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A not very exciting Christmas Bone this year


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Well there be a new Kingtiger 3D model?

/*probably not but figure it's worth a shot....*/          

 

A little bird told me 'yes' to that. Though I'm not sure how much one should trust talking birds. I've been wedded to CMBS and the CMBN pack for most of the year so my knowledge about the progress of the bulge title is somewhat sketchy.

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This is a great Christmas bone! The one thing I hope we'll see (and I know it's a minor thing in the overall scope of the game) is some better looking pine trees. Pines that scream "Hey, I am a pine tree!" The ones we have right now just don't look/feel very "piney" to me.

 

Sounds like it's gonna be another great CMing year! Lots of cool things ahead.

 

 

 

Mord.

I definitely agree with that. And the fog could do with some improvement. But the pine trees are essential. Most important feature for this game is to get the specific atmosphere in the Ardennes right, including the trees and buildings.

Edited by Aragorn2002
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This is a great Christmas bone! The one thing I hope we'll see (and I know it's a minor thing in the overall scope of the game) is some better looking pine trees. Pines that scream "Hey, I am a pine tree!" The ones we have right now just don't look/feel very "piney" to me.

 

Sounds like it's gonna be another great CMing year! Lots of cool things ahead.

 

 

 

Mord.

Pining for some "piney" pines Mord?  ;)

Me too - would add realism for sure.

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Great bone!

Will tank riders be in the bulge game? I would also like to know what we can expect for FI.. any love coming its way in 2015?

 

Yes.

 

Will Ardennes still be OS 10.6 ?

 

Yes, but only for people in Ljubljana.  It's one of my favorite cities in the world so you get a few special favors :D

 

With the development of the Battle of the Bulge game, does that mean CMBN has reached the end of it's development?

Or is there something else in the works I am not aware of?

 

We have not officially ended development on CMBN content.  Besides future Upgrades, which are a sure thing, we are still thinking about doing various Packs.  However, for now we're focusing on a few other areas.

 

Getting back to some questions about future content for Red Thunder and Fortress Italy. We are planning more content for both of these as well.  Next up for both will be Modules to carry the theaters to the end of the war.  We do not have timeframes yet for either one.

 

Steve

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This is wonderful news indeed. I read christer Bergströms The Ardennes, 1944-1945: Hitler's Winter Offensive a while back and I’m very eager to play in that setting. Major tank battles, difficult terrain and weather (although not much snow at the beginning :() and an opportunity to play on both offensive and on the defence for both sides.

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Steve

 

Since your in a sharing and answering mood, some quick questions:

 

1. Are we any closer to having the CMx1 'Combined Arms' QB setting come back? In other words, a setting where you have X points for infantry, Y points for armor and Z points for support assets. We talked about that last year and it wasn't in the works back then.

 

2. We know that CM:BS is engine CMx2 v3.0. Is CM:Ardennes also slated to be engine v3.0 or will it be the first v4.0?

 

3. Any plans to allow AT guns and small infantry guns to put into buildings directly ala. ASL? Obviously would not be able to move or make major changes to covered arc.

 

4. Any plans to allow infantry to dig foxholes during a scenario? In these monster 2 hour scenarios, there is certainly time to get a slit trench going.

 

5. Any plans to bring back the CMx1 'shift fire arc' where you held down shift and it automatically assigned a fire arc for 180 degrees to a certain direction. Would love to have this back - especially for armor where you just want him to point his turret a certain way while moving.

 

CMx2 engine is coming along wonderfully. Personally, am very very happy with how CMx2 is shaping together and getting better with each release. Especially appreciate the engine updates to older titles - more than happy to pay the $10 for that.

 

Keep up the great work!

 

Thanks

Chad

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Steve

 

Since your in a sharing and answering mood, some quick questions:

I am still in the giving mood of the season, so good timing :D

 

1. Are we any closer to having the CMx1 'Combined Arms' QB setting come back? In other words, a setting where you have X points for infantry, Y points for armor and Z points for support assets. We talked about that last year and it wasn't in the works back then.

No. We have no plans to rework the QB system in any significant way, and this is massive recoding effort.

 

2. We know that CM:BS is engine CMx2 v3.0. Is CM:Ardennes also slated to be engine v3.0 or will it be the first v4.0?

Ardennes will use the v3 Engine for sure. Any WW2 applicable improvements made for Black Sea will be included, but off the top of my head I can't think of anything beyond routine tweaks/fixes. The majority of new code that went into Black Sea is not applicable to WW2.

 

3. Any plans to allow AT guns and small infantry guns to put into buildings directly ala. ASL? Obviously would not be able to move or make major changes to covered arc.

Intact buildings? No. You can already put them in rubbled buildings.

 

4. Any plans to allow infantry to dig foxholes during a scenario? In these monster 2 hour scenarios, there is certainly time to get a slit trench going.

No. We do not want to get caught up in feature requests for massive/long scenarios. People are welcome to push CM's limits as much as they can, but we have to remain focused on the roughly 1 hour and less battles.

 

5. Any plans to bring back the CMx1 'shift fire arc' where you held down shift and it automatically assigned a fire arc for 180 degrees to a certain direction. Would love to have this back - especially for armor where you just want him to point his turret a certain way while moving.

Perhaps, but we have no plans for it at this time.

 

CMx2 engine is coming along wonderfully. Personally, am very very happy with how CMx2 is shaping together and getting better with each release. Especially appreciate the engine updates to older titles - more than happy to pay the $10 for that.

 

Keep up the great work!

Thanks!

Steve

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Yes, but only for people in Ljubljana.  It's one of my favorite cities in the world so you get a few special favors :D

Glad to hear this. :)

But seriously,only Black Sea is OS 10.7 or http://community.battlefront.com/topic/116401-system-requirements/post#4 isn't correct than?

Edited by Ales Dvorak
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"Combat Mission: Siegfried Line"

 

This is an excellent bone! Thanks for the great news. 

 

Dragon teeth flavor objects.

Parka or puffy coat skeleton files for winter troops. 

I really wish we had a US officer helmet, US NCO helmet and US soldier helmet as separately retrieved files to dress the troops. So we could have the white stripes on the back of the helmets.

US Officer's Mackinaw jacket.

 

Looking forward to it. 

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Glad to hear this. :)

But seriously,only Black Sea is OS 10.7 or http://community.battlefront.com/topic/116401-system-requirements/post#4 isn't correct than?

 

It is partially correct.  We are no longer officially supporting 10.6.x, however we are not doing anything specific to prevent it from running on 10.6.8.  Which means which means it's possible that us 10.6.8 users (and yes, I am right there with you!) will be able to play Black Sea or Ardennes just fine, but we might not be.  If there are stability or graphics problems for 10.6.8 users then the standard response from Battlefront is "upgrade your OS".

 

For those of you who don't understand why someone who develops games would be using such a VERY outdated OS... it's because I have several thousands of Dollars worth of software to replace if I upgrade to anything newer.  I know I'm just putting off the inevitable :D

 

Steve

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We had planned on showing you a couple of shots of what we've been working on alongside of CM Black Sea.  Some last minute glitches made that not really possible with the amount of time we had left.  So you're going to have to deal with a slightly-better-than-coal-in-your-stocking bone for this year.

 

Here it 'tis!

 

Development on the Ardennes (name not determined yet) Family is well along.  In fact, we intend to start early testing of the game in a few weeks.  What will the game include?  I'm so glad you asked!

 

The Base Game includes US Army, German Heer, and German Waffen SS forces covering the timeframe of October through January.  This includes Fall and Winter weather, terrain, vehicle textures, and uniforms.  It also includes new vehicles and TO&E, as well as more subtle things which set the tone for the latest war period we've yet covered with CMx2. 

 

Some new vehicles to play with:

 

M24 Chaffee

M36 Jackson

Jagdtiger

Flammpanzer 38(t)

 

There's others too, but off the top of my head that's what I have for you right now.  Though for sure there are some other fun ones (cough --- Sturmtiger --- cough) that will make their debut this time around.

 

We are planning two Modules for the Ardennes game:

 

Module 1 = Commonwealth + Luftwaffe Forces

Module 2 = extending the timeframe to the end of the war

 

So, with that, Merry Christmas and what not to you all!

 

Steve

 

Steve you should probably tell the RPS guys a Bulge game is on the way from you, they seem a bit distraught thinking about the lack of them recently!

 

;)

 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/12/26/the-flare-path-battle-of-the-bulge-wargames/

Edited by Raptorx7
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Sequoia,

 

You are indeed correct. The Sherman Jumbo was a purpose built assault tank, not the beasties being discussed here. The Sherman Jumbo had armor rivaling that of a Tiger 1. Patton ordered the creation of what were called "Expedient Jumbos" because even he couldn't get enough of the production versions. This is pretty shocking when you consider that Patton was the one who screamed "bloody murder!" over field expedients such as logs and sandbags because the additional weight broke down suspensions.

 

Regards,

 

John Kettler 

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Steve you should probably tell the RPS guys a Bulge game is on the way from you, they seem a bit distraught thinking about the lack of them recently!

 

;)

 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/12/26/the-flare-path-battle-of-the-bulge-wargames/

 

Also, speaking of RPS, Tim Stone named Red Thunder his 'bestest of best' for 2014

 

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014/12/27/best-pc-games-2014-contributors-picks/#more-260017

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I am still in the giving mood of the season, so good timing :D

 

 

Sweet! I caught that perfect window of time that :)

 

 

No. We have no plans to rework the QB system in any significant way, and this is massive recoding effort.

 

Fair enough - cant really argue with that. To me the perfect QB system is what we currently have, which is great, but with the COMBINED ARMS setting back and a way to enforce the FIONNs SHORT 75 rules ingame (boy, when was the last time you heard someone bring up Fionn's Short 75 rules? Who even remembers that anymore?). I love the QB system that we have right this very instant - it has so much power built into it. My only complaint is that there is no limitation to what type of force you can have - that's where the Combined Arms setting comes in. Sure if your playing a human you can type up all sorts of desired rules, but the AI struggles to pick good force balances in QB games, especially in small battles.

 

So if Combined Arms is not coming back, maybe some love being given to the AI purchasing routines would do the trick?

 

 

Ardennes will use the v3 Engine for sure. Any WW2 applicable improvements made for Black Sea will be included, but off the top of my head I can't think of anything beyond routine tweaks/fixes. The majority of new code that went into Black Sea is not applicable to WW2.

 

Sounds great - v3 is working great, so no complaints there!

 

 

Intact buildings? No. You can already put them in rubbled buildings.

 

Fair enough - did know about the rubbled buildings, but would love to be able to put them in intact buildings at setup.

 

 

No. We do not want to get caught up in feature requests for massive/long scenarios. People are welcome to push CM's limits as much as they can, but we have to remain focused on the roughly 1 hour and less battles.

 

Agreed on that - I don't play those monster scenarios anyways, but this is just one of those things we have been crying about since, well, you have been here this entire time :)

 

 

Perhaps, but we have no plans for it at this time.

 

I was watching ChrisND's video and he was trying to give his Abrams a covered arc while moving. Took him a couple of tries to get the arc just right because he needed a long distance. This command coming back (the shift-CA one: CA being covered arc for you non ASL types out there ;)) would help immensely with those super long range CA's.

 

Finally, thinking about what else I would ask over the day, the only other 'issue' I have with CMx2 is the way LOF/LOS works for area fire commands. Its annoying to not be able to give an area fire command because you cant see the ground through grain, or you cant see the middle of the building but can see the rest of it just fine. I think the way soldiers shoot once they have a LOS/LOF is just fine. But once the enemy goes to ground and I want to continue to shoot at their location, a single blade of grass blocking my LOS/LOF to their feet can cause frustration.

 

Would it be possible to assume that the area fire just shoots through the soft cover so we can still give the fire command? Or just shoots at the half of the building we can see?

 

Thanks again for the responses Steve!

 

Chad

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