accidently found this site,i have questions

[chickenhawk]

I am a mac user and am happy to see another game come out for us. i have been playing the hell out of close combat 2 and it is starting to get old.could those of you who have this new game, and are ww2 wise, give me your overall opinions as to historical accuracy. Also, would you recomend this game.what would you change about the game? i have seen some disturbing posts on the forum. i would just like your general feelings please. THANKYOU!

[Lorak]

If you only own one WWII game. Make sure Combat Mission is it. It is by far the most realistic WWII squad level game I have ever seen. If you want some outside opionions goto the Review bullet on the left.

Also download the Demo. You won't be dissapointed. As I'm sure the others that post after me will confirm.

Lorak

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"someone you trust is one of us"..........the illuminati

*

http://clubs.yahoo.com/clubs/combatmissionclub

Lorak's FTX for CM <--Proud member of the Combat Mission Webring

[Redleg]

I may have been a bit hard to convert, but after getting used to CM I find it a much more enjoyable game then CC. Try the demo, but play it a few days before you make objections as it is hard to transition from CC to CM. I am ordering it and expect to get more if not a lot more of gameplay out of CM than I did from CC.

[TexasToast]

chickenhawk, you came to the right place.

Combat Mission is THE BEST tactical wargame. It is amazingly realistic. Most of what you see on this forum amounts to haggling over little details that really lie on the fringe and don't impact the quality of the game. Brings up an interesting point, do the posters on the forum here really want the first impressions of a visitor to be a million-and-one little complaints?

Anyway, you know that we Mac folks have a somewhat limited selection of good games, which makes this one even more of a godsend. Try the demo, it's a lot of fun, then you will buy the game.

[jdmorse]

Boy is my face red, multiple posts

[This message has been edited by jdmorse (edited 07-11-2000).]

[jdmorse]

Oops infamous double post

[This message has been edited by jdmorse (edited 07-11-2000).]

[jdmorse]

Chickenhawk

Fellow Mac user here (yes we do exist) For opinions on CM from the world at large, not us crazies, try http://www.battlefront.com/products/worldwar/cm/cm_rev.html which is a collection of reviews of the game.

As Redleg said try it. CM is simply the most realistic, immersive WWII GAME extant. I say game because it is a challange and enjoyable. You don't say what type of posts bothered you. This is a big community of passionate people with all levels of interest and background. But there are over 72,000+ posts in over 7,000 threads. You don't get that unless there is substance.

Try it but remember that the gamey tactics of other games do not work here. Realism does. Also read the BTS Manifesto to see why it is the way it is. http://www.battlefront.com/about/index.html Also, read the forum(s) also are tech support, scenario etc. And the game has only been out a month!!! Can't find that anywhere else.

Enjoy, a whole new world is waiting, and Welcome aboard, Any concerns be sure to post and people will respond

[Mark IV]

Chickenhawk: Dunno how many forums you've been to, but this is the least "disturbed" I've ever seen.

We get exercised over how many angels can dance on the turret of a StuG*, but we're all really enthralled and in love. This is the wargamer's dream come true. If you can even ask a question like "give me your overall opinions as to historical accuracy", load it, you'll love it.

We're just kvetching about the fine points now, so we can say BTS put in "our" pet feature, and because some of us love to argue, and because no one will talk to us in any detail about WWII in our daily lives like the people on this board will.

BTS has been incredibly responsive, as any Search will show (try "Dead Bodies"), and they continue to amaze.

Anybody here, tell me if I'm wrong, can I have a witness!!!

*Uh-huh, it's a trick question.

[Colin]

Hey!

The most immersive game ever. I played the hell out of CC2 also and this is a wonderful thing. I also run a Mac CM site so if you have any question don't hesitate to mail me.

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And if we abandon any platform, I can assure you it will not be the Macintosh.

-Steve

My website!

[Moriarty]

Chickenhawk, don't be put off of the game because of some of the posts on the board. As was mentioned, this is a community that has a passion for gaming and historical accuracy. Sometimes that passion overflows, but in the vast majority of instances discussions and debates are conducted fairly, honestly and openly.

Another big benefit to this board is that you can communicate directly with the guys who designed, redesigned, tested and retested this game — and they'll answer your concerns directly.

Download the demo. You won't be sorry and I'd be willing to bet your order goes in soon.

Welcome aboard.

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K.I.T.D.

F.O.H.S.

[This message has been edited by Moriarty (edited 07-12-2000).]

[Dragoon44]

Chickenhawk, CM rocks! I played the hell out of Steel Panthers I & 2 as well as CC, CC2 and CC3. These are good games, but CM grabs ya by the gonads and screams,,,PLAY ME!!!! Besides, being a retired Armored Cavalry officer, I have a very soft spot for Stuarts, Grayhounds, and Humber Scout Cars all of which are in this game,,,pardon the froth, its not hydrophobia its enthusiasm!

[John Kettler]

(Long,detailed reply)

Chickenhawk,

To properly answer your question, let me try to give you some perspective on myself, so that you can then evaluate what I tell you about Combat Mission: Beyond Overlord. I am also one of those posters you expressed concern about.

My Background

I'm a dyed-in-the-wool wargamer, having gotten started in board wargaming in 1967 at age 12.I have wargamed with miniatures since at least 1975, playing TSR's Fast Rules and later Tractics, with many more systems to follow.

I'm the son of a defense engineer with a deep interest in military history, got into military history, technology, theory and practice in childhood, and have devoured it ever since, with particular emphasis on WWII. I also spent over eleven years with Hughes and Rockwell as a professional military analyst on numerous major weapon programs ranging from the TOW missile to the military derivatives of the National AeroSpace Plane (NASP).

My military computer gaming was initially done on an Amiga and didn't go well (SSI's Red Lightning), because I couldn't see what was happening on the 16 screens or whatever and got whomped. My next computer wargaming was on my friend's Mac playing CC2. I well remember how impressed I was watching a guy smaller than 1/285th scale belly crawling.

CM vs CC2: A Rough Comparison

Now, let me give you a rough comparison. Take CC2 as a wargaming experience and increase it by a minimum factor of ten. This is hyperconservative. Combat Mission is nothing less than a fundamental breakthrough in wargame design, a revolutionary synthesis of a multitude of individual developments into a stunning, engrossing, deeply immersive, wholly original creation.

Combat Mission & Panzer Elite: Trailblazers Both But Not At All The Same

The only thing out there comparable in creativity, ingenuity and immersiveness is Panzer Elite, a highly detailed armor sim, and the two are in no way equivalent. Combat Mission positions the player as overall battle force commander, but he is not directly

participating in the battle, which can go as high as a reinforced battalion on a side. By contrast, in Panzer Elite you ARE the platoon leader and must not only fight your tank but direct your wingmen, coordinate with adjacent units, request fire support, etc. If you screw up or are simply unlucky, the last thing you see is a big explosion. With that said, let me now justify my claim vs.CC2.

Combat Mission's Features

For starters, the entire Combat Mission game except the trees, which are sprites (major CPU hit if 3-D), is in 3-D. That includes individual men who are equipped, dressed, move and behave quite realistically. Squads are depicted with three figures (again, CPU issue), but are tracked by the computer down to the individual man for casualties, morale, ammo state, etc. Troop quality ranges from raw conscripts to elite units.

Movement is based on simultaneous mutual order issuance and execution, called WE GO, with the computer's calculating all pertinent interactions, then simultaneously executing the turn in the form of a 60-second movie, which can be endlessly replayed from any angle until the next turn is begun. This simultaneity eliminates all kinds of gaming dirty tricks which you may have learned to hate.

AI is multilayered, running everything from choosing a battle plan to the behavior of a squad under fire.Though better on defense than the attack (less to compute), it is quite capable of thrashing you at even odds and can be tailored to increase or decrease its capabilities. Play is vs. AI, hotseat, LAN (I think) and PBEM. TCP/IP will come in a few months via free patch. Otherwise, the game release date would've been greatly extended.

Smoke, depending on settings and system capability, is transparent or opaque, with white smoke for screening and oily pillared black smoke for vehicle kills. Explosions are frighteningly realistic and throw up all kinds of debris. House and building collapses throw up enormous expanding domes of dust. Fires can be started by artillery fire, handheld AT weapon backblast, recoilless weapons, or even flamethrowers. It's quite possible to burn down a house by firing a bazooka from it. There are bodies when squads are eliminated, but no blood. To permit sale of the game in Germany (huge gaming market) all Nazi symbology has been excised and stand-in graphics provided.

Except for wind (would take a Cray), environmental effects are modeled. You can play in broad daylight, at dawn/dusk,night;in overcast, rain or snow, with attendant effects on mobility, visibility, etc. The sun is not modeled. Don't know why.

Sound is point sourced, varies in intensity with distance, and is directional.

There are so many camera options I won't even try to list them here. Suffice it to say that you can have everything from a God's eye view to a view padlocked to a single figure, like a tank commander. You can even allow camera shake for that authentic "you are there" feel.

LOS modeling is real world, based on terrain and is automatically computed. Players have an LOS tool as part of an elegant, easy to learn interface. Speaking of modeling, a wealth of excruciatingly detailed data on weapons, armor, accuracy, projectile types, optics, armor quality, human factors and much much more (including accurate 3-D modeling of in-flight ballistics and terminal ballistics) went into this game, and tweaks are made when needed and properly justified. The people who made CM are themselves gamers, served in the military themselves, consulted with many veterans and really are devoted to what they're doing, going way beyond the extra mile to listen to their customers and field a first rate product.

Hotkeys allow you to perform a multitude of functions including removing tree renderings, smoke and such to find units and plot moves, without affecting game play in the slightest. You can select smoke rendering/building transparency options this way, thus allowing my anemic Gen One iMac w/ 64 MB RAM and 2 MB VRAM to run this incredible game, just not at high resolution with all the graphic bells and whistles those with more memory and better video boards can. Theoretically, though, it shouldn't run on my machine at all.

The troops speak in their own languages and accents. Forces in the game include U.S., British, Germans, Poles, Free French and Canadians. There are some 150 vehicle types in the game, beautifully rendered and many with camouflage so good it's almost impossible to identify them in battle unless quite close--which CAN be unhealthy--ranging from Jeeps and Kubelwagen up to Jagdtigers and Pershings.

Fire support covers the gamut from onboard platoon mortars to offboard 14" naval guns and 300 mm rockets. Several varieties of airstrikes are available, and casualties from friendly fire of all types not only are possible but happen often enough to make people plan their moves carefully.

Combat engineers have satchel charges, flamethrowers and can clear mines, which come in three types: daisy chain AT (lie atop the ground) and buried AP and AT. The Axis has several types of wood and concrete fortifications. Defenders on either side automatically start dug-in in foxholes. Target reference points are available for preregistered artillery and mortar fire.Barbed wire is also in.

Fog of war is modeled so well that the other night I lost a whole bunch of .50 cal MG armed armored cars trying to knock out a Marder SP antitank gun by shooting through its lightly armored superstructure. Unfortunately, it was a Hetzer! If you can't really see something well enough to ID it, the computer will throw up a generic ID until you can. And if you've ever read about, say, hearing movement and that triggering artillery fire or some other response, then you'll be right at home here. The game will tell you when something's heard. How cool is that?

The manual is a gem, 180 well organized,easily understood, properly spelled pages. And if you can't get your answer there, there is this board (quite a few sections) and a whole Combat Mission Webring to draw upon.

The game has a tutorial scenario, some 36 battles, a bunch of operations(six, I think), which are minicampaigns,each consisting of as many as six battles fought on one large map, with limited troop replacements and return of damaged (not destroyed) vehicles between battles. You also get the Quick Battle generator--a few mouse clicks to select troop types, date, weather, terrain and battle size, and boom! you're fighting. I have yet to play a canned battle from the game CD, since I'm so engrossed in ginning them out in the Quick Battle generator. You can even handpick your troops. Combat Mission has a full Scenario Editor and Map Editor, allowing you to build almost anything you can think of.

If that's not enough, dozens of new scenarios, graphic tweaks and sound mods are readily available and are free. Strongly recommend you check some of them out at Combat Mission HQ (follow link at CMHQ Update posting here on this board). Then there's the Combat Mission Metacampaign, which allows you to take command of a unit and fight from D-Day until the end of the war in blind, refereed scenarios. And let's not forget the official Combat Mission ladder series for those with intense competitive streaks.

Those Worrisome Posts

This board is awash in the thoughts, musings and sometimes rants of some very knowledgeable, often highly opinionated people, all of whom are intensely passionate about Combat Mission,many of whom served in the military (not just U.S. either) or serve now, many of whom waited two years for the game to be released. This fearsome brain trust has invested thousands of unpaid hours in an effort to make Combat Mission the best wargame ever. Period. To that end, there is an ongoing effort to provide the players with the means in the game to perform the same tactics and give them the same combat capabilities as their World War II counterparts.

Sadly, there are real limits on what can be done. This is partially because the game was designed to run on mass market computers, not 1 GHz behemoths. This in turn forces things like 3-man squad renderings to be used. Similarly, there are coding limits. Certain things could be done, were more coders available and schedule and cost not considerations. Others are practically intractable. You can't, for example, screen troops behind moving armor, as was often done in reality. The reason is that the code can't handle dynamic cover (moving cover). It does, though, model a burning wreck as cover. Certain terrain features are tough to do, too, because the game's tile size is 20 x 20 meters and many features are much smaller than a tile, trenches, for one.

Because of the above, plus partisanship,egos, language difficulties and various other factors,this board is a constantly roiling sea of demands,questions and complaints--all with the goal of further improving an incredible wargame that we all love. Ultimately, though, no matter how much we huff, puff and propose, Steve and Charles dispose. It's their game, their business, and they call the tune. They're excellent listeners, though, and their tremendous wargame fully reflects this.

So, Chickenhawk, I wouldn't worry about all those posts; I'd worry if no one was making any.

Summing Up

This game is the single biggest threat I've ever seen emerge to board wargames and battles with miniatures. You don't have to count hexes, add combat factors, hand track ammo, casualties or morale.

And you haven't lived until you've seen your Shermans, Stuarts and halftracks advance under fire, tank commanders in their spinning turrets seeking hidden enemy positions, guns blazing defiance as that last volley of suppressive fire crashes down on the town's outskirts.

You haven't lived until you've heard the dread clang that betokens a pierced tank, heard the linen ripping sound of MG-42 fire and watched with sick apprehension as a Panzerschreck rocket, tail afire, arcs right toward one of your tanks.

You haven't lived until you've desperately fought a bitter, frantically improvised defense against platoons of Allied armor and swarms of infantry, wondering whether ere long you'd be hearing a Jabo whistling down on you or the sky tearing as 105mm fire comes shrieking in.

I could go on and on, but why?

Get Combat Mission. Be happy!!!

Hope this helps.

Regards,

John Kettler

[This message has been edited by John Kettler (edited 07-12-2000).]

[Sten]

Way to go, John!

Chickenhawk, if you care enough to read John outstanding answer, you probably don't even need the demo. Go ahaed and order the full version. You won't be disappointed.

Sten

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Keep your whisky on the rocks and your tanks on the roll.

[DanE]

Wow!!! John, after reading your review, I almost left work so I could go home and fire up CM. Let's see, if I can get rid of all of this paperwork, perhaps I can cut out at lunch. Now where is that trash can...

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Dan

[This message has been edited by DanE (edited 07-12-2000).]

[sniperscope]

DAM!! John that was the best post I have ever read on this forum. I hope all newbies read this. Dam good post.

sniperscope

[GI Tom]

Wow! I am very impressed by the eloquence of that post by John. I had to print it out so I can let my wife read it to see why I'm so excited to wait and get my copy of CM!

Outstanding job John. And from me personally, thank you for taking time out to put up a phenomenal post such as that.

TO BTS: Drop the text up to the CM vs CC2 part and post it on your website. That post was the most definitive explanation that someone such as myself has seen and answered more questions than all of my 3 full days of reading this board.

You will get a ton of use out of that post if used properly IMHO. Granted, it's one person's (an owner of the product no less) view of the game, but it is packed with info that takes the emphasis away from that aspect, so it has good functionality.

Thanks again John. I have stopped using my search function to answer questions that have been popping in my head! I think that any other questions I may have about the game can only pop up after I've obtained a copy and experience play for myself.

GI Tom

[Guest Madmatt]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by sniperscope:

DAM!! John that was the best post I have ever read on this forum. I hope all newbies read this. Dam good post.

sniperscope<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I agree it was pretty good and well phrased but it really didn't have the eloquence of my classic "Steamy Pile of Poo" thread or the cuting edge wit of my "Bite Me..." series of messages and who can forget (although they try) the legendary 23 exclamation marked "Warm Glass of Shut The Hell Up" pontification?

hehehe, John with your permission I would like to use some parts of your message for a new "Newbie" section that I want to put on CMHQ. CMHQ has tons of stuff (there is no debating that) but I often wonder how approachable it is for someone that has just followed a link to it with no real concrete knowledge of Combat Mission other than what they read in a review/preview on another site...

This has been something that I have wanted to undertake for quite awhile...

Madmatt

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If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ!

CMHQ-Annex, The Alternative side of Combat Mission

Combat Mission HQ

CMHQ-Annex

Proud members of the Combat Mission WebRing

[Kingfish]

John,

That post is a thing of beauty. Pure and simple, a classic. And to think you probably whipped it up in a few minutes without much effort. Wow!

I strongly recommend that BTS have you contribute in some way (Manual, advertisments, etc...) to future projects. Talent like that can really benefit this game.

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The dead know only one thing - it is better to be alive

[Dragoon44]

John,

Eloquence, sheer f**king eloquence.

[jdmorse]

John:

You da man!

Seriously, halfway through I thought BTS needs this. It's about as succint and clear as one could get. Also, now that we have you available, we can refer all posts to you and we can get ourselves back to playing CM

[Buckeye]

Great review, John! Damn, your posts are long; I didn't know that engineers could string together so many words and have them still make sense. However, I actually cut-and-pasted your post, so that I could e-mail it to friends and suggest they try out CM. Way to go!

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"Don't lie to me, Gustav! You're a stinkin' Mac user!"

[GI Tom]

You can bet your sweet bippy that it will go on the websites of the games I play!

GI Tom

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"Da only way I got to keep dem Tiger's busy is to let dem shoot holes in me!" -Donald Sutherland in role of Oddball in Kelly's Heroe's

[der Bob]

DOH! Too many years of beating myself at wargames obviously have taken their toll. Sorry for leaving John's original message (although worth reading twice!) in its entirety in my reply. der bob

John:

I of course don't know you, but like many others on the CM board, I feel compelled

to congratulate you on an excellent post summarizing CM. I started wargaming even

before you did (at age 9, in 1961, with "Tactics II"). I bought my first computer (an Atari 800) just so I could play "East Front 1941". I think I have well in excess of 50 board wargames (mostly Avalon Hill), and I have no idea how many computer

wargames/simulations I possess. Most of them have been vastly enjoyable--despite

the fact that my only opponent was almost invariably me. None of them, though, ever

captured my heart the way CM has. My only regret about CM is that it came along when I have so many other responsibilities (wife, 3 kids, business, home, motorcycle, etc.) that require my time, leaving precious little to admire my loyal (sometimes!) troops as they run about the most beautiful computer-rendered landscapes to-date. You are also right about what a thrill it is when , for example, one's last surviving tank in the "Maaastricht" scenario is a lousy Stuart, but it manages to sneak up on the sole remaining PzIV and take it out with a 30M flank shot just as you watch the PzIV's turret slowly turn toward the Stuart.

Yes, you captured the essence of the attraction of CM very eloquently (and perfectly spelled) post. I thank you, and hope your post is taken to heart by any waverers out there who wonder if they should purchase CM.

Take care (and watch out for those spunky Stuarts!),

der Bob

[This message has been edited by der Bob (edited 07-12-2000).]

[John Kettler]

Guys,

Thank you one and all for the kudos!

What can I say? I started writing and kept going until, hours later, I was done, then had to go back and put in a few things I forgot.

I shall now attempt a coherent response to the issues you raised.

I never said I was an engineer. I said I was the son of one. I was a Soviet Threat Analyst, a position in Operational Analysis devoted to researching, analyzing and forecasting Soviet/ Warsaw Pact military developments as they applied to various current and planned weapon programs. Anything from a sapper attack to an antisatellite weapon was within my brief, as were nonCommunist foreign weapons such as Roland and Exocet plus such annoyances as F-14s in Khomeini's hands.

My job was threat characterization and definition, which in turn drove the overall weapon system design in a variety of ways. I was a generalist in a department full of specialists, many of them routinely needing detailed data to plug into their combat effectiveness models (Soviet SAMs vs. B-1B, Alpha strike vs. Soviet naval units, etc.) or information on how a particular system fit into the overall combat dynamics. I had piles of reports, target lists, orders of battle, and map layouts like you've never seen. I used to have an 8'x 8' 1:250,000 map mosaic of East Germany with no less than eight sets of classified overlays upon it. I didn't get to wargame, but I definitely had the raw materials.

Madmatt, if you want to cut out the extraneous personal stuff and post the rest to your free Combat Mission support site, then do so with my blessings. I'd appreciate an appropriate byline, though, since it is my creative product.

As for BTS, if Charles and Steve wish to use my post officially, then they should contact me directly.We could then discuss all sorts of things.

Finally, I also cut my wargaming teeth on Avalon Hill's Tactics II, playing AH games exclusively for years until discovering SPI and those who followed.

My best to all of you.

Sincerely,

John Kettler