Collingwood

I suggest you buy directly from BF. Main reasons being: modules and new releases take a while to filter through to the app store, Apple also sometimes are stubborn and will cause new releases to be delayed weeks. Developers such as BF are at the mercy of the Apple App Store beaurocracy. Patches also will always be available from BF before they appear in the app store. I run CMBN/CF on a MBP with no problems so far.

I hope so. If it's going to occupy so many releases just to handle Market Garden - a 9 day campaign - and the Bulge, imagine how many releases will be possible for the EF if we are given the usual suspects, let alone some more obscure ones. For example in no particular order CM:Barbarossa CM:Smolensk CM:Leningrad CM:Moscow CM:Kharkov (1,2,3 & 4) CM:Stalingrad CM:Kursk CM:Korsun Pocket CM:Bagration CM:Warsaw CM:Hungary CM:East Prussia CM:Berlin - oh, insert expansion 1,2 & 3 after each of those cheers!

- and forgot to add the one I'm reading at the moment which is available on Kindle too, "Battleground Prussia: the assault on Germany's eastern front 1944-45" by Prit Buttar. It's operational with some personal accounts included, so far it's very good.

Another good account of the Korsun pocket which I read recently: "Korsun Pocket: The encirclement and breakout of a german army in the east, 1944" by Niklas Zetterling and Anders Frankson. It's a good account of operational and a couple personal recollections. It's available on Kindle. I agree about the dearth of eastern front books for kindle. Late war, excellent operational with a mix of personal accounts is: "Slaughter at Halbe: The Destruction of Hitler's 9th Army" by Tony Le Tissier. For the OP, the problem with readability of operational accounts is that they will be often concerned with getting dates, unit names and directions correct, and with the huge battles on the eastern front just one single operation, e.g. one of the Kharkovs, can take hundreds of pages to document. Glantz does this well, but I think everyone agrees it's bone dry stuff. However if you want to create a scenario for a wargame and be fairly confident you are involving the correct units in the right place, he's one of the best. Great thread

Yes, if people only knew how much time was spent by tankers at the end of each day, repairing tracks and damaged road wheels etc. There is a high amount of maintenance per mile for tracked vehicles.

May as well add more baseless speculation into the mix Perhaps the big announcement was going to be the release of the MAC version of the CMSF bundle... which was announced a long time ago as about 4 - 6 weeks away.

You brought a big smile to my face with that posting, some great memories. What you say is true - and for me so much of the enjoyment of CMBN/CW is the spectacle that's unleashed with my orders. Much of the time my "fun meter" isn't determined by whether I am winning - it's to do with the unusual events that can happen, the drama of the struggle. Or just the sight of my armor rolling along in support. I have read a lot of WW2 history, and read a lot of personal accounts. This game comes pretty close to what I've read. Each to their own though: if someone doesn't like it they are entitled to that opinion. I don't care - surely there are enough games out there that everyone can find their wargame nirvana.

I confess I was once a programmer - it's OK, I'm in recovery thanks - and it really is one of those endeavours where although you can see the end of the tunnel, you can't tell how much longer to get there. Programming is a constant process of solving problems, each of which can lead to more. Some problems are easy while others prove to be more stubborn than you anticipated and can take days or weeks to surmount. Further, when in a programming head-space, there's a strange kind of time-stretching. Other programmers would know what I mean. When you have a product it needs to be tested, whereupon more problems are found - just when you thought it was over, they drag you back in. Even if BF thought they had an idea of when something would be ready and told us, the moment it didn't arrive at the time announced there would be people exploding with self-righteous indignation about their "rights as clients" and "poor customer service". I'm as interested as anyone else about new releases, but "it will happen when it does and not before".

I am very grateful for CMBN and the CW module, escpecially that it's available on OSX. But, I'm a little sad to think I might have to wait several years before seeing an Eastern Front version. I do hope this fabled "Big Announcement" is something to do with the Russian side of the conflict. Not that I imagine BF are swayed by begging on the forums, but perhaps adding my vote for "Eastern Front Please!" will encourage them that there is a genuine market for it.

M: Oh look, this isn't an argument. A: Yes it is. M: No it isn't. It's just contradiction. A: No it isn't. M: It is! A: It is not. M: Look, you just contradicted me. A: I did not. M: Oh you did!! A: No, no, no. M: You did just then. A: Nonsense! M: Oh, this is futile! A: No it isn't. M: I came here for a good argument. A: No you didn't; no, you came here for an argument. M: An argument isn't just contradiction. A: It can be. M: No it can't. An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition. A: No it isn't. M: Yes it is! It's not just contradiction. A: Look, if I argue with you, I must take up a contrary position. M: Yes, but that's not just saying 'No it isn't.' A: Yes it is!

Fabulous news, great to hear! Thank you BF for listening and continuing to support us OSX users! ???

Yes, but with the deafening silence... It's OK though, I can take a hint.

... and his answer was ...

That's what hooked me on CMBN straight off: in the demo the AI was not a walkover. There are a few neat pointers in this tutorial by Dakuth using that map. See here: http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=98844 cheers

"Old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill" 47 here. Pleasantly surprised at the maturity level around here.

Oh my aching sides. Hahahhahahaha! Sorry Michael but as a life-long programmer that has done some hard graft programming Macs, I found that very funny. All platforms have their quirks, but Apple have a history of being, er, not exactly helpful to developers. cheers

I know you were after detailed reading with maps, but worth considering afterwards is "Nothing Less Than Victory: The Oral History of D-Day" by Russell Miller. Combatants from both sides tell their stories, a great book to get a human insight into what it was like at ground level.

Howdy, dakuth has put up what is probably the best beginner tutorial on youtube. It goes for a long time but it's worth the effort, I was struggling in so many areas but his tute got me rolling. http://youtu.be/SbE8795rt2s

Good work Hull down, I was getting to the point of putting the known good patch up on a site for wonderjeep. So far the uncertainty of exactly which patch is being downloaded from what mirror has tripped up a lot of us, there's bound to be more people with the same problem coming along.

If it helps, I found that the patch didn't apply correctly if I allowed it to choose the default location. I had to specify the location to install to (/Applications/CM Battle for Normandy). Until I did that the game did not patch properly.

wonderjeep - poesel71 is correct, there are two versions of the 1.01 patch and not all the game mirrors updated their patch in a timely fashion. I had the same problem but fixed it by getting the new 1.01 patch, there are a couple threads with more discussion: http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=99565 and http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=99384

drbassie a colleague of mine supports hundreds of macs here and says the changes in Lion are pretty extensive. Happily work doesn't require me to update (yet). Good luck YankeeDog oh yes, it's not just Apple updates that cause heartache. I support UNIX enterprise stuff as well as OSX, but the real world requires a lot of my work happens on Windows too. As a developer in the past on both Win and Mac I understand, even empathise with both. Bottom line for me is that I am ecstatic that BF released CMBN for OSX. Not many other wargame companies out there that care about us.

+1 I can see CMBN being a gateway drug for OSX people.

Seems to me every time OSX is upgraded software forums get lots of postings wondering why software has problems on the new OS. My experience of Mac OSX is that ever since 10.0 -> 10.1 (nearly ten years ago) there have been problems with existing applications failing to work after an upgrade. Not every application of course but so many that unless I can't live without the features of the next OS (e.g. Lion) or software I desperately need won't run on anything other than the new OS I won't upgrade. The issues so many applications face with an OS upgrade are usually a result of Apple deciding to tweak something under the hood. Live and learn - I will not upgrade to Lion until at least 10.7.3 or 10.7.4 is released and I know the apps I depend on are fine on it. 10.6.8 works perfectly OK for me.

Answering my own question about how do you tell whether you have the good Mac 1.01 patch or the earlier 1.01 patch: Select the downloaded zip file and then command-i (get info). The file size of the original patch is 50,261,519 bytes The file size of the new, good patch is 49,851,426 bytes Once again the main screen shows version 1.01 but now during a game I have the FPS readout, LOS etc on the lower right corner of the screen, so I have the proper patch in place now. I'm guessing I won't have the problem of disobedient tank crews any more. Thanks everyone for their help and input.