Artillery question

[Faelwolf]

OK, thanks to several threads, I finally have a better understanding of C2, and am having a LOT less trouble getting fire orders in for artillery and mortars. Many thanks to those who have posted!

Now I am trying to figure out how to get on target accurately. I thought that a pre-ordered artillery strike (placed during setup phase) would act as a preplanned bombardment, and be accurate. This has not been my experience, the shells land on one side or the other, and is a waste of shells.

I am also having a problem of my FO calling in a strike later, with the same result. The spotting shells walk in, it appears to be on target, but as soon as they fire for effect, they are off target again, just like the preplanned, and at about the same distance, to one side or the other.

This has happened with all three targeting types, linear, area, and single point. My FO does not move, or lose LoS (though in setup he does not have LoS, so I thought this might be the problem for preplanned barrages). I am not using emergency fire. The mortars seem to be having this problem much less often, but off map artillery has been almost consistent with it, and I can not rely on it at all.

Any ideas?

[Lanzfeld]

Yes I have seen this and made files for BFC to look at. There is something wrong in there and I am sure they are taking a look at it.

[Faelwolf]

So my FO isn't crosseyed?

[Wego McPbem]

Is your FO being shot at? I think that can have an effect on the accuracy of artillery.

[Faelwolf]

No, he is usually under light fire if any at all, I am pretty paranoid about losing my FO. It is also happening during the initial bombardment, so he isn't even in the enemy LoS.

I have had a couple times where he has been hit by friendly fire, along with losing whole squads when fire for effect lands on them instead of on target. This problem has been consistent across several scenarios.

[Jonny(FGM)]

When you say the shells land either side of the target what sort of mission type are you issuing? Line, area or point?

Don't forget WW2 arty wasn't exactly the most accurate thing in the world, if you plot a line or point mission don't be surprised if the shells don't land bang on the point or line, the WW2 tolerences of such arty pieces was a lot greater than they are today.

[Sgt Joch]

As a general rule, you can't expect laser like accuracy as in CMSF. WW2 artillery was less accurate. FOs were using less than perfect maps, estimating ranges on unfamiliar terrain and trying to spot from ground level. Look at the strike from ground level and you will see what I mean. You should get better accuracy when using TRPs.

[akd]

Pre-planned missions should be on target (dispersion might fall off target, but they should not be trying to attack a different target area than selected). A mission following spotting rounds that land on target should also stay on target, if the spotter can clearly see point of impact of the spotting rounds and is not suppressed, hiding, etc.

[Chris Ferrous]

I don't think there can be anything wrong with the mechanics of artillery spotting because, being new to CM2, I actually played the Devon campaign and on the practice range everything was pretty well spot on target on the dummy trenches.

I can only assume that something is happening during your scenarios which is affecting accuracy, but I don't think it can be the mechanics.

[vetacon]

I'm getting some weird aiming issues as well. In one game (in the Road to Montebourg campaign), my Company commander called in an off map arty strike from 3 / 400 yards away and it landed bang on target. Later, using the same asset, a platoon commander, around 150 yds from his target calls in a strike - the spotting rounds falls apx. 200 metres away so I adjust, then the spotting rounds for the adjusted mission are equally far from the target, just in a different spot. The platoon commander has LOS to the target the whole time and isn't under fire - surely he wouldn't proceed with the fire-for-effect command until he sees the spotting rounds hitting the target.

Any ideas anyone? I have save games.

[Sgt Joch]

I'm getting some weird aiming issues as well. In one game (in the Road to Montebourg campaign), my Company commander called in an off map arty strike from 3 / 400 yards away and it landed bang on target. Later, using the same asset, a platoon commander, around 150 yds from his target calls in a strike - the spotting rounds falls apx. 200 metres away so I adjust, then the spotting rounds for the adjusted mission are equally far from the target, just in a different spot. The platoon commander has LOS to the target the whole time and isn't under fire - surely he wouldn't proceed with the fire-for-effect command until he sees the spotting rounds hitting the target.

Any ideas anyone? I have save games.

you should only use "adjust" when you want to change the target. When you adjust, it becomes a new mission. It is normal for the spotting round to be off, let the spotter do his job, mind your own business, should'nt you be commanding troops or something...

[akd]

I'm getting some weird aiming issues as well. In one game (in the Road to Montebourg campaign), my Company commander called in an off map arty strike from 3 / 400 yards away and it landed bang on target. Later, using the same asset, a platoon commander, around 150 yds from his target calls in a strike - the spotting rounds falls apx. 200 metres away so I adjust, then the spotting rounds for the adjusted mission are equally far from the target, just in a different spot. The platoon commander has LOS to the target the whole time and isn't under fire - surely he wouldn't proceed with the fire-for-effect command until he sees the spotting rounds hitting the target.

Any ideas anyone? I have save games.

"Adjust mission" is not meant to be used by the player during spotting; it is there to switch to an entirely new target without having to start the call for fire over from scratch. Observation and correction of spotting rounds is handled automatically between the spotter and the firing unit, assuming that the spotter can see the spotting round impacts (if not there is nothing you can do but cancel the mission).

[vetacon]

"Adjust mission" is not meant to be used by the player during spotting; it is there to switch to an entirely new target without having to start the call for fire over from scratch. Observation and correction of spotting rounds is handled automatically between the spotter and the firing unit, assuming that the spotter can see the spotting round impacts (if not there is nothing you can do but cancel the mission).

OK - I get it thanks. I thought I'd read somewhere that 'adjust fire' was the correct response to spotting round falling miles away - obviously it isn't.

So the only answer to the situation where you see the spotting rounds falling in the wrong place but still hear the "fire for effect" command, is to cancel the mission and start again? If so, that brings me back to the question, why is the spotter saying FFE when he doesn't see the spotting rounds landing on the target?

Thanks for the responses.

[Baneman]

Hmm, how do you "know" if the FO saw the spotting rounds ?

In CMx1, this was abstracted ( as I understood it ) that if a spotting round was fired whilst the FO had los to the target, the mission was then on target.

Are you saying that if your FO can't see the spotting round fall, he can't ( and doesn't ) correct the barrage and it ends up off target ? Do we need to draw a LoS targetting line to where we see the spotting round fall and cancel if it's not in his LoS ? And since there can be more than 1 spotting round, how many that he can't see is "too many" ?

That said, most of my arty mission ( thus far ) have been pretty close to where I wanted, so would appreciate the clarification.

Cheers

[StellarRat]

I've had the same problem. My FO had LOS to a target, was not under fire, and called FFE, every round landed 100 m behind the target! So I'm thinking wouldn't this moron adjust the fire or cancel FFE if he was totally missing? Apparently not, as the whole barrage pummeled an open field. So....I try again, go through the whole calling fire mission process and again I blow up a bunch of cows and turnips! Exact same wrong location was hit again! I think code thought I was indicating a different target hex then where the cursor was pointed to.

[Vanir Ausf B]

If the FO will call FFE regardless of whether he sees the spotting round that could certainly explain it. But that begs the question: should he be calling FFE or should he be requesting another spotting round?

[Offshoot]

I had a situation where the spotting rounds fell maybe 10 or 20 metres from the spotter himself. Idiot then calls 'fire for effect' and the subsequent rounds wipe out his team and a MG team nearby. I'm pretty sure he remained spotting throughout (no one was hurt by the spotting rounds), but he was in a woods so maybe he didn't 'see' the spotting rounds falling on the other side of the tree he was behind. Or maybe he thought they were enemy rounds as they were so close

[Gryphonne]

I've had an FOO with perfect line of sight to target (unsupressed) and LOS to the spotting rounds, miss all three spotting rounds (on board mortars), then call in FFE resulting in my artillery hitting absolutely nothing 200m away from target. Surely in real life he'd be able to adjust a bit better I hope? :')

[gunnergoz]

I've had an FOO with perfect line of sight to target (unsupressed) and LOS to the spotting rounds, miss all three spotting rounds (on board mortars), then call in FFE resulting in my artillery hitting absolutely nothing 200m away from target. Surely in real life he'd be able to adjust a bit better I hope? :')

Ain't calvados wonderful?

[Faelwolf]

Yes, this is the problem, the spotting rounds walk up to the target area, the artillery should be on target, then the shells are landing at least 100m away from the target zone. It is doing it regardless of the mission type. I aim for a patch of woods, I hit the empty field next to it, or sometimes even my own troops instead.

I don't expect smart bombs, but I do expect that with having a full LoS the whole time, that it shouldn't be landing so far away, and on several occasions, landing on my own troops (one time including the FO) Preplanned hasn't landed on target yet at all, and it always seems to be the same distance off, and generally to the right so far about 70-80% of the time. (Roadblock Scenario)

I am a noob, so didn't know if it was me screwing something up (which is why I posted), but it looks like there may be a glitch somewhere.

[StellarRat]

Yes, this is the problem, the spotting rounds walk up to the target area, the artillery should be on target, then the shells are landing at least 100m away from the target zone. It is doing it regardless of the mission type. I aim for a patch of woods, I hit the empty field next to it, or sometimes even my own troops instead.

I don't expect smart bombs, but I do expect that with having a full LoS the whole time, that it shouldn't be landing so far away, and on several occasions, landing on my own troops (one time including the FO) Preplanned hasn't landed on target yet at all, and it always seems to be the same distance off, and generally to the right so far about 70-80% of the time. (Roadblock Scenario)

I am a noob, so didn't know if it was me screwing something up (which is why I posted), but it looks like there may be a glitch somewhere.

You're describing the exact problem I encountered and I'm not a noob. I don't think you screwed up unless you called "emergency" fire. I would think that an FO would at least call in a cease fire if the FFE is way off target or call an adjustment in to correct the FFE while it's in progress. If the FO can't observe the fall of shot something is wrong or you intended AND the FO knows that your fire is a SWAG. I do realize that in WWII the arty sometimes was way off the mark even if the spotting rounds were OK, but to not even correct seems a bit odd. Usually, getting arty to land correctly was just a matter of being willing to spend the time to correct the spotting rounds BEFORE calling FFE.

IMO: It's either a bug with the aim point or a problem with AI that controls FO behavior. Either way it's an issue.

[Offshoot]

Although I have seen off-target artillery strikes where one would have thought they should be more accurate given conditions, I should say that every single pre-planned strike I have done has been remarkably accurate and most of those called in-game also.

If anyone wanted to do tests, it would be useful to know how artillery strikes are handled by the game. Are spotting rounds actually used to adjust on-map co-ordinates or are they just used to check whether the spotter can see them and then this factored into something like an accuracy bell curve? Or maybe they aren't used at all?

I do agree that it doesn't seem like common sense that a spotter would call for fire for effect without having seen any spotting rounds. I would prefer that the mission just took longer to get to fire for effect and used up more rounds in spotting than that it was dumped prematurely way off-target.

[StellarRat]

Specially if the last spotting round landed on top of him!

[Blackcat]

I have a had the occasional barrage go adrift by upto 200m or so. At the time I put it down to a LOS issue from my spotter to the target as each time the LOS was marginal (a grey line or a blue line to just one spot but when clicked the tarrget line jumped sideways a bit to where the spotter couldn't actually see. I don't know if my assumption is correct or whether there is a nasty little intermitant bug.

[Glukx Ouglouk]

Although I have seen off-target artillery strikes where one would have thought they should be more accurate given conditions, I should say that every single pre-planned strike I have done has been remarkably accurate and most of those called in-game also.

For pre-planned strikes at least, there seems to be a bug that specifically affects line targets (but not point or zone targets). It's been confirmed to be under investigation by BFC.