dalem Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 Originally posted by Battlefront.com: I am not sure how exact the controls will be for the Scenario Designer regarding asset withdrawal, but there will be some sort of ability to influence how things happen. Random reinforcements in QBs is something that I'd also like to see. At least as an option. Steve I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO in your head Steve. -dale Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
von shrad Posted February 20, 2005 Share Posted February 20, 2005 originally posted by Battlefront.com: von Shard is back? Holy crow... is the van back as well? The Van is back in all its rusted glory and it appears not a moment too soon. With the popularity of lightning fast processors and 20 inch rims, it looks to be a good year for both of us. Still catching up on this thing you call CMx2 so I don't have much input at the moment, but I am sure glad to see that the level of intellectual debate is still quite high here. It is relieving to see some familiar greybeards and dedicated novices and newbies. I have no doubt as to the quality and depth of any BF product. It is definitely in good hands.Now if I could only get you guys to make a grand strategy game... von shrad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrSpkr Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by dalem: I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO in your head Steve. -dale Be afraid, Steve. Be VERY afraid! Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wadepm Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Yea, yea Dale's a real demon seed.... So Steve, are we getting together for beers or what? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 I have also read of many accounts of tanks packing it in and abandoning infantry. This includes a story from my friends father who was in WWII. The grunts went back later and found the tankers and it turned into a unit brawl. But if the size of battles in cmx2 gets smaller and assetts like Tanks CAN leave, then the player might actually use them suicidally BEFORE they can leave (or stick them very far forward so that they at least shoot on the way out). So modeling something like this ends up with gamey behaviour. The player should be rewarded with keeping his assets if his loses are low and things like victory objectives are not taken yet. A variation on this is the modeling of Orders. The player gets Orders during play directing him to send reinforcements off XX coordinate. The player may send all or some and his 'victory' assessment is factored by how much he can send. Always sending the tanks with no ammo not being appreciated by the higher ups. [ February 20, 2005, 06:19 PM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew H. Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by dalem: [snip]I've read more than one anecdote of U.S. operations in WWII where tanks tasked to supporting infantry just picked up and left. I would suspect that this was more common when the two units were not familiar with each other - say an independent tank bn just assigned to an infantry division or an ad hoc force thrown together at the last minute. I wouldn't think it would be a common thing, but it would be a nice way to simulate more of that battlefield friction we all read about every once in awhile. -dale Yeah, if you read the green books, this sort of thing seems to happen all the time - a company of infantry is taking fire and hope that the tanks will help them - but instead, the tanks inexplicably drive off. The reason for is is because we may think of a typical CM battle as being a company of infantry with an attached platoon of tanks, the platoon wasn't really "attached" to the company - the tank would be part of a larger force (at least a company, perhaps a battalion) attached itself to a much larger force. So it's really coincidental that a tank platoon happens to be helping out this particular company, and it could be called away at any minute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dalem Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 I think the mechanic would/could work the same for purposes of modeling either re-tasking or simple confusion. The scenario description clues would be different but the game wouldn't care "under the hood". As far as abusing the tanks if you know they might leave, well, the tanks are still worth points, and if you take foolish risks with them you might lose more poitns than you gain. -dale Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tero Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by Philippe: This is starting to sound like there could be some interesting exploration of group morale. Right now there's global morale and unit morale, and nothing in between. In Napoleonic games you often have to worry about a panic in one unit spreading for no apparent reason to nearby units -- one unit in your line panics at the sight of those Cuirassiers barrelling down on them, and when they turn tail and run they take three or four adjecent units with them. I don't pretend to know enough about crowd panic behavior to suggest what should and shouldn't apply to CM, but I would think that the state of mind of a cluster of units smaller than everyone on your side would influence fight and fright behavior. Panic by platoon may be too artificial (unless the platoon leader -- probably an NCO -- just got wasted), but it should be considered. And I seem to recall stories of soldiers worrying about their officers getting killed, not because they were good leaders or that the men cared one way or the other, but because the men knew that the captain was the only person who could influence events going on outside of his foxhole, who had a map and battalion hq's phone number, and who generally knew what was going on. One option would also be bogus orders. It was not uncommon for misinterpreted orders or downright rumours to trigger quite orderly retreats/redeployments (to the rear or alternate positions) or indeed even advances. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 21, 2005 Author Share Posted February 21, 2005 Glad to hear the van is back and that so many people are in my head. I usually only have Mr. Giggles and Ms. Molly in there, so I assume they've got some beers ready for Dale and his friends. Oy Since the player will not know if an asset is going to stay or be called away, gamey play is avoided. At least it should be since this scenario designer option SHOULD be fairly low overall. In other words, if you find that 1 in 10 scenarios (or even 1 in 3!) have some of your armor leaving early, what are you going to do? Are you going to do the Charge of the Light Brigade at the beginning of every game just on the off chance that *ALL* the assets are slated for removal? I would love to play against that 'feller Plus, losing the assets will still count against your score in some way, so suicide rushes in anticipation of removal can have a double bad consequence (i.e. sacrificing something, and sacrificing it for no reason). Some sort of morale sharing between units should be possible. It was actually on the table for CMBO but it was simply one thing too many for us to do. After CMBO it wasn't the sort of thing that could go in without major rewriting so the ideas sat gathering dust. The concept is both good AND bad things happening to an individual unit may affect others. That Hero Squad that is holding everybody back acts as inspiration for others to stick it out, for example. Or the best unit (the Sgt Steiner Squad) starts running back to the rear, sending most other units along with it. Not sure how to do misinformation causing units to do the wrong thing since this runs into the Borg and God perspectives. We do, however, think that Relative Spotting will cause a lot more palyer uncertainty and that should screw things up a lot more than is possible in CMx1 (and it does happen, just not for very long). Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 21, 2005 Author Share Posted February 21, 2005 BTW, I am also quite pleased to see so many members in the Triple Digit Club showing up for these discussions. On the other hand, when I see the Registered Dates I find myself saying "my God... where has the time gone!". Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain Pies Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 I'm all for having assets re-tasked mid scenario but what worries me is the loss of control aspect of it. The AI sometimes does dumb things and I can see no exception to this rule if it is given control of re-tasked units, eg reversing a bunch of tanks into LOS of an 88. How about a compromise where the player retains control but re-tasked units can only move towards the friendly or neutral edges of the map? There would be nothing to stop the player from leaving the units where they are if they want to defy orders but this could be mitigated as suggested with a points reduction if they are not exited from the map by a certain turn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dschugaschwili Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by Captain Pies: How about a compromise where the player retains control but re-tasked units can only move towards the friendly or neutral edges of the map? If the player retains control of the units I'd suggest suddenly assigning those units the "should exit for points" flag with their exit zone to the rear. Of course, in that case the player could first use up all ammo and only then exit the units. So the victory points gained for exiting would have to be tied to time of exit and/or ammo level at exit. But I think it could be a viable way of doing a "soft" removal. Dschugaschwili Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by Captain Pies: I'm all for having assets re-tasked mid scenario but what worries me is the loss of control aspect of it. The AI sometimes does dumb things and I can see no exception to this rule if it is given control of re-tasked units, eg reversing a bunch of tanks into LOS of an 88. How about a compromise where the player retains control but re-tasked units can only move towards the friendly or neutral edges of the map? There would be nothing to stop the player from leaving the units where they are if they want to defy orders but this could be mitigated as suggested with a points reduction if they are not exited from the map by a certain turn. Thats why I would want the assets removal to be triggered by certain events. One is the loss of too much of the asset. Suppose you have a 4 tank platoon assigned and 2 are KO and one is gun damaged. The removal trigger is excessive losses and the 'platoon' of tanks leaves by TACAI control (yes would be nice if the tank would fire lots of smoke and back away smartly). In this case, they may not leave but just have an aversion to any firepower/enemy units. But having them be TACAI controlled (no player command) models a soft failure. The other 'event' is the NOT taking of objectives yet (meaning they stay). The assets are assigned to TAKE objectives. So once you HAVE taken the objective, THEN they are susceptible to being recalled. IF recalled, its up to you to drive as many back as you can spare. The more you deliver, the more victory 'credit' you get for them. A more detailed example is: You are a CW inf comp commander (captain?). You are assigned two 4 tank sherman platoons. You take town XX and the recall for the armor is given. You pull out 5 tanks (2 sere immob and one KO) and the next turn four 6 lbrs with lorrys show up. Perhaps a section of Achilles shows up instead. So losing assets may also be tied with reinforcements also. Note that teh reinforcements are not assets per se and will stay with the player. For 'Campaigns' this could have some good effect on gameplay. The point of assets is important as it will show who the player is actually modeling. In this case, he is a CW company. As the game models smaller forces, assets can bring more realistic combat behaviour into the game. [ February 21, 2005, 09:09 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrD Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Here's something else I'd love to see. In many battles, one side was heavily outnumbered. It is difficult to simulate this in the current system. I'd like to see the ability to assign variable points for casaulties (by side) in a scenario. Thus, the briefing might be "take this town, but keep casualties down." In this case, the defender would receive more points for casualties than the attacker. An outnumbered defender can win by causing such casualties then withdrawing. Alternatively, the briefing might be "take that hill at all costs!" In that situation points for casualties would be minimal, objectives all. The variations are endless, you could simulate a rear-guard action in which the objective is to keep your force intact, or an Alamo-like last stand. This system would give us far more flexibility to design scenarios based on RL battles, and would be very simple to implement, just include a "casualties variable" for each side that acts as a multiplier for that side's casualty points. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yair Iny Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Robert Oleson, in his excellent single player campaign rules system, has something very similar to this. In his campaign there is a higher level of point called "Favor" which you carry from mission to mission and which you can use to upgrade your forces etc. One of the mission types he thought up is a raid mission, in which your forces have to infiltrate the enemy's setup zone and destroy certain objectives, then they have to exfiltrate. You gain favor for having occupied the flags during the middle of the raid, but lose favor for still occupying them once the mission is over. Steve, you might want to give his campaign rules a read, they are very innovative and add a whole new layer to CMBB/AK. Might have some ideas there that can be useful for CMX2. RobO: hope you don't mind me suggesting this, I just thought that a discussion of CMX2 features would be left missing without considering your work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Note: I heavily edited the post a few back, please reread. Assets have many good implications. Ideally, it would be great if multiplayer-sameside could have two independant players so that one commands the armor and one the inf/Arty/etc. Hopefully this will be a future feature. But in the meantime, the concepts of assets almost forces the single player to mimick a multiplayer situation. By having him think differently for forces under his overall command, he simulates having two seperate players. [ February 21, 2005, 09:10 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kipanderson Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Hi, When it comes to artillery stopping unexpectedly, counter battery fire could also force an artillery unit to go into emergency bug-out mode. (There is a piece of jargon for it… but I forget what it is ) The threat of counter battery fire could even be in as a design tool. A sort of random event, but within a realistic context. No matter… just a bit of trivia.. All the best, Kip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kipanderson Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 The Triple Digit Club I had a number in the 400s, but Steve brutally vaporized me in the Great Crash of ’99. (Tried to post when the system was down.) I have never recovered for the trauma of the sudden loss of status. All the best, Kip. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by kipanderson: Hi, When it comes to artillery stopping unexpectedly, counter battery fire could also force an artillery unit to go into emergency bug-out mode. (There is a piece of jargon for it… but I forget what it is ) The threat of counter battery fire could even be in as a design tool. A sort of random event, but within a realistic context. No matter… just a bit of trivia.. All the best, Kip. Interesting idea. Also, tubes could be lost as weapons/crews are knocked out. Reaction time could be longer as plotters/commo is also taken out. Ready rounds could also be damged and they would not be used. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aka_tom_w Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Originally posted by kipanderson: The Triple Digit Club I had a number in the 400s, but Steve brutally vaporized me in the Great Crash of ’99. (Tried to post when the system was down.) I have never recovered for the trauma of the sudden loss of status. All the best, Kip. yea! Me too SAME thing I am pretty sure I was one of the first 999 sign ups but my "good" triple digit number got smoked the same way. tried to post...... ...and poof! I needed a new number too. (but I am happy with 1515 its easy to remember!) -tom w Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andreas Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Regarding loss of units. While I am agnostic on the loss of units during a battle. While it happened, it probably would have depended on the dynamics of the battle - 'sorry mate, we have lost half a platoon already, you're on your own'; 'sorry mate, there is an uncleared minefield, you are on your own'; 'sorry mate, we are US tankers, and that's what we do, you're on your own' (if you believe Ganter 'Roll me over'). So to predetermine it may not be as great or realistic as it sounds where battles are concerned, unless it can be tied to the dynamics of the battle. Where it is absolutely required though is in operations. Inbetween battles, assets would be reassigned, sometimes with catastrophic consequences (see e.g. Kissel 'om Dnjepr zum Dnjestr. Rückzugskämpfe des Grenadierregiments 683'). So, to sum up - what is needed for realistic settings is a tie-in with the dynamics of the battle. E.g. Germans have Kingtiger = tanks bugger off. German KT taken out by air attack (German or allied) on turn 1 = tanks stay. Or, attacker loses four tanks to hidden ATG = tanks bugger off. Attacker loses one tank, IDs ATG and kills it = tanks stay. That's what you get for asking us to think bigger BTW, Steve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Carr Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 This sounds great! Sorry I'm so late to this thread. Just read the initial post from Battlefront. I especially like the ability to have more doodads like wrecked/knocked-out tanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Offsetting the player from his assets could also mean other things. Simple example is a sherman attached to my platoon. I give him fire orders but do not designate the actual target itself. Maybe I get to just rotate the turret and he will pick targets himself and not even let me know what they are. Same with movement, if there are delays, the delays are not shown in the info box like they are for my core units. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wartgamer Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 An alternative assets example could also be: Your core force is 2 panzergrenadier platoons with several halftracks with 75mm (long and short). The assets include two panthers from a panzer battalion within your division and a smattering of infantry from another division. The loose infantry are the remains of a battalion that has just been ousted from a village you must retake. They are very vulnerable to 'recall' in that they will not withstand losses for very much longer. The panthers are assigned to help you take the village but just as far as defeating armor/ATGs. They may recall if you have taken the objective or there are no heavy opposition. Or if they lose a vehicle.. But the panzergrenadiers, being trained the the cooperation with armor, and having some integral 'armor' (HT), would not take a hit on its 'core' unit gloabal morale than the scattered infantry (who will bolt for any reason) when the Panthers leave. [ February 21, 2005, 12:33 PM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Philippe Posted February 21, 2005 Share Posted February 21, 2005 Out of curiosity, what name do you go by when you design scenarios? I think I might be interested in taking a closer look at some of your work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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