SNAFU

I agree. That's one reason I'm not worried about it.

That's the same mothod I've used. It's the only method that seemed to have a chance of avoiding traffic jams. One important thing to factor in though is the initial facing of the vehicle. If it has to pivot to get on the road it is important to allow extra time for the following unit (and so on down the line). There were times when I would have road marches set where the later vehicles in the colummn were plotted to start their move over 90 seconds from when the lead vehicle did. It worked reasonably well in scenarios like "2 Pounders and Tigers" where I wanted to rush a platoon of German Inf in halftracks forward to the woods. Usually though, I tried to avoid road marches where the column could be fired at except for very brief glimpses.

I just finished reading Dick Winters' book "Beyond band of Brothers". Regarding the very action you mention: Page 198 "To accomplish the mission the patrol had to reach a point close enough to the outpost to lob rifle grenade in the cellar window. (...) The patrol would then then charge to throw additional hand grenades in the cellar window." So not only is the portrayal of that event actual (except it wasn't a cellar in the mini-series) it was planned that way before the patrol crossed the river. The Rifle grenade blows out the window and stuns the troops inside which make it easier (and safer) for others to toss grenades in the same--now blown out--window. Cheers!

IMHO--that would be a very good option. Fog-of-War makes the nail-biting more enjoyable!

Sequence of events when game is received: 1. Install while twitching and palpatating in anticipation. 2. Double clicking desktop icon (automatic due to twitching and palpatating) 3. Start with tutorial scenario (assuming there is one) 4. Laboriously do everything wrong and get my clock cleaned 5. Start a small unit action scenario 6. Realize I have forgotten the few things I thought I remembered from the turoial 7. Endeavour to retreat and save the few surviving troops under my command 8. Weep at the carnage and write a letter for each casualty 9. Re-write letters omitting all references to inept leadership 10. Try scenario again (see 6-9) 11. Glance at manual cover 12. Think about manual 13. Try different scenario (reference 6-9) 14. Curse myself 15. Curse my parents for not drowning me at birth 16. Pick up manual 17. Go to latrine 18. Read until I have lost all feeling to my legs Lather, Rinse, Repeat

No cows in the game is udder non-sense!

I've always preferred WWII sims as well. The modern battles hit too close to home for me as my son is currently in Afghanistan on his 3rd tour. Talked to him yesterday for a while and it doesn't sound like they're having any fun at all in the Argandab Valley... It'd be nice if the media would give those guys a nod once in a while but...well, I won't start that here! I'm looking forward to getting this game soon and look forward to some PBEM matches in the near future. Thank You to Battlefront for making great games which have consumed a notable percentage of my life when I could have been getting a tan, a date, eating, making money or doing something socially productive.

The nice thing about lurking here is it doesn't offend my neighbors who hate it when I lurk there.

This is all sounding very good. I'm quite confident my pre-order is going to pay off quite well!!! I do have one question though that I haven't seen answered or addressed anywhere... Will some of the US armor be equipped with gyro-stabilizers and will they have a better (albeit slightly) chance of hitting while on the move?

The Pacific

Yep. Boning on Friday is always a great idea! It relieves stress that has built up through the week.

Of course this could all lead to a higher comsumption of Fast Foods. The cycle continues...

Spot on. That's the main reason when people bring a stock, store-shelf system to me and ask to put in a honking video card, I try to talk them out of it. For one thing, they'd typically need a new power supply and--more important--the motherboards chipset usually isn't capable of allowing the system to be a good gaming rig. The moral is, If you want a good gaming rig, buy a real one or build it yourself! :-)

Be gentle with me guys. I just got here.

Very good points. Making a program multi-threaded can be described as running trains all in one direction. If they are going the same speed on one track it's no problem--just line them up one after the other. But when you're trying to merge 2, 3, 4 (or more) tracks all leading to the same destination it can be very tricky to avoid collisions. One minor bump and the whole line is jammed ie--the program crashes. I certainly understand why CMBN would be written as a single-threaded application. It saves a lot of programming time, avoids potential pitfalls with future hardware/software changes and keeping it 32 bit means it'll work on the widest range of existing systems. All this equals stability and fewer nasty forum posts about the program crashing when the air-support arrives Past experience with BF programs would lead me to believe that a video card of moderate power will handle the game fine. I'd be leaning more towards a new monitor (well--actually I just upgraded to a 23" Samsung). As far as CPU's go, the multi-cores are better than single cores even with single-threaded, 32 bit programs. If considering a CPU upgrade, definitely go multi-core. Prices are great right now especially with Intels release of its new Sandy Bridge line. The older models fall in price and AMD's are a fine alternative as well. I would imagine a good CPU will make a tremendous difference with the new sighting/LOS system... I won't presume to claim what hardware requirements will actually be but I'm betting a bottle of Leininkugel's Amber they'll be very reasonable. No doubt those stats will be revealed before the actual release of the game. SNAFU

...unless it's Blatz. Then a white flag will only make you a clearer target. Of course you did say "VERY good beer".

I've been playing the CM WWII series for years. It was so much easier than handling all those Squad Leader chits and--frankly--more fun than watching my buddy roll snake-eyes 4 times in a row. The news that the series is headed back to WWII has me pumped up enough to actually post instead of just lurking about! No doubt I'd preorder right now if I could but it's better that the team take their time and get it right (and I have faith that it'll be plenty "right" when released). My hope is that this installment of the series will post higher than 35th in ten years and that the devs will make at least 50 bucks more a piece than they are hoping for If I measured how much I paid for CMBO, BB and AK with how may hours of enjoyment I received in return--well--it'd be an investment of roughly 2 cents an hour. Waiting--like breaking up--is hard to do... Snafu