Artillery

[KarateDoug]

Ive searched the threads and found nothing on this.

Personally i'm not a big fan of the current arty. takes too long and too many people opt out of commanding.
Also if I'm correct, the correct procedure of a Platoon attack is, Recon an area, Arty it, send in the armor and than finish it with inf. With the current layout this is not even an option.

Option A:
Installing Arty cannons at the main that would be manned by a squad and able to be called in like a JDAM, by an SL in the field. Limiting how many rounds can be used in a designated set of time. Or Limiting the amount of shells that can be used in one complete round and they cannot be reloaded once fully expended. Hopefully this ould inspire the team to not waste it on useless low threat targets

Option A would be good for 2 reasons. 1, A squad would be there to guard the main and be able to call it in for the team while stationed there.

Option B:
Have it as a build such as a 50cal turret, but only 1 FB having this option. Giving the team the freedom of placing it where they feel fit. Maybe letting it fire almost unlimited rounds until the enemy disposes of the cannons.

Ive seen Big Gun cannons on certain maps like Assault on Mestia, but they don't aim in any effective direction.

[ShootToKill235-[GS]]

I like option A...

It could be something like BFBC but more realistic

[Ccharge]

like the idea but thats taking yet another squad off the field for your team. Infatry is already streched on alot of maps. adding this would completly destroy the roll.

[Rudd]

As stated, it would take a squad away from the front compounding the problem that there are only 32 people on a team.

The DEVs have made a mortar model, I expect in .9 there will be a move to some kind of mobile mortar emplacement. there will hopefully be around 11 4km maps by then, making arty/FSGs more important.

[McBumLuv]

Having played FH2, I have to say I'd love to see player based Artillery using a compass and elevation/distance nobs. You'd have to limit the ranges to avoid Main base shellings, but otherwise it would be a very good and team oriented system.

Plus, making it destroyable would add another aspect to base defense and attacks, especially in insurgency.

EDIT* It's not asking to take 2 or 3 of the players at most off the field and putting them into support groups, especially when you consider how important support is on the battlefield.

[Rudd]

EDIT* It's not asking to take 2 or 3 of the players at most off the field and putting them into support groups, especially when you consider how important support is on the battlefield.

But why do that when you could give it to the commander, keep 2/3 people in the fight and give the commander some more stuff to do all in one stroke?

[McBumLuv]

Why not have both?

Actually, I'd prefer smaller mortar support to be available for player use, whereas the Commander get's an even larger array of support with smaller spawn times.

I mean, I agree large howzter teams aren't exactly doable with 32 players, but mortars should at least be usable.

[RHYS4190]

i think every one want's some kind of Artillery support not a system that going to be used constantly in game but some thing that people can call on to root out those tough fortified enemy positions that just can't be taken by conventional means.

[Ccharge]

Everybody loves a good artillery strike but whats the point if theres nobody there to capture the objective?

There would need to be a way to keep the same amount of inf in the battle or this wouldnt be useful.

[McBumLuv]

With small mortars, you're not asking to take even a strong minority off the field, just maybe 1 or 2 guys. How it works (whether it's deployed at Firebases or is a main base static) can be thought up of later, though.

Heavy artillery, Jdams, and other such off map support should go through the Commander when appropriate, though.

[KarateDoug]

Ok taking guys off the field is not good. Good point. Make it only require like 2-3 players to work this stuff. Normally there are 2-3 noobs sitting at main anyhow. No difference

Also just so that players are in the field and ready to push on the obj, make it to where it can only be called from say....250m or slightly closer away from the target?
The SL calls it in, than the arty team accepts the order and sends it down range. How many people irl does it take to run a howitzer? 3 if I'm right.

Ive heard rumors of mobile arty being worked on, maybe this idea will help with that in some way.

The main point i'm trying to make is that a text book platoon attacks first step is to Arty a position before assaulting it. We cannot do this as you know. I mean, we could, provided everyone sits at main for the first 40 min

[Conman51]

As stated, it would take a squad away from the front compounding the problem that there are only 32 people on a team.

The DEVs have made a mortar model, I expect in .9 there will be a move to some kind of mobile mortar emplacement. there will hopefully be around 11 4km maps by then, making arty/FSGs more important.

i agree with rudd

your just going to take away another thing from the commander

i could see people shooting this of like a round every minute w/o any coords, just random shots causing tks and maybe, by luck hit an enemy- just like BF2 arty

[M_Striker]

I like option B. I always wished we could have an artillery placement just like a .50 cal. It wouldn't take a squad off the field, and it would add more meaning to what the "firebase" is always called.

[GR34]

We need an Air Burst round as well as a barrage

[Ironfist7997]

adding a mortar could help rejuvinate the commander role, with he/she having access to both mortar and arty.

mortar for inf/soft targets - faster reload time

arty for hard targets - normal reload time

could the mortar be an animated static? ie when u look at the mortar pit u can see the mortar crew
could the mortar be used to fire smoke missions?

[Ironfist7997]

i guess player crewed arty will only be possible once EA removed that large piece of wood from their a**es and give us 128 players per map

[wookimonsta]

Meh, I doubt its gonna happen. I also doubt that its just a number thats hardcoded in. Probably the game is designed to take 64 people. Changing it to a 128 could, depending on how they programmed in the first place, take major changes to the game.
I mean there have been hacks for this for years now: http://www.halflife2.net/forums/archive ... 84142.html
but I think there might be issues with server stability and to be honest I have no idea if these work or if they just look like 128 players can connect. I can't imagine DICE or EA would not allow 128 players out of spite. if it was doable I imagine they would've added it in 1.5, perhaps even as an unsupported feature.

i guess player crewed arty will only be possible once EA removed that large piece of wood from their a**es and give us 128 players per map

[Arnoldio]

FH2 system is pretty cool....maybe if we had mobile mortar...

[Ccharge]

Well maybe instead of firing single shots every little while why not make it like 6 rounds are fired in the space of lets say 18 seconds and this could simulate a artillery barrage. Then there could be a mode to fire in single shots but it takes a great deal longer to reload then the space between barrages like 10 seconds but it has more single fire shots then barrage shots.

Make artillery a one man system and maybe two peices on a map with the rest of the team spotting for them.

[mockingbird0901]

How about making it like in BFV, where the engineer had it.
Only here it would be a special, very limited kit, like the sniper or whatever, and the mortar was your main weapon, and you had a very low amount of ammo.
I'm thinking somewhere between 6 and 10 regular rounds, and not too good accuracy, so you would need more then one mortar to make it effective, not like in BFV where you could hit a tank dead on each and every time if you just knew where to aim, no matter the range.
And then perhaps different types of rounds, with maybe one or two test rounds, and some smoke, like said before.

And then because of the limited accuracy, you would need them to bee quite close, to make them hit anything at all. But then you would have the fear of somebody killing the mortar-crew, and stealing their kit...
*imagining insurgents raining mortar-shells down on on USMC with their own mortars*
So that would mean you NEEDED somebody to protect them.
(Would be SO much worse then loosing a noobish sniper, wouldn't it.
Bet you could get banned for less)