Forum Discussion

New Rookie

3 months ago

Mortars - Why Bother?

The entire design on this item is nothing short of pathetic. As a Marine Rifleman I can tell you that this fantastical pile of crap is nothing more than an attempt to placate folks calling for a mortar. You gave it to them, and it is nothing short of worthless. It has almost no splash damage. The time on target is unrealistic. All that this thing does is mark you for everyone on the other team to see. And like fools they ALL move rapidly to destroy you. Now, I could understand that if the mortar was worth anything. In reality, the other team should just ignore it and leave this pile of crap alone. The Support unit using it is not firing has LMG at you, not reviving friendlies, and not supplying anyone with health/ammo. In truth - anyone using the mortar is all but removed from the game. The idiocy of not allowing the use of the mortar from the HQ area is mind-boggling at best. There is simply WAY too many ways to destroy these things from range. The damage it does is forgettable. I hit a tank over a dozen times - it did 5 points of damage per shot. Every now and then you get 5 points for "suppressive fire". In all the times I used it - I have only managed 2 kills - and I am pretty sure I just finished off targets already engaged by my teammates. I did manage to get about 3 kills per round - fire the mortar and get off immediately to set up an ambush on the 12 guys coming for you. None of it was mortar fire.

So how do we correct this?

First off, make it usable from the back. If you do so, don't worry about the time-on-target aspect. In fact, for every sector between your location and your target - add about 10 seconds to point of impact. Next, limit shots fired. I have humped the base-plate and the tube and the rounds. 6 Shots is more than fair. Make the only way to resupply is a vehicle crate. Next, I would add a greater variety to the rounds you use. HEDP is awesome and should do more splash damage than a tank. But it should not kill a tank outright. Maybe three shots. I love the smoke - good use. Next consider other packages. Willy Pete (WP - or White Phosphorus) can lay down a sizable burning field that is great for area deniability. But you can just call it incendiary and use the flame mechanics you have now. I am not sure if they ever delivered an EMP package (there was talk) but an EMP round should kill every device in the area - heavy armor excluded. Another favorite use was flares for night missions. And yet another was colored smoke to mark area targets for aircraft.

None of this is hard to do. But as it stands now? The mortar is entirely useless. Very bad design flaws all around.

discussion

weapons

61 Replies

1_Hat
New Scout
3 months ago
Have you seen the smoke land next to you from an opponent mortar user? Maybe mine was bugged, but it's a small puff smoke good for nothing. It's not like a smoke grenade.
Making the mortar stronger but harder to resupply sounds like fun. I can imagine setting it up temporarily with special purpose rounds as part of playing the objective. At the moment the player tends to sit in a safe position on the mortar forever, making it not really a gadget but an entire class of its own.
The mortar currently is more suitable for the defenders in Breakthrough to use because it can be set up far behind the defensive lines. I was disappointed and amused to see the difficulty an attacker would have trying to use the mortar to soften the opponent's defences on some maps like Empire State Breakthrough, where the opponents roam around the edges of the attacker's HQ. Even on Sobek City, trying to target the defenders on the rooftop was impractical because you have to set up in a vulnerable area too close to the action. This would not be as much of a problem if the mortar was a shorter-use and more powerful gadget to use on the way to the objective.