WhiteWolf65
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Posts posted by WhiteWolf65
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27 minutes ago, Wicky said:
Okay - show us the coding you can do to to implement necessary use of motorcycles on front line - including reversing
animations showing pixeltroopen putting the bike on its centre stand when parking up, shooting on the move and importantly jumping over barb wire fences. Again if you want to mimic motorcycle reccie riders get a nominated driver & pile em up in a jeep or Kubel - park up behind behind a house or trees when approaching suspected enemy locations, disembark and walk a bit further to watch & wait rinse & repeat....
I'm not going there because I don't want to be kicked off these forums. You want to discuss this in private, fire away.
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3 hours ago, Bud Backer said:
Don’t sweat it. Meds and forced inactivity don’t make for a peaceful mind. I was just teasing you.
i agree with you on the issue of realism and playability with old board games. I bought nowhere near as many as you, but I’ve had my share and while I started with AH Battle of the Bulge, with its division - level units, I sought more “realism”and less abstraction. Down the rabbit hole to PanzerLeader and PanzerBlitz, eventually to all the modules for Squad Leader, and branching out to other things like Vietnam, etc.
Trouble was, being able to recollect all the rules for something as complex as SL, (and rule revisions as old ones were superseded) became an issue. As was battle preparation - it took time to set everything up. So much time that playing with others became an impossibility. We’d never finish what we started and that was unsatisfying.
Returning to simpler things like PanzerBlitz with its simpler mechanics and manageable scale, it ended up that “too much” realism was replaced with something that just worked.
Computers were a revolution for me. I didn’t have to play both sides, and I didn’t have to spend hours putting counters on a map (only to jar the board with a knee and have to start over). When SSI came out with Steel Panthers, I was instantly hooked. This was as close to SL one could get without the pain. CM bested that of course, but this isn’t meant to be a game comparison, more that as much as I seek realism and depth, there comes a point where it’s just work and not play.
Dying (which I did last Friday) definitely has it drawbacks......I HATE HOSPITAL BEDS!!!!! I know you were teasing.
My very first game was Guadalcanal and then Midway. Guadalcanal wasn't that fun but Midway sure was.
I had all of the SPI monster games, including Atlantic Wall. That map was over seven feet long. A friend of mine and I were going to try to play it but it took us nearly three whole days to set it up. And then one of our dear little furry creatures (spelled CAT) decided that it was the best place in the house to take a nap.
There were as many pieces left of him as there were counters in the game when I got finished with him (no, I didn't kill the cat, but he is lucky I didn't).
I lent my copy of SPI's Highway to the Reich to a college student that she used as a visual aide for her Master's dissertation on airborne operations in World War II. Sadly, every single game I owned (all 900+) along with my 15,000 piece collection of GHQ and CNC miniatures were destroyed in a house-fire.
I was the same as you when SSI came out with Steel Panthers and Steel Panthers MBT (man those aircraft delivered ICMs were devastating in that game).
Agree completely with your last statement. I tried playing the entire invasion of Normandy using Matrix Game's Campaign Series. It took nearly an hour to watch my opponents replays (15 to 20 minutes alone for all his artillery barrages to complete) and then I would spend at least three hours making my moves. I was also involved in a scenario depicting the Battle of Aachen. Imagine playing with over nine divisions on the US side and at least five divisions of the German side at the platoon level. Same thing as with the Normandy scenario. Sometimes, even with computer games, they do tend to be more like work than play. I think that when I return to playing PBEM CM scenarios, I am going to limit myself to tiny and small sized scenarios, with the occasional medium. Short and bloody is going to become the norm for me. Big and huge scenarios....just too much micro-management issues.
**Chris**
Geez Luweez, four or five edits. Still in a haze and not a good one either.
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36 minutes ago, Bud Backer said:
This is the forum equivalent of drunk dialing!
We’re sitting here wondering..huh? What was that all about.
I don't even know why I posted that stupid one liner last night. Brain just won't shut up.
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Morning gents,
Well the Zanax fog has lifted enough that I think I can continue this topic.
Many of you know that I've been playing war-games for 50+ years now. In that long period of my gaming history, I have played the traditional board type games (Panzer Blitz and a ton of others), 1/285th scale World War II miniatures (Eastern Front), computers (since 1981/82) and even reenactment (Society for Creative Anachronism....heavy fighter and armourer) from the mid 70s to the mid 80s although this was a little extreme as it was definitely REAL. Got the broken fingers and knocked out teeth to prove it.
When I was playing the conventional board games back in the day, I was buying every game published (Avalon Hill, SPI, Yaqunito, Game Designer's Workshop and others) that I could lay my hands on (I think I had over 900 games at one time). Over time though some of those games got so complicated as the companies tried to inject more realism into their products and they became dust collectors on my bookshelves. I completely gave up on conventional war games when Advanced Squad Leader was published. In order to play that game you almost needed an advanced degree in military history/tactics to play it. It got to the point that spending hours and hours playing those scenarios and the rules arguments that often happened (yes, I have gotten into dice throwing wars....bad temper) that it, well it just wasn't fun anymore. I wound up selling all of my ASL material for $150 on Ebay. I still have a large collection of Avalanche Press' Panzergrenadier/World War II platoon level games (about $1,500) but it is in storage, More about what I plan to do with that game series in another post as it relates to the Combat Mission World War II titles.
**Break. Gotta change O2 tank** Gotta tell ya' that lugging an O2 tank around so you can breathe is not fun.
I am sure by this point of this topic you are saying to yourself, "Get to the topic and quit with the personal history lesson.". Okay, I will.
With the advent of the personal computer, it opened up a whole new realm for war games, IMHO so I hopped on the wagon. The one disadvantage of computer war-games is well, ya gotta have a computer (and almost need a CRAY to run some of the newer games being published these days). The advantages, too many to list and I am sure you already know what they are. I haven't killed a cat in ages (send me a P/M and I'll explain the cat thing to you).
With today's computer's the companies can and should do what TAHGC tried to do with Advanced Squad Leader. If you think about it, what is Combat Mission? A pretty close 3-D representation of ASL. Yes, there is much that could be done to improve it to even a higher level of realism, but I'll leave that to the experts. You know though, I sure would love to see a helicopter flame into the ground after getting ripped apart by a Tunguska. The "Aircraft Destroyed" notification just doesn't do it for me.
**Chris**
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On 6/25/2019 at 4:37 PM, Michael Emrys said:
I think maybe the last large scale use of motorcycle-borne troops in combat was 1940 in France and the Low Countries. Once they had enough trucks, those were the preferred mode of transport for fighting troops. Recon battalions continued their use for a while longer, but massed formations on motorcycles just wasn't on.
Michael
That is what I am saying. I did not suggest they be a primary means of transport for combat troops but for recon work. The advantages of a recon motorcycle team are 1) They can transverse almost any type of terrain, including heavy woods, 2) they are fast (now you see me, now you don't), and 3) they are hard as hell to spot when hidden in certain types of terrain. I think they would play a very important part in Combat Mission.
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5 hours ago, Combatintman said:
At least they were wearing helmets though …
Probably more than the dumbs**ts here in South Carolina? LOL>
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On 6/25/2019 at 1:29 PM, Wicky said:
More work for BFC to work on complex motorcycle animations when gamey recon 'sploding jeeps & kubelwagens can do much the same job...
Really? Ask yourself this question. What exactly is BFC attempting to simulate with all of the Combat Mission titles? To give US (the players) the fun of recreating a very important part of history, World War II. I am sure that the graphics necessary to model any of the motorcycles used by any of the nations would not be that hard to do. And as far as 'sploding jeeps and kubelwagens, well my friend if you put them in my LOS, then yep I will turn them into junk. All nations used motorcycles all the way up to the end of the war, especially in the recon mode. Just ask some of the United States veterans that fought in France in 44/45.
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I was going to start this topic this evening but I'm too zonked out on my Zanax at the moment to think clearly enough to convey my thoughts on this topic. I will resume this topic tomorrow.
Yeah, this was sort of a click-bait topic now and I apologize for that.
Nite all,
**Chris**
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4 hours ago, RockinHarry said:
me or generally? As said I have two german originals HDV 300 as of 1933 and the 1923 HDV 487 as well. Though the latter is not quite too good condition nearing almost a hundred years of age.
Regarding Stackpole stuff, I´d also recommend Schneiders Panzer Tactics from their collection. In case you want to know almost everything on german tank tactics related in WW2.
Yes, that was one of my next purchases. Kampfgruppe Peiper at the Battle of the Bulge is really good. Lots of 1:50000 scale and smaller tactical maps. Lots of good scenario material in that book.
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6 minutes ago, Blazing 88's said:
1,2,3,4... where do I click to pay?
No interest in South Pacific CM.
Like I said.
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4 minutes ago, IanL said:
I find it humours when people assert that idea X or Y will make them bundles of more money with nothing at all to support such a position.
It is the customer that will buy X or Y because of the feedback you see here and on other forums dealing with Combat Mission. Okay, I'll post this question and let's see how many members of this forum would like to see these possible new CM games. 1) Tunisia after the United States got involved, 2) The lengthy battles of Tobruk, 3) Early and Late Stalingrad, 4) Northern and Southern flanks of Kursk and so on. The one theater of the war that I am sure would not be very popular, would be the war in the Southern Pacific with the possible exception after the Allies started island hopping (those were some extremely intense and bloody battles).
**Chris**
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BTW, I just added about seven new Stackpole books for my reference library. 1: Kampfgruppe Peiper at the Battle of the Bulge, 2: Retreat to the Reich: The German Defeat in France, 1944, 3: The Siege of Kustrin: Gateway to Berlin, 4: The Germans in Normandy, 5: German Order of Battle: Panzer, Panzergrenadier, and Waffen SS, 6: Normandy '44 (D-Day and the Epic 77 Day Battle for France), and 7: Tank Tactics: From Normandy to Lorraine. I plan to expand my Stackpole reference library in the weeks and months to come.
**Chris**
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12 minutes ago, RockinHarry said:
Just read at Amazon:
"English translation of the military manual that guided the German Army in World War II. This book was carried into battle by officers and NCOs and had been classified by the U.S. Army until the year 2000. Topics include command, attack, defense, tanks, chemical warfare, logistics, and more."
Classified until 2000? Now that´s BS for sure! (guess it´s simple advertising, must buy thingy) The Hdv 300 Truppenführung (of which 2 originals I have from 1933) in fact were written in the 1920ies / early 30ies more as basics to be applied as ideal german conducting war principles at that time and later. Think much of what "von Seeckt" worked out past WW1 made its entries here as well (carried over from 1923 Hdv 487 "Command and battle of combined arms"). Nonetheless a recommended read and with some adaptions surely had full validity in WW2 and way beyond. At ~20 $ I´d likely buy. Mine ebay originals weren´t more expensive couple of years ago.
I highly recommend you purchase this book. It has a lot of very informative information on how Germany conducted itself during the war, IMHO
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47 minutes ago, IanL said:
As will continuing on their current path
They just get to the place where they can make the new game families later - that is all.
LOL my added bold. Not only would that mean people could create all kinds of unrealistic equipment the only thing I can see it doing to profit is reducing it. I think BFC will have to see a detailed business plan for how sales will go up with customers having to do more work.
And pray-tell where do you find the funny side of that idea? I am not being argumentative with you and you very well might be right but BFC could hold the design of a yet-to-be designed new unit made by a modder to historical limitations. No, I don't want to see mods like any of the German Entwicklung series or the outlandish Landkreuzer P:1000 (Ratte) or P:1500 Monster.
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On 6/23/2019 at 5:22 AM, Kaunitz said:
I sometimes ask myself how often these kinds of close quarter ambush positions were really used. To me, they seem a bit suicidal. True, you might knock out a few enemies, but your chance to get away after that (or to get away with a crew-served weapon) were probably rather slim? I would not volunteer to man an ATG that was supposed to fire at tanks at close quarter.
Setting up troops in highly "effective" but suicidal positions is something that can't really be prevented in CM. Pixeltruppen don't have a high degree of tactical awareness and no will of their own except when panicking.
That's not to say that it never happened in reality. Fanatic or naive units sometimes did set up in suicidal positions. Some of them were not even "effective", as demonstrated by an example quoted and translated from Joseph Klein's book "Fallschirmjäger", from the chapter on the third battle of Monte Cassino:
"Pixeltruppen" as you describe our beloved CM fighters, may not have as much tactical awareness as their human counter-parts but I feel that they can be more than what they currently are. As it stands now, our Pixeltruppen, have a very limited number of options when it comes to their own preservation. They can either carry out the command as given to them, pop smoke, cower, run away or die. I do feel that the A/I of the pixeltruppen could be improved upon to where a squad of men led by a competent (veteran soldier) should also have the ability to refuse to follow an order if that order has a high, or even a moderate, degree chance of turning that squad into a bunch bloody body parts on the battlefield.
As I have mentioned in previous posts, read how effective concealed German weapons (from infantry up to heavy towed weapons) were at destroying advancing US infantry and armored units as the US was making it's way to Cologne. One excellent source of how Germany conducted combat operations during the war is "On the German Art of War: Truppenfuhrung: German Army Manual for Unit Command in World War II" by Bruce Condell and David T Zabecki, published by Stackpole Books. This is an excellent book for anyone that is interested in how the German Army conducted combat operations during the war. And, it's pretty cool to read while listening to Dark Side of the Moon by Floyd. LOL
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Good morning gentlemen,
It was a good thing I wore my flak jacket when I posted this topic. What I want everyone to understand is that there are so many possibilities for the current CM engine and I in no way was putting down the game or the plans that the development team have for future products, even if it seemed I was. Combat Mission is, and always will be my go to tactical level game dealing with World War II and modern era warfare. I've worked on, beta-tested and played many others (not going to list them) and they do not compare to even to the 20 year-old versions of CM. I will continue to post suggestions as it pertains to all the games but not as "Click Bait". If the administrators give me a warning to stop, then I will. I would hate to be banned from this forum.
Saying that, I would personally like to see new CM titles dealing with other periods of World War II whether they might be considered a popular title or not. There are those of us that would buy them and I would personally be an advocate for them on any of the social media sites that I am currently a member of or might be in the future.
I hope all of you have a great week.
**Chris**
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If you want to see the competition that BFC is up against, just check out the Steel Division games by Paradox Interactive. That is what concerns me about future plans for BFC. Again, just a dedicated player of CM and customer of BFC.
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3 hours ago, sburke said:
only problems with that theory is BF has explicitly mentioned not doing early war or North Africa... The actual financial picture for that is not as rosy as it's advocates seem to think. Still one can dream. BF plans are mostly articulated around financial return. Late war NW Europe is apparently the cash cow. That then determines what you do next.....
It is a strange method indeed. Sort of like building a house with the roof first, then the walls, and finally the foundation. And there is only so much less left to do with Late war NW Europe. We are almost to the point of the invasion of Germany itself (actually it is already there with Final Blitzkrieg). About the only new NW Europe title I could foresee would be something like Battle of Aachen or the Siege of Cologne. After that, the war was pretty much a boring job of mopping up what remained of the German forces and that would be boring as hell for me, as a gamer.
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What I fear most for the great group of designers at BFC is that they are only going to be able to go so far with any new World War II games or add-on modules. Sure, new units that had been left out of the original games is good, but there aren't many more weapon systems that can be added if they don't develop new titles for the earlier periods of the war. I myself would love to see a game dealing with the German airborne invasion of Crete or the Russian cavalry charges that happened during the war, even in the later stages of the war. As far as modern titles, the same holds true. All of the major nations in the world are constantly adding new weapon systems but for BFC to say that ending the Black Sea or Shock Force games at a particular date is going to kill the sales for those games as well. I just don't want to see BFC go out of business. You are just too damn good to let that happen. Please don't let it happen.
A very dedicated Combat Mission player and concerned customer.
**Chris**
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There is a fix to these problems but I doubt that BFC would go along with it. Open up the possibility of letting the mod guru's design those vehicles, tanks, and weapons that could be used for earlier periods of the war or theaters of the war that BFC does not feel would be profitable for them to do. To me, such an option would literally make their profit margins for the basic games go sky high. Each new model designed would follow the same guidelines as far as how a certain unit performs in battle; armor thickness, ROFs, caliber of guns, speed and other specs relative to that particular unit so that the new unit is compatible with the CM Game Engine. Design the model and then simple fill in the data for each new model. Same could be used to add more visual eye candy for terrain. Why do you think the guys at Bohemia Interactive Studios are getting absolutely rich off the ArmA series? Because it is so easily modded. I have over 2.2 TB of mods for ArmA III alone and I can fight almost any period of combat I wish to fight. I say make Combat Mission an Open Source game.
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3 minutes ago, RockinHarry said:
not yet. lol
I know him from the CSI series, but I hope I´m not looking that old yet. 
Here ya go. Spittin' image. LOL
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7 minutes ago, RockinHarry said:
Think it was rather common in late war. Found some this vehicles track segments and bolts (and parts of the front drive wheel) in some german forest couple of years ago. Apparently was abandoned and blown up by it´s own crew. Sold to a happy collector thereafter.
Very cool find. When I lived in Tuscon, AZ I visited the PIMA Air & Space Museum and bought a spent 30 mm shell fired from an A-10. I got to find that and put it on my desk. BTW, has anyone ever told you that you could be the twin brother of Gary Sinise, especially as Lt. Dan in Forrest Gump?
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When, and if, there is an vehicle update for Red Thunder I hope that the Raupenschlepper OST is not forgotten. Maybe the ATG version as well. I just think it is a very cool looking vehicle.
**Chris**
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4 hours ago, Bud Backer said:
The Germans also had some fine BMW motorcycles, not just the Kettenrad.
I did list the Zudapp KS 750 and BMW R, with and without sidecars.
They just get to the place where they can make the new game families later - that is all.
I know him from the CSI series, but I hope I´m not looking that old yet. 
Motorcycles?????
in Combat Mission - General Discussion
Posted
Fair enough, but I don't appreciate being made to look like an ass that doesn't know what he is talking about. Woo Sa. Btw, my nurses love me....so there