You win. I'll stop posting.

[MOSwas71331]

Okay, you win. I'll admit I'm too stupid to play the CMBN demo, and I'll stop trying and asking for help.

Steve may be right that realism sells combat simulation games, but, however realistic the game is, I see no point in playing a GAME when nothing I want done gets done in a predictable fashion. Not even something as simple as using the +(plus) and -(minus) keys to move from one unit to the next. This mechanism should ALWAYS work, whether I'm setting up units, viewing units during the action phase, or giving commands to units during the "giving commands to units" phase, and it doesn't. It only works sometimes, and other times it doesn't. Even when it SEEMS to be working, it doesn't take me to every one of my units on the map, so I leave units without commands.

It may be realistic that you can't be sure what areas will be visible from a particular location and what areas won't be unless you stand at that location and look around for yourself. But this is a computer GAME, so I can only get that information by studying the game's map and using targeting lines. But, during action, enemy units appear and disappear from areas I earlier was told were out of view. So what's the point of map checking, particularly of spending hours studying the map? NONE of the information is reliable.

As for realism, I also expect that in real-life, you could walk along a hedgerow on a sunny day and tell at a glance where you could get through it easily. I've found no way to duplicate that feat by map study. The only way you can be certain that a hedgerow can be moved through at a particular point is if a unit executes a movement command to go through at that point. A unit rejecting such a command doesn't tell you anything; that point in the hedgerow "normally" may be traversable, but the "realistic" AI can do as it decides for any reason (and I'm sure Steve can always suggest half a dozen plausible possibilities) or for no reason at all beyond a "realistic" die-roll.

The "Game to hard" thread does show that I'm not the only one finding CMBN frustrating, and I recall a thread discussing how people have spent hours with the complete game creating dead simple situations to discover how to control views and how to move squads. Gamers with only the demo obviously can't do that, and I doubt many of them will want to try the demo multiple times after they've found how impossible the demo is.

I've carefully read through every thread with "beat the demo" instructions, and none of the instructions work. "Use smoke to conceal movement." How? No units able to project smoke can see any useful places to smoke. "Place a unit with a radio near mortars, and use other units with a radio to call in smoke." How? No unit with a radio can move to a position from which to see a useful place to smoke and call in adjustments to the mortars firing smoke, as it (the moving radio equipped unit) will die en route. "Use a tank to fire covering smoke." How? Any tank which moves to a place from which it can see a place it would be useful to smoke will be destroyed by units which it can't see (according to the map info) -- until it's too late. Of course, there's a lot of "realistic" die-rolling in the game, so saying "something works" may mean works "two times out of three" or "three times out of four." When I say it doesn't work, I mean doesn't work "six times out of six."

Admittedly, there's at least one thread out there which claims movement in CMBN is too easy, that their units move in the open and rarely take casualties! I can't believe they're playing the same game.

By the way, I still don't understand why EVERY page in the on-line manual has a large ?-mark in its center covering useful text. I've looked at the manual with six different browsers on my iMac, so it can't be a browser artifact. WHY??? Why put out a demo with a manual concealing large chunks of text? The ?-marks don't appear when I print out the pages, but the phony 1944 field manual with faded ink on faded pages wasted a lot of my colored toner, to the point that I ran out of light-magenta with 90-odd pages to go -- unfortunately the first 90 with a lot of useful info.

[gunnergoz]

Nobody wins if you quit. We (the forum and BFC) are not here to defeat your efforts to enjoy the game. You may have fair reasons to be frustrated and to leave the game unpurchased, but neither we as forum members, nor BFC, have conspired against you in any way. It may simply not be your cup of tea. Fair enough, point made. Just don't leave wearing a martyr suit that no one made you don.

[MikeyD]

You asked for novice tactical gameplay advice, we sincerely gave the best advice we could. CM:BN is a detailed historical combat sim with no deliberate corner-cutting (except maybe artillery lethality is a bit light). The game's like chess, the learning process isn't finished once you've learn how the pieces move. Most players find the ongoing learning to be the fun part. I've been playing this game engine for five years more-or-less. Every scenario's a new challenge and I still get my butt kicked by it on a regular basis. In other words, I'm having fun!

[dieseltaylor]

Its interesting to here such a view.

I am not quite sure what your previous gaming experience is but I am a CM-1 player for a decade and perhaps my innate knowledge of WWII makes me see things differently. I expect surprises.

Its also interesting as you are apparently working through the manual. I have printed it out and yes the page colouring is remarkably stupid. But learning for me is best done by playing with the toys so you get to see how far you can stretch the boundaries. If you are experimenting you are not "failing" you are learning during the many defeats you suffer.

So for instance driving a Sherman as fast as I can down a road will let me practice my drive plotting - well thtas good unitl he gets blown up ... but then how well does he die?. I then drive a second Sherman down at a different speed - what changes. And then I might start again and re-do the Shermans. Then play with switching cover arcs and driving. I am not failing I am learning. Ditto mortars. Ditto moving speeds for infantry. Ditto concealment.

But I am not "doing" by reading steps in a manual - that is boring AND you have to live up to their expectation. Free yourself to go wild. Then when you feel ready go with a scenario and play it through. BTW I have never played any scenario against the AI through.

Of course I do play humans now I completed "my" basic training!.

[Vencini]

MOSwas71331

You may need to take a break from the game. The demo, the game and community will still be here when you return CM for help. It's a new game and we're all learning. Not everyone learns at the same rate: some faster and others less so.

It breaks my heart to see people desperate.If you begin to answer your questions from 0 I will try to help you.(but i'm newbie)

Greetings from a Spanish fan. (I return to the game)

[stikkypixie]

Okay, you win. I'll admit I'm too stupid to play the CMBN demo, and I'll stop trying and asking for help.

We try to help as much as possible, I think you can agree with that. There is no easy way to find an opening in the game. You have to go the preset view 1 and move a long the bocage and see an opening.

You can see what a unit can target if you plot a waypoint, highlight it and select "Target". A line will be drawn from your unit showing where the unit can target from that waypoint.

Spotting however is something variable, which is basically the crux of the game, so I would be very upset if units did not disappear in and out of the game. I don't what you expect there.

Also put that manual away, the tutorial in the game is not a step by step guide, but more like hints on how the different mechanics in the game work in a real setting, so don't treat it as such.

Maybe a video AAR might help here.

If most of your frustrations comes from interacting with the game, know that there are 3(!) different ways of moving the camera around and 3(!) different ways of issuing orders, all of them equivalent. Nothing stops you from trying out a different one . Once you get used to it, you'll find most of your frustrations go away.

Finally if all of that does not help and if the game is giving you such a miserable time, maybe it is better to stop.

[Georgie]

Hang in there MOSwas71331. I played CM1 for years and this game is still kicking my ass. If you didn't play CM1 and learn the relative capabilities of the US and German equipment, or learn it some where else, then you have an added disadvantage. But if you like ww2 games that portray combat , minus the sad loss of life, in a realistic manner then you will probably enjoy CMBN once you learn it. My advice is, if you don't already know it, is to learn the capabilities of the US and German tanks and guns and small arms. Your knowledge at first dosen't have to be detailed, just which weapon is better in what circumstance. Hope this helps.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Okay, you win.

that's not the right attitude.

I'll admit I'm too stupid to play the CMBN demo, and I'll stop trying and asking for help.

if you get through the initial problems (we all had them), you will be rewarded by the great depth of the game for years to come.

I've carefully read through every thread with "beat the demo" instructions, and none of the instructions work.

i might guide you through, but i can't take screenshots from the game (it's some kind of graphics driver issue i think). but please post questions and i see if i can give some advice.

"Use smoke to conceal movement." How? No units able to project smoke can see any useful places to smoke.

if your men are being fired by a machinegun (for example), you don't need to fire the smoke on the machinegun. it's enough if you fire the smoke on some place between the machinegun and your men, so that the machinegun can't see your men.

it helps if you don't advance with your men until you have that smoke-firing-unit in a position where from it can fire smoke if the needed arises.

try to think ahead of events in this way. plan before you move. if you can't figure out a plan yet, perhaps because you don't have enough information yet, then don't move at all or only with something like a single scout team. if possible try to have other units see the area the scount team is moving towards, so that they can support the scout team with their fire if enemy opens fire at them. don't move the scout team too fast. only move short distances at a time (for example 20 meters per minute, using hunt or quick), so that you get some time to spot enemy units and you don't advance too deep into possible trouble.

"Place a unit with a radio near mortars, and use other units with a radio to call in smoke." How? No unit with a radio can move to a position from which to see a useful place to smoke and call in adjustments to the mortars firing smoke, as it (the moving radio equipped unit) will die en route.

try to find a path that is covered (there is terrain between the radio unit and the enemy, so that the enemy can not see the radio unit), so that the radio unit does not get shot up.

if it can't be done, avoid moving your men into places where it's hard to support them with other units.

"Use a tank to fire covering smoke." How? Any tank which moves to a place from which it can see a place it would be useful to smoke will be destroyed by units which it can't see (according to the map info) -- until it's too late.

sounds like using smoke is not a useful tactic in that situation. you may need to try a different tactic. it would help if i knew what the actual situation is.

Admittedly, there's at least one thread out there which claims movement in CMBN is too easy, that their units move in the open and rarely take casualties! I can't believe they're playing the same game.

have you won the tutorial mission yet? it would be good if you could play the tutorial mission again and again until you can win it easily. you can move your men across that large open field on the left.

[womble]

... nothing I want done gets done in a predictable fashion. Not even something as simple as using the +(plus) and -(minus) keys to move from one unit to the next.

I've never had a problem with this. There are, however, if you like, 2 'modes' to stepping through units.

If you have a unit (just) selected, with the viewpoint independent from the unit (i.e. there's no 'view lock' or 'unit lock' text blazed across the bottom of your screen), when you step through the units, the viewpoint will not change, just the info displayed in the unit panel. If however your're 'view...' or 'unit locked', the viewpoint will jump around as if you'd clicked the unit and then pressed Tab.

This mechanism should ALWAYS work...

It does. The only exception is when you have the support request screen open...

Even when it SEEMS to be working, it doesn't take me to every one of my units on the map, so I leave units without commands.

I think the problem here is no one else is seeing this flakiness. It's never failed for me, so there must be something wrong with your particular setup, or your perception.

But, during action, enemy units appear and disappear from areas I earlier was told were out of view. So what's the point of map checking, particularly of spending hours studying the map? NONE of the information is reliable.

Setting aside the hyperbole, you have to remember that spotting info takes into account the height of the spotter and the subject. Checking LOS to 'empty ground' might show you can't see it, but when an enemy pops their head up, it can be seen past some intervening obstruction. And vice versa. If your troops are prone when checking LOS, and later stand or kneel, they'll be able to see more. You just have to take that into account, because the game engine can't, or if it did, the info would be a meaningless fuzz.

As for realism, I also expect that in real-life, you could walk along a hedgerow on a sunny day and tell at a glance where you could get through it easily. I've found no way to duplicate that feat by map study.

Walked along many hedgerows IRL? I have, and it's surprising how close and opposite an opening you have to be to be able to see some openings.

The only way you can be certain that a hedgerow can be moved through at a particular point is if a unit executes a movement command to go through at that point.

Not so. If you get down in the weeds and sideslip along the hedge, you'll see the gaps. Remember that these gaps are representative of possibly tortuous half-gaps that your brave truppen will crash through, disregarding thorns and pointy sticks. They certainly wouldn't show up to a commander, and if you want to make all the decisions for your subunits you need to gather the info to do so.

A unit rejecting such a command doesn't tell you anything...

There, you have a point. This game could do with a lot more feedback in some places.

The "Game to hard" thread does show that I'm not the only one finding CMBN frustrating, and I recall a thread discussing how people have spent hours with the complete game creating dead simple situations to discover how to control views and how to move squads. Gamers with only the demo obviously can't do that, and I doubt many of them will want to try the demo multiple times after they've found how impossible the demo is.

The demo isn't impossible. I got a total victory the first time I played it. This off the back of pretty light CMx1 experience which frankly isn't very relevant and some play with the CMSF demo. Read the manual. Have some patience and pay attention to what you're doing so you realise why something's not behaving how you expected. If you want tight control you have to exert it (with short waypoints for example) and support it (with close inspection of the terrain).

I've carefully read through every thread with "beat the demo" instructions, and none of the instructions work. "Use smoke to conceal movement."

Smoke, IME, both sucks and blows. You never have enough of it and it always lands in the wrong place anyway. And it never lasts long enough to cover a significant movement.

Firepower trumps smoke, IMO. If you've got area fire orders in, and smoke appears, your units will happily keep banging away at their target, with scarcely reduced accuracy.

Admittedly, there's at least one thread out there which claims movement in CMBN is too easy, that their units move in the open and rarely take casualties! I can't believe they're playing the same game.

"It's all about the suppression, baby." If all the enemy are cowering in their scrapes, they won't shoot at your maneuver elements.

Suppress everything.

Rule number 1 of CM combat: If it moves, suppress it.

Rule number 2 of CM combat: If it doesn't move, suppress it until it moves, then apply rule 1

Rule number 3 of CM combat: if it still doesn't move, you've probably killed it already.

[sand digger]

His point about the lack of artificial aids to compensate for the lack of terrain detail that would be apparent, or more apparent, in the real world is a good one. It's the worst feature of this game and quite surprising given the history of the CM series.

In fact the appearance of the terrain can be worse than being merely uninformative, it is misleading on occasions, particularly where certain angles of features such as roads may, for example, indicate a rise when there is not.

It's strange given the really excellent quality of the game otherwise, anyone done a grid mod or something yet?

[Blackcat]

"... anyone done a grid mod or something yet?"

There was one available within a few days of the game being released. Last time I looked there were two available at the Repository.

[GreenAsJade]

The one you want (IMHO) is the Niessuh Outer Grid. FWIW.

We do need a "bocage gap higlighting" mod, but the gaps aren't that hard to find.

If you're desparate do {{{{{ till you are at "Fastest", then zoom out. Bocage will be drawn as "walls" with clearly visible gaps.

GaJ

[Other Means]

The one you want (IMHO) is the Niessuh Outer Grid. FWIW.

We do need a "bocage gap higlighting" mod, but the gaps aren't that hard to find.

If you're desparate do {{{{{ till you are at "Fastest", then zoom out. Bocage will be drawn as "walls" with clearly visible gaps.

GaJ

And it will be even more obvious in the shadows.

[Mord]

His point about the lack of artificial aids to compensate for the lack of terrain detail that would be apparent, or more apparent, in the real world is a good one.

I don't have any problem with this at all...I don't know how much more detail someone could want. I can tell tons of detail just by looking at what is right in front of me on the screen. I still don't get why this seems to be such a huge problem for some of the guys here.

Mord.

[Lt Belenko]

As a long time CMx1 player I too was/am a bit flusterated by CMBN. The best advice I've seen on the forums for the new game.

Play with your self on a hot seat. No wait I mean that didn't read right.

Play some "hot seat" games against your self...better... You will see the damage and suppression your troops on both sides. You'll see the mistakes you are making.

[YankeeDog]

Well, it is important that no game is for everyone. If it's not your cup of tea, there's no shame in this.

But if you are still looking for assistance, I would be happy to send you the save files from my first (blind) playthrough of "Road to Berlin", so you can watch how I beat the scenario. Except for a couple of turns I forgot to save, I think still I have all the movie & orders files. Once you take a look at the files, I can answer any questions you might have.

[Agua]

MOSwas????

If you want, we'll arrange a phone call, both fire up any scenario, and I'll walk you through what I'm doing, what I'm looking at on the UI, et cetera. I'd wondered if maybe scenario author mode would work tcp/ip? Don't know if the friendly and opfor ai would have the spotting disabilities (or do the spotting routines affect information the player receives only?).

[Pak40]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MOSwas71331

... nothing I want done gets done in a predictable fashion. Not even something as simple as using the +(plus) and -(minus) keys to move from one unit to the next.

I've never had a problem with this. There are, however, if you like, 2 'modes' to stepping through units.

If you have a unit (just) selected, with the viewpoint independent from the unit (i.e. there's no 'view lock' or 'unit lock' text blazed across the bottom of your screen), when you step through the units, the viewpoint will not change, just the info displayed in the unit panel. If however your're 'view...' or 'unit locked', the viewpoint will jump around as if you'd clicked the unit and then pressed Tab.

Womble, I already tried to explain this to him in another thread but he obviously ignored it.

[Michael Emrys]

If you get down in the weeds and sideslip along the hedge, you'll see the gaps. Remember that these gaps are representative of possibly tortuous half-gaps that your brave truppen will crash through, disregarding thorns and pointy sticks.

Affirmative. Nearly every hedgerow I've come across has a break in it somewhere, a long one might have two or three. Some are harder to spot than others. The key, like womble says, is to get down in the "1" view and slowly move down the hedgerow from fairly close up. The trees and bushes are growing on top of an earthen berm and a break in the berm is a visual dead giveaway. You will also usually see a man-wide patch of daylight through the shrubbery as well. Men on foot can easily move through there. Movement through one of these breaks will be smoother if you split squads into teams and time the teams 10-15 seconds apart or more.

Michael

[Rocky Balboa]

I wouldn't go on the assumption that "nearly all" hedgerows have breaks in them. Many do but I have also found plenty that do not. It really depends on the scenario designer.

As been mentioned before sometimes you will need to look very closely to see them. I've had a few occasions where I thought there was an opening but after plotting a move I realized that wasn't the case. My rule of thumb is if I'm not absolutely sure then I come up with another way to get where I need to go or I make my own hole.

Another way to tell if an opening is true is by using the indirect spotting method. Plot a move to the suspected opening but one square away from the hedgerow. This is key, you want to be at least one square away for the hedgerow for this to work. Now select the end of the movement plot and issue a target command. If you are directly in front of an opening/break them you should have LOS through the opening but the surrounding hedge will block LOS.

[Childress]

How hard is it for a scenario maker to simply put a patch of dirt under a bocage break? Prob realistic, as well, as it no doubt gets a lot of transit.

[PLM2]

I think BFC would ultimately benefit from a serious and well made built-in tutorial. Everyone I know outside of these forums that knows about the game or its predecessor laments about the interface being hell.

[Javaslinger]

But, during action, enemy units appear and disappear from areas I earlier was told were out of view.

I think these may be 'sound' contacts... Units out of your LOS that you periodically hear moving, shooting, etc... the are transient.

[zukkov]

hang in there is my advice. there's definitely a learning curve for the ui, but it ain't that bad after you get the hang of it. the tactics on the other hand, some of us never get the hang of. lol... so if that's your main problem, do like the rest of us. die alot...

[lookeylou]

The need for instant gratification strikes again. So sad So sad . Heart of the swarm is hitting store shelves soon. Siege tanks!