why cant morters fire without line of sight?

[hansfritz]

I've never understood why the infantry morters cant just fire where ever they want.Sure increase the scatter,maybe lower the damage,but why not allow it? Any ideas out there?

[Pzman]

Thats like asking why infantry can't shoot at what they can't see.

[Michael Emrys]

To expand on Pzman's very insightful response a little... You will notice that mortar teams carry very little ammunition, not much more than a couple minutes worth. In real life, they wouldn't have fired at anything but a spotted target because they couldn't afford to waste ammo.

Okay, they might have, but it would have been really extraordinary and not worth BTS' time to try to include it because it's one of those things that would fall prey to all sorts of gamey usages. :mad:

Michael

[ 09-09-2001: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[hansfritz]

the game allows you to drop artillary into any area,so why not be able to order your morter team to say drop some shells into a village or over the brow of a hill.I'me sure in real combat the morter teams wearnt so over exposed to enemy fire.

[Fuerte]

Also mortars can fire where the HQ has line of sight.

[Soddball]

You can use headquarters units to spot for the mortars. So long as the mortar unit is within the command radius of the HQ unit, you can click on the HQ unit, shift-click on the mortar, and then place the target based on the LOS of the HQ unit.

[hansfritz]

thank-you Michael'yes it was a better reply

[hansfritz]

yes thanks,I know you can use HQ's but dont you find it anoying if another leader unit without line of sight comes close to your morters and they switch "team" to them. wouldent it be better to be able to lock on to a leader(HQ)until further orders.

[dNorwood]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by hansfritz:

yes thanks,I know you can use HQ's but dont you find it anoying if another leader unit without line of sight comes close to your morters and they switch "team" to them.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

MadMatt addressed this issue in a similar thread - unfortunately, Idon't know how to include URL's in a message, except like this:

http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=010209

sorry,.....

[hansfritz]

Thanks dNORWOOD,it worked-but unfortunatly there was no answear to the problem

[CMplayer]

One way around it is to buy an 81mm mortar FO. Or if you really want some fun, splurge on the 120mm.

[Roach]

The thing I find a little annoying is taking fire from behind a hedgerow and not being able to indiscriminately lob shells from my 60s on to the other side of the hedgerow in the hope of scaring the impolite guys into going to bother someone else somewhere else. Essentially, my mortar crew can see the hedgerow, they can hit the hedgerow, so why not be able to throw something the other side of it?

[Yowie]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>

The thing I find a little annoying is taking fire from behind a hedgerow and not being able to

indiscriminately lob shells from my 60s on to the other side of the hedgerow in the hope of scaring the

impolite guys into going to bother someone else somewhere else. Essentially, my mortar crew can see the

hedgerow, they can hit the hedgerow, so why not be able to throw something the other side of it? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Similar to what Roach said, if I want to go into tall pines (or got flushed out after trying to to in), and I know the bad guys are in there just some 10 meters away from the edge of tall pines. I'd love to supress the bad guys with my mortars before I attempt to go in (again)... Or is that too gamie?

:eek:

[Andrew H.]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bad Dog:

Similar to what Roach said, if I want to go into tall pines (or got flushed out after trying to to in), and I know the bad guys are in there just some 10 meters away from the edge of tall pines. I'd love to supress the bad guys with my mortars before I attempt to go in (again)... Or is that too gamie?

:eek:<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Just target the edge that you can see; you'll easily get more than a 10 meter scatter. These are not precision weapons.

[Andreas]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bad Dog:

Or is that too gamie?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Gamey, shmamey, it is not allowed by the engine because of the borg spotting model.

[chrisl]

There's enough spread in where the shells fall that if you want to bomb the back of a hedgerow you can target a point where you can see (just short of where the guys are) and expect a good fraction of the shells to land where you want them. Same with units a little back from the edge of a woods/tall pines tile.

[Cover]

I just recently got my arse handed to me in a notably leaky steel pot, by some guy who was in an artillery in the army. He had 81's, only 3, not even spotters.

He Timed his barrages to land on the only cover available in the logical line of advance for my attack.

The Shells were hitting the trees as my troops arrived, and while my guys were out of his line of sight, he targeted as far into the trees as he could and let 'em rip. The next round Shells were falling in back of the trees from a lateral 81.

The results were several routed and broken squads, heavy casualties, and several requests for tranfer out of my command by angry, pixelated, Allied Soldiers. While sometimes this tactic can lead to wasted ammo, it may also force your opponet to choose new tactics if an area he was planning to move through is suddenly "hot".

[Tero]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Germanboy:

Gamey, shmamey, it is not allowed by the engine because of the borg spotting model.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I quess this is why the infantry can not fire off its small arms beyond LOS (in the dark for example) even if it was physically possible.

[Hon John Howard MP LLB]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tero:

I quess this is why the infantry can not fire off its small arms beyond LOS (in the dark for example) even if it was physically possible.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Does the game not allow firing on fixed lines by tripod mounted MGs (or even sandbagged LMG) ?

A common tactic to discourage movement throgh minefield lanes and/or to harrass known movement lines in comparatively static areas. Use of tracer was optional (scared the opposition as well as assisting to disclose firer location) particularly by the LMG if it used magazines (tracer not a common load).

[Vanir Ausf B]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by hansfritz:

yes thanks,I know you can use HQ's but dont you find it anoying if another leader unit without line of sight comes close to your morters and they switch "team" to them. wouldent it be better to be able to lock on to a leader(HQ)until further orders.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes it would. I hope they put something like this into CMBB.

[Andreas]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tero:

I quess this is why the infantry can not fire off its small arms beyond LOS (in the dark for example) even if it was physically possible.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, same for why you can't fire into smoke.

[Michael Emrys]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Hon John Howard MP LLB:

Does the game not allow firing on fixed lines by tripod mounted MGs (or even sandbagged LMG) ?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[sigh] Welcome to the forum. Not your fault that you don't know it, but this has been the subject of several HUGE discussions. It has been discussed forward and backward in more detail than you could likely imagine.

If you possess incredible stamina and patience, you might try playing with the search engine. Alternatively, some kind soul who keeps better track of such things than I may post a few URLs to the relevant threads. Good luck.

Oh...BTW...the upshot of all that is that BTS concedes reluctantly that their model of MG behavior falls somewhat short of perfection in some areas and moves are afoot to alleviate some of the problems. Trouble is, it can be hard to progam something as complex as this and have it work right with all the other parts of the game system. Sometimes in curing one problem you create five more. :eek:

Michael

[Vanir Ausf B]

To add to Michael and Germanboy's comment's, the basic reason units like MGs and such are not allowed to fire beyond LOS is the absolute spotting model used in CM, where if one unit spots an enemy unit all other units know where it is. Allowing units to fire "blind" into areas outside LOS (through smoke screens for example) in the game would allow you to "cheat" at it because other friendly units (who do have LOS to the area) could spot the enemy units for the firing friendly units. I hope that made sense.

It is an imperfect compromise for a limitation in the game necessitated by limited CPU power.

[Hon John Howard MP LLB]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Vanir Ausf B:

To add to Michael and Germanboy's comment's, the basic reason units like MGs and such are not allowed to fire beyond LOS is the absolute spotting model used in CM, where if one unit spots an enemy unit all other units know where it is. Allowing units to fire "blind" into areas outside LOS (through smoke screens for example) in the game would allow you to "cheat" at it because other friendly units (who do have LOS to the area) could spot the enemy units for the firing friendly units. I hope that made sense.

It is an imperfect compromise for a limitation in the game necessitated by limited CPU power.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Surely not a "cheat".

This comes down to the role of the observer and whether this role needed have special qualification. The could boil down to the need for specialised training and equipment.

In the former case, BritCom practice was to train almost all officers and many NCOs to have the skills necessary to direct artillery/mortars/MMG (in addition to their own specialised observers which in the latter cases were NCOs and in the former case junior subalterns).

Communications could be by line or radio though generally this meant the lowest was platoon HQ level.

On the Allies side at least, it did fact happen with FOs for artillery calling in all available units on DF and FDF tasks through divisional artillery nets. Similarly, any sufficently trained personnel could, if in communciation, request similar action from at least battalion assets if not higher.

[Vanir Ausf B]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Hon John Howard MP LLB:

Surely not a "cheat".<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Call it what you will. That's why I put it in quotes.

On the WW2 battlefield all units were not in constant continuous contact with each other. In CM they are for the most part. So units are prevented from firing out of LOS to (somewhat) limit people from taking advantage of that. I'm not telling you this is entirely realistic, I'm telling you why it was done.