IICptMillerII

Thanks! The attack was loosely modeled after a Soviet style tank assault. What would the Soviet equivalent of "Ride of the Valkyries" be? Thanks for the feedback! The pacing was much easier to do as the action was more straightforward. Simplicity has a beauty of its own. I have a soundmod, among many others (some I've made myself) that I play SF2 with. However, the showcase video's I've made are intended to show off vanilla features, how a newcomer would first experience the game out of the box with no mods installed. I don't want to mislead anyone into thinking that the game looks/sounds one way, only for them to buy the game and have it look/sound differently.

Using the Target command essentially tells a unit to use all of it's weaponry in the most destructive way possible. Target Light tells them to engage with small arms fire only, and to preserve heavy weapons. In the case of vehicles there seems to be more nuance. For the Bradley, if you give it a Target command against a building, it will fire TOWs. However if you give it a Target command on ground, it will fire the autocannon. If you give a Bradley a Target Light against a building, it will fire its autocannon. However, if the Bradley is moving while firing Target Light against a building, it will only use its coax. Note that this is only for the Bradley, and other vehicles with other weapon systems may be different. I am talking from personal experience, not authority, so it is possible what I described is not the case 100% of the time. Just what I have observed. The limited use of the coax makes sense to me. The coax is essentially a fallback weapon for the Bradley, not a primary. The gunner will engage enemy infantry in the open with a decent mix of coax and autocannon in my experience and I think the behavior is modeled well in that respect.

Here is a second showcase video, this time showing a successful Syrian armored assault against defending Germans. This was taken from a modified version of the NATO scenario "Bier un Brezel." Some of the better Syrian equipment is on display here, such as the T-72AV equipped with the TURMS-T as well as the BMP-2. This should pain the Syrians in a more favorable light compared to the first showcase video. Hope everyone enjoys!

Here is a second showcase video, this time showing a successful Syrian armored assault against defending Germans. This was taken from a modified version of the NATO scenario "Bier un Brezel." Some of the better Syrian equipment is on display here, such as the T-72AV equipped with the TURMS-T as well as the BMP-2. This should pain the Syrians in a more favorable light compared to the first showcase video. Hope everyone enjoys!

Looks great!

Yes, it’s been fixed. Yes, the demo is operating with the fix. I dont recall which thread it was in, but Steve stated that CMSF2 will ship with the patched version of engine 4. The other games will receive the patch after CMSF2 is released.

There is an option in the game options to turn the music off. No need to mod it out.

Then feel free to mod the German army. Not sure what relevance the US or Britain is here though.

The game takes place in 2008, not 2018.

Looks great Bil! I especially like the OpFor icons. I’ll likely mix and match your icons with IanL’s as I am quite fond of his BluFor icons. Thanks for posting these!

Blacktail defense is NOT a credible source. He has an entire video series devoted to how "terribly awful" the Abrams tank is. The information is so off base and false that I honestly think the entire channel is a parody/satire channel at this point. I agree with @Bil Hardenberger on this one. While the Soviets did have plans to use chemical weapons in all of their scenario's, they were terribly afraid of employing nuclear weapons for fear of nuclear escalation. In the later years of the Cold War that is, primarily post 1973. The US was the same way, post 1973. The issue of if/when nuclear weapons would have been employed is certainly up for debate, but neither NATO nor the Warsaw Pact countries would have initiated a war using nuclear weapons, unless it was a strategic exchange. Even then, the Soviets had no intention of initiating a first strike on the strategic level, and were in fact quite afraid that NATO would be the ones to strike first. It is quite possible to execute well timed and orchestrated maneuvers of large formations in CM, it just takes a bit longer and a bit of practice. The only way you would get Syrian-like behavior from Soviet forces in a CM game would be to set them all to green/conscript with low motivation and leadership, and give them category B equipment relative to their NATO peers. Otherwise you could expect a matchup that is at least as good as the one between the US and Russia in CM:BS, but likely even more competitive.

Vehicles with thermal sights can see through smoke, unless the smoke is IR blocking.

Forgot the M1IP (or IPM1, IP standing for Improved Protection) which began being fielded in 1983. Another note on the M1A1 is that all new models were sent directly from the factories to units in Western Europe. In 1989 production began on a limited scale on the M1A1HA (heavy armor) with the new depleted uranium armor inserts. These models were largely the ones used during Operation Desert Storm in 1991. There is a lot of Soviet gear in CM:A which is great, but it's important to remember that they are all "category B and C" units. Meaning, they were not equipped with the latest and greatest the Red Army was operating at the time. As an example, if you set the year to 1989, the best tank variants you can get are late model T-62's, instead of T-80's being fielded by the Shock armies and Guards tank divisions in Eastern Europe. But I agree that between CM:A, CM:BS, and CM:SF2 much of the equipment is already modeled.

@HerrTom really like how your shaders work in CMSF2. Those pics are great!

I would love to see a Fulda Gap game (as well as a 1973 Yom Kippur game as well) but am fully aware that development of either would not be possible for at least the next 5 years or so. I do hope that one day it'll happen though. As always, obligatory +1 for Fulda Gap

These are my settings. I haven't done any other tweaks with the Nvidia control panel. I'm using a GTX 1060 (3Gb) as my GPU. Could just be the default antialias coupled with the GPU. Not really sure honestly. I do sometimes have shadow/shader issues, such as flickering and such. There's probably a way to go about fixing that.

As already mentioned there are a handful of user made RedFor campaigns and scenario's out there for CMSF1 that work with CMSF2. @George MC did a great scenario called "Daraya Tank Raid" that I've confirmed works in CMSF2. Highly recommend playing it when CMSF2 comes out. Not sure if George will be reduxing it at all, but as is it's still great. Here's the link to the scenario and accompanying PDF on The Few Good Men: http://www.thefewgoodmen.com/tsd3/cm-shock-force-2/cm-shock-force/cmsf-daraya-tank-raid/

https://i.imgur.com/5Wu84xC.mp4 My understanding is that there is a bit of abstraction going on. They name the destroyer and the destroyer's real life armament, but it's simulated in game using a pair of 155's. Though it would be cool if we got a few actual naval gunfire support assets as part of some type of vehicle pack for CMSF2 down the road.

Wow, the preview picture looks great! I’ll definitely download this and try it out. Nice work!

Screenshots from an upcoming video I'm working on showing off the Syrians in a more favorable light than the first showcase vid. Note: These tanks have modded skins done by myself, but in the video they will appear with stock textures. Speaking of mods, I've put a few quick things together: My own silly take on Syrian uniforms And a retexture of US infantry to wear multicam (taken from CMBS) part of the 3rd Infantry Division: Not quite happy with the multicam models yet though. The velcro patches are a bit too light for my tastes, so consider the pic to be WIP.

If employing combat power against an enemy is mind boggling to you, you need to reinforce your mind a bit. First off, the idea that using these assets against "primitive" insurgents being wasteful is wrong. Yes, these assets are expensive. You know what is infinitely more expensive? Human lives lost doing a job a Tomahawk/F-18 can do risk free. Preventing combat units from being used against actual targets in order to posture against nations that aren't targets is the literal definition of wasteful. By the way, just because you don't think those "primitive" insurgents are worthy of the munitions spent on them, I am quite positive you would be singing a different tune if they were lighting you up. Even if you were indifferent in said situation, I am quite content in the tens of thousands of lives that have been saved as a direct result of those supposedly "wasted" munitions being used against those supposedly "primitive" insurgents. Second, the US Navy is not overstretched. The Navy operates 10 supercarriers and is building more that are a newer generation. The supercarrier is an asset the US has with no equal. Carrier Strike Groups (CSGs) are assigned to all of the worlds major oceans. I can assure you, that having 1 or 2 carriers operating in the Persian Gulf and Mediterranean is not "overstretching" the rest of the 8 carriers, or their deployment rotations. The CSG's that are "confronting" the Russians and Chinese in both the Atlantic and Pacific are not negatively effected by Middle East deployments of carriers that are assigned to that part of the world to begin with. The Apache exists. Fixed wing propeller aircraft are redundant and are less effective at doing the same job. If an Apache can't solve the problem, a slow moving prop plane won't be any better. At that point you need bigger assets, like A-10's/F-15E's/etc. Designing an airframe specific to one type of conflict that would be useless in other forms of conflict is wasteful. As it turns out, a (very) small sliver of that bureaucratic inertia is a good thing. Without it, the US Navy would have scrapped all of its carriers just after WWII, as @Vet 0369 pointed out.

Great work!

I still have the modpack for CMSF1. All that is really needed for the modpack to work in SF2 would be retextured infantry models. Everything else would port I believe. Of course it might be better to upgrade the ground textures with those from BS, and I'm sure there are other improvements that could be made. Still though, you could actually get yourself a decent looking formation of Soviets, or an even better fit with the DDR. Convert the T-72M1 to have the textures of a T-72G. Could be a fun project.

Obligatory +1 from me for Fulda Gap. That said, if you set the Syrians to have good training/motivation, and you give them their best equipment, they are a pretty decent proxy for the Soviets in the 80's. It's not quite 1:1 but it's certainly doable.

It was clearly a microcosm demonstrating the tactics of splitting squads and using them. +1. I think Battle Drill and the examples you provide are exceptional. You can lead a horse to water...