CMx1 games

[Apocal]

CMBO had terrible graphics when it appears on the market. CMX1 never was an Eye candy.

CMBO's competition was Close Combat, TacOps and a bunch of hex and counter based wargames. Hard to argue it had worse graphics than those.

[[hirr]Leto]

Still play CMBB and CMAK, but admittedly, like some of the advances made in CMSF. Unfortunately, I feel that those advances came with costs, and CMx1 is still the better wargame.

CMN will hopefully backtrack enough to what made BFC great and deliver unto us something that we can play for the next 10 years (albeit at 40 dollars a pop for a new module every year or so).

Cheers!

Leto

[Battlefront.com]

No backtracking, only going forward The primary thing that CMx1ers miss with CM:SF is the WW2 setting. Well, that's already taken care of! The second thing that they miss is a flexible QB system. On paper that's fixed, and soon it will be coded. The new system has all the flexibility of CMx1 BUT with far fewer problems. Yes, the CMx1 QB system had some pretty serious problem areas. So while part of the new CMx2 QB system will appear to be like CMx1, the system as a whole will definitely be forward looking.

Steve

[Jaws]

No backtracking, only going forward The primary thing that CMx1ers miss with CM:SF is the WW2 setting. Well, that's already taken care of! The second thing that they miss is a flexible QB system. On paper that's fixed, and soon it will be coded. The new system has all the flexibility of CMx1 BUT with far fewer problems. Yes, the CMx1 QB system had some pretty serious problem areas. So while part of the new CMx2 QB system will appear to be like CMx1, the system as a whole will definitely be forward looking.

Steve

I was very disappointed CMSF saw light before CM Normandy. But … tbh Battlefront choice to release CMSF 1st is the best CM WW2 fans could overcome CMSF as test lab for CM Normandy. Looking forward to Bridges and QB system. But got caught by CMSF as well now. .

[Michael Emrys]

...the system as a whole will definitely be forward looking.

Fine and dandy, but the real test is whether it will play on my PPC Mac. Failure to do that will mean that the game is fatally flawed (and I am going to try really hard never to use that hackneyed phrase again!).

Michael

[Frenchy]

I must be in the minority - I still on occasion do play the CMx1 games.

[Meach]

I cannot bring myself to install the old CM games. I loved them at the time but CMx2 has incredible gameplay which will only ever be improved.

I think once Normandy and CMSF2 are established not much else will take up my game-playing time.

[Childress]

Looking forward to Bridges and QB system. But got caught by CMSF as well now. .

CM1 exercised a compulsive fascination for me that CMSF hasn't, probably because of the asymmetric aspect and the undernourished QB component. Nor have I been inspired to do a PBEM. But they'll be addressed and it's hard to go back go back because of the other cool enhancements and sheer graphical bravura and detailing of the new system. Also, I gather, we'll get surrendering troops which somewhat detracts from the flavour and realism of CMSF, IMO: the pacing of battles seems to fast without POW processing.

Personally, I wish BFC would devise some work around for the lack of friendly fire effect the abuse of which I noticed in one of tyrspawn's excellent videos. But I'm not unaware of the AI programming challenges involved.

[Michael Emrys]

Personally, I wish BFC would devise some work around for the lack of friendly fire effect the abuse of which I noticed in one of tyrspawn's excellent videos. But I'm not unaware of the AI programming challenges involved.

I don't know what the situation is in SF, but in CMx1 friendly fire could happen if your troops walked into an area receiving area fire. Arty short rounds could also cause you grief, as I recall. But since grazing fire was not accurately modeled in CMx1, there were many occasions when friendly troops should have been in danger but never were. It'll be interesting to see if that situation changes.

Michael

[Childress]

But since grazing fire was not accurately modeled in CMx1, there were many occasions when friendly troops should have been in danger but never were. It'll be interesting to see if that situation changes. Michael

I was thinking of this:

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=74165

[Battlefront.com]

Michael Emrys,

I don't know what the situation is in SF, but in CMx1 friendly fire could happen if your troops walked into an area receiving area fire. Arty short rounds could also cause you grief, as I recall. But since grazing fire was not accurately modeled in CMx1, there were many occasions when friendly troops should have been in danger but never were. It'll be interesting to see if that situation changes.

It's the same in CMx2 as it was for CMx1 and for the same reasons. Most HE rounds, of any type, can cause friendly casualties. Small arms can not. The amount of AI coding required to get even mostly acceptable (but still bad) behavior is huge. So huge that it's not even on any of our ToDo Lists. As far as we're concerned 5 years from now friendly fire will be the same as it is now. Think of how many times we've categorically stated that we're not going to do something which is arguably important to the basic sim itself. That should emphasize how difficult and time consuming it is.

BTW, to be clear we could definitely do a really detailed and accurate simulation of friendly fire issues. The technical skills required to make such a feature aren't an issue. We have them. But the time to code the behavior would be catastrophic in terms of overall game development features. As important as simulating friendly fire is, it isn't important enough to derail development. People have been coping with lack of small arms friendly fire for four CM releases

Steve

[Childress]

Michael Emrys,

As important as simulating friendly fire is, it isn't important enough to derail development. People have been coping with lack of small arms friendly fire for four CM releases

At any rate, it matters less in your typical WW2 setting than in a modern urban environment with modern weapons, right?

[Battlefront.com]

It's all situationally dependent. Some WW2 combat was just as urban intensive as anything going on in modern times. Even more intensive IMOH. Support fire when crossing fields is also about the same issue for both time periods. But overall, probably less of an issue for WW2 since the volume of fire was significantly less on a per unit basis.

Steve

[Combatintman]

There is no such thing as friendly fire if you're on the wrong end of it - I can't believe anyone is seriously suggesting that it didn't happen in WW2 and that it is only a modern phenomenon. There are more mechanisms and situational awareness tools in place now than there were then and yet these unfortunate incidents still happen - why? Its what somebody from Germany called 'friction'. You put cold, wet hungry (or hot, sweaty, thirsty) and tired people with lethal weaponry in situations where they are frightened and have to make quick decisions. There is nothing from a study of warfare that suggests that you can eliminate friction.

[Battlefront.com]

I think you misunderstand the main point And that is one should not be allowed to be putting out withering support fire, from MGs for example, and advance your infantry right through the middle of it without any sort of chance of either your guys getting hit or the supporting fire letting up, which in turn allows the bad guys a few moments of peace.

Now, in real life gunners momentarily let up on their outgoing fire when someone friendly crosses into their LOF. So reality says that although the game should have some negative effect for this, I do think in real life it's less than people may think. Which is why we're not even considering putting in the code to deal with this.

Steve

[Michael Emrys]

It's the same in CMx2 as it was for CMx1 and for the same reasons. Most HE rounds, of any type, can cause friendly casualties. Small arms can not. The amount of AI coding required to get even mostly acceptable (but still bad) behavior is huge. So huge that it's not even on any of our ToDo Lists. As far as we're concerned 5 years from now friendly fire will be the same as it is now. Think of how many times we've categorically stated that we're not going to do something which is arguably important to the basic sim itself. That should emphasize how difficult and time consuming it is.

BTW, to be clear we could definitely do a really detailed and accurate simulation of friendly fire issues. The technical skills required to make such a feature aren't an issue. We have them. But the time to code the behavior would be catastrophic in terms of overall game development features. As important as simulating friendly fire is, it isn't important enough to derail development. People have been coping with lack of small arms friendly fire for four CM releases

I'll accept your word for all that, Steve, and I don't want you to think I am persisting in any kind of argument at this time. But just to clarify what I wrote earlier, on more than one occasion I had my troops wander into a target zone of friendly area fire—in at least one case, MG fire—and receive casualties. Where friendly units did not suffer friendly fire was when they were in the line of fire, but not in the target zone. And that I all I meant.

Michael

[Childress]

Now, in real life gunners momentarily let up on their outgoing fire when someone friendly crosses into their LOF. So reality says that although the game should have some negative effect for this, I do think in real life it's less than people may think. Which is why we're not even considering putting in the code to deal with this.

Steve

Probably an ignorant question, but could the TacAI disable fire, or at least targeting, when friendlies and (spotted) bad guys occupy the same tile?

[MikeyD]

Apparently the AI fire control doesn't see its own units at all. A way of saving on processor load, no doubt. So the AI recognizing that the guy it's shooting at is sharing space with Blue troops (that it doesn't see otherwise) may need pretty substantial code manipulation to pull off. Theres a very very long wish list for CM Normandy. Halt fire when Blue walks in front is nice but I'd prefer Charles spend his time coding decent water or working tank ploughs or multiple vehicle skins, or... like I said its a long wish list

[Apocal]

Probably an ignorant question, but could the TacAI disable fire, or at least targeting, when friendlies and (spotted) bad guys occupy the same tile?

CQB would become quite awkward.

[Battlefront.com]

I'll accept your word for all that, Steve, and I don't want you to think I am persisting in any kind of argument at this time. But just to clarify what I wrote earlier, on more than one occasion I had my troops wander into a target zone of friendly area fire—in at least one case, MG fire—and receive casualties. Where friendly units did not suffer friendly fire was when they were in the line of fire, but not in the target zone. And that I all I meant.

Things that go boom generally are allowed to cause friendly casualties. So if you're in a building that is being pounded by your tanks, you're going to be at risk. If you're too close to an airstrike, you're going to be at risk. But if you are in the line of fire of your own weapons you won't be. I don't recall small arms fire, even when at ground zero of friendly Area Fire, causing casualties in CMx1. But hey... it's been a very, very long time since I've had a reason to recall that so I could be wrong there

Probably an ignorant question, but could the TacAI disable fire, or at least targeting, when friendlies and (spotted) bad guys occupy the same tile?

There's an old saying that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't true. In this context... if it sounds too simple to work, it probably won't work Think of it this way... if it really was that simple, then three possibilities would exist:

1. We didn't think of it, despite the fact that it's a pretty obvious solution.

2. We're lying because we purposefully don't want to make the sim part better.

3. The suggestion only scratches the surface of how to deal with the problem.

Hopefully most of you will think it's #3 The problem is that friendly fire, and avoiding it, is an incredibly complex thing in real life because there are so many "Human" factors involved. In game terms these "Human" factors mean lots of AI programming. A ton of it TacAI specific.

What happens when a friendly unit gets into friendly LOF and doesn't move? What does the unit shooting do about it? Shift it's fire? Yell at the guys in front of them to get the Hell out of the way? What happens when the friendly unit in front is pinned and calling for the supporting unit to fire over their heads at the enemy? What happens when you have a single soldier off to the left side of an Action Spot and your supporting fire has a clear LOF through that soldier's Action Spot's right side? Should supporting fire be blocked? Or more commonly... should your rushing soldiers be prevented from getting into LOF of your supporting units because it's obvious that doing so would mess things up? It can make a huge tactical difference, couldn't it?

There are other things as well as just the TacAI. How about if Unit A is on top of a 4 story building firing at the top of a 4 story building, and Unit B is on the street inbetween, then there's no risk of friendly fire, right? How about if Unit B is on the 1st floor of the building being shot at? Also not a risk of friendly fire, right? Sure thing, but in order to "know" this every friendly unit shooting now has to check every possible Action Spot and height inbetween it and its target for friendly units. And not just once, but every time it goes to fire. Which is a big problem for CMx2 because each soldier fires individually, therefore if you have 50 guys firing at targets that means each time each guy goes to fire the system has to check LOF for friendlies.

But worse than all of this is what it would do to the AI Player. Sure, a decent Human player can do all kinds of things to make sure he doesn't get screwed up by possible friendly fire situations. But how about the AI Player? Obviously unless we code in specific behavior for it then the answer is "no". Does the AI Player really need to know this? When the AI Player moves a platoon into the line of fire of another platoon, and ignorantly stops it because it's found a good firing position, then either the supporting platoon will cut the advancing platoon to ribbons or will just sit around picking its nose if we at least told it to hold fire when friendlies are in the way.

And that's just what I came up with off the top of my head. I'm sure it's far worse than the few months of programming and major hit to the CPU and RAM than I've just described

CQB would become quite awkward.

Unplayble is the term I'd use

Steve

[jeffsmith]

The only Small Arms friendly fire incident I remember in CMBO

was during a night battle where two squads were moving toward some treees

one squad firing from slightly behind decimated the other squad

that I thought would be safe

[Meach]

When being instructed on the L86 LSW we were told to fire roughly three rounds then look up over the SUSAT. This was because one of your own guys could run into the sight picture in seconds and you needed a wider view to check that this was not going to be the case. I stress this was before the L86 became a DMR role when the MINIMI came into the inventory.

I actually see the troops in CMSF doing this and it's a major factor in cutting down on Blue on Blue incidents from small arms fire.

[Battlefront.com]

Meach,

Yeah, that's the way we think of it. Our virtual soldiers aren't firing max ROF with their heads screwed into their weapons sights. They are simulated to take aim and fire deliberately. As you say, standard training encourages this behavior for a variety of reasons.

Steve

[Patrocles]

Who definitely stop playing Combat Mission AK-BB-BO?

I stopped playing these games for several months ago and the only motivation I had, was the mods! I expect a lot (perhaps too) the new game engine, hoping that the gameplay is better than what I saw on the demos of shock force!

I still play all three classic, excellent CMX1 games (cmbb the most of all BF games...unless you can also count Dangerous Waters)! CMSF is a big pile of steaming bytes imho, ymmv and I rarely touch it anymore.

I can't wait for CMN!! bring it on!!

[British Tommy]

I still play AK and BB every day (mostly via PBEM) and I'm still not tired of them

Also, thanks to CMx1 I have made many good friends over the years and shook hands with some of them.

As for CMSF, I have tried it twice but it's not for me.