BTS, Are you considering doing a Pacific Front Theater with the CM engine?

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

I know, obviously, that CM2 will be Eastern Front, which I'm sure will totally ROCK. Then a CM3 and CM4 having '41-'43 North Africa/Italy and the '39 Poland and '40 France theaters. I think the Pacific Theater needs its "glory", ahem, "Carnage".

------------------

"I want you to remember that...no bastard ever won a war...by dying for his country...He won it...by making the other poor dumb bastard...die for his country."--George S. Patton

[Gregory Deych]

From their previous statements, Charles

and Steve think that 3-4 years is way too

far ahead to make reasonable forecasts.

[Bullethead]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>From their previous statements, Charles and Steve think that 3-4 years is way too far ahead to make reasonable forecasts.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Which is why I hope that, with sufficient support, we can still get them to do PTO/CBI before NA and EW

------------------

-Bullethead

jtweller@delphi.com

WW2 AFV Photos: people.delphi.com/jtweller/tanks/tanks.htm

[Mark IV]

Ack, deserts. Nice to visit but I'm not thrilled about spending CM hours there. Boring.

The Early War is my number one choice after the Eastern Front, the facination partly being how the Germans did so well without markedly superior equipment. Then, I'm ready for the Pacific and Korea.

I guess Korea would have to be a different game, although that's a lot of engine evolution by the time this comes around.

The scenario-makers can easily simulate North Africa (once the Early War is out) by removing terrain features until the map is sufficiently boring. Vehicles are the same. Easy terrain mod to resemble sand, and you're there. Desert games always make me see pink when I look away from the monitor.

[Major Tom]

Contrary to everyone's belief, it seems, the terrain in North Africa is not entirely desert. Infact, only a relatively small portion of the area that was being fought over was just flat desert. Most of it took place on ridges, wadi, torn up and uneven ground, basically, like CM1 without the green or trees. You still have rolling ground, buildings, fortifications, etc... There is plenty of cover in North Africa. Albeit, I would much rather see a 1939-40 CM before North Africa, but, remember, for 2 years the British, Italians, and Germans were battling over this terrain.

[Strider]

Bear in mind, if I remember correctly, the North Africa theater will also include Italy and such of the Medterrain(sp) area.

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

Yes I believe it will also include Sicily/Italy. That area will make for some good mountainous scenarios. There were some hard fought battles in that area. Nationalities should include, Vichy French, British, American, German, Italian, and maybe some Arab Partisan groups.

The East Front version, I think should include Finnish, Rumanian, Bulgarian, Russian, and German.

------------------

"I want you to remember that...no bastard ever won a war...by dying for his country...He won it...by making the other poor dumb bastard...die for his country."--George S. Patton

[Guest Germanboy]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Ol' Blood & Guts:

Yes I believe it will also include Sicily/Italy. That area will make for some good mountainous scenarios. There were some hard fought battles in that area. Nationalities should include, Vichy French, British, American, German, Italian, and maybe some Arab Partisan groups.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Careful, I believe Gen. Sosa what's-his-name might take offense (and rightly so) if anyone forgot the Poles here, IIRC they had a rough time at Monte Cassino... What about Indian, New Zealand and Canadian units - are they just subsumed under British in CM1 (don't know if there were any Indian or New Zealanders on the west front though...

------------------

Andreas

[Speedy]

As well as Italy/Sicily I also believe it will contain Yugoslavia, Greece, Crete, Syria, and hopefully the fighting in Eastern Africa.

[Major Tom]

Oh man! I can't believe all of you! Germanboy got most of them but, you are forgetting some of the most important nationalities ever to be a part of CM. CANADIANS, Poles, New Zealanders, Australians, South Africans, Brazilians (1st Division), African Americans (in the 92nd Division), Indians, etc... This is the most multinational theatre of war.

Battles could range from North Africa, Middle East, Italian East Africa, Malta (possible theoretical invasion), Yugoslavia, Greece, Crete, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Italy. Each with very good terrain. Reenacting some of the battles on Crete will be amazing! Imagine, ANZAC troops armed with Matilda II's and Mk VI's take on crack paratroops armed with only 75mm Recoiless guns.

[Guest Germanboy]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Major Tom:

CANADIANS, Poles, New Zealanders, Australians, South Africans, Brazilians (1st Division), African Americans (in the 92nd Division), Indians, etc... <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

How embarassing, I forgot over half of them. While we are at it, the French had some Moroccan division that by-passed Monte Cassino on paths considered difficult for mountain sheep there, and there was a US Nisei (2nd generation Japanese) bataillon (regiment?) that was considered to be too unreliable to fight in the Pacific. These guys had volunteered from the internment camps and acquitted themselves very well AFAIK. Very good movie about the internment topic is Alan Parker's 'Come see the Paradise'.

------------------

Andreas

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

Well, Hell. Why don't we throw in the Zulus. Point is you gotta draw the line somewhere.

But yeah, sorry, didn't know/think that the Balkan area would be in that MOD.

[Guest Babra]

Can you believe it? I musta been reading war books for close to thirty years now, and it was only about a week ago I ever heard of the Brazilians in Italy. Is that sad or what?

------------------

Floreat Jerboa !

[Guest Germanboy]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Ol' Blood & Guts:

Well, Hell. Why don't we throw in the Zulus. Point is you gotta draw the line somewhere.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Completely agree, but I also think it would be adding flavour to the game.

Hmm, Zulus... Rourke's Drift scenario anyone?

------------------

Andreas

[Dave]

To get back to the original question, I believe Steve & Charles have said NO to a Pacific CM.

[Gen. Sosaboski]

That's General Sosabowski to you Germanboy!

Indeed , the Poles fought on every European Front and made the Germans pay dearly in each for making that bad decision in '39.

I don't get it. There aren't many Pacific games around. I found one today though. Pretty good. Try www.cincpac.com

------------------

Sosabowski, 1st Pol. Abn.

Yes, I know my name is spelled wrong as a member!

[Guest Big Time Software]

Major Tom's post was pretty much the most on the ball overall We are planning on the third CM installment covering all the theaters and troops from 1940-1945 in the Med. Theater. This includes all the areas Major Tom mentioned except perhaps Italian East Africa. We are wondering if we should draw the line there as the number of troop types we will need is already in the silly range

PTO is not currently on our list. If it were, it would be about 4 years out. It absolutely will not come before any of the other three games currently planned.

Steve

[Guest Ol' Blood & Guts]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software:

Major Tom's post was pretty much the most on the ball overall We are planning on the third CM installment covering all the theaters and troops from 1940-1945 in the Med. Theater. This includes all the areas Major Tom mentioned except perhaps Italian East Africa. We are wondering if we should draw the line there as the number of troop types we will need is already in the silly range

Steve<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes I agree, the number of troops types would be insane!

Awe ...that's too bad about no PTO, but that's alright. Not enough armor engagements out there to make it interesting, other than alot of flamethrower tanks ousting Japs from there bunkers.

------------------

"I want you to remember that...no bastard ever won a war...by dying for his country...He won it...by making the other poor dumb bastard...die for his country."--George S. Patton

[This message has been edited by Ol' Blood & Guts (edited 02-13-2000).]

[Major Tom]

Well, CM3 would have to have more than 1 BMP to represent faces. You have Caucasian, Indian, African, Japanese, Canadian...

Frankly, I don't think that it would be too difficult to represent every nation and their weaponry in the Medeterranean theatre. Many nations used the same weaponry, or, didn't have multiple weapons, or in any quantity. It will "basically" probably be British, German, and Italian units and weapons, with the few indigenous weaponry of the other nations. Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Canadians and Indians were all equipped by the British. The French at this period were mostly equipped with either their own personal weaponry (small arms), and/or American equipment. The Brazillians were probably equipped just like the Americans also. The number of different types of weaponry will be very similar to that of CM1. Plus, many items can be reused from CM1 to CM3 (Sherman tank, etc...).

I think that the Japanese battalion was called the 100th Battalion. They were able to keep their name because they were so successful and such a brave formation. Always found the American denomination of Battalions (and the German one at that) to be pretty bland. It is either the 1st, 2nd or 3rd of whatever regiment. The Commonwealth got it right by having battalion names, with regimental histories to boot.

Forgot to mention, there was a Czech battalion in the Middle East, and, there was an Iraqi rebellion which required the "British" to invade Iraq. There was also Vichy French (Syria) and the Free French (1st and 2nd FF Brigades), plus the regular French Army (XIX Corps) after the Torch Landings.

[Bullethead]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>PTO is not currently on our list. If it were, it would be about 4 years out. It absolutely will not come before any of the other three games currently planned.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

(BH clutches his chest) Hold on, Elizabeth, I'm comin'! It's the big one!

(grumble grumble) boring (grumble) North Africa (grumble) early war (grumble) clunky tanks (grumble grumble) no Marines (grumble grumble)

------------------

-Bullethead

jtweller@delphi.com

WW2 AFV Photos: people.delphi.com/jtweller/tanks/tanks.htm

[Berlichtingen]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>(grumble grumble) boring (grumble) North Africa (grumble) early war (grumble) clunky tanks (grumble grumble) no Marines (grumble grumble)<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

North Africa... boring... right!

Early War... clunky tanks... true, but still the most interesting part of the war

No Marines... That Sucks!

[Guest Germanboy]

Major Tom has a point with the fact that equipment was pretty much standard over all these different nationalities. I guess one of the big things in going into the Mediterranean theatre would be that a lot of rountines regarding air support would have to be rewritten. AFAIK the allies only really got to grips with that in the last year of the war (have that from 'Closing with the enemy - good book). Unitwise (apart from different faces), I just think it would be very good for immersion to have the Babylonian number of languages calling for medics, turning panicky, etc. I have no clue how much work that would be, though - my biggest achievement in programming was to make the edges of my Comodore 64 screen flicker in different colours.

As far as the early war is concerned, I am not sure whether it would be so great - how do you simulate Blitzkrieg on bataillon level? AFAIK, most battles were won through encirclement and large scale flanking maneuvres, something that is beyond the scale of CM.

------------------

Andreas

[von Lucke]

CM2 or 3 will deal with operations on the Ost Front, yes? Since CM is limited to battalion strength ops, won't that make simulating a realistic encounter rather difficult? Sure, a battalion (+ or -) size kampfgruppe will work for the Germans, but what about the Soviets? Wouldn't a typical battle require the Germans to be out-numbered 5 to 1 (if not more)?

[Guest Big Time Software]

I've answered the scale thing before. There is in fact NO difference in scale between CM1 and any other theater. Do you really think that all attacks on the Western Front were sub battalion? I know of a few battles where an entire regiment attacked on a 500m front in fact.

Unit density at CM's level was no greater or lesser for any other front as it is for CM1. Sure, there are cases where there was a much greater concentration of force, but again this is true on the Western Front as well as any other. In fact, the AVERAGE density of troops in the East was LOWER than in the West because neither side had enough men and equipment to adequately man the front. Yup, even the Soviets had manpower problems...

Steve

[Guest Big Time Software]

As for the Med. Theater being boring, I would counter that the PTO is far more boring Just saw another show last night that only reinforced my opinion of the warfare in the PTO from about 1942 on. The bulk was static, suicidal combat with the Japanese being totally overmatched. One of the battles they mentioned the US killed 107,000 Japanese for a total of 7,000 friendly losses. And the US were on the offensive!!! The battle included flamethrowing galore, 100ft deep bunkers (which weren't entered, just blown up), bonsai charges, starving out the enemy, etc. Oh boy, sounds really interesting I can hardly keep my eyes open

Steve