CMAK (Feasible) Wishlist

[PeterX]

What an earth-shaking announcement! And I'm the first with suggestions. Hehe.

Since this will be built from CMBB I'll try to keep the wishes as realistic as possible, that is, no request for flares, animated 12 men squads, multi-multi-player, borg spotting elimination, etc. This should add only thin layers of coding on to the engine.

1- Expanded treatment of minefields. They were a very prominent element in the N. African campaign.

2- Company HQ tanks. Basically the same way infantry C&C is now handled.

3- Simulation of radio damage/dropouts in vehicles. Right now, the radio equipped vehicles have too much freedom 'cause they're unbreakable.

4- Wind affects longer ranged fire. Target bracketing should take a bit longer in windy conditions. Especially, one supposes, in the case of mortars.

5- Scenario specific bmps; a village in Tunisia has little in common visually with say, Naples. Or user selectable building sets depending on the theatre depicted.

6-Anti-tank ditches.

7- Sand storms.

Any others?

BTW, love the dust and smoke enhancements. Should really add to the realism and immersion!

[ April 04, 2003, 04:15 PM: Message edited by: PeterX ]

[MikeyD]

Remember, we're getting this so quick because it's CMBB-based. So don't wish for the moon!

My own (limited) wish list includes:

Panther turret pilboxes along the gothic line.

A fancier (less ugly) polygon of concrete bunkers.

Placeable Dragons Teeth (perhaps purchasing a 'line' of dragons teeth like Road blocks).

Brit Staghound and AEC ACs.

Churchill AV(?) mounting Sherman 75mm gun in Siciliy & Italy

Possible inclusion of Yugoslavia (Tito partisans vs German units in captured French armor).

Possible inclusion of Champagne Campagain (might be the same weapons/units as Italian campaign, now that I think of it).

[flammenwerfer]

- A dedicated Orchard Tile(Olive/Almond or Date palm)

- S.African Troops(and Armored cars)

- Sangars(rocky foxholes)

- Matilda mkII C.S.

- Flying Monkeys

- Soft sand

- GURKhas!!!!

- Dome-less Church

[ April 04, 2003, 04:19 PM: Message edited by: Flammenwerfer ]

[Gordon]

Portees?

Gordon

[Broken]

It would be REALLY nice if support weapons could be attached to a specific headquarters, even if another HQ is closer. The current system of units willy-nilly attaching themselves to whatever HQ happens to wander closest can be very frustrating.

Case in point: You have an HQ with LOS to an enemy unit. An on-board mortar (out of LOS) is attached to this HQ, allowing the mortar to indirect-fire on the enemy unit. However, a friendly platoon (with no LOS) moving up out of reserve "steals" control of the mortar, rendering it unable to fire.

It would be nice to have an "Attach to HQ" command.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Broken: I agree completely. That would be a major improvement.

[Vanir Ausf B]

Make the camera tilt angle sticky so it doesn't reset itself when you change view level.

[ April 04, 2003, 04:14 PM: Message edited by: Vanir Ausf B ]

[Juardis]

heat shimmering off the sands of Africa

Mountains

Beaches

Model the entire island of Crete on one map? The battle itself lasted some days and a whole slew of Brits escaped, so maybe a new victory condition. Escape all your troops off the edge of the map while preventing your opponent from getting his off the same edge.

[Holman]

I'm curious:

If CMAK actually goes to 1945 in Italy, won't we be getting the entire slate of nations, OOBs and vehicles (barring a few UK Funny Tanks and the Free French) that we have grown to love from CMBO? If this is the case, doesn't this mean that CMAK will essentially *include* all of the elements necessary for 44-45 West Front battles except terrain?

In fact, given what's already in CMAK, it looks like the only thing necessary for our Western Front needs is the terrain set from CMBO (so that we can have marsh, snow and grass in addition to CMAK's sand, oasis and olive groves). And fortunately these European terrain elements are *already* all present in the CMBB engine today!

BTS, please don't remove the green grass, snow, frozen rivers and other northern terrain types from the CMAK engine just because they don't fit the Med setting. (Maybe they could be just be left as undocumented features in the scenario maker.) Given what will already be included in CMAK, those terrain elements are all we need to make "Beyond Overlord" a reality under the CMBB/AX engine.

(I should add that I know that the next generation engine will probably return to the West Front. But I can't imagine that the presence of Western Front terrain and user-made scenarios in CMAK will in any way hurt sales of the next CM two years from now.)

I'm looking forward to converting CMBO scenarios to CMAK!

[ April 04, 2003, 04:23 PM: Message edited by: Martyr ]

[MikeyD]

Talk about mines, how about proper big dusty mine explosions! Currently I often overlook mine detonations in CMBB (Hey, why is that tank suddenly immobile?).

[MrNoobie]

Originally posted by Martyr:

I'm curious:

If CMAK actually goes to 1945 in Italy, won't we be getting the entire slate of nations, OOBs and vehicles (barring a few UK Funny Tanks and the Free French) that we have grown to love from CMBO? If this is the case, doesn't this mean that CMAK will essentially *include* all of the elements necessary for 44-45 West Front battles except terrain?

In fact, given what's already in CMAK, it looks like the only thing necessary for our Western Front needs is the terrain set from CMBO (so that we can have marsh, snow and grass in addition CMAK's sand, oasis and olive groves). And fortunately these European terrain elements are *already* all present in the CMBB engine today!

So, BTS, it comes down to this: PLEASE don't remove the green grass, snow, frozen rivers and other northern terrain types from CM just because they don't fit the Med setting in CMAK. (Maybe they could be just be left as undocumented features in the scenario maker.) Given what will already be included in CMAK, those terrain elements are all we need to make "Beyond Overlord" a reality under the CMBB/AX engine.

(I should add that I know that the next generation engine will probably return to the West Front. But I can't imagine that the presence of Western Front terrain and user-made scenarios in CMAK will in any way hurt sales of the next CM two years from now.)

I'm looking forward to converting CMBO scenarios to CMAK!

YES!! YES!!! what he said!! :beer:

[nevermind]

Lots and lots of bodybags!

I had asked this question a few days ago,and it was as usual overlooked.How the heck are you going to use infantry in CMAK?Its hard enough in BB to get them to advance with cover,now picture lots of open sand,and nothing to server as cover other than LOS blocking sand dunes.

Lots and lots of smoke?

Just make sure you win the armor battle?

Only play defense?

Anyone?

[PeterX]

If this is the case, doesn't this mean that CMAK will essentially *include* all of the elements necessary for 44-45 West Front battles except terrain?

I don't why BTS is including the Italian campaign; it doesn't fit in chronologically with the other two theaters. Plus, as your post demonstrates, it will unleash a clamor to turn it into CMBO II. (Which is fine with me- but then forget Q4 2003).

[ April 04, 2003, 04:40 PM: Message edited by: PeterX ]

[Holman]

PeterX says:

Plus, as your post demonstrates, it will unleash a clamor to turn it into CMBO+. (Which is fine with me- but then forget Q4 2003).

But the beauty of it is that my request *doesn't* add development time to CMAK! All of the essential equipment needed for 44-45 Western Front battles will already be in CMAK. Maybe a small number of CMBO units will be missing (volksturm, Pershings; anything else?), but we can live without these.

In fact the sum of my post is this: if BTS will refrain from *removing* the northern terrain types already in CMBB for the CMAK engine, then we will essentially have CMBO under the newest engine as soon as CMAK is released.

[Juardis]

there's snow and marshes in Italy. Everything that's in france, except bocage, is in Italy.

[ParaBellum]

Originally posted by Juardis:

...Model the entire island of Crete on one map? The battle itself lasted some days and a whole slew of Brits escaped, so maybe a new victory condition. Escape all your troops off the edge of the map while preventing your opponent from getting his off the same edge.

You know that Crete is about 260km long and its width varies from 15 to 65km?

[Holman]

Juardis sez:

there's snow and marshes in Italy. Everything that's in france, except bocage, is in Italy.

Yep. I guess I'm just worried that the Italian terrain in CMAK will reflect the sunny Mediterranean character of Africa and Crete, and that we'll not have snowfields or snowy weather.

The inclusion of Bocage would, of course, be lovely!

[PeterX]

But the beauty of it is that my request *doesn't* add development time to CMAK!

Perhaps. But I wish they'd limit the theaters to Crete and N.Africa. They can focus on game enhancements and new features and avoid the Kitchen Sink morass that so delayed CMBB.

[Ted]

Will the setting/rising sun have an effect?

I think longer or larger maps may be needed for N.Africa.

Can’t you see from Algeria to Libya or all the way to the Suez if your standing on a k-ratio can.

I wonder what it’ll be like to be on the defense and see all that dust and have no clue as to what’s making it.

Didn’t they tie a lot of brush to the backs of trucks to create a lot of dust to fool the enemy into thinking it was a whole tank brigade out there.

I wonder if CMAK will include special “Dust Trucks”

And the sixty four thousand dollar question is…..what will CMx2 encompass?

[Holman]

PeterX says:

Perhaps. But I wish they'd limit the theaters to Crete and N.Africa. They can focus on game enhancements and new features and avoid the Kitchen Sink morass that so delayed CMBB.

I see your point, but I'm more optimistic. I doubt that we're going to see many game enhancements and new features anyway: CMAK is going to be an "on the fly" adaptation of CMBB's engine, as one of the BTS fellows (Moon?) pointed out. What we're getting in CMAK seems to be mainly the appropriate OOBs, Med terrain and skins, and probably new models (if the Allied tanks are going to be brought up to CMBB levels of detail; Germans have already been done).

Armor and other data for US and UK vehicles is probably mostly done (from CMBO), although I understand that the CMBB calculations are more complex.

With the Med made real and NW Europe maybe sneaking in alongside, I think we're looking at enhancement enough!

[Moon]

Martyr is basically correct. Don't expect a new engine with CMAK - that's what the new engine will be for

And yes, with the exception of probably bocage, you should be able to create a France type scenario with CMAK with a little bit of fiddeling around. What exactly will be possible and not is too early to tell at this point, though...

Martin

[litchy]

work with nvidia, one of you has got to get the drivers working correctly

[KNac]

I would like to see france camaping, or if not france troops with their secret weapon: the big white flag.

[MrSpkr]

Gurkhas

Brazilians

South Africans

Italian Partisans

Greeks (on Crete)

Australians/Kiwis

Free French

Arab Pro-Axis and Pro-Allied Partisans

Airfield terrain type.

Crags/boulders (worse than Rough)

Rowhouses (probably not doable until the engine re-write)

Dustplumes off vehicles as they move.

Wide variety of Allied air support

An option for English language exclamations for all the players (shouldn't be hard to get if you just have them record both English and Italian/German/insert nationality here in the same recording session).

Drifting or scattered paratroop drops (even if this is just done by game engine calculation -- say the setup point is at location X, then the reinforcements scheduled for that location would arrive scattered about according to a random variable, perhaps based upon unit experience, and wind)

Minimal armaments/ammunition levels for air-dropped German paratroopers

Different types of landmines (I really would like to see a graphic for a bouncing Betty)

Shimmer or haze effects (both game-engine and graphic implementation).

And, oh yeah -- Elite jeeps with .50 MGs mounted on the back

Steve

[Juardis]

Originally posted by MrSpkr:

Dustplumes off vehicles as they move.

And, oh yeah -- Elite jeeps with .50 MGs mounted on the back

Steve

Excuse me, MrSpkr sir, but did you not look at the freaking screenies. Those would be the pretty pictures kindly posted by BTS for your viewing pleasure. You will see dust plumes off vehicles. Now, unless I somehow missed that class during physics, the only way to throw up dust clouds like that would be if THE VEHICLES WERE MOVING. Thank you for your time.

And by the way, did you see the M16? QUAD 50s!! Now you can have your cake and eat it 4 times. Rumor has it that BTS will NOT allow them to be elite though.