Mortar Targetting

[Argyle]

Can anyone give some advice on mortar targeting?

I have been unable to see the ‘bullseye’ target on the map as mentioned on ET for Dummies.

[FstFngrz]

I rarley see it in game with more than a few people playing, go into an empty server and it will appear. Sometimes in the full servers(10-30) i will see the location appear if I target away from all action. It is a great weapon as soon as that is fixed, especially when your recharge rate is fast and a FldOp is close by.
Get the bind to make the command map toggle from WOLFforDummies, makes it lot easier.

(In the mean time go in as a soldier/mg42 do this: prone/altweapon/jump/jump/forward/forward/sprint/altweapon and that’ll keep ya busy (runnin round with the mg42 zoomed)

[Ifurita]

i made a range card that worked out very nicely. instructions are on thr et 4 dummies site

[FstFngrz]

I saw that(range card) and just went in and started using the weapon.
Using your toggle for the command map and actually being able to see on the command map where the mortars landed helped immensely. I didn’t use the range card, but after using it(mortar) a bit I kinda got the feel for it, when ya can see where they land
You learn quick at 85-90V ya die and the Horiz is just a matter of using your player icon on the command map that has an arrow on it to point where ya want if you dont know.
If you deploy on a slope you can fire kinda like a rocket launcher at least for a lil while.
60-75 will go from back of group to front. (i.e. from allied ammo to bridge). Being able to see where it landed did make all the difference. I was ready to become a morting hoe :bash: , until in the full servers the landing location rarely(like almost never) showed up on the command map.
One thing I do like is that if a covert is close to enemys, then they are visable on the compass and command map, so ya could be behind something and still have targets. If no covert is around you can still use the Fieldops airstike markers thats shows on screen and in the command map to know where he has fired.

i.e. I hope it gets fixed so you can see where they land

[_187_Red]

I also found that I could see every shot land on my own server but only rarely on a public. I thought it might be a problem i have experienced when spotted mines dont appear on the maps.

Anyway, i have drawn up a range card and chose a number of firing positions (usually close to lts route and ammo supplies). From these positions i prepared targetry info for likely enemy concentrations.

Now all i do is go to the spot, align my sights on the bearing (i use the left edge marker to read the bearing, saves calculating where u think centre is) set elevation and fire whenever i see there are enemy in the area (thanks to coverts). It works pretty well but it is let down by the implementaion of the mortar in the game.

Obviously my military experience will show but here are some observations:

The mortar round is much more dangerous to personnel than artillery round of equal calibre. This is due to the fact that the firing stresses on a mortar round are significantly less and the case can therefore be designed to fragment much more efficiently than an artillery shell.

The high trajectory of a mortar round means it arrives in an almost vertical trajectory. This helps create a rounder dispersion of fragments. Artillery rounds (usually fired from greater distances formed egg shaped blast areas with the long side pointing in the direction the round was headed.

So I suggest we make the mortar round more effective than it is.

The greatest number of casualties in artillery barrage are caused in the first 30 secs before troops in the open take cover. Therefore a critical factor in indirect fire support is to call the most weight of fire right at the start. To limit the mortar by a recharge bar makes it farcical. How can one attain that volume of fire? 1 round then enemy know that a mortar has targeted that area and can avoid it cause there are 15-20 secs before next round comes.

I suggest the mortar guy is able to fire a burst of 4 rounds before he needs to top up (personally I would rather he didnt top up at all.)

Without any indication (like I said at top, I dont know why the fall of rounds is marked sometimes) a mortar guy cannot know if he has the range and bearing correct. Small adjustments to a range card wil ltake a lot of experience and an understanding of trigonometry and ballistics.

I suggest we give the mortar guys more input and allow him to see enemy and mortar impacts without requiring the presence of covert or field ops.

I believe these measures will make the mortar more fun and useful. I do not see a mortar ( in its current form being useful in a 6v6 game, it would suck up too much manpower and resources for very little effect). In the m-player game it is difficult to get an interest because it is so hard to use and the XP rewards so few and far between ( I sometimes go pzr for first round then mortar in 2nd or 3rd round with some heavy weapon skills to help me as a mortar man)

I suggest we give the mortar kills more XP points to reflect the hardwork it takes to use this weapon and make it more appealing to users.

I also find that the provision of ammo is too low. If a mortar guys goes empty and goes to the ammo rack then he will empty the rack in order to get his full ammo leaving team with nothing. Hopefully he has an understanding field ops. But i find myself in pub servers frequently with no ammo ( cos I stripped the ammo rack bear 2 minutes ago!!)

I suggest that 1 ammo pack/box equates to a full ammo load out (and/or) the mortar guys generates ammo slowly ( reflect the fact that in an infantry organisation every soldier would carry 2 rounds of ammo for the mortar) (and/or) give the mortar guy a higher starting ammo load.

Well thats my input to this forum on this weapon, hope we see this weapon better implemented in full ET (a shame if it didn’t cos u don’t see this weapon in many games do you!)

[Iamthefallen]

Just a note:
Keep in mind the targetting will be better as the point of impact not showing up on the map after a shot is a known bug and will be corrected for the final release. I think that was in the FAQ or somewhere.

Right now the mortar is very crippled, it has promise and should be a very interesting weapon, but the targeting/aiming system needs some improvement. Compare to panzerfaust which will fire a prefectly accurate highly explosive round no matter the distance as long as there is a line of sight to the target and you’ll see that the mortar isn’t even in the same league.

With a good targetting system (such as map showing what the point of impact will be with current aim) the mortar will be a very good tactical addition and it would be worth setting up a battery of a couple soldiers hitting targets.

fallen

[_187_Red]

True, I didn’t see the targetting issue on known bugs page. However the other concerns remain.

You are of course correct that the PZr is a highly unrealistic portrayal. It has a shaped charge so does not create the amount of splash damage the game depicts. It was pretty limited in range too, so those fantastic rail-gun straight shots from the beach up to the bunkers etc are pure fantasy.

What we need is the ability to strip the beds in the huts and place them on the tanks frontal armour so that they bounce the pzrfausts off without them detonating (like the Russkies used to do in the Battle for Berlin).

So an extra engineer task!!

[senator]

Targeting should be made easier for the mortar soldier, for example he should get some instant feadback were his round will likely strike, otherwise most players will just ignore this class because it’s to difficult to master.
And the ammo rescived from a FieldOps should be increased! When I’m a Lv1 FieldOps and see a mortar soldier crying for ammo I think twice whether I should give him 4 packets = 4 shots (unknowing whether he’s good at his job or whether he’ll just fire them into the mountains) or order an arty strike myself which will place 8 shells right were I want them to go !