Artillery

[Tank-Ace]

Seeing as we're getting a spotter aircraft, I think the time is right for some artillery to be added. Perhaps the 15 cm Kanone 18, and the 155mm Gun M1.

With ranges of 15.2 and 14.4 miles, respectivly, these guns would be sufficently ranged to hit any base from the spawn, yet they would lack the ability to shell a target from a friendly field in 99% of the situations. To put things in perspective, their range is just a bit over 1/2 of a sector (15.2 and 14.5 miles, compared to the 12.5 miles that would be 1/2 of our 25mile wide sectors)

They would recieve a modified land-gunner mode, that would have an area of variance about the size of a town (if possible). They have to manually adjust fire to be any more precise with the targeting. This means no spawn-camping with a 155mm from BVR without a spotter aircraft (vulnerable). But it will still let them be accurate enough to carpet shell a town without assistance (about the minimum they can have, and still be usefull in groups, since spotting the shell fall of multiple guns is difficult to do). If he clicks on another spot inside that area of variance, it aims at a different random point within that area.

Another option is to give them a land-gunner mode that displays the range and bearing of a selected point, and they then have to manually bring the guns to bear on that target. This would be more accurate against a specific target, but it would be more time-consuming and carpet-shelling would be less effective, since he has to manually adjust the fire of the gun.


They would spawn from the VH of course, and would have a truck or artillery mover attached to them. Deployment of the gun could take several minutes, or be adjusted as HTC sees fit. Ammunition would be limited to 20 rounds without resupply.

[W7LPNRICK]

Would have to be a point potato to get enough interest because you'd need a spotter as well, and how would the spotter AC direct fire other than "Fire for range, 50 yards long, 100 yards left, etc." + learning curve...? maybe...

[FBCrabby]

or... I'll find a nice mountain to climb up to and shell the runway... 

[SmokinLoon]

The best thing HTC could do if they wanted to implement usable artillery in to AH is to utilize a chassis we already have in the game and develop the new gun.  The Sherman 105 me thinks would be the easiest to add.  OR... the M7 Priest.  The chassis is already in the game, only the gun would need to be designed from the ground up (and the upper structure of the Priest).

The M7 Priest might be better suited because of the higher available trajectory and better indirect support ability.  The Sherman 105 was more direct support, iirc.  The range of the M7 Priest is almost 7 miles thanks to its ability to elevate is gun.  This would be great to launch to an enemy field and sit at the spawn point and hurl rounds in to the field or town.  The best bet to make it worth while would be to be able to aim it just like the 8in and 5in naval guns are: click on the map and adjust fire.  Thing is though, having a spotter would be paramount to its success and that does not mean it has to have the Stork to do so, either.   

[skorpion]

LVT-A4.




however..on top of that i say we throw in the M7 Priest and the 150mm sFH german artillery piece.

[Tank-Ace]

Well, a concern of mine is range. Max range for the sFH 18 is only a little over 9k. IIRC, the M2 105mm howitzer had a range just slightly over 1/2 of the M1 155mm. The leFH 18 is about the same I think.

Yeah, still withing firing range of the base strait off the spawn, but that means theres also a MUCH smaller search area for the defenders to cover, and so survival rates would probably be substancially lower.

A Hummel, with the sFH 18 would be workable, since its self-proppeled, and would have no deployment time. Priest might work, although again its range would be rather limiting.

[MAINER]

Seeing as we're getting a spotter aircraft, I think the time is right for some artillery to be added. Perhaps the 15 cm Kanone 18, and the 155mm Gun M1.

With ranges of 15.2 and 14.4 miles, respectivly, these guns would be sufficently ranged to hit any base from the spawn, yet they would lack the ability to shell a target from a friendly field in 99% of the situations. To put things in perspective, their range is just a bit over 1/2 of a sector (15.2 and 14.5 miles, compared to the 12.5 miles that would be 1/2 of our 25mile wide sectors)

They would recieve a modified land-gunner mode, that would have an area of variance about the size of a town (if possible). They have to manually adjust fire to be any more precise with the targeting. This means no spawn-camping with a 155mm from BVR without a spotter aircraft (vulnerable). But it will still let them be accurate enough to carpet shell a town without assistance (about the minimum they can have, and still be usefull in groups, since spotting the shell fall of multiple guns is difficult to do). If he clicks on another spot inside that area of variance, it aims at a different random point within that area.

Another option is to give them a land-gunner mode that displays the range and bearing of a selected point, and they then have to manually bring the guns to bear on that target. This would be more accurate against a specific target, but it would be more time-consuming and carpet-shelling would be less effective, since he has to manually adjust the fire of the gun.


They would spawn from the VH of course, and would have a truck or artillery mover attached to them. Deployment of the gun could take several minutes, or be adjusted as HTC sees fit. Ammunition would be limited to 20 rounds without resupply.

+1 we should have a 2 1/2 truck to go with it 

[mipoikel]

World of tanks style artillery could be fine.

[shotgunneeley]

Here's an AI centered variation:

Each field has three or more large AI artillery pieces placed on the field that are linked to the spotter aircraft that are deployed. When an artillery strike is called, each gun fires three or so rounds into an area within 50 sq. feet of the target. If a gun or all guns are destroyed, then the artillery fire will be less intense or completely unavailable, respectively. The spotter aircraft can point and click once on a target within the vehicle spawn for its home field. Once a strike has been called, that spotter plane must return to a re-arm pad to be able to call another strike. For multiple spotter aircraft calling artillery strikes on different targets, there could be a reload time where artillery strikes are called at the first target and then at proceeding targets one at a time. 

Any form of artillery strikes would be a big deterrence to GV oriented base capture raids without air cover because the spotter aircraft could effectively cover the map room while staying out of range of flakkies.

[Tank-Ace]

Don't really like the idea of semi-AI artillery, personally. Especially since its value as an anti-vehicle weapon is extremely limited, regardless of if there is a spotter (a near-direct hit would be required, and the vehicles won't be stationary), and there are no structures to shell when defending. About all it could be used for would be to shell town in the hopes of killing troops.

-1 to WoT style artillery. No satellite view.

[Skyguns MKII]

World of tanks style artillery could be fine.

aces high is too good for WoT style

[curry1]

aces high is too good for WoT style

Haha good one you are joking right?  The new vehicles system is based off of the WoT style even Hitech said so.

[Tank-Ace]

In that we can controll the turret and and main body of the tank independly from a single posstion perhaps, but the application and coading are almost certianly not based off the WoT system.


Apples and oranges. Yeah, they're both round, but once you get past that, the similarities end.

[SmokinLoon]

Haha good one you are joking right?  The new vehicles system is based off of the WoT style even Hitech said so.

Perhaps the tank commander interface, but it stops there.  Can you pull the quote for that one? 

[SDGhalo]

im all for the M7 priest but we can also add the sexton. there both on the same sherman chassis just a different gun one is a 105mm the other a 25 pounder and you know how the british and commonwealth armies used there artillery.