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[WIP] modding CMSF into HD


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I have been working on an ISIS scenario, the idea of making a campaign is too overwhelming, moreso due to the lack of experience on both scenario and campaign making on my side.

Maybe I could make several scenarios with the same theme, but I recognize how much people enjoy campaigns most of all and for a reason.

Anyway, this is a preview of the map, I tried to represent a little border section between syria and iraq, using Google earth as a reference, the original idea was a campaign ranging from the border crossing to the capture of al rutba town in iraq, with a full speed warband to command against unprepared defensive forces.

2poocbt.jpg

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I do recommend taking a look at the Zawiya Uprising map(s) and they way that campaign works.

I think he created (at least one) single large map. Many missions then take place in various places on that large map with some overlap from previous missions. That gives you a xnt sense of making progress through a real area since doodads and burning vehicles etc are in the same place as one advances past them.

This approach works particularly well in an urban scenario.

You don't have to create your own map(s). I thought there were many Quick Maps and hopefully some of the designers of xnt maps (eg: for Zawiya or JOKER 3) may give you permission to use theirs.

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  • 3 years later...
On 8/13/2014 at 1:01 AM, Kieme(ITA) said:

 

14xmfk7.jpg

izx5if.jpg

Bump of an old thread. Kieme's modding heyday coincided with my enforced absence from CM. But this work is superb!  these should be the stock building textures for the new game.

On 8/15/2014 at 7:38 PM, Kieme(ITA) said:

A quick view to a potential add-on, some variated buildings useful to improve somehow the city feeling, it's the same as one of the released modded buildings, but with a couple of tricks, first attempt ever to create such thing, so here it is in a small mock-up situation (needed to check sizes comparison):

fyejoy.jpg

1q3msg.jpg

(from CMBS) 

317gto6.jpg

Edited by LongLeftFlank
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2 things.  Kieme's mod works in CMSF 2.  It is not stock and won't be as it is a third party mod, but yeah it is a mod I always use.  :DThe others you listed are independent buildings.  Modular buildings do not get that damage level look unfortunately.   CMSF and CMSF2 do not have independent buildings.

Edited by sburke
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1 hour ago, sburke said:

Modular buildings do not get that damage level look unfortunately.

Probably something to do with the amount of different textures Modulars have compared to the two or three choices of Independents. It's too bad they couldn't come up with a damage overlay along the lines of hit decals, only on a bigger scope.

I am surprised though they left Independent buildings out of the mix. I guess they didn't want to have to create new models to fit the setting?

 

Mord.

Edited by Mord
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51 minutes ago, Mord said:

Probably something to do with the amount of different textures Modulars have compared to the two or three choices of Independents. It's too bad they couldn't come up with a damage overlay along the lines of hit decals, only on a bigger scope.

I am surprised though they left Independent buildings out of the mix. I guess they didn't want to have to create new models to fit the setting?

 

Mord.

I assume so typical scope creep issue.  What do they keep adding.  I really wish there were some independents both for damage modeling and some variation, but I also want to see CMSF2 released so.....

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Noted on 3rd party mods.

I completely disagree re 'scope creep' though, given that independent buildings have been standard issue with all other new generation CM games. Several could be dropped right in from CMBS and CMFI with no texture work (Northwest Syria is *very* Mediterranean).

I mean, BFC has already done the work. Why not make it available, even if it doesn't appear in the repackaged content from SF1? The thick-walled village church (mosque) and the small flimsy (cinderblock) sheds and barns (which nonetheless block LOS) are *major* advances over CMSF1 for those of us who care about designing granular battlespaces in urban, village or industrial  areas.  As opposed to dropping random buildings on a map footprint and pretending that's a 'town'.

They gave us the tools back in 2011, and now they're taking them away? cuz they can't be arsed or got burnt out fiddling with highway overpasses or sumfink?*

And if those bog standard features are *not* in fact easy to drop in, why the heck not? Did BFC outsmart itself with this whole Families thing?

* not dissing the highway overpasses, btw.

20180103044245-eeafaed8.jpg

Edited by LongLeftFlank
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Well having seen some of what has gone into CMSF2 there has to be a line somewhere and unfortunately (or fortunately in the interests of staying focused) I don’t get to choose for them. I think they are long past how much effort this was thought to take and yet they still offered a hefty discount for owners of CMSF. 

You cant just drop the buildings in, you also have to alter the scenario editor list to include them and probably do other things I am unaware of. 

Edited by sburke
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1 minute ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Yeah, I get all that, and I sympathize. But if the legacy engine has locked them into this kind of "2 steps forward and 1 step back" then Houston brainjar we have a problem and it's time to move on to engine 3.

 

I don’t think it is an issue of the engine locking them in.  It is a question of a thousand different things folks want and only being able to do 995 but that 5 includes one item somebody is passionate about. 

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Sure, again, all noted but unlike the 995 I'm not asking for CoPlay or some other new functionality, just not to delete perfectly adequate features that have been present since CMBN 1.0 just because they don't appear in the stock CMSF scenarios (of course they didn't, nor did overpasses etc.).

Edited by LongLeftFlank
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Well then, I wish you joy with your latest open country übertank shooter, gents.

But at this moment it looks like this gives infantry players very little that isn't already present in SF1. No sale for me before I try the demo and see if infantry is still ditching cover, earth pimple fortifications are still spotted in 30 seconds or less, etc.

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39 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Well then, I wish you joy with your latest open country übertank shooter, gents.

But at this moment it looks like this gives infantry players very little that isn't already present in SF1. No sale for me before I try the demo and see if infantry is still ditching cover, earth pimple fortifications are still spotted in 30 seconds or less, etc.

As noted in a prior thread I had an ATGM kill 2 Challenger 2s firing some 5 rounds and never get spotted.  This certainly isn't an uber tank game. As to the rest, well that is something you'll have to decide for yourself.  We all have our point of what we consider values worth.  Only you can decide what yours is.

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You want pie-in-the-sky wishlist stuff where I had an expectation of getting 0 out of 24, this was mine. But what I wasn't expecting was that features would be taken away!

On 4/16/2017 at 10:11 PM, LongLeftFlank said:

Here's my humble 'tweaks' wish list for the CMSF2 reboot, in priority order. I assume here that all existing CMSF and all CMBS 4.0 content and functionality becomes available. I excluded dreaming up "new" features that really need a CMx3 engine (e.g co-play, camo nets for vehicles/ fortifications, limited tank gun elevation vs adjacent targets).

Note my top asks are terrain-related, as intelligent use of cover is one of the only 'equalizers' RED has to use in the game.

1. Default modular building walls are thin, as in CMSF1 (mud brick or cinderblock), but also have heavier square pillars at the corners that provide tree trunk like cover. Can also be used to simulate open shops, garages, under construction, etc.

RPGAlley-Red.jpg

2. Buildings don't collapse very readily under HE fire, crushing occupants. Instead, thin curtain walls are readily torn away / blown out, leaving a ragged skeleton of pillars and flooring intact.

BabaAmr_ruins2.jpg

3. Building floors are dense poured cement, providing significantly better hard cover than do walls against fire directed up or down through them.

4. Custom buildings include a minaret with 2 man max capacity (and multiple textures), or at least an oversized doodad with no functionality.

5. Keep modular buildings with flat roofs and parapets a la CMSF, but give some custom buildings angled (steel or tiled) roofs.

6. Reskin the thin-walled double height 1 story European barn as a tin roofed high bay or warehouse area (no rooftop access). Option to ctrl+click remove one or more walls, leaving 4 corner pillars (i.e. the last stage of 'damage' is total removal of the wall)

7. Standard building skins include open fronted shop types ubiquitous in the Middle East.

2012_Syrian_Army.jpg

 

FSA_BabaAmr.jpg

8.  Ctrl+Alt+click window/door frame toggle includes a "gutted" version with windows and doors removed (alpha channel transparent)

Ruin1.jpg

8. At least 6 different skins for the tiny European Shed outbuilding, with minimal windows. Third world settlements contain countless sheds,  shacks, cookhouses and shanties, mostly cinderblock or mudbrick with rusty tin roofs.

9. Top asks for new Flavour objects: COSCO shipping containers, lie down freezers, an alternate skin for the bus shelter object to represent shopfront awnings.

Souk_1-1.jpg

10. Doodad cars, lorries and buses, each with multiple skins, including new, rusty and charred wreck. Also a soil type containing a slick of burned oil. (Charred wrecks add mucho atmosphere to otherwise sterile maps).

Roadblocks.jpg

11. Wider range of CM tree types including Med climate CMFI vegetation, plus conifers for higher altitude areas.

12. For each AI order, designer can paint map squares for units to *avoid* (as if it contained impassable terrain), as well as destinations. A simple fix to hinder zombietruppen banzai charging down roads etc....

AI_Fail.jpg

13.  Some way to fortify/sandbag/thicken selected walls of upper building levels, and rooftop parapets (aware that this is harder than it sounds in CMx2 as fortifications are a kind of vehicle). Perhaps just a thicker-walled small square modular building we can then use to "harden" portions of a larger structure.

14. "Rout / remove" (!) feature for all non-Fanatic Uncon infantry, not just Spies. Units removed in this way don't count as kills for VP. If possible, link rout probability to pop density (i.e. guerrillas who strike then fade into the population)

15. Tall clusters of reeds/grasses/ thornbrush for watery/marsh areas (high LOS block). These grow prolifically in any Mideast water source. Something like the growth atop gapped Bocage, without the embankments.

Mangroves.jpg

16. Units and men stay inside buildings and don't enter balconies if their facing is <30 degrees in each direction from perpendicular to that building wall. Otherwise, they do use the balcony (i.e. to gain LOS up a street).

Facing.jpg

17. Western forces facing Uncon units do not Surrender. They know what happens....

18.  Some kind of locked (driveway) gate in a High Wall section that any unit can 'Blast' a gap in without special charges, after a brief delay.  (Even better would be a Toggle allowing these gates to be freely passable to a Defender without blasting (presumed to have support of occupants), but this may require too much brainjar....)

19. Uncon sections (not snipers, MG or RPG teams) don't take a prone position when fighting, except when they Pin or Cower.  Middle Easterners tend to think of it as unmanly, unless they receive Western-style military training.

20. "Poor" equipment Uncons get SMLEs or Mausers instead of SVDs.

21. Ambient smoke and haze from explosions lingers in the air for longer (toggle it with the Toggle Smoke switch). Also, would love to see bigger plumes of smoke and more cookoffs from burning wrecks (which also turn black). Again, immersion without major new functionality.

Joker3-30min_2.jpg

22.  True Humvee guntruck with better protected gun turret, as well as "passenger" version with open topped rear and higher seating capacity (don't make me reskin a BRDM).

Guntrucks.jpg

23.  I personally like the idea of a "collonade" or a wall surface with multiple doorways, for fights in mosques or Old Town areas.

Ramadi_S_SaddamMosque_Int3.jpg

24.  Add a fourth wall type: reinforced cement wall/barrier sections in common use by Allied forces and civil highway authorities alike, both low ("Jersey barrier") and high (T wall or "Texas barriers"). Should be breachable only by fully tracked vehicles, main gun rounds, or demo charges.

X

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Well it is a good thing that you are not a program manager because your project would never release due to feature creep :)

As for nothing for infantry in SF2 I think you will find (well it will be there, we'll see if you find it) that plenty has changed with regard to infantry behaviour. They have better spacing, better pathfinding, FOW entrenchments, and even better models.

Come on man, the glass is half full, more that half even.

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Same here.....Looking on the bright side, we have a new iteration of the game and all the modules, as a base-line. 

If it proves popular BF might decide to add some new features down the road.

It should also bring in a new generation of CM:SF players who we can gleefully traumatise in Ramadi & Mosul.....We even have some new tools to do it with!  :ph34r:

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Don't hold your breath on that, mate. Infantry is the poor cousin of the tanks, which is really what most folks are here for. Look at the AARs. But anyway, I plan to drop it, or at least take it offline until they release. Nunc dimittis.

(bonus points for referencing 'Seljuks' in a heavy metal lyric)

Edited by LongLeftFlank
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