The verdict is in

umbro · 11-15-2008, 06:27 AM,

Hawk Kriegsman Wrote:A 115 rounds hitting a hex over 6 minutes is quite possible.
Take for example the German 81mm at which had a ROF of 10 to 12 rounds a minute.
In 6 minutes that is 120 rounds for a 2 SP unit. For a 6 SP unit that is a whopping 360 rounds. Both over the 115 in your above math.

Hi there Hawk:
I agree with you that there should be a difference in the chance for 120 rounds and 360 rounds - but that is not how the rule works.
Certainly it's possible, most things are - however, is it likely? Once your 6SP unit has expended nearly 2 tons of ammo in the first six minutes of the battle what is it going to do for the rest of the week? Also, you assume that every round fired is a live round, further you assume that a hit with a 81mm mortar will destroy the vehicle (and that all vehicles are equally destroyable).

Hawk Kriegsman Wrote:At the other end of the spectrum is the 155 long tom which fires a round about every 90 seconds.
This is only 4 rounds per 6 minutes per 1 SP. However if you did get hit by this it would be lights out.

You are again correct that if a hit was achieved it would have the desired effect, however with only 4 rounds impacting the chance of a hit is .18%. Lets assume that any 155mm round within 10m kills the target the chance would be 4% - much closer. However, to get there we had to use the biggest gun. This rule applies to all indirect fire.

Hawk Kriegsman Wrote:I think the 5% is an approximation. It is designed to give armor something to think about when driving through artillery barrages. The old rule was no good as armor had nothing to fear from artillery.

Again I agree with you that that the 5% is an approximation. However, the rule is the same as in the TS days, the only thing that changed was that the % went from 2.5% (I believe) to 5%, and that some armoured units were considered to be too armoured to be vulnerable.