Honour Forums

Discuss the Honour system.

1. Great Redoubt
   Member

   I've been spending some more time looking at the rules and have a question about artillery counter-battery fire. Unless I'm missing something it doesn't look like there is a modifier for firing roundshot at unlimbered artillery. It normally takes 3 hits at 4+ to force an unlimbered battery to limber up and move, and it takes 5 to break it and remove it from the table.

   I usually play Russians and the Czar's brigades are well-stocked with 5-stand batteries. It appears to me that if I can use proper sighting of my batteries to work inside the targeting priority rules or use the bouncethrough rules, I can outduel the damned Frenchies and have good success driving their guns off the field. With a single 4-stand battery, counter-battery fire doesn't look like the greatest use of artillery. If I spend a turn concentrating the two 5-stand Russian batteries in a given infantry brigade against a French battery, all I need is 50% success rate at throwing a 4,5 or 6 to blow the target off the field. Those seem like pretty good odds.

   From my reading long-range artillery duels were not the norm. In the rules it appears that it can be a fairly high-probability gambit. Am I missing something?

   I've not had a chance to actually play the rules yet so I would be happy to be corrected.

   Bart

   Posted 2 years ago #

2. Sam Mustafa
   Le Grand Fromage

   Hi Bart -

   Games are often too crowded with better targets for the gunners to be wasting their time on enemy artillery, although I have seen counterbattery fire used effectively as a means of keeping a defender's guns quiet (symbolized by having them keep limber up, which then means they miss a Reaction Phase and can't shoot until they unlimber again, etc.)

   It's tricky for the attacker because it's hard to deliver a concerted attack AND have nice open fields for your supporting artillery... unless you've got a very open table without much terrain.

   Posted 2 years ago #

3. Great Redoubt
   Member

   Hi Sam,

   I agree that in many cases there will be other things for gunners to focus on. I'm just thinking out loud with my rules lawyer hat on, and this looks like an area of possible abuse. Considering that there's no penalty for targeting unlimbered guns, I don't think that it would be a waste of time in many cases.

   I'd say it's more common for gamers to play on a pool table-flat board with a few hills or woods around rather than true undulating terrain.

   Posted 2 years ago #

4. cam_millar
   Member

   My gut feeling is in time limited comp games on the comp tables provided this is unlikely to be a successful strategy (or at least a key strategy in itself).

   You certainly could take out a French battery in a few turns. In fact with time, your artillery could concentrate to destroy all the enemy units if they sat still in the open. But I doubt you would do it in the 8-9 turns of firing you have.

   With artillery units only worth 1 point, destroying them does not much help you break the enemy. Taking say 2 turns to destroy one battery means that around one-quarter of your firing of two of your batteries has only taken the enemy slightly closer to having to take morale tests.

   If you have had to hold back your attack to keep the fields of fire open, it will be hard to then get across the table with enough time to win.

   As Sam points out, what are the French doing while you are smashing their guns and what is the rest of your army doing? What terrain choices would the French take? If you did this today, what would your opponent do next game?

   A player who sits still in the open in front of massed artillery is asking for trouble. Which suggests they shouldn't.

   But admittedly I do not look forward to fighting mass Russian artillery.

   Cam

   Posted 2 years ago #

5. Great Redoubt
   Member

   Hi Cam,

   I wasn't looking at it from a competition-oriented point of view. Tournaments are not my thing. The games I usually play revolve around historical actions or hypothetical scenarios. These will often feature a turn or two of preparatory bombardment to soften up the enemy, and I could see the utility in wiping out a few forward French batteries and then still having a turn or two to pound the infantry before sending the boys in. In a tournament setting it would be different I'm sure.

   As I stated earlier I have yet to play a game, so I'm just working off of what I'm reading and my knowledge of the period. From what I've read it appears that counter-battery fire was less common at long (or roundshot) range because of the low probability of doing much. It looks to me that in certain circumstances it could be more effective than that. I'll be giving the rules a go or two in the new year and will report back when I have some concrete game experience to draw off of.

   Bart

   Posted 2 years ago #

6. Pickton
   Member

   Sam
   If the other player has decidedly less artillery than yourself, it is a very good tactic to lay a couple of batteries to each of the opposite numbers guns, Thus removing in a few moves, supporting fire, part of his line, and allowing manoeuvrings without loss.

   Pickton

   Posted 2 years ago #

7. Sam Mustafa
   Le Grand Fromage

   I agree. If you have artillery superiority, then it's definitely a good tactic to silence the enemy guns. You'll probably force him to limber up, and then he'll get the message and relocate his guns, since he knows that spot is too hot.

   The trick for an attacker, though, is finding the space on the board to do that. Two batteries take up about 8BW of frontage. That's a fairly wide zone in which you can't place any of your attacking infantry or cavalry units. It's quite difficult, unless the board's terrain is wide open, and you can attack at an oblique angle to your guns.

   Posted 2 years ago #

RSS feed for this topic

Reply

You must log in to post.