Dietrich

*** FILMED IN SPOILER-VISION! *** I just LGB'd the building the triggerman was in. :cool: I don't see why deploying a smoke screen on the enemy's side of the bridge would be so gamey. Sure, one could reckon, "Well, if the triggerman's view of the bridge gets blocked by a smoke screen, he's going to detonate the explosives"; but is that really the most likely eventuality? If that were so, then why have there been so many instances where a prepared-for-demolition bridge was not detonated even though the defenders could see enemy units crossing the bridge?

To directly address what the OP brought up: It seems to me that German snipers not only don't seem to spot as readily as other infantry units, but they also seem disinclined to open fire on spotted enemy units. Of all the scenarios (including those in campaigns) I've played with German forces, the only one in which my sniper teams have done much shooting is "The Alamo".

Thanks very much, Vein. Love the skies, the dappled clouds; and the toned-down lens flare makes dawn/sunset scenarios much easier on the eyes. Keep up the excellent work.

recoilless gun = tchoom rocket launcher = pfwish Based on my couple decades of first-hand experience with dozens of weapons types*. * not true

I've made a mod that replaces the masked uncon Combatant model with the spy model (with MikeyD's spy "skins"), so the Combatants look more like guys who just grabbed AKs and RPGs from their homes and such, vis-a-vis the more hardcore and militia-like Fighters. Ryujin's idea of a reskinned and partially transparent-ized Syrian infantry model sounds even better.

My question is, Mord ol' pal: can you make [a version of] the mod with NATO icons?

What, is this non-Blue second F-15 included to effect a 2008 revamp of the Tarnak Farm incident? O.o

Well, what was the contemporary (circa 1944) name for an infantryman who was trained in marksmanship as well as fieldcraft and issued with a scoped rifle?

My two bits (two cents adjusted for inflation): The absence of borg spotting in CMx2 more than makes up for the absence of misidentification in terms of a more verisimilitudinous tactical experience. When I first found out a next-generation Combat Mission had come out, I was psyched. When I found out it wasn't a WW2 game, I was like "what?!?" Soon thereafter, though, I got the CM:SF demo and played all the scenarios six ways from Sunday, and I realized it was a game I could really get into. Now, about one and a half years later, I'm still digging it thoroughly. I dig CM:SF not just because it's a really good game and because I now have an interest in modern warfare and wargaming, but because as the first CMx2 game, it has paved the way for all the other CMx2 games, and because by making it in the first place BFC showed guts and a willingness to take all sorts of flak so as to come to grips with the engine they developed.

Some rules of thumb (based simply on my observations in playing CMSF for about 1.5 years; I'm no beta tester): 1. If a fast-mover has just two tiny ammo bars, it has only bombs. 2. If an air asset (fast-mover or helo) has a large ammo bar, those represent missiles. 3. The only fast-movers with guns are the US A-10 and the USMC Harrier. (The British Harrier has no on-board cannon.) 4. Cobras have either cannon plus rockets or cannon plus missiles. Apaches have (usually) cannon plus missiles plus rockets. 5. When an Apache has 4 ammo columns, one is for M230 AP and the other M230 HE (as per akd in an earlier "Airpower munitions" thread). Hopefully CM:SF 2 will include more control over air asset calls (within realistic bounds, of course) as well as tooltips to indicate which ammo bar indicates what.

With my luck, the teacup would be shattered by an unserendipitous Spitzgeschoß just before it got to my mouth. :cool:

A perfectly reasonable supposition; but it's not like all fixed-wing assets have loadout A and all rotary-wing assets have loadout B. Even the same aircraft can have several different loadouts depending on intended sortie type ("ground attack" or "anti-armor") and on payload weight ("light", "medium", or "heavy"); thus there are as many as six different loadouts for every single aircraft. For instance: If it were that the left-most bar represents cannon ammo, then why does an RAF Harrier GR9 (which has no cannon) fitted for a general CAS mission (bombs rather than missiles) have two "ticks" in each of the two left-most bars? Likewise, if it were that the second-from-the-right bar represents dumb bombs, then why does a fully-loaded Apache (whether AH-64D or AH1) have ammo in that bar along with the three on the left? In other words, the loadout of an aircraft and thus the display of its loadout is very case-dependent. Seems to be a terminology mix-up. When Erwin writes "columns," he evidently means the ammo bars. When you write "columns", you apparently mean the mission parameters (point/area/linear, light/medium/heavy, general/personnel/armor). Is that correct?

D. B. Cooper after age-regression plastic surgery.

The funny thing is, there is a Bradley TOW launcher animation. Of a sort. No doubt plenty of others have noticed this too, but with a Bradley that hasn't yet fired any TOWs, the launcher is partially inside the ISU (integrated sight unit). Yet right before the Bradley fires its first TOW of the scenario, the launcher slews laterally several inches, so that it's no longer inside the ISU, and as far as I've noticed it remains in that position throughout the rest of the scenario.

I'm posting this mainly to elicit a grognardly rebuttal/correction from someone more knowledgeable (or with more authoritative sources at their fingertips) than I; but I've heard/read that on the Western Front, about 90% of the casualties were inflicted by artillery. On the Eastern Front, despite the Soviets' fondness for massing guns, the figure was about 50%.

Will there be turret traverse sounds? Or is it a Hollywood-generated misconception that the sound of whatever traversed a tank's turret (electrical motor? something else?) would be audible over the noise of the tank's engine (except perhaps to the guys inside the turret)?

Now it's your turn to be told: Shhhhhhh! =P If BFC were to charge as much as big-name, huge-budget, profit-mongering companies do, wouldn't that effectively be one less thing in BFC's favor? However, I do concur in terms of where you're coming from—the replay value of the CM games (CMx1 as well as CMx2, for those who may think that playing CMx2 invalidates any due appreciation of CMx1) is so high that they're in effect underpriced. Looking forward to your equipment list for the Germ[an]s!

Interesting how the newer and more vehicle-icious game has fewer AT guns. Then again, the US Army was much more mechanized than the Wehrmacht actually was, so no wonder they had fewer (towed) AT guns.

The impression I've gotten (from playing the game) is that the left-most ammo bar indicates "light" ammo and the second-from-the-left ammo bar indicates "medium" ammo. The actual caliber of "light" depends on the weapon carried by the squad/team; likewise with "medium". Sometimes the "medium" ammo doesn't even show up in the bar.

A perfectly reasonable nitpick, stoex. Twas a bit of inadvertent hyperbole on my part.

"Once upon a time in the West[ern Front]..."

I made no mention of CAS; nor did I say tip-and-run attacks were equivalent to CAS. Nor was I expressing dismay at any supposed omission of German air assets. I concur with the reasonableness of omitting Syrian air assets in CMSF (before the NATO module, that is), since the Coalition air forces, likely the same as in OIF, would have destroyed or rendered otherwise unserviceable pretty much every Syrian combat aircraft, not simply destroyed some with planned or opportunistic airfield attacks and kept almost all the rest harried or at bay through round-the-clock overlapping air superiority-type sorties. But just because the Allies had round-the-clock air superiority over Normandy and beyond doesn't mean that German air assets ought to be left out; it just means that it would be blue-moon rare for even a single German a/c to be encountered in a CMBN scenario, whereas not a few scenarios would include at least one Allied a/c. In other words, I concur with German air assets being included and am glad that they are.

Just because the Allies had air superiority in and around Normandy and their sorties outnumbered the Germans' by, like, 12,000 to 1 (in 6–30 June 1944, 10,061 single-engine fighter sorties flown by Jagdkorps II, versus an estimated 120,000–140,000 flown by the Allies, according to Donald L. Caldwell), does that really mean that the Luftwaffe had so little a presence as to be not worth including German air assets? In my view, comparing Normandy in 1944 to Syria in 2008 seems fairly apples-to-oranges. If, however, the Allied air forces had destroyed or otherwise rendered unserviceable every German combat aircraft in and around Normandy... But I'm sure someone with a more grognardly knowledge of the air aspect of Operation Overlord will blow my suppositions out of the water. =P

<cheery singsong voice> ...for some football! </cheery singsong voice> And more CMBN screenshots too. >.>

He was last sighted (or heard, rather) commanding a Canadian infantry platoon in Afghanistan a few years ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eD_Lo61rAw. By now, though, his roto is no doubt over, so he could perhaps be persuaded to furnish some voice acting for CMBN.