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Freyberg

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Posts posted by Freyberg

  1. Most of the things I would like probably wouldn't require a new game engine.

    Firstly, I would like to see some changes to the scenario editor and the AI. In particular, a way to program the AI more easily, as I find this a little hard to understand and even harder to predict how an AI plan will unfold.

    These could be simple, general AI commands - like 'advance and manoeuver against armour', 'advance, pausing at cover if under fire', or 'defend [x] location and fall back under fire'. Obviously these are not so simple from a programming standpoint, but they would make devising playable scenarios much easier.

    The other thing would be some features to make house-to-house combat less fiddly - like a 'transparent buildings' toggle; and maybe tweak some of the troop behaviours against buildings, like an 'attack carefully' mode, where they don't halt on contact, as with hunt, but the also don'r run in and get slaughtered, like throwing grenades and so on - although maybe this is already modeled and I'm just using the commands wrongly.

  2. This one was fun and quite different gameplay - it had a bit of a narrative to it. The entry of certain of the enemy reinforcements was exceedingly well timed. The map is first class (I'll reuse that in a QB for sure) with a great little village with winding streets.

    It was a little bit annoying that A Coy were 'unfit' (took a while to work that out and slowed things down considerably), but overall a really good play.

  3. I don't find the new licensing system hard at all - you open that little app in the folder, type in your S/N and it all works. And since the switch to 4.0, I didn't bother patching and upgrading the old games, I just downloaded the new one off the website and registered that. Or am I missing something?

    It used to be a bit fiddly to register games, but in the last year (I've registered bought 3-4 upgrades in that time), it's very easy.

    I would like to see more modules, too, but I think the 4.0 upgrade is nice - the AI certainly seems better, and the new squad behaviour, which makes it often unnecessary to split squads, makes the game much more playable. Those and the new casualty counting methodology make quite a difference IMO.

  4. I love those moments - I had one just last night: clicked the big red button, watched the digitroops running thither and yon, suddenly realised that the halftrack full of the best guys was going to use to storm some buildings was going to advance into the sights of a keyholed Panther (which I knew was there but I'm often careless). At the end of the turn it was 5 metres too far forward, right in his sights. Next move, gave a reverse order - fully expecting a little rose-garden of red crosses to bloom -  clicked Big Red again. Boom, he fired, clipped the edge of a wall, missed! My men lived to be uselessly sacrificed another day (or a few minutes later, as it transpired).

    If it wasn't for WeGo I would be constantly wondering why various of my men and assets were burning or dead.

  5. 3 minutes ago, c3k said:

    Oh, they notice them all right. These are the men who no one likes. They're shirkers, card sharks, degenerates, and/or owe money, or dated their sisters...and then told everyone all about it. 

    The lesson? Don't be that guy.

    Haha - OK, next time I'll let them die and just go through their pockets. :P

  6. When I play against the AI, I cheat.

    I usually choose the opposing forces, based on the random selection which (like Anson Pelmet above ) I don't check too carefully but which I usually toughen up with some decent armour. And I remove some of their infantry, because too much AI infantry is less interesting than tanks, flak, AT guns etc.

    And I give myself some solid reserves (at least +100%), so if the game starts to drag on or I get 'unlucky', I can bring it to a conclusion without losing.... 

  7. 51 minutes ago, MOS:96B2P said:

    I don't think unit type matters.  Below is a method you can use to encourage your troops to administer Buddy Aid.  I think I learned this from @IanL 

    For buddy aid if the casualty is not in or near the center of the action spot I give the unit I want to perform buddy aid a Slow order to an action square that takes them directly over the casualty. Then I give them a pause of 20s, 30s or 45s depending on how far away the casualty is. Push the BRB. In the next command phase they will be directly over the casualty.  Then cancel the remaining Slow order and issue a Face command.

    Yes - I sometimes find myself doing things like this.

  8. It can be a little frustrating how difficult it can be to get units to perform buddy aid sometimes, particularly when the buddy is kind of on the boundary of two action squares. I've had cases where the troops are not green, not of poor morale and not under fire, within close proximity to the wounded man - I move them from square to square but they still refuse to notice the wounded guy.

    Are any units more likely than others - officers for example - to give buddy aid..?

  9. What a fabulous, intense and difficult scenario! Those damn Luftwaffe are few, but they are so fiendishly well positioned. The map is fabulous - the game-play is nicely varied (rural and house-to-house.

    I also saw my Quad-50cal completely destroy a building, which was fun.

  10. I have to admit, it was the lack of replay that stopped me from using Real Time. I kept looking round and finding one of my tanks a flaming wreck or one of my squads a mass of red crosses and wondering what had happened.

    The same thing happens to me in WeGo, too, of course, but at least I have the fun of watching the explosions.

    The other aspect with Real Time was that CM requires giving quite a number of commands. In Real Time, I was stopping so often to give them that I was losing the feeling of the action. In WeGo, the replay can be more exciting.

  11. I think it's a shame that much of this thread has descended into incivility (that's the thing that so often keeps me off this forum) - and it's particularly unkind that peevish things are said about the developers. This is a niche game, from which I get a great deal of pleasure and have done for many years, and I feel lucky that Battlefront have continued to improve and expand on it. No other game I have ever played has held my interest upgrade after upgrade the way Combat Mission has.

    The pity is that this an interesting thread. It's made me interested in playing Iron Mode again; some of the ideas suggested don't appeal, others are a bit far-out, but fun to think about, and others would be really interesting to try.

    I agree with the point made that maximum 'realism', in the absence of a super-AI with human-like ability, would be less realistic. The abstraction in the AI balances out the abstraction in the command interface pretty well, in my opinion. However, I like the idea of increased immersion, to enjoy the feeling of the commander's experience without trying to recreate every aspect of it. I think Iron Mode can be quite immersive and I'll probably get back into playing it (It's been mostly Elite for the past few years); and I hope this experience is something the developers continue to improve.

  12. I'm not asking or arguing for the feature discussed above - but one way to achieve it, which might be fun once in a while, would be to have something like an 'intel-view' lock hot key.

    If you could lock the intel-viewpoint onto, say, the company commander, then until it was unlocked, you could select and give orders to other units (assuming you could see them, for example in Iron mode), but the intel you received would remain that of the company commander.

    It would achieve most of what those above are asking for without reworking the whole game, and might be interesting.

  13. I notice several people discussing features they loved from CM1, so I thought I'd mention one I used to love: the ability to import units from a scenario or finished battle (or even a battle in progress) into a QB.

    I remember having some extremely enjoyable H2H games based on this idea, where a self-made scenario with a few units would be imported into a QB, so both players would know a few of the units the other one had, typically the toughest pieces (for example, we might import a little heavy armour into a QB where we agreed the rest of the units would be selected by a rule-set like 'short 75').

    I remember also once playing a second QB over the ruins of the first, in effect adding reinforcements to an ongoing game.

    ...anyway, I love the game. My only real wish is more maps/scenarios for the old games with up-to-date AI plans; but since the discussion is so often about fond wishes - that would be mine.

  14. On 26/06/2017 at 6:24 PM, Aragorn2002 said:

    Personally I don't post often, but I play CM at least once or twice a week. With regard to the future of CM, well, I still don't see another game that comes even near to it, so I think we don't need to worry about the future too much.  I still think though that BF could do more to keep us posted about the development of what they are working on. I don't get the argument that it will only lead to lively discussions and wild speculation. Nothing wrong with that.

    I play some CM nearly every second day. I have all the Second World War titles, modules and packs. I browse the forum regularly.

    One of the reasons I seldom post is that although I'm quite knowledgeable about history and the Second World War in particular, I'm not 'grog' and I don't that degree of detailed knowledge; and some of the posters here are frankly kind of hostile to those lacking their encyclopedic knowledge.

  15. On 6/04/2017 at 3:26 PM, db_zero said:

    By the time the grease gun was in service the Sherman already had a reputation for catching fire quickly when hit so I'm sure the last thing on a crewmans mind was grabbing a grease gun...

    In game terms it's ethically correct to move bailed out crewman to the rear. Doesn't always happen and players often use them as scouts or infantry. It is irritating when you see a bailed out crewmen hosing down one of your infantry sections, especially when armed with just pistols and your men have rifles, SMGs and MGs. I've seen this happen too many times. Gun slinging tank crews with six shooters Wyat Erp style...

    Unless specifically mentioned in house rules I've decided to join them if I can't beat them and not retreat my bailed out crews.

    I like to use bailed-out crew members as medics.

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