What are the limitations of CMSF in size ?

[pkjsmith]

hi i was just wondering if i have hit a bug or am just hitting the size limates of CMSF game engine.

i have designed a few battles over the years but never published them as i never feel they are ready but i designed one battle lately that is giving me problems in testing, its a 2500m by 1400m map and is a blue side is over a battalion in strenth and red has abit more troops. the latest PBEM save is 134mb, so it is a bit of a large battle. My computer handles it fine with no freezing but sometimes the saved game shows up in the incoming folder but not in the in the saved games list in the game its self, thus i have to play the turn again and make less moves. is this a bug or is it just that i am reaching the limits in size of PBEM battles ?

thank

paul

[gibsonm]

Well I can't speak with certainty but if the "small" side is a Bn (+) and its on a big map I'd guess you are probably approaching some limit.

[Tactical Wargamer]

I did a re large map with about 4-5 bn's. I have had 8 gig and i ended up eventually with a out of memory error. I would say about 3 Bn's is max on a large map IMHO.

[MikeyD]

Your map dimensions aren't excessive. 2500x1400 is just a bit over my own most comfortable 'large map' size. But map data grows exponentially with increased size so be careful. I have heard of other people doing scenarios that big. I've also heard of laptops overheating and shutting down too. The reason why you don't see BFC-built scenarios that scale is the product has to be played on a wide range of platforms. So building scenarios playable on only the top 30% was out of bounds.

[chaos49]

Iam playing this game with pkjsmith, and we had a few problems with save games.

as he said it when u are done moveing u troops, and press done and the pc is about to calculate the next turn. its make the file all right but some times we can not see the file when we fire up the game and choose the save game were the flie normal are.

my pc is a AMD 550 dual core 4 Ghz

with 4 GB ram

and i use Win7

GFX is two 7900 GTX

so we have no lag when we play the big battles ( yet )

[Boche]

what would you say is the biggest thing that contributes to lag... flavour objects? shadows? units?

[Lanzfeld]

From my own personal experience, disabling shadows works well.

FWIW

[Alan8325]

what would you say is the biggest thing that contributes to lag... flavour objects? shadows? units?

There is also the LOS system where every unit on the map does periodic LOS checks to every other (authorized) action spot on the map. This means that each additional action spot that gets added with increased map size is basically another LOS check multiplied by the number of units you have. This is mitigated somewhat by some type of system that "authorizes" LOS from one action spot to another at compile time to cut out the obviously impossible LOS lines, like between two action spots on opposite sides of a hill.

There are some problems with this system though, as illustrated in another thread. The one off the top of my head is one where infantry on top of a steep hill or cliff can't see over the edge to some areas that they should be able to see, realistically.

[Lanzfeld]

There are some problems with this system though, as illustrated in another thread. The one off the top of my head is one where infantry on top of a steep hill or cliff can't see over the edge to some areas that they should be able to see, realistically.

Gosh I hope they fix this someday.

[Volltreffer]

I couldnt agree more,

Had some AT guys standing over some Syrian tanks in a shallow ravine in the Marine campaign and yet they cannot see to fire... despite all the advantages - the tank just traversed turret and the rest is history.

[chaos49]

back to subject.

i have a test map i play with Sgt grunt and i think we made a record in PBEM file size 158 MB and guss what we have the same problem i have with pjksmith,

so BFC is there a limit in file size or do u have any suggestion solve the problem.

regards

Anders

[chaos49]

ok i have now a save file to beta tester and any who like to try it out.

the password is 1 for blue and red.

email: kaos49._.gmail.com

._. = @

Anders

[chaos49]

to do it more easy for u i upload the file, it will stay for 7 days.

i like feedback here if the file work for u or not.

link :

http://www.fileconvoy.com/filelist.php?id=g9d81a1cbea7f56724325413c6cc20778a9409

this file is before it go wrong, so make a turn as u normal do and see if the file nr 027 work.

[gibsonm]

Mate,

Happy to look at it but "Beta Tester" does not equal "Tech Support".

Have you thought of posting a link to this in the Tech Support area too?

After all the more time I (or others) spend with this the less time we have to do what we are actaully upaid to do.

[chaos49]

u are right dont want to take precious time form the tester so it might delay the next game.

but dont think its a tech problem, u can see my PC in post 3 or 4.

so will be happy if ohter player can try it out and only testes that have time and

desire to look at it.

Again not at cost of test time on new game.

[gibsonm]

And I'm afraid that's just it.

I can "try it out" but all I'll be able to say is "it crashed for me too" (or not).

I'm not a programmer, I don't know how it works internally.

I will however post a link to this in the CMSF Beta area (which of itself is a bit of a backwater now as the beta testing is now focused on some little series of battles in Normandy).

[gibsonm]

OK,

I've just posted something to the Tech Support area:

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?p=1219200#post1219200

May I suggest that if you want to add comment or expand that there is probably the best place (I suspect the tech support staff are so busy that they focus on posts there rather than trying to scan the entire forum).

[chaos49]

i say thanks and hope for solution if there is one.

Anders

[MikeyD]

I am perpelex at this commonly held notion that more has somehow got to be better, that playing two battions is better than playing one company. That a 20 square km map is better than a 2 sqare km map. I admit I've been part of that mindset too, having built a 90-building mall complex on a map some time ago. Believe me, a 90 building complex is not better than a 5 building complex in this game.

[gibsonm]

That a 20 square km map is better than a 2 square km map.

Well for vehicles it certainly is.

The problem is the engine wont support it.

Small maps are pretty much fine for "infantry centric" operations but little else.

But anyway, let's hope the tech support guys can help them (even if it is to publish some limitations).

[JonS]

I am perpelex at this commonly held notion that more has somehow got to be better, that playing two battions is better than playing one company. That a 20 square km map is better than a 2 sqare km map.

Most often I think it's an attempt, either conscious or sub-conscious - to mitigate the edge-of-the-word limitations of a contstrained map. Bigger maps give more scope for manoover, and manoover is what many people enjoy.

There are other ways to mitigate it, but a bigger map is the most obvious, and easiest, approach.

(and Marks comment about the range of modern AFVs, which neatly ties into what I said above anyway, I think)

[Alan8325]

Bigger maps would be nice to have in the modern setting because of the range and accuracy of weapons as well as optics. On a 10km x 10km map you couldnt just park an Abrams or Javelin team on top of the nearest hill and be able to blow up everything on the map from there. Vehicle maneuver would come into play more. Lightly armored recon units with advanced optics would have much more use because their optics could be used at a distance without bieng in danger of immediate destruction by an ATGM.

I would like to see bigger maps in CMSFII, if possible.

[sfhand]

I'd like to think if the editor is capable of making a 4kX4k map that the game would be able to support it. I'm not sure that's the case, but then I haven't tested it in a while.

And then there is the question of force size... I know I've encountered difficulties there as well (not that I'm terribly interested in fighting huge sized battles). For me, I'd rather have the ability to create and play on larger maps than to command multiple battallions - but then I have an agenda...

[gibsonm]

Yes but as covered in the tech support thread (perhaps the best place to continue this discussion, instead of having two competing threads) its not as simpe as map size.

Yes you can have a moderatley sized map of a plain, flat piece of terrain (say the Sahara with no wadis, dunes, etc.). However as soon as you add vegetation, land forms, buildings, etc. the requirements go up exponentially.

Then put units on it and it goes up further.

Then have the engine determine who can see who or resolve if X hit Y and if so what damage / casualties occurred and it goes up further.

As CMx2 is 32Bit there is a limit to how high that limit is.

It doesn't matter if you are running it on a 64Bit Operating System or how many CPUs your machine has.

[sfhand]

I actually just checked the tech support thread, and I agree with the notion of carrying on in one thread, however... I think we've arrived at different conclusions about which thread is the proper place for conjecture - which is why I'm responding here. (btw, nice reasoning about 32 bit software and memory limitations)

The following is really tangental to the original post in this thread, but I'm wondering if the newer tweaks in the engine (CM:N, no NDA information is being sought) relating to LOD, new vegitation types, and FOW fortifications might make larger maps less memory intensive. So, if there is anyone reading this who isn't under an NDA and who has some insight into the issue cares to comment I'm all ears... er, eyes.