Profile of Lago

If it's possible to do that as an ongoing thing (rather than a check when the barrage starts) that'd be a neat idea.

T0 mortar, that can also shoot smoke?

He's talking about the mortar. Vipper was suggesting removing it.

I think that the point Vipper is trying to make is that with your changes it WOULD still be a get out of jail card.

There's no possible way that a Pyro Tommy is going to fall into hmg range anyway, so making it cast beyond that range, suppress denial or not, make the whole thing abusable.

It makes it serve its actual function: to barrage an HMG out of position. The whole idea of an indirect fire weapon is you can attack stationary targets from beyond their range.

The flares currently require you to flank a properly set up HMG to throw them, and if you can do that you don't need the flares in the first place.

The issue with that is it's two indestructable howitzers. The munitions cost, while heavy, does serve as a decent limiter on the base guns.

The problem is they're infantry-based flares that you can't fire at a suppression platform from outside its range. With only 30 range, they're effectively direct fire.

The UKF Base Howitzers are currently their mobile indirect fire option: upgrade an Infantry Section for 40 munitions, then spend another 45 munitions each time you fire.

A unique red flare goes down, then the howitzers fire a long barrage. The shells are pretty powerful, so a team weapon that doesn't reposition is very likely to get wiped, but the barrage is so long that you've got plenty of time to retreat.

It works, sort of. Even the T1 barrage tends to collapse buildings, making it work as a denial tool. It's powerful and useful, but the prohibitive cost discourages overuse. There's just one problem.



The role of indirect fire is to displace entrenched infantry and team weapons, particularly HMGs. That's pretty much the whole reason UKF needs mobile indirect in the first place.

And the base howitzers are next to useless at this.




A mortar has about 70 range, allowing it to outrange and barrage HMGs, which have 45 range. UKF artillery flares? 30 range.

Try to use a flare on an MG42 from the front (as a mortar does) and you'll get suppressed before you can throw the flare. When you get suppressed, your range drops to 20.

This means to actually use the expensive flares in place of a mortar, you've got to flank the HMG. And if you've flanked the HMG, you don't need the flare. You've already displaced the HMG.



For the UKF base howitzers to function as indirect fire rather than as a very expensive area denial grenade, they need something approximating the following changes:

• Give the Infantry Section variant of the flares at least 50 range. A mortar has 70.
  
  
• Disable the ability entirely when suppressed. Otherwise, the range extension turns it into a get-out-of-jail-free card against HMGs, which was the whole problem with USF Rifle smoke.