On-Map Mortars = "Superunit" !?

[General Jack Ripper]

Um... that wouldn't be real spam would it??

Welcome to the internet.

[sburke]

Nah, that's the real thing. BFC has caused quite a stir in Brazil and totally disrupted the online dating scene. More so with the women than the men apparently.

[Michael Emrys]

I'm available to hot, lonely Brazilian women who want to discuss CM. Or whatever.

Michael

[Kanonier Reichmann]

Back on to the point of the original discussion. Is it just me who thinks that a light mortar of 60mm calibre is able to take out 50 or 57 enemy troops and not think that something might just be wrong with this type of result? That's more than 1 casualty per mortar round fired!

Regards

KR

[JonS]

"This must be one of the few times when a complaint has been voiced that a weapon was too accurate."

Not really. Moratars are area-effect weapons. That is, you want them to affect an area, not a point. That's why they carry HE rather than having a solid warhead. Too-small dispersion means that the area affected is smaller than it could be, making the weapon overall inefficient.

This was also one of the (few) complaints about the Bren - it was too accurate. And the reasoning was the same; you want your MGs suppressing an area, not a point.

[LongLeftFlank]

Back on to the point of the original discussion. Is it just me who thinks that a light mortar of 60mm calibre is able to take out 50 or 57 enemy troops and not think that something might just be wrong with this type of result? That's more than 1 casualty per mortar round fired!

No, you are hardly the only one. My own opinion is, it isn't the mortars, it's the failure of the pixeltroops to take cover promptly and stay down.

[Holien]

No, you are hardly the only one. My own opinion is, it isn't the mortars, it's the failure of the pixeltroops to take cover promptly and stay down.

Nope not the only one and I see this consistently where 60mm are on map. Until it is tweaked you have to accept it as part of the game. I hope it will get tweaked as it does not seem right but as people have posted the weapon seems to be modelled correctly but maybe the fix is getting the troops to take cover and lay flat. I guess that is not an easy code issue?

[Redwolf]

No, you are hardly the only one. My own opinion is, it isn't the mortars, it's the failure of the pixeltroops to take cover promptly and stay down.

Cover was and still is broken in CMx2, as is cover finding, or rather troop positioning. The very basic problem with 1:1 representation without (optional) 1:1 control has been left unsolved, and that is what the naysayers have been naysaying about since the first announcement that the point-shaped units of CMx1 fame are gone. The soldiers go neither where you (the player) want nor do they go where a real soldier would. And since it isn't repaired in an abstraction layer anymore (*) the full impact hits the defending player.

I just hope that Charles has been polishing this up for the next module, with or without Steve knowing.

(*) there supposedly is some amount of ground abstraction but it seems to be too little to even judge, we can't even tell if increasing it would improve the situation.

[Apa]

I think there are two problems: infantry bunching and too little suppression to the mortar team. Firing a 81mm mortar under enemy fire is suicide. You pose a meter high target, you must stay stationary for at least a second, and the enemy knows where you will pop up. You will be no1 target for the enemy.

So, while under enemy fire, the mortar team should be suppressed, or if not, then the team should get killed. Fast.

[YankeeDog]

I think there are two problems: infantry bunching and too little suppression to the mortar team. Firing a 81mm mortar under enemy fire is suicide. You pose a meter high target, you must stay stationary for at least a second, and the enemy knows where you will pop up. You will be no1 target for the enemy.

So, while under enemy fire, the mortar team should be suppressed, or if not, then the team should get killed. Fast.

This. I've been saying this for a while -- infantry should treat mortars in LOS the same way armor units treat AT Gun and infantry AT teams -- a dangerous, high-priority target.

As far as I can tell, in the game right now, an MG team presented with two enemy targets in LOS, a rifle team and a mortar team, is about equally likely to fire at each (assuming similar range & exposure conditions, etc.). IMHO, in general, the infantry AI should strongly weight towards firing at visible, unsuppressed mortar teams over other infantry teams. A mortar team is usually much more dangerous, and, as Apa notes, a mortar is also very difficult to operate under small-arms fire due to the nature of the weapon and the way the operator(s) of the mortar have to expose themselves in order to aim and fire the weapon. So mortars are a dangerous, but vulnerable target. Another term for units like this is "bullet magnet." Remember how hard it was to use flamethrowers in CMx1, because the second the enemy spotted them every unit in LOS would target them? Imagine if mortar teams were treated this way in CMBN...

This should make mortars substantially trickier to use in direct-fire mode in the game -- if spotting is approximately equal, an MG or a few riflemen should be able to get lead downrange and suppress a mortar team, much faster than the mortar team can get the range dialed in, and start dropping bombs on an infantry team.

[A Canadian Cat]

This. I've been saying this for a while -- infantry should treat mortars in LOS the same way armor units treat AT Gun and infantry AT teams -- a dangerous, high-priority target.

Seems reasonable enough. My trouble is that I am usually taking mortar fire from totally unknown locations. In fact this is currently driving me nuts in two games I have on the go. My guys keep dying to direct mortar fire (I know it is direct because I have broken contact and then had the same guys hit again 2min later approaching the same area (from a slightly different direction) after the firing stopped. It is so bad in one game I have two tanks an and MG team doing nothing but firing at nearby places with cover that can see where my guys were last hit. I have not got the foggiest idea where the mortar team is.

Mortars are the bane of my existence except when they are mine:)

[Apa]

There is the other problem. If you have a scout team, in real life it sure as hell would not advance in a way where the 3 or 4 men are in the center of a 8x8m area. The enemy mortar team would only have single soldier targets. And would not probably see all of the enemy soldiers simultaneously. Thus, a scouting team would not be a good target for the mortar team.

However, the other side of this is that in real life if you bunch up your troops, a single mortar team could easily decimate a platoon+ of infantry. I don't see anything unrealistic about that.

[Baneman]

Problem I've had is that my infantry can see and are firing at the mortar unit ... who are unfazed, take no avoiding action like diving to the ground, no they calmly change their mortar's facing, target and decimate the infantry shooting at them.

So, yes, superunit.

( maybe if my infantry could hit what the hell they shoot at it might be different, but typically I find it takes a good turn or more before they seem to have an idea of how to aim. Not so the mortar guys who rarely miss by more than 3m )

[Dave85]

I read that in Normandy 75% of allied casualties were inflicted by mortars. If its true, its pretty impressive considering that the krauts were using; bayonets, pistols, rifles, smg's, mg's (thousands of em), grenades, rifle grenades, shreks, fausts, inf guns, AT guns, 88's, assault guns, TD's, tanks, artillery, mines etc etc. I guess for them, anything bigger than a mortar didn't last too long what with allied air supremacy.

I just did a defensive quick battle using a rifle company and a weapons company against a full bosch battalion + 16 odd armoured vehicles and I got 230 out of 410 kills with my 6tubes (70 kills with 4 ATG's). My 4 .30 cal MG's rattled of about 15 000 rounds and they killed virtually nothing. The .50 cal did ok though, with something like 15 kills for 300 rounds.

[Redwolf]

However, the other side of this is that in real life if you bunch up your troops, a single mortar team could easily decimate a platoon+ of infantry. I don't see anything unrealistic about that.

But the game neither places the soldiers where self-preserving soldiers would place themselves nor does it allow you to control that.

The troops die from too much exposure to the mortar fire from stupidly chosen positions all right. But the game does it on it's own, refuses your help, does hack it up with an abstraction and for everything except the most green troops that is not realistic.

[LongLeftFlank]

Cover seeking and cover has been tweaked some since the initial release of CMSF and is noticeably improved since those early days, though it remains a work in progress. However, I disagree that 1 to 1 modeling is inherently futile at CM scale -- it requires a lot of micromanagement, true, but to my mind delivers more satisfying results than more abstract tactical games like ASL, CM1 or PC. YMMV.

At this point, prone Cowering and Hiding units in any kind of cover terrain, especially entrenchments are pretty invulnerable to all but direct hits and very near misses. The major missing component that accounts for the outlandish kill rate is getting them to "hit the dirt" in a timely manner when the shells are coming in and I have a feeling that fix will be made sooner rather than later.

One other observation about mortars: most CMBN maps are wayyyyyyy too open -- you can see right through copses of trees for hundreds of meters, settlements don't have walls or hedges, map designers didn't bother to put in gullies, ditches, elevated road or railbeds, etc. etc. that would otherwise break up the LOS. When most of the map can see most of the rest of the map, this massively favours the player with the most lethal ranged weapons, whether 88s or mortars.

[Holien]

But the game neither places the soldiers where self-preserving soldiers would place themselves nor does it allow you to control that.

The troops die from too much exposure to the mortar fire from stupidly chosen positions all right. But the game does it on it's own, refuses your help, does hack it up with an abstraction and for everything except the most green troops that is not realistic.

This is a good point and highlights another frustration that at times you can not get a HMG or AT gun to set up properly on a hedge line to fire and it takes numerous attempts.

Lots of good points and I hope they find some way to address, still fun to play despite these issues but I must say getting the lazer mortar effect on your men does hurt at times...

[c3k]

This is a good point and highlights another frustration that at times you can not get a HMG or AT gun to set up properly on a hedge line to fire and it takes numerous attempts.

Lots of good points and I hope they find some way to address, still fun to play despite these issues but I must say getting the lazer mortar effect on your men does hurt at times...

Holien, if this is happening to you, please start a thread (or direct me to an existing one) which has examples of this occurring. If it is still a problem, perhaps it can get looked at and fixed.

(Screenshots and savegames are worth their weight in gold. Seriously. Send me the electrons.

Thanks,

Ken

[A Canadian Cat]

One other observation about mortars: most CMBN maps are wayyyyyyy too open -- you can see right through copses of trees for hundreds of meters, settlements don't have walls or hedges, map designers didn't bother to put in gullies, ditches, elevated road or railbeds, etc. etc. that would otherwise break up the LOS. When most of the map can see most of the rest of the map, this massively favours the player with the most lethal ranged weapons, whether 88s or mortars.

Oh man and it can be unexpected too. I am currently in a QB where I moved a platoon supported by a few tanks into a forested area after an artillery barrage only to find a Stug 800m away can see through 200m plus of forest and pick my guys off. Yes, it is true I could have checked that but I did not because it looks like a forest so I figure it would behave like a forest - silly me.

After this I am going to be looking for some good QB maps where what you see is what you get. No more see through forests on the billiard table:)

[LongLeftFlank]

Yup, that's all too common an experience. My suggested fix is simple: go into the Editor and everywhere you have a forest tile with trees that's adjacent to non-forest (i.e. receives sunlight), drop in a randomly selected and "gapped" Bocage, Low Bocage or Hedge segment to represent the bushes and smaller trees that would in RL make LoS through this "forest edge" terrain spotty at best in summer. The gap is there to allow infantry movement.

Suddenly you will find you are playing a VERY different game. Uberkitteh fetishists and on map mortar abusers will howl with dismay when they actually have to think hard about where they place their "superunits". And suddenly the Allied tactics of seeking flank shots from multiple angles against solo Tigers don't seem so futile.

I swear to you: 9 out of 10 of the supposed "Fatal Flaws" © in this game (and CMSF) are simply a function of hasty map design. Mapmakers: spend a little time at ground level with the Target tool. Is the visibility meeting your intent? Does it seem like June? in Normandy? Throwing down buildings, roads and trees on a Google Earth footprint ain't enough.

[Holien]

Holien, if this is happening to you, please start a thread (or direct me to an existing one) which has examples of this occurring. If it is still a problem, perhaps it can get looked at and fixed.

(Screenshots and savegames are worth their weight in gold. Seriously. Send me the electrons.

Thanks,

Ken

When I notice it again I will post. I did not realise it was a bug? Just something I have seen in a few games and sometimes it works and others you just have to keep jiggling...

[umlaut]

most CMBN maps are wayyyyyyy too open -- you can see right through copses of trees for hundreds of meters, settlements don't have walls or hedges, map designers didn't bother to put in gullies, ditches, elevated road or railbeds, etc. etc. that would otherwise break up the LOS. When most of the map can see most of the rest of the map, this massively favours the player with the most lethal ranged weapons, whether 88s or mortars.

In my experience that is certainly true for especially the QB maps provided with the game. I´ve never played any of them because I think they look horrible - like the designers had been using about one hour creating each map.

The majority of them look mostly like parks with randomly scatted houses.

They might have "balanced" terrain suited for H2H QB´s - but they don´t look anything like Normandy 1944 to me.

[Redwolf]

Cover seeking and cover has been tweaked some since the initial release of CMSF and is noticeably improved since those early days, though it remains a work in progress. However, I disagree that 1 to 1 modeling is inherently futile at CM scale -- it requires a lot of micromanagement, true, but to my mind delivers more satisfying results than more abstract tactical games like ASL, CM1 or PC. YMMV.

Is that in reply to my post? I never said that 1:1 is inherently futile. But what we have here doesn't work right for defensive positions, and no matter how much time you invest invest playing what we currently have for an interface you can't fix it simply as a player.

[LongLeftFlank]

My apologies if I put words in your mouth. As I've noted subsequently, I believe most of the solution lies in better map design. If you don't want to be selective about maps or muck about in the Editor, then I suppose you're right -- not much you can do as a player. But if it's any consolation, I strongly suspect you will see major improvements in the CW module.

[LukeFF]

Holien, if this is happening to you, please start a thread (or direct me to an existing one) which has examples of this occurring. If it is still a problem, perhaps it can get looked at and fixed.

M1919s and M1917s are notoriously finicky for being able to fire from behind a hedgerow. If I get a save file that shows this behavior I'll also upload it.