OK, CCIV sucks...

[Kraut]

Ahhh ... here's a board where i can really let my dissapointment in cc4 come to light without being haggled. Especially by that mad bunny ... lol

I'm one of those, who "rushed" out to get the game the moment i knew it was in stores (i contribute this eagerness to get my lazy ass off the couch partly to the fact that i havn't bought a game in about four months). I knew the battles would be shaky at best from the pityful demo, but i just needed to see the full package for myself. At first i was a *little* enthusiastic about the game, because there seemed to be a lot of stuff to explore and units/features to use (one thing i like about CM is all the different stuff to try, makes for good "early-game" fun). After playing two campaigns, one GE the other US and both about 15 battles each, against the AI i was bored, frustrated and found that i still wasn't used to those terrible german voices (i've had nightmares from them already, seriously). So i went online and played several games direct ip. I found those games to be equally boring. Infantry are useless, except for acting as "radar" for tanks. Infantry die at 300m from a M5 firing it's .30 cals and 37mm within seconds, while sneaking in dense forrest. MG's chop 'em up, eventhough they are inside stone houses. Zip zip zip, three men dead ... blech !

The game revolves around tanks. Tanks tanks tanks ... i found that all you had to do is mass your tanks, then rush them up a flank and hope that you will take the enemy out before he tankes you out. In at least three online game i played, i was taking severe losses while playing the smarter, slower and safer way. When i massed my remaining armor and rushed it up the enemies flank however, i won all games. No fun in that, since i've done this a million times in C&C Red Alert ...

I feel atomic has now completely stepped over the line from no-mans land into the realm of the flashbang, mainsteam RTS game. It feels like playing AOE, C&C or starcraft with WW2 tanks, and men holding "authentic" weaponry ...

MK

[Guest titan]

As a loyal cc1-3 fan im trying real hard to talk myself into buying cc4,i know they lost there way with cc3 to tanky for a start.inf got killed to easy etc,i was hoping it to come out with a better campaign system which it seems it has.But the more i hear about it the more i feel put off.It has'nt arrived in the shops in NZ yet but im begining to feel i dont even want to go a check it out.

Is it really that bad,were inf get gunned down so easy and rocket firing shermans know out king tigers with direct indirect HITS!

Boy,ive been waiting for that game for so long and with all the criticism they got on the RR forum i thought they may have been abit more astute with this sucker,so far from what ive heard it sounds worse.

Damn the campaign system sounds great to. I couldnt ask for a better system EXCEPT get the damn game play right as well.

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AUCK

New Zealand

Superpower waiting to happen

[This message has been edited by titan (edited 11-23-99).]

[Kraut]

Believe me titan, cc4 is really a bore. To someone who liked cc2 it is especially troublesome.

The overall "feel" of the game leaves a lot to be desired. It just doesn't awake those adrenalin-filled moments i've enjoyed so many times in cc2. It's just a dud ...

About infantry survivability, which for me is the core problem, well, i don't know what those people, who say infantry are fine, are smokin', but it must be something REALLY strong. No offense to the crackheads, but i honestly don't see how they can come to such conclusions.

IF you can get the game and return it (like us americans), then you should probably check it out (unless you live on one of those sheep-farms in the middle of nowhere ), but if you can't get your money back, i would at least wait a few months until it's cheap AND there are some mods.

MK

[Moonpie]

Well I am a CC veteran. Have'em all except CCiV. I was really looking foward to it because I like the Germans and they never got a fair shot except in Market Garden (CCII).

Liked the graphics...they looked improved. It was hunky dory until I tried to drive my tank across the bridge. That snapped it for me. That has to be the BIGGEST complaint of all in the series and it actually seems to be worse?!? That tears it for me.

$19.99 bin here I come for once!

[CoolColJ]

I'm not eeven gonna bother downloading the demo - not at 50+megs on a 56.6k modem, well Unreal Tournament and Quake3 demotest I downloaded, but I knew they would be good, but CC4 been theree done that, I can't believe how flat CC3 looks to me! The only flat games I'll except are ones that look like a boardgame, ala ASL.

I'm so used to 3d (I play heaps of FPS games), there is no turning back.

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CCJ

aka BLITZ_Force

My Homepage - Just updated, check out my MP3

and Combat Mission photos

www.geocities.com/coolcolj/

[dumbo]

Titan, I am afraid CC4 is pretty bad. If you dont care about realism then it may be fun for the first 4 battles after that then the difficulty level (or lack thereof) of the game starts to kick in on the annoyance level.

A few peaches.

1.) In the grand campaign my US front line comprising of 2 AT guns and 2 bazookas with a few units of sponges (this is what infantry is in CC4 a sponge to absorb tank fore for a few turns) has successfully held off Peipers main armoured force (5 or 6 panthers with backup) for 5 battles and still going strong. How? Just hide then retake the Victory points after the germans have left. They never do any sweeps so you can repeat this for as long as you want.

2.) The germans and Americans have an MRLS unit with cluster AP bomblets. The german one is a rocket halftrack the Yank one is a sherm callipole. Basically this unit get to kill whatever open top units it wants until it runs out of ammo. So you can expect to nab 3-4 halftracks or M10's per unit till it runs out of ammo. Even more absurd is these units have NO fire arc. I lost two M10's to the German rocket halftrack in an amusing episode. The Rocket launcher was DIRECTLY behinf a levl 2 building (I mean right up next to it.) nearby I had an M10 directly behind a levl 3 building (opposite side). The Rocket launcher killed it no problem. If you think about the angles involved here for a second you will see that the Rockets must be AP guided

3.) 81mm mortars simply "pop" halftracks at will. As soon as you see a halftrack target it with your lightest mortar and wait for it to blow up.

4.) Campaign system. As Fionn points out you CANNOT concentrate force. Or even reinforce an area! The manual says that disband is a useful feature because you can then move in reinforcements to a battle area, DISBAND???

5.) Braindead AI. Tanks WILL spin like tops for no good reason and the computer is timid on offence and Japanese on defence (IE insanely couragous charges out of good positions).

That said its not all bad. There is undeniable fun in playing the first few times to check out all the new goodies but that slowly turns to dissapointment. Maybe a mod will fix it but a mod cant fix the AI or campaign system, I dont think any of us expect anything from Atomic.

[killmore]

Is infantry survivability in open field not realistic in CC4?

I don't think 10 guys can last long in open field against tank with MG.

Different story in the forest. Here MG can only hit some guys - assuming they are not running around but crawling.

Also I believe that if tank round hits the wall of the room where 10 guys are sitting then quite a few of them should die!

The real problem maybe be the price of tanks. Maybe tanks should be much more expensive then infantry. That will force people to buy more infantry. A tank in the open field can kill a lot of infantry...

Is real WWII infantry easy to kill with tanks? I think it is. Unless it is hidden and manages to throw granades or fire zook at the tank. Once tank notices it it can kill infantry easily! (Unless it get KO)

In CM I was wondering why German ZombieJeagers march into the fire of 2 mashine guns without much problem.

[Guest Big Time Software]

Killmore, the answer is simple -> CM is realistic in regards to weapons lethality, Close Combat is not. It never has been, but it seems to have got worse with the latest release. MG fire is not a sure kill, even in the open. Remember that open ground isn't a tennis court. There are small dips, rises, rocks, whatever. Lots of stuff to shield a man.

In real warfare the MG is meant more to keep the enemy's heads down, not to take 'em off. Obviously the MG is designed to kill, but it is far more likely to cause other things to happen other than casualties. Do not confuse the quantity of lead coming out with the number of kills it does or does not get.

In CM I have seen plenty of squads torn apart by MG fire, but in CC it is more like EVERY squad is torn up by ANY kind of fire. Totally unrealistic. Think about it... if the MG and tank were *so* good at killing the enemy, why not have ALL tanks and ALL MGs? And why were over 70% of casualties in WWII cause by artillery, and less than 10% caused by things other than small arms fire (i.e. tanks)? Because MGs and tanks are no more the super infantry killers as seen in CC as the Calliope is a King Tiger killer

Steve

[Guest KwazyDog]

I remember in CC3 I stopped buying German tanks earlier in the war and start buying as many of those rocket launching half tracks as I could, hehe Youd think that the Russian tanks were made out of wet paper the way they used to take them out. Sounds like that problem is still there in CC4.

Ive found the CC series fun little games to play, I must admit. I think they reached their high point with CC2 personally. I played that one for endless hours. As fun as they are, personally I dont feel you can all them realistic, but I dont think they are designed to be (at least, I hope they arent).

Out of interest, does anyone know if the CC4 map txt files are still text files, or weather they turned them into binary? Just curious if my CC3 map maker will still work with it

[Guest KwazyDog]

"the answer is simple -> CM is realistic in regards to weapons lethality, Close Combat is not."

I agree Steve. If MG fire was as lethal in real life as it is in CC3 (and probably 4?), they the allies would have never gotten off of the beaches.

[killmore]

So you guys are saying that MG fire is less effective then it was supposed to be...

It worked well in WWI.

Now I am not saying you guys are wrong but why was it so effective in WWI ? (I just want to know...)

Do you guys have some real statistics about MG fire effect? What do these numbers say?

I know that MG run out of ammo quickly...

[Fionn]

Actually Killmore I think what people are saying is slightly different.

What they (and I) are saying is that MG fire is LESS effective than Close Combat would have you believe.

MGs are excellent weapons BUT their real role is to keep the enemy suppressed and unable to mount a charge into your positions at a nice distance.

Infantry lethality in Close Combat is reckoned, by many people including myself, to be quite incorrect and so the sort of casualties you've seen in CC are IMO and that of others inflated.

Also, food for thought here for you... In WW1 when soldiers walked across no-man's land in the face of far heavier MG concentrations than we see in CM they STILL sometimes managed to get into the enemy's trenches. If MGs were as effective as some games would have you believe no man would ever have made it into an opposing trench.

Even in the Somme only some 15% or so of men were killed or wounded on the first day WHICH given the fact that they walked slowly towards MGs says a little something about how infantry lethality in some games is vastly over-rated IMO.

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___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Iguana]

I have seen several posts in this thread refer to Close Combat "mods". Can anyone tell me where to find these mods and which ones are worth having?

-Doug

[Guest KwazyDog]

Killmore, I think another thing you need to keep in mind in WW1 was the different tactics used (or lack there of). When it came down to trench warfare, the MG was in its prime. Troops were ordered to charge enemy positions in more or less a big bunch, with no fixed tactics in place. We often see film of this over here in Aus on Anzac Day (a day when we remember our fallen diggers), and its a truely chilling site to see.

It really makes me wonder watching it how one could order his troops into what would often have been certain death, for them and himself...

[killmore]

Well - I always thought that the reason for finally breaching the enemy lines was that tanks were introduced. And it was not the infantry that broke the lines. Please correct me because my knowledge might be incomplete.

I can tell you that I have no military experience at all but with fully automatic paintball gun I can shout 10 people in under 20 seconds. (if they are running toward me)

Is that a realistic in the real war? I don't know.

My feeling is that in the open field the infantry is just a MG fodder, different story in the forest, buildings and other places with a lot of places to hide.

In the enviroment where infantry can get close to tanks annoticed the tanks are in trouble.

That why in the open field Tank is the way to go but infantry is needed for house to house fighting. And tanks are just an artilery support in the city.

I might be totally wrong so please educate me !

[Guest Big Time Software]

Tanks had a VERY minor role in WWI, even up until the end.

Paintball is a VERY bad thing to think of when trying to picture how war really plays out. VERY bad. I know, because not only am I a "historian" (well, at I have a degree in history at least ), but I also have been playing paintball since 1987. While there are some interesting things to pick up from the game and use in understanding small unit action, overall it is very divorced from reality.

The fact is that the MG, for a variety of reasons, was *not* a mass killing weapon overall. In certain circumstances, yes... it could very well be just that. I have seen that happen in CM from time to time. But this notion that if you can see it you *will* kill it is just pure fantasy.

Keep in mind that any game that has a rare, indirect fire weapon, with a MINIMUM range of something like 1500m (or so I am told), designed to knock out troops instead being used for direct fire against heavy tanks at as little as 50m is a game that has little credibility in the accuracy department. Add things like NW firing halftracks, über men running around with 10 Panzerfausts, etc. and you can see what I mean.

My best advice is to start reading more about the war from the folks who either fought it or make a living off of telling the story of those who did. Other than that, look at the comments on this BBS that come from veterans. One thing that we have received many compliments about from veterans is the realism of our infantry modeling.

Steve