Heavy field guns.

Thanks, we'll give them a go

Cool, so this means +9 to hit?Q

I wondered whether to have a house rule of more templates or even a deviation. Will try these living rulebook rules first.

thanks

I don't have the rule book in front of me, but the way I remember this (if I remember correctly) is that +9 applies to the armor piercing die roll, not the hit.  The Hit roll is done as normal, and if successful you get to add the +power value to a second die roll which you then compare against your target's armor rating. So...if you hit, you hit with more power.  Successful armor penetration then results in a third die roll against the damage table.

Another interpretation goes like this:  Let's say the attacking unit is a full battery of three field guns.  You roll 3 dice together to see if you hit the target (1 per gun).  If ALL 3 hit, now you have a Heavy Barrage.  Roll 1 die for armor penetration with the +9 power.  Successful penetration = roll 1 die against damage chart with a +2 for battle damage (because all three guns hit). For me, this seems more intuitive than counting 3 hits with +9 each.  Each individual gun shouldn't be empowered, only a combined hit!

My interpretation is that you would have three attacks at +3, which is still pretty gruesome for those downrange. The thought of replacing an Assault Tripod with a pile of black confetti does have its appeal

Historically, since gunpowder came along, more battlefield casualties have been caused by artillery than by anything else, and in WWI by everything else combined. (Disease is not factored into this.)

I have little issue with the terrific power of artillery except that dominant artillery can make for a dull game. Being in a hidey-hole with a map, a set of really good binoculars and a radio; feeling the sky ripped open by the out-going and seeing (and directing) the incoming; even when the bad guys down range are abstract targets, is very far from dull. Directing 155s was the greatest rush I have ever felt, but I don't think it can be reproduced on a gaming table.


I would think any "rules change" would be to require all artillery batteries to fire separately. After all, it is not possible for a landship to fire all its weapons in one volley.

So we had a play the other week (story is still coming...) and found that both types of attack seemed fairly similar, one made it pretty much an auto hit and one made it an auto wound (then rolls on the damage chart).

I found myself wondering something different. What about using the barrage number of the weapon to give you the size of the template (barrage 3 = 3"), but give each weapon its own template. So a battery of 3 would have 3 x 3" templates. These templates must be connected as they fire as a barrage.

You would still only make one roll to hit as they are firing as a battery, and they would still each have their own power rating and would better give the effect of a large salvo of artillery fire hitting. It would mean that artillery was still really useful, but not a complete game winner.

It may sound too much like other systems, but it could also have a deviation if a to hit roll is missed.

Just some thoughts, be gentle with me...  I bruise easily!

Yep, I'm happy to put up the power & was erring on the side of caution by leaving it low, I actually thought with this option that all power should be put up by 1 for barrage weapons OR the artillery ammo type has its own rating, similar to the anti tripod armour being different to HE.

Multiple templates on a target would be hit by each template, but would need multiple rolls to wound. 

so with no real military based knowledge, my thinking is that more artillery should give you more chance to hit (more explosions = damage over a broader area, hence the multiple templates), the roll needed to hit shouldn't change, so yep, your right this could minimise the chance to hit. The only way I see to make it easier to hit is to give +1 for each extra artillery piece in the barrage, so 3 artillery pieces would gain +2 (don't get one for the first), but is that making it too complicated.

damage will still get the normal power bonus (heavy artillery gets +4 I think), so they are quite deadly already, and if multiple templates cover the figure it gets multiple hits, so that could be 2 or more hits with damage +4 each time.