Free France Campaign

[bru888]

I can run this Campaign on my desktop but it doesn't seem to run on my laptop even though my laptop runs all other campaigns along with all DLC's fine.
It gets to the Loading screen with the tips rolling by but doesn't go any further. Is there some settings for laptop only?
I even tried to run just the Dakar scenario by itself but does the same thing. It's like it hangs up.
Any suggestion?

BTW, playing on my desktop is really fun with this campaign.

Funny that you say this (funny, meaning remarkable, not funny about your situation). A while back, I had what I thought was a decent laptop. Wouldn't run OOB for beans, no matter what I tried. I bought a new laptop with a bigger brain and voila, not a bump in the road. It may not have been the relative RAM size, though; I also suspect that the old machine couldn't handle the heat load. The new one can. OOB is deceptively resource hungry, if that is the right term.

So, all I can advise you to do is to indeed play it on your desktop which may have more CPU capability or a better tolerance for heat. There is no difference nor variable setting about the campaign in terms of hardware used but its scenarios do tend to be large with many units, so if your laptop is going to choke on OOB, it probably will have a good candidate to do so with the Free France Campaign.

[bru888]

P.S., One thing I invariably do now is to play games with my laptop sitting on one of these. Yes, it takes up a USB port. Yes, it drains the battery quicker. But it keeps the laptop cool and extends the life of the laptop. Actually, I have it attached all the time, game playing or not, except when I am traveling and both pieces go into the laptop bag in that case. Otherwise, it's like part of the laptop now.

Image1235.jpg (213.76 KiB) Viewed 2593 times

[gw15]

Thank you for replying. I can play all of the other OOB DLC's but like you said maybe Free French is just enough to push my laptop over the edge.

The cooling unit is something I may have to get.

[gw15]

This is an excellent Campaign! Good job!!!

[bru888]

This is an excellent Campaign! Good job!!!

Well, thank you kindly on behalf of myself and ColonelY.

[terminator]

P.S., One thing I invariably do now is to play games with my laptop sitting on one of these. Yes, it takes up a USB port. Yes, it drains the battery quicker. But it keeps the laptop cool and extends the life of the laptop. Actually, I have it attached all the time, game playing or not, except when I am traveling and both pieces go into the laptop bag in that case. Otherwise, it's like part of the laptop now.

OoB WWII does not heat up my old laptop(AMD A6-9220 RADEON R4, 5 COMPUTE CORES 2C+3G 2.50 GHz) because this game does not require specific video card.

[terminator]

P.S., One thing I invariably do now is to play games with my laptop sitting on one of these. Yes, it takes up a USB port. Yes, it drains the battery quicker. But it keeps the laptop cool and extends the life of the laptop. Actually, I have it attached all the time, game playing or not, except when I am traveling and both pieces go into the laptop bag in that case. Otherwise, it's like part of the laptop now.

OoB WWII does not heat up my old laptop(AMD A6-9220 RADEON R4, 5 COMPUTE CORES 2C+3G 2.50 GHz) because this game does not require specific video card.

That’s why I don’t plug the system fan on the laptop, I just use the system to stabilize the laptop when I play in my chair.

[outyis]

Hi Bru,

Love the campaign, the historical anecdotes scattered throughout are excellent and a lot of the objectives are very fun.

I seem to have encountered a bug/glitch in the Battle of the Mareth Line, however - on OpFor Turn 3, it always ends up freezing towards the end. The convoy guard ships move, but none of the enemy planes do. Not sure if its an issue on my end, or if some update for OoB has done something there, but I was wondering if you had any idea what caused it?

[bru888]

I'm sorry that you are having problems. I ran the scenario for a while, allowing enemy ships and planes to destroy my defenseless fleet (defenseless only because I did not fight back! ) and it all ran normally.

Screenshot 6.jpg (604.56 KiB) Viewed 2349 times

This was in the latest version, 9.1.4. The developers, praise be to them for this, have done a good job of not destroying custom scenarios and campaigns with their updates.

If you look above in this thread, you will see another fellow who had a similar problem. I could not help him, either. It seems this Free France Campaign is not for the faint of (computer) heart.

If you are playing it on a laptop, then I would urge you to follow the advice that I gave him: Use a laptop cooling pad. Or, if feasible, play it on a more robust computer.

That said, let's cover some basics.

• Reboot. Yeah, yeah, I hated when the tecchies would tell me that, but you'd be surprise how often that works and users don't think of doing it.

• If you don't have a solid state hard drive, and you have not recently defragmented the traditional disk drive that you do have, you should do it now.

• What about available storage space on that drive? It's not full, or close to being full, is it?

• When you run Order of Battle, shut down everything else, especially your browser. Anything that uses up resources. Look for stuff in the system tray that you don't need to be running, and close it down.

• I hesitate to advise you to temporarily turn off your anti-virus software, for fear that you forget to turn it back on, but you can go into the options and exclude OOB program and gameplay folders. That may help.

• If these measures do not work, then try calling up the latest campaign save that you have on file. It should be from when you finished 09Medenine. Then start 10MarethLine again, fresh.

• If you still get bogged down in Mareth Line, start it one more time and use the Shift + C cheat code #igotnukes to skip it and move on to the next scenario.

[terminator]

• I hesitate to advise you to temporarily turn off your anti-virus software, for fear that you forget to turn it back on, but you can go into the options and exclude OOB program and gameplay folders. That may help.

Take the opportunity to verify the origin of any anti-virus software...

[Horst]

While coming to the third scenario in this campaign, which is by the way very good so far, it came into my mind that Rough Desert terrain blocks so nicely vehicles and towed guns, and lets infantry only crawl slowely through these tiles.
Combining this with the Czech hedgehog deco objects, makes a fine Fortification terrain, similar like in Panzer Corps.
Sadly, it only looks good on desert maps. On green maps, only Swamp and Rice slows vehicles enough that could still look okay combined with the hedgehog deco. Swamp has the useful disruption on it what's plausible for passing such obstacles like additional barbered wire.
Just my thoughts about generally mapping...

Fortification Terrain 1.jpg (280.57 KiB) Viewed 1854 times

Fortification Terrain 2.jpg (285.08 KiB) Viewed 1854 times

[terminator]

While coming to the third scenario in this campaign, which is by the way very good so far, it came into my mind that Rough Desert terrain blocks so nicely vehicles and towed guns, and lets infantry only crawl slowely through these tiles.
Combining this with the Czech hedgehog deco objects, makes a fine Fortification terrain, similar like in Panzer Corps.
Sadly, it only looks good on desert maps. On green maps, only Swamp and Rice slows vehicles enough that could still look okay combined with the hedgehog deco. Swamp has the useful disruption on it what's plausible for passing such obstacles like additional barbered wire.
Just my thoughts about generally mapping...

Pity that hedgehogs are only there for decoration

[Horst]

04Keren
Possibly the worst map I have ever endured... playing is something else where you can have fun. Not here!
I don't mind the slog throught the narrow mountain paths so much, as I got used to crawl through all the wooden roads before.
However, every 3-5 hexes a fully entrenched MG foxhole is plain ridiculous and clearly sadistic.
Possibly only by divine intervention, I made it on the very last turn 60 to the palace capturing/replacing it.
The last battle would have been at least a satisfying slaughter, although on one hand, the many Italian cruisers enjoyed the same with my squishy troops. On the other hand, the Dogali "bridge" totally ruined it, as road-crossing on a river that can't work as bridge anymore.
A total map failure, compared to the better start. I'll never ever play this map again, that's for sure.

Can't wait to get back to the desert afterwards where less ultra-difficult terrain can make make ones life more miserable and especially doesn't waste so much lifetime.

[InventorausRex]

I'm also having a problem with the Mereth Line scenario, I get to turn 3 and it moves and then just 'thinks' indefinetely.

Everything else, thus far, has run fine and my PC isn't a potato. I've also tried it as the standalone version and I have the same problem. I even checked the task manager and it isn't even doing anything taxing hardware wise. Interesting that someone else had the exact same problem, but you didn't when you tested it yourself, so it might be one for the devs.

My relevent specs are an AMD 5600x and 32gb of RAM.

On a sidenote from what I've played so far the campaign is excellent and story telling is amazing, so many little tidbits of information scattered about. It's been a lot of fun. A big thank you and congratulations to all those who spent time making it.

[Horst]

I'm also having a problem with the Mereth Line scenario, I get to turn 3 and it moves and then just 'thinks' indefinetely.

I remember vaguely I had this too, although playing with my personal mod with totally different stats.
I couldn't figure out why, but after half an eternity, the game continued. Maybe it was on another map. Not sure anymore.
Usually, these extremely long pauses are from airplanes on Search & Destroy AI task setting scanning the whole map if a very large radius is set what can take a while. The AI juggles around combat possibilities with other allied units, so it possibly repeats such for different theories... heh, that's my theory.

[GabeKnight]

Usually, these extremely long pauses are from airplanes on Search & Destroy AI task setting scanning the whole map if a very large radius is set what can take a while. The AI juggles around combat possibilities with other allied units, so it possibly repeats such for different theories... heh, that's my theory.

Sorry to barge in, but fully agree. That would be my analysis of what's happening exactly, too.
Finally... someone agrees with me...

[bru888]

Sorry for the hassle, guys. Yes, it probably was one of those things that should work, theoretically, but when the program is asked to do so, it gets overwhelmed in permutations.

This trigger was the culprit, I bet:

Screenshot 1.jpg (509.7 KiB) Viewed 1650 times

Screenshot 2.jpg (536.95 KiB) Viewed 1650 times

There are a total of thirteen planes in those two groups. They were all being told, at once, to go to that hex and defend it (that is, get involved in the sea battle). I imagine it went like this:

"Yo, listen up. There's thirteen of us. Who's going first?'

"No, no, no. We can't ALL go first! Who's got the best angle and path?"

"You? You? You? All three of you are handing me the same flight plan!"

"Okay, at least YOU four guys are taking a different route. The same one, I see. What makes your route better than theirs?"

"No, I haven't forgotten the rest of you guys. Pipe down! I will get to you next."

"Look, I can't see any difference between the first group and the second group in terms of advantage."

"What? What's that? Three of the remaining pilots want an "L" approach and two are yelling for a "V"?

"Well, I got news for ALL of you. This vector here (slashes at map with marker) is the one that I am taking!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hey, who's in charge here? I thought I was. Will you knock it off? I can't hear myself think!"

"Okay, here's what we do, since we can't coordinate. All of us take off immediately and head directly for that hex. If we get jammed up, the hell with it but as you go, try to look at everybody and figure out what they're doing. May the best pilot win!"

So, I got rid of that trigger and dumbed down the aircraft group tasks. I believe it will fix that problem in turn 3.

If you still want to play that scenario, do one of two things:

1) While retaining your last campaign save file (saved after 09Medenine), download version 1.1 of Free France from the link in the opening post. Save that over the campaign folder that is currently in C:\Users\[name]\Documents\My Games\Order of Battle - WW2\Campaigns\ and load the last campaign save file.

Or,

2) Just download the 10MarethLine scenario file itself, from the link below. Open the zipped file, and copy the scenario.scz over the old file with the same name in C:\Users\[name]\Documents\My Games\Order of Battle - WW2\Campaigns\Free France 1940-1945\Scenarios\10MarethLine\. Load the last campaign save file (saved after 09Medenine).

10MarethLine scenario file only.zip

(15.69 KiB) Downloaded 78 times

[InventorausRex]

Thanks Bru, just tested it and it works.

[bru888]

Thanks Bru, just tested it and it works.

Excellent! Enjoy.

[terminator]

Will you add the new V-1 ?

V-1.jpg (73.44 KiB) Viewed 1624 times