Accuracy of Walls, Doors, and Windows in Buildings

[Joe Snuffy]

I am new to CMx2 and have seen a lack of accuracy in terms of doors and windows in buildings.  For example, during one battle, I ordered a squad to approach a building from behind.  The back of the building had no windows or doors; it appeared to be just a solid brick wall.  I moved the squad up against this brick wall.  I didn't know if any Germans were inside, but without any visibility or openings to shoot through, I assumed the squad was safe.  The next thing I know, the occupants of the house opened fire on the squad through the brick wall, killing all of them with bullets and even a grenade.  

 

I have had other instances where a squad entered a building miraculously through a wall with no doors or windows. But then, at other times, when giving a squad a command to enter a building, the squad has had to run around the building to a door to enter, possibly exposing them to enemy fire.  I have had troops inside a building able to have line of sight through solid walls in some cases and not in others.

 

I just don't know whether to believe the accuracy of doors, windows, and walls on buildings or not. And not knowing this can be very costly.

 

I would appreciate any comments.

[AttorneyAtWar]

I am new to CMx2 and have seen a lack of accuracy in terms of doors and windows in buildings.  For example, during one battle, I ordered a squad to approach a building from behind.  The back of the building had no windows or doors; it appeared to be just a solid brick wall.  I moved the squad up against this brick wall.  I didn't know if any Germans were inside, but without any visibility or openings to shoot through, I assumed the squad was safe.  The next thing I know, the occupants of the house opened fire on the squad through the brick wall, killing all of them with bullets and even a grenade.  

 

I have had other instances where a squad entered a building miraculously through a wall with no doors or windows. But then, at other times, when giving a squad a command to enter a building, the squad has had to run around the building to a door to enter, possibly exposing them to enemy fire.  I have had troops inside a building able to have line of sight through solid walls in some cases and not in others.

 

I just don't know whether to believe the accuracy of doors, windows, and walls on buildings or not. And not knowing this can be very costly.

 

I would appreciate any comments.

 

Long story short: the building was most likely damaged.

[sburke]

Very mixed, would need to see specific instances to address, but I do know adjacent modular buildings can have some issues at the point their walls meet etc. Iit is not definitely something you can count on 100%. That being said it is very very instance specific. Approach with caution.

[Pak40]

Remember the scene in the final battle in Saving Private Ryan where two of the airborne soldiers manned a machine gun inside a 2 story building? At one point they heard footsteps come up the stairs. The Jewish guy says "Upham?" to see if it's Private Upham coming with more ammo. When there's no answer one of the airborne guys sprays the wall with his Thompson, killing a German.

 

CM does indeed model sound. I'm not entirely sure that the AI will fire on sound contacts, but it's certainly realistic. Also, just because the facade of the building shows a brick building doesn't mean that it's solid cover. There are basically only two types of buildings in CMBN: light and heavy. The light buildings are the independent buildings, the heavy buildings are the modular ones. Light buildings offer little cover especially when close.

 

Raptorx7 brings up another possible answer with the damaged building.

[Joe Snuffy]

Long story short: the building was most likely damaged.

 

There was no visible building damage, and the building had not been involved in any previous firefights or artillery shelling.

[Joe Snuffy]

Remember the scene in the final battle in Saving Private Ryan where two of the airborne soldiers manned a machine gun inside a 2 story building? At one point they heard footsteps come up the stairs. The Jewish guy says "Upham?" to see if it's Private Upham coming with more ammo. When there's no answer one of the airborne guys sprays the wall with his Thompson, killing a German.

 

CM does indeed model sound. I'm not entirely sure that the AI will fire on sound contacts, but it's certainly realistic. Also, just because the facade of the building shows a brick building doesn't mean that it's solid cover. There are basically only two types of buildings in CMBN: light and heavy. The light buildings are the independent buildings, the heavy buildings are the modular ones. Light buildings offer little cover especially when close.

 

Raptorx7 brings up another possible answer with the damaged building.

 

 

In Saving Private Ryan scene you describe, the incident takes place through an interior wall - essentially dry wall - which I would expect to pass bullets.  But, even in that case, a grenade wouldn't work.  But, the situation I'm describing involves exterior walls which are textured as brick and, in the instance I'm referring to, show now visible signs of damage and were not involved in a firefight previously during the battle.

 

Not sure what you mean by the terms independent and modular.  Do you mean standalone and attached? Is that how light and heavy buildings are determined?

 

This seems to be a flaw in the game. In real life, soldiers for the most part can determine whether a wall is penetrable or not.  In urban kinds of fights, it would become very difficult without knowing with a high degree of certainty where you have cover and specifically where you can enter buildings.

[Kieme(ITA)]

You got some screenshot of any kind? These would help a lot to better understand these situations.

[Joe Snuffy]

You got some screenshot of any kind? These would help a lot to better understand these situations.

 

The battles are already done and progress saves deleted.  next time I encounter this, I'll take a screenshot.

[sburke]

The battles are already done and progress saves deleted.  next time I encounter this, I'll take a screenshot.

Actually hang onto the save for the turn you take a screenshot as well.  Sometimes the screenshot promotes more questions than it can answer.

[Joe Snuffy]

Here are some screenshots from the scenario "La Valence".  Unfortunately, I don't have the screenshot right when actions occurred.

 

#1 men standing on red circle and hit with gunfire and grenades through brick wall with X.

 

#2 Squad entered building through X in brick wall:

 

#3 Men have line of sight through wall they are facing, as shown by red target line

[MOS:96B2P]

I am new to CMx2 and have seen a lack of accuracy in terms of doors and windows in buildings.  For example, during one battle, I ordered a squad to approach a building from behind.  The back of the building had no windows or doors; it appeared to be just a solid brick wall.  I moved the squad up against this brick wall.  I didn't know if any Germans were inside, but without any visibility or openings to shoot through, I assumed the squad was safe.  The next thing I know, the occupants of the house opened fire on the squad through the brick wall, killing all of them with bullets and even a grenade.  

 

I have had other instances where a squad entered a building miraculously through a wall with no doors or windows. But then, at other times, when giving a squad a command to enter a building, the squad has had to run around the building to a door to enter, possibly exposing them to enemy fire.  I have had troops inside a building able to have line of sight through solid walls in some cases and not in others.

 

I just don't know whether to believe the accuracy of doors, windows, and walls on buildings or not. And not knowing this can be very costly.

 

I would appreciate any comments.

 

This is a partial answer as I understand it:  If the wall of two adjoining buildings have a mismatch (one side with a door, the other side without) passage is allowed from either side.  Any door on any wall allows passage.

 

As far as units shooting through what appears to be solid walls.  Are the walls solid on both the outside and inside?  If the walls are solid on both sides I have no explanation. 

[sburke]

This one could be a bug.

#2 Squad entered building through X in brick wall:

entering through a solid wall suggests something potentially more significant. I'll see if I can find the location and duplicate the behavior, if so I will report it.

[sburke]

Here is what I found so far.

 

Here are some screenshots from the scenario "La Valence".  Unfortunately, I don't have the screenshot right when actions occurred.

 

This building has a wall coming up to but not quite connecting to the building. On the other side of that wall is a door and there is a gap between the building and the wall. If you try to draw LOS on the right hand side, you can not past the corner so it only affects the section of the wall that has the door.

 

#1 men standing on red circle and hit with gunfire and grenades through brick wall with X.

 

This I could not duplicate, they squeezed through the connection between a wall and an adjoining building on a very circuitous route to get to that building, but did not enter through that wall. I found this and the above instance interesting as I'd never noted that gap between building and wall before and what it can do to movement and LOS that isn't readily apparent. If you have two modular buildings adjacent you can actually see a gap, but I hadn't noticed this before.

 

#2 Squad entered building through X in brick wall:

 

I think #3 is a barn, not sure I can't really tell and barns are pretty much considered riddled with holes.

#3 Men have line of sight through wall they are facing, as shown by red target line

Edited January 17, 2015 by sburke

[Warts 'n' all]

I agree with sburke about #3, it certainly looks like a barn. I pays to to bear in mind, particularly with farm buildings, that holes caused by age or weather, or even made in the walls or roof tiles by their defenders will not be big enough to show up on screen, unlike holes caused during the course of your battle by heavy weapons.

[Kieme(ITA)]

Here are some screenshots from the scenario "La Valence".  Unfortunately, I don't have the screenshot right when actions occurred.

 

#1 men standing on red circle and hit with gunfire and grenades through brick wall with X.

 

Given MOS's citation, I'd like to know if there's a window on the building wall behind that wall.

 

Anyway, this seems a bug to me. It is possible that in some cases the wall placed right on contact with a building might lead to problems, could be Worth to test this over and over to see if there's a problem there. Scenario designers often use techniques like this one to close a building LOS or reinforce the structure.

[Joe Snuffy]

For picture #1, it seems the reason is that there is a door on this wall on the other side of the perpendicular wall, which gives the occupants a view out this wall.  It's as if the perpendicular wall isn't there.

 

I couldn't duplicate #2 either.  Maybe it was a dream I had.

 

#3 seems attributed to the fact that it's a light structure (barn).

[womble]

Barns are significantly more opaque to us players than they are to the pTruppen from either side of it. IME they barely give even any concealment to the occupants of the building and less cover, and effectively have windows all the way around from the perspective of the troops inside.

[Bulletpoint]

I have also had this problem a couple of times.

 

I believe it's due to the houses we see not always being exactly the same as the game engine sees. Mostly they are, but not 100 pct. of the time.

 

Perhaps it's related to the problem with troops unable to go through certain doors, instead running to the other side and getting shot doing that. The player sees a door that does not exist.

 

If the game abstracted houses, we would not get into trouble, but in a game as "what you see is what you get" as Combat Mission, it can be a very serious bug when it happens. It's rare though.

Edited January 18, 2015 by Bulletpoint

[womble]

There are also some specific maps with specific problems, dating back to release. I never internalised which maps were affected, but if you let us know which map it's on, someone can have a look and see if there's some sort of map-specific issue only just coming to light or introduced in later code.

[Pak40]

In Saving Private Ryan scene you describe, the incident takes place through an interior wall - essentially dry wall - which I would expect to pass bullets.  But, even in that case, a grenade wouldn't work.  But, the situation I'm describing involves exterior walls which are textured as brick and, in the instance I'm referring to, show now visible signs of damage and were not involved in a firefight previously during the battle.

 

Not sure what you mean by the terms independent and modular.  Do you mean standalone and attached? Is that how light and heavy buildings are determined?

 

This seems to be a flaw in the game. In real life, soldiers for the most part can determine whether a wall is penetrable or not.  In urban kinds of fights, it would become very difficult without knowing with a high degree of certainty where you have cover and specifically where you can enter buildings.

 

CM doesn't show damaged walls until they are damaged a good bit, just FYI. So a building can be quite damage and not particularly show it yet. I'm not say that's what happened in your case but just something to keep in mind.

 

Yes, the SPR scene was an interior wall but light buildings in CM are not known for providing good cover. Bullets go through walls, interior or exterior. Even bricks are easily penetrated by bullets. 

 

Independent and Modular buildings are the two types of buildings you can choose from in the editor. I suggest taking a look at the editor if you haven't had the chance yet. The facade of buildings can be changed by the designer, so even an independent building can look like sturdy brick but in fact it's just as "light" as all of the other light buildings.

[Kieme(ITA)]

Now that I recall thanks to your words, Pak40, back in the old CM1x games, before modular buildings were introduced, didn't we have the option to choose light building, heavy building etc.?

Edited January 19, 2015 by Kieme(ITA)

[MOS:96B2P]

Independent and Modular buildings are the two types of buildings you can choose from in the editor. The facade of buildings can be changed by the designer, so even an independent building can look like sturdy brick but in fact it's just as "light" as all of the other light buildings.

 

This is interesting.  I learned the hard way that barns are light and often a death trap.  In CMBN are the other four independent building types, house, commercial, church & other (store front), also considered light?  As in barn light?       

[womble]

This is interesting.  I learned the hard way that barns are light and often a death trap.  In CMBN are the other four independent building types, house, commercial, church & other (store front), also considered light?  As in barn light?

No. Not barn-light, and in the case of the Church, not light at all Still not very good cover (apart from the Church...) though. Better concealment than a barn by a fair distance, IMO, but only marginally better cover. Especially if your troops are moving, which will also mean they have sacrificed the concealment of the building they're in.

[Pak40]

This is interesting.  I learned the hard way that barns are light and often a death trap.  In CMBN are the other four independent building types, house, commercial, church & other (store front), also considered light?  As in barn light?       

 

 

No. Not barn-light, and in the case of the Church, not light at all Still not very good cover (apart from the Church...) though. Better concealment than a barn by a fair distance, IMO, but only marginally better cover. Especially if your troops are moving, which will also mean they have sacrificed the concealment of the building they're in.

 

I think there is some truth in what womble says. At least logically and realistically it should be that Churches offer more cover than other "light" buildings and barns should be the weakest of these. Since Battlefront doesn't really say, or even give a hint in the manual, all we can do is go from experience or perhaps run some tests. I do remember some old threads where this topic was discussed but all I remember is that Modular buildings offer more cover than the independent ones.

[womble]

Did a bit of a test to see. A British MG platoon with both its MMGs dismounted and other elements used to man the UC-carried MGs inflicted casualties at about 3x the rate on individual "houses" compared to individual "churches". The targets were 3-storey with an unsplit squad of Grenadiers on each storey. The Grenadiers were Elite, Fanatics with +2 leaders. The MG platoon was Regular Fanatics. The shooters never saw a single German; this was all area fire. While the Germans were "Hide"ing, they didn't take any casualties. As soon as they "unhid", they started taking them, in both building types.

Another test with Conscript grenadiers as the target dummies didn't change the casualty rate noticeably, nor did it mean the Tommy machinegunners saw anything more of them; still not spotted at a range of 200-250m after minutes of hammering away.

Edited January 19, 2015 by womble