Better fortifications in modual?

[flammenwerfer]

We need a third category, Meshy Units.

[Peach Operations]

I kinda would prefer the 2D implementation too -- especially when it comes to trenches being hidden. When you can see them from across the map, they become perfect targets for artillery (unless there's so many trenches that you can't shell it all).

It sounds like there's no going back with the CMx2 engine built as it is, though.

[Battlefront.com]

Yes, roadblocks... totally forgot about them. Yeah, that should be on the list too. I warned you that my list was off the top of my head

No way we're going back to 2D representations. It not only would look like crap (and I mean big, steaming, pile of poo), but it won't work with the 1:1 simulation. Currently guys are in the trenches and their relative height to the rest of the world around them is portrayed directly. If they instead stick on top of the ground and yet behave like they aren't... well... the engine isn't designed to have that sort of extreme disconnect.

Steve

[Combatintman]

Go back to 2D trenches - you are kidding me aren't you. I appreciate that you are asking for effects and that is very much a grog type request and there is an element of realism to it. However do you seriously think that it will be reintroduced - it won't be worth the other whingeing that Battlefront will cop for it.

Also - for all of you guys who keep saying 'I see trenches and therefore I will target it' I go back to my earlier post. Have you never heard of deception - it is one of the principles of defence for a starter. Army Field Manual Volume 1 Part 2 Battlegroup Tactics refers:

'Deception. The attacker must be delayed and confused by the defensive layout. The early destruction of his reconnaissance, the use of false fronts, concealment and dummy positions will combine to deceive and surprise'.

[76mm]

Originally posted by Combatintman:

Go back to 2D trenches - you are kidding me aren't you. I appreciate that you are asking for effects and that is very much a grog type request and there is an element of realism to it. However do you seriously think that it will be reintroduced - it won't be worth the other whingeing that Battlefront will cop for it.

***********

'Deception. The attacker must be delayed and confused by the defensive layout. The early destruction of his reconnaissance, the use of false fronts, concealment and dummy positions will combine to deceive and surprise'.

Uh, no, I'm not kidding. I much prefer a system that works to one that doesn't, even if it is "ugly". As to "very much a grog-type request" and having "an element of realism to it"...puh-leeze! I think that having entrenchments that aren't visible all the way across the map is pretty much key to realism, or even a fun game.

Not to mention the fact that a good part of the fun is deciding yourself where to position entrenchments rather than having the scenario designer decide for you; I find that setting up a successful defense is much more satisfying and fun than just blasting away from whatever positions the scenario designer decides that I should have. I guess (haven't tried) I can go into the scenario editor to reposition entrenchments, so maybe that's an effective work-around for the placement issue.

As to your assertion that it is realistic to have occupied trenches spotted all the way across the map because units should also employ dummy positions--I can't follow your argument. First, note the first part of your quote: "The attacker must be delayed and confused by the defensive layout." Please explain how that is accomplished by putting all of your occupied entrenchments in plain view?! Sure, *if* units have time to create convincing dummy positions, they'll create some to draw enemy fire. But even dummy positions shouldn't be broadcast to the enemy; as it is in the game, I would need to litter the battlefield with entrenchments--mostly empty--for the empty ones to offset the artificial disadvantage of having all of my occupied entrenchments fully visible.

And sadly, based on Steve's feedback, I recognize that there is apparently no chance of fixing this problem. That doesn't mean it's not a significant issue.

[Combatintman]

76mm,

Well clearly you're not! Yes a system that works is a good thing - but at the end of the day I think there will be far more whinges about a whopping great decal on the map if it were to be introduced. I ain't going to die in a ditch about it if you'll forgive the pun.

I do agree that the defending player should be given the option to place their own trenches in order to plan the defence in the way they want to and the fact that they cannot do so is unrealistic.

Having dug down to stage 3 I know exactly how long it takes and therefore I am aware that real world time constraints preclude 'littering' the battlefield. However creating a couple of dummy positions is realistic.

Modern systems such as Desert Hawk deployed down to Battlegroup level will see defensive positions - so being able to see them as the Blue Player can be justified.

If dummy positions aren't broadcast to the enemy then how do they achieve their purpose of deceive and surprise plus a whole host of other things? The whole point is to 'set out the stall' to attract the enemy's interest. As has been pointed out by other posters - the default setting is 'I see trench, I call in offensive support'. Of course other effects can be achieved such as to shape the attacker into your preferred Target Area of Interest or maybe to focus the attackers ISTAR assets into the wrong area as examples.

Oh and its not my reasoning - its the British Army's reasoning - the quote is from the pamphlet.

[C'Rogers]

Just out of curiosity to perhaps put the question in perspective.

What are the chances that an attack would happen and the attacker not have a pretty good idea where the enemies trenches were? With modern recon (and even less modern recon) would one side try and take an objective and when they showed up go 'oh, who dug that massive trenchline'? Anyone know?

[Guest Guest]

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[Secondbrooks]

Originally posted by C'Rogers:

Just out of curiosity to perhaps put the question in perspective.

What are the chances that an attack would happen and the attacker not have a pretty good idea where the enemies trenches were? With modern recon (and even less modern recon) would one side try and take an objective and when they showed up go 'oh, who dug that massive trenchline'? Anyone know?

Why should it be massive? Sure massive 'batallion dug-in inside 500x500 meters area, and trenches running everywhere'-fortifications would be visible. But how about more realitic: 'Trenches representing individual foxholes of squad'. Or 'camoflaged fortifications', where everything has been pretty much camoflaged forexample trenches covered atleast partially.

It would require lots of recon (UAV isn't enough) to spot this and i think only quite reliable way is to make it on foot. Ofcourse if we are sending whole batallion to assault, recon will/should be done first on path to objective and beyond.

Then again we most likely would end up in situations where recon isn't possible or it didn't manage to complete it's job (got dead) or it hasn't spotted what it should have been.

[76mm]

Originally posted by Combatintman:

Modern systems such as Desert Hawk deployed down to Battlegroup level will see defensive positions - so being able to see them as the Blue Player can be justified.

I'm not familiar with these new-fangled devices...how well do these things work? Are they thermal? Can they pretty much detect *all* defensive positions, or just the "obvious" ones? And is the info then transmitted to, and displayed in, each individual tank/squad, or disseminated by briefings, etc. prior to an attack? Clearly these things make a difference for the Blue forces in CMSF, but I should point out that a concern for WWII settings is behind all of my comments.

Originally posted by Combatintman:

If dummy positions aren't broadcast to the enemy then how do they achieve their purpose of deceive and surprise plus a whole host of other things? The whole point is to 'set out the stall' to attract the enemy's interest.

Yeah, but you have to take care to make the position look real, I mean otherwise you'd be mounting bullseye billboards or giant red arrows above the dummy positions.

[C'Rogers]

Come on, it's just that the engine is mediocre at what it does, it is not a doctrinal/realism issue.

There are a lot of things the engine is mediocre at. Some it is quite bad at. I tried to get a soldier to settle down with a nice Syrian woman, get married, get promoted, and buy lots of furniture. It was pretty awful at that.

The engine has one primary goal. To my understanding it is to represent a company size engagement in the early stages of a hypothetical modern war between Syria/US. Now there are a lot of things the engine can also do, Purple vs Purple battles for instance. But those are side functions so I think the realism issue is pretty relevant.

No engine does everything. Things have trade offs. If we had to trade hide able/movable trenches for increased unit depth and relative spotting (which is also I think a key issue as the map would have to be redrawn every time you changed units) I think it is an obvious choice.

As was mentioned in the previous page there are a whole lot of fog of war issues that aren't addressed. We can see every bush, tree, and building from the onset. What makes trenches different? How much more unlikely would the attacker be to not know about them (and even if he didn't how quickly would they be spotted anyway)?

If BFC could snap their fingers and put this in of course it would be nice. For WWII were hidden foxholes seem to be far more important I can see it being big issue. But on the matter of priorities now there have to be at least 20 things that are more important. I'm stunned that this could even approach a deal breaker for some people.

[Combatintman]

76mm,

Try these links - gives you an idea of what Desert Hawk is and does.

In essence though it is a mini UAV with a realtime downlink:

http://www.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=10467

http://www.codeonemagazine.com/archives/2003/articles/apr_03/hawk/

[76mm]

Originally posted by C'Rogers:

No, you describe the goal of this particular game, not the engine. As I understand it, the engine has been designed for use with tactical land combat in virtually any period/setting. Any shortcomings of the engine identified in this game will need to be fixed for other period/settings, and that's why I'm posting. This is not a minor issue for WWII.

[76mm]

Combatinfman,

Thanks for the links. The one link says that they've been deployed with army units for "convoy protection and base defense". Have they also been adopted for general use by combat troops? They sound pretty handy, but curious how far adoption has spread.

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[76mm]

Steve,

Two more fortif questions:

1) Will things like roadblocks also always be visible, or only entrenchments? The whole fun of roadblocks is surprising someone as they come around a corner.

2) Regarding 3D entrenchments--forgive me if this is a ridiculous idea, but what about capping the 3d entrenchments with a 2D "lid" that would camoflage them (think camo nets or placed foliage)? There could be several lids, one for each base terrain type in which trenches could be placed, so that they would blend in better. The lids could be placed automatically during scenario set up, or better yet have a scenario setting for "camo'd" or "uncammo'd" entrenchments. Not sure if these could be made to look like anything better than the proverbial dog poo, or how hard it would be in general, but thought I would toss it out in the ring.

[Combatintman]

76mm,

I don't know about the US forces but the Royal Artillery own Desert Hawk in the British Army. In Afghanistan Desert Hawk detachments have operated/been attached to Company/Squadron sized groups and because of the compactness of all of the equipment involved it is quite capable of being employed in all types of tactical operation. Remember the airframe is launched using a bungee cord - it doesn't need a runway.

So to that end a company group could have an attached Desert Hawk team with the control station and one or two airframes and they could squeeze into the back of say the company commander's or company 2IC's AFV. The live downlink would only be seen by the operators and the OC or 2IC in this instance but this information could then be passed over the Company Net in near real time - namely 'Charlie Charlie 1 this is 0, enemy trenches identified at grid 123456, out'

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[Combatintman]

Adam1 - I'm just answering 76mm's questions now - I'm over the trench thing.

[Statisoris]

I was thinking about the "Placeable Trenches & Foxholes" issue and would like to propose a possible work-around I thought of. Try to read all the text to get my overall view, I know it's probably a little scatterbrained.

Preface & Ponderings:

We all know CM:SF already has the editor where you currently are able to add and remove 3-D trenches. Likewise, I'm thinking that foxholes might work like trenches, be tile based instead of free-form and be only half or a quarter of the length, thus making more of a hole-like 3D feature. Also, maybe with some various "Number of fox-holes / fox-hole layouts" tile options in the left-hand design menu.

* Now on to my main point & question *

1) In reference to the "defender placed trenches/foxholes" problem.

- Why would it not be possible for Defender to be allowed to enter a limited "Fortifications Only" version of the map editor before starting the selected battle? Here the defender could place their defenses on the scenario designer map and preview them in 3D if they want. When the defender is finished, a Temporary "Fortifications" version of the current scenario is saved to disk after which the game is played like normal. When the scenario is finished and if it was not saved, the temporary "Fortifications" version of the scenario file, would be auto deleted.

- One possible hurdle for this approach might be implementing this feature for Campaign missions, because you might have to break up the "baked" campaign file or figure out how to edit a specific mission within the "baked" campaign file. So this placeable fortifications feature might have to be sinle scenario only, which would still be cool.

- I know this method doesn't address the "hidden fortifications" problem at all, but if what I'm thinking of is possible, then it should add alot of extra replay to atleast stand alone scenarios and make alot of people happy.

- Steve, would you say what I propose might be possible, overly difficult or beyond engine capability?

- What does everyone else think?

[76mm]

Originally posted by Adam1:

It's not the desert hawk or how the comm net spreads info from downlink. It's just that the engine stinks at cover modeling. If they could do it now, it would be in there now. All this fluff about whether defensive works are relevant in modern warfare has nothing to do with the reason we don't have them in the engine.

I agree, although the availability of thermal sights, these drones, etc. does mean that entrenchments are easier to spot with modern tech than by using the Mark I eyeball.

But I really don't care what they do with fortifications in CMSF, since I don't play it. I do, however, hope and expect that BFC will figure out a solution prior to bringing out the WWII titles.

Combatinfman, thanks for the info!

[Battlefront.com]

76mm,

And sadly, based on Steve's feedback, I recognize that there is apparently no chance of fixing this problem. That doesn't mean it's not a significant issue.

First, I never said there is "no chance" of it being fixed. I said there is "no chance" that we're going to stick a 2D representation of a 3D element in the game. That's definitely out for a variety of reasons, one of which is that it would look like crap and two is because it would require so many bloody hacks to the game system that it wouldn't be worth it.

I also never said it wasn't a "significant issue". I completely agree that it's something that is desired and overall better than having fixed trenches like now. What I am saying is that this is a difficult thing for us to change and it isn't on the top of our priority list. Obviously, people can disagree... but you do that without knowing what our priority list is

Adam1,

As a "company level simulation", CMx1 is more accurate in every regard except small arms.

Uhmmm... I think that's a bit unsupportable, though recovering old ground isn't a productive use of my time. I think the trench thing is actually one of the only things that CMx1 does better than CMx2. CMx1 can't hold a candle to CMx2's LOS/LOF, real ballistics (for more than small arms), damageable systems in vehicles, 1:1 representation (argue all you want about it, but Moe, Larry, and Curley were not as realistic ), deformable terrain, dynamic lighting,Relative Spotting, artillery, vehicle physics, terrain resolution, terrain variety, so on and so forth. Even the trench issue isn't unrealistic in CMx2, especially in the current setting.

One thing I do agree with you about is that realism is important. Having known defensive positions in CM:SF is more realistic than not, but for WWII the equation flip flops where unknown defenses should be more common than fully known ones. But as someone else said... no game can be 100% spot on all the time every time. Certainly CMx1 had some huge realism gaps in it due to technical issues. But you guys are consistent... you complained for years about those too

Back to 76mm,

1) Will things like roadblocks also always be visible, or only entrenchments?

I don't know. Certainly that is the desire, but as I said at the outset of this thread... we haven't gotten to this stuff yet. All in good time.

2) Regarding 3D entrenchments--forgive me if this is a ridiculous idea, but what about capping the 3d entrenchments with a 2D "lid" that would camoflage them (think camo nets or placed foliage)?

That's the solution, but that is also what is difficult to implement. The problem is the "cover" has to join up with the mesh perfectly for it to work. Doing this dynamically is not easy to pull off. With CMx1's cruder underlying terrain system it would have been much easier. However, the crude terrain mesh in CMx1 is exactly why we had to have 2D trenches in the first place (unless you wanted a 20m wide trench ). So the difficulty is a function, mostly, of the complexity of the geometry rather than the concept itself.

Combatintman,

I don't know about the US forces

Each Stryker Brigade and (IIRC) Battalion have their own UAV units organically assigned. I can't remember how the allocation is in other BCTs. I would suspect they are moving towards the same capability if they aren't there already.

Back to Adam1 again,

All this fluff about whether defensive works are relevant in modern warfare has nothing to do with the reason we don't have them in the engine.

Not true As I said, the lack of this feature in CM:SF was not some oversight. We knew about this years ago. We felt that it wasn't a top priority because of the high degree of likelihood that the US forces would know where the fortifications were ahead of time (sat photos, various levels of UAVs, air recon, ground recon, etc.). Thermals make camouflaging positions extremely difficult and, of course, mean that nighttime offers no natural cover.

So true enough the technical issue was there first, but part of the reason we didn't try to overcome it for CM:SF was because we felt it wasn't all that relevant. For WW2 it's definitely on our "ToDo List", but it is far enough down that I'm making no promises that it will be included. At least not initially.

Statisoris,

Why would it not be possible for Defender to be allowed to enter a limited "Fortifications Only" version of the map editor before starting the selected battle?...Steve, would you say what I propose might be possible, overly difficult or beyond engine capability?

Time to implement is the only issue here, not technical limitations. In fact, what you suggested is how it will work when we eventually allow user placement of trenches. Why? Because it's the most simple way to do it. Basically, the player would do something like color the tiles he wants to have fortified and this information would be incorporated into the terrain mesh for the game to follow. There would be no problem with Campaigns since this same UI could be used for both. Having it packed into the existing SetUp Phase would likely (though not for sure) introduce other problems, hence why I think a separate "fortification phase" would be the way to go.

Note that placement of trenches is completely different than having them be hidden. The two are not directly related from a technical standpoint.

Steve

[ May 01, 2008, 09:20 PM: Message edited by: Battlefront.com ]

[Statisoris]

Hm, cool news, thanks for the feedback Steve.

I can't wait until some extra features like this are worked into the game engine. For me, mission design is already pretty fun overall, these extra features will make CMx2 mission design that much more of a "game" in itself.

[ChrisND]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Statisoris,

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Why would it not be possible for Defender to be allowed to enter a limited "Fortifications Only" version of the map editor before starting the selected battle?...Steve, would you say what I propose might be possible, overly difficult or beyond engine capability?

Time to implement is the only issue here, not technical limitations. In fact, what you suggested is how it will work when we eventually allow user placement of trenches. Why? Because it's the most simple way to do it. Basically, the player would do something like color the tiles he wants to have fortified and this information would be incorporated into the terrain mesh for the game to follow. There would be no problem with Campaigns since this same UI could be used for both. Having it packed into the existing SetUp Phase would likely (though not for sure) introduce other problems, hence why I think a separate "fortification phase" would be the way to go.

</font>Allow me to be the first to complain about this future feature. Well, not complain so much as clarify: what about checking LOS on the map when placing trenches? With even a tiny fold in the ground being able to block LOS, and that coming into play even more when we are lowering the elevation of the men (through placement in trenches), It seems to me that it would be hard to place trenches in a way that would take advantage of the terrain.

[Battlefront.com]

The LOS check issue is one we can probably work around, even if imperfectly.

Remember, the problem here is that the theoretical best way to go about this is completely not going to happen. And that is "realtime" terrain mesh deformation during the Setup Phase. There would be so much lag due to recalculating the mesh that it would be unworkable even if we put in the time to allow it. That means any solution is going to be sub-optimal in some way.

Steve