Artillery Barrages

[DEY]

Hello All CM Addicts

I've noticed in some scenarios, where the designer had been able to get the computer player to conduct artillery pre-bombardments against the human player. I would like to include this method in scenarios I make and for the life of me, I can't figure out how it's done. Can someone enlghten me.

[ParaBellum]

The AI likes to use preplanned barrages when it can see enemy units after setup and especially when it has some heavy stuff with slooow reaction time.

Put a bunker or a truck with LOS to an AI FO and chances are high the FO will target it with a pre-planned barrage.

No guarantees, though.

[Aco4bn187inf]

The AI seems poorly equipped, mentally, to use its artillery in any but the most obvious situations. It may be that the sort of planning, intuition, and educated guesswork that makes for proper use of artillery in the game is simply beyond its capacity. It took this human player long enough to learn it, after all.

I often find, after I've beaten the AI, that he has healthy FO's with a full stock of ammunition sitting twiddling their digital thumbs in the rear of the map. Kind of a let-down.

[Tom Murphy]

Something else that helps the computer is the use of target reference points. Place them in line of sight of the artillery spotters when designing the scenario. This will increase the odds of the Computer Al using its artillery sometime during the battle.

[DEY]

There is several battles I play often that always seem to have an arti strike at the same time on the same spot, right within a few seconds of turn one and none of the FO's have a clear LOS, nor is there any TRPs on map. Two I can think of right now is " The Seam " which always seems to lay a barrage in the upper corner behind the Romanians every time I play it. And the other is " Jaegermeister " which almost always drops a barrage right where the panthers are waiting.

This is why I was wandering if there was someway you could setup a barrage for the computer player. I wouldn't necessarily went it to be effected so much but to add a little more immersion.

[Joachim]

If any AI unit can spot one of your units (maybe only if the unit is worth enough points) the AI targets that unit, probably supsecitng troop concentrations. A gamey trick is to put a cheapo tank on a hill.

You might even see 76mm or 82mm stuff, so even "responsive" arty might be used by the AI in preplanned barrages.

BTW: Pre-planned needs no LOS from FO to target.

Gruß

Joachim

[SgtDuke6216]

I have found that AI also targets the objective flags with arty, but usually only if there is a low number of flags and AI's mission is Attack or Assault.

[Znarf]

Try padlocking a vehicle - such as a flak vechicle - in plain view of an enemy artillery spotter. That usually works. See my scenario "LP Gerta" at the scenario depot. Play as the Germans and you will be hit by a pre-planned Russian bombardment.