Paulverisor64
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Posts posted by Paulverisor64
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You guys need to refer to the linked thread. It's perfectly clear that BFC are aware of the defecit in fidelity of the simulation in this respect. It's also perfectly clear that it's a low priority thing to adjust, but is on the list. I think it's pretty evident that, given the architectural choice made ab initio, it's a non-trivial change to the basic characteristics of a unit.
I have read the linked thread.
I understand that the coding to accomplish this is difficult. Just because of this it doesn't make the annoyance go away.
Battlefront should be at least aware of how many people would like to see this changed so they can know how to prioritise their efforts.
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Remanning a gun would be a very helpful feature.
The last game I played I got routed. Early in the game my troops abandoned their gun and ran. Their morale improved enough to come back to the gun, but it was a real disappointment to have this option taken away. It is very frustrating to be fighting a losing battle and find a supposedly viable way of bolstering your defense taken away.
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Yes, there is a chance for weapons being passed without Buddy Aid. It's a bit more than random, but from the player's perspective it will appear random. It's designed to simulate an easy weapon pickup during movement without having to write up a lot of complex AI to handle it.
If we were to strictly enforce wounded and weapons transfers, as they would happen in real life, I don't think may people would enjoy the game much any more. Unfortunately we do have to be mindful of that.
Steve
For the most part I like how the weapon exchange works in the game.
One thing I am curious about however is whether it is possible to weapon exchange from an empty Mortar to any other weapon that the previous owner doesn't need any more? I've had a couple games where I would have liked to make this exchange but I couldn't figure out a way to get rid of the un needed Mortar.
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Is there any chance we might see the above mentioned "decouple" improvement applied to the game's interface in an upcoming patch or upgrade?
I have trouble reading the briefing screen and the user interface. The numbers in specific are hard for me to make out.
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I like the facing idea that Poesel71 presents.
Would this be a viable idea to impliment with this game?
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I'm glad I'm not the only one who has succumbed to moving unintended units. I'm in a PBEM that this problem has resulted in terrible consequences.
My PBEM opponent told me the simple cure to this; instead of double clicking just single click, this will reveal the locations of your unit without the possibility of inadvertantly moving multiple units.
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Womble - I would have argued along your line but while thinking about it I stumbled about one thing.
Remember when CMBN came out that Steve told a story about a bug where the cause was that the eyes of a TC were rotated by 90° so he couldn't spot properly. So LOS is calculated from every single soldier and not from the AS.
Another argument against that AS are used directly for LOS is that soldiers do cross AS limits and - while moving - some soldiers of a unit may be in one AS while others are already in the next. This does not stop them from spotting.
I guess that LOS from AS to AS is used as a filter to lower the actual necessary spot checks. If there is no chance for a unit in one AS to spot someone in another (e.g. behind a hill) then don't test at all. Saves time.
My guess the reasons for ASes is that it makes the placement of the individual soldier much easier. An AS is a well defined and not too big area that the algorithm has to consider. Without the confinements of an AS it would become exponentially harder to place them right.
What would be nice is if we could exert some more control about what our ptruppen do. The face command helps in most cases. But sometimes in an urban environment or, like Paul said, at ridges or similar it is frustrating.
If we could change the origin of the face command to change the weights (*) for the algorithm that would be nice.
I tried to put that in a picture:
I drew the origin for the 'possible' case very close to the front because that's my feeling what CM does. In the game the origin stays in the centre.
UI wise that could be handled like this:
You give a face command like it is now but then 'space' would cycle through 'front', 'back', 'centre'. Indicated by moving the origin of the face arrow. The origin will always stay in the AS. If you don't use it everything will stay as is. No new buttons.
(*)
by weights I mean this: CM places the individual soldier as good as it sees fit. Every spot in the AS has a certain 'usefulness'. This will be determined by factors like closeness to a wall or hedge, direction of the face command, availability of other cover etc... If for instance the weights would be 'back' then spots in the reverse direction of the face arrow would be calculated as to be more suitable for a soldiers position. Result: the soldier would not cling to the wall and stay a few meters back.
I like your line of thinking. I would not be fixated about being able to pinpoint place troops if it were possible to better position and face within the box. To carry this a step further this would be great for placement in the large buildings that well exceed the 8 by 8 size.
It appears that with the developement of the latest game engine that the purpose of the area square has become less prominent. The tax on the CPU with smaller area squares appears a bit unclear.
Long story short: IMHO it's ok how it works now but there's still room for improvement.
I couldn't sum it up better. I love this game but there are a couple things that remove you from the immersion experience as it is now.
Thank you for the feedback everyone!
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I'm not really wanting to debate the placement issue. From what I've experienced I still find one grid box will never draw enemy contact and the next leaves my unit dead, whether I use the face command or not.
You've mentioned specifics as far as computer resources needed to get a more accurate placement. This is what I'm wanting to find out. My question out to game developers is; are these numbers and the way Womble describes the effects accurate?
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I often find myself fussing about the coarse placement constraints of troops on the map.
So many times I find that I can't get my troops to the spot that would be most helpful because the 8 by 8 tile is either too far behind a ridge or too far over top of it. I wish buildings had other placement options beyond the facing of the troops.
There are many games out there that don't have these limitations.
The soldiers themselves are modeled very well but their environment is very fussy.
I don't want to debate whether this makes things more or less accurate; I'd just like to find out what is behind these limitations and whether there is likely to be game code break throughs that will allow pinpoint placement.
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I too would like to use the decorative tin case for all the version 2.0 WW2 games that Battlefront has come out with.
I haven't bought the Commonwealth expansion because I'm crossing my fingers that Battlefront will offer a value package of a mixed set of FULL (not upgrade) disks for each of the 2.0 games. I'm not fond of placing the upgrade versions in the tin case because that means I also have to store the original version with it's activation number somewhere as well.
I'm not against spending my money over again to help Battlefront become a stronger force in the game making market, but I'd like to see some kind of a discount with their collection set games.
I think it was a great idea of Battlefront's to market the Tin display case; I'd like to see this become more functional.
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From what I read the 2.0 upgrade that was released actually cost more in terms of manpower and other resources than what the proceeds will take in.
What would possess any company to spend arduous months completely giving away their time? That is close to what they are doing now.
This isn't a perfect game; but I absolutely love what this game represents. I for one would hate to see this company go belly up because it catered to the whims of the selfish few.
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Has BF considered an "all-in advance price" for a particular family of CM products?
Maybe I am alone in this concept, but I would much prefer buying such a package for $150+ which would include hard copies of everything so there is no confusion and worry about whether I should get a hard copies or only the d/l of an update, or a module and burn a safety disk.
Based on someone saying there is no 2.0 manual with the update I bought the d/l version. But now, (I think) Steve said that the 2.0 mailed hard copy does come with a printed manual - which is what I wanted. Or, is that the same manual I received with my hard copy of CMFI??
It's become way too confusing. So, how about a package price for those of us who haven't the time to keep up with all the options?
No one would be forced to buy the package, BF would get a lot more money in advance, and much confusion re what is free and what needs to be paid for would be eliminated.
Doesn't that seem like a win for everyone?
I too would like an option to buy all up to date FULL INSTALL disks in one package. I bought the steel case with the original CMBN; it is very attractive so I would like to have everything up to date on this so it can be functional as well.
Right now you have to go 2 places to install CMBN. I'd rather not have to put 2 CMBN disks into the metal case because it will run out of room that much sooner.
I also don't like the idea of having a seperate download upgrade to keep track of and possibly lose with the computer.
With both options there are 2 seperate activation codes that have to be kept track of as well. When 3.0 comes out this will require 3 seperate installs and activations that hopefully work. I know for a fact that I am on my last activation for 1.11. Steve himself said that Battlefront will only support the last 2 upgrades with each product. If I should have to install this game again I might have 9 upgrades available with upgrade 2.0 and 3.0 but completely run out with version 1.11. Since that will be no longer supported unless I'm looking at this completely wrong (as I do from time to time) everyone in this same boat is S.O.L.
I'd much rather just have 1 up to date FULL INSTALL disk for every single game and not go through the whole crossing the fingers routine of tracking down everything and hoping for an issue free install. I'm hoping that Battlefront will give us some good packaging options. Perhaps even allowing us the option of purchasing 3 games of choice for a discount.
I'm not sure whether anyone answered your question Erwin; the manual that came with CMFI would be the same that would come with the upgrade disk. In this instance the better issue might be to download.
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Thank you for clearing that up.
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I'm starting up the Le Desert scenario as a PBEM. Immediately I've discovered that I can not move the pre set Anti Personnel Mines.
To someone who would preview the map it would be a simple task to just walk around these fixed obstacles.
These mines are forward of the setup zone; but the TRP's which are forward of the setup zone can be moved.
Is there a trick to this or is this a bug?
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Yes I have. See attached link. So far this has been observed by a couple of us in the same exact building.
http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=107214
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This is really bad style on part of BFC.
They can't do this sequence:
- They don't have their own download locations (for code)
- You can only download through third-party websites
- They don't digitally sign the patches and don't even do as much as publishing md5 checksums on the forums
- And then they drive into being classified as malware by virus scanners (because the DRM related system inspection looks suspicious) and you have to de-activate the virus scan
The result is that if anything happened to the patch during transport or storage, such as being infected with malware, you have no way of noticing or even fixing. You just told the virus scanner that whatever is there is valid.
Of course you told that to the scanner without having any idea whether the patch is actually clean or having any way to find out if you did care.
And they won't even sticky a bleeping FAQ topic that covers all this crap. Every new release it's the same thing. The same people chime in about how bad Norton software is. The same people try to help out with the fix. Cheez guys enough is enough; just FAQ sticky the appropriate fix and be done with it. Other forums use such things as FAQ's; I honestly think you'd have enough to keep busy with without having to troubleshoot the same stuff over and over.
That being said; I do applaud all the work that was done to fix issues on CMBN to make it an even more enjoyable game.
- They don't have their own download locations (for code)
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You might try reducing the game's rez to something smaller. I'm using 1600X900 on a 22" screen and having no problem reading the type at all.
Michael
I followed the directions you gave right from page 10 under OPTIONS. I really hoped that you could prove me wrong about the real issue that I see with the command interface size. There doesn't appear to be any improvement with text size at all using the 1600by900 size. Do you seriously see a text size difference on your monitor? I will attach exactly what I see. Do you see a difference here? My 49 year old eyes quite honestly has a lot of trouble reading the text with the loading screen and the command interface. If it wasn't for the maps themselves I wouldn't be playing Fortress Italy. When I bought Combat Mission Battle for Normandy I put it on the shelf because reading the text was such a labor.
This is the 1920 by 1080 size screen.
Here is the 1600by900 size screen.
I tried other sizes as well by changing the screen of the desktop. There may be a little stretching with 1680 by 1050 but it really isn't an improvement.
I will give you the benefit of the doubt; perhaps my display doesn't scale up the command interface like your computer's does because I am going through a laptop.
I can show you examples of much better command interface implimentation in other games than shown here. Battlefront has already said that they would like to get to this issue. I just would like to campaign that it be released with the upgrade.
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Color me surprised! Hard to believe there hasn't been a single comment on my considerable AAR for "Cats Chasing Dogs."
Regards,
John Kettler
You've done a good job of describing the battle but if someone hasn't played the specific scenario it's hard to piece things together from the receiving end. Pictures of specific events would help some. That is a good idea about perhaps having a seperate forum thread talking about a specific battle you are playing. Many people do like discussing specific battles; there is nothing in this thread's title that gravitate these people.
I am on a learning curve of my own. I initially started reading this thread because I was looking for some tactic or implimentation type advice as learned by you or shared by others in the know. There is some very valuable information in here. I do think specific battles deserve a thread of their own.
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You might try reducing the game's rez to something smaller. I'm using 1600X900 on a 22" screen and having no problem reading the type at all.
Michael
I understand what you are saying but my PC is used for other applications that are best at the 1920 by 1080 standard. 1600x900 would work in certain cases but it is not a 1 size fits all solution.
Thank you for the suggestion.
People who have played the game for a while have learned to adjust. To people who come to the game new the interface speaks of an unpolished product. It's interesting to watch in the Armchair General series how he needs to zoom the entire screen to show the interface.
This improvement, independent of any other change would be worth me spending money again to buy the game.
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You guys made my day!!!
The way this works is very counter intuitive (it would be so much clearer from the waypoint pivot point) but this will save me tons of setup mistakes.
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The UI changes very little in v2. You get fewer, slightly larger "special equipment" icons that show how many of a given asset you have, rather than each zook bomb/demo charge etc. taking up one whole icon slot. That's about it. The panel stays the same width, in the middle of your screen. To be honest, there wouldn't be any point making it any wider. It wouldn't show any more information, and just scaling everything sideways wouldn't improve legibility.
The issue that I struggle with here is that with a 1920 by 1080 screen the user interface is very tiny, it doesn't scale well with widescreen monitors. The load screen also is very tiny. I do know that this is on Battlefront's to do list, and for my aching eyes I really hope that this change makes it in.
It is on our ToDo List. Back when we made the original game engine in 2005-2007 this sort of thing rarely came up because few people had cards and/or computers capable of running fast enough at very high resolution. That's obviously changed.It will take quite a bit of work, but we want to "decouple" the 2D UI at the bottom from the screen resolution. This will allow us to keep a standard display size no matter what the screen resolution is.
Steve
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Unless I misunderstand your post, you can already do everything you're asking for.
Give a movement order and then select a waypoint. Hit "T" and you will run an LOS check traced from that spot rather than from the unit's location.
You can also give a target order from the waypoint itself. (I know this can be done with area target locations, anyway. I've never tried targeting a specific unit from a waypoint.)
I don't believe what you say is possible; I certainly wish it was.
You can set a Target from the waypoint but the pivot point is always where you stand. The sight lines always revolve around the fixed pivot. Unless there is something that I'm missing you can't run a line of sight check from the waypoint.
For any target arc set to a waypoint the method of doing this is:
1) Click on the waypoint line which allows special orders to be set to the waypoint.
2) Select the Target Arc option and the arc center will be set to the waypoint.
It would be wonderful if I was missing something here because that tool would be so useful.
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One thing that I'd like to see added to Combat Mission's toolbox is the option to Target from a waypoint.
You can do all kind of Target "Arcs" at the end of a waypoint, but a plain Target command would be very beneficial.
I like the Target command because you can test out different firing and approach lanes to aid in setting up.
It would be nice to test lines of sight from areas other than what you are presently located.
It of course would also be helpful to specifically Target something at the end of the movement phase as well.
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Thank you everyone for clarifying this for me. As explained it does make perfect sense.
This could ruin the day for someone setting up in a small zone. This could certainly be "gamed" just like in FPS game spawn points.
I could certainly see the justification for using this however. At times this could stipulate that the attacker get the advantage.
The common protocol appears to be to ask your opponent. At last I did something right.
Thanks!
Leadership
in Combat Mission Battle for Normandy
Posted
I'm very glad that you brought this up.
It is hard to substantiate leadership effects.
I can certainly see that units within proper C2 react better, but it's hard to put a finger on what physical effects are transmitted.