So who here is enjoying this?

[ClarkWGriswold]

Perhaps the unit icons can be made to switch around and show different info at a keystroke. First keystroke is unit type, second is command status, third is formation ID, then back to unit type.

Formation ID and command status could be the same one, ID number would be formation, shading would be if in command or not.

That's another idea. There are lots of possibilities. But given how much the icons are used for interacting with units, they really need to be more informative. Right now they only tell you four things:

1) Which side the unit is on (American or German)

2) What the unit is (though, special units like engineers don't get their own icon)

3) Which units belong to the selected units group (but only when you click one of them. There's no way to see more than one group at a time)

3) Which units are routed/paniced or otherwise not able to be given orders.

Ideally, I'd like to see the unit type, unit grouping, C2 status, suppression level, fitness level, morale, etc. You could even show something when a unit is low on ammo, immobilized, or otherwise ineffective (FOs who can no longer spot due to a dead radio man, for instance).

I think it would be possible to show all of this information in an easy to view and non-overwhelming way if some time was put into it. You shouldn't have to click each and every unit to get this sort of information. Stuff like buttoned/unbuttoned I can understand (though, even that is not shown anywhere in the interface), but C2, suppression level, morale, etc. are so core to the game that they need to be conveyed to the player in a more direct way without having to hunt or dig for it. And there's a lot of wasted screen real estate that could be put to good use for this sort of stuff.

[chrisl]

I'm in the "not enjoying it" group because I'm 10 years older and have way more things going on in my life than when CMBO/BB came out so I don't get to play as much as I like. When I do get a chance to play, I've enjoyed it quite a lot. It's definitely a different game- I have to advance a lot slower than I remember, and be more thorough with prep fire and covering fire, but it has a lot of the same feel. I mostly play wego so I can play a bit at a time, but was surprised by how fun RT was when I tried it, too.

[Battlefront.com]

We have TONS of UI improvements that have been sitting on the drawing table since 2006. As with almost everything in game development, a good development team has far more good ideas than time to implement them. The next major release, however, is when we pull a lot of them off the drawing table and put them into action.

Steve

[theFightingSeabee]

I have already been a supporter of BFC for the last ten years. You come across like you have not tried the first CM series and have just jumped on board with the new engine (beta tester i see). Because against a human opponent in CMx1 and in some well designed AI opponent scenarios' date=' what you just described happens in a CMx1 game as well. Relative spotting aside.[/quote']

No, I've played it since 2001. Bought CMBO and later found the whole package, CMBO, CMAK, and CMBB all together, so I bought that too. Still have it. The games really made me a fan, as they were the best of their type at the time. Once CMSF came out, I was totally hooked on CMx2. Having been in the military in the modern era, I quite enjoyed commanding modern pixeltroops.

[altipueri]

Why is the new UI better than the old?

I have CMBO and CMBN in front of me on separate laptops.

Camera movement. CMBO shows me the whole by just using the eight little arrows on the panel. CMBN makes me wave the mouse all over the screen to get to the edges.

Unit movement. CMBO Click unit, right click, move place destination. Oh and you can right click to change your mind and move up the other side of the street. CMBN Click on unit move mouse to panel, select move, move mouse to place. Oops too far, have to take hand off mouse and press backspace etc.....

Command lines. CMBO I can quickly see who is getting way too far from who. CMBN??

Badly typed on an iPad which is why I can't easily scroll forward to remove the next 'Typed' to remove it as the text box moved up. So help on iPad UI welcome too please!

Typed

[bab]

CMBN Click on unit move mouse to panel, select move, move mouse to place. Oops too far, have to take hand off mouse and press backspace etc.....

Excuse me, but what are you doing with your other hand?

[Bertram]

I'm glad you like that, as we do too. But it doesn't sit well with some player types. We even found this in CMx1, though the "surprise" factor was far lower due to the Absolute Spotting system of that game series. The fact that it's more realistic to not know what's going on doesn't sway such players. Yet when I suggest they play with the lower settings, which approximate Absolute Spotting, I get the usual "I'm not a beginner, so don't insult me by suggesting I play the kid level". Well... as the old saying goes, if the shoe fits...

Steve

I have to disagree here. As commander it is indeed more realistic not to know what is going on. But I am not only the commander of this force, I am also the brains of the squad, and the mother of the individual soldiers. All to often their digital brains are not up to reacting realistic to the events around them. As long as I have to direct them as much as I have to, I need to be aware of the things they are aware of. I personally think it LESS realistic that units don't react to evolving events, because the compagny commander is looking through the eyes of a squad on the other side of the battlefield (and having an unrealistic close up knowledge of what happens there). I think it LESS realisitc that a force only reacts when the compagny commander is around, making it necesairy for him to race around the battlefield and sacrifice his overall view in order to tell individual AT teams to targetthis tank or that verhicle.

As long as our input is needed at squad/team/verhicle level we should have time to give that input, and have the information that that unit has at that level to make decisions in a ralistic manner. That has the drawback that we, at the same time, have a better overall view of the events than the unit in question would have, but that problem isn't solved by going the other way, and giving less information then the unit would have, or not enough time to make the units act realsitic.

I think this is substituting the fog and information overload of the battlefield (due to limited intelligence and speed of events around you) with the information overload of a computer game (due to complete other factors, like being on the left flank of the battlefield while somethig happens on the right flank, or having to actually having to tell ten tanks individually how to drive along a straight road, and baby sit them while they do that, because they otherwise get tangled up, turned around and stuck in the trees). If you like that, it is ok with me, but I don't view it as more realistic.

And I certainly don't think people who want to take as much time as their digital counterparts would have for each decision are beginners, and people who like the twitch and run around as more experience. Except maybe that they have learned to move the camera faster and use the commands faster. Which would make you an experienced player in some sense I guess.

[Petrus58]

Why is the new UI better than the old?

I have CMBO and CMBN in front of me on separate laptops.

Camera movement. CMBO shows me the whole by just using the eight little arrows on the panel. CMBN makes me wave the mouse all over the screen to get to the edges.

Unit movement. CMBO Click unit, right click, move place destination. Oh and you can right click to change your mind and move up the other side of the street. CMBN Click on unit move mouse to panel, select move, move mouse to place. Oops too far, have to take hand off mouse and press backspace etc.....

Command lines. CMBO I can quickly see who is getting way too far from who. CMBN??

Badly typed on an iPad which is why I can't easily scroll forward to remove the next 'Typed' to remove it as the text box moved up. So help on iPad UI welcome too please!

Typed

camera movement - Basic movement keyboard options: WASD & Q/E

unit movement - click on unit, hit space bar, select order, click on location.

command lines - been discussed here often. Double click on unit to show all in that unit. Easy, quick and clearly visible even on the largest map.

[altipueri]

Excuse me, but what are you doing with your other hand?

Holding a glass of beer/wine/whisky/port (now); and occasionally the steering wheel. Having learnt to drive and read at the same time I'm now trying to drive and play laptop games at the same time. It seems to upset the oncoming traffic occasionally, but no casualties so far.

[womble]

Why is the new UI better than the old?

I have CMBO and CMBN in front of me on separate laptops.

Camera movement. CMBO shows me the whole by just using the eight little arrows on the panel. CMBN makes me wave the mouse all over the screen to get to the edges.

No it doesn't. Hold the left mousekey and move the mouse horizontally to slide L-R or move it vertically to slide forward and back. You can combine the two to move obliquely, and the distance you drag the mouse with the button held from the point where the mouse cursor was when you started holding the button determines the speed of your movement: press and drag it half a cm and your view moves slowly; press and drag the mouse near the edge and your view zips along. Similarly, hold the right mouse button to pitch up and down. Vastly superior because you can control the speed of your movement.

It has its niggles, it's a long way from ideal, but it's about a hundred times better than one-speed pan-and-glide.

Unit movement. CMBO Click unit, right click, move place destination. Oh and you can right click to change your mind and move up the other side of the street. CMBN Click on unit move mouse to panel, select move, move mouse to place. Oops too far, have to take hand off mouse and press backspace etc.....

CMBN: Click the unit. Press a letter for how you want them to move. Click the destination. Click another destination to set another waypoint. Delesect and click a waypoint to be able to do funky stuff at that waypoint. Again, it's not perfect, but it's no worse than x1. x1 had moveable waypoints. x2 has actions at waypoints. Swings. Roundabouts. Heard of 'em?

Command lines. CMBO I can quickly see who is getting way too far from who. CMBN??

And once they're out of command you have no idea which HQ they were originally under. Since in BN, the looey in charge of Charlie-1 can't command the guns from Able-4 or any other platoon, it matters more that you know who's in what chain. It's usually pretty obvious whether an infantry element is near enough its HQ to be in command.

[Wodin]

Love it...love the old series aswell...but couldn't go back...I don't mind losing....it's war...

[altipueri]

Thanks for the long reply. I have tried again and I am only marginally changing my feeling that it is still more work. And pressing a letter means I have to put my drink down or take both hands off the steering wheel.

Anyway I won't bang on any more. It is still a good game Battlefront so don't despair that you put all this work in only for old farts to bleat that it is not as good as it was in 1947.

[Frenchy]

I have found myself enjoying the game. Yes, it is much more difficult than the original, and there in is the beauty for me...I have to work harder to master it.

[TheBlackHand]

I liked CMx1's UI better, but CM:BN's isn't half as bad as some people think. Hardly "unplayable/unusable" as some have claimed. Just my opinion.

My main gripe with the UI (so far) is the lack of moveable waypoints. Leaving them out is a step backwards. I guess I'll have to accept it if the code wizards decree that moveable waypoints are impossible . . . but it just seems like they SHOULD be possible.

They certainly would come in handy.

[Chek]

It's a bit like going from a cessna 172 to a T-38 Talon.It's got all those extra buttons and stuff 'cause it can do a whole lot more.

[Sybaris Angst]

For me, I really, really want to love it, but there is something missing. I just can't put my finger on it - ...

For me it's the camera perspective. In CM:BO and CM:BB you could adjust your camera angle and height to see the battle and still see the detail in the vehicles and troops. It seems that in CM:BN detail is lost too quickly as you zoom out and you get left with ants and non-descript blobs rolling about the field regardless of the size of the battle. There doesn't seem to be a happy medium. I assume this has to do with ratio??

[Battlefront.com]

I have to disagree here. As commander it is indeed more realistic not to know what is going on. But I am not only the commander of this force, I am also the brains of the squad, and the mother of the individual soldiers.

Absolutely. When you click on an individual unit you get to see what that individual unit sees. With CMx1 you saw a what every unit saw with no regards to who saw what and when.

As long as I have to direct them as much as I have to, I need to be aware of the things they are aware of.

You are. When you click on a unit you see exactly what it sees. You do not see what it doesn't see. In CMx1 it was the opposite. You saw what everybody else saw and never saw anything less than that.

I personally think it LESS realistic that units don't react to evolving events, because the compagny commander is looking through the eyes of a squad on the other side of the battlefield (and having an unrealistic close up knowledge of what happens there). I think it LESS realisitc that a force only reacts when the compagny commander is around, making it necesairy for him to race around the battlefield and sacrifice his overall view in order to tell individual AT teams to targetthis tank or that verhicle.

Huh? Units react to stuff they would be realistically aware of. If a player isn't paying attention to a particular unit it doesn't affect that unit at all in any sort of negative way.

As long as our input is needed at squad/team/verhicle level we should have time to give that input, and have the information that that unit has at that level to make decisions in a ralistic manner.

Again... huh? That's exactly how CMx2's system works.

That has the drawback that we, at the same time, have a better overall view of the events than the unit in question would have, but that problem isn't solved by going the other way, and giving less information then the unit would have, or not enough time to make the units act realsitic.

I'd agree with you if CMx2 was working the way you describe, but it doesn't. So I'll say for a third time... huh?

I think this is substituting the fog and information overload of the battlefield (due to limited intelligence and speed of events around you) with the information overload of a computer game (due to complete other factors, like being on the left flank of the battlefield while somethig happens on the right flank, or having to actually having to tell ten tanks individually how to drive along a straight road, and baby sit them while they do that, because they otherwise get tangled up, turned around and stuck in the trees). If you like that, it is ok with me, but I don't view it as more realistic.

If units moved around on their own, there wouldn't be a game to play. Just a fancy slideshow. So I'm not sure what you're advocating for.

And I certainly don't think people who want to take as much time as their digital counterparts would have for each decision are beginners, and people who like the twitch and run around as more experience. Except maybe that they have learned to move the camera faster and use the commands faster. Which would make you an experienced player in some sense I guess.

If you play WeGo then your units are getting WAY more opportunities than any unit would in real life. This is the fundamental unreality that is a turn based wargame. We call it "time compression" because all events are compressed in terms of time because the player is allowed decision and evaluation time that is without limit, using information that would be unavailable to said units, and with an understanding of the battlefield's artificial parameters (eg. I am on the defense, therefore someone will attack me within a few minutes of the game starting. That is a 100% sure thing).

In RealTime it gets a little more interesting, from a realism standpoint. In real life units do not act according to highly optimized, carefully considered, constantly reevaluated large scale plans. They don't even do this on a small scale basis. Read any account of a battalion or company sized engagement and you'll see that much of the time, most of the time, units haven't a clue what's going on outside of their very narrow perspective. They also spend a lot of time sitting around uncertain about what to do or incorrectly certain about what to do.

WeGo is not necessarily less realistic than RealTime because there are other things which are more realistic in WeGo. But in terms of control and the flow of information, RealTime (with very minimal pausing) generally is more realistic than WeGo. At least when the conditions are such that the player is capable of keeping (roughly) realistic control over his units in terms of issuing Commands and evaluating unfolding events. The latter is where WeGo has an advantage because it theoretically scales from single unit to entire armies (or fronts) just as easily, whereas RealTime doesn't. Not to say many people would like to play a CM WeGo game in control of 100,000,000 units... but in theory it could work.

Steve

[sburke]

WeGo is not necessarily less realistic than RealTime because there are other things which are more realistic in WeGo. But in terms of control and the flow of information, RealTime (with very minimal pausing) generally is more realistic than WeGo. At least when the conditions are such that the player is capable of keeping (roughly) realistic control over his units in terms of issuing Commands and evaluating unfolding events. Steve

As a Wego player I take offense! Okay not really. As a Wego player I just see no alternative as I want to be able to review the action. If RT offered that I would probably be more open to playing that style.

The latter is where WeGo has an advantage because it theoretically scales from single unit to entire armies (or fronts) just as easily, whereas RealTime doesn't. Not to say many people would like to play a CM WeGo game in control of 100,000,000 units... but in theory it could work.

Steve

You didn't really just say that did you? Have fun explaining to Charles you just opened the topic of a CM of the entire Eastern front.... Gonna take a Cray to work that map.

[LordCalvert]

The scenery sure looks nice, but the sight of all those AFVs and trucks bouncing on their soft suspensions makes me feel like all the vehicles are French Citroens in disguise.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!

("LOL" was deemed "too short")

[Battlefront.com]

As a Wego player I take offense! Okay not really. As a Wego player I just see no alternative as I want to be able to review the action. If RT offered that I would probably be more open to playing that style.

Oh, I know I think 100% of RT players want the ability to have a running "buffer" that they can rewind and watch replay. It's pretty complicated to support, but I do think at some point we'll get it in.

You didn't really just say that did you? Have fun explaining to Charles you just opened the topic of a CM of the entire Eastern front.... Gonna take a Cray to work that map.

heh... well, the term "theoretically" was suggested by Battlefront's legal department as a universal disclaimer term best suited to just such a comment

Steve

[kipanderson]

Hi,

I think 100% of RT players want the ability to have a running "buffer" that they can rewind and watch replay. It's pretty complicated to support, but I do think at some point we'll get it in.

Wow... that would be a real stunner.... Never would have even crossed my mind such things would ever be possible.

Makes me wonder what else Battlefront has squirreled away as long term, but still realistic possibilities .

Lots to look forward too...

All the best,

Kip.

[Mondinen]

Love it(CMSF & CMx1 too). Whenever I have free time I feel the urge to fire it up. My biggest issue is whether to play WeGo or RT? Can't wait for the modules.

[Georgie]

I think that CMBN is a great game, hard to learn and play but worth the effort. There are a few bugs and some things that don't seem right like infantry firing on buttoned up tanks for instance but those things will probably get worked out in the coming months. Meanwhile I'm playing with the editor and trying to get some action on some of the things that I feel is wrong in the game. I've held off on installing the patch until the next one comes out because of its teething problems. I'm in no hurry, already waited four years or so.

[GSX]

I left CM-1 behind quite some time ago and followed BF into CMSF and CMA, both decent titles that are worth a look in my opinion.

By the time I got to CMBN I was well used to the new UI and the new feel of the game. I think that CMBN is better than CM-1 games in almost every respect. I do think the scale is reduced but, I never did like playing huge games. Im not a fan of the Campaign system, seeing it as simply a group of scenarios very loosely linked together.

I do like the RT play, never though I would but after 4 years its my preferred way to play now, unless the games really big.

Sure the games content is limited right now but that will improve as we see new modules arrive (Brit one by Xmas?). In time I will have as much, if not more variety than was available in CMBO.

I like the new graphics, although I find them a wee bit cartoony for some reason and I like 1-1 representation, even though the infantry model isnt ideal. Although regarding that Im satisfied by Steves explanation of where its at right now and how difficult it would be to make it more realistic (formations, immediate action drills etc).

Even if I had a PC to play CM-1 games on now, I doubt I ever would again and while CMBN isnt perfect its a fine game that will Im sure continue to improve.

So yes, Im enjoying it.

[GSX]

Oh, I did forget about a pet peeve of mine though....

Please BF can you do something about Vehicle crews carrying out the vehicle orders once the vehicle is destroyed. Its become a real pain in the arse. Cats chasing dogs, my Pumas knock out 3 US greyhound. A while later some more show up, but at the same time all these crews start running by my Pumas, who immediately start to turn and fire on the crews, exposing their flanks to the new Greyhound threat.

Is there anything to be done about this gamey AI tactic?