Artillery Ammunition

[Schweinewitz]

Hello everyone! :ciao:

I'm new to the Napoleonic Battle series, so please excuse my perhaps noobish questions. Looked for answers in the several help documents that come with the game but couldn't find proper info.

ATM I'm playing the Goldberg scenario from Campaign Leipzig, French vs AI. Took Goldberg, pushed away the Russians from the Wolfsberg etc. So far, so good. Now, at turn 52, my artillery has no more ammo. I mean, ALL of my artillery batteries AT THE SAME TIME, even those that were released just some turns ago and weren't able to fire a single shot up to now.

OK, so how's artillery supply represented in the game?

For my infantry there are plenty of supply wagons left, I even captured a number of Russian ones. All of them are placed near the front line so that the majority of my units are in supply range. Seems that the wagons do not supply artillery, right?

If that's the fact, why is all artillery without ammo at the same time? Is there a kind of 'ammo pool' from which all batteries are supplied so if that 'pool' runs empty the guns remain silent? :hmmm:

 

[KEYSTONE07950]

Check out the isolation effects optional rule in the main program help file.

From the user manual:
When an Isolated Artillery unit fires, it may become Low or Out-Of-
Ammo. The Artillery unit will become resupplied when it becomes non-
Isolated, unless the Artillery supply level for its side is zero.

 

[Schweinewitz]

Thanks for the reply, Keystone!

In this scenario I had not activated the isolation effects (in the optional rules), so this cannot be the reason for my problem. Also all artillery units are concerned on the same turn, I think not all of them can be isolated. In fact there was no note before that one of them (or all) is low of ammo.

 

[Lord_Valentai]

If you look in the terrain information bar you will see it say Ammo and a number. That is the total number of artillery shots you can fire. The only way to gain more is to get reinforced. Having batteries captured decreases your amount.

Unless you are using the optional rule each battery (regardless of size) uses one shot per firing. When it reaches zero you can't fire more artillery.

There's no supply wagons for cannons like infantry. The designers decided it would create too much extra complexity so it's abstracted.

 

[Schweinewitz]

Well, it makes no sense for batteries that haven't fired a single shot to run out of ammo from one turn to the next. But thanks anyway for the helpful info! Gameplay and rules are complex and there may be more details I have to learn yet; although there are some strange rules and the AI is not the best I really like the game.

 

[Lord_Valentai]

Overall I think it's a pretty good system. Infantry fire one sort of shot, and pretty much they all have the same types of weapons within the army. With artillery though not only do you have up to 5 calibres being used, you have different types of ammunition such as roundshot, grape and cannister. It wouldn't make sense to add in artillery supply wagons because that would also be assuming that one size fits all for cannons. Not only that but it'd create a nightmare of additional units. At Waterloo for instance you'd require at least 50 more artillery supply wagons and that just makes things unwieldy. Overall, this system isn't so bad.

If you have any questions about rules let us know. Some of them are a bit odd and counter intuitive at times.

The AI is...lacking. Even compared with the older Talonsoft games in the 90s the AI in the HPS games is almost always mentally challenged. It does stupid things like stick cavalry in swamps or rush artillery at you so you can capture it. So long as you understand this though it's fine.

Playing against other people though...that's the real skill. This forum has a lively competitive game network, and that's the best way to enjoy the game. I strongly suggest trying a game or two against another person, you'll find it is a whole heap more fun than beating the hapless AI.

 

[Schweinewitz]

Thanks for the hints, Lord Valentai, very much appreciated!

 

[Sgt_Rock]

The artillery ammo has been global since the days of Battleground Waterloo and there is no sign that it will change. I would personally like to see where ALL artillery, regardless of Isolation or not, could go Low on Ammo (but not Out of Ammo unless Isolated). That would help out with the "one battery can fire all of the ammo" syndrome.

Thanks, btw, for the feedback on the ammo for the French. I do like the idea that one side or the other can run out of ammo. This will cause the players to think twice about leaving (all of) their guns unlimbered for the entire scenario.

 

[TheGrayMouser]

The artillery ammo has been global since the days of Battleground Waterloo and there is no sign that it will change. I would personally like to see where ALL artillery, regardless of Isolation or not, could go Low on Ammo (but not Out of Ammo unless Isolated). That would help out with the "one battery can fire all of the ammo" syndrome.

Thanks, btw, for the feedback on the ammo for the French. I do like the idea that one side or the other can run out of ammo. This will cause the players to think twice about leaving (all of) their guns unlimbered for the entire scenario.

That would be an nice clean aproach!

Also, I would love to see unlimbered artillery be subject to disruption like all other units. I mean you can hammer away at artillery with counter battery fire, and all you can do is cause minimal fatigue and maybe occassional gun loss. Which makes their quality ratings somewhat irrelevant too.

 

[Rhetor]

Thanks, btw, for the feedback on the ammo for the French. I do like the idea that one side or the other can run out of ammo. This will cause the players to think twice about leaving (all of) their guns unlimbered for the entire scenario.

The reason for having "reserve artillery" was to have fresh guns ready to deal with a crisis. In the game we can place a battery on top of a hill and happily fire away for many hours, whereas it was physically impossible for the gunners (and the guns) to maintain max rate of fire for longer than 1-2 hours.
It would be good if batteries paid in fatigue for each salvo; in time the effectiveness of sustained fire would decrease, and it would force players to keep some batteries in reserve.

 

[Rhetor]

Thanks, btw, for the feedback on the ammo for the French. I do like the idea that one side or the other can run out of ammo. This will cause the players to think twice about leaving (all of) their guns unlimbered for the entire scenario.

The reason for having "reserve artillery" was to have fresh guns ready to deal with a crisis. In the game we can place a battery on top of a hill and happily fire away for many hours, whereas it was physically impossible for the gunners (and the guns) to maintain max rate of fire for longer than 1-2 hours.
It would be good if batteries paid in fatigue for each salvo; in time the effectiveness of sustained fire would decrease, and it would force players to keep some batteries in reserve.

 

[Sgt_Rock]

Hey, good idea. I like that. I think that the same applies for a charge. Cavalry, regardless of whether it wins or loses in its charge, should accrue 100 fatigue points just for charging. Pts added on after they are done for the turn.

 

[Lord_Valentai]

25 fatigue for each time a gun fires would certainly be interesting. Means they can fire 12 times before getting to medium fatigue. It might persuade players not to blaze away from turn 1.

 

[Rhetor]

25 fatigue for each time a gun fires would certainly be interesting. Means they can fire 12 times before getting to medium fatigue. It might persuade players not to blaze away from turn 1.

I'd say that the fatigue increase should be higher, even 100, but should not apply to opportunity fire, to avoid a situation when the opponent uses some third rate units to draw fire and thus limit the effectiveness of enemy guns.

With 100 fatigue per salvo a battery would reach medium fatigue after an hour of constant firing; I'd say that is a reasonable time for the crews to get tired. Twelve times that's three hours of game time - too long IMHO.

 

[trauth116]

Fwiw, I find the idea to have some merit; probably especially in situations where there are multiple day actions. I don't really have anything to add apart from expressing my appreciation for sharing it.

I can see where it might work as an optional rule, and have the amount of fatigue applied probably set by the pdt file (which in a lot of cases would provide scenario designers' the flexibility to play around with however many points might get added per shot.). I can see where it might be fairly similar in coding terms as the night fatigue ( I don't play enough NB series- but more of the CWB instead -which uses this optional rule).

I have to think more about it, the only real con I can come up with (and this seems directly related to titles), is that in shorter scenarios this same effect is sort of governed by ammo limits (not to the same extent of course). But from where I stand, it seems like there are a lot more Pro's. In other words, it might not fit all titles (potentially).

 

[czarek04.02]

Not only fatigue artillery. It is important fatigue after marching units. All units. Not only after fighting. I'm talking about HPS / JTS Napoleonic Battles.

 

[Lohengrin]

Is there any chance that the Napoleonic games could get the Artillery Ammo by Cannon (instead of by battery) optional rule like the Civil War engine got? I was creating a scenario and the oob had several batteries of only 1 or 2 guns. It's very impractical to have those batteries fire as they use as much ammo as a 6 to 8-gun battery does.