Major Mishap said:

But the artillery rules say (in the FAQ, I think), that the artillery walker can't perform an indirect shot if it has LOS to the target. In that case it would be forced to take a direct shot. I agree that it would make sense for an indirect shot to be possible if the LOS to the target was interrupted by something other than the building itself, but the rules are currently not allowing that.

Here's an example of the sort of situation I think felkor was mentioning:

I really can't see why the Lothar wouldn't be able to make this indirect shot. The artillery shell would soar over the obstacle and go in through the door, just like a direct shot if that building were not in the way.

Yup, that's exactly the kind of situation I was thinking of. And I agree - I would allow it, as I think it stays true to the FAQ's reasoning. I think they just didn't think about this situation.

I am sure they did think about it. They made the ruling based on tournament play as well as casual play. To avoid arguments in tournaments or league play, just eliminate the argument of if you actually can fire into the building by just making it not work. In casual games, you are free to allow it all you like.

Gobbo said:

Perhaps they did, but their history so far with the rules and scenario design does not give much evidence to your claim.

I'm not complaining - I don't really care - I don't play in tournaments, and i did, I'd be fine with whatever rules they used. But most of the FAQ is either errata or rules you couldn't possibly glean from the rulebook, so their track record for thinking through all their rules before writing them down is not the greatest.

felkor said:

1 ) Where does it say that artillery can´t do indirect fire at a unit in a doorway?

2 ) In the first sentence of the answer to the second question regarding artillery fire in the faq it says that LOS is drawn from the artillery unit even if the artillery unit doesn´t need to see the target to fire.
The above sentence together with the examples clarifies that regardless of if a unit is standing in a square with an exit that exit need to be in the direction of the attacking unit and that the artillery unit can perform either a direct shot or an indirect shot. (this is how I interpret it)

Loophole Master said:

1 ) I agree with Major Mishap

2 ) I doesn´t say you can´t perform an indirect shot if you have LOS, it says you can´t perform a direct shot called by the artillery strike ability.
If one takes the answer out of context it says the opposite which is why one shouldn´t take it out of context. The wording is not the most clear as usual, I would formulate it differently so that I couldn´t mean two different things.

Gian said:

It's a circular thing. The rules say that "If an artillery unit has line of sight to the target, it must fire the direct shot on its own activation", it can't use an observer to fire an indirect shot. And the rules also say that "the line of sight is always drawn from the Artillery unit to the target", resulting that the artillery must have LOS to hit a target inside a building. Thus, if you need to have LOS to the target, you can't fire indirectly.

I do agree that the "even if the artillery unit doesn´t need to see the target to fire" bit is really confusing. Maybe they actually meant to write what we are all concluding, but it's not what they wrote.

Gian said:

Page 5

Q: In a situation where a target is inside
a structure and an Observer has clear line
of sight to the target, can an Artillery unit
fire an indirect shot at the target?
A: No.

It makes no exceptions for units in a doorway.

A direct fire shot would pass through the doorway, but the target unit would get cover where it normally wouldn't.

An indirect fire shot would be intercepted by the roof and stopped.

That fits what they've written about artillery fire in most of the places it's addressed.

It gives artillery a little more of the direct fire capability they should have, while keeping the rules very simple. Not a perfect solution, but quite worakble for the game.

Oh, so what you're saying is that when the artillery fires directly, the shot goes relatively straight and would then be able to get through the door, but when it fires indirectly, it goes in a parabolic trajectory that would hit the roof in the same situation. I guess that makes sense, thouhg I don't think that's really what they're saying. If that were the case, you could use direct fire when inside a building.

It doesn't make sense or if you used the same argument, firing direct should not have a minimum range.

Firing direct shouldn't have a minimum range for most guns , but rockets didn't fire like guns in WW2. They kept the game simple for 'A' range weapons in a way that fits the weapons in the game.

A tank's main gun rarely has the elevation to fire indirect, even when the same weapon is used in an indirect fire mounting. They also don't come with the sighting needed for indirect fire. A good example would be the German Flak 18, 35, 36, etc. series of 88mm guns. In the anti-aircraft mounting, they served as direct fire anti-tank, artillery, and anti-aircraft. The same weapon in the Tiger tank couldn't elevate enough for indirect or anti-aircraft uses. They used Sherman tanks in Korea as make-shift artillery, but they had to build berms to elevate the guns enough for it to work. There were self-propelled artillery vehicles in WW2, but they were not that common compared to the rest of the vehicles.

Rockets in WW2 other than short ranged direct fire weapons like the bazooka were high parabolic arc weapons. That gives good reason for minimum ranges for the Steel Rain's 4.2" rockets or the Lothar's nebelwerfer rockets. They could fire on a lower trajectory, but only to a point. Allowing them access to a unit at the edge of a building near an opening makes sense, while still forcing them to use indirect fire minimum ranges. Plastering the edge of a building will send shrapnel inside if the walls aren't really heavy. A round could be directed into a doorway on a high arc, but the effect would be lessened for the barrage by the walls and roof. Giving targets hard cover when artillery normally ignores cover is a nice representation of that.

The petard mortar doesn't allow indirect fire, because it was not sighted accurately enough for indirect fire, though it did fire it's charge in a higher parabolic arc than a normal tank gun.

Infantry mortars, if and when they make an appearance in DUST, are likely to either match the petard mortar for lighter mortars, and use Artillery ranges for larger mortars. That fits the weapons.

Howitzers mounted for direct and indirect fire have not yet made an appearance in DUST. When they do, they may have special rules, or they may only fire as direct fire weapons. Howitzers at close range normally switch to direct fire, because it's faster and more accurate, and targets close enough to fire on directly could be moving across the field of fire too quickly for good indirect engagement. Giving them an option to fire as Indirect Artillery or Direct would not be hard to deal with, so I hope they go that route.

Giving cover for a Direct fire weapon fits, because cover is more likely to protect the target than from an Indirect attack coming in and possibly air bursting above the cover.

I'm an ex-artilleryman. When I first heard about the 'A' range inability to fire direct, I was unimpressed, but then I looked and saw the weapons involved were rockets that never fired Direct historically. I'm hoping they make allowances for tube artillery if they add any to the game (which I would like to see) to allow either Direct or Indirect fire, but we'll have to see.

I'd forgotten the petard mortar originally, but understood their decision on that once I looked it up.

felkor said:

In the second example they say that you are allowed to fire at the unit standing at the exit/entrance. You aren´t allowed to shot at units inside buildings.

DT makes a big differance between standing on a square in a building and standing on a square with an exit/entrance in the direction of an attack in a building.

Again poorly written rules and examples that doesnt cover ALL possible angels with all possible wording, but i do think that it doesnt need to be exactly written to be able to figure out whats allowed or not. Answears taken out of context is if you ask me what makes people interpret the rules wrong most of the time.

Here is an example:

If we take the answear out of context this text is saying that an artillery unit must make a direct shot if it has line of sight to the target.

But if read as an answear only to the question above the text is saying that the artillery unit is not allowed to make a direct shot type of attack when activated by the artillery strike ability and that the artillery unit can only perform a direct shot type of attack on its own activation and when it has line of sight.

Gian said:

If we take the answear out of context this text is saying that an artillery unit must make a direct shot if it has line of sight to the target.

I think you're grasping at straws a bit here. While that sentence answers the above question, it's also making a pretty absolute statement that shoud apply to any situation. It proposes a pretty straightforward connection of cause and effect: "Artillery has LOS - MUST fire direct shot itself", it doesn't leave much wiggle-room for different interpretations.

I might be wrong. would not be the first time. As usual we see thngs diffrently which is good, who would i else have to discuss with

If every sentence should be considered to be making absolute statements then there are more contradictions in the rulebook.

ex:" After artillery weapons fire, the unit must reload before it can fire that weapon again. This costs one Skill action. (see “Special Weapons” on page 24). "

What about Steel Rain, does it to have to reload??? according to the above sentence it has to, even though it is not stated on its card like it is on the Lothar.

I would say Steel Rain does not need to reload since it is not stated on its card and it is not a reloadble weapon even though it is an artillery weapon. Sometimes it is necessary that one is not to literal, especially not when the rules are so poorly written.

Perhaps it is me grasping at straws or perhaps it is me that is actually getting what they mean. I can´t imagine that they would go through the trouble of making rules that in the end does not let you do anything.

Sure, it's possible that you're right about the designers' intentions.

But your example is quite different. The "artillery must be reloaded" rule is contradicted by the "steel rain's artllery rockets don't need reloading". But I don't see any rules that contradict the "Artillery must use direct fire if it has LOS".

The Steel Rain doesn't need to reload, because it is specified as having four single shot rockets that are gone after firing, with no chance to reload during the game. It does not reload because each weapon is separate, discrete, and usable only once.

It can combine the effect of its rockets as a single attack, but they are still four single shot weapons that are gone after firing.

FFG has specifically stated that artillery cannot fire indirect at a unit in a building. Roof penetration rules would add a lot of complexity without necessarily adding anything to actual game play. Unless you differentiate each type of round, roof penetration would be inaccurate as generalized rules.

FFG has specifically stated that an artillery unit with LOS to a target cannot fire at that target using Artillery Strike from another unit, and must use direct fire when it is activated to target that unit. No trained artillery unit is going to engage an enemy with a less accurate type of fire (indirect) when they can see and engage the enemy better with a more accurate type of fire (direct).

FFG has specifically stated that artillery can fire at a unit in an entrance to a building, but the unit would recieve hard cover against the attack. That gives artillery a logical option they would have, and ensures a ridiculous loophole does not exist for rules lawyers to try and exploit.

Those stipulations are quite specific.

For artillery to fire at a unit in an opening to a building, it would have to be direct fire, as the rules stipulate artillery cannot fire at units in a building with indirect fire.

For artillery to fire at a unit it has LOS to, it has to be direct fire during the artillery unit's activation.

Artillery cannot fire at a unit in a building if it does not have LOS to the unit, because indirect fire will not penetrate the roof.

Artillery can fire indirect at units that do not fall under the restrictions placed on the artillery weapon type by the above stipulations.

Taking rules out of context invalidates any argument based on those rules, as context is what sets the full meaning of the words.

Gian said:

Any argument that involves "if we take this out of context it means something else" defeats itself.

Lose ten internets. Right now.

I haven't read through the whole thread here but yeah... I can see artillery fire ignoring corner cover, but not cover elements. Why do you think when you watch training videos for the military, or watch accurate depictions of battle in movies they always yell "TAKE COVER" when the artillery rains down... Because soldiers used cover to survive artillery strikes in real life. Though the rules in general for artillery aren't really great to begin with. Plus it only really applies to the AXIS, because the ALLIES have 1 to 4 shots and that's it... None of them with any great amount of power. It would be nice to see a second artillery option for the ALLIES that wasn't quite so limited. Or a unit that could reload the Steel Rain. Otherwise it's pretty much useless unless in close range to other Walkers, and that's not really the point of an artillery weapon.

I do not understand this one:

Q: When a hero joins a squad with a
different movement value than the hero,
which movement value does the combined
unit use?
A: The combined unit’s movement value is equal to the
fastest movement value of the two units.

How could this possible?

Supaplex said:

Because the rule writer said so?

Hmmm, I don't have the hero pack and haven't looked at my DT cards, but what hero + squad combo is this relevant for? IIRC: Sigrid, Manfred, Lara, Joe & Rosie are M1 and all lthe squads they can command are M1. Ozz & Hammer are M2 and all the squads they can command are M2. Markus & the Apes are all the same Move.

You're right, this "different speeds" thing is not yet an issue. There are no heroes that we know of that have a different Move rating than a squad they could join. This would be an issue with Action Jackson (Move 1) joining a heavy squad like the Grim Reapers or Tank Busters, but all of those Move 2 heavy squads also have the Jump skill, which Jackson doesn't, so they are automatically forbidden to join each other.

They are just covering their bases for future developments, I guess, which is not a bad idea. I just don't understand why such a question was "frequently asked".

ktj1138 said:

Standing in the open when artillery comes down gets you dead. Cover gives you a better chance to stay alive. That doesn't mean you have a great chance, but some is much better than none . Cover from artillery is best as foxholes with a top cover, or something large between you and the center of the blast. Hollywood likes to yell 'Take Cover!' against screaming barrages of artillery coming in, but soldiers might call, 'Incoming!' with that after the first round lands, because artillery comes in too fast for you to hear before it gets there. Most would figure the explosions had clued everyone in, and simply look for better cover for themselves, with NCO's checking troop status. 'Take Cover!' or 'Incoming!' would be more effective against an air attack, where they mounted screamers on the bombs just to unnerve the target area. Stukas frequently added screamers to their wings for the same effect on a strafing run. Another use of, 'Incoming!' is when friendly artillery is firing anywhere near a unit, because artilery blasts can reach out quite a ways to make your life miserable, whether they're friendly or enemy.

DUST gives blast weapons the ability to ignore cover, because blast weapons are designed to make cover much less effective. A direct fire shot from an 88mm gun is still a lot of nasty, but it's normally coming direct, and having to blast through any cover. Grenades, flamethrowers, artillery, etc. are lobbed into the middle of the cover, or worse fired as air bursts, where the protection the cover gives is minimal. The wall the 88mm is firing through won't help much against a grenade tossed over it to land at your feet.

WW2 saw more deployment of timed and probe fuses for air bursts, and the initial deployment of proximity fuses for better air bursts, and made artillery much worse when they were available. A ground burst might have its effect lessened because it hit soft dirt, buried in before it detonated, and had reduced fragmentation and blast on surrounding troops. Rommel noted in his WW1 tactics book how he survived a few artillery strikes that way. One of those could wind up worse for the guy in the foxhole, as the blast wave shredded and buried them at the same time.

The two Artillery class weapons for DUST are the nebelwerfer and the 4.2" rockets. Nebelwerfer's throw a lot of smaller bombs (though some nebelwerfers from WW2 threw fewer bigger bombs) to saturate an area. Nebelwerfer means 'fog thrower' because they created a dense cloud of shrapnel at the grouns throughout an area. The 4.2" rockets on the Steel Rain each run probably over 100 pounds of explosive (based on the 60 pounds carried by the initial 3" rockets used on the Sherman in WW2). That's a lot of explosive, in either case. The nebelwerfer gives you a masive cloud of shrapnel to bounce around and through the cover, while the rockets give you a massive blast wave and shrapnel from fewer points.

As for tactical usage of the Steel Rain, consider what it can do: four small attacks are not really an effective use, as artillery is designed to be used for massive strikes. All four rockets fired together give an average roll with a normal attack that kills any current medium walker. The more dice involved in such a situation, the less the probability that you will not roll average results, so 12 dice for four hits is pretty reasonable. That can pay for the cost of the Steel Rain in one attack, and let you get bonus points with the petard mortar. You can do that without exposing the Steel Rain if you have a unit with Artillery Strike. If you fire direct, you might be able to use Sustained Attack, for an average of close to seven hits, and have a heavy walker close to destroyed in a single attack.

Two separate two rocket attacks would average two hits each, up to over three hits on Sustained Attack, to take out more points than the Steel Rain is worth in light walkers or heavy infantry.

The Steel Rain is a heavy strike weapon (the rockets) added to a short ranged dangerous strike with the petard mortar. If you can use it well to pay for itself with its rocket strike, the extra firepower it brings to bear at shorter ranges is all gravy.

Artillery is there to destroy the enemy, and the Steel Rain can do that rather well. If it could reload its rockets, it would either have to cost more than a heavy walker, or have the rockets mush less effective, to remain balanced within the game.

Supaplex said:

The rules keep the rocket troops with rocket troops, so this comes down basically to the Fast or Assault abilites.

I look at it this way:

A unit that is trained to move quickly is simply more willing to push to get close to the enemy. A hero fielded with them will have learned to keep up, or be left behind. That's a good reason to not let heroes join units during the game. Once the hero leaves, they don't have the unit driving them forward, so they lose the ability.

A hero with either ability fielded with a unit is a leader, and good leaders are trained to get the most out of their troops. So long as the hero is there, they can keep the unit moving faster. I never knew I could run a marathon until I dealt with one unit's First Sergeant. Top didn't look incredibly impressive, but he was infamous for leading us out on occasional morning runs that lasted from 0530 to 1200. When he did that, you did NOT want to be someone who tried to drop out of the run. He could keep an entire battery (artillery company) of men moving at a run by sheer force of will.

It doesn't make since with the movement but I see there point. Action Jacksion has movement 1 and if he joins the say Grim Reapers he is upgraded to movement 2 which is the movement of the Grim Reapers. Same with OZZ117 or Rhino with movement 2 joining the Red Devils. The Red Devils get movement 2 b/c the fastest model moves at 2.

This doesn't make since but I don't make the rules I just follow them. I guess they give the models without jetpacks, jetpacks kinda like the medic with a bunch of ammo hahaha.

arkangl said:

Action Jackson can't join the Grim Reapers, as there is an additional restriction that only Jump heroes can join Jump squads, and vice versa. The same would hold for OZZ 117 or Rhino with the Red Devils.