danzig5

Dipping in to check my ancient thread ahead of the CMBN steam release, surprised to see this never got patched. Hopefully this issue is corrected for the steam release.

Dipping in to check my ancient thread ahead of the CMBN steam release, surprised to see this never got patched. Hopefully this issue is corrected for the steam release.

Dipping in to check my ancient thread ahead of the CMBN steam release, surprised to see this never got patched. Hopefully this issue is corrected for the steam release.

Known issue? Damn and after all that work. To best serve the human race at large I will post some random spotting info I collected over the past two hours. I used a split test field with two tanks on each end with 800m distance between them. Here is a picture. The victims were set to never engage and no measurements were taken from them. All target tanks were always stationary. Difficulty selected was Elite and all tanks were Regular with Normal motivation and 0 (which is in the middle) leadership. For a control I tested M1 first. All times are posted MM:SS. The cutoff point I used was from the moment the tank could have spotted the enemy (typically the start of the game) to the moment the vehicle's 3d model appeared. I would considered a unit spotting when it looked like this. Sometimes contact icons would proceed the contact, sometimes not. Tanks would never fire on contact Icons however.
 
M1 Tyrannotitan targeting T-90A at 800m
Buttoned
Front Towards Enemy
0:56
0:14
0:14
0:14
0:14
average 22.4 seconds
When the enemy was in front of it the M1 was both the fastest on average and the most consistent.
Side Towards Enemy
5:13
7:18
3:30
2:33
5:27
Average  4 minutes 48 seconds
This result surprised me, as I had bought into the hearsay that sensors were so advanced the tank could be fought buttoned with minimal spotting ability lost. This appears not to be the case however, as time to acquire went up dramatically. A factor of 13 times in fact.
Unbuttoned
Front Towards Enemy
0:11
0:08
0:16
0:20
Average 11 seconds
The M1 appears to gain a mostly marginal advantage with the commander unbuttoned when spotting threats ahead it.
Side Towards Enemy
0:17
0:23
0:16
0:57
0:20
Average 26 seconds
This is an enormous improvement over the buttoned times, a factor of almost  22 times faster actually! 
BM Oplot
Oplot testing is where things start to get a little weirder. Note that due to the range, the commander never tried to use the MG and was never in rotating status.
Buttoned
Front Towards Enemy
0:31
0:01
0:19
1:12
0:39
0:19
0:33
0:32
Average time 31 seconds
Even with an extremely tactical one second spot, the Oplot still managed to be on average slower than M1. It was also very inconsistent having both the fastest and slowest times of those vehicles tested, causing me to run more tests than I did with M1 to try and achieve a true average. Still probably not enough of a sample size, but interesting.
Side Towards Enemy
0:24
3:01
8:11
0:08
14:15
0:10
0:24
0:60
3:44
Average time is 3 minutes and 48 seconds.
If the previous results were inconsistent, then these are out of control. I don't even really know what to say. It's fastest times are orders of magnitude quicker than M1, but it also has the single slowest spotting time I recorded at an appalling 14 minutes 15 seconds. But seriously an 8 second side spot of tank at 9 o'clock at 800m is really exceptional.
Unbuttoned

(BTR-san's Ukrainian vehicle skins are so hot)
I did less of these tests since we were mostly concerned with sensor functionality but ran few just to give us more numbers to work with.
Front
0:20
0:20
0:14
0:21
Average 19 seconds.
Nice and fast. Not quite M1 fast, but fast. Also consistent, which is nice. I assume the slight bonus M1 has is the gunner is still using his sight since he hasn't turned out, as the commanders should be equal skill and equipped with binoculars.
Side
1:43
1:25
0:55
0:45
Average time is 1 minute and 12 seconds
I am driven to wonder what the difference is between the Oplot and the M1 in side spotting. Is the turret slowly rotating around and not visually represented, instead abstracted? As outlined previously, the commanders of these vehicles should be identical in ability. Unless the Ukrainian knights don't get binoculars or get cardboard ones or some such. Still faster than the buttoned times on average, but none of the recorded times were close to as fast as the very fastest buttoned times. Small sample size though.
By shooting infantry first and then driving out from behind an obstacle with the target tank at 9'clock I was able to initiate the perpertually rotating commander bug. I then measured spotting times at the same 800m range.
Rotary commander
Side 800m
16:05
1:05
11:32
3:45
Average time is truly monsterous about 8 minutes. Not sure what to make of this, results pretty much inline with the wild and out of control numbers we got without the commander rotating, but my sample sizes are small. (I was starting to question the value of this process)
Side
At 150m
1:18
0:35
2:24
Average about 1 minute 25 seconds.
This is pretty much guaranteed to be a fatal encounter for the Oplot. The enemy took 1 - 5 seconds to get a fix on it at this range, while it was quick to react as a glacier. 
I then re-did this test but without the commander rotating. 
With normal commander condition
At 150m
0:50
0:14
0:23
Average about 29 seconds. Still likely to get fried, but rolling out from behind cover with an enemy at 9 o'clock watching you is still a very tough spot. Possibly shows the effects of the rotation bug, but with this small sample size its hard to tell.
During the second half of this testing I had a spare T-90A not being used as a spotting target. I reversed the roles and let it try to spot the Oplot, while the Oplot was ordered not to engage. Mostly just a frame of reference.
T-90A targetting BM Oplot 800m
Buttoned
Front
0:49
0:50
0:45
0:45
0:28
0:15
1:15
0:10
0:24
0:34
Average times is 37.5 seconds. Half as fast as M1,  just a little slower than Oplot. Although those Oplot number are ridiculous, so I suppose any comparison is probably frivolous. 
Halfway through this testing I started recording the BM Oplots choice of shells to confirm a suspicion, and was soon proven correct. The Oplot seems to heavily favor the Kombat ATGM at this range, often firing two back to back to finish a target. At 150m range, the APFSDS and T-Heat warheads are used about equally. I am not sure what shell the BM Oplot is modeled using, but it sucks quite dramatically against the T-90A. Even at 150m it had at best a 50% change of doing heavy damage or destroying the vehicle.
Types of shells fired by oplots fun and learning chart
APFSDS:7
T-HEAT:6
ATGM:15
Thus concludes this episode of wasting time on video games.

Excellent. It is by far the most serious bug I've encountered in CMx2 for the last couple years. While you are running this up the flagpole, I figure I will mention a few other multiplayer bugs I've encountered in Cold War, but they are not limited to Cold War.
1) Sometimes weapons get duplicated for the Client player. I used to think this was a result of reloading, but I have noticed it happen without reloading the game. I'm not sure what gameplay effect this has, but it producing some interesting visuals. Heavy weapons teams are most common, like double Dragon men, but I've seen men with extra LMGs or rifles. It seems pretty random.

https://i.imgur.com/TSPnXGg.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/nwhTjwP.jpg
 
In the first 2 images, you can see Double Dragon men. At no point did either man have an opportunity to pick up the extra dragon, nor should they even if the opportunity presents itself. The last one is from Italy, which is a little off topic, but it's the same deal. Men with extra weapons for no reason. In the Dragon examples above, they lose their small arms.
2) If the Client player is defending and places mines, the mines will sometimes not have a game effect or be present for the Host player unless the game is reloaded. This one seems random and related to map size, with larger maps being more likely to have this happen. Other fortifications don't seem to have this problem. Save/Reload fixes this. I've reloaded the game to find large chunks of my force inside a minefield, which is painful. We now have a policy to save/reload after the first turn is played if a defending player has brought any mines.
3) If the Host player is the defender and places any fortifications, like mines, trenches, barbed wire, or anything of the sort, the Client player cannot see them but they do have a game effect (units struggle to pass trenches and drive around obstacles.) Mines however do not have an effect until the game is reloaded. The video below shows this. Saving and reloading seems to correct this.
4) You can also see in the video above that during turn playback a player (Host or Client) is able to cheat by grabbing and moving waypoints, when players are not supposed to be able to issue orders. This can be solved with a gentleman's agreement, but it should not be possible.
5) Bunkers placed by the Client player seem to have random elevation issues when the game is started. The Client player places a bunker, and it looks normal, but when the game starts after deployment phase suddenly the bunker has sunk into the earth.

https://i.imgur.com/3UQJEmv.jpg
Not as bad as when Trenches would fly or sink to hell but it can be frustrating after spending 45 minutes in a deployment to hit the start button and see your bunker sink to the point that it no longer has line of sight to the ground just in front.
6) Hills-Rough (1200 x 1424) 101 Attack.btt suffers from the same texture bug it had when Black Sea first launched. Many buildings are missing sides. Not only are textures missing, but you can see right through them.

7) Bridges with central supports seem to be impassible by vehicles in multiplayer turn based mode. An example of these bridges from Town-Water (1504 x 1008) 152 Attack.btt can illustrate.
 
 
In singleplayer, this bridge is not a problem. No obstacles were placed on the bridge.
8 This one is not multiplayer specific, but if you play singleplayer realtime or multiplayer turnbased you'll notice that possible contacts bouncing and blinking, an effect that does not seem to happen during a WEGO singleplayer game.
 
It's not game breaking, but it can be distracting.
 
9) During Map Preview, in turn-based multiplayer, the Client player is bombarded with the game Pause sound from realtime mode if he and the Host player are both using Map Preview. Not a game buster, but it is loud and annoying and forces the player to turn off sound until game start. The sounds then play aggressively for several seconds as if they've been queued up, but then they go away. 
 
10) This one is more of an AI issue, but I have noticed repeatedly that when the Dragon AT guy is tasked as part of an assault team entering a building, he will enter the building with the Dragon in hand. I admire his willingness to try and use the Dragon for room to room fighting, but I think he'd be better off with his M16.
11) Despite being unsupported, you can set reinforce groups for Quickbattle units in the quickbattle setup screen using the 1-5 keys. They all appear at the 5 minute mark but are not bound by quickbattle setup zones, so they can appear in some pretty exciting places.
Again, the simple solution to this would be to just not do it, but it shouldn't be doable.
12) This one I can't replicate and only happened once, but we had a Client player with a Strela team spawn without ammunition. Not sure why that would be. Other teams on the map had their ammo.
13) If a Dragon attempts to fire at a tank while it is charging the Dragon's position, the team will fire the missile even if the tank is only a few meters away, and the missile will wrap around the turret of the tank and fly off into the ground somewhere. I don't think this one is multiplayer specific, but I have only really played multiplayer. I would expect that if a tank enters minimum range the team would not fire at the tank. Maybe this is expected behaviour and the way it is shown is just funky? I didn't get a video of this one unfortunately.
I've been meaning to write this up for a while, myself and several of my friends have played an absurd amount of CMx2 multiplayer through the pandemic, and Cold War is the best yet, so it has finally convinced me to get off my ass and do it. The save/load crash bug is by far the most important, as most of these other ones can be worked around or laughed off, but it would be nice for some of these bugs to see some care and attention.
If you need any elaboration or save games I can probably provide.
Despite these issues, CMCW kicks a lot of ass.

Hello, I have recently returned to playing CM Normandy and have noticed that while present in the scenario editor the Porsche turret King Tiger are not present in quick battle even when set to June 44 Heer. I own and have activated all the expansions including the vehicle pack, so I am thinking this may be similar to the situation with the M8 HMC from a few years ago.
I mostly play drop in quick battles online so I would love to have access to this vehicle.
Unrelated, but back adding the Wasp from Italy to Normandy would be splendid in some hypothetical perfect update.

I have never played a single player game of Combat Mission since shock force. Only ever multiplayer the best possible AI. So I would not pay for single player features.

I have never played a single player game of Combat Mission since shock force. Only ever multiplayer the best possible AI. So I would not pay for single player features.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-P05uRDGPU
Same scene with the ship, now with red, white and blue commentary.
 
Also amusing, the translated title of this video is "On board the Freedom arrived in Riga polite black people, Abrams tanks and BMP Bradley". Polite Black Men>Polite Green Men

That new polish rifle the MSBS is looking better and better with time. The kind of gun the ACR should have been, it has all the best ideas from many of the cutting edge rifles.  The conventional layout rifle is particularly attractive, as opposed to the bullpup. Have heard the ones on show at shotshow 2015 were impressive. I can say with confidence I will purchase one once they hit US civilian market.
 
http://youtu.be/27Te9cGGVpI
 
Also, I have said this several times but Poland is life, Poland is love. Including Poland in CMBS in some future module would separate me from my US dollars with impressive speed.
 
In short, add Poland.

All those ideas except the 1v1 campaign are bad.
 
However, focusing on what would be the best thing to add:
More forces for the nations already in game are numba 1 in my opinion. US marines and Ukraine and Russian VDV. Orthodox marines would be nice too, ukraine marines too but less so given their very small numbers.
More NATO countries would be Nice, specifially POLAND LAND OF THE STRONG/FREE/BRAVE THE HEROES OF EUROPE, Germany, and Canada are muh most wanted NATO boys.
Also, CMBS vehicle pack 1 T-80UD for Russia and Ukraine, T64bm1 Bulat or whatever the hell that new t-64 they are producing is called for ukraine, BTR-80 baseline (both ukraine and Orthodox empire use this wagon) possible but very speculative features would be T-14 and M1a3 both of which should in theory be shown to the public in this year. Also vehicle pack could include older tanks like the old t-72b which still makes up alot of Russian armor. Older US tanks would be nice if unrealistic, if for no other reason than variety. IE a US tank that isn't the FInal Solution to the T-90 question, but on tracks. 
 
In short, add the Army Rangers.

LOL blacktail is just mike sparks, that raving lunatic who loves the m113 and call it the Gavin. Not one word he says even resembles fact.

LOL blacktail is just mike sparks, that raving lunatic who loves the m113 and call it the Gavin. Not one word he says even resembles fact.

LOL blacktail is just mike sparks, that raving lunatic who loves the m113 and call it the Gavin. Not one word he says even resembles fact.

No choice for poland? Poland is the future of eastern europe. Should be first module.

No choice for poland? Poland is the future of eastern europe. Should be first module.

No choice for poland? Poland is the future of eastern europe. Should be first module.

Also if we got the unusual addition of German Kriegsmarine in Market Garden I feel it only right that Russian Marines are added in one of the modules. They were the first to into Crimea. Also very little custom art needed.