Combatintman

Can we get back to Helmand in the 21st Century? I haven't seen muskets on the equipment list for the British Module.

Thinking about it, if we could visually mod the Syrian helmets to disappear that they would be almost perfect as ANA as they are (mind you the ANA are starting to swap their AKs now for M-16). Similarly if we lost the helmets for the Syrian Militia pick and changed the uniform tone to grey we could use them as ANP. The term 'Green Zone' is a reference to the highly irrigated and cultivated areas close to the main river features in Helmand Province. So called because they are green rather than desert.

Yeah most of the terrain in the editor means you can do Afghan-style terrain fairly easily. In the early days there were a lot of attacks on the District Centres but now the majority of the fighting is in the so-called Green Zone or attacks on troops approaching the Green Zone with bags of compound clearing.

Yep - the name comes from the Bde's insignia - 19 Light Bde's badge is a Panther's Head.

Not sure about an absolute requirement to Mod units to be honest. I can live with both the 'Fighter' and the 'Combatant' picks, the former are even dressed in black! Replicating compound walls is more difficult and we could certainly do with a sandy coloured wall texture. Google Earth coverage of Helmand has improved recently and there are plenty of resources: Books: 3 Para by Patrick Bishop Blood Clot by Jake Scott 3 Commando by Ewen Southby-Tailyour Ground Truth by Patrick Bishop Joint Force Harrier by Adrian Orchard Apache by Ed Macy Apache Dawn by Damien Lewis DVD Ross Kemp in Afghanistan Ross Kemp Return to Afghanistan Or just stick something along the lines of 'British Army Helmand' into Youtube. I'm certainly looking to create some Helmand-style missions.

I had a list somewhere too - my short term suggestion is just to select loads of tank coys at different quality settings then trawl through your picks. You will find T-55s eventually - that's how I came up with my now lost list.

Like everything in life - there is need for balance. The issue of responsibility and culpability which has been driven by civilian legislation has in many ways been very beneficial. When I compare my deployment to Gulf War 1 (what the US calls Operation Desert Storm) it was a case of - you'll get your kit in theatre ... good luck. Move on to Afgnanistan - there were a number of mandated training events and that was a couple of years ago - there are more now. While the 'you'll get your kit in theatre' line still rules the roost in the supply chain, the situation is radically different. So, such interventions have been culturally significant and quite frankly the right thing to do. However, there is a danger of this going too far and this is the territory that, in my opinion, we are close to entering. I hope it doesn't get out of hand.

I think the problem is not a dearth of ideas - I have a shedload of them - its the amount of time it takes to nail the map.

What are we basing these opinions regarding medic behaviour on? If one of your blokes goes down you get him out - that's it - its what you do. He's one of your mates - somebody you went through training with, somebody you've been drinking with, somebody whose wedding you went to, somebody you'd do anything for, somebody you've spent the best years of your life with - in essence somebody who you have a closer bond with than anybody else in the world. Ask anybody who's been in the Army - you're not fighting for your country .... or victory points ... you're fighting for your mates.

Agreed that there is the potential there but do you really think that this has been nailed? The kit isn't there to do the Iranians justice. I think you need to be careful about your use of the term 'low intensity' - for instance ask the blokes who were on the rooftops in Musa Qal'eh or Sangin in Afghanistan whether they were in a low intensity conflict. There is certainly scope in CMSF in its current iteration to do Afghanistan and the warfighting bit and other ops in Iraq - the full scope of COIN can't be done and I don't think there is an appetite for it - any shura grogs out there for instance? I would like to see better representation of civilians but it isn't going to happen so it limits opportunities to a degree.

Not really but there are some great videos on YouTube - just bash in British Army Afghanistan or Helmand.

Of course there are a lot of variables in here and I'm no expert but it probably wouldn't do any harm to have a look at it - from what I see on the boards HUMVEES seem to get a rough deal whether they are recce, .50 cal or TOW armed. I don't think any of us are expecting them to be the recce, FSP or Atk panacea, but they might possibly be underperforming.

Looks like good work - I just wish we had rounded buildings to do Africa properly.

Well its a nice to have - but would you prefer Charles' programming time to be taken up in this way rather than (list feature here).

I've always had misgivings about the mortar allocation - sure I'd mentioned it somewhere but I can't find it. 82mm should be the bog standard Bn-level mortar for 2nd/3rd World armies modelled on the FSU-pattern. The 120mm mortar is generally found in leg infantry brigades either as part of the bde artillery battalion or as the bde mortar battery in its own right.

Bear in mind you would be wasting your time in real life by siting the BMP with just the launcher poking over your relief feature. The gunner's sight is on the turret and therefore he won't shoot unless he can see the target which means that the turret needs to be exposed to get LOS.

Dieseltaylor - I'm not suggesting anybody is calling themselves an expert I'm trying to get this debate off the 'I read this book which says that in x condition y happened ergo it must be in the game because it supports my soap box subject/pet peeve'. For me - bottom line is that in my experience of playing the CM series I have had vehicles bog in/get immobilised and the average seems about right. At the end of the day this thread has banged on for 19 pages with what seems to me to be the object of giving the player a button that will turn off vehicle bog-ins/immobilisation. Given that the model already employed: a. Isn't overly intrusive. b. Reflects the fact that this happens. c. Seems fairly balanced. d. Will in all likelihood be retained. It seems pretty pointless dragging up extremely selective quotes/examples trying to prove the point.

I hate to be negative but this is horrendously emotional - the more Steve has to answer this stuff the longer you guys will have to wait for 'Normandy'. Just out of interest - how many of you so-called 'experts' have either commanded or crewed an armoured vehicle of the 1940s in bocage terrain or at any other time for that matter? The key things to remember here are the classic Von Moltke quote about no plan ever surviving contact with the enemy and another quote about the essence of war is friction. What about the infantry model - have you ever had scenarios where blokes get lost in the game? Happens a lot in real life but I don't see any gum bumping going on about turning on or off the facility that blokes turn up at the right place at the right time most of the time in the game. The model in all of the CM-series games that I've played is pretty ok and I don't deny that I get urinated off when I get wagons that are bogged/immobilised but I can get over it .... so long as there are power-ups.

Nope - my understanding is that the NATO module will be the Dutch, the Germans and the Canadians. France was considered but the range of equipment was judged to be too prohibitive.

Yes that would be the case for the 51mm mortar. For WW2 types, it is the descendant of the 2-inch mortar.

I have no problems with bigger maps - apart from creating them that is! They take a long time to load but if you keep your flavour objects to a minimum and if its not an urban map there should be no problems. The more I get into the editor the more I find that the best way to do things is to make sure you capture the flavour of the terrain rather than follow it religiously otherwise your alt and tab keys do take a hammering. I now find I can work quite quickly off a 1:100,000 scale map. The method I use is to create the 1km grid square by using the gravel tile and then just plonk features down in relation to that. Everybody has their preferences but I'm now moving to the view that the first thing you should sort out are the contours - followed by the road net. Once you've got those squared away everything else fits into place reasonably easily so long as you don't slavishly follow the original format. I've got 3 maps which hopefully will see the light of day soon which I'm pretty pleased with in terms of their resemblance to the real thing.

I think Afghans and Soviets just require the suspension of disbelief by using Syrians to be honest. I've been toying around with an Afghanistan circa 1980s campaign. I am eagerly awaiting the British Module so I can put together either a few Helmand style missions or a campaign.

There is a tutorial in the repository that explains this and a whole bunch of other stuff - I downloaded it and it helped me immensely - probably worth a look for you as well.

No problem - I'm working on some stuff right now and when I gave it to others to test they said my scenario was an utter stinker!!

I started with WEGO due to my CMBO, CMBB, CMAK background but have gravitated to realtime. I rarely pause and there are certainly moments where I think 'where the hell did that come from' but the thing I like most about realtime is that you can stonk a position with OS as you race up with your armoured infantry and you can debus and assault as the OS lifts. This I find a lot more difficult to orchestrate in WEGO.