To Counter Battery or not to Counter Battery...

[klanx171]

Personally I dont do CB fire very much as I have way to much else to shoot at but some people swear by it.

Also I have lernt from experience that if your arty is on board then it has to be mobile or it will die.

So at risk of exposing my "secrets" I will explain what I do and why I dont bother doing CB unless its a totally obvious target.

If I cant get mobile arty I get trucks, lots of them and pack the guns into them, also If I can have ammo dumps I will take mobile over not but if its worth it I will get a bigger dump and ferry the guns to it before ferrying them back to their firing positions.

This takes organization so I work on the principle of on/off. One battery or group is firing while another is in transit, and if I have a third then it may also be firing or setting up. This often means shifting targets, or switching who is firing on what but it often pays off as I have watched my opps blasting away at where my guns were.

The only exception to this situation is when the fire is needed and cant be stopped so I will take a risk and keep the gun where it is, sometimes they get popped but sometimes they dont, its a risk worth taking.

I tend to put my guns in hollows, dead ground or in rough or rocky terrain if I can as they provide some protection, trees also but not as much, arty in tress is protected by planes but harder to move around, also I try to stay near roads and keep my gear spaced out in one or a series of battery related arty parks so i know who has what and how much, this keeps things well set and means I dont have all my eggs in one basket.

The main thing I look for in a gun, ammo count, I want duration much more than hitting power although i like hitting power as well. Next is caliber but bigger calibers dont have as much ammo as other and can take to long to load so I aim for the 100 to 120 mm and 40 to 50 rounds of ammo, this means I can reload faster and spread my ammo trucks around more as the time to reload is a bit bigger than guns with lower ammo counts.

The principle behind this, SUPPRESSION not destruction, I want to suppress units, button tanks, as most of the time arty will not destroy but will make it harder to see the thing that will destroy you coming at you.

Except in totally close combat I keep units spaced out as I often forget that the enemy has arty until he starts dropping rounds right on my head so I keep spaced as it prevents the all important clusterf**k that can occur when bunched up.

I dont like to have my units stay close on the assault to the assaulting units, I will keep a distance until they are through and use the arty to support them, to many time i have had an Opp drop rounds right behind the main attack to trust that they will not.

But the reason I dont do CB fire so much is often my opps are doing the same as me and so I know that its not worth the effort and so I concentrate my fire on the fighting.

also if its off board arty my Opp has then I dont always have the bigger calibre arty to do the off board CB fire so I just keep plugging away.

I do manage my ammo by switching of tubes as need be and by keeping lots of ammo trucks about to refill guns, when it works well I will have one ammo truck, dump, box per gun or at worst one per two. If I can I double up ammo supplies per gun so they get reloaded faster (even more important now as the days of one ammo trucks doing all at a time are gone) and then onto the next one.

Another trick I have found is parking my arty right on the edge of the map, I mean the very edge hex, enemy fire often misses as it goes of the map or drops short and if you have rough terrain its even worth digging the guns in as they are almost impossible to hit by planes who dont like the edge of the map very much, so all is needed is a screen of AA to deter choppers or some planes and you can fire away in comparative safety.

If I do have to move I will move fast but only a short hop, either in a clockwise or counter clockwise way so the ammo stays central but the guns (and the smoke they make) moves around, watching the enemy chase smoke is very satisfying

All this on/off, moving around, lots of ammo and edge of map stuff means I can concentrate on the battle and usually dont worry about CB shoots.

The only time when CB is important is when I know the enemy arty has to be stopped or Im a gonner and in mots battles I try to stay down and keep moving my forces with where the arty is well in mind so its only when I am stuck do I think about CB.

If arty starts to land near my main advance i jink left or right by 5 or 6 hexes and most of the time my advance is not in a direct line of attack as its just setting up for a blasting and to many SP players are very good at bringing arty to bear but less are good at adjusting it or plotting ahead.

The hardest person I have every faced at dropping arty on me is Jadpanther who often has had an almost telepathic knowledge of where I was was going to be, often I think he knew what I had and knew the terrain so he could work out a very close guess based on direction, either way I learnt many of my skills from fighting him.

All in all CB is important but I like to use planes for that job more often and keep the arty for the fast moving targets while the planes can hit the slower arty as planes will adjust to whats in the area even if you dont see it on the map while arty will not so I need arty to be where I want it but planes will switch and move if the target has moved so they will often pick up enemy ammo and arty on the fly.

many Opps I have faced are very careful with their arty, they will wait to see what I have and where the attack is before showing their guns, I like to blast away for the first 5 rounds even if I dont know as I can often guess and estimate where stuff will be and if turn zero fire is allowed I will always do it because even if he isnt on the start line all lines up, or close by you can effectively block his main approach or avenues of movement by dropping some turn zero rounds and then making him work around them.

Also I have found that on the front line an Opp is very careful about force dispersal but since I got more into using scouts (or zeroed units) to get forward I have found that behind the lines many players are less careful and its much more tempting to hit their rear even if its not the main fight as it can cause major disruption.

Finally most CB do not hinge on CB fire while the main fight does, so I prefer to keep my fire there and make it count, I have won more than a few battles where my arty got chopped up but my guys were spared so while I keep some units around as a guard often my arty runs amok and has only AA guns and such as protection.

Also if I have units positioned from the start of the battle I do it always in trees or dead ground with lots of spacing, and will not move them even if being shelled as it seems once they break cover they are much easier to spot and more susceptible to damage or suppression so I dig them in well back and spaced out and never in a formation that allows a plane to come in and drop a line of bombs on them, thats happened too many times.

All of this leads me away from CB fire and towards fire on the main body of the fighting or its auxiliary areas and little if any on what arty he has.

Of course these are just my thoughts and there are other ways to do it.

What are yours?