Rules sources:
Total Warfare, 9th printing PDF
Tactical Operations: Advanced Rules, 6th printing PDF
Tactical Operations: Advanced Units and Equipment, 6th printing PDF
Exactly how do artillery cannon work when used by aerospace units against other aerospace units? The description on TO:AUE page 97 states that "Aerospace units employing Artillery Cannons against other aerospace units use them as autocannons, and cannot deliver damage effects into adjacent hexes. However, the damage type is still considered AE." The first sentence is very unclear, particularly the "use them as autocannons" section.
Some specific questions:
1. The description does explicitly say that they cannot deliver damage effects into
adjacent hexes. However, do they hit all units in the
same hex as the target, or is damage delivered to the target only? The latter seems plausible given the wording, but is not explicitly stated.
2. For a Sniper Cannon or Long Tom Cannon, is the damage delivered to the target aerospace unit as a single 10 or 20-point cluster (whose damage type remains AE), or is it split into 5-point clusters?
A search of related rules failed to turn up any rule saying that AE damage
must be split into 5-point clusters. References:
- The definition of AE damage (TW page 113) does not mention cluster size.
- The rules for bomb damage (TW page 246) specify that it is split into 5-point clusters.
- The rules for artillery damage (TO:AR page 150) specify that it is split into 5 point clusters.
- The Artillery Cannon rules themselves (TO:AUE page 97) explicitly reference the artillery damage rules above for ground combat. This was a major point of contention, with some arguing that the following sentences implied that things should be different in air-to-air combat (with the lack of any given cluster size indicating a single cluster), and others thinking that it ought to be the same as for ground combat.
- Airburst Mortar ammo (TO:AUE page 185) acts as either a counterexample or an exception to a hypothetical rule of AE damage being 5-point clusters, with explicitly stated 1 point clusters.
A argument was forwarded that the "use them as autocannons" sentence was solely intended to be a reference to the fact that they are included in Autocannon bays on large craft (TO:AUE page 228), which seemed off to me given that the same sentence also removes (at least some of) their multi-target effects.
As a side note: artillery cannons have both the DB tag and AE tag. Is there any particular reason for the DB tag? Given that they are explicitly excluded from using Targeting Computers, the only effect that I can find is that they do half damage against Ballistic-Reinforced Armor (while also doing half damage against Reactive armor, since they are also AE).
