this game almost exclusively on my computer so it's important that it runs.
How well is SF handled by quad core processors?
Is anybody using them successfully?
Any recommendations?
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From the blog:
"We're talking about a potential 25 fold increase in one of the most intensive game calculations! Version 1.03's speed optimizations and the realization that most people have at least dual core systems caused us to risk coding Enhanced LOS now instead of later."
Sounds like a pretty big potential performance hit to me
. I guess most of the scenarios I'm currently designing have been turned into unplayable monsters. Looks like I'll be upgrading my processor faster than anticipated. -
2 Jungle War
Yup, have to agree with that because there's TOO much cover in the jungle. If you want to see how much fun is to be had with this type of setting choose ANY QB map, pick Red v Red and choose Syrian infantry for both sides. Finally, choose NIGHT. Have fun!
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Lurker:
a} Steve has also stated that they were perfectly willing to drop PBEM if needed. PBEM is WEGO. No WEGO currently exists in multiplayer. Ergo, WEGO is not the focus.
The reason why they were contemplating leaving it out was because the file sizes one minute of action generates are often in excess of 10MB which is too big for most ISP's. And not everybody has broadband access either. It's not proof of Battlefront ignoring WEGO.
secondly,
b} Even now the WEGO playback is incorrect and leaving your men up to their own devices for one minute will end up with a lot of dead Strykers when they bump into one Syrian tank since the Strykers won't attempt to get out of harm's way.
The reason I don't like WEGO in SF is not because I think it's buggy or sucks. It's because 1 minute is too long to be out of control of your troops. I suspect this SAME WEGO system will work very well when they return to WW2 later. In my opinion, RT is the better of the two systems for playing modern era and not necessarily because it's had less attention than RT.
The reasons why vehicles don't react to threats in the same way as CMx1 is not to do with lack of attention to WEGO players but because of the new relative spotting system.
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GSX:
"Anyway, the point I'm making here isnt about game playability or game bashing, its simply this:
At some point BF knew that they were designing an RT game and at no point before its release did I see any mention of this whatever, please feel free to correct me if I am wrong though and I will apologise."
In my opinion, it's not primarily RT. WEGO is definitely there but it's a different WEGO system from the CMx1 games. It HAD to be different to allow RT. I don't think you were deceived, perhaps you just don't like the new WEGO. I don't either.
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That's very good news thank you. Looking forward to that patch.
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I did some further testing this afternoon and it's not everybody that can do it but HQs and full squads. BTW, I am using Special Forces and haven't tried this wil other Syrian units yet. I'll report back later.
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That sounds like what's happening. It also happened with a FOS team this afternoon though and you can't split them. That was a bit weird.
So it's a bug and not a C2 thing?
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I'm sure you'll want to change this sometime in the future.
At present, when the Syrians ARE given air support by the scenario designer absolutely anybody and his brother can call it in EXCEPT the FO.I was puzzled when it wasn't available to my FO unit but when I clicked on an HQ unit, it became available. And then again with a squad and then with an AT team. That's fine for the US but it feels a bit weird as the Syrian side.
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I have been playtesting an infantry action this morning and I have been seeing my squads split with great frequency. Why does this happen and what can I do to minimise the chances of a squad doing this?
It's a scenario of my own design and I play RT Elite. The squads in question are Syrian Special Forces squads and they're among the best that they've got. They are all in eye contact (the BIG eye) at the scenario start and they are being given short 'move' orders but sometimes, they still split. One half of a squad just sits on the baseline while the other half carries out the order.
It doesn't seem to matter what kind of terrain they're in. It happens in trees and in the open. It happens after they've successfully completed one movement order and I give them a fresh one.
I'm assuming that there is something built into the game that makes them do this so if I understood why this will sometimes happen (ie it's not bug related) then I can do everything I can to control my squads.
Once they do split, they are effectively gone for the duration of the scenario without a LOT of management.
Everytime I played this scenario this morning, at least TWO squads did this every time. Not sure if it was the SAME two squads, I wasn't watching that closely.
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Done banging on.
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Cheers guys, thanks for the feedback.
Pandur:
when you feel its tight in WeGo its much too tight for RT. if you feel its tight in RT keep it, otherwhise its boring in WeGo.
You'll be happy to hear that it's all being tested in RT. I like Red on Red too. Because the weapons accuracy and lethality are somewhat less than the US kit, some of the exchanges of fire between the two forces can get very exciting. :eek:
Seabea
What I like: Interesting background/storyline, some type of tactical choice, clear objectives, photos and briefing (a lot don't bother putting those in), and a feeling of realism.
There's definitely a storyline involved but I lack Webwings PDF skills. In fact I can only read PDF files but there'll definitely be a Word document with maps and pictures accompanying the campaign. I've already started writing it. I also like writing the briefings. I think you'll find them very instructive. Thy're a very important part of creating a mission.
Webwing. Thanks for that mate. Yes, it's very hard work but I'm loving every minute of it. Yesterday I designed a new map which is stunning and it's a farmland map that I'm really excited about playtesting this weekend. It's SO beautiful. However, it's slightly out of kilter with the other desert/hills maps so I've 'expanded ' the original story line to include this new theater of ops and it gels nicely with the campaign finale too. I'd been wondering how to wrap it all up and this will be perfect. But it means a new map for the finale.
There'll be screenshots coming when the project is nearer completion sometime next month by the look of things.
CplSteiner:
I'm really hoping to design a battle in the campaign such as you describe in #1 but how successful it will be depends on how well you do in the early missions. If you blow through the early missions with scarcely a loss (unlikely
) then this mission will feel very easy. When I'm playtesting the missions individually, I'm giving the player his full OB from the Core units file. Then I playtest until I can beat the AI.I'm not sure how satisfying the Real Unit designations will be though as I have very little knowledge of Syrian Republican Guards/Armour Division formations but I'll be posting to ask about that very soon.
Oops, time to get back to work.
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thewood:
No it was in CM1 right from the start. It needed tweaking because sometimes AFVs did or did not reverse based upon opinions, but I can play a vanilla CMBO today and a halftrack will reverse out of LOS of a serious threat.
Ach, of course you are right. I only really noticed it in CMBB because I played pretty much all infantry actions with CMBO but loved the armour game in CMBB. That was also when I found this forum too.
I remember stating in an earlier post a couple of months ago that I played CMBO without patches and only patched CMBB much later too while CMSF was not too pretty out of the box so I won't disagree with the second part of your post either.
The vehicle self preservation feature has something to do with the new relative spotting feature but I think you already know all this. If it's possible, BFC will put it back in.
Even with all the bugs mentioned in this list, and some that aren't yet, it's definitely nearly there now. Once that low wall bug is fixed a lot of people will be much happier.
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In that very same post, GreenAsJade continues:
"So there's no point in being shirty about BTS's sad attitude... they make a good game, and that's their job. If you like making stuff for the community then get pleasure from there by all means, but don't expect thanks from BTS. BTS will come down on you for making silly whinges whether you are CoG, GJK, Dorosh or Seanachai."
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Guardsman:
no problems sir. I was only asking if it would be out before the end of the month. That's not unrealistic in the light of the quotes provided in my second post. I design scenarios, so this information is actually important to me and it's perfectly reasonable to ask.
And now, a quote from your post:
"The inevitable outcome will be total silence from the team, and then more moaning that they don't respond to threads."
I worry about this too sometime when read some of the things that are posted here. We're VERY lucky to have the game's designers and programmer posting in this forum and interacting with their customers.
A better example of posting that might have the effect we're BOTH worried about might be found in the 'CMSF is the best wargame out there' thread currently running. I am a little surprised that I'm drawing a "I feel I have to comment." response from you for such a mild enquiry.
Still, I'm occassionally surprised at the things that wind me up too.
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CplSteiner:
By the way, the map looks quite a bit different since those last screenshots. The roads are now all "dirt road" instead of paved, the grain fields are now surrounded by slightly raised berms, and the mosque has become a group of apartment blocks set within a grassy area. As you can tell, I can't seem to stop tinkering with it!
LoL! I can empathise with that statement. I have the same affliction. Sometimes, I just like to open them up in the editor and browse around at ground level looking at them from different angles. And then I get an idea how to improve them further. I have one under development that has definitely had a minimum of 50 hours spent on it already.
Maps are like your children, you bring them into the world, shape them and become proud of them but at some point, you have to let them go . The problem with creating a masterpiece is that you need a killer scenario to go with it. 'Hill 621' IS that killer scenario. Last weekend, I found a scenario in my CMBB scenario file called ASL Hill 621 from years ago. I'd forgotten about that beauty. A Shock Force conversion of that situation would be a tough proposition. I remember that all the action takes part on boards 4 and 2, while board 3 is just there to give the Red side some set-up options.
Good luck with this project.
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Maybe you need a Battalion HQ unit in there to spread the news between the two companies?
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thewood:
I have never seen any vehicle reverse out of danger in CMSF. Am I missing this?
It's definitely not in the game yet. And yes, I think you're missing it.
Seems that there will be some tweaks to vehicle behaviour if not in 1.07 then further down the line. It took a while to get it into CM1 games too.
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Of course it's work to play this game. A wargame that's not work to play is usually quite a simple affair, one example being Avalon Hill's 'Victory in the Pacific". Definitely easier than ASL. I loved playing both. Before I got a handle on it playing ASL was W-O-R-K!
I'd be VERY happy if the difficulty level of computer wargames shot up through the roof thank you.
I'm not American, have no military experience and before I bought this game, I had zero interest in modern era warfare. But this game has got me hooked.
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Opinions of 1.05 thread:
Thanks! The fixes are easy, and we'll put out v1.06 very quickly.
Steve (16th December)
Version 1.06 will be a quick patch so it doesn't get bogged down and turn into a monster patch as v1.05. TacAI stuff is generally time intensive to get working right (programming and testing).
Steve (17th December)
BTW, Charles fixed the low wall LOS bug over the weekend already. It was a fairly easy thing to address.
Steve (18th December)
We intend to release a v1.06 patch within a few weeks. We need to fix a couple more of the pressing issues (low walls was the most important) and get it tested. Remember, rushing the last part of testing is why the low wall problem is there in the first place We also have to allow for an extra week just because of the Holidays. The problem with volunteers is that they can't be forced to work, the little buggers!
Steve (19th December)
It took less than 5 minutes to find that. I suppose the important part of this is the 'in a few weeks'. Since that was more than 3 weeks ago, I think that it's reasonable to ask and I am entitled to as long as I do it in a responsible and mature way. I'm not impatient, I'm certainly not complaining and I am a happy customer too. However, the 'mature' part is open to debate.
I am working on a few scenarios of my own and the low wall bug makes playtesting awkward for balancing purposes in the situations that have them.
Of course I don't expect Battlefront will be hurried into releasing the patch by anything that's posted here. And I don't expect them to reply either. However, it seems to be a convention in this forum to ask when a patch will be released beforehand in a light hearted manner, thus the smiley in my first post.
But until I see what happens when I install 1.06, I can't inspire myself to do any further work on these scenarios.
The inevitable 'when's the 1.06 patch coming?' thread
in Combat Mission Shock Force 1
Posted
I have to confess that I'm a bit nervous about this change. I only have a single core 3Ghz Intel processor and I like to play the game with all the settings maxed out and have usually been able to in most situations, including my own designs.
But a potential 25 fold (that's 2500% not 25%) increase in one of the most intensive processor activities is bound to give us all a significant drop in frames unless the processors are super-fast.
Any word on what kind of situations will be the hardest hit? Large maps? Lots of individual soldiers spotting? Mixes of vehicles and footsloggers? Will more closed terrain help or not?