All Posts by Tontoman

Wished your 60 people squads were around when I was logged in.  But this is what I saw, people not staying on (me being one) because nothing big happening, logging off and causing low pops.

http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/component/content/article/10-production-notes/167-attack-objective-minimum-reduced-to-2

BTW, anything in particular that brought the sapper issue up to this big change.

http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/component/content/article/18-discussion-feedback/244-sappers-the-difficult-choice

That's been around since the new cover, well been around forever but much more so with the switch from hard cover to the plentyful soft.  I like some of the comments saying they need their cover, I'd like to see how they would have found the old hard cover days hehe.  Now those were hard core sappers.  No running down massive bush lines totally hidden (and being able to is pretty lame, what happened to the trunks).  With the hard cover (or that really skimpy soft hedgerow stuff) you had to pick one side or the other, really had to plan your route and not get enemies on both sides as you could only hide from one.

Yeah, didn't see much of a map change when I tried again last night.  Brussels being attack by 23 people from a depot mission, 5 from the FB mission.  Not much chance there (and no FB defense) with taht number.   FB went down just as I arrived at the city with a 232, went back with the thought of picking off the FB team (and RTB) and got lucky and wasted the FB busting team.   

Found another attack with some of the ex Brus attackers in it, ~20 people there over all.  Again nothing much.  Lots of ATGs around at the end waiting for tanks that weren't bothering spawning in.  Everywhere else dead.  7:30-8:30 EST.

T.

Might be the hours you play.  Used to be a drop off after summer when school started heh.  The night time hours would be determined by free time where there's lots in the summer. 

Maybe with the Tiger announced already (man that was fast, they really bumped up the research speed) and the map already West even before the toys, folks have dropped out of the map.  End of map low pop have always been around but I've never see it at this level before and this early... the map is not that far East or West.

T.

After the welcome back week, and then the $5 for one month for returning vets, and the change with diffferent brigade classes (armor, inf) which I thought could be really interesting ...I joined back up.

Tonight at 11PM EST, other than air at Glize, there were ZERO full missions.  Of the two brigades that had some of their player bar used, they had 9 and 8 players on.  That's Axis wtih sides balanced.  Summer used to be one of the better times. 

What's up,  folks have already given up on the map and it's going to have a slow death with these numbers for the next couple of months?  Needless to say I was shocked and glad it was $5.

T.

Liked the new sounds especially the planes, rifles are a bit weaker but that's not totally bad as you can have your volume up without blowing out your ears.

I know they couldn't change the timing, but pity it ended up being the end of the map.  Even on comms there was talk of lack of teamwork due to eom.

Cool, BTW do you know if you keep your prior rank?  Not that I care about the rank itself, but don't want to be stuck with no binos and/or tier 1 weapons.

Thanks

T.

Yep Red Orchestra rules.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=4w6RaX7heGc

Similar to WWIIOL with no painted crosshairs, iron sites only.  Not MMORPG, but some of the maps are huge, easliy big enough to make use of full rifle range and heavy MG use (has the big MGs).  But just look at the inf animations, full rag dolls and no lag!.   I had my buddy say 'you know, this is kinda disturbing' after my he saw the ragdoll effects, tumbling down stairs, sliding off roofs etc. hehe.  The WWIIOL inf death, the jerk and laydown 1 second after the hit always put me off. Why I stuck to the more unique tanks, ATG and AAA.  Also has full arty with people being tossed into the air, missing limbs etc. if you're the bloodthirst type.  No binos, so no bino sniping for everyone.

For $20 one time payment.

And HE works for tanks, shoot the back wall and people in the room die.  As MG you have to work the angles to keep alive.

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Originally posted by Bl@ckVoid

Try Red Orchestra, Inf gameplay is the best. Tanks suck like Electrolux.

Try the Carpathian Crosses addon/mod, fixed lots of the arcadish aspects of the tanks... thank goodness.

http://www.redorchestragame.com/forum/showthread.php?t=26850

Lots of tank tweaks, getting the tank combat to be more realistic.  Didn't think they could get his far due to the engine limits.

• Removed the view shaking for the tank MGs.
• Armor values depending on lower armor, upper armor and turret.
• Crew can be killed from penetrating shells.
• Tanks don't start to burn on overall damage.
• Engine hits can cause the engine to start burning.
• The possibility to switch off the engine of the CC tanks.
• Where applicable: the turret rotation speed is slowed down in case the engine is switched off. This is not relevant for the tanks in CC.
• Fire from the engine can spread to other areas in the tank like the driver compartment. The sequence and speed are specified per tank.
• Switching the engine off reduces the possibility that the fire spreads.
• The main gun sights can be shattered when a shell hits the relevant area.
• Tanks trigger an event defined in the VehicleFactory when destroyed (usable for mappers).

Come to think of it, not sure why stat HE should hurt the central server.  All kill calculations are done on the host PC with the central servers just routing information (and now keeping hulk/dead body positions etc.) .  Which is why you can get things like the dual kill  and what you see is not what you get with bombs etc.  So if you're firing off HE, it's your PC that does the stat HE calculations and just sends the kill information over.  As shrapnel is not drawn shouldn't be any extra work for the central server as far as I understand it.

T.

Nice to hear about the sappers, had gotten a little crazy at one time.

Yeah ATGs and the AB has aways been an issue but at least a real one (bomb in the AB would be devastating in RL), why it was so important to get them out early.  Didn't bother me as if the enemy got the coordination to call in air (or mortars) to shut the AB down for ATG etc. good for them.  What got me is even with them out early, it's hard (with all the bushes and LOS) to get any trucks and any truck spawns an infinate army from anywhere (not RL).  So you miss one truck and you've got inf running everywhere which means your 10 min push is wasted cuz you're going to die.  If there was an FB to MS range limit to keep them on the enemy side of the city, it would help ATGs hugely.  It's why you see ATG usefulness spike in river battles, fewer rear spawning inf.  So defensive ATGs die out, the last use I got out of them was offense guarding the MS and usually covering an AB exit.  Not the gameplay I wanted :(

I understand why the bushes and banks were put in for the inf, but for my gaming preferences the inf game never really did it for me due to the animation, lag and the fact most other FPSers have an inf game.  Large scale and large numbers are great of course, but with the 300m from MS to city not hugely different than something like Red Orchestra.  So for me it was Tanks, ATGs, AAA, air that made the game unique.

Glad to see it hanging around and always keen on news of the engine overhaul they are working on.

T.

Originally posted by Bl@ckVoid

I thought they gonna use Scottsman's stat-HE data for HE shells. Bombs and hand grenades use stat, right?

With guns though it's better now as you have to kill one guy to score the kill, before they were able to despawn.

And speaking about spawn buildings, they should plug the windows. So campers come down and defend CPs and tanks stop humping around sniping riflemen through the windows.

Well it's better for the guy who worries about stats, they no longer lose the kill.  No help for the gun though.  Now not only do people teleport in from 360 degrees on the battlefield (mobile spawns), but with the tons of cover even with defenders it's easy for someone to get the one shot needed to kill you.  Add that to the global problem of cover blocking your view more than the enemies (a total killer for ATG/AAs) so you can't actually setup IN cover and the sharp banks and gullies around tree patches blocking your ATG/AA.  The banks are also at a perfect height where you can't shoot over it (88 is ok) but leaves you open for incoming.  Then with the tons of cover (it is the Vietnam jungle after all and not France ;) ) your FOV is 100m anyway at the ATG view height.  So it's no suprise the main ground enemy for tanks is the fairy sapper and his sachel of love and not the ATG.  Seeing the waves of sappers spawning in and running out of the city into the bush when the AO went off was probably the last straw for me.  I loved the ATG as it's so rare in WWII FPSers, I get my rifle and inf WWII combat fix from Red Orchestra (iron sites only, pretty good).  

Can't plug the windows, that would make depot camping even easier, just cover the two doors and no risk from nades or being shot from the windows.  I hear ya about the people sticking around and just sniping from the depot, but there's no ideal solution with fixed spawn points right beside the cap points.

T.

It's more like non bomb or grenade HE doesn't work, for those it works fine.  But tanks, AAA and such yeah you pretty much have to hit to kill.  But to be honest you are far more likely to die outside the city to the guy you never see.  With all the bushes now, there's always one sapper burried in the bush that will pop out and get you as you go past, HE doesn't help here as you can't HE every bush.

Where it really does hurt is in the city.  The guy you just saw looking out the window and now behind the wall......You can't HE the wall and kill him, and you can't shoot HE through the window onto the back wall (just ~8 feet away from him) and kill him that way either.  So the asault aspect of the tank, clearing building after building for your fellow troops is not really represented as you've noticed.  If you think it's tough for tanks, try ATGs desperate to hit a running inf to save themselves (no MGs for ATGs) hehe.

As to why, probably due to the fact with fixed spawn points with defender buildings it's a camping issue.  Setting up a tank or worse AAA shooting into the spawn building would be horrible.  Ideal solution nope (better spawning would be better), but it's been around from the start as coding spawning methods is one of the toughest things.  Also maybe some preformance issue tracing all the shrapnel for HE shots.

T.

Cool, so you're probably just limited by e-mail accounts.  Gmail, Yahoo, etc. and John Smith XVII welcome. :)

But it's good, been meaning to check it out again, just have to pick a couple of weeks where I've got some good spare time and the start of a new map.   Can't be stuck with no binoes with inf, or not enough rank for ATGs and other equipment VS late research tier stuff.

T.

Well the AAA fan's haven't got much either, never got their SPAA (and bofors for everyone). 

Interesting bit about the ease of use and learning curve.   PAINTED CROSSHAIRs for weapons for everyone!!!!!

T.

Actually no Sparre, that's what drove lots of people crazy.  They had system that rocked in other games that were meant to stress the PC/vid, but WWIIOL performed way below expectations.

I was somewhere in the middle, had people with slower PCs getting better rates than myself but at least I wasn't stuck in the teens like some.... except in town during a massive battle. 

T.

Originally posted by hardcase

OId players weren't leaving..new players weren't staying. There is still limits on MSP..400 to 1400 meters from target but it takes into account enemy and freindly bldgs when it tries to deploy. Without MSP, etc there would be no ww2ol. They would have had to close their doors.

Hard to say as they never publish their subscription numbers.  The staff cuts came after MSPs.  Don't have a problem with the range,  it's the 360 degrees that get me.  Any battle on a river city shows it.

Elendril, RAM's pretty cheap now, so another stick might be worth it if your motherboard has room.   Also turning the radar thing in the lower right had corner can boost your FPS amazingly.  And if you think that 360 spawning makes inf  play hard, you can imagine what it does to ATGs on city defense.  My ATG work basically went down to offensive only, being towed on potential MSP on attack.  That way the enemy inf come from only on dir (the city) so you can at least plan and position for that.   Then you kinda hope the attack goes bad so enemy tanks start coming outside the city to give you some work :). 

T.

Originally posted by hardcase

The Mobile Spawn Points..are trucks setup and static that allow players to spawn closer to a battle. One reason people left the older versions was it took a long truck ride to a battle and many times after riding for 10 mins you were killed before you got into a fight. Very few wanted to fight infantry and it was a lot of tank battles with little infantry. Since Depot Spawning..spawning in a capture building in town..that is in supply linke with a freindly town and MSPs the infantry game has come into good play. MSP still get destroyed, Depots still get recaptured, but now there is a substantial infantry component to the battles. AAA and ATGs are being added to Depot Spawning, how many no one knows..I suspect 1 or 2 each. All these do is represent a bigger attacking force that actual. MSP means there are in essence..many trucks..filled with many infantry who have arrived on the battle and are fighting.

 

You must practice offline to learn to fly well. Remember each equipment takes 7.5 hours to replace and you cannot use them to learn to take off and land and do Basic Flight Manuevers.

Thatt was a good flying vid. DId you watch the complilation in the other post. The guy is working on a much longer version and that short vid is just his intro.

Oh I'm well aware of the reasons for the MSPs, it was mentioned not for lack of gameplay reasons for why it was needed, but the 'sim' label ;).  Sadly I have to agree they were needed once depots came in as those where right beside the CPs (another CRS decision I don't like) and made capping almost impossible.  It adds to the inf battle but removes it also.  The inf fights are so restricted around the city now, defense becomes nothing more than stopping the hordes coming in from ALL directions.  Before it was cutting off the stream of trucks (by longer and longer defensive lines) and the counter battle to keep those routes open.  As lots of the threads in the playschool forums said at the time, somesort of limit to MSP/FB range would have been nice to at least keep them on the enemy side of the map and not spawning in troops behind the city.   How realistic is it having a nice ATG and far out defense on one side when from one truck a whole army can spawn in behind you in every city battle.  Only one truck has to drive around a defensive line.  Why I'm pretty sure that the big eagle eye 2 part vid from killer? on that battle was a river city, rivers stop that problem and make for the best battles that do look more realistic. But that's why I don't like the word 'sim' anymore, basic concepts like a defensive line are gone.  But with the current setup and playerbase no agrument from me MSP are needed and here to stay.

Also I would say lots of NEWLY joined left the old version once they found they couldn't take the truck ride.  The players who were playing for a long time were not leaving because they suddenly couldn't take the truck ride.   MSP, the radar and deployment method was to cater to a more instant action crowd.  We had the discussion of an 'instant action' button that would just drop you into the middle of a battle for that reason, I think CRS was hoping of getting and keeping both.  Now you can debate whether that turned out good or bad for the game, but it did cause a rotation of the type of gamer in WWIIOL.  While lots of new people came in, lots of old ones left.  And I find that the new ones have very little patience, usually even on defense charging ahead with tanks (even topping a ridge instead of holding a nice reverse slope defence, North hill in Ciney.. omg was so sad)  and dying instead of playing smart and letting them come to you.  And fair enough, they pay their $15 and can do what they want, but with more playing like that it's not worth my $15 anymore for the resulting gameplay which has become more BF1942 like and less WWII sim like.

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Wow, that ended up bigger than I thought.  But anyway I hadn't seen the completed version of the movie, will check it out.  That one was just the first one I hit on a google and it looked good quality.  Some of the ones I would have liked to show are ones demonstrating RL manouvers like scissors etc.  Those are good ones as they show how effective they are in game (real 'sim' aspects), and just how calm and cold those pro fliers are when pwning other WWIIOL fliers  

EDIT: You got a link to the full vid, couldn't find it from the same guy.  BTW after that big 'sim' rant, should say WWIIOL does have the best balistic and tank damage model of any WWII game, MMORP or FPS.  No hit point BF1942 nonsense there, I'll give it 'sim' points for the mechanics.  Why I miss my ATG...

T.

Well I have some issues with calling it a 'sim' after the introduction of Mobile Spawn Points (armies teleporting out of trucks) which make it more of FPSer game than a sim.  But by all means give a freebee a shot, but if you do put some hours into it as it takes  a while to get even the basic hang of it.  Especially as they still don't give newbies binoculars, which means everyone can see you from 2+km away and you can't see anything.  Which also means playing inf you'll be dying to tons people you can't see and have no hope of seeing, unless you get into town and do house to house fighting.  Another personal peeve I have with a CRS decision, not the way to bring new players into a tough game.

But anyway, if you are a flying guy (play IL2 etc?) then WWIIOL is probably as close to a flying sim as you can get.  The mobile spawn points, CPs, depots and other non 'sim' like stuff introduced to get the ground game to work doesn't apply to the air.  That's where WWIIOL map size, the fact it's air and ground (with AAA etc.) and plane mix (fighters and bombers so you have easy targets and hard ones) shines.  People will argue with the WWIIOL flying physics and modelling etc., but that's nitpicking when compaired to the fact you're actually flying in a full combat environment and not some air arena.  But do note that unless you're a good pilot, you're ass is going to be grass for a while.  Lots of the pilots are only that and they know all the manouvers and planes strenghts and weaknesses.  Also lots fly in squads with mics and thus full comms... so definately join a flying squad if you want to fly.   Ton of Utube movies for a taste.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_w9MLVxN8g

Yeeaaahhhh, such a joke that we had tons of big squads and they were playing almost every night.  A bigger pop than we have now.   Lots of smart stuff was being done then that you don't get now.  The least of which (and the most obvious) are simple things like letting the tanks come to you and die to the setup ATGs, not meet head on with your tanks and blow any chance of a counter attack.  On the larger scale we were setting up supply cutoffs etc., but that requires teamwork (which we had) which means taking orders.  Just because you don't like it and didn't join, doesn't mean it wasn't there.

So you expect teamwork and smarts from a group of people who like yourself, don't want to take any direction from a leader and don't want to spend any time away from action (NEED MS for close spawning)?  No wonder haning around that crowed you didn't see much.  It was there, pity you didn't try the squads while they were still around.  You get out what you put into it.

T.

Originally posted by Bl@ckVoid

 

 

Originally posted by hardcase

If the sim were only that simple as to campfest.

Let me elaborate. Campfest for those who know how to play.

 Engines-off bombers. People guarding CPs outside the CPs. Silent sappers sneaking into VS, sappers hiding in the berms near AB exits. Lone riflemen hiding for hours on airfields.

And people helping us to enjoy campfest.

Endless stream of lemmings exiting the manholes in AB wall camped by ETs (concept of using smoke grenades is alien to them).

AAA guns parked inside AB (concentrated firepower, simultaneous death LOL).

infantry checking map standing on the road (good for practicing your rifle skills).

People running from MSP across the open field. (trains your "find EMS" skill).

Tanks driving into ABs (100% char driver trait,  good for sapper training).

And most of all people who never mark contacts, never approve them, and never look at the map.

I always find that the complaint that AAA inside the AB is stupid should more specific.  AAA in the middle of the AB is dumb.   AAA wedged between the walls is smart.  I've always survivied WAY longer that way than any outside open position, especially when the bombs were given more lethal and longer range shrapnel effects.  Couldn't count the number of times a distant bomb goes off and you get that single 'plink' sound with 'crewmember 2 hit in arm' rendering the bofor totally useless. 

Add to that the engine off bombing and the warp 10 and instant pull up bombing run.  The fact tree cover hurts more than helps is another reason to opt for hard walls.  Air has no problem locating you via those super fat tracers and since AAA has no sand bags or other standard protection, it's easy to spray and pray (or bomb) a general location on the AAA blind side (tree cover).  Give me a position wedged between two hard walls where the plane either has to do a perfect drop or come at me from a fully visable side

Only time I've found outside postions to really work well (post bulletproof trees) is with heavy friendly air so the enemy air is either too busy or doesn't even see you as you don't get drawn in (the games visual bias to show the most dangerous first).

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On the camping side, I wonder if there's a game engine reason why the CPs and depots have to be side by side.  To me that's the dumbest single decision ever made in WWIIOL if it was a design choice.  No better way to promote camping than that.

T.

Originally posted by Nerf09

 

Originally posted by Bl@ckVoid

 

Originally Posted by........ What the original poster fails to understand is any HC is only as good as the troops who serve under it.

 

 

This is what grinds my gears the most.  There are no players I 'serve under', its a fricking video game. 

All of the "leaders" or self proclaimed "officers" are lousy tacticians, at best they are mediocre cat herders.  Even ones who have claimed to actually be "leaders" in a real "military" are lousy tacticians.  The dynamics of a video game environment are entirely different then the real world, something they will never understand.  For one thing, nobody is afraid of dying.

On the smaller squad scale it worked fine.  Even though it was just a 'video game' the leadership in the squads added a lot to the game, it's why some of my best gaming ever was in WWIIOL.   Myself and tons of people had no problem with leaders.   You always had the lone wolves who just wanted a tank and drove off head on to the enemy, but with big squads they were diluted enough to be mostly harmless.  Fear of death, or lack thereof, is always a problem in video