Taipen

That's why I created this thread. I love this game, and it saddens me to see that almost unique as it is (yes, we have plenty of tactical level wargames, but not so spectacular and intuitive; I know only one another project of that kind, but it currently lacks multiplayer), it lacks some (not so many, as you see) features, which could create much more realistic environment. That's why this frustrates me so much - it almost finished masterpice, but it needs a couple of finalizing moves. I'm uderstand this, what I want is not a totall control, I want some means to designate general patterns of behavior to my troops, this is known as "ROE", "Reaction to contact/fire". This is real world practic, and without that, in current AI state, they just behave as mindless drons in situtations, described above. Well, I don't see how it can spoil gameplay. Features I've proposed should plug some holes in rudimentary AI's behavioral patterns, they won't change balance or something, they shouldn't even force developers to rewrite code from the start - just to add some controls to GUI which will allow player to tweak its algorithms a bit. I don't think they stupid. I think they just could have other priorities, or that there are not so many peoples playing PBEM - in real time you just can microcontrol all your troups while paused. Or maybe those questions have been rised already in past, but then there were some more critical developments to do, maybe now it's finally a time for them to appear in schedule. Well, at least I've tried. Thank you

I'm not asking it be super-effective, just a little info on what happens down the street will help a lot. Well, they could introduce some kind of lag - to emulate that your soldiers won't be peeking out constantly, only from time to time, so this tank you see as transparent silhouette, can be gone long ago. Currently to know this you have to step out of the cover.. and encounter armored halftrack with machinegun, and lose a couple of man; when IRL you would have only to peek out for a brief moment. That's just stupid. Yes, I tried. But: 1) You can easily run into currently unseen enemy troops and lost your men - remember, game lacks reaction to contact, they will continue to run even under massive automatic fire, you can't order them "run, but if fired upon - cover immediately or fall back" 2) Dashing can be not enough if they got MG42 on 50m distance - recons will be killed on spot. 3) That's just tedious. To get a simple option like this you have to implement this stupid and risky workarounds again and again. Same as in case of cautious movement - PAUSE PAUSE PAUSE PAUSE, then your troups encounter a couple stormtroopers with mp-40s, and get butchered, because you can't set them fall back as a reaction to contact.

Won't work, you can't in most cases predict future with such accuracy Exactly what I'm talking about. Well, thats why I created this thread, wasn't been able to find "Suggestions and proposals" form on http://www.battlefront.com/index.php?option=com_contact&Itemid=3

Can't quite remember why, but I was shure this only so within a platoon or any other unit (soldiers inform each other within their element), and won't work between different units. Well, and how about this: you know from CC about tank around the corner, but game's mechanic doesn't allow to to specify it as a target, not until you'll be able see it directly. So you decide to send yout AT team near it hoping they'll spot it. You set them a route (with a lot of PAUSEs cause game lacks proper "Reaction to contact" controls :mad:; and even with pauses, if they encounter enemy troups, they will continue to push forward, you can't order them to lay down and hide as reaction to such encounter), at the ent of a route - cover arc, approximately covering its position, and press End Turn button. But what if upon arriving they spot, say, damaged armored truck, which will be closer to them, than tank, and arc will cover it too? I can't be shure, but they can choose it as a target, no? And waste perfect opportunity to get from behind a really nasty german Tiger, what a shame - just because game won't allow you to specify WHICH EXACTLY armored vehicle you want to be blown up. And again to reaction to contact - how will you deal with this situation? Set them be paused at the last point of route for 20 second hoping this will be enough to spot and fire, then retreat? Often when I did it this way they just sit there, spot nothing and began to retreat. You can't predict how much time they will need to spot target, and you don't have controls to instruct them retreat ONLY AFTER spotting it and firing once-twice.

No, no need for THIS level of authencity This will suffice: when stacked at the building's wall in such a way that this building obstructs field of view, preventing from observing the long street around its corner, you can chose something like "Urban awarness mode" and your troops become able to spot tartgets and movement on this street which they wouldn't spot otherwise - this emulates your troops peeking around the corner, to the cracks in devastated walls, to the windows. Well, maybe with a somewhat increased chance to be spotted itself. And ability one or two of them to shoot around the corner would be greatly appreciated, as well. Not exactly what I meant. I meant this: when you know about some target from chain of command, but don't observe it directly, you can't order your troops to "go there and shoot this target" command, game won't allow you to do it. At least in CM: Battle for Normandy. You can only give such an order for targets you observing directly Another clumsy workaround, I've responded to it in previous post.

My 1st CM game was CM: Battle for Normandy, and in multiplayer I'm mostly playing in turn-based mode (cause it's impossible to achieve authentic feeling of tactical level command with such amount of troops under control in real time). And I found a couple of things that totally ruined my fun during MOUT (military operations in urban terrain). This game is great in many ways, but such lack of controls ruins tactical flexibility I cherish the most. Buildings block line of sight/observation completely in CQB - nonsense. Your troups are stacked at the wall of the building, and can't look out of the corner? This is a must have feature in any urban environment, and it's absent in this game - can't tell why, nothing difficult to implement. Chain of command, out of chain communication. There are 2 platoons in close proximity, one is observing enemy troops, one isn't. Suggest, they don't have communication via chain of command tree - and what now? They cannot communicate by voice and convey position of enemy troops one to another? Inability to act directly on targets, known from chain of command communication. Here are those 2 platoons from previous example (2). But now they have connectivity via chain of command. One of them have spotted a tank, but other one - haven't. This other one was informed about the tank via chain of command a couple of minutes later. Now he knows there is a tank in close proximity around the corner. He could get it from behind with AT grenade, but.. You cannot issue DIRECT order to your AT team to "Go there and blow this tank up", you only can order them "Go there, hang there for a while in hope you'll spot this tank, and blow this up if you'll do". You KNOW there is tank over there, you DON'T HAVE TO spot it again, you SHOULD HAVE ability to give a clear mission description to your ATs to destroy it, because you have it correct position via chain of command - but game lacks this possibility. Reaction to fire/contact. Totally absent. Well, in fact, we have to rely on AI for that - and he is very clumsy and unaducated while doing this. Just a couple of most frustrating examples: You can split a recon team from your platoon, but you cannot easly organize joint movement with needed level of caution. When your recon team suddenly attacked, they often just keep pushing forward, to their deaths, so do the remaining part of platoon. While in real life scenario you sould have ability to instruct them to take cover the instant they got contact or become fired upon, and the other part of platoon - to stop advancing and take cover too. And "Assault" movement type won't compensate for this. Firstly, it's only available to platoon as a whole; while moving in assault mode, it's splitted equally in halves, but what if you don't want to risk lives of 4 people, and want to sent only 2 as a recons? And another one: in assault mode your troops will open fire on sight, but what if you planned to advance silently as far as it possible? This game lacks Reaction to fire/contact option SO badly! AT infantry section's behavior just awful. IRL, they HAVE TO use hit and run tactics to stay alive. So you HAVE TO have ability to order them like this: "go there, wait for 30 seconds/or until target spotted, fire your bazooka, fall back IMMIDEATLY or move to other fire position" Instead, we can only designate it a fire sector and specify target type "armor". Upon contact, their just keep standing there and fire again and again for at least a minute (until you'll get to controlls for next turn in PBM; in real time it's better, but you have to move them to other possiton manually) Often this results in its premature death. This last one could be solved with "Reaction to fire/contact" options, which would influence behavior of your troops' AI in such circumstances. Not something excessively dificult to implement, either.