How will CMC affect CMBB tactics?

[PzKpfwIII]

Originally posted by Russophile:

[QB]It's been intimated that operational night turns might be 6 hours in length.

Actually, for Runyan99, here is a clarification from the official FAC on the website CM:C:

the game comes with a "Turn Editor which allows for the game to run with several different turn lengths (in hours), "

The six hour figure was given in an example by either Moon or Hunter, it would appear at this point this may be onfigurable by the scenario designer.

[citizen]

I am hoping for multi-day campaigns, like 3-9 days.

Question for those who have beta'd:

Say there's a continuous engagement where 2 ME's are fighting it out day after day. One force gains the right flank of the enemy on day 3. On day 4 is the front a straight line like CMBB does now? Or do troops get to keep the flanking position they won?

[Runyan99]

Originally posted by Russophile:

The six hour figure was given in an example by either Moon or Hunter, it would appear at this point this may be onfigurable by the scenario designer.

I'm aware of that. The 'standard' right now seems to be 1 hour turns during the day and 6 hour turns at night for the operations map. That will keep things moving along a bit better on the op map. But I think we're still looking at roughly 12 one hour turns for day and two 6 hour night turns to make up a full CMC day. All those 12 day turns are potential 60 minute CMBB battles, and that might be cumbersome.

[Runyan99]

Originally posted by citizen:

Say there's a continuous engagement where 2 ME's are fighting it out day after day. One force gains the right flank of the enemy on day 3. On day 4 is the front a straight line like CMBB does now? Or do troops get to keep the flanking position they won?

I think so.

As I understand it, each 1x1km quadrant of a 2x2km tactical map has a flag which designates control.

So, in your scenario above, if one force holds three of these quadrants on day 3, then the day 4 battle should start with the defenders only in possession of one corner of the 2x2 map.

[Yair Iny]

Originaly Posted by Abbott:

I do not believe that CMBB's AI will be responsible for fighting CMC's battles. CMC's own AI should be resolving the Grand Tactical engagements.

That's not what I meant. I meant to say that if you play single player both in CMC and in CMBB (when resolving the tactical battles against the AI), you would now have a regular CMBB battle using the forces built in to the scenario from the CMC level. Now, the CMBB AI doesn't know it is fighting a CMC originated battle. As the AI plays now, it will go all out in attack or defense, without conserving forces, since there is nothing there telling it to do so (I am assuming the CMBB AI will not be changed in the new CMBB.exe).

This will put the CMC AI, i.e. the "high level commander", at a disadvantage, since its "low level commander", the CMBB AI, doesn't know how to fight battles without taking unacceptable losses, unacceptable due to their effect on the operational level.

[RSColonel_131st]

Opps. Very valid point.

OTOH, how does the AI do it in current operations? These require a minimum of force preservation as well.

[Abbott]

Originally posted by Yair Iny:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originaly Posted by Abbott:

I do not believe that CMBB's AI will be responsible for fighting CMC's battles. CMC's own AI should be resolving the Grand Tactical engagements.

That's not what I meant. (snipped)

This will put the CMC AI, i.e. the "high level commander", at a disadvantage, since its "low level commander", the CMBB AI, doesn't know how to fight battles without taking unacceptable losses, unacceptable due to their effect on the operational level. </font>

[Yair Iny]

Abbott Said:

I am wondering if playing a very large Operational Campaign with the A.I. deciding every battle could have some fun. That would even the field and if it plays well will offer a fun diversion between receiving turns from human opponents. With the A.I. taking a few minutes for a decision that would normally take hours and hours for players to fight tactically it should accommodate large orders of battle.

Yeah, but then you would be missing the whole point of CMC in my opinion, that is, of adding an operational layer to CMBB, not being an operational game in itself. With all due respect to BFC and the developer, I doubt CMC alone is much of a match for the other operational level games around there. Its whole charm to me is the addition to CMBB.

[Abbott]

Originally posted by Yair Iny:

(snip) Its whole charm to me is the addition to CMBB.

I guessed you missed this part of the post " a fun diversion between receiving turns from human opponents".

As in something to tinker with in the evening between PBEM turns being received.

[76mm]

To ensure that the AI doesn't smash itself too completely in futile battles during home-brew campaign games, I have taken to hitting the "cease-fire" button at the beginning of every

scenario against the AI. This way the AI will take its licks but at least some significant portion of its forces will live to fight again another day.

I am also curious about the effect of the four quadrant victory flags on AI behavior--I've never played with that victory flag configuration and am curious if it will trigger any weird(er) AI behavior.

[farmerch]

Yeah, but then you would be missing the whole point of CMC in my opinion, that is, of adding an operational layer to CMBB, not being an operational game in itself. With all due respect to BFC and the developer, I doubt CMC alone is much of a match for the other operational level games around there.

They never claimed to be a full operational game. The suggestion is to have the auto-battle function solve smaller fights, but to the other battles on your own. And to calculate the outcome of small battles, well... it doesn't need to be perfectly balanced (even though I am sure the developers put a lot of work in this).

[PzKpfwIII]

Originally posted by farmerch:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Yeah, but then you would be missing the whole point of CMC in my opinion, that is, of adding an operational layer to CMBB, not being an operational game in itself. With all due respect to BFC and the developer, I doubt CMC alone is much of a match for the other operational level games around there.

They never claimed to be a full operational game. </font>

[Peterk]

It also looks like a typical method of balancing games against the AI, by increasing their experience level or by using a force multiplier might also be out the door since it risks messing up the communication between CMC and CMBB at the end of the battle.

I'm pretty skeptical that this will allow fun campaigns against the CMBB AI. But...we don't know much about it yet.

[imported_KG_ThorsHammer]

There will definately be strategy changes needed from many players. Those that already play campaigns understand the differences and are used to this type of conflict. Most regular cm "victories" come at such a cost that they are really pyrrhic victories.

The balance issue is also an interesting one. Most are used to playing games that are designed to be balanced. With cmc, most battles will be unbalanced; the question in many cases being how well a player can keep his assailed units from being annihilated.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by NIX:

Auto resolve will be a key feature in the game. My concern is my experiences in games such as RTW. In RTW in the campaign, the auto-resolve would cause 10x the casualties and typically the life of the commanding general. The same battle played out would be a one-sided victory for the player. I'm guessing the results of either auto resolve or playing it out should be somewhere in the middle.

If anyone knows, is auto resolve anything more than crunching the total attack values versus the total defense values without regard to other modifyers such as terrain, morale, etc?

RTW lacks a good AI. One unit's actions don't take into account the actions of other friendlies. The CM TacAI suffers similar during a turn - but to some extent the AI player corrects it when planning a turn.

It is much harder for me to achieve an overwhelming victory vs vastly superior forces in CM than in RTW. So auto-resolve should be much closer to the real thing in CMC.

OTOH I remember some unbalanced AI attacks in CM with BCR. Superior forces suffered heavily.

For single player campaigns, I can imagine house rules for CMC where a player has to stick with his maneuver element so his tactical advantage doesn't imbalance the whole operation.

Gruß

Joachim

[Joachim]

Can we have the AI-controlled side with a quicker and higher casualty recovery rate? If the human player wipes the board because the AI is less mart than him and the AI doesn't know it it playing CMC, then the AI should get a bonus. Either more units at the start - or a reduced campaign loss rate when the battle is not auto-resolved.

Example 1: AI attacks (worst case ) with 3:1 odds. Human player inflicts 50% losses and withdraws before the AI can close in. Losses below 5% as the human player shamelessly exploited the AI's weaknesses. A bit unfair...

Example 2: Human attacks. He goes for one flag. AI counterattacks. AI gets wiped out, then human goes for next flag.

One of the main reasons are the two targets for the AI. It either goes for the flags or for enemy positions that it discovered.

Is it possible to patch CM so we get battles where it does no counterattack once it looses a flag? I mean it would be pretty boring if you take the right forward flag, kill most of the counterattacking force and then march ahead fighting only the few units still in place. If this patch ain't possible, please don't put the flags in the center of the 1x1 sectors - put them towards the defender's edge of the sector.

Gruß

Joachim

[Peterk]

OTOH I remember some unbalanced AI attacks in CM with BCR. Superior forces suffered heavily.

I just tried a biltong mission ater being away from CMBB for a while that fits this bill.

Turned out to be a very uninteresting battle. Just to see why it went so badly, I replayed with the fog of war turned off so I could see how the AI was handling it's units and it became obvious (not letting fatigued/exhausted units rest before attacking, not keeping squads close to HQ's, etc. etc). Pretty basic stuff.

Again, I'll be really surprised if CMC is even playable against the AI and it won't really be CMC's fault. Some innovative balancing methods will have to employed to compensate for CMBB's AI.

[Runyan99]

Playing the AI is a waste of time.

[Peterk]

...and the loudest screams for a campaign system came from people who want to play against the AI.

It'll be interesting to see how this pans out. Playing by e-mail has a problem in that it slows things down a great deal, maybe too much, and playing solo will possibly have a problem unless the AI has been fundamentally altered in the new executable (which I doubt, but who knows).

I really hope this works out, but it's going to be a "wait and see what others say first" purchase. The initial thrill has worn off after a bit of reflection. (Civ 4 on the other hand... ).

[Yair Iny]

Sure would be nice if someone from BFC, or Hunter, chimed in with their take on this. Or maybe they are also baffled by this. No disrespect intended, it's just that CMC is something I was hoping for a long time would come along, after playing ROQC a lot. And these new thoughts about the problematic interaction between CMC and CMBB are making me anxious about the viability of single player play.

[GAGA Extrem]

Runyan99, i agree to your point of higehr careness for the palyers troops.

Maybe someone here has played with the RQQC tool - it is all the same there, you look twice after eacht ank or each ounit from your core force