Combat Mission engine wishlist

[CorporalJohn]

Hi! Long-time fan of the series, first time poster on this forum, and very excited to hear that a new Combat Mission is on the way! I love the game, and think that on the tactical level it is better than any I have ever played, so the below is not just whinging. HOWEVER there are a number of things I would love to be improved about the underlying game engine. Maybe a developer will see this, maybe not, but I’d love to discuss it anyway.

 

Full disclosure –I have tried to be realistic, but I am no programmer, and accept that much of the below may simply be impossible. Also, I much prefer playing infantry (CM:Burma would be my dream), so nothing below on tanks!

 

1.       Retreating when sensible. Say I have a team behind a hedge coming under heavy fire. It’s time to fall back through the gap in the second hedge behind them, just one square away, where they will be out of site and safe. As is, very often the team will cower behind the first hedge, even though if they retreated they would be safe! Units should be much more willing to move AWAY from threats.

 

2.       NOT retreating when NOT sensible. How many times has this happened to you? Your infantry dashes from one building to another. A few metres from the door, a machine gun in another building opens up and kills half the squad. The remainder stall, hug the ground, and start crawling back across the killing zone, and soon your whole squad is gone. I am no soldier, but I would think that even a terrified rookie would know that he has a much better chance if he carries on forward. So I would hope that the AI could be improved to assess whether changing orders is appropriate when soldiers break.

 

3.       Dynamic reactions. The mission that sums up my frustrations is ‘Kiwi Soldiers’ from CM:FI. Although you were aware of where the enemy was, there was no way to get your soldiers to approach them in a sensible manner. The enemy occupied a building with another building adjoining it: the commander would probably want his soldiers to hug its wall until the doorway, keeping out of the line of fire, before entering with weapons trained on the door to the enemy building. As it is, the soldiers move in the open outside the building, and then move towards the buildings centre, and usually get massacred. I’d love units to be able to mark an ‘area of interest’, which they would treat as occupied and act accordingly.

 

4.       Formations. Infantry has a tendency to clump close together and move in long, vulnerable lines. I’d love some sort of formation system, so you could, for example, cross a field in a spread out line, just as a platoon would in real life. Maybe a ‘space out’ button would encourage soldiers to maintain distance between themselves and their comrades?

 

5.       Grenades. Minor point – I’d love to be able to order soldiers to throw grenades at a nearby spot regardless of line of sight e.g. over walls or into buildings. This would make urban combat more manageable, especially in conjunction with the previous point.

 

6.       Blasting. Minor point – please could engineers not automatically rush through the gaps they blast? Mine tend to get machine-gunned, so I’d love the option to stay in cover!

 

7.       Direct linear fire. Minor point – I’d love HMGs and mortars, for example, to be able to do linear direct fire missions e.g. spreading their fire along a trench line or hedgerow. This would especially allow HMGs to be better at their real-life job of area suppression.

 

So what do you think? What improvements to the tactical engine would you like to see?

[Warts 'n' all]

Just picking up on point No.6     .... Engineers/Pioneers can either "Blast" in line with a hedge/wall, or "Blast" through it. The difference between the two is explained in the manual. It can be a bit tricky at first, but it is fairly easy to master. 

 

Some of your other points have been raised from time to time in the forum. And I suspect that you find varying opinions on them.

[Pak40]

These are all valid points and have been brought up many times in this forum. The developers, I'm sure, are quite aware of all these issues.

 

With regards to #4:

Splitting the squads will help lessen the line effect and you can spread each group out to your hearts content. Still, I agree that it's not an ideal solution but it helps mitigate the problem

 

with regards to #7:

For on field mortars, once they have already bracketed with their spotting rounds, you can then use the fire briefly command to place a few rounds in one spot. Then on the next turn use the same command on another spot along the hedge. This can simulate the process of raking a hedge or trench line. Not ideal but it's the next best thing. I would like on board mortars to be able to "call in" their own fire missions in direct fire cases. This would allow us to use the "line" option. This can be done with a spotting unit but it takes a ridiculous amount of time to execute even if the spotting unit is in the next AS as the mortar.

[SgtHatred]

Engine wishlist?

 

1. More than 2 player multiplayer. Larger battles would be a lot more fun if you could split responsibility between multiple players.

2. More than 2 player multiplayer. Larger battles would be a lot more fun if you could split responsibility between multiple players.

3. More than 2 player multiplayer. Larger battles would be a lot more fun if you could split responsibility between multiple players.

4. More than 2 player multiplayer. Larger battles would be a lot more fun if you could split responsibility between multiple players.

5. More than 2 player multiplayer. Larger battles would be a lot more fun if you could split responsibility between multiple players.

 

[Migo441]

@SgtHatred, yes, yes, a thousand times yes.

 

Multi-Player Co-Op is a long held (possibly never to be realized) dream of mine.  This is the natural solution to the Borg Spotting / Hive Mind problem.  I mean, you'll always have the Borg / Hive Mind as long a human player is controlling more than a single vehicle / squad / team.  But the issue would at least be moderated with more human players on the same side.  Controlling a single Company in a multi-Company sized engagement or a single Platoon in a Company sized engagement and trying to keep tabs on your OWN side's disposition and movements (much less the enemy's) via spotting and the C3 net would be SUH-weet. 

 

As you show here, BF was explicitly planning for it at one point.  Somehow or another it fell by the wayside.  I'm not sure if there were specific technical hurdles that emerged to thwart it or it simply plummeted down the priority list, i.e., it was judged that there wasn't enough people who cared about it.

 

It's good to know I'm not the only one that's missing it!     

[A Canadian Cat]

Hi! Long-time fan of the series, first time poster on this forum, and very excited to hear that a new Combat Mission is on the way! I love the game, and think that on the tactical level it is better than any I have ever played, so the below is not just whinging. HOWEVER there are a number of things I would love to be improved about the underlying game engine. Maybe a developer will see this, maybe not, but I’d love to discuss it anyway.

 

Oh we love this kind of thing.  New lists are constantly popping loads of fun.  Devs definitely see this kind of information.  Mind you they see lots of repeats too.

 

1.       Retreating when sensible. Say I have a team behind a hedge coming under heavy fire. It’s time to fall back through the gap in the second hedge behind them, just one square away, where they will be out of site and safe. As is, very often the team will cower behind the first hedge, even though if they retreated they would be safe! Units should be much more willing to move AWAY from threats.

 

2.       NOT retreating when NOT sensible. How many times has this happened to you? Your infantry dashes from one building to another. A few metres from the door, a machine gun in another building opens up and kills half the squad. The remainder stall, hug the ground, and start crawling back across the killing zone, and soon your whole squad is gone. I am no soldier, but I would think that even a terrified rookie would know that he has a much better chance if he carries on forward. So I would hope that the AI could be improved to assess whether changing orders is appropriate when soldiers break.

 

Yeah, there is one really big problem though: no matter what the AI will never be viewed as perfect. People have varying expectations several people think their pixel troops should perfect we get to hear about it often (whenever something goes wrong for one of the perfect pixel troop believers).  While you might want some more flexibility and improvements in the AI it sill will not do what you expect / want every time.

 

Also do not forget that often it does pretty damn well.  I just had an instance of two teams doing a great job in CMRT.  I was trying to flank an enemy HT in the woods.  I failed to give enough distance as my platoon moved around the HT's known location.  One team actually took casualties and the nearby team did not - they both did just what I would have wanted them to - cancel my orders and run away from the HT to get deeper into the woods.

 

3.       Dynamic reactions. The mission that sums up my frustrations is ‘Kiwi Soldiers’ from CM:FI. Although you were aware of where the enemy was, there was no way to get your soldiers to approach them in a sensible manner. The enemy occupied a building with another building adjoining it: the commander would probably want his soldiers to hug its wall until the doorway, keeping out of the line of fire, before entering with weapons trained on the door to the enemy building. As it is, the soldiers move in the open outside the building, and then move towards the buildings centre, and usually get massacred. I’d love units to be able to mark an ‘area of interest’, which they would treat as occupied and act accordingly.

 

4.       Formations. Infantry has a tendency to clump close together and move in long, vulnerable lines. I’d love some sort of formation system, so you could, for example, cross a field in a spread out line, just as a platoon would in real life. Maybe a ‘space out’ button would encourage soldiers to maintain distance between themselves and their comrades?

 

Yep, often requested and I agree it would be nice.

 

You already had one suggestion for making your life better here is another one.  Use several shorter way points instead of one long one.  If you give a squad a quick order 100m away across a field before your squad got there you will probably have a single conga line.  But if you made that quick order into 10 or 12 way points at each one the squad would form up and spread out and you would never get a single big conga line.

 

Yes, I know it is not the same - just offering a suggestion that can help improve things now, while we wait for formations to show up as a feature.

 

5.       Grenades. Minor point – I’d love to be able to order soldiers to throw grenades at a nearby spot regardless of line of sight e.g. over walls or into buildings. This would make urban combat more manageable, especially in conjunction with the previous point.

 

Yeah, not so sure about that.  Right now you can place a way point in front of a building's door with a 10s pause and a target or target briefly into the building and your guys will most likely throw grenades if they have them.  Maybe for the wall thing it would be nice.  I guess I just see my guys doing a pretty good job throwing grenades.

 

6.       Blasting. Minor point – please could engineers not automatically rush through the gaps they blast? Mine tend to get machine-gunned, so I’d love the option to stay in cover!

 

You already got one answer.  Here is a link to a larger discussion: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/96403-demo-charge-and-bocage-glitch-other-questionscomments/and here is a much older one with some good pictures: http://community.battlefront.com/topic/83075-blast-command/

 

7.       Direct linear fire. Minor point – I’d love HMGs and mortars, for example, to be able to do linear direct fire missions e.g. spreading their fire along a trench line or hedgerow. This would especially allow HMGs to be better at their real-life job of area suppression.

 

Indeed also asked for a few times.  Area fire does spread around a bit but you are correct nothing like a fire along a hedge row command would be.

 

So what do you think? What improvements to the tactical engine would you like to see?

My top three:

1. Head to Head Campaigns via PBEM
2. Command line support
3. Add "Custom" Quick Battle size so users can specify points

[sburke]

 

1.       Retreating when sensible. Say I have a team behind a hedge coming under heavy fire. It’s time to fall back through the gap in the second hedge behind them, just one square away, where they will be out of site and safe. As is, very often the team will cower behind the first hedge, even though if they retreated they would be safe! Units should be much more willing to move AWAY from threats.

 

Welcome aboard.

 

I understand there is a technique for this, but I can't say I have tried it.  Perhaps others can chime in who have but the evade button in the command panel (top of the panel with arrows going to the compass points) can help you in these situations.

[The Steppenwulf]

Don't whether it's been mentioned before this, but text displaying when a unit is under fire, just like the "Vehicle Hit" text, but for infantry, would speed individual player decision-making at a stroke and thus speed the whole game. That would make RT slightly more palatable for the WeGo players too. Furthermore, the net-effect of speeding play would not be gained at the cost of dumbing down the game - no-one is asking for Vehicle Hits text to be removed to make it more realistic?!

 

I would think this could be a game feature that could be easily implemented given that all units are flagged by the engine when receiving fire in any case. Hope BF consider this for version 4.0.
 

[MOS:96B2P]

<Snip> Perhaps others can chime in who have but the evade button in the command panel (top of the panel with arrows going to the compass points) can help you in these situations.

 

When a unit becomes pinned and refuses movement orders the Evade button will generate a Fast waypoint.  The waypoint can then be clicked and moved to an appropriate destination.  (If the AI picked destination is not to your liking) 

 

 

 

[General Jack Ripper]

That would make RT slightly more palatable for the WeGo players too.

 

I can't speak for everyone, but the reason I play WEGO is the Fast-Forward and Rewind buttons.

Until Real-Time has some sort of "Instant Replay" option, I'll stick to turn-based play.

No offense.

 

MOS, you can also modify the movement type of the "Evade" waypoint as well, so you can [sLOW] evade if you want to. It's useful in situations where standing up will get you killed.

 

As far as the wishlist is concerned here are my thoughts:

 

#1 - This depends on the motivation of your troops. Highly motivated units will tend to try to "stick it out", while low motivation units will say, "The heck with this, I'm outta here!"

 

#2 - This depends on the quality of your troops. Veteran or better usually know enough to complete their movement into cover. Regular or worse are more likely to "hit the deck" at the first shot.

 

#3 - An often requested feature is "instant action" drills on the part of the TacAI, however, it is up to the player to approach each tactical situation in a way that keeps your men from getting killed. Well, except for c3k, whose men are just dying to fulfill their duty! The use of suppression fire, smokescreens, blasting, and staggered movements with individual teams, are all tools you can use to resolve your tactical problems. Complaining that the AI doesn't fight well enough is making an excuse for poor execution on the player's part.

 

#4 - Abso-freaking-loutely! Tactical formations for teams and squads are a must-have feature, and I sincerely hope Charles has enough brain jar nutrients to work on this a bit. At the very least let me have: Single Column (March Column), Staggered Column, Wedge, and Line. That covers the basics.

 

#5 - Every time I have purposely conducted a grenade assault, my troops have thrown plenty of grenades. An area target order 24 meters or less should result in plenty of grenades being thrown. 16 meters (two Action Spots) is typical of my close assaults, the real trick is getting your guys to within two action spots of the enemy without getting killed.

 

#6 - There are two types of [bLAST] order, one in which the waypoint is placed on the other side of the obstacle, and one in which the waypoint is placed in front of the obstacle. The first results in your troops running thought the gap, the second does not. The problem is the second form of blast order was only discovered after experimentation by a player, and is not listed in the manual. It's one of those tricks you learn by asking people here on the Forums, and there's a lot of them tips and tricks floating around.

 

#7 - I agree with this one. Giving a Linear Target order resulting in fire being "walked" from one place to another would be neat. Perhaps limited to Mortars and tripod mounted MG's which can traverse.

 

SgtHatred,

I've been waiting for that page of the manual to come true since I first bought Shock Force on Feb 17, 2009.

[MOS:96B2P]

MOS, you can also modify the movement type of the "Evade" waypoint as well, so you can [sLOW] evade if you want to. It's useful in situations where standing up will get you killed.

 

Hmmmmm.  I knew the waypoint resulting from the Evade instant command could be moved I didn't know you could change it to a different type of movement order.  I will have to give this a try and update my TACSOP.  Thanks!  

[womble]

Hmmmmm.  I knew the waypoint resulting from the Evade instant command could be moved I didn't know you could change it to a different type of movement order.  I will have to give this a try and update my TACSOP.  Thanks!  

Yeah, once generated (and you'll see the "Pinned" text, if they're in that state, disappear - sadly it comes back if you cancel the WP), it behaves like any other waypoint. My gut feeling is that it gets Cowering troops up on their feet, and reduces or even eliminates the "milling about" you sometimes see when you issue a movement order before the team gets cracking.

[General Jack Ripper]

I used that to get my Pinned HMG team out of the trench they were stuck in during my battle with John Kettler.

[Duckman]

Ditto on formations, it would make larger battles more manageable. 

My main wish would be more work on cover and concealment. I'd love good looking foxholes of different types, camouflaged AT guns, tanks in haystacks.....that kind of stuff.

[Bulletpoint]

2.       NOT retreating when NOT sensible. How many times has this happened to you? Your infantry dashes from one building to another. A few metres from the door, a machine gun in another building opens up and kills half the squad. The remainder stall, hug the ground, and start crawling back across the killing zone, and soon your whole squad is gone. I am no soldier, but I would think that even a terrified rookie would know that he has a much better chance if he carries on forward. So I would hope that the AI could be improved to assess whether changing orders is appropriate when soldiers break.

 

Try using FAST orders for moving across streets that might be covered. Your troops will not only run a bit faster, they also are a lot less likely to stop before their destination if they take fire.

[RockinHarry]

#6 - There are two types of [BLAST] order, one in which the waypoint is placed on the other side of the obstacle, and one in which the waypoint is placed in front of the obstacle. The first results in your troops running thought the gap, the second does not. The problem is the second form of blast order was only discovered after experimentation by a player, and is not listed in the manual. It's one of those tricks you learn by asking people here on the Forums, and there's a lot of them tips and tricks floating around.

 

From my experience with the blast command, I think only the facing towards an applicable terrain object (wall, building, bocage) is of relevance, if it´s just 1 action spot away. If I want to blast, but don´t want to move the breach/engineer team, I first make sure, that facing is ok and then assign the blast (actually movement) waypoint 1 or 2 AS in facing direction. Directly after, I drag the waypoint back to the breach teams AS. A good condition (non suppressed) breach team takes about 15 seconds with regular and about 25 seconds with green experience to prepare and then execute the blast. A nearby assault squad/team then can be "paused" for either 20 or 30 seconds respectively and then be set to quick move directly through the newly created gap/hole, during the same game turn.

[womble]

Regarding Blast:

As RockinHarry says, Regular or better teams take 15s to actually execute their breach order. The best way to be sure they go through as close as they can to where you want them to is to Blast "through" the obstacle. To stop them running through, though it takes a patient commander (  ), get them to the waypoint before their Blast the order phase before, give them a 45s pause at that waypoint. Then you'll get a little explosion graphic and a gap as the timer hits :00. Teams better than Regular can be a smidge quicker, so they might've gotten to their feet ready to run through, but you can wheel their (now Quick) waypoint back to the safe side of the obstacle they've breached.