Anson Pelmet

I've been playing continuously since CMBO and would love a major upgrade in ways of playing (eg, live hotseat battles against humans online, auto-generated careers, replayability of battles so you can follow one unit's progress from start to finish) and in graphics (better battle damage to vehicles, more realistic soldier movements) but having said all that I still find Combat Mission miles ahead of any other tactical wargames I see online in terms of realism of play (Post Scriptum and Hell Let Loose look gorgeous but play like kids running around randomly shooting each other). It's a bit like watching a 4k video on a huge new TV versus a VHS on a small screen - if the movie's crap no amount of graphics will make it good, and a good movie will always be good despite mediocre graphics...
 
 

I've been playing continuously since CMBO and would love a major upgrade in ways of playing (eg, live hotseat battles against humans online, auto-generated careers, replayability of battles so you can follow one unit's progress from start to finish) and in graphics (better battle damage to vehicles, more realistic soldier movements) but having said all that I still find Combat Mission miles ahead of any other tactical wargames I see online in terms of realism of play (Post Scriptum and Hell Let Loose look gorgeous but play like kids running around randomly shooting each other). It's a bit like watching a 4k video on a huge new TV versus a VHS on a small screen - if the movie's crap no amount of graphics will make it good, and a good movie will always be good despite mediocre graphics...
 
 

I've been playing continuously since CMBO and would love a major upgrade in ways of playing (eg, live hotseat battles against humans online, auto-generated careers, replayability of battles so you can follow one unit's progress from start to finish) and in graphics (better battle damage to vehicles, more realistic soldier movements) but having said all that I still find Combat Mission miles ahead of any other tactical wargames I see online in terms of realism of play (Post Scriptum and Hell Let Loose look gorgeous but play like kids running around randomly shooting each other). It's a bit like watching a 4k video on a huge new TV versus a VHS on a small screen - if the movie's crap no amount of graphics will make it good, and a good movie will always be good despite mediocre graphics...
 
 

No teasing about my name please. It was made up by my brother when we were kids, as the name of a character who was a test pilot in a comic book he was writing. And he wasn't even trying to think of a silly name. I found it funny then and have since...

No teasing about my name please. It was made up by my brother when we were kids, as the name of a character who was a test pilot in a comic book he was writing. And he wasn't even trying to think of a silly name. I found it funny then and have since...

Don't want to seem like a grammar Nazi (or like the other sort of Nazi you come across occasionally on this site) but a mistake I often see on these pages is in the use of its and it's, even from very competent writers. A useful trick I learned is that it's is always short for it is or it has. So if you apply that rule to "it's becoming clear that..." you can see it works perfectly. But if you apply that rule to "there are problems with it's performance..." you can immediately see it doesn't work, and you should instead be using its.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

Yes, I agree that based on viewing youtube vids a lot of player spend almost all their time half-a kilometer up in the air, and play with objectives on, which totally spoils the game's delightful aesthetics, in my humble opinion...

I'm shocked to hear you say most people play the game from high up in the air and rarely look at the game close-up and see its visual detail. To me Combat Mission's most appealing aspect is the ability to watch events unfold on a macro scale in WEGO, then repeat the go 1, 2, or 3 times and watch interesting events unfold from the perspective of single vehicles and even individual soldiers. For me that's the core of its uniqueness and charm.

I used to play a lot of East Front 2 and recall a self-generating campaign mode, in which you could buy a core force (including yourself in a kubelwagen) and then you'd be plunged into a randomly-chosen battle, and given a few non-core forces to play with too, and you had to fight that battle. And the interesting thing was that sometimes you had to attack and the defending force would be too strong, and you had to realise that and mimimise your losses, and opt for a 'defeat', and then what was left of your core unit would be transported to the next randomly-chosen battle. Between battles you'd be awarded some replacement points, which could be used to buy new units for your core, or reinforce existing units in the core. Units would start off as 'green' or 'regular' but as they got more combat experience their experience level and effectiveness would increase, so long as they didn't get too denuded in battle.  If you lost too many battles (2 or 3 in a row) you'd get a notice relieving you of your command and ordering you to report to the Gestapo, or something like that. Or if your commander unit (the name of which you could choose) was killed in action, the campaign automatically ended. I wonder if Combat Mission could one day have such a function. I remember it keeping me amused over 10-15 battles before my luck ran out... 

I used to play a lot of East Front 2 and recall a self-generating campaign mode, in which you could buy a core force (including yourself in a kubelwagen) and then you'd be plunged into a randomly-chosen battle, and given a few non-core forces to play with too, and you had to fight that battle. And the interesting thing was that sometimes you had to attack and the defending force would be too strong, and you had to realise that and mimimise your losses, and opt for a 'defeat', and then what was left of your core unit would be transported to the next randomly-chosen battle. Between battles you'd be awarded some replacement points, which could be used to buy new units for your core, or reinforce existing units in the core. Units would start off as 'green' or 'regular' but as they got more combat experience their experience level and effectiveness would increase, so long as they didn't get too denuded in battle.  If you lost too many battles (2 or 3 in a row) you'd get a notice relieving you of your command and ordering you to report to the Gestapo, or something like that. Or if your commander unit (the name of which you could choose) was killed in action, the campaign automatically ended. I wonder if Combat Mission could one day have such a function. I remember it keeping me amused over 10-15 battles before my luck ran out... 

I used to play a lot of East Front 2 and recall a self-generating campaign mode, in which you could buy a core force (including yourself in a kubelwagen) and then you'd be plunged into a randomly-chosen battle, and given a few non-core forces to play with too, and you had to fight that battle. And the interesting thing was that sometimes you had to attack and the defending force would be too strong, and you had to realise that and mimimise your losses, and opt for a 'defeat', and then what was left of your core unit would be transported to the next randomly-chosen battle. Between battles you'd be awarded some replacement points, which could be used to buy new units for your core, or reinforce existing units in the core. Units would start off as 'green' or 'regular' but as they got more combat experience their experience level and effectiveness would increase, so long as they didn't get too denuded in battle.  If you lost too many battles (2 or 3 in a row) you'd get a notice relieving you of your command and ordering you to report to the Gestapo, or something like that. Or if your commander unit (the name of which you could choose) was killed in action, the campaign automatically ended. I wonder if Combat Mission could one day have such a function. I remember it keeping me amused over 10-15 battles before my luck ran out... 

Thanks for the extensive and polite response, which I've just found.  I share the frustrations you list with the CM second generation games, but I don't see a viable competitor, perhaps because I don't play or investigate other games very much. Having said that, it was on an online games forum that I first heard about CM and its unique WEGO turn system, and I liked the concept so much I bought Beyond Normandy, more than 21 years ago, and I've been playing constantly since. So I'm not a newcomer to the game, I just don't post very often...
 

Thanks for the extensive and polite response, which I've just found.  I share the frustrations you list with the CM second generation games, but I don't see a viable competitor, perhaps because I don't play or investigate other games very much. Having said that, it was on an online games forum that I first heard about CM and its unique WEGO turn system, and I liked the concept so much I bought Beyond Normandy, more than 21 years ago, and I've been playing constantly since. So I'm not a newcomer to the game, I just don't post very often...
 

I never noticed this before: note how the American hand grenades roll down the hill before exploding! Great, gripping vid.

I never noticed this before: note how the American hand grenades roll down the hill before exploding! Great, gripping vid.

Re. "A couple of us are experimenting with long duration, small unit scenarios set on whopping maps...."
I love that idea,  but lack the skills and gumption to make such scenarios myself. Way too many campaigns and scenarios are so packed with soldiers and vehicles it looks like a car park! They often start off well with just a few forces but then as reinforcements arrive thick and fast the game turns into a traffic management exercise. And worse, because of restricted time frames you have to race these masses of forces across the map without adequate recon. I find I give up on loads of scenarios and campaigns because they feel totally unrealistic. I try to make more realistic games by playing quick battles with 'tiny' forces on 'large' or 'huge'  maps, with the time set on 2 hours, but purpose-built scenarios are always better. If others feel the same way maybe we'll get some official campaigns that use smaller forces. The drawback for me is I'm conservatively struck in WW2, so won't be able to try your upcoming Fire & Earth campaign...
 
 

Well done! Keep going and keep improving. Your video is already much better than a lot of youtube Combat Mission AARs out there, which leave the ugly objective markers on, and spend ages showing movement being plotted, or zoom all over the landscape and give you a headache. You've gone for the cinematic, story-telling style adopted by the best youtubers like Josey Wales. My only suggestion is that the overcast conditions make the visuals a bit soupy and undefined. It'd be good to have a few shadows picking out the details. Please keep 'em coming!

I like Red Thunder: Reckoning
Because the atrocities the German people suffered in the final Soviet assault on the Reich (and afterwards) weren't as terrible as those the Russian people were subjected to, and were the result of the majority of Germans supporting or failing to stand up to a racist, genocidal and dictatorial government that committed those horrors in their name. So it was a reckoning - the horrors they'd unleashed bouncing back on them!

"The prevalent culture here is that the customer is little more an an irritant and liable to be ignored for months on end - except when it comes to promoting new product and 'upgrades'. It is hardly surprising that these games are such a niche market when even the small current customer base is treated with such continued disdain"...
I think that's bit (lots) over the top. Battlefront is by all accounts a small company with limited resources, and its games and upgrades don't cost a lot (as far as I can tell from the position of somebody who only buys Battlefront games). They seem passionate about quality, and often warn fans that projects can drag out, and they'll only issue them when they're right.
There's still no game that comes close to the realism and playability of Combat Mission (largely thanks to the WEGO system), and I play only CM WW2 titles. Sure, it's annoying when troops jump out of their trenches into mortar barrages, or don't react quickly enough to enemies right in front of them, but I just put that down to the craziness of stressed-out troops on the battlefield, which I imagine often wrecked the carefully laid plans of real life battalion commanders...