SelfLoadingRifle

Romm it was a pleasure. I look forward to your next scenario. SLR

Let us not forget "The Cruel Sea" "In which we serve", "The Dambusters", "The way to the stars", "Ice cold in Alex" and "Went the day well". SLR:D

Romm has read my translation and has given his approval. My final update has just been submitted to him with instructions on how to use the I.E.D. added to the Afghan (blue) briefing text. Watch this space! SLR

I have juist finished translating/writing the Mujahideen/Afghan briefing. I have added it to the scenario file, along with the Russian briefing and have zipped and posted the result to Romm. It feels a bit like translating Victor Hugo!!! Hopefully, he will make it available in due course! Cheers, SLR

The Russian/Soviet briefing (in notepad format) has been sent to Romm for approval. I am now working on the Mujahideen briefing. Let's hope my schoolboy French is up to the task:D Salut, SLR

Sergei It worked:D Now I can get some sleep. Many thanks. SLR

I have just (after lots of effing and blinding) managed to insert via notepad, my own set of orders into a scenario. Unfortunately, I cannot seem to be able to get rid of the CM orders template which is intruding into what I have written:mad: Sombody HELLPPP... before the rest of my hair falls out in frustration:confused: SLR (in thicko mode)

Romml I have written an English version of the briefing of this scenario. I would prefer to send it to you for approval before posting it on this forum, but you have not left any contact details. Repondez si vous plait. SLR

There is no briefing for this scenario... as yet! Would the author please include aforementioned briefing and let us know when this has been done? I am holding fire until then. Thanks, SLR

Duh!!! Thanks SLR:)

This scenario is of the .rar type, AND I CANNOT GET IT TO RUN. Currently it is sitting in my scenario folder, along with 'A Helluva Road Opening' and 'Forging Steel', also .rar files. None of them appear at all when I boot the game up. What am I doing wrong?:confused: SLR

Always delighted to help. 1) It should be noted that writing orders is never an exact science, and no two people will agree on what should be set down. 2) The acronym KISS is useful. It stands for Keep It Simple Stupid. 3) Pitch your order to the correct level. As the writer of the orders, for example in the role of a Lieutenant Colonel - you are not going to be at all worried about how a player, perhaps ranked Major achieves his objectives, ONLY THAT THEY ARE ACHIEVED WITHIN THE OVERALL PLAN. The devil is in the detail, and that is pretty much entirely up to the player. However, timings, unit boundaries objectives and limits of exploitation should be clearly set down. 4) Intelligence can in real-life get things wrong, sometimes badly wrong, particularly with regard to 'situation enemy forces' If you, the scenario designer, have a nasty vindictive streak, you can use this to spring some unpleasant surprises on the hapless player;) Again, good luck! SLR:)

From memory... Met (weather) First and last light times if appropriate. Overall situation/general outline. This is the tasking of the higher formation, for example, battalion tasks, if you are commanding a company. Next comes the nitty gritty; your specific task(s) set out in the following order. Ground, (key features) Situation Enemy Forces Situation Friendly Forces (including attachments and detachments) MISSION (what you are going to do - stated twice) Execution (how you are going to do it) Service Support, (cooks, bottlewashers, REME etc) Command and Sigs. (radio frequencies etc) Service support and Command and Sigs, are probably not essential in the format of a computer simulation. Hope this helps. SLR:)

The lack of what I would call proper snipers in the game is a weakness that Battlefront would do well to address. What I would call a sniper would be pretty much undetectable when firing from cover from as close as 150/200 metres. Their long range accuracy, particularly with some of today's state of the art kit is phenomenal. This could also be better simulated in the game. Some years ago, I had a very interesting conversation with the Master Sniper who trained me. He had just returned from the Middle East where he had been training Saudis in the noble art of sniping. He couldn't persuade them to stalk - an essential sniping skill. They argued that it was the will of Allah if they got hit and that stalking was not necessary:confused: I have since heard similar accounts. I would surmise that Battlefront would certainly have to model the Arabic sniper somewhat differently from his western counterpart:eek: If Battlefront ever do get around to modelling snipers properly, I would suggest that they be used very sparingly indeed in scenarios because a well trained sniper pair can be a major, major pain in the arse for the poor sods that come up against them. SLR.

There is a very simple answer to this; snipers are special, with meticulously taught skills that set them completely apart from the normal soldier. These include navigation, observation, cam and concealment, stalking, marksmanship and MFC/FOO, and in this day and age, probably CAS. Sniping is not something that can be done by (say) an elite grunt from the Rifles Guards or Paras. He/they would have to do the course first, and it has a high failure rate. Simply put,the normal perameters of the game do not come close to simulating what the highly trained sniper can do. I hope that the game designers are reading this. I was a sniper... a long, long time ago. I can help to a certain degree, but I am not current. My advice to them is to consult a sniper who is. SLR

Flaming Knives, If the aim of the CM series of games is to produce as realistic a simulation of modern warfare as possible, it is worth stating that the main problem is that the virtual soldier does not behave in the same way as his real counterpart. Simply put, you cannot give him his orders and let him get on with it because he cannot think for himself. Consequently you have to micro-manage him to an extent that you would never do, or be able to do in real-life, particularly if our virtual soldier is a sniper. In simulations such as these, I suppose that it will ever be thus, until such time as artificial intelligence approaches the levels displayed in the Terminator series of movies:rolleyes: The key is to identify which elements of our virtual soldier require a separate imput from the gamer, and which can be covered by the program. As you so correctly imply, much of the way they perform in the game depends directly on you the player. There is no way around this and nor should there be. For example unskilled CMSF players will deploy snipers on bare hilltops, rooftops or deploy them in isolated cover, locations that no real-life sniper would consider even for a moment. Their choice of route for the sniper will often be equally inappropriate. All of this will have inevitable consequences; the life of the virtual sniper will be both short and exciting. But that is the beauty of products such as CMSF. No one gets hurt:D You learn by your mistakes, re-boot, and try again. However, I digress. There are certain characteristics which the software can and IMHO should replicate. 1) When snipers/sniper pairs are statically deployed in cover, there should be a modifier that makes them significantly harder to spot than the normal soldier. 2) Their long range accuracy should be ramped up considerably from what it is at the moment in the game and 3) They should be given FOO/MFC capabilities. If all this was done the improvement in realism with regard to the sniper would be considerable. And finally, the game designers would do well to ask the question; "What is a sniper?" Merely giving someone a highly accurate rifle does not a sniper make. My definition of the kind of "sniper" currently depicted in the game would be the term 'sharpshooter' I would reserve 'sniper' only for someone who had undergone extensive training in the art of sniping. In my opinion both sharpshooter and sniper should be featured in any future CM releases. SLR. P.S. With regard to Brit snipers, the LSW would be the preferred choice of weapon for the number 2 of the sniper pair over the standard SA80. P.P.S. The L96 had green plastic furniture, but what a wonderful bit of kit it was:) Don't get me started on the SA80!!!

I had a problem with this one. I downloaded the scenario and put it in the appropriate scenario folder. When I booted up CMSF it didn't show up in the battle list. I then repeated the download with the same result. Before you ask, I have CMSF, the Brits, USMC and the Nato add-ons. Has anyone else had the same problem? Suggestions please:confused: SLR

With the greatest respect, this is wrong. Snipers take cam and concealment to a completely different level from that of the normal grunt. In fact, they are SO well cammed up that when in position, you would pretty much have to trip over one in order to discover his position, and that is no exaggeration:eek: Their use of ground and selection of fire positions is also equally superior. Routes in and routes out will be planned meticulously using 1:1250 scale maps, and also aerial photographs. Fire positions will usually be in in-depth positions of cover, taking full advantage of shadow. Muzzle flash and smoke will be almost impossible to spot. If firing from a building, the sniper will be well back from any window, again making him very difficult to spot. Sticking the barrel of the weapon out of the window, as depicted in the game would only happen under exceptional circumstances. The standard sniping range, at least when I was in, was 400m. At this range, successful head shots would be expected pretty much all of the time, unless of course, the wind conditions were particularly tricky. 300m is close - we had to stalk to within this range for the purposes of tests - and 200m would be considered too close for comfort. Accurate sniping with the L96 was expected out to about 800m, and harassing fire from 800 to 1200m Spotting an in-position sniper at anything under 300m (perhaps even 200) would be very, very difficult, and in my opinion some form of modifier is required to reflect this. Two scenarios reflect the different uses of the CMSF sniper. In UK British Mettle, sniper pairs would be out on their own ahead of the FEBA, their tasks recce, FOO/MFC, and elimination of key personnel, in that order. They would have moved into position during the night, and would be fully cammed up - possibly even in hasty hides - and ready to perform their tasks by first light. They would be fully ghillie-suited up. In Joint Venture, they would be operating in close proximity with the troops. As I recall, the ranges in that scenario were much closer. The snipers would be concentrating on elimination of key personnel, certainly until the enemy got really close. I would surmise that they would probably be wearing normal uniform as depicted. Some of you may disagree with my figures. I can say in my defence, that I am now very, very rusty with regard to the noble art of sniping, and will listen respectfully to anyone who is more current than I am. Both the sniper rifles I used (the L42 and the L96) are now out of service in the British Army. I guess that makes me an old fart! SLR

No, not at all, because (as always) the suit itself, plus the scrim used would be designed and selected to blend in with the local surroundings. As to whether or not ghillie suits are worn in the Middle East, I will accept the verdict of those who served in that particular theatre; I didn't. It also seems from the replies that coding would be a problem. HOWEVER with my sniping hat on, I would surmise that for activities such as stalking, or anything that takes a sniper pair out on their own, full cam (ie a ghillie suit) would almost certainly be worn. My second point is of more significance to the game. Sniper pairs (at least those in the Brit Army) should be given MFC capabilities. SLR

Just a couple of thoughts... 1) It irks me somewhat to see sniper pairs wearing standard infantry kit including helmet. I know from first hand experience that the standard garb for snipers is the ghillie suit with matching hat. 2) An important sniper function is mortar fire control. (At least it was in the British Army circa 1980s/90s). This does not seem to be represented in CMSF at all. Point 1 should be relatively easy to deal with if (hopefully) one of the talented modders on this forum reads this and is inspired into creating a more authentic looking sniper. Point 2 would require sniper pairs to be issued with a radio, and perhaps some re-coding to be carried out. Might the Battlefront.com team consider doing this, or is CMSF now a totally finished product:( SLR:)

Thanks guys. SLR

I have just downloaded the bushes and trees mod. I went into the CM Afghanistan file in my C drive, expecting to find a bitmap folder to paste the files into. I have found nothing and there seem to be no accompanying instructions. The only directions I have discovered are in the CMA repository, which tell you to unzip the files into the z folder which is located in Data. Needless to say, no such folder seems to exist:confused: Can anybody please tell me how to install this mod? Thanks, SLR

FOOs may indeed be a complication but their survival and function have always been crucial in real-life, both in the '40s and indeed today and for that reason I would like to see them included. . In general, for off-map artillery I would like to see: 1) Accurate fire with FOOs spotting and much less accurate or scattered fire if FOOs become casualties or are unable to observe. 2) The player to have control over pre-determined fire plans; in other words to be able to set WHERE and WHEN. 3) Indirect fire for on-map mortars ONLY if the PTN/COY/BTN Commander can spot for them. 4) The ability to shift fire within certain limitations. By the way, I couldn't agree with you more about the fixed defences:eek: Development team please, please take note SLR:)

Let me get one thing out of the way right now. The T.O.W. series of games are very good indeed. However, some things are still wrong and need putting right. They are as follows. 1) Installing, patching and saving games. When I first started playing T.O.W. I got into all sorts of problems getting patched games to run and successfully saving games; all because the instruction manual failed to mention that you should right-click and use the 'run as administrator' option. If I had problems with this, other people will have as well. This should be very simple to correct. PLEASE PUT THIS RIGHT. 2) The scenarios themselves: A previous poster commented that some of the scenarios had a distinctly 'Command & Conquor' feel about them, in that only one exact course of action permitted victory. He also stated that instead, scenarios should reward proper tactics. I make no apologies for repeating this. If this advice is too late in the day for the Caen expansion, please, please think long and hard about the Korea game. 3) Incomplete rules/instructions: For example in the real-life battle of Kursk, the mine was one of the most significant weapons used. At one stage, German soldiers were lifting/disarming them at a rate of one a minute per man. Consequently, one would have expected a whole section dedicated to them in the instruction manual. ALMOST NOTHING WAS PRINTED, except the statement that minefields existed!! One presumes that engineers would be able to clear them, but there is absolutely nothing to indicate how this should be done. Posters on this forum have indicated that minefields can be cleared by concentrated artillery, but that is all that I have been able to find. PLEASE PUT THIS TO RIGHTS. 4) Poor briefings: It is very hard to formulate a plan without the right information. Objectives should be clearly marked and visible on the map at the set-up stage of the game. Being told (for example) in mid-scenario, that a smoke barrage has been allocated to you is just not good enough. Again you need this kind of information in the set-up stage. The briefing itself should contain; the overall situation, ground, situation enemy forces, situation friendly forces and mission as the bare minimum. Execution, service support plus command and sigs can also be included. A nice touch would be a graphic showing key features, known enemy positions and lines of approach. (Needless to say, intelligence can be wrong!) PLEASE IMPROVE THE BRIEFINGS. My remaining points concern tweaks to the game itself. 5) Tanks should be able to operate in both open (tank commander exposed) and closed (hatches battened down) mode. 6) Foward Observation Officers (FOOs) should be represented in the game. Ditto pre-determined fire plans. The existing off board artillery system is IMHO too simplistic. 7) Enemy Scrim (camo) nets: Currently these are visible, even at considerable range, giving a clear indication that something is hidden underneath them. The whole point of these nets is that they make what they are covering INVISIBLE... especially when grass, leaves etc have been added. These points are meant to be constructive. T.O.W. has such wonderful potential and could be a world-beater. Let's extract the digit and (finally) get it right! Best regards, SLR:)

Er... (sticks head over parapet) I find that realtime works for smaller scenarios, and we-go makes the larger scenarios far more manageable ... and yes, playing we-go, I much prefer the CM system of moveable waypoints. However for me this is a relatively minor issue:) SLR