BA Mortars?

[False Son]

Am I missing something with the BA mortars?  There doesn't seem to be any significant advantage in mounting one, compared to say, a recoilless rifle.  Can they be fired indirectly, or something?

I'm just curious why something like the Phalanx C would mount a Magshot, then mount something as odd as a Heavy Mortar.

[Moonsword]

Am I missing something with the BA mortars?  There doesn't seem to be any significant advantage in mounting one, compared to say, a recoilless rifle.  Can they be fired indirectly, or something?

I'm just curious why something like the Phalanx C would mount a Magshot, then mount something as odd as a Heavy Mortar.

No, you're not, and they can't be fired indirectly.  They may be more useful in the RPG.  On the plus side, the BV's lower than the other two, and it hits decently hard inside its range.

[Leon Shirow]

I thought BA Mortars could fire indirectly, but I must have imagined it :-\ Grenade Launchers used to be able to fire indirectly but that seems to have been dropped in Total Warfare.

http://www.classicbattletech.com/forumarchive/index.php/topic,46149.0.html

[Moonsword]

Grenade Launchers used to be able to fire indirectly but that seems to have been dropped in Total Warfare.

They weren't able to do that under the immediately prior rules, the BattleTech Master Rules, Revised.  It's not something TW changed.  Not every option in the BA weapons rules is equal, guys.

[Jackmc]

The mortars do have the IF ablity in AToW (the RPG).

-Jackmc

[Leon Shirow]

They weren't able to do that under the immediately prior rules, the BattleTech Master Rules, Revised.  It's not something TW changed.  Not every option in the BA weapons rules is equal, guys.

The rules for Grenade Launchers to be able to fire indirectly were in Classic Battletech Companion, I think that was released after BattleTech Master Rules, Revised :-\

[Moonsword]

Ah, I think I see the problem.  The Companion is primarily RPG rules, not rules for the board game.  Total Warfare's introduction doesn't mention it superseding the Companion but specifically mentions all of the various board game rule sets (including the BMRr), so are you sure you're not mixing up the rules for the RPG equipment with the board game?

EDIT: Combat Equipment, published after both, specifies the Kobold's micro-grenade launcher as a direct-fire attack.  I think that, since ATOW does allow grenade launchers to fire indirectly, this is one of those places the RPG and board game rules diverge.

[Leon Shirow]

The equipment introduced for Battle Armor construction had rules for CBT:RPG and BattleTech, the rules for indirect fire with Grenade Launchers are in the BattleTech section. I thought that Classic Battletech Companion was where I had read rules for Mortars indirect fire but there is no mention of it. As Jackmc posted I am probably remembering something from the RPG for Mortars indirect fire :-\

[Moonsword]

That's odd.  Every reference for the board game I checked treats them as direct-fire weapons with no mention of indirect fire to be found.  The BMRr treats the grenade launcher on the Infiltrator I the same way as TW does and Combat Equipment uses the same stats.  A Time Of War does make them indirect fire capable.

Apparently there was some jag toward the idea in Companion and they backed off from it again, I dunno.

[FedComGirl]

Well, Mech Mortars are capable of indirect and direct fire so I don't know why Battle Armor and Infantry Mortars wouldn't be either. Mortars also can't be stopped by Anti-Missile Systems so they have an advantage there.

All the entries for the Infiltrator I say to treat it's auto-grenade launcher like a machine gun but that it only does one point of damage. That could be why it's a direct fire weapon only.

[Moonsword]

Well, Mech Mortars are capable of indirect and direct fire so I don't know why Battle Armor and Infantry Mortars wouldn't be either. Mortars also can't be stopped by Anti-Missile Systems so they have an advantage there.

A) Infantry mortars aren't tracked discretely.  This means that any damage done with them would require changes to the heavily abstracted infantry rules.  Some of the points under B also apply here.

B) Battle armor mortars have such short ranges and are so rarely used that they're probably not considered worth the headache of figuring out rules for them and balancing them, then finding space in TW for it.  They're also fairly unpopular as a battle armor weapon IC, so not a lot of energy has gone into dealing with them.

Realistically, both weapons can be fired indirectly and the RPG tracks that.  It's also a much grittier, more detail-oriented system than the tournament-level rules are.

[FedComGirl]

a) Not really. You'd still have to determine the number that hit and then apply the damage in 2 point clusters. The fact that the attack is an indirect one just make hitting the target harder to do.

b) The ranges for the Heavy Mortars are BA and I weapons are 6 and 9. That's plenty of range for an indirect attack. Light Mortars have a range of 3. Thats enough to attack targets on the other side of a small hill or building.

[Moonsword]

Well, if you think it should be changed, try asking the developers for their view on it.  However, on A, you missed what I was actually saying - it requires changing the rules (and perhaps more importantly, the record sheets) to track mortar damage separately.

[FedComGirl]

You lost me.  Who said the rules needed to be changed? Clarified, yes but changed? They don't say one way or another. And why would the damage be tracked separately? For infantry, a Platoon can fire 8 Mortars. That's 2.72 points of damage rounded up to 3 points, presuming all rounds hit the target. Then you roll for where each cluster hit and your done. Battle Armor rounds are even easier at 3 points per round. So where are you having to track damage differently?

[Moonsword]

You aren't for battle armor.  However, infantry doesn't track support weapons separately after construction, all the damage from the entire platoon is averaged out.  Do you really want an infantry platoon to be able to deal rifle damage indirectly?  More to the point, infantry is heavily abstracted for play purposes.

Frankly, this is coming down to standard answer #1 - do what works at your table.  I don't think the rules (like, say, the ones about firing indirectly) need to be changed.

[FedComGirl]

Who says I'm not for battle armor? I never said I wasn't. In fact battle armor has a big advantage over regular infantry. I don't just mean the obvious ones either. BA mortars do 10 times the damage Infantry mortars do. They also get 10 shots per 1 kg of ammo while Infantry mortars only get 1 shot per 4kg.

Infantry also only have a single weapon attack. If they're attacking indirectly only weapons that can fire indirectly can be used.

It looks like infantry damages need a lot more clarification than they currently have.

[Moonsword]

You don't need to mess with damage tracking for battle armor.  Their weapons are already tracked differently.

[FedComGirl]

I didn't say they did. Some clarification of how weapons can be used would be nice however.

[Moonsword]

I was clarifying what I said last time about battle armor not needing a change to damage tracking, not saying you'd said anything.

[FedComGirl]

Oh. Okay

Cheers

[BirdofPrey]

Infantry also only have a single weapon attack. If they're attacking indirectly only weapons that can fire indirectly can be used.

It looks like infantry damages need a lot more clarification than they currently have.

THe problem is infantry have ONE damage value even if they have two different weapons, and the effects and ranges are taken from one of those weapons only.  The abstraction given to infantry causes them to act as a single weapon that does clustered hits (think LBX); for gameplay purposes there are no multiple damages even if the unit fluff says there are.  If you look at the infantry record sheet, there isn't even a space to write the the weapon type, there's just a place to write how much damage your platoon does with X number of troops.

Because of this, to properly do indirect fire, they would need to change the infantry rules to track secondary weapons separately from the primaries, but that causes infantry to lose a level of abstraction.  (otherwise if they gave mortars indirect fire, fluffwise you get bullets raining from the skies since you would have a squad using the mortar effects and adding rifle damage to it)

[FedComGirl]

Wouldn't infantry losing a level of abstraction that conflicts with everything be a good thing?

[BirdofPrey]

Depends on who you ask.  I personally have no problem with it, but I am a combined arms player and you shouldn't be surprised if that forest you want to use as cover for your mechs turns out to be loaded with field guns (and you are now at short range).  Most other units have multiple attacks, so it doesn't seem tot terrible to let infantry get a choice of attacks.  Infantry are supposed to be damn near useless though; keep that in mind; they aren't going to go into great detail with rules for stuff we aren't going to use much.

On the other hand, AToW being a role playing book goes into great detail regarding infantry combat and it was written so that it meshes with the other levels of combat well, so if you are planning on deploying infantry, feel free to take advantage of the tactical combat addendum to inject some of that detail into TW level play.  This might slow your game down a bit though.  AToW goes into quite a bit of detail regarding infantry engagements with multiple damage types and differing armor penetration and optional hit locations rules, so in some cases the abstraction is a good thing.  Think of A Time of War as Tactical Operations for PBIs.

Also it's not so much conflicting with everything as mortars simply being ignored for simplicity to make infantry usage a bit more seamless under the  standard TW rules.

[False Son]

Wouldn't infantry losing a level of abstraction that conflicts with everything be a good thing?

Nope.  I honestly could not be brought to have an additional roll to hit, cluster chart roll and damage location roll for a set of weapons that do less that 1 point per trooper.  The abstraction works just fine, there are a few issues with the abilities of weapons (it might be nice to have indirect ability with mortars and LRMs for example) but it's abstract for a reason.  Infantry construction is already the most minute of scales in CBT, the idea of being able to break a platoon into 3-4 squads and rolling 2 weapon attacks each is a tiresome thought.  Might as well break B points into single man units just to get as many to-hit rolls as possible.

[FedComGirl]

Personally I think there should be. The Kuritan Ceremonial Guard for example has 20 vibro-katanas and 8 auto-rifles. The vibro-katanas do a total of 5.2 points of damage. The auto-rifle 4.16. and yet those 20 troopers armed with melee weapons can still hit a target 3 hexes away. How do you hit a target 90 meters away with a sword?

I have looked at the Infantry Rules in Age or War and they are kind of complex. The weapons in that book can do a lot more damage though. For example a single Heavy Recoilless Rifle does 1 point of damage to mech armor but you'd have to have 4 using TW rules.

Can you guess which ones my infantry prefer?  ;D