Questions about lances, armour and artillery

[twrchtrwyth]

Do lances count as spears?

Would Egyptian curassiers armour count as a shield giving a -1 to opponents in close combat or should it be better, perhaps a -2 to opponents?

Artillery:
Three types of artillery are mentioned on page 26 of the rule book, grenades, artillery and off table artillery. In the cost section, page 31, you have grenades, mortar and artillery piece.
Grenades are easy . Is the page 26 artillery and page 31 mortar the same thing, and page 26 off table artillery and page 31 artillery piece the same thing?
The English QRS mentions mortars, field guns and heavy artillery. Is the QRS mortar and field gun the same as the page 26 artillery and is the QRS heavy artillery the same as the page 26 off table artillery?

Which models can act as observers for a mortar?

From the Colonial supplement:
How much does rocket artillery cost?

How much does the 2" template mountain gun, page 25, cost? When it says 'work like cannon', I'm assuming you mean that it follows the artillery rules?

[Driscoles]

Hi,

Lances give a + 1 weapon modifier in close combat from horseback and + 1 modifier for cavalry. If you like you can give an extra charge die for the first round of combat.

I was actually thinking of doing rules for cuirassiers  but scraped the idea. If you like to have them in your games and need special rules  I would not suggest a close combat modifier of -1 or -2 to opponents. What about a +1 save modifier on the damage table for close combat only.

Ari:
I guess you talk about the template size ? If so - yes !
We use the medium template for most of the artillery.
For small guns I use the grenade template.

Observer. One model of the mortar unit.

Rocket and Mountain Gun  : Use the points cost from the basic rulebook for Artillery, but please see them as a general guide line and not hammered in stone. If you think 100 points for rockets are too much use 50 points ( which makes sense to me -  we cut  the costs for machine guns in halve )  . Same with the mountain gun. Make two for 100 points. 

I hope my answers could help a little. If not, please post again.

Best regards
Björn

[twrchtrwyth]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Lance and cuirassier, thanks.

Artillery, just some clarifications. I did mean the template sizes. You have confused me slightly though with your answer.

Mortars cost 75 points on the points chart so other medium template guns should cost the same shouldn't they, and it's off table artillery that should be 100 points? Is this correct? If not what does off table artillery cost? If on table field guns cost 100 points why do they cost more than mortars, I don't see any difference in the way they work other than mortars being able to fire indirectly? Am I missing something?

[Westfalia Chris]

Thanks for the quick reply.

Lance and cuirassier, thanks.

Artillery, just some clarifications. I did mean the template sizes. You have confused me slightly though with your answer.

Mortars cost 75 points on the points chart so other medium template guns should cost the same shouldn't they, and it's off table artillery that should be 100 points? Is this correct? If not what does off table artillery cost? If on table field guns cost 100 points why do they cost more than mortars, I don't see any difference in the way they work other than mortars being able to fire indirectly? Am I missing something?

I interpreted "mortars" to mean smaller-calibre, indirect fire weapons, or "grenade launchers", rather than howitzers or large pieces like the German WW1 trench mortar or the 21cm (which should be off-table, actually). By that reasoning, the 75pt mortar should use the smaller grenade template but can fire indirectly (actually must), field howitzers the medium artillery template. You could differentiate by limiting the height of obstacles the various guns can fire across. I'll admit it's not terribly clearly-worded. Additionally, when treating "mortars" as "grenade launches" (and not indirect fire cannon), they would only receive a -1 armour penetration modifier, whereas field guns receive -2 (although you might make a point for weaker top armour, although I wouldn't, to make for easier and more stringent handling).

I really need to write up a proper artillery article, differentiating the pieces a bit more clearly.

[twrchtrwyth]

Thanks Chris.

So the 75pt mortars are NOT the mortars mentioned under the heading artillery, page 26, second column, 5th paragraph? Do the 75pt mortars still have unlimited range?

How much does off-table artillery cost?

[Westfalia Chris]

Thanks Chris.

So the 75pt mortars are NOT the mortars mentioned under the heading artillery, page 26, second column, 5th paragraph? Do the 75pt mortars still have unlimited range?

How much does off-table artillery cost?

It all gets rather messy, doesn't it? Didn't want to confuse you.

I suggest treating mortars just like artillery in handling, except that they can fire indirectly at high trajectories (with an observer seeing the target), and use the smaller template.

Howitzers should be treated like field guns, since the table ranges don't really are that big, and may shoot over low intervening terrain (such as a low outcrop, or some huts, and friendly infantry).

All direct-fire field guns are normal cannon.

Heavier pieces (for simplicity's sake, anything above 100mm calibre or bigger than an 18pdr) should be treated as off-table artillery. We did not add off-table artillery since it should only be available in a special scenario, agreed upon by the players or by an umpire.

I hope that helps for the moment. I'll see if I can manage to write up a PDF article on artillery until we can incorporate more detail in a future book.

[twrchtrwyth]

Thanks Chris, that helps a lot. I can see where you're coming from now.

Might I suggest that a chart with all the weapon types on would clear everything up. And probably less work than an article, so available sooner.

[Westfalia Chris]

Thanks Chris, that helps a lot. I can see where you're coming from now.

Might I suggest that a chart with all the weapon types on would clear everything up. And probably less work than an article, so available sooner.

I've just drawn it up (including a short summary table at the end), and submitted it to Björn. Once he's happy with it, we will probably upload it.

[twrchtrwyth]

Excellent. Hope you remembered the point costs!

[Westfalia Chris]

Excellent. Hope you remembered the point costs!

Yes, all catered for, except for the field howitzers (but there's an explanatory line for that included). We usually select forces to match a scenario, and since we can almost always field roughly matching armies, we tend to not bother with the points values at all. I'll admit though that they will be helpful for some people, and I can assure you that we chose them to approximately represent the impact of the game piece while maintaining easy handling in the selection process.

[twrchtrwyth]

Rocket and Mountain Gun  : Use the points cost from the basic rulebook for Artillery, but please see them as a general guide line and not hammered in stone. If you think 100 points for rockets are too much use 50 points ( which makes sense to me -  we cut  the costs for machine guns in halve )  . Same with the mountain gun. Make two for 100 points. 

I hope my answers could help a little. If not, please post again.

Best regards
Björn

Is the cost of 50 for the mountain gun you gave here superseded by the new artillery rules? I'm guessing yes.

[Driscoles]

yes. This is official now 
Cheers
Björn

[David]

Is there rules for smoke in the rule book ? can't find it? and rules for wind.
what size is a light mortar ? up to 45mm, 50mm or 60mm?
Antitank weapons, What size mortar gets the -1 or -2 to hitting Tanks
Thanks
David

[Westfalia Chris]

Is there rules for smoke in the rule book ? can't find it? and rules for wind.

I'd suggest the following, to keep it simple:

1. At the start of the game, determine the direction of wind, maybe by rolling a scatter dice, or by rolling for one of the table edges and/or table corners which is the direction in which the wind is blowing.

2. Every smoke round generates a single 2" (light mortar/light cannon) 4" diameter (heavy mortar/field gun/howitzer) round template upon impact. Any shots whose line of sight passes through this template area is penalised by -2.

3. At the end of any turn, roll 2D6 for each smoke template. The cloud moves by that distance with the direction of the wind. If you roll a double 1, the cloud dissipates. If you roll any other double, add another template of the same size which is placed adjacent to the first and along the line of movement of the template, but reduce the modifier to -1 (the cloud expands, but gets thinner).

3. Continue this procedure for every cloud (which comprises of either one or two templates) until the smoke cloud leaves the table or dissipates (either by rolling a double 1, or any double for a cloud of two templates).

Since the focus of the rules was mainly for smaller skirmishes rather than large scale battles, we didn't include rules for smoke ammunition in the original rules, but I hope you find the above suitable. I've whipped up a sheet of two templates each of 2" and 4" diameter. Simply print at 100% on an A4 sheet of light cardboard or paper (you could also print it on coloured paper to provide coloured smoke for signalling purposes).

what size is a light mortar ? up to 45mm, 50mm or 60mm?

I'd rate anything with a calibre of 60mm or less would count as light mortars (I'd rate the 7,6cm Minenwerfer as a heavier variant, and the largest to be depicted by the rules probably around 80mm, like German WW2 models, maybe 120mm like the Soviet ones, but that is really the utmost limit).

Antitank weapons, What size mortar gets the -1 or -2 to hitting Tanks

Mortars firing high explosive may apply a -1 (light) or -2 (heavy) malus to the target's damage rolls.

[David]

Thanks thats great, just what i needed.
David