Bulletpoint

Is there any reason to believe the MP44 would be less deadly at close range than the MP40, the Thompson, etc.?

Churchills seem very poor tanks in my experience, but I've only played them in campaigns where of course they are up against Panthers and 75mm PaKs. Churchills seem slow, spot poorly, and quite fragile. certainly I haven't seen them survive anything a Sherman couldn't have survived. The only Churchill worth the name "heavy tank" seems to be the mark VII. In short, I agree. I don't see why they should be more expensive than Shermans.

Very impressive. I think there's a lot to discuss in this, and hopefully improve upon. Thanks for doing all this work. One thing about the methodology - you said each firing team only consists of one guy. But also you said that there's a spotter with binoculars to aid with spotting at a distance. If you mean he is in a separate team, I don't think he affects the spotting of the firing teams.

I'd just like if the shadows would stop flickering off and on as I move the camera around

Yup, I saw your post a few days ago and forwarded it onto Charles. I agree there's probably something there that needs to be fixed. Great to hear that. If you guys want the scenario file with my test setup, just let me know.

I just noticed the german Panzer Aufklärung Battalion 44 has a weapons company that includes thee PaK38 and two light infantry guns. I thought "Aufklärung" meant recon troops, so what were they lugging those heavy guns around for ? (Just noticed this battalion can be bought either as "infantry only", "mech infantry", or "armour only". I'm talking about the one found in the "infantry only" category)

Another option is to attach some scout teams. At least the US scouts have a couple of demo charges. If I attach regular breach teams, I often turn down the number of regular troops in the squads, as I suppose the breach teams would be formed from those squads.

Any chance that vehicle windshield glass will be made non-bulletproof in the new patch? I know it's a bit late maybe, but hopefully it could just be a matter of changing the material properties of the glass...

Yes I thought that sounded a little bit too small, but I'm no expert. This stuff always boggles my mind. Thanks for digging up the source and the pics, I appreciate it.

I think he meant the weather and light levels specifically here.. I think that's not represented in the game currently? About the experience, yes, but I don't think fatigue and nervousness affect the spotting - as far as I understood the recent soft factor test by Josey Wales..

Thanks a lot for the good answers everybody. I don't have a strong preference either way, east or west front, that's why I thought I would ask for the quality of the scenarios. Of course that will always be subjective, but I wanted to hear your take on it. I'd much rather play a great campaign in a theater I don't (think I) like so much than a mediocre campaign in an interesting theater. Did Paper Tiger design any of the campaigns of those two games? Not saying other designers are not good, I just came to enjoy the quality of the guy's work in CMBN

I'm thinking about buying one of these two - which would you say has the better scenarios and campaigns? (considering both the ones that come with the games and the community made ones)

There's something 'bout them little shrooms

Just to make sure, what time of day is the scenario, and how are the weather conditions? Do you have smoke and vegetation toggled ON?

That's a fascinating fact. Do you have a source?

Yes, that is my assumption too. All hits result in a "penetration" message. I guess what happens is that the game correctly calculates that the bullet hits the windshield, correctly calculates that it penetrates, but then the bullet path is stopped from hitting the driver and instead there's some kind of random lookup on a table to see what the effect of that penetration will be. And getting the driver killed is only a small chance on that table. So in effect, the driver can soak up tonnes of ammo as long as he has his windshield. I suppose the easy solution would be to reduce the armour value for the windshield to zero, or simply disable it completely from armour hit calculations (letting all bullets pass through it as if it were air)

That's a really clever idea. I just tried it out, and it works. Jeeps don't move now. I'm running the test a couple of more times now, using the stationary jeeps. The pattern seems to be the same. The jeep drivers without a windshield get killed within the first 15-20 seconds every time. Often faster, but it also depends on how quickly the Germans spot them. The ones with a windshield survive much longer, but the survival time varies. I had one test where all but one of the jeeps had been knocked out after 1 minute. But I'm looking at another test now where there are two jeeps surviving after 2 minutes. This is at 130m distance.

I have been thinking the same thing. The CM2 series started out with a modern title (Shock Force), so maybe the "glass" material was defined as bullet resistant back then?

I tried that of course It makes the jeep drivers dismount and I can't put them back in, even in the "Deploy Allies" setup mode.

Some time ago, I posted a video showing a jeep surviving a lot of bullets straight through the windshield. Testing was done, and it was found jeeps were not invulnerable to small arms fire. However, I decided to do some more testing, and I think there is a problem with jeeps and their windshields. The result of my test is that jeep windshields are not invulnerable against small arms fire, but that the glass offers a very high degree of protection. I belive it should offer no protection at all. As far as I know, WW2 jeep windshields were just regular glass. Details of test: 8 lanes, 1 jeep in each, VS 1 German team with 1 LMG (and sometimes a marksman with a scoped rifle). Distance: apprx. 150m. 3 jeeps have windshield up, 5 have it down. This seems to be random on purchase. Results: The jeeps with windshield up often survive several minutes worth of fire. Most of the bullets hitting the windshield cause no damage. Sometimes, the driver will get killed from frontal fire, but this is quite rare. Mostly what happens is tat the moment the jeep reverses to flee, it turns a bit and the driver very quickly gets killed from fire from the unprotected side or rear. In other cases, the driver bails out and very quickly gets hit. Often before he hits the ground. The drivers of the jeeps with the windshield down often get killed by the first or second German MG burst. It's difficult to do a 'scientific' test of this issue, as there's no way of making the jeeps stay put. Even fanatic drivers quickly start to reverse away from the enemy, often exposing their flanks. I think this issue also affects trucks and other vehicles with window glass, but I haven't tested this. Link to the original thread with video: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/125392-invulnerable-jeep-now-with-video/

I had this bug too. It's rare, but it happens.

Don't worry, I don't think you're implying anything. Sometimes people notice odd things happening in the game, and in rare cases they turn out to be bugs that are later corrected. That makes the game better for all of us. I don't know if the game models armour joints, but don't all Shermans have either one big angled block of armour on the front hull, or they have a cast rounded hull? Not sure if that should be vulnerable to those effects...?

Thanks for the update, but is there only modern stuff in this year's bones? Was hoping for a bit more about the ww2 games modules etc

I've been playing around with that penetration calculator quote a bit, and I haven't found any points where it differed too much from what happens in game. But if you found any weird results, let's hear. It's often interesting stuff.

As far as I remember, the main points of that discussion were that the SMGs kept their accuracy out to max range (200m), and that the K98 was not very accurate at range. I agree with you that it's more relevant to players of this game to test for effectiveness than for accuracy - though of course those two things are very linked.