JRMC1879

Yes - I can confirm - all those who voted for CMBN on the wargamer were immediately sent a download link. Playing it now, very cool ... all green hedges and cups of tea n stuff ...

I reckon its because Battlefront hate making games - or money out of them. Yeah - thats it.

So did AP ever get fired at Infantry in real life in open ground? I would imagine it was only something done in absolute desperation in real life if at all - or likely at pilboxes etc where if was more effective. Surely then the issue becomes not one of a ACA - but of the gun doing something it wouldnt have done in real life except in the most desparate of circumstances - and to negligible effect. Doesnt the main solution to the issue then become simply - if target = infantry - and not in a pillbox dont fire at all. I would think thats a lot easier to code than a whole bunch of ACA stuff and then becaomes part of the TAC AI ... Admittedly if the gun has HE its a bit more complicated ... but at least it resolves the specific AP only example.

Well I guess it would be - but I suspect the logic for it also included when to disregard that covered arc. Given man to man representation in CMx2 and the fidelity that gives I suspect its much harder to do. I would guess in CM1 when an infantry unit was spotted the whole squad was - and with a certain level of info - whether it had weapons capable of hurting the tank. Now the tank might only spot a single man from the squad - and he might just be carrying a rifle. Does the tank then assume there is a whole squad of ten men then ? and they are also armed with AT weapons ... again - it may also be more complicated but I do beleive the CMx2 model is a whole lot more complex than CM1 ever was and some things that appear simple at first glance become a stream of never ending decisions with the new game. Again - I still believe the secret lies in the coding of the TAC AI. Maybe with some account for whther the side in the scenario is attacking or defending. My view is the tactics themselves are universal amongst combatants and situations so it can be done. Operation outside of those norms can be done by the player. Personally I think its much less of an issue in realtime then WEGO - but one thing I think that could be done to resolve some issues is to give the players an option to have 30 second turns.

Well - I think a weekday - I cant recall them ever releasing a game on a friday - although I seem to remember them saying the imminence or otherwise of a weekend is not an obstacle to doing so. My money is on a release next monday in any case as I think they still have a lot of loose ends to tie up. By saying this of course I am hoping for an immediate invocation of sods law which proves me wrong two seconds after I have said something. It seems to work all the time when I dont want it to so here is hoping.

Yes - but the tactic of screening tanks with infantry was to protect the tanks against close assault by infantry and hand held AT weapons. You didnt screen tanks with infantry to protect them against other tanks. Maybe AT guns yes - but with good line of sight etc these would have likely been placed in positions behind a screen of their own infantry - so the screening infantry would run into them before they got near a tank or AT gun. Of course there may be situations in covered ground where the tanks and AT guns would have been in the line with infantry but that wasnt done if it could be helped. The problem with ACA is that it has to allow for some discretion on the part of the tank to decide when infantry becomes enough of a threat to itself to open up on them and forget its covered arc. I seem to recall in CM1 you could set both an armoured and infantry covered arc so the two worked together ? I think decisions on whether requests to the tank to open fire on infantry by the tanks supporting infantry can be left to the player in realtime but in wego its a much longer period. Seriously - the only way to do it sensibly would be to instigate a system like in John tillers campaign series or steel panthers where you can set individual engagement ranges for types of units. For example - in a situation where you might want a tank to open up on infantry - you wouldnt want them to open up on an empty truck - but if that truck is full of infantry you would. I believe the issue is less around giving an armoured covered arc feature although more options are always nice but more around getting the tac AI right so it makes those decisions correctly itself without player intervention. I would imagine the programming around the AI to take advantage of explicit ACA would be a nightmare - whereas if it was a feature of the TAC ai then it takes care of itself I think xian post above would be great - but represents a major programming effort for anything outside of a big module. I also do think that battlefront see those items as something the TAC ai should be making decisions on. Thing is I am never certain that BFs reluctance to do things is so much allowing humans to have those options - but the effort in coding an AI opponent to take advantage of them during a game.

If you want a picture of the whole war - read Max Hastings latest one. A journey into Hell. It is superb.

Fine - but my point is its a game not a wargame - which I tend to define as at least marginally based in reality. For all the nice pictures of tanks make any difference the units might as well be zombies as T34's. Its as much a "wargame" as chess is. depends on your definition I suppose

Not rude - just extremely condescending. the moral of the story is then - if you cant mind read dont arrogantly presume others dont know what you do.

Oh right - thanks for that - I have only been wargaming for about 30 years now so wouldnt have known otherwise. It is still to me not a wargame - like a couple of others on the wargamer Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II - Retribution ?? please do me a favour ... Total war I suppose just might make it - but world of tanks ? And as I said - its a kids game - its just not a wargame.

Yeah - I bought and thought it tiresome. A kids game pretending to be a wargame.

I have the game - it is fun - but its most definitely NOT CM - then again nothing is. I sincerely hope that CM learns absolutely nothing from this game.

Well steve said yesterday that they were still nailing "critical" bugs - so understanding they have to fix and retest those then compile an istall etc - I would say week after next for an actual release.

Well the comment was lighthearted ... I think you will find it wasnt at the time finland was invaded and ukrainian soldiers fought the finns in that war - although admittedly it likely wasnt by choice and if I recall correctly - there was actually a unit of ukrainian volunteers fighting for the finns.

So I guess us Brits reallly should have just given up to hitler ... we might then have kept our empire for a while longer and not had to completely bankrupt ourselves paying off our debt to the americans.

His location says kiev - so why does his reaction surprise you ?

Mmmm... Dont agree at all - you are arguing against four things that just add to the flavour of the game and make it what its ... Ammo bearers, first aid etc are all things I have longed to see in a tactical wargmame. I would argue for 1. greater flexibilty in ammo simulation - ie being able to detach a single man back to get ammo for the rest of the squad. 2. Buddy aid - I would argue for the tactile simulation of casualty evacuation - ie detaching men to evacuate casualties 3. Deploy as I understand it is an option - the gun can still fire ? at least for german mg's and in cmsf 4. XO's were still part of the fight wernt they - so they have to be there - If they posess a radio they are useful for mortar spotting - and dont they have some leadership benefit ? People complain about realism - then argue against things that if you read any real life accounts often figure as the single most important facets of warfare. what brings the game to life for me are the things outside of just shooting at each other In short I would argue for more detail not less - its a tactical simulation after all ... then again I would argue for simulation of hot meal delivery and post drops also ...

Any news on the Brits - I love the americans and everything about CMBN - but I cant wait for the brits. Always been something about them in normandy I love. Are we going to get any funnies - I presume as there are no flamethrowers now crocodiles are out ?

I posted sometime ago that the action spot is almost invisible in some cases - Steve posted back that there had been a late change that meant the action spot was invisible in some terrain conditions - and that it would be fixed in the first patch ... This doesnt appear to have been done ... Its a real pain as it makes zoomed out placing of movement virtually impossible in some condiditons:(

... edit wrong forum

Yeah - I read his stuff on gamesquad etc - he is, frankly wierd. He seriously needs to get a life somehow and stop acting like a four year old. His review of the game is so obviously biased towards his own pre concieved dislike of the game I can barely understand why he is not embarassed to write it. He has some valid points - none of which werent or havent been acknowledged by BF. Sure we would all have liked landing craft et al but the reasons for not including them have been explained ad nauseum by BF and I accept them. As for his so called review - a 5 out of ten for this game is so laughable as to make him look silly. Its amazing how someone I have never met can annoy me so much.

Yeah - what a freakin pointless post ... Personally I hate trees and grass - and there is crap loads of it all over the place.

Quite how you believe Import charges are a responsibility of battlefront is beyond me. the simple fact is - as someone else said - this is just another way for the governments of this world to screw the folks for more money at a time when they are lready screwed so they fill the coffers of banks that put us in this place in the first place. I have ordered many games from the US and frankly the whole thing is so seemingly arbitrary that it does amount to nothing beyond legalised stealing - how they can charge you that much just to release your package is beyond me. That being said I really fail to see - even though they did - why you think it is battlefronts responsibility to point this out to you. End of the day the answer is simple. Digital download - and screw the authorities for their tax.

As far as I know - Yes - it can - it depends on your level of victory ? I may be wrong ? I hope it works like that ... - in any case in real life you dont get a second chance - taking the knocks and dealing with them in the next scenario seems to me part of the enjoyment of the game - someone on this board once said - play it like you were there ... that seems to me to be most of the fun in the game - not endlessly trying to maximise the win and minimize the losses. I can understand wanting to win the campaign but not every battle with a major victory. I am talking general here not about this specific campaign - far as I know the campaign doesnt end if you fail ? anyhow if it does I apologize but the rest stands ...

No ... not what I meant. Play the mission once - try the best you can - take the losses and move on ... you cant win every battle with a major victory - you cant win every battle ....