Quote:
Originally Posted by Imp
These are important because your guns will be away from the front lines for a while.
Call time of 1.5 plus 2 turns to bombard means 6 turns minimum they are not suppressing the front line.
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To be honest I've pretty well given up trying to fire mortars/artillery on the front lines.
With the automatic scatter for the first volley (unless you have a high tech FO spotting) and my incredible luck - I'm not joking or exaggerating when I say close to 75% of the time it scatters toward my units - and the lack of effect suppression seems to have on the AI until it builds to about 50+ I find I hinder myself far more then the AI trying to hit the front lines.
I tend to stick to countermortar/battery and air defense suppression.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Imp
If you do CB using a Batt is a waste unless a tight group.
2 Mortars or guns if they wont reach on target should route & convince to run with the second go in most instances. If they are in rough I would not bother or assign a 3rd gun. If you think did not hit to well or side seems to rally well leaving one gun for an extra turn falling just back from in the position it routed to should stop it recovering.
This is an ideal use for your plane that just has its cannon left send it in on turn 2 so you see it & know its running.
Basically if you are going to CB you need to route it badly enough so it continues running. 2 or 3 guns will achieve this & one will remind it to keep running.
Truth is though I only do it if I am struggling for targets or know its something nasty as arty is much more useful giving my front line an easier ride. Especially if you are a mech force the best defense against arty is to move strike hard & relocate before it hits. If playing foot sloggers all you can do is disperse if you think its coming in trying to get platoon leaders clear as a priority.
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Only on rare occasions have I seen AI controlled mortars/artillery/SAM's collect enough suppression from less then 3 to 6 tubes of anything smaller then 155mm for the crew to rout. I just wish my troops were that steady under fire!
That's probably the difference, I tend to play with infantry heavy forces so running away is rarely an option, and AI indirect fire has an uncanny ability to land at the worst possible place at the worst possible moment, so suppressing it really does have to be a priority.
I rarely play with more then two batteries of off-map artillery on my side, and I pretty much have to leave them to the automatic counter battery routine to deal with the battalions of artillery the AI tends to have. So most of my counterbattery is done with 60mm, 81mm, 4.2"/120mm mortars - not the most effective weapons in the world for it, but all that I have available.