A Canadian Cat

Yeah, I have been operating under the assumption that you can move short distances without the full tear down and setup process. I'm going to have to check that then..

Indeed welcome to the club. I save a bit (because I will most likely forget to turn if off at the important moment) and install all my BFC titles under a common sub directory. I exclude that and that way I can install any new title without remembering to do anything with my AV software. Heck one of my machines (that only I have admin rights to) I don't even run AV but every time I bring that up someone give me heck for even suggesting it so I won't

But that is probably pretty realistic. I don't thing that is totally lost but reduced.

No tools that I know of exist for helping with that. The AI has no files so there is no way to see things from their perspective. You can play in Scenario Design mode so you can see the AI orders but that is not really how you want to play a battle. What you want is not there now. Given the list of features and titles that have been requested all of which I am sure will be given a higher priority I just don't see something like this getting implemented any time soon. Unless an easy way to do it is discovered but my recollection (but I cannot find the post) is that Steve said they did look at this and it is a lot of work and presents some significant challenges.

It is a general conundrum for the TacAI, your troops want to maximize cover and you might not want them to do that at certain points. On the other hand if they stayed standing or kneeling they would be prone to getting shot in other situations and that would cause problems. In this case you really don't want them to hit the deck. There are a few tricks I found that work somewhat. If you give them face commands so they now where they should be looking for the enemy. Also give them short move orders. If they are on move they will be more likely to spot something and if they do then they are more likely to decide to target it - which will cause them to kneel instead of go prone. Hunt can also work too - depending on where other threats might be.

Wow - ouch. Glad you came out OK.

Things are not going well for my Russian tankers. On each side of the main road they are getting beaten back by M1 platoons. At one point there is so much smoke no one can see each other. Then one of my T90 crews spots an M1 making a fast flanking move and they are able to take advantage (action starts at the 30s mark): Hopefully that will slow them down a little.

Sounds good to me. I like the possibilities you outlined of suddenly getting called off or having the tanks drive of to help elsewhere or unexpectedly getting reinforced. Brilliant. Of course you realise we are going to blame our CO for screwing with us when we fail.

A long standing request. I can find requests for it in the old CM1x forums. Here is some reading: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/96695-future-feature-request-save-replays-for-playback/ http://community.battlefront.com/topic/75521-battle-video/ http://community.battlefront.com/topic/106924-full-replay-some-thoughts/ http://community.battlefront.com/topic/106662-review-entire-battle/

Sweet. I have most of you mods - looking forward to this one too.

Wow I forgot about that. Yeah that is a really nice change.

Yeah, those are fun LOL. Yeah I regularly turn off land marks and objectives to take screen shots and then spend a while the next turn feeling a bit dazed and confused as to where things are until I realize they are off. Thank goodness I have not started a thread like that before I once spent several hours trying to figure out why my AI plan setup zones were not being respected until I realized that the AI does not place its troops into the AI plan setup locations until you press the BRB and start the first turn. I might have posted about that problem - but I cannot remember (if I did then I would be forgetting on purpose).

Sounds like a good plan. Thanks for the update. We have confidence you can do it.

Interesting I can only thing of one thing that could cause that (outside of a defect, or your error). That would be if those units were added to an AI group and there was an AI plan that had a setup area for that group inside Allied territory. If that were the case then when you played as the Axis it would not happen and when you played as the Allies in Basic Training mode all would look fine until you started the game and then the truck would jump from the Axis side to the Allied side as the AI moved the units from where you deployed them to their assigned AI starting locations. Honestly I would start by checking again one more time to see if you did make a mistake. Then check if any AI plans are messing with you head. After that I would un purchase the truck and purchase it again and then deploy it to a different starting location and see what happens.

There are actually two manuals, one for the game and one for the engine. In the engine manual (CM Engine Manual v3.00.pdf) on page 36 there is a discussion about the command panel starting with the instant comands. It is true that you do not have access to turn based play via TCP/IP they did add it to the newest game CM Black Sea. Eventually fixes to the engine make it to the other titles in a patch. So, my guess would be that the next time CMBN gets a patch it will have support for that added. Before you ask I have no idea when that might be True, nothing has technically changed, there are a few differences starting with the files are bigger and I do no know of anyone who actually uses email any more. The majority of people use DropBox - if you want to join you can follow this link and help me out by giving me some extra space help IanL as a referral reward - only do that if you decide to join Drop Box anyway The other thing that has changed is that the vast majority of people are using a turn management program - CM Helper has already been mentioned. There is another turn manager Whose Turn Is It? that a handful of us use too (more self promotion - I wrote it). Using Drop Box and a turn manager like CM Helper or WTII? make playing PBEM really really straight forward. The turn manager runs in the background monitoring drop box folders you tell it to monitor and you can see when new turns arrive for you to play. From there you can launch the game and play your turn and once the game saves the outgoing turn file the turn manager programs automatically copies the file to Drop Box and you opponent will get it. No messing around copying files manually. Here is a thread that goes into more detail: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118043-newbie-wants-to-use-dropbox-for-multiplayer-games-but-is-ignorant/#entry1580876 There was talk about BFC creating an opponent finder but that has not been done and I also did not install the toolbar. It has not been discussed here very much if at all. I am sure it is not spy wear, BFC is far to upstanding for that. As for finding opponents that does get discussed from time to time. Here is a thread that mentions all of them: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/107265-pbem-opponent-wanted/?p=1407990. There is a link to theBlitz in my signature - more self promotion - that's where I find many opponents. Welcome to the forum!

Really liking this DAR - very interesting. I do have a comment on this though. Moving vehicles 10-20m will not avoid hits from precision rounds. If you can break the LOS with the spotter then you can potentially save a vehicle but just moving a short distance without going into cover or behind an obstruction will just mean a small correction for the precision round to still hit.

Minute 21: Orders Here you can see with the debris from the shelling settling my men have spotted two new contacts and some trench works near the farm. My initial contacts are starting to fade since I have not seen their heads up in a while. Note that certainly does not mean they have been taken out just that my suppression has worked and their heads are down. Figure 108 New contacts and fading intell Some of the woods teams will move forward so the tank can have some protection to get into a position to put some HE into that trench system. Now that the mortar fire is landing around the AT gun I feel OK moving the tanks forward some. They still need an infantry screen. It might be a bit thin on the right but I’ll fix it up as things move along. In looking at this screen capture I think I should have paused the tank at the second way point just to give the infantry some time to get a head. Oh well not looking back now… Figure 109 Moving up in the woods including a tank In the road more infantry take up positions to bring killing fire on the known enemy contacts. Figure 110 Moving for more return fire Since the troops on the road are moving well I am positioning my reinforcements closer to that avenue of approach so I can take advantage once the lead platoon breaks the first line of defense. Note I am not fully committing them to this route just positioning them closer to flavour that direction. You cannot always do that but since this area in the back has such good cover I can shift these guys around quite a bit. Many scenarios changing which attack route you want to take is difficult. I am taking full advantage of this terrain. What this means is that I think the road is the likely place they will be used. If am right about that they will be rested and sitting right at the entrance of road so they can get going quickly. If things change I can shift them into the woods and let them rest up and be ready there too. Right now I am betting that the road will be my main thrust. Figure 111 Moving up reinforcements

Minute 22-21: The mortar and other HE rounds finally stopped in the woods. My men take the time to tend to the wounded. Figure 101 Tending to wounded There is still action in the road way. I am taking fire from a new location. At least I think there is a new team firing at me. Given the volume of fire aimed at the known enemy I find it hard to believe there is effective fire coming my way from them. Figure 102 Still taking fire in the road way Here is just some of that outgoing fire. Nearly a whole platoon of infantry plus the tanks are shooting at them. Figure 103 Return fire Having my lead teams crawling up the edge of the bocage pays off. They spot this ambush just past the edge of the woods. Figure 104 Waiting in ambush They know what to do… Figure 105 Crawling up the edge of the bocage pays off One thwarted ambush (although they are only taking cover they are not dealt with). If my troops in the road had just quick moved along it once the first contact was suppressed they would have run right into this and paid a heavy price. This time I got lucky and my lead team spotted them first. Even if it had not gone my way only one of my teams would have paid the price. Figure 106 Pinned ambush Sometimes I think it would be better to target near where the enemy gun is since shells so rarely land right on target. Really that’s just observation bias – here I am breaking it and reporting the thing I think I never see. That probably hurt the AT gun. I hope. This is only 60mm so it is hard to predict what might have been done to the crew or the gun. Figure 107 Right on target

Thank you. Of course you could have just one building with a mural next to a regular building and hide the mirrored mural in the same way, right? I think the mention of having two buildings with murals caused my brain to start asking - why what are you missing?

I really am not seeing anything like what you are talking about. Case in point from the ongoing open AAR http://community.battlefront.com/topic/119229-axis-cmbn-buying-the-farm-crowd-sourced-dar/page-9: That was my 60mm mortars taking out most of the gun crew behind the gun and the bocage. This just an example. I fire mortars at AT guns when ever I can because they are at less risk of being spotted and they are quite effective.

Ken, you can always find the silver lining. Even if the finish is tarnished

I was wondering how you handled the mirroring of buildings issue. But I have to admit I do not quite get what you are saying. Are you saying that to solve it you place the building so that the mirrored side is against another building? - if so got that makes sense. But why does that mean you need two murals for each building? Couldn't I just use the one and put the mirrored side against another building to hide it. Clearly I am not getting something - can you help clarify? Perhaps with a map editor screen shot with arrows - you the Umlaut's mural for dummies instruction pamphlet

Lol, two big reasons : BFC would like to sell more content. And most of us would like to be able to play opponents without having to figure out what extra ding dongs and do dads we have to add for compatibility. Not to mention I don't really want a world where some guy creates uber turrets or uber tanks. Oops I guess that is three reasons.

LOL yeah that was brilliant - thanks.

There ya go Ken for manual writer This is the reason why after a while your platoon HQ can end up leading the way after a series of way points: HQ is usually a small team and therefore they take less time to get ready to go again.