What have been the most frequently requested features / tweaks

[MOS:96B2P]

The problem with routing units is that they directly rout away from the source of the rout, the enemy unit. <Snip>

 Since friendly/enemy map edges have no effect on units rout behavior  <Snip> 

I will have to pay more attention to this.  I have seen units run in foolish directions but thought they were the panicked units.  In the scenario editor we set the friendly/enemy map edges.  I now wonder what purpose this setting of the edges serves.  

[RockinHarry]

The manual says this:

Allied Friendly Direction - sets the direction into which Allied units would withdraw to join their lines
Axis Friendly Direction - sets the direction into which Axis units would withdraw to join their lines

Beside that, there is mentioning of off board mortars, who when the friendly map edge on a large map is too far away, the mortars won´t be able to shoot far out onto the map. So this is also the direction from where friendly Arty fire is coming.

Bit meager info on map edges, but maybe one needs to see a particular unit routing several km, in order to see the friendly map edge really attracting friendly routing units. The big problem is near frontline routing, where panicked/routing units move away from an enemy threat, which most the time is NOT towards the friendly map edge, but rather the neutral map edges. I notice this more so if map edges are set to N, S. E or W. If one opens the editor first time for a new game and in "data" one sees Allied/Axis map edges are defaulted to NW/SE, I always wondered if this has a special meaning. Is diagonal movement/routing somehow prefered by the game engine? NW and SE gives 2 map edges each and more options so to say. Or maybe just coincidence?

[RockinHarry]

Ok, I reversed the enemy/friendly map edges in my test mission and once a unit panicked, it would rout toward that friendly (actually now enemy) map edge, if there´s no enemies in sight. If there´s enemies in the path toward the map edge, the panicked unit simply would keep lying prone. So the map edges work as stated in the manual generally, but units tend to prefer diagonal routes, that oftenly takes them in LOS/LOF of other enemies. What also might be in effect is not an actual rout, but rather an automatic evade (a quick move and face combo). Maybe I need to make some more tests, if "evade", when followed by panicking, takes over the evade movement path and direction, which would then be away from the last enemy threat and not necessarily toward the friendly map edge. However, we got to live with this behavior and I better keep going with my WIP missions now. 

[IronCat60]

Whenever a unit is selected, having the end of the movement lines of units of the same command display a "capped line" so it looks like a "T" at their stop points would be very helpful. This way when the movement lines of several units overlap you can easily tell if the units of the same command stop in the desired formation and area.

[womble]

Aye, vehicles in forests don't pay much attention to trees. Seems to me they "detect the collision" with the actual trunk of the vegetation, and slow down, and yes, Steve has said it's an abstraction to make pathfinding around trees more straightforward for the AI, and, to some extent, the player: you can plot a twisty non-tree-intersecting path around trees, but you don't have to (and if you don't it won't 'box' round every tree you 'hit', like it would other obstacles, which would be a frellin' nightmare).

[RockinHarry]

Aye, vehicles in forests don't pay much attention to trees. Seems to me they "detect the collision" with the actual trunk of the vegetation, and slow down, and yes, Steve has said it's an abstraction to make pathfinding around trees more straightforward for the AI, and, to some extent, the player: you can plot a twisty non-tree-intersecting path around trees, but you don't have to (and if you don't it won't 'box' round every tree you 'hit', like it would other obstacles, which would be a frellin' nightmare).

Yep, aparently a very small trunk, a single straight vertical center line maybe, serving to check collision with the 3D center point of a vehicle. If watching closely, these centers never meet (collide) and the vehicle gets through. I´m sufficiently satisfied with this system, combined with light forest tiles and wet/muddy ground conditions, forests is very difficult slow going terrain for vehicles with a noticable chance for bogging. If BFC would give slope effects some more attention, I´d be satisfied even more.

[Bozowans]

I´m as well a sound freak, beeing musician for more than 30 years and it would be great if more distant sounds get muffled, or sounds adapted on the fly, when beeing in urban terrain, within buildings, in forests or in changed environmental conditions (fog, clear nights....). I´ve no idea about OpenGL audio filtering features, but I´m fairly sure that these features can be added without adding gigabytes of new sounds to the game. I´d expect additional lag and dropped frame rates though, so this should better be then a switchable option, in case some people have less powerful hardware and such.

Would you really get that much of a performance loss with that though? Unless you're using a really, really old computer or something. Maybe some longer loading times? It seems like extra sounds might be a small hit compared to all the AI, pathfinding, spotting, and ballistics calculations going on. I'm not a programmer or anything though, so all I can do is compare different games to each other. I mentioned Red Orchestra earlier, but perhaps some of the best gunfire sounds I've heard in a game come from Project Reality, and it's a mod for a 10 year old game.

I was trying to find examples of the sounds in that game that don't have people talking over them. I love the way the distant gunfire sounds. It can really get the adrenaline going when you're getting shot at in that game and you crank the volume way up.

https://youtu.be/FIH46l4hVz8?t=466

https://youtu.be/yVdICtjDZ04?t=958

Red Orchestra 2 also has a system where sounds not only change according to distance, but location as well. Like firing in a tight space would sound different from firing outside. But like I said earlier, I don't expect BFC to ever have a fancy realistic sound system as a priority. That doesn't stop me from fantasizing about it though.  CM does such a great job at simulating all the munitions flying about on a battlefield - everything except for the sounds. The sounds are just so plain and bare-bones. So many players consider sound mods to be essential, and they help, but they still don't do the trick for me. Just having them change according to distance would make a big difference.

 

Whenever a unit is selected, having the end of the movement lines of units of the same command display a "capped line" so it looks like a "T" at their stop points would be very helpful. This way when the movement lines of several units overlap you can easily tell if the units of the same command stop in the desired formation and area.

Oh and I love this idea.

[RockinHarry]

Would you really get that much of a performance loss with that though? Unless you're using a really, really old computer or something. Maybe some longer loading times? It seems like extra sounds might be a small hit compared to all the AI, pathfinding, spotting, and ballistics calculations going on. I'm not a programmer or anything though, so all I can do is compare different games to each other. I mentioned Red Orchestra earlier, but perhaps some of the best gunfire sounds I've heard in a game come from Project Reality, and it's a mod for a 10 year old game.

I was trying to find examples of the sounds in that game that don't have people talking over them. I love the way the distant gunfire sounds. It can really get the adrenaline going when you're getting shot at in that game and you crank the volume way up.

https://youtu.be/FIH46l4hVz8?t=466

https://youtu.be/yVdICtjDZ04?t=958

Red Orchestra 2 also has a system where sounds not only change according to distance, but location as well. Like firing in a tight space would sound different from firing outside. But like I said earlier, I don't expect BFC to ever have a fancy realistic sound system as a priority. That doesn't stop me from fantasizing about it though.  CM does such a great job at simulating all the munitions flying about on a battlefield - everything except for the sounds. The sounds are just so plain and bare-bones. So many players consider sound mods to be essential, and they help, but they still don't do the trick for me. Just having them change according to distance would make a big difference.

 

Oh and I love this idea.

I have no idea what actual sound system API is actually used in the CMX2 game engine. It seems that it just uses basic sound file playing, with no further filtering applied. OpenAL seems to provide some the desired sound FX, but I think it has some demands on CPU power and such, affecting game performance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAL

[RockinHarry]

The problem with routing units is that they directly rout away from the source of the rout, the enemy unit. If it was enemy flanking fire, then it could happen frequently that when considering that something like a "frontline" exists during battle, the routing unit, running away in straight path from the enemy causing the rout, moves diagonally or even parallel to the "virtual frontline", straight into the LOS/LOF of other enemy units. That´s most the time a death march. Since friendly/enemy map edges have no effect on units rout behavior, the TacAI needs something like a compass point (general rally location) towards and behind friendly "frontline". It could also be the (last known) position of the Bn HQ, or any other highest echelon HQ. I understand that "panicked" units are of the headless chicken kind, but I´d even assume those soldiers to generally know where the "friendly" compass direction is. In the attack, they generally would know where they moved from (assembly point) and in defense, every unit would know where the friendly rear area is and such. Thus it it is not sufficient to just move into next available cover, as it could happen that just this cover is in LOS/LOF of another enemy unit. It could also happen, without any enemy influence, that a rallied unit breaks again and starts a further rout. So the rout path IMO should be a combination of "rout away" from most dangerous known threat (causing the actual rout) AND a set friendly map location, the rallying point.

Interestingly I found something by chance, although I keep not liking it, supporting the Panic system as implemented by BFC in CMX2:

From  Hans Schmidt´s - SS Panzergrenadier - A true story of WW2, page XI

"I had been lying in that icy ditch but 10 km east of the heart of Bastogne for several hours, when this German boy soldier, judging from his appearance perhaps seventeen years old, came running out of a line of hedge rows, to the right of me that was largely beyond my view, dragging his obviousiy wounded left foot in the deep snow. But instead of trying to reach German lines that were somewhere far, perhaps a rniie or more,  to the rear of us, or lifting his arms in surrender and going over to the Americans, he ran in his panic exactly parallel to the front, about equidistant from where I was lying, and the American lines, resulting in his horrible death."

[Tarkus]

[The] ability to import units from a saved game.
In CMX1 I used this to turn many a QB into a prolonged campaign.

Let me support that wholeheartedly. In CMBB back in the days my regular CM opponent and me had a system in place using the troops/map import feature, and seriously, this turned awesome CM battles into truly epic campaigns. 

We're currently playing a CMBN meeting engagement QB and it would be just awesome to be able to followup on this. In this case for instance, we where fighting for a village. My opponent will clearly leave the game in full possession of the village and I would love to be able to counter-attack and try to re-capture the village, but only if the troops from the previous battle are in place.

[Vencini]

If a tree get hit(s), it degrades gradually. For example , a tree gets  hit(s) > trunk > hit(s) > stump > hits  >  completely destroyed.

Not necessary hit decals. I'm not so Grog...  

Images for weapons. Please buy some of the actual mods... Those green silhouettes are    too simple.

Best regards and good weekend to all of you

[CarlWAW]

My personal preferences are in the area of realism and gameplay because this is what will keep me playing. IME eye candy wears off and cannot make a game any better.

 

Realism:

Campaigns playable on the same map or taking place on varying portions of a bigger map - with map destruction and units from the prior battle.

That hide-command makes moving vehicles reverse and evade instead to engage.

No more machine pistols aiming like sniper rifles.

Way faster self preservation of vehicle crews.

Burning terrain/buildings: flames & smoke blocking LOS.

 

 

Gameplay:

Clickable movement paths: selects corresponding vehicle (or in case of multiple overlaying paths opens a menu to select the correct unit).

Cover arcs and setup areas not causing eye cancer, but showing only the borders of the arcs.

Unit hotkeys saved with game.

 

 

Eye candy:

Anti aliasing working with movie lighting.

Soldier's animations (i.e. the K98 being carried with both hands when running is just ).

Edited November 28, 2015 by CarlWAW

[Bulletpoint]

 

Soldier's animations (i.e. the K98 being carried with both hands when running is just ).

Also would be nice with some more sense of urgency in the animations. Not saying total time to reload should be faster, for example, but the individual movements could be faster and more urgent.

[user1000]

US M9A1 Anti Armor rifle grenade, waaaay long over due. Airburst version too

Edited December 7, 2015 by user1000

[womble]

There's a HEAT rifle grenade in the game already. It's the only visual model used, too (the same graphics are used for frag and HEAT RGs). Is that not the M9A1? Since airburst for artillery fire, with its plethora of tables and minutes of lead time, serviced by dedicated, intensively trained fire control officers, isn't possible without considerable preparation, do you really think that airburst firing of rifle grenades is anything more than a training ground fantasy?

[user1000]

There's a HEAT rifle grenade in the game already. It's the only visual model used, too (the same graphics are used for frag and HEAT RGs). Is that not the M9A1? Since airburst for artillery fire, with its plethora of tables and minutes of lead time, serviced by dedicated, intensively trained fire control officers, isn't possible without considerable preparation, do you really think that airburst firing of rifle grenades is anything more than a training ground fantasy?

No the game is missing some.. training ground fantasy or not they were used.....

There are 3 main types of rifle grenades that were used.

1. M17 Contact Grenade, regular launched hand grenade with contact fuse, explodes on hard surface

2. Airburst Fuse (Above picture) regular launched hand grenade explodes above ground with certain angle measured with sling. I don't know if the fuse can be set or it is all the same time in seconds since it's a regular hand grenade. Could be arced over hedgerows and dug in troops in fields for above ground burst.

3. M9A1 AT Grenade, hard surface contact HEAT. Used on armor but, could also be used on sandbags, wooden houses, logs, some thin concrete emplacements

 

all3.lnk

Edited December 7, 2015 by user1000