Artillery bug...or not?

[TopShelfCookieJar]

Should it be possible to swap from HE to smoke or vice versa instantaneously (ie with no time delay) for off-board (and probably onboard - I didn't check) artillery?

It seems that you can and I was just curious if this was intentional...

Apologies if this has already been discussed. I'm at work and don't have time to peruse past topics.

[Dirtweasle]

If the clock is ticking down and you have more than the reload time + manual clearing the tune time than it should not be noticable to the player. But if you can swithc from HE to smoke inside that time, then yes it's not 100% accurate as clearing the tubes and reloading smoke is going to take a little time.

The majority of time spent in CMBB waiting for arty to fall is simualted C&C delay, not how long it takes to swing the tubes into position, load up and fire.

[TopShelfCookieJar]

Oh, I'm talking about swapping it mid-fire!

During a TCP game versus a workmate I dropped a rather large smokescreen on his entrenched position and midway through 'converted' it to HE. He was not amused...

That can't be fair can it?

[Dirtweasle]

If the firing units did not suffer a reload penalty then it is not right. However, My experience is that the firing units do always suffer a slight delay when changing from HE to smoke and back with CMBO. I have no recollection of it changing in CMBB.

[TopShelfCookieJar]

Well, I'll have to check again when I get home but I'm 99% sure that there was no time penalty for making the change.

[TopShelfCookieJar]

On further examination of the facts it would indeed appear that you can swap from smoke to HE or vice versa without incurring any additional delay as long as you are happy to have the target marker remain in the same place.

Make of that what you will...

[Caesar]

As the victim of this incessant barrage of smoke and HE, I too would like to know if this is intentional or a bug. It doesn't sound right. I could understand the delay being substantially shorter, but no delay at all seems a bit off (especially from the recipients point of view)

[Michael Emrys]

I'm afraid I don't quite get the problem. Maybe I'm missing something. In real life, if a battery were firing smoke and the order came down to switch to HE, why should there be much of a pause? Wouldn't they simply fire off whatever was in the tube and then load the appropriate shell next? I can see a possible necessity to re-lay the gun due to a difference in ballistics between the types, but how long would that take? What am I missing here?

Michael

[Dirtweasle]

Michael,

I agree with you and maybe I was not making myself clear. There should be a delay of whatever the reoad time is, plus maybe - just maybe, another few seconds to relay the tube.

I believe Jeeves has had a 0 delay after changing to smoke from HE and back and forth. I cannot duplicate this. I recall always get a slight delay when I change the target line from K to T or the other way. I'd have to sit down with the game and test it to make 100% sure.

[TopShelfCookieJar]

Again, I emphasize that I have no idea if this is a bug or not. My sum knowledge of the inner workings of artillery is best described as 'slim to none'.

If you are currently laying down smoke and wish to change to HE then when the orders stage rolls around you simply set 'Target', click anywhere (giving you a small delay) and then press 'Retarget' which moves the target point back to where it was previously, removing the incurred delay and changing to HE. The same procedure can be used to change from HE to smoke.

[ October 14, 2002, 04:05 PM: Message edited by: Jeeves ]

[Dirtweasle]

I'd say that needs to be fixed at some point as there has to be time spent at the very least reloading with smoke rounds.

[tar]

Even if this is a problem, I don't think this is really worth worrying about. As it stands now, you can only change the composition of the gunfire once every minute anyway. If there isn't any delay, you can chalk it up to the FO calling the order in a few seconds before the end of the previous turn anyway. I can easily live with this particular abstraction.

[Trey Marshall]

Speaking as someone who has been a fire direction officer in a field artillery battery - it is not as simple as reloading new HE shells into the breach and firing away. The Observer would have to tell the Fire Direction Center (FDC) to change shell type to HE and the FDC would have to calculate brand new data for the battery. Then the commands would have to be sent down to the guns. Then tubes laid on proper data and then loaded. Roughly:

FDC to recieve change of shell type: 15 seconds

FDC Computes new data: 45 seconds

FDC sends data to guns: 15-30 seconds depending on comms

Gun relays on target: 30 seconds

Reload and fire: 15 seconds

Total time: 2 minutes roughly. Variables can add time especially comms and training of observer/artillery crews.

Trey

[Dirtweasle]

Thanks Trey. I knew there had to be more to it but had no first hand knowledge of what exactly it would be.

Is it possible though Trey to have the battery fire X rounds smoke and then Y rounds HE, as a planned fire mission? Do you see what I'm getting at?

[JonS]

Dirtweasle,

yes, this can be done. And is. Though, in my experience, fireplans be default allow one minute between changes. That could be a change of target, or a change of ammo type, or both.

For a fireplan all the data are pre-calculated, so the minutes delay is to allow the gun numbers time to effect the change.

Even moderately trained crews will be able to complete changes well within a minute, but keeping at one minute assists with command and control, and also (probably more important when you think about it) co-ordination with the supported arms (inf and/or armd).

Regards

JonS

[PK]

Based on what I've read in this thread, I would like ask the following.

When an off field arty barrage has been told to cancel it's current target, should there not be a comman delay of say thirty seconds as the request for the cease fire is processed through the chain of command.

[JonS]

PK,

in theory: yes. In practice: why bother? Just assume that the FO cancelled the fire order '30 seconds ago'

Works for me ...

Be Ccool

JonS

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by tar:

Even if this is a problem, I don't think this is really worth worrying about. As it stands now, you can only change the composition of the gunfire once every minute anyway. If there isn't any delay, you can chalk it up to the FO calling the order in a few seconds before the end of the previous turn anyway. I can easily live with this particular abstraction.

I think for me this is the bottom line.

Michael

[PK]

Originally posted by JonS:

PK,

in theory: yes. In practice: why bother? Just assume that the FO cancelled the fire order '30 seconds ago'

Works for me ...

Be Ccool

JonS

Well I'm happy with that, good point

[Trey Marshall]

Yes, it is if it has been planned in advance. Firing HE and Smoke is not a standard practice and crews will experience delays if observers get "creative". Smoke is normally used to impact in front of the enemy to screen your own actions. But yes, you could tell the FDC any number of combinations beforehand. Also, planning nice smoke screens takes much longer than normal HE missions. In planning smoke, FDC crews have to consider the length of the screen, attitude of the screen, observer's requested duration of the screen, current wind speed and direction, etc. It easily takes about 5-7 minutes to get a good smoke screen downrange. If observers want smoke right away like under an ambush, FDC run an immediate smoke mission which is just a predetermined number of WP rounds at the target location. Way I look at in CMBB - TRPs (Targets to artillerymen - TRPs are for tankers and infantrymen) are used as preplotted targets that the FDCs/Observers/and gun crews have rehearsed in advance and have data precomputed. Any other targets are on call and thus subject to the longer delays.

Trey

Originally posted by Dirtweasle:

Thanks Trey. I knew there had to be more to it but had no first hand knowledge of what exactly it would be.

Is it possible though Trey to have the battery fire X rounds smoke and then Y rounds HE, as a planned fire mission? Do you see what I'm getting at?

[Andrew H.]

Trey: If I understand what you're saying, it seems like the delay for switching to smoke should be substantial, since the they not only have to load up with smoke, but they also have to re-aim the guns. At a minimum, this should take as long as slightly shifting the fire does; at a maximum, it should be like dropping a whole new fire mission, complete with spotting round.

It was common, at least on the Western front by the US, for initial bombardments to be half smoke and half HE (presumably from different batteries). I wish that the initial bombardments in CMBB gave you a 1/2 smoke, 1/2 HE option without having to purchase two units.

[jamgra]

Originally posted by Jeeves:

If you are currently laying down smoke and wish to change to HE then when the orders stage rolls around you simply set 'Target', click anywhere (giving you a small delay) and then press 'Retarget' which moves the target point back to where it was previously, removing the incurred delay and changing to HE. The same procedure can be used to change from HE to smoke.

Ok, I'm not entirely positive, but it sounds like this might be a small bug.

You're getting around the delay by creating a new target for HE rounds, which gives the correct delay time, but then telling the observer to RETARGET the old target. In RETARGETing, the observer is going back to his old target, with no time delay, but however is now firing HE rounds rather than smoke. This is not correct, as the delay time that should be incurred for HE times seems as if it isn't being carried over through the RETARGET. However, I have not tried this but am taking your word for it.

From reading other's posts about artillery here, it seems impossible that there would be no delay time at all in switching from Smoke to HE, which is what this bug is allowing.

It seems as if the game just isn't taking into account if there is a delay time from firing new rounds when you RETARGET a target that is already receiving fire. Not the biggest deal in the world, but should be fixed and more than likely will be if BTS looks at this issue. Unless there is something I am missing....

-Jim

[TopShelfCookieJar]

The simplest solution would appear (at least to me) to be that when you press the retarget key it should reset your fire mission back to whatever you were dropping previously, be it HE or smoke. Thus if you wish to swap you would be forced to set a new target.

Whether the resulting delay would be to everyone's satisfaction is debatable, but at least a delay would exist and I would think that such a fix would be reasonably 'simple' for a man of Charles' talent to effect.

[ October 17, 2002, 12:46 AM: Message edited by: Jeeves ]