Ultradave

That's what I've been doing, you realize? There are authentication tables. Impossible to spoof unless the enemy has captured a copy of one somehow. Even then it would take work. It's a call and response but MUCH more secure than "today's challenge is 'bullfight' and the response is 'olé' " There *are* procedures for processing a call for fire from an untrained observer, HOWEVER, that assumes that the untrained observer can correctly contact the firing battery and can authenticate. THEN, he'll be talked through an adjust fire mission by the Fire Direction Center. We used to train on this by having infantry soldiers get on the radio and make a call for fire with no help from the FO, just in case. Without a proper authentication, though, you're not getting any rounds. And the "keep your FOs alive". Also near to hand. When I was a FIST Chief, the infantry company commander told me that if he spun around quickly and didn't knock me over in the process, I was too far away. And taught his platoon leaders the same thing for their FOs assigned to them. Reach out and touch Dave

This started with Big Sur. Before Big Sur, it worked fine. Updated to Big Sur, it hasn't worked since. I have a ticket in about it, along with the graphics wonkiness of the Activate screen (flashes and bounces). They may or may not be related. So it's not an M1 or Monterey specific issue. It's something Apple did along with Big Sur - wish I knew what. Dave

I can at least speak to the Canadian Cold War era procedures. I've mentioned before but since we're discussing, I did an exchange program with the Cdn Parachute Regt. Their procedures were VERY similar to ours, and so I assumed (obviously correctly) the British are also very similar since the Canadians were very British Army oriented. My background - FIST Chief A/1-320FA(Abn), with C Co, 1-325 Inf(Abn), Fire Direction Officer B/2-321FA(Abn), Fire Support Officer, 3d Brigade, 82d Airborne Division, and Assistant S-3 and Battalion Fire Direction Officer, 2-321FA(Abn). I think when I was editing that previous post, I left out the part where for the Infantry CO or Plt Ldr to call the artillery, they would pretty much have to grab the dead FOs radio and call the battery using his own callsign, not knowing the battery callsign. The battery would force him to authenticate, which his own RTO would be able to do. All this is going to take some time, ASSUMING the FOs radio even works after he is killed. Somehow in reformatting I ended up deleting that part. As @DougPhresh says, anything else requires the radio request to go up-over-down to get to the battery Fire Direction Center. Dave

Usually there would be no radio contact back and forth during the FFE phase. So no one may know for a while that the FO is dead. The infantry CO who the FO is with could make a call if he wanted the mission canceled, but it could take a few minutes to verify that it's a valid call. It's the firing battery that decides the number of rounds to fire, not the FO. The FO describes the target. Firing battery determines rounds to FFE based on target description, standard response, and their ammo situation. So likely you're going to get those 22 minutes of rounds no matter what, unless the FO called for a check fire. If he doesn't, the battery is going to fire what they planned. Dave

Ah, yeah. My previous experience with Matrix PBEM++ is that people tend to set up matches between themselves, say here on the forum or FGM (in this case), and then one will post the match, to prevent random people grabbing it. I've done it that way several times with WitW and Flashpoint Campaigns - agree with someone on the scenario and then one of us posts and the other accepts. So if you just want to play a random game, probably your best bet is to create one, and leave it NOT password protected and someone will no doubt grab it. It's just a function of how people prefer to set things up, I guess. Dave

SF2 I find the campaigns more fun that a lot of the scenarios. Nothing against the scenarios, just the continuing action of the campaigns is fun. I particularly like the British campaign. There is a real variety of different missions and terrain and quite a challenge. Plus two branches for two different paths to take at one point which will change what the last 4-5 scenarios are completely (downtown Damascus, or south of Damascus). Great stuff. And if you saved in the "choice" scenario at the beginning of it, you can go back and choose the other path. You'll know what I mean when you get there - it's obvious how to do that - different objectives. Great stuff. Dave

M1911 recoil takes a little getting used to - to not fight it. We did a range competition with the Canadians. Shot with our own weapons first then switched and used each others. We won the pistol easily. The Canadians needed more practice time with the M1911s before we shot for score. Like a lot more. We could easily shoot the Brownings. Kind of unfair for them. Dave

You've got it. That's the place. Dave

Never had one. I did, early on. Heavy (compared to an M16), but accurate. Compared to an M1, 20 rd mag > 6 rd clip. Add a scope to the base rifle and it's decent sniper rifle. A little hard to clean the bolt with it's funky notches and angles, but that's a minor nit, and I've never cleaned an M1 so I can't compare, and the bolt on a M16 is no prize in the easy to clean sweepstakes either. While on exchange in Canada with the Cdn Parachute Regt, I got to try out their FNs though, and I would take one of those over and M14. Same with their Browning Hi-Power 9mm over our M1911 .45s. This was back in (I think) 1981? Dave

^^^ The breadth and depth of knowledge that @akd brings always amazes me. Dave

Throw a track in the time span of a CM scenario and the best bet for the crew is to grab their pistols and SMGs and become scouts. Dave

Agree. We were all pretty positive this was fixed. If it isn't though, we can resubmit the problem. If you can post a save and instructions on how to generate the misses, it can get looked at. Dave

I am a fan of the Cold War because it never turned hot! Well, a bit warm at times, at least for me, but mostly not hot. Dave

Depends on the bridge of course, but it's tough to destroy sturdy bridges with artillery. A 155mm HE shell has about 15 lbs of explosive in it. Even an 8" has "only" about 20 lbs. You need in the area of 150lbs in one spot to drop one span of a reinforced concrete bridge that is about 5 meters wide (very rough rule of thumb for a typical road bridge). A wooden footbridge is another story of course. One hit = lots of splinters. Getting that one hit though, you can still expend a lot of ammo! Typically, you'd need to expend quite a bit of artillery ammo to destroy a solid bridge, since only a few rounds will actually hit, unless it's modern day with precision munitions, but that's not what you are looking for. Dave

That started with Big Sur. I have a Mantis report in on it. Both that loading screen and the calculating turn progress bars are missing and have been since the Big Sur update. It's an OS thing and not an M1 issue. Dave

I played around with the save file you posted and had no issues at all. I was able to move around, place units. Nothing unusual happened. HOWEVER, I'm on a MacBook Pro, not a PC, and that may make a difference if it's a graphics issue. Perhaps someone with a PC could also take a look at this. Dave

Look at the last couple posts in the 1.03 patch released thread. Dave

My luxury I took for fire planning was a homemade, hinged, plexiglass cover "clipboard" for lack of a better word. It was square, folded map goes inside, grease pencil plans drawn on the plexiglass cover, useful for briefings in the field - as FIST Chief for the Co Cdr, but more useful in the Bde TOC for planning when I was a Brigade FSO. Depending on what we were doing, sometimes the Bde TOC was a tented site, other times it was a dozen of us huddled under some trees. Lots of "sand tables" - clump of grass representing treelines, dirt hills. Pretty rudimentary and quick and easy stuff. This was before the days of GPS, anything digital of any kind. Dave

Yes

Supposed to make to the rest of the titles that get sold by Slitherene. Except for Mac versions ( which won’t be sold by Slitherene or include PBEM+++ — boo, hiss) Dave

Can you post or send the last save file you may have before it freezes? Dave

I had to go back and re-read this. It's a classic of analysis Dave

I understand that. The question was about an iMac, though. And your problem would not exist on a Mac. That's all. Just clarifying for the next time. Dave

For future reference, a new Mac can be completely set up by transferring EVERYTHING from the old one. Works every time. I've done it a number of times and NEVER had to re-install or re-license anything, other than possibly a few web site saved logins (some will check and see that it's a new computer logging in). But software. Works like a charm. Dave

Me too. It's a great bargain for the massive content you get. The Commonwealth module is lots of fun. It's like a whole different game playing with all that different equipment and organization. Dave