Where we're headed from here... a quick glance

[gibsonm]

Originally posted by Meach:

You do tend to go off at a tangent. Deciding which weapons are lootable and giving up on pathfinding are two different things.

Not really. Why take one part "seriously" and the other not?

And your opinion carries just as much weight with me.

Enjoy.

[Cpl Steiner]

As some scenario/campaign designers are creating some really impressive accompanying documentation, in the form of PDF files, it would be great if BFC supported their efforts and encouraged this approach by giving us some method of linking to a PDF in the briefing screen. Would this be possible? I'm thinking of a simple hyperlink that opens a PDF in a special folder created for them. Ideally you'd want the game window to stay active behind the PDF somehow otherwise you'd probably be booted out of the game to the desktop when activating the PDF.

[Meach]

Originally posted by gibsonm:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Meach:

You do tend to go off at a tangent. Deciding which weapons are lootable and giving up on pathfinding are two different things.

Not really. Why take one part "seriously" and the other not?

And your opinion carries just as much weight with me.

Enjoy. </font>

[Huntarr]

wow, good thing you used smiley faces

[Battlefront.com]

Meach,

I've got no choice but to ban you for flagrant violation of the Forum rules against swearing (two posts in a row). The little smiley faces don't make up for the violations. You know it, I know it, and everybody else does either. Sorry mate, no exceptions on this one.

Email me in two weeks and if you agree to refrain from violating the Forum rules going forward I'll unban you. For now, however, you need to cool your jets.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Back on topic...

We will never introduce a higher level layer onto CM:SF. I know many of you would enjoy such a system, even if flawed, but it's just not going to happen. It's like making a separate game and we simply do not have the resources or sales volumes to make two games and sell them as one.

Yup, we've been listening to you guys about the QB system since the day it first came out. Seems nobody wanted to listen to us at first, but after the initial hubris died away we had some good discussions about QBs several months ago. We've been consistent for about 6 months now that we'd redo QBs for the WW2 game. And so we shall

It is too early to talk about the specifics now. We're busy with other things and won't get to this for a while yet. When we get closer to starting to code I'll start up the discussion about the specifics of what we think we should do. The most productive discussions here are ones that are about specifics rather than people trying to dream up "the best possible system ever".

As for the old boardgame map piece suggestion... if Dorosh mentioned it on his own (I don't know if he did) then he violated his NDA. And since Dorosh is obsessed with credit going where credit is due, I'll just state that he had nothing to do with us coming up with the idea

Yes, the "mega tile" (as we call it) map system is the route we are planning on exploring. What this basically means, in practical terms, is that people make small maps with certain predefined characteristics. This is similar to the way the game works now, but instead of selecting a single user made map CM will custom assemble one from the smaller pieces based on the QB parameters.

This is the best system we can think of since making a true random map generator is beyond our capabilities. Even the CMx1 system, which had a vastly simplified terrain system, left a lot to be desired. Wasting months of time on something that is likely to disappoint isn't a good thing for us to do

Steve

[Huntarr]

http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=52;t=002918

"Meta Tiles" thread

Your g key was to close to your t

[Battlefront.com]

Thanks for the link! Wow... that goes all the way back to September, eh?

Yeah, I do remember calling it "Meta Tiles", but I think "Mega Tiles" is a bit more accurate. Plus, it sounds cooler

As the old thread sates, the idea is not ours. It's been around for a long time. I've never played ASL/SL so that wasn't the game that I had in mind when I thought this would work for CM. For me it was Panzer Blitz and Panzer Leader, both of which I loved to play. The boards for those games had a lot of different terrain on them and that's akin to what we're looking into for CM:SF. Hopefully it will prove to be as good of an idea in practice as it is in theory!

Steve

[kipanderson]

Steve,

“For me it was Panzer Blitz and Panzer Leader, both of which I loved to play.”

I am shocked… you must be as old as you look…

Maybe even as old as me… .

All good fun,

All the best,

Kip.

PS. For me Squad Leader replaced Panzer Leader… BTW…it is those great SPI operational games I would love to see you have a go at developing in PC form…

[Peter Cairns]

Steve,

Read through the old thread and the difficult issue for me is height and geometry.

I'll start with some general points on how it might work.

In Squad leader the key was the edges of maps, where a road crossed something like 10 hexes down on a 30 hex board so you could turn boards and link the right to left etc, so that the road ran from one side to the other.

In theory you could do that for CMx2 with templates of say 100m x 100m tiles with a standard edge which you could fill in and then save.

You could also download these from other players or BFC.

It could also be that when saved the file gave it a code that detailed how much of each terrain type it had in it.

That would mean that if you selected a "forest" scenario it selected tiles that were high in forest type terrain etc.

You could also have a system where you had a 10x10 grid and you clicked on a broad type for each square and it filled each box with a 100m x100m tile of that type.

Now the problems.

With common edges that mean the roads all exit at the same point the overall effect of a large grid could well appear symetrical.

SL got by this by having a turn just after the exit/entry point on some maps or even a dead end. Another option would be to have a selection of edges running to about 16 with each tile being started with any four, including four the same.

However for me the biggest issue to overcome is tile height, SL tiles were effectively 2D while CMx2 is 3D.

How you get round that without making the 16 edges all follow a set of heights as well as terrain types I don't know.

Would it be possible to have a system that let you set the height of the main tiles in the 10x10 grid but kept the relative height of the edges the same?

For example lets say an edge has 10 parts at heights 3,4,4,5,4,3,4,3,2,3. that would join to an edge that was also at heights 3,4,4,5,4,3,4,3,2,3. But if the joining tile was set a +10 then the edge would vary to 13,14,14,15,14,13,14,13,12,13.

I think the way forward would be to decide the size of the grids, both for the overall map and for the individual tiles, and to come up with a solution to the edge issue for terrain and particularly height and then let modellers do the rest beyond a limited pallet provided by BFC.

Peter.

[Battlefront.com]

Kip,

I am as old as I feel, which today is about 10 years older than I am. Party weekends with the extended family is a lot of fun, but we tend to overindulge a tad bit

Peter,

Yup, there are definitely issues to deal with in order to avoid the maps looking too generic. Roads and rivers are going to have to be treated with more care. Probably some sort of routine to override what is in the Mega Tile. This is one of those things we're going to have to play around with a bit, that's for sure.

Height isn't a big deal. CM:SF can churn out a pretty decent random mesh, based on user settings, without too much difficulty. The assembled Mega Tiles would then lay on top of the mesh like a sheet over random furnishings around the house. For sure some things won't look quite right so I suspect the mesh will have to be adjusted somewhat based on the terrain that is on top of it. Again, this is something that will have to be played around with when we actually get into the coding.

Steve

[Cpl Steiner]

Here's how I'd do the "meta-tile" thing:

As has been said, have road exits on all edges of the meta-tile at specific coordinates. They don't have to be exactly central to an edge, as long as when put together, the roads match up.

Next, ensure that no fixed-elevation square can be closer than 3 squares from the edge of the meta-tile and that fixed-elevation squares within 3-5 squares of the edge of the meta-tile must be within the elevation range 18-22.

Finally, make the game recalculate the elevation of all squares once the meta-tiles have been put together into a whole map, just as it does now in the editor based on the fixed-elevation squares.

This will allow some variation of height between meta-tile edges but without the transition areas from one meta-tile to another sloping too much.

[Peter Cairns]

Steve,

So if we had a 20x 20 grid to create a 2km x2km map made up of 200 tiles you could specify a set height in each box, and the system could create an overall mesh 2kmx2km.

You would then choose Town, City, Forest, Farmland or whatever for each box and the system would choose random tiles from a set library to lay on the grid.

That sounds a pretty good system to me.

You mentioned the routine to deal with the generic issue.

Could you use something that sort of worked like anti aliasing where once the tiles were laid it aligned the edges by taking the average of the terrain in something like a 10m radius.

If two roads didn't match up it would either move both or one till they met, with say the one with the longest straight moving least.

I still feel that letting people design their own tiles and having a library would be the best way to go, especially if any tile could be "tweaked" to match any other by blending the edges and laid on a random mesh.

My initial ideas were probably to literally based on recreating board game tiles and not taking enough account of what computers can do in terms of generating a unique piece of terrain.

I doubt it would be that difficult to have each tile saved to let it be recognised for it's terrain content as a short cut without having to look through page after page of peoples tiles or having to download lots of model tiles.

Peter.

[ April 14, 2008, 04:13 PM: Message edited by: Peter Cairns ]

[Battlefront.com]

Peter,

We don't know what the optimal Mega Tile size is yet, but I suspect it is larger than 24x24m and probably smaller than 96x96m. Remember, of course, that the terrain within a Mega Tile is still at the same 8x8m scale, so whatever the tile size is it will be a factor of 8.

When someone makes a Mega Tile they will likely assign tags to it characterize it. These tags would then be used to aid CM in the picking process, much the way the current QB system works.

As for what sort of massaging CM will do... I don't know. Roads and rivers are extremely tricky to deal with and therefore, for sure, CM will have to be able to customize these things on its own.

Some sort of terrain edge "averaging" is also something we will look at. That way you won't see hard edges between tiles as much, if at all.

As for downloading them with ease... that's a critical component. I'm not exactly sure how we'll go about it, but one idea is that when the map maker saves out the file it will get some sort of unique file name that also reflects the "tags" I mentioned above. This way you don't have to worry about getting duplicates or accidentally overwriting unique ones by mistake.

Steve

[redbear]

well is nice to hear soem news about the CMx2 engine. my question is there will be pure desert terrain in CMSF or some of the modules will add some new terrain too.

Maybe a question asked before the modules will add just for example marines unit or it will add OPFOR units too besides the Syrians?

[Mord]

What are the chances of having a simplified height adjustment for the editor? Not change what's already there but have an option so I can place heights like in CMX1, just click and the height changes without everything else changing with it, or having to black out the spots I don't want to change. I have not been able to get the hang of that part of the editor and always end up closing out the map in frustration. It just confuses the hell out of me.

Mord.

[Battlefront.com]

Redbear,

Temperate terrain will be available for the modern combat at some point. When and how is not yet determined.

Mord,

It does take a little while to get used to, but the old way doesn't work very well since the mesh is so much finer. The best tip I can give you is to use the black spots as you would contour lines on a map. Do that and you can make a really great looking map in a couple of minutes, then spend more time to get more subtle features.

Steve

[Webwing]

[edit]Ops, Steve already answered that, while I was uploading my image![/edit]

Originally posted by Mord:

I have not been able to get the hang of that part of the editor and always end up closing out the map in frustration. It just confuses the hell out of me.

Best way to handle it is to think in terms of 'islands' of the same height.

-

-

Use the zoom out mode. The one where you don't even see the numbers you are drawing.

Chose the fixed height tool.

Paint 'islands' with it.

The engine will make the transition between those heights.

The closer the islands and the bigger the difference between the numbers, the steeper the landscape will be.

-

[ April 14, 2008, 07:20 PM: Message edited by: Webwing ]

[hoolaman]

Originally posted by Mord:

What are the chances of having a simplified height adjustment for the editor? Not change what's already there but have an option so I can place heights like in CMX1, just click and the height changes without everything else changing with it, or having to black out the spots I don't want to change. I have not been able to get the hang of that part of the editor and always end up closing out the map in frustration. It just confuses the hell out of me.

Mord.

Webwing's explanation is good but I will add a bit more. The elevations in the editor are NOT intuitive, but once it "clicks" they are a truly brilliant way of doing it, much quicker than CMx1, and one of the more innovative parts of the CMSF design.

The best explanation I can give is that the black bits are like "pins" in a sheet of 3d rubber. If you want a certain area to remain flat level at say height 20, you only have to pin 20 around the edges, not black out the whole area, if you want to make a cliff or something you pin the line of the cliff edge at 30 and pin out the base parallel to that at 20 and the rest will go where it should.

I find the most realistic results come not from drawing solid contour lines (although this works), but from roughly pinning one or two squares here and there along the contour line.

[Mord]

Thanks fellas I'll give that a go and see if I can finally wrap my head around it.

Mord.

[Peter Cairns]

Steve,

I think I was looking at something larger as I swa tiles more as mini maps. If you went for a roughly 2kmx2km map of 100 (10x10)tiles then each would in theory be 25x25 8x8each or 200mx200m for a tile.

With 625 grid boxes to a 200m tile then in theory the tag could be something like a 625 didgit number simply made up of a number from 0 to 9 for each 8x8 scale part, 0 could be clear, 1 scrub etc.

This would let people do two things. They could choose from Forest or whatever to get a match.

Alternatively you could make your own 200mx200m Tiles and then ask it to search for the best fits to it's tags to create a map that was similar to your key tiles.

You would then assemble your 2kmx2km map and run the routine to blend the edges.

It's not quite the same as you a suggesting and probably more a map builder than a QB system.

Peter.

[Cpl Steiner]

Steve,

When you get around to developing the system for merging together mega-tiles, please keep in mind that the same functionality would be very useful for scenario designers in the map editor. In other words, if you could code the merging routines in a generic or modular fashion so that we can have an option in the map editor to cut and paste sections of map, this would be a real bonus and would make scenario making a lot more fun.

[Cpl Steiner]

Oh, and having just tried a quick turn-based game today I'd like to add to the voices calling for a return of the old CMx1 style "hunt" and "move to contact" commands. At the moment it's pretty hard to play turn-based and keep any sort of momentum going because your forces stop at the slightest hold-up. I had a Bradley spot a single sniper on a rooftop about 5 seconds into the turn, whom the Bradley easily took out, only to spend the next 55 seconds doing nothing when I was trying to get a convoy of vehicles to advance down a road.

And on the subject of convoys, how about a "follow" command like we've always asked for on the forums since CMx1. You could then have the lead vehicle hunt down the road (CMx1 style) and the vehicles behind follow each vehicle in front. If an enemy popped up the whole convoy would stop but the whole convoy would then move off again when the threat had been eliminated.

[Scipio]

To make a break from the mega-tile issue and mention a detail for the scenario editor: I noticed that it's still impossible to remove the Headquarter Teams from the OOB. Is there a special reason for it, or could this be changed?

To go one step further, why ain't it be possible to create a complete OOB from scratch down to teamlevel? This could make sense in several situations - unconventional forces, cut off or scattered troops ralied by a local commander - just to name two.

[Mishga]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Meach,

I've got no choice but to ban you for flagrant violation of the Forum rules against swearing (two posts in a row). The little smiley faces don't make up for the violations. You know it, I know it, and everybody else does either. Sorry mate, no exceptions on this one.

Email me in two weeks and if you agree to refrain from violating the Forum rules going forward I'll unban you. For now, however, you need to cool your jets.

Steve

Hmm...not quite sure how to put this but Meach asked me to say

"****, gibby the stuck up cunt " And the ban can stay as long as you like cos he "don't really give a ****"

I apologise for his crude and innapropriate behaviour. He is totally out of line. He states that he wishes "all the best to BFC and hopes they apply the same rules to all who swear"