sandman2575

Battlepacks are a fantastic idea. Really excited to see Battle for Normandy (and hopefully FI and RT too) getting new content.

Love your work, dragonwynn -- thanks for keeping the campaigns and scenarios coming !

My guess is either Joseph Heller or Evelyn Waugh.

This is an impressive list of projects, and all sounds very promising. I'll keep my credit card at the ready. Love the idea of Battle Packs. As someone who loves SP Campaigns above all, I trust there will be some solid offerings in that dept.

Thanks Kieme. That makes sense. Interesting that the problem doesn't show up when using the scenario editor. Wish that were the case during actual gameplay as well. Do you know what gfx setting determines LOD textures? 3D Model Quality, or 3D Texture Quality? I can never keep those 2 straight.

Appreciate the feedback. Although still can't tell what's wrong. In Aris's skin pack for the sdkfz 251_1, there are fourteen (!) different hull textures, from "sdkfz251d-hull.bmp" to "sdkfz251d-hull 14.bmp". In the case I described above, the texture with the "714" decal is the "hull 10.bmp" texture, and this is getting swapped when I zoom in for the "hull 13.bmp" texture (which has the "1224" decal). There doesn't seem to be anything amiss with the file names or number sequencing. All seems in good order. But I can't fathom why the game is 'selecting' the "hull 10.bmp" at one distance and then swapping it for the "hull 13.bmp" texture at another distance? Sorry for the technicalities. But if anyone else is experiencing anything like this and has an idea what's up, I'd love to know.

Not a big deal but this does irk me and I'd love to get to the bottom of it. I notice vehicle skins 'shift' at different magnifications. For example below, the Sdkfz 251 at one distance shows the "714" decal. If I zoom a bit it, the skin suddenly shifts and shows a "1224" decal (also the Balkenkreuz on the back is now off-kilter?) Is there something in my gfx settings I should do to prevent this? I'm using Aris's skins, which I know have multiple variants for the Sdkfz 251 ausf. D -- what seems to be happening is one variant is being used at one magnification, then another gets 'shifted to' at another...

Simply wrong. Infantry combat in GTOS is laughably simplistic, completely lacking in tactical nuance. German infantry anti-tank capabilities are essentially non-existent. A T-34 can close with German troops occupying decent defensive positions and slaughter them. To do the same with a tank in CM would be suicidal, and correctly so. Graphics by no means 'blow away CMx2 in every respect'. GTOS does a nice job of creating an atmospheric environment that is arguably superior to CM. But CM's vehicle models (esp. modded models by Aris and other talented modders) are every bit the equal of GTOS -- and again, GTOS infantry are downright primitive in appearance and in realism of movement, and simply cannot compare with what CM offers graphically. I say this as someone who has devoted countless hours to GTOS, Achtung Panzer Kharkov etc. etc. There's a lot I admire about the game, but CM is superior on so many levels that I've essentially shelved it. I look forward to Mius Front, if it ever comes out, but I don't expect it to rival CM.

I'm in many ways a big fan of GTOS, but you're spot on about infantry combat -- it sucks. Have to say though that i'd pretty much kill for CM to have something like GTOS's dynamic campaigns -- still the one big advantage GTOS has over CM. But the lack of sophistication in infantry combat in GTOS can be a game breaker, coming from CM, I agree.

^This. Really looking forward to this.

Steam, GOG, GamersGate etc. have altered the landscape so that we pretty much expect to get pc games at a discount unless you're determined to buy at release (I say that as someone who loves Steam). There are only a handful of games I'm perfectly content to pay full price for, and CMx2 is front and center among them. (For the record, others would be Out of the Park Baseball, Wings over Flander Fields, Scourge of War, Graviteam Tactics modules, Paradox's grand strategy titles... and that's pretty much it. )

Looks fantastic -- will definitely give it a go when completed. Many thanks, George MC!

^this. Awesome work!

One of the first things I did when I installed CMBS was to port over your Arrow Bases from CMRT. Can't play without 'em!

These are fantastic -- thanks! Can't stand the vanilla icons. These are a huge improvement.

Pretty sure Germans don't use the 'scharfes S' ß to conclude proper names -- 'Straße' for example, but Strauss, Krauss,etc. Also, Hauptmann definitely has 'zwei N'

Fantastic -- can't wait to try this. Huge thanks for this major effort. New scenarios are worth their weight in gold, if you ask me. (Michael -- Small thing, and not sure if it's rendered this way in the scenario or just your post, but you might consider changing 'Hauptman Johan Clauss' to 'Hauptmann Johann Klaus' If you want a slightly more 'echt' German flavor for the protagonist's name.)

^ I'm mostly thinking of situations where your tanks spot a new contact mid-turn, so that you don't have the option yet to use Target Light, and are forced to watch helpless while they merrily blast away at trucks and infantry stragglers with reckless abandon (WEGO, of course). Was playing the 3rd or 4th mission of the Blunting the Spear campaign, where you get to control a couple coy's of Panthers. And boy, fire discipline (or anything resembling it) is not the order of the day for these guys. I know, limitations of AI, and a small complaint in an otherwise superb game -- but man do I wish the AI could be a little smarter about target prioritization and fire discipline...

Tim Stone at RPS is almost sure to do a write-up soon, and given the (deservedly) overwhelmingly positive response CMBS has gotten here so far, I can't imagine his assessment will be anything other than positive. [ninja'd in part by MikeyD... Ah well...]

When I see the work of Kieme, Vein, and CM's collection of other talented modders, all I can say is "Wow!" and "Thank you!". You guys enhance the CM experience immeasurably.

Fantastic work!

trucks 1.5 km away... tucked inside a protective ring of trees.... This drives me a bit batty. I can't claim the historical knowledge to say whether this is completely insane -- did tankers routinely expend AP against soft-skinned vehicles like trucks? Maybe this is "just one of the things you have to live with" in playing CMx2. Setting a 360 deg. 'armored arc' seems like it should prevent this, but the AI seems to regard all vehicles, armored or not, as fair game. Guess I just wish there were some way for the AI to better prioritize targets. Maybe a "ignore effin' trucks" button is in order

I've been completely absorbed in Red Thunder for a while, so my memory of "A Brief Moment in Time" is pretty hazy -- I should perhaps have said "the immediately subsequent mission(s) are easier" -- although yes I certainly recall the mission where you use the Kriegsmarine conscripts being difficult -- but the mission where you have to fend off the assault by the British paras along that highway being easy (the ol' "AI good on the defense, on the offensive, not so much" issue.)

Huge thanks for your efforts on this, dragonwynn. I loaded this up a couple of weeks ago just to get a taste and was agog at the size of it! Seems every bit as big as the first "Blunting the Spear" mission. And if anyone likes Tigers....they're in for a treat. Haven't tackled it yet but will at some point soon.

Some more campaigns, and on a smaller scale, would certainly be very welcome. I don't have the slightest idea how to use the Designer (I'm still kind of baffled by the Quick Battle generator, truth be told), so unfortunately I'm not likely to contribute new content myself, at least, not any time soon. VasFury, you might consider tweaking a few settings, either in-game settings or you gfx card control panel. I also have a pretty powerful machine and can run RT perfectly without stutter even on the large maps / large engagements. The single setting that seems to make a difference is Model Quality - I have everything else on max, but leave this at the Medium/normal setting -- if I crank it higher, I start to get noticeable lag -- and it doesn't really detract from the visual experience of the game in the slightest.