Ranged direct fire in WWI

[Volcano Man]

Sorry about the delayed response - busy here as usual.

Since its 0330 here, I can't make a very detailed reply, but basically (and this may have already been explained) --

The ranged-fire reduction does increase over range so that, for example, at 2 hexes you get the first ranged-fire reduction (as defined in the PDT data), and then it continues to be reduced for each hex beyond that. 

That said, this ranged-fire reduction has nothing to do with trajectory of shells, it simply has to do with the fact that if a target is further away (we are talking about 2000m and beyond here) then a target is simply harder to hit due to natural dispersion of rounds, and environmental conditions, and general difficulties with aiming. This is to make sure that fire at 2km is not the same effectiveness at <= 1km, and not the same effectiveness at 5km. Certainly though, in WW2 you could say that this ranged-fire reduction value could also take into account the loss of penetration for KE ammunition over distance against hard targets, but its all abstract of course.