Kevin2k

Normally I just feel like playing a quick games, so I do smaller battles in realtime mode. My computer is hardware from 2012 already, so I don't have that much CPU and GPU power to spare. If things would be stalling somewhere I should notice. But for the games I play, I don't really notice much of a performance difference between any of the CM games. I tried some of the games in Linux on the same system. These are run through Wine compatibility layer there. I don't like to play them like that anymore though, because of stalls in game speed. The funny thing is that it is pretty clear that pathfinding or other game logic is causing that. The game stalls there when I issue orders for groups to move. And you may have noticed that when the game can't keep up it starts these annoying redraws of the whole scene. Another thing I now remember is that rendering distance for the game is actually dynamically decided by framerate feedback. Meaning that the game cuts down on drawing distance when it measures that framerate is getting low. Point being: there are many factors at play. GPU power, CPU power, overall 3D polygon count of the scene (influenced by both the 3D models (=game data) and the renderer (=game engine)), framerate feedback for drawing distance, and like I showed with the linux example: some surprising CPU bottlenecks related to game logic calculations. And none of these thing can be logged to the screen in this game, as messages or counters. So it is hard hard to say what is actually going on when things are slower then expected.

That is not my perception. CMSF2 has the oldest vehicle models. Battlefront say they redid them, well the soldiers sure, but the vehicle files are mostly the same. In case of frame-rate the old vehicle models are a plus: These vehicles had to be used on 2011 computers. So they had to take great care to make up to 5 low-detail variations of them: distance-lods. In the last new title, CMCW, the attention to distance-lods was ... not that good. Try to play v1.00 of that game on a low-end computer and you will see lots of things wrong. So they fixed the most obvious things in the patches. But still things like the M16 rifle only has 1 full detail model for all distances, regardless of whether or not that M16 rifle is actually the size of a pixel at 500 meters. The CMSF2 maps have less trees of course. But the tree system in CMSF2 is different from all the other games. These trees are modular things. with slightly random appearance for each of them. They don't seem to really work well for frame-rate and especially drawing distance. They don't support the "trees nearby, trunks in the distance" option either. I have no reason to think the actual renderer in any of the latest versions of the CM game is different from one another, not in image quality and not in performance. The steam version may be a little slower because of a steam launcher taking up CPU cycles in the background. To make more substantiated statements about the renderer things would need to be compared with a frame-rate counter and with equal scenes to render. With the games being content-locked that is not really possible.

No, that was initial E4 release. And then in CMBN similar problems remained in 4.01 and 4.02. It was with CMBN 4.03 that it was properly rectified, in july 2020. That is still the last version as of now.

That is from page 102 of the game manual. I don't know much about this T-90 series of vehicles myself...

Glad I could help. Yes, only the name "silhouette m-47-dragon.bmp" will make it work.

This mod of mine contains all weapon and vehicle silhouettes. Though i did not change them that much, most are merely recolored.

That sounds like Macintosh talk, like the iPad/iPhone IOS 12 32-bit drop. In Windows, in the past at least, it used to be that legacy 32 bit software that will never-again be updated, can still be expected to run fine. At least when it does not do anything ambitious or special, like CM checking available screen space. I am not making excuses for Battlefront not being on top of this, it being a practical difficulty, regardless of what caused it or whether or not it is acceptable.

So Windows adds something and then software needs to be updated to bypass it? LOL (Well, I have nothing constructive to add, I am afraid... But it does reinforce my opinion to either stick to 96 dpi screens for Windows Software, or go at least double that dpi. Anything in between seems blurry and messy)

I am not familiar with these options, but maybe it is because 768 pixels in height scaled 150% becomes 1152 pixels, which is larger then the available 1080 pixels.

I updated the above tweaked model files. The earlier fix used to work fine with my Radeon graphics, but I found it malfunctioned on a NVidia Graphics: The skin texture would appear transparent instead. Well, it should now work properly on both AMD and NVidia.

CMBN has a different location for "Game Files" compared to all the other games. Because when CMBN was first released it was not yet common practice to store such things in "My Documents". AFAIK it cannot be changed.

I benchmarked it: Loading time om the same system (i5-3550), at same settings (Graphics Balanced/Balanced) CM Black Sea v2.16 Scenario 'Ambush' HDD 3,5" WD Caviar Blue 7200 rpm 500GB = 50 seconds loading time SSD Crucial M4 MX500 500GB = 40 seconds loading time Edit: A laptop 2,5" HDD may perform worse then this desktop HDD.

Good to hear that. Here they are. (Follow link in that topic).

CMSF2 Quick Battle Map Conversions For the Sim/Game "Combat Mission: Shock Force 2". Quick-Battle maps converted from CM Normandy - Commonwealth module to CMSF2. (Newer CMBN maps won't allow for that trick, and older CMBN maps aren't the most desirable, but the Commonwealth module had a few nice ones. Had to remove all buildings for this process within the old version of CMBN, and then in CMSF2 put them back again, by hand.) Several of these maps have bocage in them, which is not normally available in CMSF2. To make the bocage blend in a bit better with the Syria environment I added recolored bocage textures. Also Included is a CMFB map which was remade from scratch. That one only includes the first AI plan for each side, with multiple AI groups. Included maps(11): _CMBN Asslt Large Rough (water) QB-131.btt _CMBN Asslt Med Village QB-006.btt _CMBN Asslt Small Rough QB-081.btt _CMBN Meet Large Open (water) QB-258.btt _CMBN Meet Large Village QB-058.btt _CMBN Meet Large Village QB-086.btt _CMBN Meet Med Hills QB-245.btt _CMBN Meet Med Open QB-255.btt _CMBN Meet Med Village QB-203.btt _CMBN Meet Small Open QB-084.btt _CMFB Tiny Open-Rural (528 X 384) 100m.btt All credits to the Battlefront company for supplying the original maps, from which these modded ones were derived. Only for use in the Combat Mission games, other then that, this mod is free and non-profit. This mod cannot be held responsible for harm done to pixeltruppen. Copy the extracted .btt files into your "Game Files\Quick Battle Maps" folder Copy the extracted z-bocage-adjust folder to your install folder in the "data\" subfolder. ---------------- Download from this place: http://www.gb-homepage.nl/index.htm (Select "Combat Mission" in left navigation window)

(Drifting off the original topic, I know...) Well not a separate tool, but some debug functionality within the game. There is always some distance where the high detail model switches over to a lesser detail one. But when you are working on LODs you want the game to do that up close, temporarily. That is the only way to avoid errors, AFAIK. Thanks for the compliment, but no, I haven't made any 3D objects for CM. Just texture and map mods. I have no experience with Blender, but with a combination of 3D software from AutoDesk. Man, I am too spoiled with how well Strike Fighters 2 supports modded objects. It is still a lot of work, but everything is as easy as I think it could possibly be. And still I also burn out with working for that game: I would not consider making an aircraft from scratch, even ground vehicles from scratch takes me too long, after I did a couple. So for me the casual fun is in adapting bought models, or conversions from other games, and the latter I can't ever publish.

Yeah, of course, lol. Well I don't complain about modded content in principle, it is free and people have fun making it and using it, so that is the main thing. Also there are no tools for you to to check LOD synchronization. ( When I make objects for a game called Strike Fighters 2 I can easily change the switchover distances to test-setting like 80, 90, 100 and 110 meters. In the game zoom in and out a little, and see immediately what is working and what is odd. ) I don't know much about that one. I did briefly try that ground control module for DCS world, which is a similar thing, but never found the motivation to learn the controls. If I really want to drive a tank I have to be content with the ArmA 2 tank control. Which is not that bad in itself, but computer controlled vehicles behave like "solitary wild animals" IMO, and that breaks the immersion.

Yes, and part of my point was, that may also be a bottleneck. Suppose most of the Combat Mission 3D models are by "Cassio Lima Studio", as per the credits in the manual, and because of consistency in style and quality. I really like it. Contrary to for example Eugen's Wargame content, which is a mixup of styles and authors. In Cold War I noticed some deviation from that style/quality, plus malfunctioning LODs, and was a bit grumpy about that. Also, this is a bit of a controversial topic. It is like that with game modding in general: Make additional 3D objects for a game -> don't make low detail lods for them -> nobody notices that difference -> eventually frame rate suffers -> blame the engine and say it is unoptimized without actually knowing the cause. The average modder sees the main model and assumes the job is done, but it ain't. Complain and appear ungrateful. Reminds me of IL-2 Sturmovik. They had most of WW2 modeled in the 1946 edition in 2006. Then they come with revamped games like Battle of Britain and Bodenplatte, which are initially very narrow in scope. I don't know exactly because I prefer broad scope and lesser detail, so 1946 edition is what I stick with. Well, CMBN was the same situation compared to CMX1, I suppose, but I never played CMX1.

I have like 10 Quick-Battle maps converted from CM Normandy - Commonwealth module to CMSF2. Newer CMBN maps won't allow for that trick, and older CMBN maps aren't the most desirable, but the Commonwealth module had a few nice ones. I had to remove all buildings for this process within the old version of CMBN, and then in CMSF2 put them back again, by hand. I can upload them to my website, if you like.

You can buy 3D models on something like turbosquid alright, but to do it properly you still need to make lower detail models derived from the main one. To keep frame rates acceptable. If there are a few items without these LOD models it won't be that noticeable, but it all just adds up to the overall poly count. Programming and 3D modelling are different things of course.

Indeed, The file name says Sand Hollow. I never heard of it before.

That is much better and 100% correct, just like this one, in Utah. Sorry, could not help myself..

It is certainly an interesting photo: Many bunkers close together and also close to the sea. So it is tempting for publishers to use it even if not correct for Normandy beaches. You can imagine how such goes.

This source does not mention any useful info: https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-some-second-word-war-bunkers-are-built-in-the-sand-dunes-and-now-they-83631942.html Though I think this is a match: https://www.alamy.com/tourists-visiting-remains-of-bunkers-from-the-atlantic-wall-at-the-north-sea-beach-of-lkken-denmark-image378585929.html "North Sea beach of Løkken, Denmark"

Yeah, sorry as well. I get a bit annoyed when people talk 'we' in relation to military. But since it is normally not about the country I live in, but the US or something, I usually don't care much. I have no connection with Putin either. I don't trust him. ( Even though my neglected facebook page says I work at the Kremlin. That is just a joke, since I had to put some rubbish in that field. )

Man, do I also belong to the "we" and the "our" you are writing about? I am from the same country, you know? I have no solidarity with it. Still in the previous ****-storm, and THEY are ramping up the next one already (or just bluffing about it). But I will have no part in any of it.