Question about a Mtn Gun Platoon

[Wiggum]

Hi,

while playing COTA i run into this, a Greek Mtn Gun Platoon with 104 Men but only two 65mm Inf Guns.
Now, why is this unit displayed as a section, i mean with 104 men it should be a company or what ?
And why does this unit not have any Anti-Armour firepower, it can destroy light AFV and tanks with it 65mm guns at close range with HE ammo for sure...or what ?

[Wiggum]

Ok, after looking at this again i believe that only units with AP (Armour-Piercing) ammunition have Anti-Armour firepower.
Is this correct ?

But HE ammunition can destroy AFV's and tanks too, is this possible ingame or can units with no AP ammunition not attack amoured targets ?

[Lieste]

Oh, they can attack armoured units, and as far as I can tell they will get an occasional kill, but it is not guaranteed. What they will definitely do is disrupt the target's actions - I've just finished playing a home-built scenario where a tank battalion was pounded over a short period (but by a lot of artillery) and then close assaulted by infantry. One company disengaged, the rest were trapped by close assaulting infantry and destroyed - took a while for the infantry to rest enough to want to attack - they'd already advanced 10km in less than 24 hours fighting through a Regimental position and were pretty blown, but otherwise in good condition.

Two 65mm mountain guns aren't going to achieve a great deal against a company sized armoured unit, even when they are "light" tanks, mostly because two guns are going to have a really hard time engaging 15-18 tanks.

Further, I estimate the armour defeating capability of a 65mm shell as being less than a 50cal - maybe 10mm or so. There isn't even any significant KE effect of a non-fusing shell as the V0 is so low.

[Wiggum]

Thanks for the answer Lieste !

The manual says:

AArmFP is pretty comparable to Armour; it roughly represents the number and armour-thickness of
AFVs the unit could destroy in a minute of fire at close range in perfect conditions. It is a product of
the armour-penetrating capability of the unit’s weapons and their rate of fire.

Now i understand why this unit with its two 65mm mountain guns and no AP ammunition has 0 AArmFP.
But why are the range rings for Anti-Armour the same like for a Infantry unit with makeshift AT bombs ?
Do they only engage tanks and AFV's that are inside the Anti-Armour range rings ?

And what about the size, can someone explain the logic behind this to me please ?

[Lieste]

On the size:

It probably should be a Gun-section (typical for 2 gun sub-battery grouping), but that would be .. rather than . as a formation icon. OTOH, it also includes the ammunition supply platoon, so could be designated as a platoon ... as the formation name suggests.

As to the unit strength, remember this is a mountain gun section - there is no supply truck or horse drawn wagon - the ammunition is carried (in wicker baskets) by the gun crew and the support platoon - there may also be a gun-defence section included as these are Small-Arms range only, like ACW type cannon.

It also might not be a rational organisation - the Greek Army was not a modern, well trained or equipped force, though neither was the Italian Army in Albania - Using Germans against them could be considered cheating [:D]

(Isn't it more of a COTA question though??, or are you importing these into the Estab for BFTB?)

[Wiggum]

Ok, i understand this...and yes it is a COTA question but the COTA forum is really dead. [;)]

So only one question left:
Do they only engage tanks and AFV's that are inside the Anti-Armour range rings ?
If yes, this unit will be total useless against any kind of tank or AFV.

I just think the guns can attack armored units much farer away with HE ammunition, the question is...will they do it ?
For me this is important, i need to know if they will attack armored units with HE ammunition beyond the anti-armour range rings too.

[Lieste]

They will fire HE at armoured units if given a fire order, also bombard if capable (from memory the 65mm isn't (in game)).

The Greek formations are fairly paltry - there are no formal AT weapons in the XII Division at all, and only 8x 45mm ATG, 4x20mm ATR, 4x 20mm Flak and 4x 37mm Flak (captured) in the 19th Motorised Division.

In this world, a PzI or PzII is a formidable tank... how different barely a month later in the Soviet Union
Of course, even without formal AT weapons, tanks are vulnerable to all manner of misfortunes.

I would like to see the demise of the 4 attack types for the gun, and a handling of ammunition types instead, with the four roles allocated to the ammunition.
This would allow HE ammunition to have an emergency AArm (although except for larger guns this is modest - only a threat to light tanks and half-tracks), or for mixed loads of PzGr(rot) and SprGrHl, or APC and APDS for 6pdr and 17pdr guns, and AP and HVAP for US guns - it would also allow dual use of Heat ammunition as emergency APers ammunition... this is vital to account for modern weapon practices, where M1A1 in ODS for example had mixed loads of M829, M829A1 and M830 (HEAT) for anti-armour use, and used M830 as the only OR round from the tank gun.
It would also be good to move the V0 information from the gun to the ammunition "as fired from gun xx", as the muzzle velocity of HE, AP and HVAP can show considerable variations from the same ordnance.

[Wiggum]

I tried the direct fire order but the unit did not use the 65mm guns at 1,5km (no 65mm ammo used after 15min).
Question is, why ?

Should be quite possible to do:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_de_6 ... odele_1906

[Lieste]

Just checked, the 65mm guns seems to be set in the Scenario Editor as a bombard capable unit... so it should be able to suppress/retreat a light tank company with a bit of luck and a following wind. I still think you have a very optimistic expectation from what is a Victorian Era weapon, and a light one at that.

The behaviour in-game is no different from most of the other light guns/howitzers which lack a formal AT round, and the missing capability is minimal. In some ways the Germans get a rawer deal with the default leIG18, as it has no bombard capability and still lacks any AT ammunition. Their TOE is more favourable, in that there are other units equipped with light AT weapons - both ATR and PaK or FlaK weapons exist throughout the Infantry Regiments.

The Greek light infantry seems to be set-up as mountain infantry - so an anti-tank capability is not of the first importance. Fighting a battle against mechanised forces with such unsuitable troops suggests that you've lost the campaign already

The Mechanised troops are provided a little better with AT weapons - they do at least have a token quantity, but again they are too light and too antiquated to stand against a modern (albeit light) Pz force.

[Lieste]

Hmm I take it back - although the weapon is set as bombard capable (max range 2000m) the unit doesn't have this flag set... Probably not going to get looked at in COTA, as it is relatively unimportant, but once the Estab data is transferred to BfTB it should be easy to fix stuff like that.

[Wiggum]

Believe me, this unit was total useless against a german tank company (Panzer II & III).
They never fired a single 65mm round into them, even if ordered to area fire (direct fire) at 300m distance.

Ok, this unit was not well trained and not experienced. Moral was low also and the unit was moving (but later deployed) as the enemy tanks came closer...
Finally they got a beating by the tanks and were disbanded.

Maybe someone with editor skills can test if this formation will, maybe under perfect conditions, generally engage enemy armour.

[Arjuna]

Wiggum,

Thanks for your posts. Sorry for the delay in replying.

The short answer is that from our research we found this weapon was not capable of effectively engaging WW2 tanks and, more importantly, was not employed to counter them. I admit that there would be a small chance of damaging a halftrack or maybe even a Pz I or II, but they were just not used for that purpose.

[Wiggum]

Thanks for the answer Arjuna !
Its always great to get such informations from one of the developers.