Matrix Games Forums

I think it was in 2000 or 1999 that there were a lot of posting about a SPWaW set in modern times (1950 - present.) Did the project get scratched?

I remember we had forum threads about battling M1A1's and Bradley's, etc.

Sergeant, get me a clean shirt! - A wounded Nicaraguan general during the war of 1926 in Nicaragua

Yes it was scratched and replaced by a completely new game. SPWaW basicly stretched the old SP engine as far as it could go. Additionally Matrix can't make any money off of SP so wisely they decided to work on a better, profit making game.

Correct me if I'm wrong anyone.

Yep Steel Panthers is done like dinner.

We can add Mega Campaigns indefinitely, we can modify it indefinitely, but the future is using lessons learned to develope the "new kid" game.

I sure hope I have the cash handy when Combat Leader is ready for sale.

And no I wont faun unduely over how I just want to support Matrix with my purchase. I am not afraid to say I will purchase a good product just because its a good product.

Steel Panthers is a great game. I have no reason to suspect Combat Leader will disappoint me.

I see your point. I have purchased my Mega Campaings too. I think that the ones that have played SPWaW for the past 5 or 6 versions did buy Desert Fox as a sign of solidarity and to pay back for those years of great wargaming. The newer campaigns are bought as a sign of recognition to quality.

Maybe in the future Modern Warfare will see the light of day. I am a fan of the A-10's and I had this sequences in my mind of seen them plinking T-80's.

As part of an armor batallion, I heard the sweet sound of their gattling guns in the field.

Thanks for the info.

If you're still inerested in a free, Steel Panthers-based modern warfare game, SPCammo Workshop is working on a modern Steel Panthers game entitled SP:MBT due out late this spring, I believe. I was hoping for a Matrix version as I am more familiar with SP:WAW than SP:WWII, but I'm sure it will be a fine game anyways.

Thanks L of C! I have downloaded it and checking it.

Can't imagine telling a "smart bomb" to take out a school (suspected terrorist site) would be very challenging anyway. Modern warfare is boring as there are NO anywhere equal opponents to combat. What I would like to see is a sim which involves well paid cops struggling with their own inner demons as to whether bust a drug dealer and do resultant paper work or ticket 10mph speeders with seatbelt undone and perpetuate job. :p

Hmmmm Ron you might be the first person that has stated about modern warfare that which I have sort of said before myself.

But I suspect we are a very small minority opinion.

Not sure about the cop thing though.

Yeah, not much fun in modern warfare, except maybe when all modern weapons are expended baroque technology will be activated from reserves and museums. Yeah, right again. Oh, that cop thing...they don't call me Captain Tangent for nothing. Had a few CC and cokes before coming home...:p

I have played Armored Fist and Tank Platoon. These games were "What If" and usually gave the enemy T-80's and BMP's with the Russian version of Hellfires, plus the ever present Hinds.
Redoing the Kuwait battlefield will most likely give better leaders to the Iraqis.
B-52's sound fun, but it is like in SPWaW when one get hold of A-26's and just blast them before ever reaching your minefield . . . it gets boring after a while.
Modern warfare will be a spread from 1950 to 1991.
A lot of artillery and machiguns in Korea; a lot of infantry in helicopter and napalm in Vietnam; tanks and artillery in the Sinai; beach assault in Grenada; there is not much for Panama; maybe have an scalated conflict in Kuwait (like North Africa with the Iraqis playing a similar role as the Italians and the Afrika Korps, maybe the Russians.)

I have heard a lot of friends and other contacts "explain" how Npoloeonic and Modern era are the "same".

IE that a manuever element is a maneuver element. It doesnt matter if its horse cavalry or mechanised cavalry for instance.

But for me its the forgone nature of modern conflict that loses me. And the fact that Napoleonic just doesnt cover as much "ground" as I like. Sure he went all the way to the outskirts of Moscow. But controlling the Third Reich is a great deal different.

I "know" we can model the Gulf War. Thats not the point.

I watched the Gulf War on TV the same way I watched Sept 11 (you didnt have much choice). But while it made for intensive news watching, it did not make for much military interest value as a wargame.

Is there actually anyone here that actually thinks Saddam had a chance in hell?

I don't want to fight a game, where one side is the loser regardless. And Saddam, while still in power is a loser. He is dead meat the second someone in the US wants it that way. He lives or dies at the whim of US policy.

The Second World War was not a sure thing. It involved our whole planet. Entire nations were at risk. Great new technologies were developed. Horrible new weapons were created for the first time. The future was not set in stone.

That is what makes the 40's interesting. Asking "if I was there, could I have made a difference?" makes the game of interest.

I will say boldly, anyone on this post could have run ole Norman's job and accomplished what he accomplished.

He didnt do anything revolutionary eh. Pinned them with airpower and flanked them. Duuuhhhh.

Saddam's Mother of all battles turned out to be no more interesting than the performance of a whiney kid sister tantrum.

I am not interested in leading a column of Coalition armour just so I can pop off Iragi tanks that cant even defend themselves adequately. Not exciting at all.

Or the Grenada invasion, yawn. Tarawa is a challenge, Grenada is not.

Or the Israelis vs Arab peoples. Talk about one sided. Even when they let the Arabs go first in 73, the Israelis made it look like God truely hates the Arabs.

Korea is where I generally leave off for interest. Korea was not a sure thing. Actually technically it never ended. Both sides agreed to disagree.

For me, modern warfare is all about the hypothetical 80's WWIII in Europe/Norway. I have my doubts about NATO being able to hold off a Soviet offensive on the ground, in the air and on/under the sea. This would have been one war with an uncertain outcome for either side.

While serving with an armored batallion in Germany in the 1980's we were told that our purpose was to hold the Russians for three days until reinforcements began to arrive and they took out all of the equipment mothballed in several areas.
Now, the word hold should be interpreted as slowing down the Russians.
We new our batallion was going to last so many minutes after the initial attack. I guess the planners hoped that our bodies and the burn out hulls will clutter the highways and slow down the Russians.
Under that kind of situation, the sweet buzz of the A10's Gatling guns was a welcome sound. It meant one less tank to roll over our dead bodies.

I still have cold war stress even today.
I was trained to sit in the Fulda gap as a speed bump too.

Never saw that happen thank god.
But Bush is doing a good job refreshing my stress unfortunately.

The U.S. has a history of creating these monsters and then having to destroy them. Nicaragua, Panama, Iraq, Iran, and the list go on.
One thing is sure, the U.S. has learned how to fight its fights with people from other countries. The Nicaraguan contras to get rid of the communists. The Afghans to get rid of the Russians and then the Taliban.
Something that just amaze me is that the Afghans only fight at ranges of 150 meters. Operation Anaconda was designed to approach the enemy to 50 meters (were most of casualties happens.) Do you imagine SPWaW set at 150 meter hexes? A lot of noise and no killings.
Interestling enough, Hitler had this WWI thinking of trench warfare of killings at 150 meters and doomed the German infantry to those single action rifles. He felt that weapons like the Garand M1 were just a waste of the limited ammo they could produce. Yet, in Stalingrad, they learned their lesson and gave us the most widely used weapon in the world today . . . the AK47.
That Kalichnikov guy was a tank mechanic that found this weird looking weapon next to a death German soldier. He cleaned it, figured out its mechanism and made it its own.:rolleyes:
Bush is making a lot of people nervous because he is calling for the fighting to be done within the 50 meter range.
SPWaW is very versatile and modern warfare can still be fought with it. Vietnam? Japanese with grease guns and Americans with napalm. I guess gliders can play the role of helicopters with jungle clearings. Iraq? Take a Tiger, increase its speed it can be a decent M1A1.

Originally posted by Eduardo
While serving with an armored batallion in Germany in the 1980's we were told that our purpose was to hold the Russians for three days until reinforcements began to arrive and they took out all of the equipment mothballed in several areas.
Now, the word hold should be interpreted as slowing down the Russians.
We new our batallion was going to last so many minutes after the initial attack. I guess the planners hoped that our bodies and the burn out hulls will clutter the highways and slow down the Russians.
Under that kind of situation, the sweet buzz of the A10's Gatling guns was a welcome sound. It meant one less tank to roll over our dead bodies.

1975 to about 1982 was a missed oppertunity for the Russians...I think that NATO would have been hard pressed to stop them with out using Tac-nukes.

Originally posted by Raverdave


1975 to about 1982 was a missed oppertunity for the Russians...I think that NATO would have been hard pressed to stop them with out using Tac-nukes.

That's the one thing about any wargame about this period. I don't think there could be a winner: failure for either side would simply be an unnaceptable options. For both sides, loosing the conventional war would certainly mean an end for their respective governments and counties, probably leaving them little alternative than nuclear weapons. Tactical nukes would lead to stategic weapons, leaving NO winners. Not a very...favorable...outcome, even if it is only in a game now

Of course, that's just MY admitedly uneducated opinion on the situation that existed: I certainly do not have all the facts. I was only a kid in the 80's, so i don't know the mood and tensions of the time.

Except for the fact you can't change altitude, Helos ARE in SPWAW. The .shps are still there, the unit classes are there. I made Cobra and Alouette III K-cars and Puma, Alouette III, AB-205 and Huey G-cars for modified OOBs. ATGMs and SAMs are still in the code as well. Reactive armour and cluster artillery rounds are not.

troopie

You are right, but the Russians were busy trying to get into Afghanistan and overseen the Cubans mercenaries in Africa. The importance of Afghanistan? It is like Poland. To go from a desirable area of the eurasian landmass to another desirable one, you must go through Poland or Afghanistan.
If the Russians had it under their sphere of influence, then they had access to the Arabian Sea and all that petroleum and the warm water ports of Iran or Iraq.
The Russians tried to dominate South Yemen and their warm water ports, but failed. As you know, both Yemen merged into one country.
By the mid 1980's, it was too late for the Russian since the Abrams M1A1 had been deployed and remember those mid-range misiles . . .

The only thing entertaining about modern warfare is Clint Eastwood's performance in HEARTBREAK RIDGE!:D