Low cost of german arty

[Greybeard]

Hi Gila,

I’m sorry, I probably didn’t explain myself clearly.

Let’s say we have a platoon of mortars and a platoon of SP-guns. The mortars have been stationary since the start of the battle. The SP-guns are moving forward and have been for several turns.

Then at the start of the next turn the FOO spots enemy infantry advancing, and decides to call on both artillery platoons to hit them.

Although the SP-guns had moved last turn, they haven’t yet been moved this turn, so the wait time for the stationary mortars and the SP-guns is the same.

This is unrealistic because IRL arty requires a setup time after moving. When firing indirect, it’s not enough to know where the target is, you also have to know exactly where you are, and orient your guns.

The stationary mortars would be all set up and ready to plot a new target. The new target would correctly take a couple of turns to acquire.
The SP-guns have far more work to do, they first have to establish where they are, create an aiming point and orient their guns, and then they have to acquire the new target. (This is my rough understanding)

In Steel Panthers, when infantry move quickly there’s a moving fast flag set that doesn’t allow them to take full advantage of cover even if stationary in the next turn. I’m suggesting it would be more realistic to use something like that for SP-guns, where if they moved on a previous turn, they don’t just get the same delay as an arty unit that’s been stationary for some time.

I hope that’s a bit more clear

hey there.. one of the reasons I like the WW2 SP game is that you get GPS for mobile artillery years before it gets invented..:whis:

seriously though.. CAMO's artillery... IMHO a good compromise in a game situation.. far better than the 'instant' artillery found is SPWAW (which was a carry over from the SP-3 game engine)..

I think JP's original concern was 'how much' is available when a raw point percent is used.. can get to be so much that artillery smothers the game.. that's why it's important for players to experiment a little, and based upon those results more 'reasonable' artillery allocations can be decided upon..

regarding my earlier comments about a game in progress.. we have decided to toss this one into the 'draw' bag.. and hopefully have worked out some reasonable parameters for a follow-up game.. time will tell..

well.. reasonable artillery anyway.. how about an assault/defend game where the defender gets the same points (27,000) as the attacker?? my idea, I'm the attacker.. expect it to be a tough nut to crack.. call me stupid :)

Cheers!
Greybeard