1:1 Representation in CMx2

[Tarkus]

Originally posted by Blanar:

So, what was the training regimen for the forces in WWII? Did they force lefties to shoot righty as many schools did with hand writing? Did lefties on the battlefield shoot lefty anyway, have the expended cartridges ding off their helmets so they could shoot straight?

Slightly OT but, at the very least, MGs with rear trigger groups (maxim, M1919, vickers, etc) yield some advantages.

My two cents.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by junk2drive:

We could start a "What the leftys want in CMx2" thread.

Easy; big government and more social programs.

[Battlefront.com]

A reminder to people here... don't pay much attention to my math skills Charles is the guy in charge of the math stuff. Sad thing is that Charles even told me it was a 100 fold increase (in that example) and yet I somehow messed up my post.

1:1 modeling means that we will have a lot more stuff tracked down to the individual soldier. What exactly? I don't know yet, but moral and ammo are no brainers. One of the things we are looking forward to is reducing CMx1's groups of men behaving in a unified way (though there are some abstractions to take the edge off of this). Without individual morale this won't be possible.

Keep in mind that we aren't really all that concerned about showing all the individually modeled stuff to the user. With hundreds of soldiers under your command, this information will not be useful and in fact add to the difficulty of figuring out what is what (i.e. information overload). By showing on the info that is useful we can simulate things in more detail without worrying about swamping the player with useless info.

I say useless because knowing that an individual soldier in a single squad means nothing. Knowing that the squad as a whole has a certain amount of ammo is, however, something the player needs to know. That sort of thing.

Steve

[RMC]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Keep in mind that we aren't really all that concerned about showing all the individually modeled stuff to the user. With hundreds of soldiers under your command, this information will not be useful and in fact add to the difficulty of figuring out what is what (i.e. information overload). By showing on the info that is useful we can simulate things in more detail without worrying about swamping the player with useless info.

I think the usefulness of the information is relative. In a big scenario, yes, much of information becomes superfluous. But in a smaller scenario it could have more importance. The solution of course is to give the user control of the display of the information. Those who want to drown in nitnoid details should be able to do so while the "big picture" guys should be able to filter most of it out.

[jim crowley]

Originally posted by RMC:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Keep in mind that we aren't really all that concerned about showing all the individually modeled stuff to the user. With hundreds of soldiers under your command, this information will not be useful and in fact add to the difficulty of figuring out what is what (i.e. information overload). By showing on the info that is useful we can simulate things in more detail without worrying about swamping the player with useless info.

I think the usefulness of the information is relative. In a big scenario, yes, much of information becomes superfluous. But in a smaller scenario it could have more importance. The solution of course is to give the user control of the display of the information. Those who want to drown in nitnoid details should be able to do so while the "big picture" guys should be able to filter most of it out. </font>

[Sergei]

Steve, what is your vision of what happens in CMX2 in the situation in which CMX1 a squad becomes 'routed'? Will the squad totally disintegrate and if so, will they (if time is available and officers/NKVD are nearby) reintegrate?

[Battlefront.com]

We aren't going to make a customizable interface. It's a difficult thing to do and it would take a lot of effort. And unnecessary effort too. The kinds of info that are useless/useful for a Company sized engagement are pretty much the same for a Battalion sized one. Comparing a Battalion engaegment with a single Platoon... that's where some real differences would emerge.

Routing will certainly be different for CMx2. Units will be able to lose individuals, or small portions, without the rest of the unit routing. However, as in real life every guy that wigs out and runs away increases the chances that the others will follow suit. Obviously it depends VERY heavily on the nitty gritty specifics of the situation (such as Experience, type of enemy fire, quality of cover, etc.).

Steve

[RMC]

Ok, so you're going to do one-size-fits-all for the interface. Is there going to be any kind of public beta testing of possible interface options to see if there is a happy medium between detail guys and big picture guys?

What data elements are you currently considering for display relative to the individual soldier?

Ammo?

Health?

Morale?

Name?

Rank?

Current Weapon?

Grenades?

Some of this can be shown symbolically/graphically without cluttering the interface overly much.

[Midnight Warrior]

Now this idea falls into the category of pure, unadulterated eye candy but one of the things that one could do with 1:1 modeling is to provide a bit map image for each soldier in a squad/section. These individual soldier "mug shots" could be standard .bmp files (or jpeg, etc) but also could be modded so that scenario builders and users could provide their own. There are innumerable sources for the soldier mug shots (photos, paintings, etc). However, there are also programs like The Sims 3D that let you build and sculpture a face. Given one can add helmets et al to a face building program an industrious scenario designer (with obviously too much time on his hands) could use this features to add an addition touch to a scenario by puting a face (in addition to perhaps a name) to his digital soldiers in his scenario. Now given you have 200 to 400 soldiers per side that would be alot of imagery files that would chew up alot of RAM(even with compression). As such the mug shot sizes woud have to be kept pretty small (one wouldn't want then to take up too much real estate on the control panel either). BTW, These mug shots would not be part of the 3D imagery but would be more like the picture that shows the leaders insignia in the current game. The benefit to this feature would be 1. something more for modders to do (given they don't have enough to do already), 2. more identity between the player and his troops (given so many CM planners have decided that "getting a life" is not what it has cracked up to be and are content spending their free time interacting vicariously with digital representation of their fellow species (especially after having had to deal with the non vicarious variety of their species all day at work). Anyway, I don't know how this would stack up against all the other things that could go into CMX2 but given time and money were no object I think that this might be a nice feature.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Midnight Warrior:

Now this idea falls into the category of pure, unadulterated eye candy but one of the things that one could do with 1:1 modeling is to provide a bit map image for each soldier in a squad/section. These individual soldier "mug shots" could be standard .bmp files (or jpeg, etc) but also could be modded so that scenario builders and users could provide their own. There are innumerable sources for the soldier mug shots (photos, paintings, etc). However, there are also programs like The Sims 3D that let you build and sculpture a face. Given one can add helmets et al to a face building program an industrious scenario designer (with obviously too much time on his hands) could use this features to add an addition touch to a scenario by puting a face (in addition to perhaps a name) to his digital soldiers in his scenario. Now given you have 200 to 400 soldiers per side that would be alot of imagery files that would chew up alot of RAM(even with compression). As such the mug shot sizes woud have to be kept pretty small (one wouldn't want then to take up too much real estate on the control panel either). BTW, These mug shots would not be part of the 3D imagery but would be more like the picture that shows the leaders insignia in the current game. The benefit to this feature would be 1. something more for modders to do (given they don't have enough to do already), 2. more identity between the player and his troops (given so many CM planners have decided that "getting a life" is not what it has cracked up to be and are content spending their free time interacting vicariously with digital representation of their fellow species (especially after having had to deal with the non vicarious variety of their species all day at work). Anyway, I don't know how this would stack up against all the other things that could go into CMX2 but given time and money were no object I think that this might be a nice feature.

What next, modelling underwear types?

[Midnight Warrior]

Michael, perhaps you are right. What would make a face interesting is if it revealed something of the soldier's personality and/or character. If it were just something just totally made up then it might in fact be about as interesting as modeling his underware.

[RMC]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

What next, modelling underwear types?

As long as BTS gets the finer points of the woolen drawers used by the Canadians at Dieppe right I don't see a problem.

[dalem]

Originally posted by Midnight Warrior:

Michael, perhaps you are right. What would make a face interesting is if it revealed something of the soldier's personality and/or character. If it were just something just totally made up then it might in fact be about as interesting as modeling his underware.

"personality and character".

Hm.

Well, to each his own, but in a game where I'm pretty much meant to be the company commander, I think that that level of detail is misplaced.

-dale

[Battlefront.com]

Public Beta... nah, no plans for doing that. However, you guys will be here to debate (to death ) screenshots. We are planning on putting quite a bit of info in there, just not going to be counting every last bullet and so forth.

1:1 mug shots... oy! You have no idea how hard it was to make the fairly modest amount of headshots for CMx1 games Eye candy is great to put in when it doesn't become a major headache. From experience, this idea falls into the category of hole in the head And you can guess how much we want one f those!

Steve

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by RMC:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

What next, modelling underwear types?

As long as BTS gets the finer points of the woolen drawers used by the Canadians at Dieppe right I don't see a problem. </font>

[kipanderson]

Steve,

Seeing that you are following this thread, and this is an item from my standard “wish list” that relates directly to individual units… here goes… any chance of this feature?

“ Edit morale separately from experience levels.

When units from roughly similar cultures oppose each other this is not such an issue. There is a correlation between training/skills/quality/experience and morale. So assuming that “regular” German, British and US troops had similar morale is not overly wild when also subject to Fanaticism editing. But when very different cultures oppose each other, such as on the Eastern Front, this rule no longer holds. BFC recognised and overcame this problem by giving Soviet forces in CMBB lower skill levels up until January 44, for any given experience rating. However, in my view, others will differ, this was not a success. In the majority of scenarios I have seen you still find German troops with an average experience between Regular and Veteran, Soviets with an average close to Green. The result is that in most CMBB scenarios I have seen, the Soviets have far lower morale than the Germans. This is not historical accurate. I would like to be able to edit unit morale by one level relative to its experience rating. Such that a Regular unit in experience could have morale of Veteran, Regular or Green. There would still be a correlation between experience and morale, but also some room for limited flexibility. If this feature were there one could in a future Eastern Front game have German forces with average experience ratings between Veteran and Regular, Soviet forces with an average experience rating between Regular and Green, but with both sides having equally high morale. Far more historically accurate. This would also help in many other game settings I can think off.”

Do you have any sympathy with the idea ?

All the best,

Kip.

[Tarkus]

Originally posted by Midnight Warrior:

[snip]provide a bit map image for each soldier in a squad/section.[snip]

I made a portrait pack for CMBB and am doing one for CMAK as we speak. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a clean good shot of rumanian troops in combat ? Yet in CMBB you can have up to 40 different portraits for them.

In CMAK, there are 312 generic portraits, and trust me, replacing them all with *nice and realistic* pics is a very tedious process.

Making it fully customizable via the editor, for example, would be nice, but I am not sure if many people would make use of this.

Cheers

[c3k]

Gents,

One for one representation with portraits? Count me out. I don't want to babysit every feckin' squaddie. That's the team-leader's job. I don't care that my T-34 driver is feeling low because Svetlana just sent him a "Dear Ivan" letter. Drive the tank so the Tiger will target you so the rest of the company can flank the same Tiger. That's your job. I don't care how long the stubble is on the cheeks of each of my my para's. Or, whether that same stubble color matches his hair color. I don't care.

CMx1 does a poor job of allowing the PLAYER to track his OoB during a battle. (Yes, you can "+" and "-" your way through the list, but that is a poor solution.) A much better solution was a semi-transparent window with a graphic depiction of the unit hierarchy, allowing any unit to be cherry-picked and examined. How, in the name of all that's PLAYABLE, would portraits for each man in an infantry battalion, supported by several companies of armor, and close air support, help the GAME? Sure, RPG's, (the game genre, not the rocket) are fun. (Well, I'm sure the rocket style RPG's are fun as well!) But CMxX is NOT an RPG.

Thank you for allowing this rant. Steve, please return to your regularly scheduled game development.

Regards,

Ken

[Halberdiers]

kipanderson,...There would still be a correlation between experience and morale...

People,

I read that during World War 2 the veterans were more skilled in the art of surviving on the battlefield and therefore tended to be more willing than nonveterans to go into combat.But I read too that this soldiers reached their peak of effectiveness after the first 3 months of combat.Every battle imposes a strain so great that a man will be affected in direct relation to the intensity and duration of their exposure.

do you think that could be possible an inverse correlation between "experience" and "morale" when they excess 90 days of combat?.

Then an "experienced" would have more effectiveness than "veteran" by the effect of morale. And "green" more effectiveness than "conscript" by the effect of training. But by better morale a slow "green" could have equal effectiveness than a quick "veteran" who have better training but could be panicked more easily.(From the green "this can not occur to me" to the veteran "I will die in the next corner").

In this way it could be an equilibrated units too. Isn't it?

And talking about , what about use the "facial expression" as "experience" and "morale" instead of write words in the main bar ?. Must be repetitive in each squad ,and it does not seem difficult (in my ignorance of the programming).

"facial expression from green to veteran"

"facial expression of morale"

[ January 30, 2005, 08:58 AM: Message edited by: Halberdiers ]

[aka_tom_w]

Hi ck3

I think you find most folks here completely agree with you.

-tom w

Originally posted by c3k:

Gents,

One for one representation with portraits? Count me out. I don't want to babysit every feckin' squaddie. That's the team-leader's job. I don't care that my T-34 driver is feeling low because Svetlana just sent him a "Dear Ivan" letter. Drive the tank so the Tiger will target you so the rest of the company can flank the same Tiger. That's your job. I don't care how long the stubble is on the cheeks of each of my my para's. Or, whether that same stubble color matches his hair color. I don't care.

CMx1 does a poor job of allowing the PLAYER to track his OoB during a battle. (Yes, you can "+" and "-" your way through the list, but that is a poor solution.) A much better solution was a semi-transparent window with a graphic depiction of the unit hierarchy, allowing any unit to be cherry-picked and examined. How, in the name of all that's PLAYABLE, would portraits for each man in an infantry battalion, supported by several companies of armor, and close air support, help the GAME? Sure, RPG's, (the game genre, not the rocket) are fun. (Well, I'm sure the rocket style RPG's are fun as well!) But CMxX is NOT an RPG.

Thank you for allowing this rant. Steve, please return to your regularly scheduled game development.

Regards,

Ken

[securityguard]

woops

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Halberdiers:

And talking about , what about use the "facial expression" as "experience" and "morale" instead of write words in the main bar ?. Must be repetitive in each squad ,and it does not seem difficult (in my ignorance of the programming).

"facial expression from green to veteran"

"facial expression of morale"

[/QB]

Because that's what every company commander does in real life - goes around his soldiers at 60 second intervals and looks at their faces...

I think the next person that says something like this:

"it does not seem difficult (in my ignorance of the programming)"

should be horsewhipped.

So you're seriously suggesting that every 60 seconds, I need to go down to view level 0, maneuver the camera on 150 seperate individuals, and look at their faces to determine morale states?

And if they happen to be face down because they are crawling...what then?

How about just focussing back on underwear like I suggested (if you'd bother to read the posts). White=good morale

Brown=bad morale

damp=tired

soaked=exhausted (physically and emotionally)

Perhaps BFC can FINALLY pioneer Smell-o-vision so we can most accurately assess morale. I doubt it would be hard to do, but then again, I don't know much about programming. I am sure the idiots at BFC have simply been holding back on accurate smells just to be jerks, though.

[Battlefront.com]

Yes, Morale separate from Experience. Already in the CMx2 design

Guys, NOBODY is going to look at the details of an individual soldier and CARE. With hundreds of soldiers under your command means your attention needs to be focused on the unit not on the individual. To paraphase some of the military guys in Skunkworks... "I don't give a crap if PFC Johnson has 68 rounds of ammo and a boo-boo on his foot... I want to know how capable his squad is". And that is the correct way of thinking about it.

So... even IF it was easy to add some detail like facial expressions, we wouldn't waste the interface space on it because it is a unnecessary distraction to the player. Remember... a cluttered interface is an ineffective interface.

Steve

[stikkypixie]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Yes, Morale separate from Experience. Already in the CMx2 design

Guys, NOBODY is going to look at the details of an individual soldier and CARE. With hundreds of soldiers under your command means your attention needs to be focused on the unit not on the individual. To paraphase some of the military guys in Skunkworks... "I don't give a crap if PFC Johnson has 68 rounds of ammo and a boo-boo on his foot... I want to know how capable his squad is". And that is the correct way of thinking about it.

So... even IF it was easy to add some detail like facial expressions, we wouldn't waste the interface space on it because it is a unnecessary distraction to the player. Remember... a cluttered interface is an ineffective interface.

Steve

He said something about skunkworks :eek: ! Everyone who read that will have to be "disposed off".

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

To paraphase some of the military guys in Skunkworks...

Are you now referring to your "Battlefront.com Skunkworks" forum? A slip?

Woops, let's run Stikky before the black helicopters arrive...