Flying Penguin

Perhaps an inelegant way of saying it, but probably not a million miles from the truth. A better way would be to say the Russians are likely to use "standard" wartime RoE, i.e. shoot it if it is or could be hostile, don't worry overly about collateral damage (obviously they aren't going to gratuitously shell hospitals!), rather than "kill all the things!!!!" I would expect any NATO force to be similarly hamstrung as they were in Afghanistan/Iraq, i.e. only shoot it if it is confirmed hostile, don't bomb anywhere that is likely to cause non-trivial collateral damage, even if it increases risk friendly troops on the ground. How long NATO would hold to principles as casualties mount (and how long their stomach for the fight would last), now that's the million dollar question....

Definitely an awesome scenario Played as the Russians and was thoroughly ravaged by the Hind, that thing must have cost me at least two whole squads at least! My glorious plan for a killing field degenerated into a bunch of heroic mini-ambushes and Mexican standoffs. A tactical victory, but not my proudest moment....

Honestly, I wouldn't bother for WW2 battles, just not enough low level control for me. However where it does shine is covering conflicts that no one else in their right mind would cover. Angolan Civil War (Operation Hooper), minor Russia/China border incidents (Zhalanashkol 1969) and theoretical Russian/Iranian conflicts (Shield of the Prophet). There the lack of density is actually half way credible, and if the idea of stalking T-55's in Ratel IFVs through bush in 80's African proxy wars appeals, you won't find that anywhere else. And yes the interface is an acquired taste....

From the manual: Step 1: V = (A + 10) / (B + 10) where V = Victory Level, A = earned Victory Points of the side with the higher score, and B = Victory Points of the side with the lower score. In other words, take the Victory Points score of each side, add ten, and then divide the higher score by the lower score. The result is V. Step 2: The ultimate Victory Level of the victor is determined by V and also by the percentage of potential Victory Points obtained. Draw: V less than 1.25. Minor Victory: V less than 1.75. Tactical Victory: V less than 2.5 and 30% of potential VP earned. Major Victory: V less than 4.0 and 55% of potential VP earned. Total Victory: V equals 4.0 or more and 80% of potential VP earned. The losing side will always receive the opposite Victory Level of the winning side. So if the winning side receives a Major Victory, the losing side will receive a Major Defeat. Cheers, Jamie

When the cop asks you why you hit that stationary car in broad daylight, your excuse involves the phrase 'spotting cycles'.......

Well, top of my wishlist would be the ability to filter by type of mod (terrain, unit, map, sound etc). It's great to be able to sort by date/downloads etc, but it would be nice to be able to see just the sound mods for example, as they tend to get lost in the swathes of graphical mods. Perhaps as an extension to this, being able to filter by "Modified Object"... Second, when you go into a list of mods (by date, for example), it would be nice if things like column titles were click-able (to change sorting), and the same for Author/Country etc (to change filtering). As it stands, it's a good site, but a few additions it could be much more easy to navigate and find what you need. HTH Jamie

$20 inbound.... Great site ☺

In Red Thunder there is TCP/IP WEGO (turn based), but it doesn't allow rewinding of the turn like you can in PBEM or solo play. This will be coming to CMBN in the 3.0 upgrade in a few months time.

It's a cracking read:

Fascinating, so far it's as illuminating on the psyche of early cold war western generals and propaganda as on the Russian fighting machine....

Pointed questions work better when I'm not talking from a position of complete ignorance Thanks for the clarification!

So (and please understand this is not a pointed question, just trying to clarify) you are saying that the old rule of thumb that you would send a Soviet unit one size up (say a company instead of a platoon) from an equivalent western force to do any given job was based on TO&E of heavily attrited forces rather than any tendancy to send more men to complete the job than the western allies would?

Oh yeah, can't wait for this Fuser, your mods are on every install of CM I have, looking forward to seeing what you can do with the Russians

Oddball, that's pretty much what I saw, but I had at least half the squad doing the musical chairs routine. Cheers, Jamie

Gent, Firstly, cracking job! I haven't been playing long (family visitors put paid to that idea ), but it runs smoother than FI/BN, I love the Soviet options and it's immediately clear this is going to be great fun But a question arose, I was playing the first tutorial mission and decided to mount a squad on a tank (not really necessary, but hey, new toy ), they approached it and swarmed around, about half the squad mounted quickly, but the rest of the squad ran from one side of the tank to another several times, occasionally one of them would get on, but the whole boarding process ground to a halt. The mission ended that turn so I didn't get to see the full sequence play out, but they started the turn next to the tank so I saw enough. It almost looks like they are playing musical chairs with what are (presumably) "slots" on the vehicle and all going for the same one. Is it just me or have other people been seeing this behaviour? Cheers, Jamie