Briefings

[Private Bluebottle]

I'd hope that there may be something new in the way briefings are presented in CMx2. At the present moment, they are a slab of text, which are in my opinion hard to follow. In real life, briefings are invariably given with reference to maps and/or aerial reconniassance photos.

Ideally, what I'd like to see is an option for the scenario designer to include a simplified map of the battle area beside the briefing notes. The map should include the various reference labels which are present on the game map. The designer should be able to edit this simplified map, if they desire and remove labels/features.

This would enable players to read the briefing notes and refer to the map while doing so. I find it annoying and disconcerting to say the least to be thrown into a scenario without much in the way of, for want of a better term, "situational awareness".

[Peter Cairns]

A "black and white", grainy, top view of the battlemap with standard symbols like those TacOp's would be a fairly simple way to give something that looked like an aerial photo/briefing.

They could also supliment in with a few angled "Black and Whites", and even a colour ground level , "From your start line" panorama.

All these would be good and hopefully not to difficult to put in.

Peter.

[Nicdain]

I would be quite happy to see in the briefing a topographic map of the battle area, since I suppose an officer should have one.

Nevertheless I understand the difficulty of automatically "translating" CM maps to topographic maps, so maybe a top down view of the CM map (like you can have in CMx1 with the view "7" or "8") could work, or at least, a sketch map showing the main features of the battle area (roads, rivers, hills, towns, supposed enemy positions, etc.).

It would be cool should this map be printable, since you could have it on paper to write down lines of advance, of defence, boundaries of areas of tactical responsibility of each unit and so on.

[Philippe]

What I would like to see is a very simple sketchmap, inkstains and all, reminiscent of what you would jot down on the back of an envelope during the briefing for the larger battle to remember what your corner of the universe will look like.

The simplest solution would just be to allow a bmp of a certain dimensionsion and leave it up to the designer to fill it in or not. A designer could draw a very basic map in Microsoft's Paint, that comes bundled with the Windows operating system: a few roads, a few rivers, the odd triangle for a hilltop, little or no text. Poor drafting skills would add to the verisimilitude.

The slab of text that Pvt. Bluebottle mentioned is often hard to follow for two reasons: 1) the reader's lack of imagination and/or familiarity with the genre; 2) the designer's poor writing and/or language skills. What goes in the text varies from designer to designer -- be glad when they include anything at all (some don't out of sloth or embarassment at using babblefish -- they should just do it in their native language and have done with it).

[ September 14, 2005, 04:22 AM: Message edited by: Philippe ]

[vincere]

Totally with you on this. Some kind of map would be really useful, especially in campaign games. Also for those games where I buy units first.

It isn't like officers and NCOs wouldn't know the main features of the terrain ahead.

[Private Bluebottle]

It is not lack of imagination, nor lack of familarity with the "genre". I spent 10 years in the army doing this stuff for real. Every briefing I attended or gave, had maps and/or aerial reconniassance photos when available. Its trying to figure out where the hell town XXXX is, road YYYY is and so on.

[RSColonel_131st]

I know one shouldn't speak about those things easily, but...

...how hard could it be to create (or use code already avalable to make) a vector-based small drawing applet inside the briefing screen.

All we need are a few different colors and a pen to scetch something up. The scenario designers could use this for briefings, and it may even be usefull in multiplayer.

Vector lines do have the advantage that storing them requires less space than classic bitmap images, and it has become such a common technic, surely there are APIs out which could be used?

[hellfish]

Operation Flashpoint uses html-based briefings that allow you to place pictures and maps in the briefing and also allows for multiple pages that are hyperlinked, so you can click one link and look at your operations order, another link for a battle-specific warning order, another link for an intel brief, etc.

It's also got a handy tie-in with the in game map. If the mission designer has a hyperlink to a terrain feature on the map in the briefing, the map will orient on that location when clicked. So, if you're told to assault Hill 712, you click on "Hill 712" and the map will automatically move from the default orientation on the assembly area to the area surrounding Hill 712.

Kinda nifty, but it works because all OFP maps are hardcoded, and can't be randomly generated like a CM map.

[J Ruddy]

For Quick Games anything is better than what we have in CMX1 (which is nothing).

If they do put in an Auto-Map creator, I would also like to be able to override the Map file in my scenario's so that I could put in a scanned sketch or hand made topo-map instead.

[Ardem]

Well I think if there is a briefing section and the scenario designer gets to put any scanned image into that briefing, we could get whatever we liked, I would also like the ability to have a import facility, so people can get a detail list of their (own side) troops before going into battle.

For some this is not important but, it would make it good for comps and metas to have a list of equipment on the battlefield. This as a quick check before the battle starts that all is correct.

I designed a fair few scenarios in Operation Flashpoint and I must say that is still the ultimate in scenario design, it is quick and easy and flexible.

Just some note and maybe BFC might take some interest, besides the briefing being in HTML, withint the scenario editor you could make a Beginning and end movie to play a bit of the story line. This created great atmosphere before the start and end of a movie, all that was done was some camera angles a few scripted out AI sequences and let the TACAI do its job and record the results for a playback.

Imagine just before an assault the town scenario, you have an intro movie of riding in an armoured car coming into town and suprised it finds a Tiger in the middle complex and the armour car goes up in smoke.

Then you start the battle.

Again I don't expect BFC to put the time and effort in but it something that would be very very cool for scenario designers.

[ September 14, 2005, 06:38 PM: Message edited by: Ardem ]

[Philippe]

Just to clarify one of my comments from this morning, the genre I was referring to was a scenario designer's briefing, not the real thing. The real thing would not be hampered by misguided attempts at writing fiction (there are some real doozies out there). If you stumbled on one of those, I don't care who you are, if you don't know the code that wargamers tend to confuse with reality, there's no way you won't get befuddled. Apart from that, former contact with reality won't help a bit when confronted by bad fiction. In fact, it probably puts you at a disadvantage...

I suspect that briefings are a lot more lavishly appointed today than they were two generations ago. The Soviets were probably very abstemious about giving out their maps, and even more restrictive about who got to see them. And I'll bet nobody on either side ever got to hold a magic marker. So it may be a mistake to assume that the briefings of yesteryear were like the briefings of today.

One of the implications of all of this is that it is amazing that anybody managed to write coherent accounts of what happened. I have a funny feeling that in WW II most people were lost most of the time. Especially after the retreating army pulled out the road direction signs. I don't know what that town over there is, sarge, and I can't ask the locals cause they're all speaking French...

[Private Bluebottle]

Originally posted by Philippe:

Just to clarify one of my comments from this morning, the genre I was referring to was a scenario designer's briefing, not the real thing. The real thing would not be hampered by misguided attempts at writing fiction (there are some real doozies out there). If you stumbled on one of those, I don't care who you are, if you don't know the code that wargamers tend to confuse with reality, there's no way you won't get befuddled. Apart from that, former contact with reality won't help a bit when confronted by bad fiction. In fact, it probably puts you at a disadvantage...

I've been wargaming for about 30 years now. I've seen/read a great deal of what has been written by and about wargames. I don't easily get confused about reality and wargames.

I suspect that briefings are a lot more lavishly appointed today than they were two generations ago. The Soviets were probably very abstemious about giving out their maps, and even more restrictive about who got to see them. And I'll bet nobody on either side ever got to hold a magic marker. So it may be a mistake to assume that the briefings of yesteryear were like the briefings of today.

I suspect you're wrong. Armies cannot function without maps. The Soviets were a great deal less worried in WWII about "security" than they were about combat effectiveness. Most of the bull**** that grew up in the Cold War about maps and the fUSSR's military, came because of the reverse situation coming about.

As to what information is provided in a briefing in WWII, it depends upon the level at which it occurrs, how much preparation time is available and the amount of intel available to the commander, at the time. Same thing happens today. One thing though, that the subcommanders do know is the general lay of the land and that is what I'd like to know, as well, when I'm being briefed for a scenario. The easiest and best way is to provide a map to accompany the briefing.

One of the implications of all of this is that it is amazing that anybody managed to write coherent accounts of what happened. I have a funny feeling that in WW II most people were lost most of the time. Especially after the retreating army pulled out the road direction signs. I don't know what that town over there is, sarge, and I can't ask the locals cause they're all speaking French...

You've never been taught how to navigate, have you, with a map and a compass? You don't need road signs. As long as a reasonable topographic survey has been undertaken and you have a compass, you can discover your location with a resection. As for not speaking the local lingo, its amazing how much information some cigarettes, nylons and chocolate can discover, through negotiation.

The ability of a scenario designer to add maps, pictures and other information to his briefing would be invaluable to the players. How much he adds or omits, should be though, up to him. An ability to load a html page into the game for scenario briefings would be IMO an invaluable addition to the game.

[Philippe]

Not sure what we're arguing about, so we won't. The discussion is not about what you or I actually know, it is about designers, audience, and educational skills in the '40's. You may understand everything you read, but I don't, and I was trained to reconstruct incoherent fragmentary texts in dead languages. That and US $2.00 will get you a ride on the New York subways.

Most Americans that I know have great difficulty reading maps. So handing one to a typical soldier in an American unit would have produced rather comical results. Granted you have to make allowances for the differences in the educational systems then and now -- I've seen what they studied in secondary school back then, and the drop-off seems to have taken place in the late fifties or early sixties. Australian schools are on the British model -- I don't know what happens when you hand a map to Tommy Atkins after he's got a few A levels under his belt. The results couldn't have been as dismal, but I doubt that they would have been stellar. I've seen some pretty disoriented British tourists in my time (but their being on holiday probably had something to do with it).

As for my navigational skills...let's leave the ad hominem out of this. I spent fifteen years of my life in a former professional incarnation trying to simulate bronze age navigation without map or compass. I'm not as good as those Polynesians in your neck of the woods who can navigate the Pacific by feeling shifts in the currents with their balls, but I certainly don't need anything as high tech and modern as a compass. The smell of the wind (industrial pollution) and the taste of the current (don't try it -- it's usually some form of petroleum by-product mixed with waste) and how the mist gathers on the horizon is enough. If I feel like cheating I check the sky (though it's usually overcast). And I only got dysentary once, but still love the smell of Mediterranean sea port in the morning -- it smells like diesel fuel and raw sewage.

I can't speak to not being able to ask the French locals for directions because I'm a frog. I did manage to get lost in a souk in Oman for about five minutes once, but re-oriented myself pretty darn quick after I stopped my boss from taking a leak on the back wall of a ruined mosque.

[Michael Dorosh]

Funnily enough, this has been discussed before at moderate length a couple of times already

My thread

Parabellum's Thread

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Philippe:

Most Americans that I know have great difficulty reading maps.

This strikes me as kind of dumb. How many Americans that you know did three years of military training in the United States and England before shipping off to a combat zone? What exactly is it you think an infantryman in the 1940s learned how to do?

EDIT: Seriously, what do you think occupied them for weeks and weeks on end? Take a look at Band of Brothers, it gives a small idea; look how much of the "training" vignettes revolve around reading maps. Hell, they even show a map and compass lecture with all the private soldiers happily in attendance. They used maps everywhere they went. I have a lovely map in my personal collection of Aldershot and parts of southern England used in WW II by my regiment. Our regimental museum has dozens of maps of England - they trained off of these constantly, and when they went into Normandy or Italy, they had complete sets of maps.

A friend of mine works for the Charting and Mapping Establishment in Ottawa, as a Canadian Military Engineer; he collects WW II maps and has a basement full of them. I doubt the Yanks were any less ahead than the CW; in fact, many of the "Canadian" maps were actually US military maps.

Bluebottle is quite correct on the importance of maps.

So handing one to a typical soldier in an American unit would have produced rather comical results. Granted you have to make allowances for the differences in the educational systems then and now -- I've seen what they studied in secondary school back then, and the drop-off seems to have taken place in the late fifties or early sixties. Australian schools are on the British model -- I don't know what happens when you hand a map to Tommy Atkins after he's got a few A levels under his belt. The results couldn't have been as dismal, but I doubt that they would have been stellar. I've seen some pretty disoriented British tourists in my time (but their being on holiday probably had something to do with it).

I doubt many French, British, American or Canadian tourists would know how to clean a machinegun or fire a 2 inch grouping at 200 metres on the rifle range, either. Funny thing about trained soldiers in the 1940s is that they're very much different from civilian tourists in the 21st Century....

[ September 16, 2005, 07:15 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Nicdain]

A couple of links for those who want to go through the subject "maps" and "maps reading"...

Maps reading tutorial at USGS

Maps reading tutorial from GeoSTAC

[Michael Dorosh]

Bump for Phillipe.

[Private Bluebottle]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Bluebottle is quite correct on the importance of maps.

Thank you, Michael. Of course I am. Modern warfare's speed couldn't be maintained without adequate maps. Modern armies (ie 20th century+ ones) maintain Ordnance Surveys, who's responsibility is the planning, preparation and production of maps of their own and other nation's terrain.

One of the biggest lessons that came out of the Boer War was the need for better navigation skills, first among officers and then, later among the other ranks. Armies today devote hundreds of hours to teaching navigation down to the commonest soldier. How to read maps, how to use navigation instruments, how to relate maps to ground and so on and so on. In WWII, the British Army alone produced several hundred hours of training films for the use of troops to teach navigation (I know 'cause I've sat through about 20 hours of them and bugger me, they're boring. Invariably the narrator suggests, "Look around for a tall object, such as a church steeple..." when discussing resections - not much use in outback Australia, I can assure you!).

The ability of the scenario designer to increase the "immersion" of the players and to provide them with necessary information to allow them to plan their battle would be of particular value I feel.

I'll add one other variable which I think would be useful - time. If the scenario planner could limit the amount of time available to a player to read and understand the briefing notes, it would add somewhat to the urgency of the matter. Perhaps a small clock in one corner, counting down the minutes. After that, only the text section of the notes would be available to be reviewed, to represent the problem of taking away maps/panoramic views from the briefing.

I like the idea you mentioned in the other thread of the use of overlays. That would be useful as well.

Like you, I'm not sure what Philippe thinks what happens during training in the Army but it appears he believes soldiers don't get taught navigation.

[Michael Dorosh]

By 1917, Canadian platoon commanders were getting their own maps. Part of the success at Vimy Ridge was the fact that detailed rehearsals were conducted, including walkovers of scale models of the ridge, and the fact that each platoon was briefed in detail on terrain and objectives. It was a lesson the army didn't forget. My understanding is that it had been practically unheard of before WW I to issue out maps to officers lower than field-grade.

I think it's also a bit telling that a map case was including in the standard official issue of 1937 Pattern webbing to officers in the British and US armies from 1939 onwards - every single officer was issued a special piece of gear whose only possible use could be to hold a map in place and keep it safe from the elements. The Germans issued similar cases to troop leaders, though theirs were roomier and could be used for other things as well. Why devote all that material to a piece of kit unless you intended them to use it? (In action, the British and Canadians tended to discard the map case to avoid detection by snipers, but no matter!)

Each officer was also issued a compass case and compass.

[JonS]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

My understanding is that it had been practically unheard of before WW I to issue out maps to officers lower than field-grade.

Given that maps in general were pretty rare, and that gridded maps were totally unheard of, before about 1915/16 that isn't too surprising.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by JonS:

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

My understanding is that it had been practically unheard of before WW I to issue out maps to officers lower than field-grade.

Given that maps in general were pretty rare, and that gridded maps were totally unheard of, before about 1915/16 that isn't too surprising. </font>

[ozi_digger]

After reading this thread I had to go back and have a look at the start how far it had wandered off track. Well, technically it hasn't, not by much anyhow.

I reckon CMx2 can probably jazz up the briefings a bit but it will depend on the era we're talking about.

I made the same mistake a few weeks ago - someone starts talking CMx2 and I start assuming its gonna be WW2. Well, a module or two will be anyway.

My point is this:

ACW brief - yeah sure, have a sketch map.

WW2 - maybe a map with latest guess at enemy dispositions.

Modern - same with maybe a photo.

A briefing's bells and whistles are proportional to how contemporary the era of the CMx2 module is that your playing.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by ozi_digger:

I made the same mistake a few weeks ago - someone starts talking CMx2 and I start assuming its gonna be WW2. Well, a module or two will be anyway.

heh. Good point. But my remarks here were to Phillipe's comments that American and British soldiers in WW II would have been lost if given a map when the reality was somewhat different.

My point is this:

ACW brief - yeah sure, have a sketch map.

WW2 - maybe a map with latest guess at enemy dispositions.

Modern - same with maybe a photo.

A briefing's bells and whistles are proportional to how contemporary the era of the CMx2 module is that your playing.

I think you're right on the money with this. I don't even want to see the briefing that Hannibal or Spartacus will have for their battles....

[ September 18, 2005, 07:16 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[JonS]

Well, yes and no. What you present to a player in a breifing doesn't necessarily have to be completely consistent with the particular era it's set in. But, AIUI, that isn't really the point of this thread anyway. The ability to add various multi media bits and bobs to the breifing is the point, not how any given scen designer chooses to implement that in any given scenario.

[aka_tom_w]

Yeah But ....

Will the game model the map?

and will the map be visually reprented in an animation with an Officer of an HQ unit looking over the map?

If not looking at maps? What do HQ units do the rest of the time?

(and can there be animations for those activities?)

(I say in jest BUT, I would like to see the map represented by generic animation of a map IN the game...)

-tom w