[1.3] Firestrike

[Klaus]

Is anyone else often frustrated when considering the firestrike ability against allied artillery? They both are 3 points into a tree, cost the same amount, and are offmap abilities.

Regular artillery is a lot more devastating than a firestrike, which I don't think is fair considering all these similarities.

Why not make firestrike more effective at for instance, destroying buildings by lighting them on fire?

For the number of times I've seen allied players take out my production buildings with one or two arty strikes, I sure would love the ability to do the same, or at least have the same ability to level an area considering I've "paid" the same amount.

[Fonic]

Allied off-map artillery is better because they rely on Commander Doctrines for their artillery, whereas Axis get 2 units they can build that can fire artillery barrages; the Nebelwefer and Walking Stuka. Because of this, Allied arty needs to be a fair bit stronger.
Unfortunately for the axis though; the Stuka only comes in late game, and the Nebelwefer leaves a lot to be desired.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

Umm.. Firestorm? Firestorm is considered very strong. It butchers infantry and has a fast response time.

[Virtual]

Its just because in the same Doctrine you get tiger ace, while infantry gets off map combat crap

[Klaus]

These "reasons" are all speculation on your parts.

[Ucross]

These "reasons" are all speculation on your parts.
The above quote is a speculation on your part.

(Just trying to be equally obvious and idiotic)

[Virtual]

its just (Read: Justice)

[Mutters]

dont cry imbalance by comparing two similar units/abilities in isolation. it is short sighted to do so, you need to consider the unit roster as a whole, as well as the command tree. otherwise whats the point?

perhaps we should get the puma to have an inf attack of 2 and have it lay mines instead?

people lose credibility with threads like this.

[Iceciro]

Axis, not including firestorm, have THREE artillery weapons.
1) Walking Stuka (barrages are free after upgrade)
2) Nebelwerfer (barrages are free after Nebel is built)
3) Observed Fire (150 munitions, must get officer in range)

Really Nebels just need to be buffed a bit, and the officer needs to be attachable to squads.

[RayLiota]

You need to look at the whole tree man. If you could just pick and choose yer powers from all the trees youd have one big time imbalanced doctrine. While your Allied oponent if getting Rapid Respsonse, and defensive operations you are getting Zeal and inspired Assualt. That off map arty should be better.

S.

[Iceciro]

I really hope that wasnt in reply to my post, Ray, because all the units I brought up are basic axis units you get regardless of doctrine.

[MajorThorvald]

sub par ineffective arty that takes up precious mp slots is what the axis have, i would rather have effective arty that doesnt take slots.

[RayLiota]

I really hope that wasnt in reply to my post, Ray, because all the units I brought up are basic axis units you get regardless of doctrine.
No, was just to the thread topic.. Otherwise I would have quoted ya..

[Demon_Eyes]

Klaus:
Firestorm is a bit different than offmap howitzer, the howitzer packs all its firepower in to 6 fairly small radius hits with a lot of building and armor damage, firestorm drops many more projectiles with nearly the same radius per projectile doing far more damage to an overall area against infantry and light armor. Comparing them is pointless, they server two different functions.

[Disreg]

Axis barrage abilities are terrible across the board.

None at all in Blitz.

A (much) slower non-tank damaging form of artillery strike in Terror, which gets made redundant by the overpriced and even slower but actually damaging V1 rocket.

And the only worthwhile one, a more expensive smaller-radius form of Off Map Artillery in the worst tree of all, Defensive.

They all need moving around and rebalancing against Allied AOE attacks.

It's frustrating playing Axis and seeing a massive swarm of Allied units in one spot, knowing that if you were on the other side you could take them all out with any one of several different powerful and quick barrages.

[Noble]

Eh, the firestorm ability really cant hold a candle to some of the allied offmap strikes, but its still very useable. It's best used against heavy weapons teams, IE: AT guns, mg's mortars etc etc.

[Demon_Eyes]

Disreg, what powerful and quick barrages would you be refering to?

[Vicious_CB]

I disagree disreg.

Firestorm rocks inf because of its area of effect and its insta pin capability. If you've ever used registered arty its probably the quickest dropping arty in the game and the most powerful for its cost. Rocket barrage is expensive but still pretty damn powerful. Not to mention the V1

The thing is axis arty is specific to what they are most effective at killing. IE firestorm to inf., registered to defending a point, V1 for bases while allied arty is more of a general use call in decent against all targets

[Disreg]

I'd agree the devs were probably going for more specialisation with Axis barrages, but alot like with Shermans, at the moment the 'jack-of-all-trades' Allied equivalent is almost as good against everything.

Off map art clears out infantry just fine.

[Mutters]

yea but it is very slow, quite random. many times off-map arty just hits nothing if u se it against units. i tend to wait for tank columns due to the pathfinding issues you can normally hit something then.

[CountChoculaBot]

Walking Stukas redeem all the shortcomings of Axis artillery once they're available IMO. Get 3 of them to fire on the same area and aint nothing coming outta there.

[Vicious_CB]

not really,even with 3 stukas(which is what I use in team games) does not guarentee may kills at all especially if you are targeting vehicles. The only redeeming feature of the stuka is that only has a 1 time cost. I would not pay 50 mun everytime for such a random barrage.

[Texture]

Damn boy, you gots 3 stuka's over there? Can you start playing as my teammate?

The Axis arty is a bit out of whack in terms of cost and effectiveness, especially considering the pervasive use of munitions by the Axis to do just about everything. But the one arty I would never have thought to complain about is Firestorm. It freaking rocks.

Yeah, it doesn't take out tanks... but that isn't it's purpose. It has a nice, wide area of effect. I don't call that a problem, I call it a feature. :) Make it easier to target well space AT guns, which is my favorite use for it. Heck, because of it's low anti tank damage, I very much enjoy just driving my tanks right in at the same time to take advantage of the supression on the AT squads.

Also, it fires reasonably fast. The funny thing is, the more troops he has in an area, the easier it is to get them. They retreat or move poorly when massed in a group, and if they don't get far enough away the firestorm itself will pin them for further destruction.

The commander of the other squad better not be distracted away from the group you are fire bombing, because if he is by the time he sees that red smoke it will probably already be too late. :)

[Mistenth]

Btw V1 is lousy at destroying buildings for its cost. It cannot destroy a production building; but the off-map howitzer strike can.

[Mutters]

it takes 2 off map howie strikes to destroy a tank depo which is 400 MU

[Brat_Boy]

After 1.3, I'm totally happy with Firestorm. It's not intended to be a heavy armor killer. It will, however, absolutely massacre and burn any infantry in its firing field. Its fire circle is very effective too; it rains down hard in the middle for the first couple seconds then you get hits on the fringe for those escaping. I've used it against clumped Riflemen and MGs, and it's devastating.


Btw V1 is lousy at destroying buildings for its cost. It cannot destroy a production building; but the off-map howitzer strike can. True, a V1 should destroy any production building it lands on. Especially for its cost. It's ridiculously effective against all units, though. I've destroyed 3-4 tanks in one hit with that thing. The damage radius is larger than the circle, too.

[Quercus]

I have a question - why is it that each of the Allied doctrines have a blind-fire arty strike that can fire into the fog of war, yet none of the Axis arty strikes can?
Calliope, Airborne bombing run (after recon) and 105 Howitzers can all fire blindly, but for the axis to use any artillery piece you have to use a spotter, even if the enemy unit you are targetting has become visible because it has just opened fire?

I know that generally the two sides are supposed to be balanced but this does really make no sense.

[y_Y]

balance doesnt mean that both sides are exact the same with different names... .
you need to take care of all units and abilities, axis have walking stukka and the weak nebelwerfer.
and so is firestorm great verus at guns, mgs, mortars, while the allied offmap howitzer comes down very slow and wil barely kill any infantry or tank.

[Neilius]

Firestorm is really, really slow to come down.
It goes on for awhile though, which is good.

[Brat_Boy]

I think the Firestorm delay was reduced. Or maybe the initial strike is just that much more devastating. But as for needing spotters, Axis get Nebelwerfers (yes, they suck) and Walking Stukas, which can both fire into fog of war. None of the Allied off-map arty can actually fire into the fog of war; the recon is a spotter and the off-map howies need observation too.

[FalseMyrmidon]

I think the Firestorm delay was reduced. Or maybe the initial strike is just that much more devastating. But as for needing spotters, Axis get Nebelwerfers (yes, they suck) and Walking Stukas, which can both fire into fog of war. None of the Allied off-map arty can actually fire into the fog of war; the recon is a spotter and the off-map howies need observation too.
Calliope Barrage does not need a spotter, on-map Howitzer Barrage (whatever it's called) does not need a spotter and the Bombing Run does need a spotter but you get a pretty cheap Recon Run plane thing that is in the same part of that tree.

[AntiCommie]

I dont get how you guys say offmap 105 isnt good. Its only 200Mun, kills most buildings in 1 strike, kills infantry fine, will kill tanks unless they move, and comes down about as fast as firestorm. Firestorm is ok, but a lot less universal and costs the same as the 105s. It also causes problems because its almost useless against buildings. It will take 2-3 to kill a barracks and sometimes even MG nests survive 1. Bunkers rarely survive 105s. The only better arty is 280mm rockets, which IMO, is the best arty in game, but costs 4 CP, 250muns and is in a less effective doc. V1 is ok, but almost unusable due to cost and CP. Even then tanks sometimes survive the blast, and it wont kill all buildings in 1 hit. I do agree terror is probably a better doc then infantry, but I would not say Defense is, so why do 280mm cost 50 muns more and double CP? Especially saying that onmap 105s negate almost all bonuses offered by the defense tree.