self propelled arty now practical?

[Letalis]

Big +1, heck I think that's a 2!
Anything that adds both realism and organization to the game is

Even a Yak could be useful in leveling a town with a little teamwork as spotter. There would also be a little incentive for IL-2s to "scud hunt" farther out from airfields.  

As far as implementation...the current spawn proximity would instantly put a town at risk to barrage from some arty types.  A persistent group could simply respawn ad infinitum and level a town without leaving the spawn- they should work for that opportunity. Conversely, the attacker should not be spawn-camped.  

Fix #1 is to reduce arty range. Less realistic tactically perhaps, but more realistic strategically. The x2 fuel burn factor works very well. The problem of spawn camps stays.
Fix#2 Is much harder. I call it the "FLOT" system.  (FLOT stands for "Forward Line of Own Troops")  In RW it is a fluid line in the sand that serves as a good wag for "friendly territory" vs "enemy territory."  In AH I propose the FLOT being drawn directly between one friendly base and the adjacent friendly base along a front.
To deter spawn camps...
GVs would be able to spawn anywhere with the following restrictions:

1. Outside a given radius of an enemy base.
2. Must be to the rear of the FLOT a given distance.  The FLOT would be defined as a series of lines drawn between adjacent friendly bases. This measure would prevent magical spawns to the enemy's rear. If an enemy base is surrounded, spawns can happen 360 deg outside the specified radius. In other words, the FLOT is gone, only the "no-spawn radius" would remain.
3. Outside a specified radius from enemy GVs.

(GV missions could be built with specific spawn coordinates for different groups as determined by the creating player, allowing for mass flanking maneuvers instead of simply getting spawn-camped en-masse.
GVs would be able to "land" anywhere they would be allowed to spawn in as defined above.)

Flak units (IE German 88s) would add a touch of realism to the game but would need to be restricted. Setting the right fuse would be an art but a mass buff raid at 20k could be decimated in minutes by a large group of nme players continually spawning 88s repeatedly along the buff flight route.  The fix?  Perk the 88 (both flak and arty versions) and only allow the flak version to spawn within a given radius of the nearest friendly base.

[AWwrgwy]

This AWwrgwy... 

True. But you have people dreaming of hitting tanks, out of line-of-sight, in Land Mode?

 


wrongway

[gyrene81]

True. But you have people dreaming of hitting tanks, out of line-of-sight, in Land Mode?

 


wrongway

never know what people are going to try...anything is possible in toonville.

[Skyguns MKII]

True. But you have people dreaming of hitting tanks, out of line-of-sight, in Land Mode?

 


wrongway

lets say you have a tank by a barn using cover. tanks want support and arty starts firing. may not hit him until ten shots later but it will sure scare the @#$% outta him and make him move into the open.

[Oddball-CAF]

True. But you have people dreaming of hitting tanks, out of line-of-sight, in Land Mode?
 
wrongway

You don't have to direct hit 'em. Maybe you might track one or more and then be able
to maneuver around 'em. 

[Wildcat1]

lets say you have a tank by a barn using cover. tanks want support and arty starts firing. may not hit him until ten shots later but it will sure scare the @#$% outta him and make him move into the open.

That's one of the main goals of arty. Scare the hell out of them so they expose themselves. That or obliterate their cover, but we can't do that......

...yet

 +1 from me 

[Devonai]

I realize that it would be that much more time consuming to code, but I would love to see a specific "spotter" category with a way to attach yourself to an arty piece.  I think it would be fun to earn, say, 10% perkies for each gun you spot for.

On a more general note, I am all for any idea that increases the utility of the Jeep.

[iron650]

I realize that it would be that much more time consuming to code, but I would love to see a specific "spotter" category with a way to attach yourself to an arty piece.  I think it would be fun to earn, say, 10% perkies for each gun you spot for.

On a more general note, I am all for any idea that increases the utility of the Jeep.

Right-click or will we get to throw smokes to mark? The M8's (along with other half-tracks) utility might also improve.

[321BAR]

come on guys. my squaddie rebel and i spotted my 8"ers on the notorious V85 spawn point battle you can do it with a 105 too

[Shiva]

There are multiple gv's that are already in game that have a variant with a artillery piece on them.  The M4 Sherman, M3 halftrack, SdKfz 251, and even the Panzer IV all have variants with howitzers or direct fire cannons.

For SPA, there's the SU-122 (T-34 chassis), the Sturmpanther, the different flavors of Sturmtiger, then you have tank destroyers -- SU-85, SU-100, Jagdpanzer IV, Jagdpanther, Jagdtiger ... I doubt that there's been any tank put into production during WWII that didn't, at some point, have someone mount an artillery piece or anti-tank gun on; the question is just finding variants that went into decent production numbers. For the Germans, though, a lot of the howitzer conversions were on PzKpfw II, III, and 38(t) chassis that we don't have in the game, so they would need to be created from scratch. And several of the PzKpfw IV variants used an extended-length chassis that would require some modeling changes on top of the armor differences.

[Shiva]

Flak units (IE German 88s) would add a touch of realism to the game but would need to be restricted. Setting the right fuse would be an art but a mass buff raid at 20k could be decimated in minutes by a large group of nme players continually spawning 88s repeatedly along the buff flight route.  The fix?  Perk the 88 (both flak and arty versions) and only allow the flak version to spawn within a given radius of the nearest friendly base.

The idea that was rolled out previously to require setup and teardown time for towed artillery is a good one; you could vary the perk penalty for 'bailing' depending on whether the gun was mounted or deployed when the player bailed -- abandoning an emplaced artillery piece would lose full perks, while bailing on one packed up for transport could be counted the same way as bailing from a tank in friendly or enemy territory.

[legomiles]

  i love the idea!!!

[AHTbolt]

All M4 tanks were also used in the arty mode all tanks from the M4s to the M60A3 carried gunners quadrants and a small plotting board.

[Krusty]

Here's the solution to self-propelled arty....







When you get where you're going, you set up and it hoists a balloon like this over your point. Your gunner position is actually aimed from the basket, like the 8" guns on the ships are aimed from a control point rather than the turret itself. You can see further to spot where your shells land.

If the trees are some 150 feet (last I recall?) these balloons should go up to 300 feet. Maybe 500 feet? Enough to see where shells are landing some 8-10 miles away (not sure on realistic ranges, fill in with whatever value is right).

This does a number of things to keep these possible arty setups ballanced.

1) The balloon is highly visible. GVs can spot it and drive towards it, shooting the GV at the base, planes can fly over it and spot it easily. It's a nice "look here!" sign.

2) The gunner control position in the basket simulates the radio headset used by the spotters to change the firing coordinates. That in conjunction with the Land Mode firing system (angle, range, etc) will let you walk rounds in as long as you're unharrassed.

3) The arty would be mostly soft-skinned and easy enough to strafe/kill. Even if the gun itself is made of metal the crew manning it is not. This is a stand-off bombardment idea, meant to park miles from a town. That is your protection. That is your safety. It isn't meant to take out tanks (although we've seen shore batteries and ship guns can do that with a lot of practice) and it won't work so well on in-close targets because flatter trajectories will be harder to aim over obstacles (whereas longer ranges go up and lob downward on the target, avoiding small hills and trees, etc). Because your perspective is so high it will also be hard to aim short ranges. This keeps it honest, prevents some of the possible abuses in the MA of the system.

4) Rounds are limited, and there's still a reload time and a "fire, adjust, fire" preliminary ranging to help you get a mental idea of how far the target is from your current viewpoint. You would have to get a teammate to give you supplies

5) You'd have to stop, park, turn engine off, and something like opening doors (see PT boat, open the bomb bay doors just deploys rocket launchers) to send up the balloon. Until balloon is up you can't jump to the gunner position. Nothing overly long, just maybe a 5-10 second animation.


Done this way you get arty deployments, you get the longer ranges, but still the gameplay balance of being stationary, being vulnerable, yet giving that hope and potential to be very effective. Overall a good balance IMO, with the way I've described my idea here.

[Skyguns MKII]

Here's the solution to self-propelled arty....


(Image removed from quote.)

(Image removed from quote.)


When you get where you're going, you set up and it hoists a balloon like this over your point. Your gunner position is actually aimed from the basket, like the 8" guns on the ships are aimed from a control point rather than the turret itself. You can see further to spot where your shells land.

If the trees are some 150 feet (last I recall?) these balloons should go up to 300 feet. Maybe 500 feet? Enough to see where shells are landing some 8-10 miles away (not sure on realistic ranges, fill in with whatever value is right).

This does a number of things to keep these possible arty setups ballanced.

1) The balloon is highly visible. GVs can spot it and drive towards it, shooting the GV at the base, planes can fly over it and spot it easily. It's a nice "look here!" sign.

2) The gunner control position in the basket simulates the radio headset used by the spotters to change the firing coordinates. That in conjunction with the Land Mode firing system (angle, range, etc) will let you walk rounds in as long as you're unharrassed.

3) The arty would be mostly soft-skinned and easy enough to strafe/kill. Even if the gun itself is made of metal the crew manning it is not. This is a stand-off bombardment idea, meant to park miles from a town. That is your protection. That is your safety. It isn't meant to take out tanks (although we've seen shore batteries and ship guns can do that with a lot of practice) and it won't work so well on in-close targets because flatter trajectories will be harder to aim over obstacles (whereas longer ranges go up and lob downward on the target, avoiding small hills and trees, etc). Because your perspective is so high it will also be hard to aim short ranges. This keeps it honest, prevents some of the possible abuses in the MA of the system.

4) Rounds are limited, and there's still a reload time and a "fire, adjust, fire" preliminary ranging to help you get a mental idea of how far the target is from your current viewpoint. You would have to get a teammate to give you supplies

5) You'd have to stop, park, turn engine off, and something like opening doors (see PT boat, open the bomb bay doors just deploys rocket launchers) to send up the balloon. Until balloon is up you can't jump to the gunner position. Nothing overly long, just maybe a 5-10 second animation.


Done this way you get arty deployments, you get the longer ranges, but still the gameplay balance of being stationary, being vulnerable, yet giving that hope and potential to be very effective. Overall a good balance IMO, with the way I've described my idea here.

This is interesting but a bit complex. Iv recently have gotten a new idea however. I noticed that in the LVT-4 The arty is able to fire well beyond its position 2 sight via tank commander when used right. Why don't we just get a modified commander sight. Instead of a circle for example we get something similar to the naval gun sight with its range listings. However we still do need a spotting system and krusty ideas like this, (however i preffer a piper cub ) is whats needed.