CMX2: Can we get back to fantasising now?

[Kip Watson]

All those CMX2 hints have been absolutely wonderful, but I got a bit bogged down with the stuff about cup-holders and PBEM files (I understand the deeply held feelings and stuff, but that combined with tempers frayed was like Christmas Dinner with my family - except for not being mercifully brief and only once a year...)

Anyway, now that we are armed with so many great and tantalizing hints, can we get back to a bit of innocent fantasising again now? (Like the 'what would you like in...' thread, that was great).

To get the ball rolling:

I am imagining night battles with muzzle flashes and star shells, shadowy sillouhettes briefly illuminated by exploding vehicles - and a window that shows me what I see though the slit of a buttoned up tank ('I can't see a damn thing')

I am also imaging a later CMX2 release* set sometime in the late 19th Century. (It could be the Spanish American War, the Franco Prussian War, the Boer War - or so many other 'small' wars in that period). The mix of cavalry and rifles, early machine guns, powerful field guns (but no spotters), guys in khaki or bright colours (how would that effect spotting?). And formations ranging from modern dispersed formation to Napoleonic column. Command delays of up to several minutes (runners required). Redcoats, Zouaves, Injuns, Rough Riders...

...yeah... that would rock.

[* after the cold-war-goes-hot hypothetical of course!! ]

[Michael Emrys]

Yeah, let's have the Crimean War! I've always wanted to obliterate a cavalry regiment by firing batteries of grapeshot through them. Oh boy!

Michael

[aka_tom_w]

Ok

I fantasize about TRUE LOS and LOF being actually blocked by AFV's and vehicles in motion. (So that units can take cover behind vehicles!)

I fantasize that the BORG is dead and each unit spots ALL on its own. (Relative spotting evolves as the dominant aspect of the game and becomes an significant foundation on which most other game design concepts and principles are based!)

I fantasize that each unit has some form of memory for what has happened previously in the game

(Most of this, above, has already been hinted to be in the game so there is no real thinking out of the box there.)

I fantasize that the new AI is VERY challenging, cunning, unpredictable and shrewd, due mostly to the fact that in each scenario the designer will have some new and more robust tools to "program" the units SOPs or hint the game AI (all 4-5 levels) with better tools than JUST CM1 like victory flags and this wonderfully entertaining new scenario-designer hinted "uber" AI opponent beats me routinely in a fair fight without cheating or any artificial computer aided advantage.

(PLEASE note for the new comers here, unlike most other computer games the AI from BFC in Combat Mission NEVER cheats or uses ANY form of unfair "computer" advantage (its NOT RTS so it does not for instance think faster or click faster than you!) so we SURE do want to keep that feature in the new game!! )

(OK that last one was fantasy as far as I can tell )

-tom w

[ February 13, 2005, 07:36 PM: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[Salkin]

I wouldn't mind several different death animations and dramatic combat animations from the guys battling it out in the field. Just to make the battle come alive so to speak.

If the little guys use cover and similar stuff , that would be cool too.

Just imagine it:

You see the sarge barking orders , a fire team laying down some fire while a tank crew crawls away from the burning tank...

Suddenly one of the guys in the fireteam is hit and tumbles to the ground. A stray mortar shell rips apart the ground next to the officer who flies 3 metres into the air (maybe he's missing a leg ).

Well I suppose Gpigs drawings illustrate this stuff better than me but what I'm saying is that it would be nice to see the battle come alive with a few more animations then the 5 necessary ones .

//Salkin

This , off course, is only window dressing that take a back seat to actual gameplay-programming .

[David I]

Kip,

Zulus, Dervishes, Sepoys, front rank kneeling, rear rank standing, bagpipes skrilling, "The Company will fire a volley at 600 yards. For volley. Present!" Bringing the light of civilization to the 'eathen.

Yeah, I could dig it.

DavidI

[Hamstersss]

Full movie playback.

With dramatic interludes for operations.

And civilians.

And entrance and exit animations for units getting into trucks, halftracks.

And hit-specific graphics on tanks. That stick with the tank through an entire operation. That come back when a tank is knocked out and repaired.

Turrets flying into the air from an exploding tank. Tanks flying into the air from a 16".

Background chatter, that you can turn off, but that gives you a running, commander-level audio account of the turn.

Multiplayer co-op campaigns.

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Elijah Meeks:

Full movie playback.

Background chatter, that you can turn off, but that gives you a running, commander-level audio account of the turn.

YES

Like a radio chatter audio track as if you were listening in on the events in the battle like Carroll O'Connor over hearing the "action" in Kelly's Heroes.

All I can think of when I hear is idea is:

"This is Big Duke6 Assume Attack Formation!"

he he

-tom w

[flamingknives]

Tracer represented by points of light rather than coloured 'bullets' (I think this might just strain the dynamic lighting system)

Sabot peeling off the core as it leaves the barrel

Different muzzle blasts depending on the gun, muzzle brakes etc.

Modelling and providing a visual impression of night vision/thermal imaging

ATGM smoke trails (This assumes that cold war is in there somewhere. Go on, you know you want to.)

Telegraph poles/lines (if you've got wire-guided missiles, this is important.)

Large variety of defensive positions.

WP and Base-bleed smoke, plus better modelling of smoke duration.

[Sergei]

I hope the hole in the CD will be a lot bigger than previously.

Uh... so this is not about *THAT* sort of fantasizing?

[Kip Watson]

Yeah, I have to admit, post-war/cold-war would be my second favourite after WW2, especially 50s-70s real-plus-hypothetical.

1973 Yom-Kippur would be an intense and quite closely matched battle - 6 day war would be a challenge too. Vietnam would be very intense with every type of terrain, urban, jungle, wet and dry farmland, urban... How about a 'Swift Boats in Cambodia' scenario (JUST KIDDING!!!!)

But playing Nato v. Warsaw Pact around the 1970s would be unreal (remember the board game Fulda Gap?). As kids in the 70s we were quite sure there would be a WW3, so it almost seems real to me.

Leopards, Centurions, T72s, chemical reactive armour - how many points for tactical nukes in a company-level game though...?

It might be hard to model though, are the exact specs for that gear still classified? And if such a game was super accurate, could it be a national security problem for countries that still use that equipment?

[flamingknives]

As long as you stop about 1980, the specs can be had. When you start on the gear that is still in use, it all goes a little pear-shaped. Prior to the '80s, ERA isn't a problem, all the armour is RHA steel, and the weapon data is reasonably well known. It's in the public domain so can't pose any more of a security risk.

Tac Nukes are an oxymoron. You don't use heavy bomber in CMX1, and you wouldn't use nukes in a cold-war game.

Leo 1s, Cheiftains and M60s would be in, and so would up to the contempary T-72.

[Kip Watson]

Cold War to 1980s would be very cool - huge period though, it could easily subdivide several times into still-complex games.

I was just joking about the nuke - but how spooky would it be to have a 'max damage' terrain setting that was 'after nuclear blast' - yowch! (with your troops all suited up in radiation suits and tanks permanently buttoned). Imagine that with hi res CMX2 terrain and a nuclear twilight backdrop.

---

As well as the difficulty factor, it seems a bit unethical to model contemporary warfare (eg. up to Iraqi Freedom) - even if the specs were just best-guess, the bad guys would almost certainly get their hands on it and probably learn a lot that they don't know.

[Hamstersss]

It'd be cool if you had a mini-strategic pregame, so that you could set up a regiment/batallion, purchase and perform a couple pregame moves (Scouting, et cetera) and then CM determines the specific focus of the battle at a batallion/company level. Then you could have a certain amount of strategic level assets without interfering with CM's true focus.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Elijah Meeks:

It'd be cool if you had a mini-strategic pregame, so that you could set up a regiment/batallion, purchase and perform a couple pregame moves (Scouting, et cetera) and then CM determines the specific focus of the battle at a batallion/company level. Then you could have a certain amount of strategic level assets without interfering with CM's true focus.

There's a germ of a good idea in there. I like the notion of variable pregame intelligence on the other side's dispositions.

Michael

[Wisbech_lad]

The Indo-Pakistan wars. Pattons vs Centurians.

[Panzer76]

Vietnam would be good. Let's see if they get to that after their initial cmx2 release of modern combat.

[aka_tom_w]

OK

I have been thinking about Fog of War options and the possibility of various new levels of CMx2.....

how about:

1 No Fog of War (just a BASIC option to learn the game)

2 Partial FOW

3 CMBO Standard FOW

4 CMBB EFOW

5 CMx2 EFOW (with Relative Spotting AND the new command structure for C&C modeling battlefield communications)

6 MIA CMx2 EFOW

( units OUT of friendly LOS and WAY out of C&C are deemed MIA and replaced with a generic nationality maker or some such indication they are missing (From the player) in action)

7 MIA Iron Man CMx2 IMFOW ... Where you can ONLY see enemy units from the level 1 or level 2 (church tower) perspective of your OWN friendly units WITHIN C&C range as per Frankco's True Combat Rules. (I would guess the CMx2 AI should be able to easily beat any average player using those FOW settings for the first time!)

It would be my guess that most folks would play with CMx2 FOW #5 and be happy with that as the NEW gold standard in FOW.

However....

AS OPTIONS FOW #6 and #7 might not be the setting that most users would use most of the time BUT to add some spice to the game or VARIABILITY to the user experience they could be included as REAL Fog of War options!

I guess Numbers 3 and 4 are not really necessary and/or advisable:

(#3 CMBO Standard FOW and #4 CMBB EFOW... NOT needed)

AND yes for the record I AM trying to think out of the box...

-tom w

[ February 14, 2005, 07:57 AM: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[Michael Emrys]

If BFC does decide to take CM into the post-WW II/modern era, I would earnestly plug for starting with the Arab-Israeli wars with the Indo-Pakistan wars coming second.

Why? Because they are the only medium sized wars in this period in which mechanized forces were engaged in conventional fighting on a fairly large scale. And that's the kind of fighting that gamers seem to be most interested in. And secondly, they are ones in which there is enough historical material available to stand a reasonable chance of making an accurate simulation.

This is not to say that wars like Korea, Viet Nam, South Africa vs. Angola cannot be modeled in interesting ways, it's just that I don't know if they would fit into the CMx2 framework and can't guess until we know what that framework is going to include.

Michael

[kipanderson]

Hi,

I agree with flamingknives on just about all matters, but one .

I do think that there is enough information on weapon systems of the ‘80s, including the second half of the ‘80s, to build a great CMX2 game covering that period. Thus I would like to see a Cold War game from 1970-1989. It would be a shame not to cover the first mature generation of laminated/ceramic armour. Toys as far from WWII as possible for the greatest change.

The only way I could really illustrate my point would be to launch into a “huge” rant on the subject, giving example after example and why the figures can be trusted in each case, which I do not wish to do. It would be massive waste of time and energy.

We fans of a Cold War game must not fight amongst ourselves .

Fulda Gap here I come .

All good fun,

All the best,

Kip.

[Tarkus]

After considering all the possiblities that a new, more accurate terrain engine offers, I don't think that the theater is such an issue. Even though I would personnaly prefer conventionnal, WWII battles as suggested above, there are many things that could make me really dig the game on a grand scale while it being on another era.

The first thing I'd consider is scope. Not theater or era, but scope. CMx1 was about company up to reinforced battalion size battles, but still, small unit actions occuring on the frontline. I think the game could go way further dealing with this particular scope by adding part of the reality that's inherent to it.

There are many example of this. For example, an infantry unit may - or may not- have to stay at a certain spot for quite an extended period of time. This has more implication than just staying there. Troops get familiar with the surrounding ground, they dig slit trenches, foxholes, they register field of fires, place field telephone wire about, place mines, etc. This could translate into many more details for the players, with many more (IMO interesting) tasks.

Preparing a good defensive position would be a very interesting process as far as I am concerned. And this could start right in the middle of a battle: you could order troops to dig in and the map would be slowly modified by this action: later import of the map would still carry these works and then, why not allow the player to actually spend points completing them ? Troops being at one place for a long period of time couldbenefit from knowing the ground; Along the same line, one of the first thing a platoon does settling down somewhere is to setup a track discipline.

The same line of thinking brings me back to earlier posts about patrols and recons. Don't you think it could be pretty exciting to try to infiltrate an ennemy position in order to gather intelligence about it, later to be followed by an attack ? I think the player trying to prevent such an agenda by patrols, traps, ambushes and so on would also be in for an interesting time. And these things would be quite interesting in any era. Vietnam, for example, would be a big thrill.

Cheers

[stikkypixie]

Tarkus, you got me thinking. To simulate troops that are stationed in one place long enough might get some kind of movement bonus or some delay bonus to get around because they are familiar with the terrain and know their way around.

[Tarkus]

Right. Even after 20 minutes (or 20 hours) at the same spot, I would assume each member of a squad get to the best possible position, thus a squad would be better placed after staying longer on a position. Better field of fire, better line of sight, better concealment. Making those things dynamic would really be nice.

Another way to see it is applying this talking to a squad in a building. After 30 seconds it has the building shape figured out, but a thoughtful, deliberate and careful distribution of firepower to suit the tactical requirement at hand require more time. I'm not saying it should be left to the player to set each and every rifle position, but it would make sense to consider it in an abstracted way.

I seem to recall that Panzer General had an abstracted feature about that, like when you'd leave a unit in position, its "entrenchment" factor would rise up. Of course there is a slight difference between a single infantryman and a division, but the principle applies to both.

Also, a platoon leader at the front in a defensive position gives his men a rest. He might even not be around when an attack begins. In current CM, the main line of resistances is always assumed to be fully manned. No tactical or operationnal surprise whatsoever. But modelling an alert level within a defensive line could be interesting. Like your forces would be on a 50% alert level, with the correspondent amount of troops being off the line and a delay for manning the position fully. It would pay off to attack swiftly, and it would be worthy to cut small units off.

Cheers

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by stikkypixie:

Tarkus, you got me thinking. To simulate troops that are stationed in one place long enough might get some kind of movement bonus or some delay bonus to get around because they are familiar with the terrain and know their way around.

That might be more useful for things like night navigation (though only marginally), but once the fur is flying, knowing the ground won't yield you terribly many advantages that are easily simulated.

I don't like the idea of bonuses from out of thin air - a better way to simulate these things is to have a map that reveals itself through sighting the same way that fortifications or troops do; the side with more time in an area, better maps, etc., will have less change to deal with. Would be very hard, perhaps even impossible to implement, and probably not very fun to play, but would be realistic.

Imagine your platoon going forward over billiard table flat ground, and discovering craters in the tall grass as it moves forward - or running towards a clump of trees just over the next crest, and coming to a stop at the crest of the hill to realize the map was wrong - the 3D woods have moved 200 metres farther on - and an enemy bunker is set up in it and is now firing on your men at the top of the empty hill they thought would have trees on it...

It speaks also to the necessity for true reconnaissance, and is another factor that ties in to familiarity with the ground. In CM, we have the ability to float all over the 3D battleground and even measure LOS and distances, with perfect knowledge of every inch of terrain...

[Tarkus]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

In CM, we have the ability to float all over the 3D battleground and even measure LOS and distances, with perfect knowledge of every inch of terrain...

Just for openning this to debate, but could restricting this camera all-over floating ability along certain rules (as an option) not be interesting ? I don't know, perhaps only from the player side, up to controlled zones, or tied to aerial reconnaissance/prior intelligence or the results of earlier ground reconnaissance ?

Just an idea to be sure, but still...

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Tarkus:

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

In CM, we have the ability to float all over the 3D battleground and even measure LOS and distances, with perfect knowledge of every inch of terrain...

Just for openning this to debate, but could restricting this camera all-over floating ability along certain rules (as an option) not be interesting ? I don't know, perhaps only from the player side, up to controlled zones, or tied to aerial reconnaissance/prior intelligence or the results of earlier ground reconnaissance ?

Just an idea to be sure, but still... </font>