Artillery and Mortars Crews

[Alex]

How would artillery and mortar crews be implemented?
Will you need a full crew to man a gun, or will AI be in place?
I'd like the idea of having a few guys controlling a piece, but what's going to make them cooperate correctly?

 

[VonMudra]

Will be a simple 1 man job. It would be rather bad form to have a game with an already limited number of players, then force 4 players to serve any mortar, or 6+ players to serve each artillery piece. THat would mean, in a server of say, 128 players, just to have a full 4 gun battery operating you would pull anywhere between 8 (for 2 man) to 36 and up players (for realistic size crews) away just to man the guns, PER SIDE. Always remember, when operating a tank, HMG, mortar, etc, you represent THE ENTIRE CREW, and not just yourself.

 

[Kevino]

Will be a simple 1 man job. It would be rather bad form to have a game with an already limited number of players, then force 4 players to serve any mortar, or 6+ players to serve each artillery piece. THat would mean, in a server of say, 128 players, just to have a full 4 gun battery operating you would pull anywhere between 8 (for 2 man) to 36 and up players (for realistic size crews) away just to man the guns, PER SIDE. Always remember, when operating a tank, HMG, mortar, etc, you represent THE ENTIRE CREW, and not just yourself.

so that means when you destroy such vehicles/weapons it counts for more than a single infantry right? (not sure how the scoring or tickets will be implemented)

 

[VonMudra]

If we do a points system, destroying a tank or artillery piece or such would probably grant points. But if points are in, they would mostly just be up to you to assign reason to them. They will not grant you magical abilities or weapons or such.

 

[Roughbeak]

Oh no, this is a catastrophe! I always have wanted a gold Tiger tank! :laugh:

 

[Pjosip]

How about implementing a feature, where a friend can join you as crew in your gun emplacement/tank.

It would be fun to be able to have 1 man driving and another shooting.
And as for gun implacement it could give you a (slight) precision and reloading buff.

Why choose one thing or another, when you can have both

 

[Kevino]

If we do a points system, destroying a tank or artillery piece or such would probably grant points. But if points are in, they would mostly just be up to you to assign reason to them. They will not grant you magical abilities or weapons or such.

mainly the "ticket" side of it, if you blow up a dude in a tank or arty make it worth more than 1 "ticket" as for point, i could care less !8|

 

[Comrade Roe]

Does this mean we'll have 1 person per tank as well? Or is it just because all you'd need to crew the gun itself is one person for practicality's sake, with some spotter out and the field?

For that matter, who will be able to spot for the mortar?

 

[Koenigstiger]

It'd be nice to see gunner and driver positions being able to be filled by other players (of course optional)

As for the Mortar I hope it's similar to RS where you can move around and use it although that's a Japanese knee mortar and I'm not sure if you'd have to be stationary to use the British one.


a spot mechanic would be cool but I think for realism sake it'd be much cooler to just have this one guy slamming entrenched positions with his mortar walking out fire into a trench or a house, etc and his allies giving him the heads up and letting him know where to fire.

So that it wouldn't be some kind of noob tube rather a tool for a skilled player to turn the tide.

 

[VonMudra]

One person for a tank. May make it optional to have two people crew (so if you have a friend you can do it if you want), but they will be equally operable by one man. Again, it is very difficult otherwise to operate a tank realistically if you haven't trained for months on end, 12 hours a day, with the same person.

As for mortars, there will probably be direct fire and indirect systems, with indirect fire being called in by an FO which gives you access to the same view the FO has (not like the FH system where it's an overhead camera). You of course have to be stationary to use any mortar, the kick is rather substantial. Several american GI's thought the japanese "knee mortar" really could be braced against the leg, and consequently broke their femurs, knees, and hips trying to use it.

 

[Koenigstiger]

Only knee mortar in name, you can move around with it essentially ready to fire (albeit slowly) but when you fire it holds you in position and fires away.


If you're going to implement smoke maybe the FO could drop smoke to indicate an enemy position.

 

[VonMudra]

Yep, that's basically how we'd do it. You would have to deploy it (with a deploy animation) and then could fire it.

Problem with FO dropping smoke is that an FO can probably not fling a smoke grenade a kilometer away But artillery/mortars will have smoke shells. Main thing is to offer the artillery the best possible way to range in on a target on their own time (thus not relying 100% on a player to sit there calling shots, though it can be done that way if they have a good FO), but instead give the artillery the FO's viewpoint, and work from there. Probably would make it time out after a minute or so, to encourage the FO to stick around.

 

[Koenigstiger]

I was thinking along the lines of marking a target and then the smoke would appear but as you say the artillery being dependent on that one person may not be such a good move especially if there is a kick from excessive TK'ing and it wasn't even their fault.

*accidentally marks own troops*

 

[LuckyOne]

One person for a tank. May make it optional to have two people crew (so if you have a friend you can do it if you want), but they will be equally operable by one man. Again, it is very difficult otherwise to operate a tank realistically if you haven't trained for months on end, 12 hours a day, with the same person.

Does that mean that the secondary positions (hull gunners, "commanders" etc.) will be filled by a.i.? I don't see how 1 person could effectively control multiple guns at once, unless they would all point to the same spot (kinda useless)

 

[Comrade Roe]

Besides WP and HE, what other rounds might we see?

 

[VonMudra]

Does that mean that the secondary positions (hull gunners, "commanders" etc.) will be filled by a.i.? I don't see how 1 person could effectively control multiple guns at once, unless they would all point to the same spot (kinda useless)

Oh no no, those will have positions of course. It's just, when people talk about "multi-crewed" tanks, they generally refer to separate driving and gunner positions.
[MENTION=1219]Comrade Roe[/MENTION]: WP, HE, Flare for mortars, WP, HE for artillery.