What should the chance be that Artillery fires on other Artillery first (Counterbattery Fire)

0%
20%
1
25%(Current)
20%
1
50%
40%
2
75%
20%
1
100%
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0
 
Total votes: 5
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pgr
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Counter Battery Fire

Fri Apr 14, 2017 10:02 am

I just looked again through patch notes and noticed the change that was made a few patches ago that integrated counter-battery fire into the battle logic. Originally, artillery units in the support line would be targeted last, after infantry and cavalry units, so as long as you had enough grunts in front of the guns, your artillery had nothing to worry about. Introducing counterbattery fire was a good choice, give that a big job of artillery is about suppressing the other guy's artillery.

My question at this point (for CWII but AGE game in general) is a 25% counterbattery chance actually too low? I'd argue it should be at least 50% or even 75% (at least for an attacker). Most attacks I can think of for the Civil War the supporting artillery's first job was to break up the enemy artillery before the infantry were exposed.

So I thought I'd do a little poll. Of course, in game, increasing the counterbattery rate would increase artillery losses in battle....but that might not be a bad thing.

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Gray Fox
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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Fri Apr 14, 2017 12:52 pm

The major threat to a gun crew was a sniper. The load carrier was trained to obscure the powder round with his body while carrying it, otherwise a sniper's bullet might set it off. Artillery was not very accurate. The gun had to be set on target each time, because the recoil moved the carriage off line. Also, the target had to be seen directly. A prolonged barrage, as at Gettysburg, eventually shrouded both sides in clouds of black powder smoke. During the battle of Gettysburg, the Union lost 7 pieces of artillery out of 362 and the CSA 6 out of 272, so approximately 2%.

http://www.goordnance.army.mil/history/ ... %20WAR.pdf

I think that effective counter-battery fire is more luck than strategy. A 25% chance to do the wrong thing and fire at enemy artillery is actually too high for me.

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Fri Apr 14, 2017 12:54 pm

No matter what number we use, it will be an abstraction. So I think it is worth thinking not only about what seems like the most 'realistic' number, but what works well for the game.

From a game perspective, I think 50% might work but 75% seems high to me. My impression of counter-battery fire is that it's effect was mostly to drive off enemy guns, not destroy them. I think targeting enemy artillery might quickly generate unrealistically high artillery casualties (the game also doesn't distinguish between killing the gun crew and actually destroying the gun; they both cost the same to replace). If artillery is more likely to be targeted, it might make sense to give it some protection. That would make it more likely to take cohesion losses and become ineffective in combat but less likely to be destroyed.

From a mechanics point of view, it also seems to me that it would make sense to have a high likelihood of targeting enemy guns in the early stage of battle, at longer ranges, but a higher probability of targeting infantry or cavalry at shorter ranges. I also wonder if entrenchment levels should affect the likelihood of targeting enemy artillery, but I don't have a good sense of how that actually worked in practice.

As for what seems more realistic, the 75% number seems credible to me. I suspect that counter-battery fire also often lasted longer than targeting infantry. I don't have the evidence to support it, but I suspect that the Union artillery fired more shots at the Confederate artillery in the lead up to Pickett's Charge, even though the guns were being ordered to slowly go silent, then they did at the infantry. On the other hand, the damage to the infantry was certainly much more severe, and I don't really think the game has a way of representing that (it sort of does, in that one infantry hit represents more men than one artillery hit, but I'm not sure if that is enough of a difference).
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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Fri Apr 14, 2017 1:37 pm

I agree that it's a bit of a problem with the abstraction issue. In reality, engagements would open with artillery duels but fire would shift to infantry formations as they left cover and maneuvered in the open. (Of course artillery in the defense would focus on staying counseled until the attacking infantry became exposed and then engage the Infantry). Having the artillery focus on counterbattery at the start of the battle and then change as the range closes could be interesting, but I don't know if it would break the matrix so to speak.


As to accuracy, Civil War rifled guns were quite accurate (despite all the inherent limitations with recoil). Leonidas Polk was essentially assassinated by a Union 3in rifle Battery from distance on just their third round. To steal from Wikipedia, "During the Battle of Atlanta, a Confederate gunner was quoted: 'The Yankee three-inch rifle was a dead shot at any distance under a mile. They could hit the end of a flour barrel more often than miss, unless the gunner got rattled.'"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Field_artillery_in_the_American_Civil_War#3-inch_rifle

In any event, changing the target selection% doesn't change the hit%... The guns could take a shot at opposing artillery and still miss. (Plus as long as the guns are grouped together in divisions , ether mixed or artillery only, beyond a certain point hits to an artillery element will be spread amongst the other elements and reduce the risk of the element being wiped out).

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Fri Apr 14, 2017 10:55 pm

Gray Fox wrote:The major threat to a gun crew was a sniper. The load carrier was trained to obscure the powder round with his body while carrying it, otherwise a sniper's bullet might set it off. Artillery was not very accurate. The gun had to be set on target each time, because the recoil moved the carriage off line. Also, the target had to be seen directly. A prolonged barrage, as at Gettysburg, eventually shrouded both sides in clouds of black powder smoke. During the battle of Gettysburg, the Union lost 7 pieces of artillery out of 362 and the CSA 6 out of 272, so approximately 2%.

http://www.goordnance.army.mil/history/ ... %20WAR.pdf

I think that effective counter-battery fire is more luck than strategy. A 25% chance to do the wrong thing and fire at enemy artillery is actually too high for me.

Wrong numbers used, which results in incorrect opinion. Us had 21 guns disabled at g/burg, 4 by counter battery fire, 11 captured,, 1 burst barrel,4 unserviceable due to crew losses. 10% loss in the arty arm, with 30% of arty horse lost, cs lost 10% of art manpower, 40% of arty horses, 8 guns were disabled, 6 by count battery fire,1 accident, 1 burst barrel. Destruction of arty pieces was largely beyond the munitions of the time, what county batty fire did, and 3 inch was the weapon of choice so us was usually better at it as it had more in service, or whitworth being the supreme choice, being highly accurate at extreme range, was to kill horses, break wheels, 1 hour out of action to replace a wheel by 6 men, and of course kill or wound the crews. G/burg uses the sentinels at the place each battery was in action, listing losses rounds fired etc, or the guide book from the museum lists the totals for you, aGettysburg, astudy in command. It list 356 us and 275 cs guns present. As a game mechanism, 25% is a fairly good one.

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Sat Apr 15, 2017 2:38 am

The link in my post is obviously from the U.S. Army Ordnance, i.e., the artillery school for the Army. That sort of makes them the experts, I would think. Do you have a link?

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Sat Apr 15, 2017 1:21 pm

Gray Fox wrote:The link in my post is obviously from the U.S. Army Ordnance, i.e., the artillery school for the Army. That sort of makes them the experts, I would think. Do you have a link?
gettysburg national park, with the stone sentinals showing [silent sentinals, a guide to the artilary at gettysburg is aviable online from the nationanal park serves] each batty posistion, rounds fired, losses etc, all this is presented in the book the official guides use, coddington, a study in command, used from the 60s to 3 ish years ago when they moved to using sears work. as to the arty school, they will tell you the purpose of counter batty fire in the wbts was not to desroy guns as that requied direct hits by solid shot, but to force a redoployment, by use of shell on horse and crews,so the experts are not realy going to help your point about losses of guns, had you listed how many battys were moved as a result of counter batty fire you would have been closer to understaning the process and what it could acieve with the munitions avaliable, its not till ww1 that guns were destroyed in number by counter batt., but inflicting enough losses on the horses required to manouver, by use of shell, was the principle means of counter batty fire, which is why in films you hear commanders giving timed fuse shell, when comencing counter batty fie, one us batty at gburg lost 83 of its 90 horses due to counter batty fire. your arty link specifcly refers to shell with timed fuse as the munition preferd as counter batty,so how you got from that the purpose was destruction of arty pieces is not easy to see, and it gives numbers of lost guns without a breakdown of cause, which is given in an after action report at the time.us 2 corp as an example lost 57% of all its horses in the 3 days at gburg., hunts condolidated report for all us arty equipment loss, with cause where know, is hardto ignore, he being in charge, having all the data, and writting the us regulations for art employment which called for counterbatty fire in support of any attack, quite the exprt btwas a further point, around half the arty battys at gettysburg remained in reserve and saw no action.counter batty fire from rifled to smoothbore of course ment a chance to hit at range without reply,.

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Sat Apr 15, 2017 6:38 pm

Thank you, however with apologies, your sources don't hold up. Field guides and books from half a century ago may have had information that an official institution, like the actual U.S. Artillery proponent, have corrected in the present. Further, I don't think that Lee would have told Pickett, "Our artillery have killed all of the horses for the Union guns. Your charge should have no problem." Lee's instruction for the Confederate artillery was to silence Union artillery and then support the attack. This has the fatal military flaw of a split purpose. If I am ordered to take a hill on the east and a bridge to the west, I am most likely going to do one and fail at the other. Specifically, every round that doesn't attrit the enemy I am attacking directly, is wasted. I don't want a long term effect on enemy batteries, I want to crush their infantry and break through their lines. Then I can over run their guns before they can run. Both sides fired a combined total over 50,000 artillery rounds at Gettysburg. If the artillery were deadly accurate, the armies would have been annihilated. What little effect the guns have should be focused on one target to maximize the chaos this causes.

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Sat Apr 15, 2017 9:24 pm

Gray Fox wrote:Thank you, however with apologies, your sources don't hold up.
actually they do. your the one using hunts number of pieces lost through being captured, rather than those lost for other reasons, rather a bad mistake. Almost as bad as not understanding counter batty fire as it relates to field combat in the wbts.
Field guides and books from half a century ago may have had information that an official institution, like the actual U.S. Artillery proponent, have corrected in the present.
fact free , you cannot correct the primary source material, by making it less detailed, you otoh have posted incorrect numbers and incorrect assumptions that your source in no way puts forward as having happened.
Further, I don't think that Lee would have told Pickett, "Our artillery have killed all of the horses for the Union guns. Your charge should have no problem."
a made up quote based on Lee being able to what he could not see does not help you.[quot]Lee's instruction for the Confederate artillery was to silence Union artillery and then support the attack. [/quote] correct. Standard military order and sound practice, if the guns are not silenced, the odds of a assault meeting success are greatly reduced.
This has the fatal military flaw of a split purpose.
wrong it is standard military directive, do this and then when it has been done do that, it's a conditional sequence of directives if the first is not achieved the second is not acted upon..
If I am ordered to take a hill on the east and a bridge to the west, I am most likely going to do one and fail at the other.
why so, you are to do one then the other, if the first fails, you do not proceed to the second.
Specifically, every round that doesn't attrit the enemy I am attacking directly, is wasted. I don't want a long term effect on enemy batteries, I want to crush their infantry and break through their lines.
try reading the art manuals of the day, or even an account of a battle, and you will find that arty is required by the manuals and general orders to silence Or drive off,enemy arty by counter batty fire in support of any attack, in defence it is to instead concentrate on infantry formations.
Then I can over run their guns before they can run.
odd you think men on foot can move faster than guns pulled by horses.
Both sides fired a combined total over 50,000 artillery rounds at Gettysburg. If the artillery were deadly accurate, the armies would have been annihilated. What little effect the guns have should be focused on one target to maximize the chaos this causes.
er batty were ordered to concentrate counter batty fire on one target batty at a time, the rest is just your wishful thinking rather than an accurate explanation of any engagement in the wbts, but is one of napoleonic wafare in Europe. Since cs fired just under 2 million rands of small arms, to us just over 3 million, coming out at 675 and 990 rands to achieve a kill, then arty fire was inaccurate but more cost effective in inflicting losses, and more accurate than the snipers you mentioned earlier. The OR contains a number of consolidated reports by commanding officers, one is rosecranes analysis of stones river, his forces inflicted a casualty for every 27 arty ends expended, and one inflicted for every 145 small arms expended,

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Re: Counter Battery Fire

Sun Apr 16, 2017 9:30 am

Accurate means something more than the effect of fire, which is what has interested yourself, it also means can I hit where I want, standard tests by the Army found the Springfield and Enfield at 600 yards had a standard deviation of 3 feet at 1200 yards 12 feet, rifle mounted in fixed rigged holder, so more accurate than hand held, while the rifled arty had 2 feet at 800 yards and 8 feet at 1100 yards, since shell blast radius was 50 feet, being 8 feet out made less difference to accuracy as it still placed rounds in the intended kill zone. So arty was more accurate at normal ranges of engagment than rifled muskets.

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