More questions - Operations

[Wild Bill Wilder]

Gentlemen, a few more questions:

What do you think of Battlefront's approach to Operations. Like it? Don't like it? Why?

Do you have some theme ideas for an operation? What would you like to see done as an operation?

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Wild Bill

Lead Tester/Designer

Combat Mission-Beyond Overlord

billw@matrixgames.com

[Kingfish]

Hello Bill,

There was a couple of threads on the CM board that dealt with operations ending too soon. I know one was labeled "warning, warning", can't remember the other one.

Anyway, i'd like BTS to have a look at that. IMO my opponent had the upper hand in the first two games yet it ended after that with me as the winner. Strange.

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

[Henri]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Wild Bill Wilder:

Gentlemen, a few more questions:

What do you think of Battlefront's approach to Operations. Like it? Don't like it? Why?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Bill,

I have only played one, so I am still undecided on the issue.

However, one thing that I find disorienting and a bit unrealistic is the lack of information about how one is doing after each scenario . This could be improved mightily by changing only the briefing: in sum, the player could be told that he is expected to reach a certain "phase line" by a certain time, so that he would know if he is ahead or behind schedule.In a real-life Battle plan, commanders are given specific intermediate objectives to achieve, usually in the form of phase lines.

More difficult to program in the same vein as the above would be branching scenarios that would depend on what the player has achieved or not achieved; for example, the player is tasked with capturing a certain crossroads before the end of the scenario; if he succeeds , he might be given another objective as part of a larger battle, or he might be submitted to an enemy counter-attack to retake the critical crossroads and be tasked with holding the position for a certain length of time.In the simplest case, there would be only two branches at the end of each scenario, or sometimes only one; for example if the player did not succeed in taking the objective, in the next scenario he might be tasked with the same objective, but perhaps with some reinforcements, but not necessarily.

Another somewhat different but related approach would be a campaign where the player could not advance to the next step before accomplishing the previous one . This would be a linear campaign consisting of a series of connected scenarios and depending on the programmer, there could be branches or not. To avoid frustration from weaker players, there would have to be levels of difficulty.

Nice work anyway.

Henri

[patboivin]

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

for example, the player is tasked with capturing a certain crossroads before the end of the scenario; if he succeeds , he might be given another objective as part of a larger battle, or he might be submitted to an enemy counter-attack to retake the critical crossroads and be tasked with holding the position for a certain length of time.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

This reminds me of timed artillery barrages against crossroads after D-Day...

[stevetherat]

hey there folks

an operation idea: what about a nice battle for caan. we brits took ages getting it (was supposed to be taken on d-day!). it involves a whole myriad of troops and weapon types and might be a good pbem game, being quite well balanced. would also be a nice transition from open field to hand to hand city fighting.

how about it wbw?

steve

[Smirnoff]

Hi,

The approach to Operations is quite good. I like it al lot and even prefer them over battles. It's more challeging then a single battle (if designed well) and keeps me busy for a few hours.

Improvement is possible however.. I'd like to see a kind of system in wicht it's easier to design bigger and longer operations (1 or 2 weeks with a few battles a day). This means of course the current 6 slots for reinforcments can be insufficient and possibly the current maps are to small. Also I'd like that the reinforcements can be assigned to different conditions on the battlefield (eg your forces are smashed so you need them or if you're doing well they won't show up because you don't need them or at least headquaters thinks so etc..).

Maybe there can be some kind of framework in wich a copple of Operatins or Battles can be linked giving the feeling of a sort of campeign?

Is it possible to have a random Operation generator??

I haven't search the forum but this could already been mentioned..

I hope it can be done but still CM2 will also do.... it's still a great game!!!

An idea for an operation could be Walcheren (Zeeland in the Netherlands (ok I'm dutch )) it was a quite a struggle for the allies to free the Schelde river to open the port of Antwerp because the germans flooded big parts of the island and were determant to make a stand (so, some use for the assultboats). I belelieve it was a Canedian or Britisch attack, defenatly no American. I'm still thinking about making it myself, but i haven't got the time to do some research to make it historicly correct as I think that's more fun..

Greetings,

Smirnoff

[Mikester]

I hate to say this this way, but.......

BTS needs to fix the way the front lines are redrawn in between battles of an op. The way it is handled right now is pretty bad in my and my buddies opinions. Judging from several other threads I found this morning doing a search and numerous comments by many folks on this same subject it sounds like a definite change needs to be made.

The "problem" seems to be in the way the front lines are defined for the next battle. It appears that 1) It is almost entirely based on the position of the attackers forward most units and 2) The actual position of the defenders units is not taken into account at all. Also, the new line is pretty much just drawn as a straight line across the map at that point where the attacker has made his most forward advance. Take all this, and then add in the no-mans-land buffer zone that is tacked onto this new forward line determined after the battle, and the defender can end up being pushed way back from where they probably should be. This is totally unfair to the defender in my view, gives the attacker way too big of an advantage, and I dare say, is downright unrealistic in my view. Furthermore, once (i.e. already) folks figure out this is how things work you end up with nothing but gamey tactics of the attacker trying to sneak units to the other side of the map in order to win the op. This seems to be especially easy in some scenarios when the first night battle arrives. And this appears to already be happening from the comments people have made in regard to operations ending after only the first or second battle even though a large portion of the both sides forces are still on the map. Bill, do you know if ver1.03 is going to address these issues? I certainly hope so.

Other than this I love the operations. Only other thing I would like to see is a view of the entire operation map so that we as players know as an attacker how far we really have to go to reach the end of the map and as a defender how much more ground we have to give up. Maybe the entire map could be displayed during each of the pre-battle setup phases for player reference with setup zones and an outline of the next battle map shown for reference. That way we could see where we are at relative to the rest of the map and plan accordingly. Once the battle starts, it could then just display the current battle map area as the game does now.

Thanks.

Mikester out.

[This message has been edited by Mikester (edited 07-24-2000).]

[This message has been edited by Mikester (edited 07-24-2000).]

[Guest Madmatt]

1.03 is looking at the issue of the 'lines' inbetween battles of an Operation but I have not been testing this to see how it is been changed.

I just know that it was looked at and tweaked, dont know to what extent yet though...

Madmatt...

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[Mikester]

Thanks for the update Matt!

It's greatly appreciated. I hope they looked at making jagged lines for next battle setup start lines, etc.

Regards,

Mike

[dalem]

This is just a repeat of what I said towards the tail end of Bill's previous Op. thread: I played a couple of battles of the Carentan Op. and the constant 'forcebacks' (the same issue we've all been yammering about) made it pointless to continue.

I certainly won't be trying any more Ops without a tweak or fix or whatever, to this issue - I figure that if I want to be pulled back from hard-won objectives for no discernable reason whatsoever I'll just join up for real!

The QB Generator is my friend, though, and a good friend it is.

And when the Ops thing is fixed, I would love, love, LOVE to see more 'non-historical' Ops, like A Day in the Cavalry, etc.

-dale

-dale

[Talenn]

dalem and others:

I've posted this elsewhere as well, but I'll repeat it here in case you havent checked the other threads.

Edit the Ops and move the size of the 'No Man's Land' to 0m. This USUALLY solves the majority of the 'pushback' problems.

Try it out and let me know what you think. Does it take care of some of the issues that you are having?

Thanx,

Talenn

[Echo]

Thats another problem too. Setting it to zero, and then it defaults back to 400m. I still cant figure that one out.

[DEF BUNGIS]

So far I liked two OPS scenarios I played.

I kinda thought the Brits were a little over supplied during the Arnhem OPS, however it was still fun.

What it really boiles down to is the person creating the scenario and how much attention to detail he puts into it.

It takes a hell of alot more time to crank out a good operations than it does one single map scenario. The maker should spend just as much time on the story, briefings and order of battle, as he does with the maps themselves. CM is a great game for operations, I beleive the real question hear is quality. It should be play tested from both sides and pass the spell checker.

Overall, with a few BTS tweaks, and some quality designers, operations have my vote for mega fun.

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Better to make the wrong decision than be the sorry son of a bitch to scared to make one at all

[dalem]

Talenn-

I'd be 'afraid' to edit an Op because won't I see force dispostions? I'd rather wait for a fix of some kind than ruin an Op. for myself. Or am I worrying needlessly?

-dale

[Oberst Angsthase]

I remember something about the recon battalion of the 17th SS PG division having to plug a miles-wide hole in the line south of Omaha beach. I think a small mobile hit-and-run defense against a large infantry force reinforced with tanks sounds good.

Agree with the push-back issue. It is frustrating to repel an attack, hold the line and still be pushed backwards only because you didn't kill every last sob that came at you. I'd like to see the front bend a little more too.

[Mikester]

dalem,

If I remember correctly when you go into the editor there are eight buttons to go to sub-menus/functions. One is for choosing the forces for both sides. It is totally separate from the one that sets the general game settings like number of turns, number of battles in an op., and the size of no-mans-land in the operations. So you shouldn't see any forces. The map is also in a separate function so you wouldn't see the map either. Warning, if you do go looking at the map using the map preview you do see the forces on the map!

Mikester out.

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

Talenn-

I'd be 'afraid' to edit an Op because won't I see force dispostions? I'd rather wait for a fix of some kind than ruin an Op. for myself. Or am I worrying needlessly?

-dale<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[Talenn]

dalem:

Mikester is correct. You wont see any 'spoiler' info. The button you want is labeled 'Parameters'. The adjustment for the 'No Man's Land' size is in the bottom right corner of that screen. Tweak it to 0m. Save the mission and enjoy.

Note that when you save it, it will default to the Saved Games directory, NOT the Scenario directory. Simply browse to the Scenario directory and save it there. If you dont, then you'll just select the game from the 'Saves' area rather than the Scenario area of the Operation Selection screen.

Hope it helps! It certainly made the Ops FAR more enjoyable for me..no more cheesy 'pushbacks'.

Talenn

[dalem]

Mikester and Talenn-

Thanks!

-dale

[gibsonm]

Bill,

I think OPs are a great way to link battles but I do have some suggestions:

1. The front line issue (mentioned elsewhere) especially given the current inability to have salients (I'm currently running an OP in 1.03 that was designed under 1.01 and the front line is still straight). Why do my fwd elements get displaced just because the AI has made a gain (esp when my units had been cutting him up with flanking fire).

2. Vehicle recovery. I know you can adjust it but I'm using up a lot of ammo making sure those "Ronsons" lite up. I find that if a vehicle isn't burning its recovered, repaired and re-crewed by the next battle. I can understand that to some extent but to get an entire tank squadron replaced during the course of a day! Especially when my anti-tank weapons are pushed back out of their battle positions courtesy of the front line. I feel like I'm fighting tank crews from "the night of the living dead", you kill them and they come back for more.

3. Can we match mechanised troops with their vehicles? Perhaps a seperate purchase option (Panzer Grenadiers with vehicles x points, Panzer Grenadiers without vehicles y points)? Currently I have two US Inf Coy mounted in halftracks and after I bought the various pieces I had to ensure I had enough tpt for them all and mount then during the setup phase. This approach would also reflect the comd status in the unit. In an intergrated unit (purchased as a PL with TPT above) the PL commander would also control his tpt (C0 = PL comdr, C1-C3 = Squads, C4-C7 = halftracks). This would also help with selection units via the "+" and "-" keys.

Purchasing a PL without TPT (and buying vehicles seperately) would be good for vehicles not intergrated but "under comd" for the current phase.

4. This maybe beyond the scope of the game timeframe but perhaps units that survive contact and achieve some kills should have their morale rating adjusted between battles. I'm not suggesting a unit can go from green to crack in 20 minutes but perhaps if they survive x battles they could improve one level?

Just some thoughts.

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Regards,

Mark:-{)

Anxiously awaiting the G4 PowerBook

[Mikester]

Wild Bill,

Any word / discussion w/ BTS and/or other testers on how the front line is being drawn in the op's between battles and any possible changes in the works?

Thanks.

Mike D

aka Mikester