Extreme FOW Question

[Aacooper]

Extreme FOW (selectable when you begin a scenario) brings a new, realistic, level of fear and uncertainty to the battlefield. I especially like FINALLY getting close to the enemy position and finding out the enemy squad has 1 guy left, with an unknown number dead. Likewise, that pesky AT gun isn't shown as dead, but now there's an unknown infantry unit moving away from it.

Question: Does extreme FOW affect spotting, or only the amount of information available?

[Claymore]

My nit regarding Extreme FOW is that Detailed Armor Hits should not be allowable. Being able to discern partial or even complete penetrations at ranges greater than 100m is completely unrealistic.

[Le Tondu]

Originally posted by Claymore:

My nit regarding Extreme FOW is that Detailed Armor Hits should not be allowable. Being able to discern partial or even complete penetrations at ranges greater than 100m is completely unrealistic.

I agree there Claymore. Right now, all that we can do is to turn 'em off.

[aka_tom_w]

Detailed armour hits and Warning labels (I think) can still be turned on with Extreme FOW.

I think that with the warning labels on you can get a label on the the enemy unit that says its knocked out or reveal some other info about its battle ready condition.

Is that correct?

So it sounds like Extreme FOW works best (if thats what you want) by voluntarily turning off Warning Labels and Detailed Armour Hits.

Any other thoughts?

-tom w

[Claymore]

Voluntary selection of the Detailed Hits mode is possible in Extreme FOW.

My contention is that game play would be enhanced considerably (and made more realistic) by making the Detailed Hits mode non-operable if Extreme FOW is selected.

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Claymore:

Voluntary selection of the Detailed Hits mode is possible in Extreme FOW.

My contention is that game play would be enhanced considerably (and made more realistic) by making the Detailed Hits mode non-operable if Extreme FOW is selected.

yes I agree...

that and not being able to select Warning Labels (shift G I believe), as well.

one might expect Extreme FOW not to have "extra" hints like Detailed Armour Hits and Warning labels available (edit) for enemy units :confused: .

-tom w

[ September 03, 2002, 01:51 PM: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[Claymore]

I agree Tom.

[busboy]

Just to clarify, I'm sure you mean no detailed armor hits on enemy vehicles in extreme fog of war. Its kind of nice to have that info on your units.

[aka_tom_w]

How about this for an Extreme FOW issue:

fytinghellfish

Member

Member # 3701

posted September 03, 2002 12:13 PM

quote:

Originally posted by Red 6:

How can you identify which tank or vehicle is the Command tank or vehicle? So that you can knock them out first.

I'm pretty sure you can just click on the vehicle and the little figure on the left hand side (a soldier with a flag behind him) will indicate 'officer' or 'enlisted.' Of course, you have to know what an officer's uniform in either army looks like...

And I don't think this works in extreme FOW.

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Wicky

Member

Member # 7974

posted September 03, 2002 12:18 PM

quote:

And I don't think this works in extreme FOW.

I think it do....

Similar targeting tactics as with infantry will thus come into play. Also not launching your HQ tanks into frays.

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"The box said Windows 95 or better, so I bought a Mac."

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Cameroon

Member

Member # 7030

posted September 03, 2002 12:19 PM

quote:

Originally posted by fytinghellfish:

quote:

Originally posted by Red 6:

How can you identify which tank or vehicle is the Command tank or vehicle? So that you can knock them out first.

I'm pretty sure you can just click on the vehicle and the little figure on the left hand side (a soldier with a flag behind him) will indicate 'officer' or 'enlisted.' Of course, you have to know what an officer's uniform in either army looks like...

And I don't think this works in extreme FOW.

Actually, it does but it is not instantaneous. Identification of command vehicles by your troops takes a little time."

any further Comments?

Sorry I hi-jacked these post from another thread but it is still an Extreme FOW issue.

-tom w

[tar]

First off, let me say that I really like the Extreme FOW option. Getting shot at for a couple turns by "Sound Contacts" was great! (OK, maybe not for the guys getting shot at....)

Anyway, I did notice one minor glitch. I was looking at an enemy unit and saw that it had 3 men + 4 casualties. Then, when it disappeared from sight, the information on the number of men disappeared. So far, so good. But even though the number of men and casualties disappeared, the status box still showed the type and nunber of weapons graphics. That kind of defeated the masking of the number of men alive.

As another minor point, I would have expected that extreme FOW would suppress the number of enemy casualties -- only showing the number of active men.

- Tom.

[aka_tom_w]

What?

on the second page already :confused:

Too many new topics pushed this important issue off the main page.

any other Extreme FOW observations?

-tom w

[Silvio Manuel]

I would think that command tanks could be discerned by looking for the "antenna" tank...don't they have more antennas, or is that just on modern tanks. I suppose that this rationale won't quite wori for radio-less Soviet tanks.

[Claymore]

Aka_Tom,

Wishlist for inclusion for Extreme FOW

1. as above the Detailed Armor hits and warning labels

2. Quality of troops should not be identifyable...come on...could you tell the difference between veteran and crack troopers in a firefight?

3. Casualties sustained by infantry squads should not be available. Sure you can do the math but under many conditions you will be able to assess a unit's strength before any shots are exchanged.

4. Command tanks should best be identified by the TC's uniform, flags, flares and/or presence of antennae. Since only the former is available in CMBB that should be the extent of your information.

That's about it for now.

Cheers

MD

[James Crowley]

Absolutey agree that extreme FoW should be just that; detailed armour hits should be disabled on enemy vehicles (or at least as an option), whilst being able to retain them for friendlies. I noticed this in the previews and was hoping it had been amended.

As to identity of squad numbers and experience; I have only played the tutorial (rationing the battles!) and AFAIK this info is not available using extreme FoW - or have I missed something?

[Ben Galanti]

I agree with the no detailed hits on the enemy.

I also agree with the no casualties, only men left.

One thing I've always kind of wanted though was an estimate of men in the 'infantry squad?' contacts. The number wouldn't necessarly be right, but if my guys see an 'infantry squad' it'd be nice to know if they thought they saw 12 guys or 4 guys, even if it was actually 8...

Ben

[Stormin Norman]

EFOW is awsome. But, being evil nasty gameplayer I am never satisfied. My issues in order of importance

1. Experience lvl of troops/vehcles etc.

2. "Woo hoo! Over here, yes I'm the armor plt ldr.

32. Detailed armor hits

99. number of casualties

Those are annoyances rather than game stopping errors. They do stand out massivly since the rest of EFOW is handled with great detail and accuracy.

I won't get mad until the 3rd game in which an ATG which I still havn't spotted has picked off all my plt ldrs

btw EFOW seemed to make it harder to differentiate between squads/HQs, props for that.

[Chad Harrison]

Originally posted by Stormin Norman:

EFOW is awsome. But, being evil nasty gameplayer I am never satisfied. My issues in order of importance

1. Experience lvl of troops/vehcles etc.

2. "Woo hoo! Over here, yes I'm the armor plt ldr.

32. Detailed armor hits

99. number of casualties

Those are annoyances rather than game stopping errors. They do stand out massivly since the rest of EFOW is handled with great detail and accuracy.

I won't get mad until the 3rd game in which an ATG which I still havn't spotted has picked off all my plt ldrs

btw EFOW seemed to make it harder to differentiate between squads/HQs, props for that.

Agreed on all three points, except for the casulties one. Do you mean in game casulties, or the AAR showing all kills casulties? I assume you mean in game casulties shown on how many people an enemy squad has lost.

I think that when you get close enough to count the heads still running, Extreme FOW should give you only the number of people in the unit. When they loose another man, dont show a casulty, just show one less man. I think that would make a great extreme FOW change.

Chad

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Claymore:

Aka_Tom,

Wishlist for inclusion for Extreme FOW

1. as above the Detailed Armor hits and warning labels

2. Quality of troops should not be identifyable...come on...could you tell the difference between veteran and crack troopers in a firefight?

3. Casualties sustained by infantry squads should not be available. Sure you can do the math but under many conditions you will be able to assess a unit's strength before any shots are exchanged.

4. Command tanks should best be identified by the TC's uniform, flags, flares and/or presence of antennae. Since only the former is available in CMBB that should be the extent of your information.

That's about it for now.

Cheers

MD

Good points

I agree with all of them.

"Play EFOW, the Secret Realism of CMBB"

(don't forget to join us in the lobby for MORE realism :cool: )

[Wolfe]

As one who likes to play games against the AI as well as human, I'd rather Detailed Armor Hits not be disabled for Extreme FOW, atleast not permanently. You can currently turn them off (though it's a gentleman's agreement) for PBEM with Shift-D. Would be nice if BTS could add another setting for QB setup option (and at the scenario launch screen) to choose whether Detailed hits are on for E-FOW. Absent that I'd rather things stay as they are.

Good points on the other ones, especially instantly IDing command tanks.

- Chris

[GriffinCheng+]

There can't be 2 views on this one. I hope it could make all of them into the final -- or at least in 1.01.

[Panzer76]

Hear hear!!! Make EFOW even more extreme!

[lassner.1]

I am not one to post regularly, but on this point I have to speak-up: extreme FOW should disable the shot/hit descriptions. I find myself deriving WAY too much useful information from knowing if shots are side/front/rear hits.

[Fred]

Maybe you missed it, but there already is a hotkey linked to disable detailed armor hits.

Just press the hotkey and all is fine (SHIFT-d).

I, for example, prefer to play extreme FOW with ENABLED detailed hits; different strokes for different folks.

Fred

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by lassner:

I find myself deriving WAY too much useful information from knowing if shots are side/front/rear hits.

Really? Why wouldn't a gunner know which side of a vehicle he had hit?

:confused:

Michael

[ September 04, 2002, 09:41 AM: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[Kuma of Finland]

Extreme it has to be! I agree on having even more extreme fog of war!

Warning: a long boring list of no interest below. Don't read it. Skip it. Trust me, you'll feel happier that way

To achieve more realistic game play, please

- Remove detailed armor hits from enemy vehicles (one can't know about internal armor flaking even if he was shooting from 10 m distance...)

- Don't show enemy experience level at all, not even on point blank range (except maybe for some overall description like low, medium, high)

- Don't show enemy casualties during battle except for confirmed ones (see below) as it gives out too much information about enemy

- Show warning labels only on confirmed kills (ie. knock-out tanks, eliminated troops etc.)

- Show unidentified troops as stars/crosses even if they were actually eliminated (one can't make a difference between a dead person and a person just lying down until getting really close) (would this be a death clock for troops?)

- Make identifying more logical by determinating what the unidentified unit sounds/looks like or does, examples:

-- if a troop sounds like shooting multiple SMG's at the same time, it should be ID'd as 'SMG squad?' instead of 'Infantry?'

-- if a tank shoots HE which explodes with a huge blast, it should be ID'd as 'Support tank?' instead of 'Tank?' (in CMBO this would be 'Sherman 105?' instead of 'Sherman?'

-- if an infantry unit keeps getting kills in over 500 m (or even just over 100 m) range it should be ID'd as 'Sharpshooter?' instead of 'Crew?'

-- some guns and mg's should be ID'd from their sound, like 'MG34?' instead of 'Machine gun?' or 'ATG 45 mm?' instead of 'Small gun?' (referring to the ones that are easy to recognize from their sound)

- and of course to add here the fact that less trained and less fit units are more likely to make mistakes here (like ID'ing PzIV as 'Tiger?' in CMBO )

All of those are what I think realistic. Other people may think otherwise. If you think this is a matter of interest, point out your opinion.

I know I'm actually just shouting in the wind and I don't expect any of my points here actually getting to CMBB or CMII just because of me, lol

/kuma