Matrix Games Forums

Coordinate artillery fire. Why?

If I command my artillery to bombard a target it stops bombarding if one of my troops come up too close to the target area. Correct?

Why should I then make the effort in trying to coordinate my artillery with the assault of my troops (as shown in the video tutorial TM Master 6 - attack on Lommersweiler. Time Win Media Player: 03:12)?
Here, to determine when the artillery exactly stop it´s bombarding?

Maybe I coordinate the temporal beginning of the artillery bombardment, however, it seems unnecessary to determine the end?
My troops are approaching and my artillery will stop it´s bombarding by itself.

So were is the reason for determining the end of bombardment?

What if H-Hour gets delayed--like what happens in the video at 14:40, and you forget to manually reset the bombardment's start time?

By having an artificially long bombardment time (depending on a friendly unit to end it,) couldn't a delay like that coupled with time set to "fast"  mean you might accidentally shoot through all your arty ammo?

I remember one of the tutorials pointing out there's only about 50min of artillery ammo in this scenario (~100rounds per gun at a slow fire rate of 2 rounds/min)

I too noticed the same thing. My solution:

Position the bombard icon over the target thereby showing the bombardment safety box.

Get the coordinates of the safety box

Use the pathing tool to determine how long it would take the assaulting unit to move to the edge of the bombardment box.

“Assault move” takes longer than “Move” so add 5 mins. We know the arty will stop firing if you’re troops move into the box so the 5 mins is a safety margin.

We can now estimate the time the troops will reach the edge of the safety box.

Subtract 20 mins

Artillery unit 1 bombards for 10 mins from time zero to 10.
Artillery unit 2 bombards for 10 mins from time 10 to 20.

The enemy has now had 20 mins of bombardment and the infantry reaches the edge of the artillery safety box.

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Question not answered.

I am still unsure.
Planning the exact start of a bombardment may be useful but due to the security bombard zone I do not now, why to plan the end of a bombardment precisely?

to give the bombardment a longer duration?

@ simovitch,

please note post No. 1

Oh I see what you are saying. You are right, the bombardment will stop but I think Dave was just showcasing the timing ability and we should probably not read too much into it.

However if you have checked 'ignore freindlies' you may well want to carefully time the lifting of the bombardment otherwise your own troops will get plastered.

It's far easier for me to set up a preplanned bombardment than to remind myself to manually call a bombardment when the attacking units are 15 minutes from initiating their assault. It is more work for me since I need to react to timetable changes, but my staff officer has a really bad memory.

Another advantage is that the artillery units are generally fresh if they are assigned to an assault. It's always tempting to use them "one last time" for something else if you haven't preplanned the bombardment.

Ah, I see!

But I have not seen the "aviod friendlies" or how you call it 'ignore friendlies' checkbox before.

Here is the next puzzle!
Why the hell should I uncheck the "aviod friendlies" checkbox??????????[&:]
In what situation would that be a (??good??) choice??? [&:]

ORIGINAL: Templer

Why the hell should I uncheck the "aviod friendlies" checkbox??????????[&:]
In what situation would that be a (??good??) choice??? [&:]

I do it quite often when I don't mind taking a few casualties because a large group of enemy are right on top of my troops.

One of the prime reasons for conducting a preparetary bombardment ( ie one that occurs before the friendlies reach the objective ) is to suppress and disrupt the defenders while your attackers are exposed and hence vulnerable during the assault. Since you can set the AssaultAt time, you can sunc your prep bombardment around that time. Eg If you reckon it will take your forward assault troops 20 minutes to get close to the objective, then consider conducting a slow rate of fire bombardment for the twenty minutes from the Assault At time. Leave the Avoid Friendlies checked and it will lift automatically if your assault troops advance faster than estimated.