Casualties

[CRourke]

I was wondering if ya'all have decided to include any visual feedback on casualties. That is to say, are there going to be any bodies. I think the faq mentioned that this was under consideration, but could be problematic due to the high polygon count of having an entire squad get wasted. For that matter, I don't think I'd want to see 12 bodies being produced from a group of 3 "men". Even if it was the enemy. But I was rather hoping that there would be someway of seeing where your men fell. I was thinking perhaps small blood stains on the ground where casualties took place. Please don't take that the wrong way, I'm not interested in seeing gore or the blood itself, and I'd hate to revive that flamethrower argument of some months past. But I do think that getting feedback on where your men are dropping like flies is valuable. Heck, for all I care, you could have little crosses pop up where they fell. People, I think, want to be able to look over a battle field and see that something has happened there. The wrecks, shell holes, and small spots of blood all come together to tell a story of the fighting that took place. Anyway, I know you guys are pretty much done fooling around with graphics anyway, but I thought it would be good food for thought for the future.

And while I'm thinking of it, how does CM handle casualties? I think it would be acceptable at this scale to just treat wounds as either insignifigant or rendering the soldier totally combat ineffective. Is there any secondary effect on the squad other than the usual psychological blow of taking casualties? I've heard that one of "best" things about wounding an enemy soldier is that treating him usually ties up 1-3 other soldiers.

Chris

[Fionn]

Chris,

YES it has been calculated that it is FAR better just to wound an enemy (if he is rendered long-term combat ineffective) than just killing him. If he's wounded he ties up soldiers who could be advancing, medical resources, hospital beds, scientific resources, manufacturing resources (building prosthetic limbs etc)..

Also there's a peculiar morale effect on possible recruits of seeing boys 2 years older than them come home without legs or an arm you know?

Hence mines now have almost totally plastic filling (shrapnel) since plastic doesn't show up on x-rays and so operations are MUCH longer and MUCH more dangerous..

I've studied battle wounds in a fair bit of detail during my medical studies and I've found a lot of covergence agreeing its better to wound badly than to kill (in general).

[Guest Big Time Software]

Chris, we are still not planning on showing where men fall. Personally, I think it could add something to the game, but do not think it would make me plan any differently. Battles are usually pretty fast and furious, and the maps not so big that you don't have a grasp of who is getting nailed where. We plan on seeing what the beta testers have to say about it before making a final decision.

We don't specifically model guys staying with wounded. This is tough to do because wounding is so very subjective. Someone that gets a bullet in the thigh (missing the really bad stuff) might be able to hobble back on his own without help. But a guy that catches something in the face or neck might not be so lucky. The way we are going about this is playing the game and seeing if the casualty rates "feel" correct, and leave it at that. As it stands now I would say that it feels nearly bang on.

Fionn, there is another reason why the guts of a mine are plastic -> very hard to detect. The Germans were the first (I think) to make non-metal mines. They used bakelite, glass, and wood mines to great effect. The US troops HATED the Germans for using such "unfair" weapons. Now it is standard fair. Oh, and plastic mines are cheaper to make too.

Steve