rykirk

Cool. Actually looked at that title before.

dpabrams, love the top down vehicle art. What game is your avatar from?

I do understand that the Steel Beasts model is more realistic from a battlefield command perspective. For fun tonight I threw Guard the Lake into the editor, swapped all the blufor out to Canadian vehicles, and tried to command from the cupola as suggested. I generally had a pretty good time, though I did end up with a few units driving themselves into rivers and swamps for no apparent reason, the path finding leaves a little to be desired compared to micromanaging like you can do hopping around or in a Combat Mission game. I would say that the experience was fun but also very different from playing something like Combat Mission Shock Force or Black Sea. It was more realistic in your limited 'gods' view and the problems of delayed updates, disabled radios, and a bit more frantic trying to keep situational awareness and adapt to the evolving situation. On the other hand I still think Combat Mission or something similar is better for visualizing how tactics are supposed to work sand table style. You can take your time watching the replays of your turns in Combat Mission, you can micromanage and make sure your tanks and troops get into good fighting positions one at a time without the game flying past you, etc. You can sit back a bit and enjoy watching the individual duels etc. The replay feature in Steel Beasts is good for some of this too I think. Anyway, I definitely had a fun time, you guys might have convinced me to try something similar with an even bigger scenario, maybe a Battalion or something next. Not going to stop playing Combat Mission or board games tho!

Can you blame me? The toys are so fun.

Ya of course, I know it has the command layer. But I bought the game to drive and gun. When I fire up a big scenario I find myself tempted to jump in and fight a platoon at the expense of the broader picture. Just my preference and style I guess. A game like Combat Mission doesn't have that temptation lol.

Sort of an old post to bring back up, but I'm actually re-reading Team Yankee via the audiobook as I've been painting a few rooms in the house. Aside from the questionable strategic backdrop of the story, has any reevaluated the tactical portrayal of the soviets and their equipment? It seems far fetched at best to me that Team Yankee effectively annihilates like 3 battalions plus of frontline Russian troops single handedly in the first 36 hours of the war without rest or resupply and lose like what, 2 or 3 M113s, 1 destroyed and a couple damaged tanks, a few guys to a gas attack, and an infantryman or two who gets shot in the chest in a dramatic pointblank ATGM launch scenario. And most of the Soviets they shoot are like walking and driving straight at them across open fields and valleys like you're on the gunnery range in SB. I haven't gotten to the second major offensive yet, so I can't remember how that one goes. But yea, it seems a little far fetched to me. I get that it's a story and it needs characters that last more then a few pages, but wonder how much it has to do with inflated views of western troops and underestimations of Russian capability too. This attitude still persists, go look at any youtube comment section and you'll see tons of 'experts' opining on how 'Russian tanks are junk because look at Desert Storm'.

Not meant as a knock on Steel Beasts. I use the map and so on as I have to in missions. Just how I game. If I want to play tanker I play tanker, platoon, or company commander at the highest usually. If I fire up Steel Beasts its because I want to drive tanks, when the scenarios get bigger I find I spend all my time on the map screen and jumping around instead of driving tanks. If I want to play battalion or regiment commander I fire up a game system designed for that. Just my preference.

I just received my copy of GMT's new edition of MBT a few weeks ago. Haven't had time to get past the basic ruleset, but planning to play it with miniatures. Can't wait for FRG to come out so I can get Leopards! Edited to add: I really love Steel Beasts and flight sims like DCS for getting inside the gear and the immersion. But for me they aren't ideal for visualizing the larger scale tactical movements. If I want to command a battalion and play commander I'll play a board game or Combat Mission or something like that. When I'm driving and shootings tanks I just want to drive and shoot tanks.

This is my first attempt at designing a scenario after playing the game for about a week. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the logic system and different ways to spawn and direct AI units, so this is probably done in a clumsy or less then optimal way. Thought I would share anyway because it seems like there's not many scenarios using the T-55. Anyway, I had fun playing through it a few times. Best I've done so far is mission complete with loss of 1 tank and 7 personnel (turns out riders make good ablative armour for Toyota trucks).

Thanks guys. I can't make TGIF due to work schedules and the time it's at. Sundays might be an option. Maybe sometime we can do just a small pickup game or training session 'off schedule' as it were. I'll stay glued here and make a post if I know I have an afternoon or evening free in advance.

Hey everyone, Just checking in. New player here based in Nova Scotia, just been doing some tutorials and trying some small single player missions. Interested in joining the online community. I have no former military experience, but long time enthusiast and wargamer looking to play both for fun and education. Cheers, Ryan

Joystick, Mouse, Keyboard, and a Webcam are all plugged in USB. I assume it was some kind of conflict, but a reboot did fix it, so hopefully it won't crop up again.

Mouse still wouldn't work when I tried again, but after a reboot it's started working. Maybe it was some kind of USB conflict? Anyway, between the mouse and joystick I'm all set now and finished my T-72 training. Gonna go dig through the files section for some scenarios to test her out.

Thanks! I'll give it a try with the mouse and see how I fare.

Hey guys, First post, I finally bit the bullet and bought a year license to try the game out after watching everyone else playing on youtube for a few years. I'm a tank and modern warfare fanatic and I'm already hooked just working through some of the tutorials. I'm doing the T-72M tutorials because I just love that tank. So far so good on the gunnery, except for my joystick control. Is there a way to adjust the sensitivity on the joystick in game somewhere? I couldn't find it, and my joystick is an old no name one that seems like it's 'plug and play'...I can't find drivers or an app anywhere on my PC to adjust the stick input that way. Most of the flight sims I play have sensitivity adjustment in the game. It's working pretty well right now, but it's just a tad twitchy and I'm having a hard time laying it smoothly onto smaller points, like vehicles over 2000m etc. My second question is how to make mouse control work for the gunner controls? It's recognizing my mouse input, as I can use that to control the view, click on the sights, fire, laze, etc. But how to I actually move the turret/gun sight with the mouse? I was thinking if I can't tune my joystick I could at least use my mouse to fine tune my aim or something. Thanks for any help!