Normandy 44 : European Theater (Sweeten2213 retired - 2.0 Alpha released))

[Panzerfaust60]

Hi, I was browsing the images at moddb, and I noticed that there was depicted a skin for a 21. PzDiv Panther there, will they be receiving Panthers in the next update? Anyways I checked the mod folders, and as far a I could see there is in fact a skin there for the 21. PzDiv Panther, so is there a way to enable them to produce Panthers?

[Crowsy]

I finally got this mod to play and it does look good. However, playing as Brits the union flag is upside down which spoilt it for me. Can this mod be used with the cheat mod? If so are there instructions on how to do it?

I will probably wait for v 2.0 now and hope the union flag will be put right, lol. Will v 2.0 be less memory intensive?

[Twitchy]

@Crowsy - I'll look into it.

@Panzerfaust60 - I'll have a look at it in my current version this evening for you.

[MajorLustig]

Panzerfaust60,

I do believe the 21st had Panthers (a few at least) at the time of the invasion. The 21st was the closest Panzer Division to the Normandy coast and as such would likely have been the first of the Panzers to attack the beachhead, had Hitler had the foresight to release them from his personal control in time. Who knows what would have happened had the 21st been allowed to attack on D-Day or D+1.....

So I too hope that the 21st will have access to Panthers in v2.0

[Panzerfaust60]

MajorLustig

Indeed, and if I'm not mistaken they were equipped with Panthers until the end of the war. What I was referring to is that in the ET'44 mod folders there seems to me like there are skins etc. for a 21.PzDiv. Panther, so i wonder if its a glitch that they cant be produced.

[Crowsy]

Thanks twitchy. Oh btw I seem to have read somewhere here that you are not going to feature the Brit Comet Tank as it is not in your time frame, the tank was introduced to crews in the Autumn of 1944 and while hoped it would serve in the battle of the Bulge not enough crews were trained for it but it did see service at the crossing of the Rhine.

I don't know if this still falls outside your remit but it was an awesome tank and would give the Brits a decent tank of their own no?

[Panzerfaust60]

Crowsy,
The Comet also has the advantage of being quite pretty so while i don't like the Pershing, I wouldn't mind seeing the Comet.

Btw. thanks Twitchy, I look forward to hearing from you.

[Therewasatime]

The Comet falls into the same category as the Pershing and the recoil-less rifle. Yes technically it was "used" in a supporting fire role during Operation Varsity, although by which regiment/battalion nobody can articulate, but it never saw major tank v. tank or tank v. infantry combat. Either way it's still well out of our designated timeline Jun-Sept. 1944 and hence isn't involved with our project.

[Twitchy]

@Panzerfaust60 - According to the unit list I have, we've no listed Panthers for that unit currently in the mod. I'll go into the game later on today to do a physical check for you, and I'll see what that brings. If you've got some credible sources as to them using Panthers (Not saying they aren't credible of course or that I don't believe you, we just need something to go off of) Then I'll certainly throw them up the ladder and see about getting the 21st Panzer some Panthers.

And, Yeah Therewasatime caught me on the Comet part. Personnally I would've liked to see it in, but ah well. One can dream, can't he?

[Panzerfaust60]

Twitchy, I'm sorry but I really know nothing about modding, but files called "Panther21WH.---" just caught my eye after seeing this picture on the moddb.com page: moddb.com/mods/normandy-1944-european-theater1/images/wehrmacht-panthers-2pzd-9pzd-21pzd#imagebox

[Panzerfaust60]

Also, according to Wikipedia, the 21.PzDiv. was equipped with two companies of Panthers in September 1944

[doom44]

Hey guys, will the Luftwaffe Field Infantry get their correct uniforms?
As I remember, they had dark-blue uniforms, not splinter camo.

[Crowsy]

Obviously therewasatime it is up to you what you put int the mod but personally streching from June-sept 1944 to august 1844 isn't such a leap to me. And while I concede the Comet came in late and didn't see that much action the fact remains it did see action, http://www.wwiivehicles.com/unitedki...iser/comet.asp .

I have searched a bit and can find various reports on the comet being used in Sept 1944 for the crossing of the Rhine but also found this 'First delivery was to 11th Armored Division in December 1944. It was the only division to have all it's units re-equiped with the Comet.' Hope this helps a little?

As you seem to be all for historical accuracy is there any news on getting the union flag the right way up?

[Twitchy]

@Doom44 - We've literally switched out LWFD Uniforms UmpteenMillionBajillion times. Seriously, every new Alpha sub version I load up have different skins in it. ;-;

I remember us having proper Dark blue uniforms At one point, although I don't know what the hell happend to them.

@Crowsy - Not really Therewasatime's or mine's decision to make. That'd be on Sweeten's plate.

@Panzerfaust60 - I know we've the skins for it, and the Wiki backs it up. If you can get me another source, just for the sake of it that would certainly be wonderful indeed.


@Everyone - As far as skins go, once our current version is tweaked up and released, if I personnally dislike the skins for one reason or another, I'll go into the files and substitute them with my own. That is to say, I'll have a side skinpack for those who for example, don't like Luftwaffe Field Divisions with legions of troops with Fieldcaps and FlaK Ammo holders.

[ricash]

what was the final word on using cheat mod with this mod?

[MajorLustig]

Twitchy,

In response to your request I did a bit of digging. I do believe this is credible enough evidence of Panthers that were assigned to the 21st Panzer Division in Late Summer 1944. This site is devoted to the history of the 21st and indicates under its organization that the 2nd Panzer Abtielung did get refitted with Panthers in August of 1944 at Grafenwoehr, Germany before returning to the front. Here is the link to the details:

http://spearhead1944.com/gerpg/ger1.htm

and here is a link to the site's weapons and equipment of the 21st Panzer Division:

http://spearhead1944.com/gerpg/gerpics/index.htm

*Note that the picture actually depicts a Panther of the 111th Panzer Brigade which made a counter-attack as part of the 21st into the Alsace-Lorraine area in late summer of 1944.

So, in conclusion, I'm with Panzerfaust60, we should indeed be able to call up a few Panthers as part of the 21st......and you've already got the skins.........

[gliz2]

You like this one guys? Tiger instead of Sdkfz.232

[IMG]

I have lost my lust for gaming and I do not play Norm'44 anymore but I still support your efforts.

BTW. The Panthers should be available for 21st Pz.Div, they had them

[Crowsy]

Thanks for hat Twitchy. Any news on the flag or how we can do it ourselves?

[Therewasatime]

Love it Twitchy! Hope your fire for N'44 gaming is rekindled soon.

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@Crowsy
I'm glad you think expanding our period of operation isn't such a big deal, if only we'd known of this sooner. Now we only have to completely revamp each of the almost three dozen doctrines/subdoctrines to properly reflect the integrated units, vehicles and other assets for an added two months of combat operations. Since you can't even reference a suitable published reference I'd imagine you can't conceive of the amount of actual research we did to get the point we are at. Our mod literally encompasses data from mustering and combat roll reports of almost a one hundred regiments and battalions of participating units of the United States, The Empire of Great Britain, the Soviet Union, the Third Reich, and the exiled governments of France and Poland to accurately depict our designated time period down to each and every participating formation. So YES simply expanding our period of operations would be a huge deal. Simply expanding it to encompass some new unit would require a whole new effort to research the deployment of the assets each unit fielded in that added period. Even if we expanded it to August it still wouldn't allow for the addition of the Comet. Just because it entered service in that month doesn't mean it saw action then, especially in the case of the Comet. Which again I'll say it only served a secondary combat role during Operation Varsity, aka the Crossing of the Rhine, which did not take place till March of 1945, not September of 1944. Now if you offered a published reference about the Comet in use down to a specific regiment/battalion prior to this it'd be worth discussing, but simple photographs with an added caption hardly present enough evidence to warrant suggestion. Please provide informed inferences not unjustified opinions, N'44 wouldn't be what it is if we based it off the later.

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I think it's reached the point now that a general rule for posting on our forum here should be to only use published references for any aspect of discussion or argument. Simply quoting websites or Wikipedia in attempt to support baseless opinion should be Verbotten! Literally dozens if not hundreds of properly researched works exist for each and every aspect of war materiel that we've incorporated into N'44, so please take the time to make a truly educated opinion by researching it first, not just hitting up Wikipedia or Google for the first posting that supports your opinion.

[gliz2]

@Therewasatime
I have utmost respect for the amount of work done on the research side but still this is just a game. And it allow for clashes of units that did not had a chance to meet in the given timeframe or to forge a weapon that was used only once or twice on the front. The Russians used 100+ Valentines in Bagration I remeber they were not included in Alpha (I have not updated it since September so not sure of how it looks now). And what about the Challenger is it included? Or Humber or AEC armoured cars? Last time I've checked they were not there. There is a lot things that are/were a bit off. I would vouch for inclusion of any piece of equipment that was in service between June-Sep'44. Comet was definitevely not in ETO by that time. But I'm curious will they be update for the Brits? So many things were missing there...

[Twitchy]

@Crowsy - As far as the Union Jack being upside down goes, I can't genuinely tell if it's a Relic bug of if it's some weird occurance in our mod. If it's the latter, I'll send it Sweeten's way.

@Gilz2 - Honestly, as far as I'm concerned the British need all the equipment they can get. They have the LEAST amount of Community made Models/Content for them, so I feel that they're still stuck back in Vanilla land whilst the Germans and the Americans are getting anything and everything that they need.

[Therewasatime]

@gliz2
I don't think we should seek to encompass any and all units used by the various doctrines simply for the sake of doing so, especially if the number used doesn't justify it to be represented as the mainstream of our period. As you said it is a game, that especially was considered when the specific regiments/battalions were chosen to make up the various doctrines/sub-doctrines that compose the current version. We set goals to create a number of specific new units over others to see to a certain level of balance play out just as we wanted. What would adding MORE lesser known, but granted interesting, LESSER used units add to the game? Would a few earlier model armored cars really influence the over all game play? I certainly don't think so. I'm all for adding new larger units to the game if it if it played a significant enough role in our designated time period. I'd love to see the Nashorn take part once we get a crack at the Ostheer. As far as authenticity goes there are a number of issues with the suggestions you made just now. The Valentine had been widely replaced by the Churchill and Sherman for logistical reasons by 1944, how many even made it Normandy? The Crusader never saw sufficient production levels for it to make a significant enough impact on the battlefield. I think it's safe to say certainly neither should represent the main stream combat units of our period. If 500 or more were produced and used by our chosen units in our chosen period that seems suitable to let it represent the mainstream and allow them to be producible units. Less than that seems only to warrant a call in at best, when so many hundreds more of other types were used more commonly. That's my thoughts on the matter.

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As I said though if the research justifies it who am I to argue with the inclusion of a historically accurate MAIN player. That being said what other British units would you suggest?

[icegangster2]

Hey guys i have a little problem, i can't see a shortcut anywhere even not in the map op CoH (where i've installed it).
I've used the auto-installer (seemed easier to me but it isn't till now:P) So, what should i do? I've reinstalled the mod about 4 times but the shortcut still doesn't appear. Pm me or something if you know the answer to my problem because i'm dying to play this xD THNX Btw. i'm new on this forum so if i posted it on the wrong space...... i'm sorry.

[Therewasatime]

Read the Readme or the installation guide, you have to create your own shortcut.

[Niftyeye]

Just one question because I have not played this mod in months:


Does it feature the soviets in the current version?

[Panzerfaust60]

So, Twitchy, are the files called Panther21WH in the ET44 folder for a 21.pzdiv Panther? And if they are is there a way for me to enable them to be produced?

[Twitchy]

@Panzerfaust60 - Couldn't tell you on either accounts.

@Niftyeye - No. Our inhouse Alpha version does, and we're working as much as we can on finishing it up.

[Niftyeye]

K, thanks for the quick response

[Twitchy]

@Everyone - Just a small, off topic side note for those who happen to indulge in Warhammer Tabletop.

I've got a fair amount of old Chaos Tabletop Vehicles, Infantry and Demons that I'm trying to sell off. If anyone is looking to possibly purchase these, please PM me.

[icegangster2]

yeah, i must missed that part xD sorry but thnx

[gliz2]

@therwasatime
Sorry mate but we are talking about different things. I have already cross referenced this and Valetines were used in Bagration (not Normandy where did you get this idea from???). You should check the Russians before making any statements like this:
I don't think we should seek to encompass any and all units used by the various doctrines simply for the sake of doing so, especially if the number used doesn't justify it to be represented as the mainstream of our period.
Unless there has been a change to the approach since I last spoken with sweeten2213. But the last time I was involved the goal was exactly so - to include every piece of equipment that was actually there hence the KV-2 for Russians.
And as for the Brits - look at Twitchy point - yes it would have a major impact for Brits which are by far the worst of the bunch by now...

[Crowsy]

@Therewasatime

Wow, got out the wrong side of bed there eh? You should remember it is only a game and to be fair I did provide a couple of links. Anyone would think I was asking for you to donate a kidney not a Tank that is already there. Your mod isn't 100% accurate so do not pretend it is.

I also know the work involved at having been involved with the Lordz
in making the ntw1 and ntw2 mods which were hugely popular and is still going today.

One thing I am puzzled by, by your fierce post is that you seem so stuck on historical accuracy but you yet you cannot get a flag the

@Twitchy, I'm sure the flag is OK in the vanilla coh but if it hasn't been reskinned perhaps it is a weird glitch in the mod as you say hope you can get to the bottom of it.

[Therewasatime]

@gliz2
Hey man, all of the other units you mentioned were also British so I thought you meant incorporating them for the Soviet as well as the UK docs. I'd certainly like to hear sweeten's take on it. I was under exactly the opposite impression, that mainstream units would be the basis of our project while rarer units would be used less often and as call ins, many of which one time only. Which is certainly what I hope for any units that saw service in numbers less than 500, as I stated before. As for the British docs again they have so many different recon elements already I really don't think it'd make a difference, but I suppose it is just a matter of opinion and strategy. If the number of them used in our period justifies incorporation I'm all for it, I just want to see that data.

@crowsy
I'm sure there are elements of historical inaccuracy in v1.7. We developed it so long ago I hardly remember the units involved. I think you will find v2.0 to be almost flawless. The biggest inaccuracy that we have to put up with is sight distance & range of the tanks, which was a decision made by the coding element of our staff to preserve game play. That I believe is our only true historical inaccuracy. As I said before literally every unit down to the battalion level was researched to make sure all are accurate representations of the assets that were actually used by said divisions and regiments in our chosen period. When v2.0 is released and you find a discrepancy with what you feel is an inaccurate portrayal I implore you to share it with us on here.

My main aggravation with your post was that your suggestion of introducing a new historical element and time period came with no substantive research or consideration. If you even read my post in entirety you would have gathered that I was saying the links you provided weren't credible at all and that published references should be used when making a suggestion of a new unit. Surely you must have provided such references when working with NTW.

Now if you offered a published reference about the Comet in use down to a specific regiment/battalion prior to this it'd be worth discussing, but simple photographs with an added caption hardly present enough evidence to warrant suggestion. Please provide informed inferences not unjustified opinions, N'44 wouldn't be what it is if we based it off the later.

In addition after working on a historical mod yourself, certainly you should understand that modifying a timeline to incorporate one new unit for one faction is ridiculous. Doing so would require brand new research and coding efforts too see that each and every faction would now reflect the timeline change as divisional and regimental assets would significantly change.

The flag being off is minor error that I'm sure will be fixed eventually, it may have already been fixed in our current version. I do thank you for bringing it to our attention at least. Again in the future, especially with the release of v2.0 don't hesitate to bring up historical inaccuracies. It's certainly what we are striving to represent.

We just get so many empty suggestions on here it gets frustrating.

[Twitchy]

@Therewasatime/Gilz2 - Here, let me Mediate and get to the bottom of this rather quickly.


Case and point, both of you were given in your opinions different information from Sweeten. So, really we can't give a firm answer to anyone, as far as I can tell you two lads have different positions on this topic.

So, in short we cannot give a specific answer as to why we include certain units and not other units at the moment. Having said that, I can see that we are certainly trying to avoid "Prototypes" from entering our Modification. That is why you don't see the Pershing, nor do you see the Jagdtiger.

@Crowsy - What exactly do you work on for NTW, Anyway?

But, I have to concur with Therewasatime on this one going back on topic. He wasn't trying to be rude, but we get ALOT of posts on here asking for this and that and when we ask for information to back that up, we usually get a picture and a small caption or one website to support it. Published references are certainly what we're after, and it's my fault for not instructing people so in the beginning. It's been a rather hectic week as it's the last week of School for myself before Christmas break and I forgot to mention it.

@Everyone - Case, and point. Merry Christmas, let's all drink some Eggnog (Yes even if you're allergic to Eggs,Damnit.) Get along, have a laugh and let's move on from past posts and get on with matters at hand.

[Therewasatime]

@Twitchy
Indeed mate, Merry Christmas to you as well! No reason to mediate though. We both just have different views on the project, both derived from conversations at different points with the team leader. Just makes sweeten's return all the more desired so we can get back on track in the new year. Let's hope it happens. Cheers!

[Crowsy]

I do accept that you cannot take every suggestion to fit in such a small timeframe as yours, my concerns were really for gameplay balance, the Brits do seem to be under strengthed and while I do not think it is such a huge leap of faith to introduce the comet I can see your point.

@Twitchy

I was more involved in ntw1 and ntw2 then the split happened and then I was involved in lgs for little while. I started as a beta tester, researcher of the napoleonic era and ended up as Admin for a while, I used to do the forums for lgs for a time, long time ago now, lol.

Is there a way of getting that cheat mod to work with N '44? Just to even things out when you start to get over run. That flag is annoying so I hope it is fixed for v2.0. Am I allowed to ask how far off it is or is that a closely guarded secret?

[gliz2]

@Therewasatime/Twitchy
I think it's safe to say certainly neither should represent the main stream combat units of our period. If 500 or more were produced and used by our chosen units in our chosen period that seems suitable to let it represent the mainstream and allow them to be producible units.

No offense to the author of the above statement but given the timeframe and the historical data I guess this means no Tigers, Jagpanzer IV, Hummels, and about two dozens of other equipment used extensively by the three armies.
E.g. there are units that would have no equipment at all given the above approach. I'm not pointing this to get into argument I'm doing it for the sake of historical approach [otherwise all the work ondata collection was useless] and what would be the point of having the unit tree anyway? I'm not saying there should be absolutely everything that was there on the field but the Brits (if you'd bother to check) are the least equipped and least historical of armies (in terms of what do they have in Norm'44). And yes, an AEC Mk. III was used not in 500 or so numbers but it was used whit a Cromwell turrent and 75mm Cromwell gun (makes a big difference from a 37mm gun). And it make a difference when you have strong and fast reece squad or when you are stuck with Honeys and Staghounds (to me the only difference between them is one has tracks the other is wheeled vehicle - basically the same armament and combat effectivness in-game). The “heavy” troop in a recce squadron would comprise 2 AEC armoured cars and a single Daimler scout car [http://www.kerynne.com/games/British...rRegtTOE.html].
The germans have about every piece of equipment they had (even those rare ones build in numbers as great as 20+). So I guess it is not the kind of argument you'd like to use...

All this being said is that the whole conncept suffers from one problem. At the end you will have encounters of forces than never ever have seen each other and you will be able to utilise force that never could have been utilized in the way the game allows you to. The point being you will have to sacrifice something in order to keep to the engine - otherwise you either will go balancing the thin rope of having units balanced for the authoritarian balance approach or you will have unbalanced forces meaning some of the combination will stand little chance to fight against the other combo. And I have played extensively with Tigerphobia in the earlier Alpha and this was happening. So it is not something someone is making up. I cannot say that I'm not waiting for the final version of this but on the other hand after playing the Alpha I know the limitations are there. And the problems I am reffering to may influence the game badly. [Many things have been tweaked for the above reasons].

One last point - the number to which the eqipment was manufactured and distributed to the troops not always equalled thier inffluence in the War e.g. Tiger, D-10S AT gun or Ju-87G. Sometimes small numbers were very influential and bigger ones had little impact or never were used in combat.

[Therewasatime]

@gliz2
I'm not going to argue with you anymore mate. We clearly have very different view points of what should represent the fielded combat units of the participating nations.

For the sake of clarification I think Twitchy misspoke saying that 500 or more being used by our respective units, I know I certainly was referring to their over all use in the conflict being over 500. Not necessarily having 500 of the same model in a specific formation, which even in the case of the most common units of WWII, were not in that great of number in anything smaller than a Corps.

[gliz2]

KV2 [no produced during IIWW] [less then 30] (in game) Panzer II Ausf. L (PzKpfw IIL) "Luchs" [101] (not in game)
KV85 [130+] (in game) Ba-10 [100+] (not in game)
234/2 "Puma" [101] (in game) AEC mk.III [200+] (not in game)
234/3 "stummel" [89] (in game???) Morris Light Reconnaissance Car [250+] (not in game)
Brummbär [300+] (in game???)
15 cm Panzerwerfer 42 auf Maultier [300+] (in game)

Just to prove some inconsistencies. Well you do have Pumas and Stummels and can have 2-3 of them (or if you play 4vs4 8-12) on the field which would make an odd 2-10% of all the vehicles showing up in one place. I cannot clearly understand the logic behind Therewasatime post. I can agree to the inclusion of them (I cannot see how one cannot) still there is a large inconsistency to what is in and what is out. And this is not an argument but a valid question in what direction are you gonna go.

I guess the idea is quite vague like with the Jagdpanthers/KingTigers. You may as well include or you will not include them. This goes for almost anything that was not common to the commones of Panther, Sherman or T-34.

PS. The cut-off period was September 1944 so anything that did not entered service should not be included (Comets, Pershings or Land Matress).

[Mr.Mind]

Ehh there actually was +300 KV2s made during ww2.

[Crowsy]

When you things should not be included if they were not produced after September 1944, I don't wish to be pedantic but the Comet was produced in 1943 from what I have read but didn't see active service untill autumn 1944.

I can fully understand how the mod makers would not want other equipment being used and want to stick to historical accuracy. From my experience with the Lordz historical accuracy is the ideal but you should not lose focus on gameplay or balance. Obviously you can achieve balance for the under strength nations by allowing equal units to be produced cheaper or more of them.

You wouldn't believe the demands we got, lol but it does show that people are interested and passionate and however tiresome it is I wouldn't turn my back on them unless your are blessed with loads of users. I can remember ome flaming row we had on the site over a units trouser colour, lol. It was world war III. You will always get requests at it is a compliment to the mod of which I think shows a lot of promise.

I don't know if this piece of advice will be any use to you and feel free to ignore it but we found people really liked their special units but used sparingly but then our timeframe was over a longer period, We didn't cover all the time period either but some compromises had to be made but some obsure units , like the Chasseurs Britanniques, made it in.

Whatever you include I hope you can acieve balance between the factions.

[Therewasatime]

@gliz2
Again I didn't say that any unit shouldn't be in the game, aside from the Comet, Pershing and recoil-less rifle. Only that units produced less than 500 should be call ins to represent their limited use on the field and models that saw service in numbers more than 500 should be basic producible units. That's my honest opinion. I never said I signed off on every single unit that's currently in the svn at it's current capacity, I definitely feel many need alteration before release. As for those that aren't yet included in the game I'll leave that up to you to discuss with sweeten, I've had enough repetitive "discussion" to last a lifetime.

Merry Christmas to you and to all. I hope 2012 brings the return of sweeten so we can stop squabbling and get back to actually producing. Prost!

[Crowsy]

Are these regiments in for v2.0 for the Brits? 6th Bn Green Howards, 7th Green Howards, 1st Suffolk Regiment and the 46th Royal Marine Commando's. All were at Normandy 6th June.

[LloydyBoy]

they may be regiments but which Divisions were they part of?

[Crowsy]

http://www.battlefieldsww2.50megs.co...t_profiles.htm I found this site was a great read and should provide you with everything.

[Therewasatime]

If there's anything you should take from your correspondence here it's WEBSITES ARE NOT CREDIBLE REFERENCES, USE PUBLISHED SOURCES FOR SUBSTANTIATING HISTORICAL CLAIMS.

[gliz2]

@Therewasatime
If the same thing is in the form of a book it magically transfer into an absolute truth

Have you check iremeber page (Russian)? The books you can buy in English are translations of the things gathered there (not other way around) e.g. a great book on T-34 crews. Another nice one is warwheels.net/BritACsInEurope44_45BROWN.html

[Crowsy]

Therewasatime I wish some people would check the sources before codemning them.

"The major source for much of this material will be the unit War Diaries held at the Public Records Office, Kew, London. These are Crown Copyright."

Or are you saying this isn't good enough?

[Therewasatime]

I'm done arguing semantics with you gentlemen. Published references are the best source for research as they integrate and cross reference written and oral first hand experiences, military reports and other official documents all to create a concise account of the events. Such studies that go to these lengths and infer such detail have no reason to not seek publication if the collective evidence is so conclusive, unless of course their work is flawed by more speculation than factual evidence, which tends to be the case and is why I don't trust unpublished sources.

@Crowsy, we actually just had a discussion about veteran accounts on the MODDB Profile. This sums it up.
"Veterans accounts are a critical part of research but no doubt they can be exaggerated and/or become faded in their minds over time, this has certainly been my experience. Most veterans have little to no idea what units they actually went up against and can therefore not accurately speak to the logistical aspects of what they witnessed, many will out rightly admit it. Hence the need for PUBLISHED materials that interpret these accounts by cross referencing them with documented combat/battle reports of the time in order to properly organize and present the data about a historical event."

Again I wish you and all the gentlemen here a very Merry Christmas and look forward to the prospect of further developing N'44 in 2012. Prost!

[Crowsy]

Merry Xmas to you too Therewasatime.

I'm a bit dismayed by your reasoning. I show you a credible source and are crown copyrighted by you seem to suggest if it is not published it 'aint worth it. I knew an old gent who fought in North Africa, desert rat, and the stories he told me you would not find in books but are you insulting his memory because he didn't cash in on it?

I really hope you are not naive enough to think that because it is published therefore it is fact. The Hitler diaries were published and we know how true they turned out to be, lol. One thing you I really hope you take on board is that in History the Victors accounts are quite different to defeated. Of course books are a great source of information but you cannot dismiss accounts of people who were actually there.

I'll give you an example which can be verified in History. Waterloo, remember that old battle? Well the first commissioned book on it which was published was by a Captain Siborne and it was more or less tosh from cover to cover. He ignored events, countries that took part but also personal accounts even though he amassed letters from both sides.

Published references are only that, references it is real accounts if they can be verified trump them every time in my book (forgive the pun).


PS I thought we were debating the issue not arguing.