Mikeathome Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 The nice pics of a 105 barrage look like hte fall of shot is quite wide but not very deep. I had always believed that such fire tended to be deeper than wide, ie range was more variable than bearing. Is this not right? Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomm Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 I have asked myself the same question ... but on the other hand: How do we know where the battery is supposed to be ? We only know where the forward observer is, but not the alignment of the "wide" and "deep" axes ! This is defined by the off-board location of the battery itself, which we do not know ! This may be an explanation ?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JonS Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 Individual rounds have a greater range error than line error (by a factor of ~15). However, if the pattern of rounds called down by the FO was a linear, or box, then you could get the pattern seen at CMHQ. In other words, within the defined pattern rounds will vary their impact point, but overall the pattern for the battery will be retained, regardless of the line-of-fire. Now, how CM models what the FO asks for is an open question to us, the great unwashed masses. Whether it has the subtlty to provide a linear, or non-standard area, or whether it will fire a set number of rounds or just cut loose for up to 60s is known only to a select few on this whole planet of 8 billion people Hopefully it won't stay that way for more than another 4 weeks or so ... Regards Jon ------------------ Quo Fas et Vino du Femme [This message has been edited by JonS (edited 12-16-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionn Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 Arty in CM is deeper than wide BUT it is assumed that arty is firing from the "friendly map edge". (which is best thought of as the direction to go to find some REMFs ) So, the pic seems a little weird since the observer was probably offset from the friendly map edge. That's my understanding of this anyway. ------------------ ___________ Fionn Kelly Manager of Historical Research, The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moon Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 Fionn is correct. In order to get some nice shots, I made a random map and then looked for a good spot to place the FO on, not paying attention where the friendly map edge was. Sorry, my fault... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Fionn is correct. In order to get some nice shots, I made a random map and then looked for a good spot to place the FO on, not paying attention where the friendly map edge was. Sorry, my fault...<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Then I have to agree with JonS that the pattern seems a bit too stretched out. That in the picture looks like something deliberately called to be a linear pattern. If it was just shooting at a point, then the pattern should be considerably more oval IMHO. I say this also partially because the game now does some spotting rounds. The purpose of spotting rounds, of course, is for the FO to give corrections. Thus, by the time of FFE, a lot of that extreme range error bias shown should have been eliminated. Think about registrations--same process, just done in advance. -Bullethead [This message has been edited by Bullethead (edited 12-16-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 16, 1999 Share Posted December 16, 1999 Ah, something both Moon and Fionn forgot to mention... based on more research, and some help from artillery heads (like yourself Bullethead ), we changed the way artillery works after the demo. There is now a definate box pattern in relation to the friendly side that the artillery is coming from. Charles also changed the angle of the shell impacts to line up with this as well. There were some other tweaks and changes too, but I forget what they were. I think you will be very happy with the final version. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 17, 1999 Share Posted December 17, 1999 Steve said: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>we changed the way artillery works after the demo. There is now a definate box pattern in relation to the friendly side that the artillery is coming from.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> OK, guess I was confused. The screenshot we were talking about is on CMHQ and purports to show post-demo arty fixes. Definitely not very box-shaped . So you all must have tweaked it some more since that shot was taken. However, that very long linear pattern in the shot would be useful on occasion. Would it be possible to call for that shape instead of the box? -Bullethead [This message has been edited by Bullethead (edited 12-16-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Rock Posted December 17, 1999 Share Posted December 17, 1999 Bullethead has a point. A linear pattern can do wonders on a road column for example. Currently it's possible to specify open sheaf or closed shear. Personally I think it'd be nice to be able to specify target's length & width and attitude, but I suspect this would be bothersome to most players. (Note: attitudet refers to angle/dirction of fall of shot, not to the mental state of the target) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug Beman Posted December 17, 1999 Share Posted December 17, 1999 Moon said "Fionn is correct. In order to get some nice shots, I made a random map and then looked for a good spot to place the FO on, not paying attention where the friendly map edge was. Sorry, my fault" Bad Moon! Bad! Now you just sit there, and think about what you've done. Just wait til your father gets home! DjB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionn Posted December 17, 1999 Share Posted December 17, 1999 Umm, I'm not much of an arty-head but I always supposed WW2 arty wasn't quite accurate enough to have FOs select the exact pattern of rounds fired you know? Was it? Detailed explanations welcome. ------------------ ___________ Fionn Kelly Manager of Historical Research, The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 17, 1999 Share Posted December 17, 1999 >>>>>>>. Umm, I'm not much of an arty-head but I always supposed WW2 arty wasn't quite accurate enough to have FOs select the exact pattern of rounds fired you know? <<<<<<<<<<< It's been physically possible, in terms of gun accuracy and gunner skill, to shoot in all kinds of pretty patterns since WW1. For instance, in WW1 they shot box barrages combining many batteries' fire into 3 connected lines to isolate the section of trench being assaulted. Beautiful things . In terms of calling for specific patterns, the mechanics of all of them are pretty much the same. The FO tells the battery what the target is and what pattern he wants on it. During the spotting rounds phase, the battery shoots 1 gun and the FO adjusts it into the desired place. This gun is used as a reference point in the FDC. Because they know what the FO is trying to do, they can figure any required aim offsets relative to that reference point for all the other guns. They do this while the adjusting is going on. Then, once the FO is happy and calls for FFE, the FDC guys take the firing data from the adjusting gun, add the offsets, put the result on the other guns, and blast away. So, shooting a linear pattern is technically almost the same as shooting an open sheaf. In both cases, the other guns have some offset from the adjusted point of aim to cover a bigger area. But instead of the other guns being dispersed radially from the reference point, in a linear pattern they're strung out along a designated line. The FO supplies this line when he calls for the mission by giving the FDC the coordinates of its endpoints. -Bullethead Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JonS Posted December 19, 1999 Share Posted December 19, 1999 Commonwealth Arty used slightly different procedures (more control and responsibility at the FO end was the main difference), but overall I agree with Bullethead - shooting different shapes is technically an easy thing to do. Typical shapes are Converge (point target), Circular (with an radius for the circle), Linear (with a start point, length, and direction), Rectangular (with length, width, and direction of long side), and Parallel (where each gun fires the same data, so in theory the rounds land in the same pattern as the layout of the guns at the battery. This is taken into consideration when first laying out the battery position). Regards Jon ------------------ Quo Fas et Vino du Femme Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 19, 1999 Share Posted December 19, 1999 Bullethead, how many guns would it take to make for an effective pattern? Just asking because a CM FO only has control over a single battery. That doesn't seem to be enough guns to do much with. In any case, we aren't changing CM to allow for patterns. The seem to be only usefull for large scale bombardments, which CM doesn't support. Still, cool discussion. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JonS Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 Effective sizes for battery distributions, from my perspective: (for a battery of 6x105mm guns) Circular: radius 70m Linear: length 200m Rectangular: 100x60m (I think, will need to check my 'book of words) Parallel: depends on layout of battery - approx the same as circular-70, but easier to calculate Converge: 0m (used for point targets, like a single house) A popular one the Commonwealth used in WW2 was the rolling barrage - a linear distribution that advanced at a set rate each minute so that advancing troops walked behind a teel curtain. That was the plan anyway. I've seen the detailed gun programmes issued to the New Zealand gunners for Supercharge and one of the Cassino battles detailing the ammo type, rates of fire, bearings and elevations (and therefore the battery distributions), etc for each gun. These kind of barrages took a while to calculate and distribute, but they were used 'in anger'. Something to bear in mind is that the lethal radius for a standing man is 35m from the point of impact, and the wounding radius is 70m, so this increases the effective size of the distributions - the sizes given above are those within which the rounds land. For the 25lber these distance are MUCH smaller - approx 15m for the lethal radius. This was both good and bad - bad because the explosive payload was obviously so much less, but good because with such short safety distance infantry could follow up VERY close on the heels of a barrage. And it worked too - at least when the plan was good and workable I have (but not with me right this moment) information about where, within each distribution shape, each round is plotted to land if anyone is interested. Even with a battery there are enough guns to do useful, differently shaped distributions - thats why they exist. Contrary to popular perception the army isn't stoopid Regards Jon ------------------ Quo Fas et Vino du Femme Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Mike Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 This talk of box barrages etc. is interesting, but I that the fall of shot from each gun follows will be in an oval much longer than it is wide won't it? So when you say a battery is firing in a box or circle or linear (walking) barrage, that just means that the aiming points for each gun are in that shape. However the fall of shot will still have the "usual" errors around the aiming points. Hence infantry "followed" a walking barrage a hundred yards or more from it's "rear edge". However they were supposed to get as close as possible, since the minimum distance gave the enemy the smallest opportunity to recover once the barrage lifted. For a simple concentration all guns aim at one point. One thing I heard about from British barrages in WWI - when using shrapnel the biggest danger to the infantry was the baseplate being shot backwards when the bursting charge exploded! Mike (atwork) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JonS Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 Mike, If you fired 100 rounds from the same gun on the same data (bearing and elevation) then yes, you would get a long, thin pattern on the ground because of the random distribution of the rounds about the target point. But, for a battery concentration this doesn't matter too much since you are dealing with the "average-of-several-averages". So, from an FOs point of view, once the adjusting procedure has been completed you can ignore the random distribution of the rounds. In practical terms it does have some effects - for example a Linear concentration usually works best when the attitude is close to the line GT. When the attitude is close to right angles to the line of flight the Linear starts to look like a zig-zag, but the random effects of the gun are normally outweighed by the effect of local variations in topography. I could digress here about how slope effects the fall of shot, but will sumarise with 'adjusting in hilly ground is a b!tch, and it scr@ws the distribution pattern' (We usually train in VERY hilly terrain ) BTW, the simplest concentration is Parallel, not Converge. This is beacuse the calculation for bearings and elevations only need be done once, then all guns in the battery use the same data. With Converge, each gun needs slightly different data to get all the rounds to land on the same spot, which means that the calculations need to be done for each gun. Also, Converge isn't used that often as its felt to be a waste of ammo - you super-saturate a small area with shell splinters, when with a regular concentration you could cover a much larger area with an adequate spread of splinters. My point about the 25lber walking barrage wasn't meant to indicate that the grunts followed it at 15m, more that because of the realativly small explosive charge they could follow closer than with a similar barrage from other guns. Poor sods! Baseplate flying back - hehehe, you still have to watch out for that, and the carrier shell, with smoke and illum rounds Regards Jon ------------------ Quo Fas et Vino du Femme [This message has been edited by JonS (edited 12-19-99).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 Steve said: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Bullethead, how many guns would it take to make for an effective pattern? Just asking because a CM FO only has control over a single battery. That doesn't seem to be enough guns to do much with.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Like JonS said, 1 battery is all it takes. The size of the pattern on the ground, of course, depends on the size of the guns, meaning the effective casualty radius of their shells. That is, the individual guns are aimed so hopefully their shells land with the desired spacing for the desired area coverage with splinters. Generally, the choice is between having either their kill- or wounding-radii overlap. But it only takes 1 battery to do it. I guess my mention of the WW1 massive box barrages was somewhat confusing in that regard. <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>In any case, we aren't changing CM to allow for patterns. The seem to be only usefull for large scale bombardments, which CM doesn't support.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Well, that's too bad. The patterns are for small-scale tactical things mostly, a tool for every occasion. You can have your shells land along a ridge- or tree-line, land tightly on a small patch of woods or a few buildings, or spread out over a big field. Again, my WW1 reference was probably a bad idea--I just meant it to show such patterns were possible even with WW1 guns. But anyway, patterns are part of what makes artillery so effective. The existing system is OK I guess for mortars (arty snob-ism here--I doubt grunts could figure out how to shoot pretty patterns ) but arty is considerably more flexible than mortars due to having much better FDC assets. -Bullethead Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 JonS said: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>We usually train in VERY hilly terrain<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> No kidding there . We called them "chocolate finger prints" due to all the close-spaced brown contour lines on the map . I guess that's to be expected, though. The only places that get used for arty impact areas are places totally unfit for any useful purpose. And meaning, of course, that the impact areas are surrounded by land almost equally worthless, where the troops have to live and maneuver. Always a bitch being in the field in such places. Always seems to be a hellish desert or a bug-ridden swamp . -Bullethead Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest JonS Posted December 20, 1999 Share Posted December 20, 1999 Bullethead, You were USMC right? We've probably used some of the same equipment. I've seen photos of Corps gunners with the M118 or M119 (US version of the L118/L119 105mm British Light Gun), and I heard the the fire control computer developed here was sold to the Marines also. Pretty nifty piece of kit - it think it uses an AT chip (!?!), and is encased in an airtight, clamshell aluminium case. Sound familiar? It probably would have come into service in the US around '94-ish at a guess. I especially remember the little rubber sealing strip that ran just in front of the keyboard - a very handy place to rest the ole' head after a long day Regards Jon ------------------ Quo Fas et Vino du Femme Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Big Time Software Posted December 21, 1999 Share Posted December 21, 1999 Thanks guys for the info. One thing that Charles and I love about making CM is that we learn something new practically every day (well, maybe once a week at this point ). I'll pass it on to Charles, but I can say for sure that nothing is going to change at this point. But it is always good to know. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 21, 1999 Share Posted December 21, 1999 JonS said: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>You were USMC right? We've probably used some of the same equipment.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Our M198 155mm gun-howitzer is a Brit design as I understand it. I think what happened was there was a shoot-off and the Brit design won, but politics meant that instead of buying it from the Brits, we got some US company to clone it . I was always comforted knowing it was a Brit design--they've always made good guns. Sure is a BITCH to tow, though--overloads a damn 5-ton truck . And yeah, I vaguely remember that computer. That was just coming in as I was getting out so I never fooled with it much. The one I remember most the BCT, which looked like an olive drab iMac with a red LED touchscreen. You programmed it up with the forms of standard messages, hooked it up to a digital burst radio, and could send orders to other BCTs in a few milliseconds. Really came in handy in counterbattery quickdraw duels in the Gulf . -Bullethead Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bullethead Posted December 21, 1999 Share Posted December 21, 1999 Steve said: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Thanks guys for the info ... I'll pass it on to Charles, but I can say for sure that nothing is going to change at this point<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> No problem, just get the game into my nicotine-stained fingers . Save more detailed arty for a patch or CM2. But please do it someday. The God of War deserves it . -Bullethead Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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