Pascucci

I can't even play the new expansion if I wanted to. I'd have to purchase the V4 quality of life update. Most companies refer to performance and quality of life updates with minor gameplay modifications as patches. I paid $60 for the game when released, for some reason I expected performance updates to be covered in that price. Again I will restate that the forums being so slow is not a good sign, in general, of a healthy community. I used to see CM referred to all of the time elsewhere as well, I rarely here it mentioned now. Overall I wouldn't take the current situation as a good sign. I fully realize this will be taken as a crap opinion by many here, but I decided to give it anyways. I literally grew up on the CM v1 games, quite liked v2 early on as well and bought both Normandy and Italy soon after they came out, but I'm really disappointed in the current direction.

I'm a very long term lurker (well, since CMBB) but have quit playing and/or purchasing anything BF releases. It's not hatred, just disappointment with company policy, charging for performance patches, late deliveries, poor communication with the community, and massive amount of gate keeping I see here by people hostile towards anyone who questions company policy. I would love to see things go back to the way they used to be, but unless that happens myself and many others will likely be spending less money. The general attitude towards Battlefront I see these days is similar to mine, not exactly hostile, but not terribly impressed or looking forward to their products anymore. It's not really sustainable, one only has to look at the activity level on this site to see how much smaller their customer base has become. No need to stick your heads in the dirt.

Once again, I would still expect everyone to be a bit more polite about, that is all, I was partially wrong, simply pointing out my mistake without being snarky would suffice. I am on the Rise of Flight boards, which are hilarious, but I'd just expect better here, I suppose. I have already admitted to being wrong, let's just end this. Also, there isn't any persecution complex going on, I am more upset that people are being rude to a newer player than people not agreeing with me. Rudeness just doesn't accomplish anything. I honestly don't care if people disagree with me, I will continue to display my opinion regardless.

From what I have seen in searches it would appear that the devs either do not know or do not talk about it. If the latter is true, than I am sorry. I am not backing down whether you want me to or not, the old guard mentality here seems to be pretty strong, you do realize being polite to newer players is a good idea, right? I know you live here and own the place, but that is no excuse to be an ass.

You're right on the May 44, I just have Fortress Italy, and the new demo, I wasn't aware that it ended so early, I just checked the quick mission editor and saw they weren't there. Still not backing down if that's what you want, though, but I will shift towards pushing for them to be in the next expansion. It wasn't a hissy fit, I think a few people are just upset that their knowledge of the Italians is dead wrong. No idea why you are being ass to me Jon, I can have opinion differing from yours when it comes to priorities. Honestly, I think the fact that the Italians are pretty damn unique and interesting is a good reason to include them. They would actually be much more playable than those in Sicily and would have access to much more non-Italian support on both sides, making them more playable.

OK, sorry about the wait, time for the RSI. The Esercito Nazionale Repubblicano was formed after the foundation of the RSI which followed the Italian 'surrender' in 1943, using volunteers and draftees from both the civilian population and POWs held by the Germans in order to support the German forces. Many of these troops were used against partisans, but the bulk of them were regular line units and fought extremely hard on the Gothic Line and even inside Germany until the end of the war. In fact, they carried out the final successful Axis offensive in Italy, in December 1944: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Garfagnana . Many of the elite units from the former Italian military such as the Alpini, Bersaglieri and Nembo paratroops continued to fight in the ENR and new soldiers were extremely well trained under harsh conditions, which lead to an extremely high quality army. It makes even less sense that they were excluded, simply because regular Italian units in-game with German weapons mixed in would be acceptable stand ins, although you do see more camouflage by 44.

Don't know if you are trolling, but if not I will be happy to go into detail, I am on lunch so I'll just cover the Co-Belligerent for now. The Co-Belligerent army was allowed a 5000 man contingent to fight at Monte Cassino by the Allies, due to a general lack of trust due to the fact they were formerly Axis soldiers and fought very hard there, far exceeding expectations. After Monte-Cassino, it was expanded and fought actively on the Gustav Line, with Commonwealth weapons and equipment. The Italian Nembo paratroopers were considered to be some of the best soldiers in the Italian theater on the Allied side. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Co-Belligerent_Army Flubbed at all its assignments? What resources are you using to research? I'd suggest reading Monte Cassino, 10 Armies in Hell by Peter Caddick as a start.

I found them missing from the game and have to say that's a mistake I didn't expect the devs to make. The Italian army continued to exist on both sides of the conflict until the end of the war in some way or form and didn't simply cease exist in September 1943 as so many seem to accept. Fascist Italy continued to exist until 1945 as the RSI in northern Italy and continued to maintain a high quality pro-Axis army which fought actively on the Gothic line, using a mix of the German and Italian equipment, wearing Italian uniforms. They used the same organizational structure as the old Italian army and pretty much would be identical to the Italians already present for Sicily, meaning no work would be involved adding them, yet Italy is locked out as a nation for later battles. Why are they not in? The Italian co-belligerent army in the south, which was royalist in composition and Allied aligned fought very actively against the Germans in Italy and did see much combat on the Gustav line. They would take a tiny bit more work to include, however they simply used British and American uniforms with Italian rank. They would use the weapons of the nation supplying them. I can understand their exclusion to a point because a little work would be required to add them, but they still were a very important entity and it is a shame not to include them. Why are neither present in GL?

Alright just bought CW and I'm loving it even more than the base game . I've always had an interest in both the Luftwaffe Field Divisions and the Polish 1st Armored and I was pleasantly surprised that both were modeled quite nicely. Only complaint I have so far are the SS skins, which look like re-skinned Wehrmacht player models. Not that I care that much about it because, the LwFD is so well done and I'll play them over SS any day, I always like playing as the underdog units better. I'm sure I'm far from the first one to notice this, though. Either way, I find it to be a great expansion if you can call it that, it's pretty much it's own game, it seems to have as many units and scenarios as the base game had. Can't wait for Italy!

Underestimating the Poles is foolish too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mokra http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Szack The Poles had several victories during the German invasion and Polish weapons and vehicles were usually on par with German ones. Polish infantry squads, while large, were actually fairly well armed and more than a match for their German equivalents. Browning Automatic Rifles (yes, BAR's) were actually issued to every squad giving them some stopping power for 1939 especially. Anti tank rifles were also common and at the time could knock out most German tanks in the field. The Polish tanks were actually quite decent too, the 7TP could take on any German tank with ease and the TKS tankette was a solid match for the Panzer I. The Polish cavalry are also heavily underestimated, most Polish cavalry units fought as mobile infantry, which was highly effective in undeveloped areas and scored many local victories against isolated German units. Poland certainly was steamrolled, but in Combat Mission, a German unit from 1939 would be fairly equal to a Polish unit of equal size in terms of efficiency and the Poles would certainly pose a formidable adversary. The cause of so many Polish casualties was their lack of a sizable air force, capable of taking on the Luftwaffe. Even with such superiority, the Luftwaffe lost 25% of its aircraft during the invasion. http://www.hetmanusa.org/engarticle2.html Just an interesting read for those interested.

Thanks! I'm downloading Devils Descent now. I'll look into mods after I get going a little bit. I'm glad you explained how, I was getting a bit confused trying to figure it out myself and was about to go look.

I played the old CMx1 games frequently, my father owned the anthology, but rarely played it himself and they ran well on the old laptop I had 6 years ago. After reading a large amount of negativity online about Combat Mission Battle for Normandy paired with the hefty price tag for my non-existent student's gaming budget I avoided buying it for a long time. A few weeks back I tried the demo and it really was a pleasant surprise, I found it to be a realistic and extremely challenging game. Being a WWII reenactor, I really love the little details, the correct squads, the accurate penetration values, the different versions of each tank, etc.. I know I'm really late in saying this, learning that the sequel is coming out soon, but since I bought the game three days ago I've played it for about 40 hours and I think I know what I'll be doing for much of my summer downtime. Thank you Battlefront for the great game, I'll probably be picking up Commonwealth soon, after I get the money together! P.S. Can any of you guys recommend me a good, small scale user made campaign that could ease me into it a bit better than the stock ones? Having to deal with the large number of units has been killer.