cn2mc

Even back then I thought HT was silly. Like, attack my base, but don't kill my CY or something.

GDI are only somewhat disadvantaged when the map is both open and impassable for troops / impossible to expand on because of too much tiberium. Otherwise they do well, proof are GA, other stock maps and Utah 2047, which is almost completely open and has been a multiplayer staple for 20+ years. The big point is: if GDI can't expand early on they have no way to deny Nod map control until much later. This can be played around but not always, it seems.

There's too much ego-tripping and game-dodging even without a ladder. I don't think one would make things better or draw in more players. Tournaments seem like a better option, but then you'll definitely have to have a limited map pool, fixed resolution, etc. The main problems are: A) we lack the player base and games count to derive any meaningful statistics on what maps are actually balanced enough to include them in a pool; B) we lack the tools to record such statistics, unless we all write down details of how all of our games go, which borders on science fiction; C) it's all hard to do.

Someone did a trick to reinforce an 'armed' gunboat by chinook, I think. One landable square on the far west edge of the map might work.

LOL at those Japanese... Digital calligraphy.

Also, the older and better theme (pre-cncnet cnc-comm theme) got blasted too, it appears.

That may actually be the issue, sometimes when a unit's path is blocked by a tree or hostile building they will try to destroy it, happens to player controlled units too.

Does not seem that punishing from the first couple of times I played it, but both times I managed to bug it out quite crucially. A) If you uncover the GDI CY and the buildings around it before blowing up the SAM sites, the hijackers will try to go there, because it's to the North, they'll get stuck on the ridge and not go for the factories. B) When GDI goes for the counterattack in the end, you can lose even if the mammoths are intact. The lose triggers for the factories are dead by this time, but if GDI kills one of the factories and men pop out and get killed, you die.

3ref into strip appears to be more powerful vs. GDI than vs. Nod, actually. It's a double trouble, GDI can't get out and counter effectively and even if they can, strips are tough as nails.

Interesting. So you think more econ in Nov v Nod and more tech in Nod v GDI? Would that mean a greedier opening vs Nod and less vs GDI. Like 3 ref strip in Nod vs Nod, into 4th ref and then 2nd strip. And then in Nod v GDI; 2 ref strip 3rd ref, comm, 4-5th ref and then 2nd strip? You'd always want more econ than your enemy, so that's beside the point. I'm saying that, for Nod vs. Nod, if both players are at the same level and are doing a standard bike & buggy opening, they'll stay in the same basic meta for a long time, probably until the end (kinda like ZvZ in BW). It's gonna be a long and micro-intensive bike & buggy fight and it makes sense to go for more econ and a 2nd strip, rather than risk the enemy swamping you. A 3rd ref before the strip might be effective with lots of tib, but I'm not convinced it's really better. I haven't really done the math, but by the time you've built the strip, you've spent basically all initial cash and only gotten a few harvloads back. If the other guy pulls a 1ref stip to your 3ref, it's gonna be a tough run. So yeah, depending on what you get, it's either a rrrsrs, or rrsrrs, or something... Vs. GDI, it's a bit easier to keep them in check in the early game so that gives you more options for later on. The thing is, if you don't finish it with B&B you have to be quick to switch or you risk mediums, AGTs and barracks wrecking you.

Vs. Nod you definately want more strips. Vs. GDI you can pretty safely tech to flame/stealth tanks and SSMs. Maybe even pull a flame tank rush or something if the map is not too big, just pop a few out, while he's preparing for bikes and buggies, and torch him.

The thing is nobody's sure if the airstrike trigger works in MP or if it crashes the game. Have you tested it with actual players?

Thanks. So used to seeing them crossed out that I didn't notice the difference in font/higlight colour. That, or I was too drunk.

Games that have already started do not appear crossed out. All games look like they're 'open' on the left but double-clicking results in a 'game already started' message. The only way to check if a game is open or running is to /whois one of the players to see if they're in a game with someone or idle. What's up with that?

Nice one. Haven't finished it yet, but it is challenging and I too go the orca route. But I'm posting for another reason. I don't have time to test it, but it might be possible to have 'reinforced' gunboats that fire without heli shenanigans, theoretically. LKO (or someone) found out how to loop gunboats through waypoints, preventing them from going the full 9 yards of the map. If a team of gunboats is looped like this in open water, and then that team is destroyed by a trigger (turrets gone), the boats should start behaving as usual, i.e. E-W patrols. 'Reinforcements arrived' peeve still present though.

Yes, this happens when you start the game with cyrillic input enabled. I hate newer Windows versions for this, XP used to only switch input for the app you're currently using, now with 8 and 10 alt+shifting changes language overall. Sucks when you use different languages for work and browsing/gaming.

Buildings are too grid-like, yes, but I think the main problem is the perspective on the sidewalks or what-have-you. The ones that run horizontally should be narrower than the ones that run vertically, just like the roads.

The explosion crate crash is quite common on the PC version of cncnet too, actually. When you pick one up, it's basically a coin toss whether the game crashes or not.

About the Soviet-style power plant, maybe make the chimneys a few pixels taller? Add a heap of coal stacked in the corner perhaps? Outside staircase on the SW wall? IDK. The thing is, IRL these buildings aren't that dark a shade of grey. Many are actually brownish tinted, or orange/yellow, etc. They also have more metal elements on facades. You got the general look spot on in the part under the chimneys, although I woundn't want to work in those offices. Maybe try out a few different textures for the rest of the building?

Even with 10K you can go straigth for apaches with no ref and build 5-6 for an all in, that's what probably happened. It mostly highlights that scouting and anti-scouts are underrated in TD, though.

AFAIK the only way to get DOS res on a modern machine is to download the DOS version and run it in DOSBox. Otherwise, you can't go lower than 640x400.

Probably to limit bandwidth upon downloads. Every byte counts.

A couple of the posts in that thread have reasonably default .ini setups included, so just paste those and figure them out. KeyAlliance=65, so 65 is 'a', 'b' would be 66, etc. Proper values can be easily found through google if you're not into extrapolating. Here's mine, if you can't find the section in the other thread: [WinHotkeys] KeySidebarToggle=9 KeyScatter=88 KeyStop=83 KeyGuard=71 KeyNext=78 KeyBase=72 KeyResign=82 KeyAlliance=65 KeyBookmark1=32 KeyBookmark2=68 KeyBookmark3=69 KeyBookmark4=87 KeyRepairToggle=84 KeySellToggle=89 KeyMapToggle=85 KeySidebarUp=38 KeySidebarDown=40 KeyTeam1=49 KeyTeam2=50 KeyTeam3=51 KeyTeam4=52 KeyTeam5=53 KeyTeam6=54 KeyTeam7=55 KeyTeam8=56 KeyTeam9=57 KeyTeam10=81 KeyForceMove1=18 KeyForceMove2=18 KeyForceAttack1=17 KeyForceAttack2=17 KeySelect1=16 KeySelect2=16 KeyScrollLeft=0 KeyScrollRight=0 KeyScrollUp=0 KeyScrollDown=0 KeySelectView=90 My map bookmarks are 'w', 'e', 'd' and SPACE, team 0 is now team 'q' so it's closer to my main teams 1-5, and select view, which I don't really use, is 'z'. Everything else is default, IIRC.

Which hotkeys? No matter what version you have, you shoud have the default ones: H for home, G for guard, etc. In the cncnet version, you can open your conquer.ini and insert a [WinHotkeys] section, if it isn't already there. I think there was a chat command to do that. I also vaguely recall a GUI menu for setting them in the config tool. If not, you have to manually set them by entering some decimal values for your keys. Cncnet's new stuff basically is that hotkeys are now remappable to whatever you want, and that you also have hotkeys for sell and repair (default T and Y, I think, scroll-wheel also works for sidebar). Ingame you chat with F1-6, depends on how many players there are. Basically F# is chat to all, where # is the number of players. So if there are 5 players, F5 will be chat to all, while F1-4 will be private. Dead guys can only chat to all. You probably played some noobs. Rushes are a staple and most regular players are hardcore.

I managed to play one yesterday and it ran quite smoothly. The other one I tried OOS-ed though. I assume that's going to happen often because of geography et al. It also happens often with 4-5 player games, especially when players are all far apart, like one is in Canada or USA, another in the EU, a third one in Asia, etc.