Mortars Exploding?

[Sgt. Osiris]

It seems after a set amount of shots the mortar collapses and you have to rebuild it. Is this intentional?

[andrieu_pizza]

Are you pointing it too far forward?
Made a few tests yesterday. It seems if it's in an unstable position it breaks the bipod and blows it off the base.

[Sgt. Osiris]

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

Are you pointing it too far forward?

No. The mortar will collapse in itself after firing X amount of mortar rounds. It's as if each mortar shot does damage to the tube and then once the mortar tube's health reaches zero it collapses. The shot that causes the tube to collapse also does not leave the tube, meaning it doesn't fire and land on target. It does not do any damage to the player.

[andrieu_pizza]

Maybe it's just an overheating mechanic?
But I just made a test. Blew it off the base in 5 shots when pointing extremely low.
But at totally erect ;) it just kept working pretty well. Didn't really count, but it was a few dozen.

EDIT:
Figured it out. The more propellant charges the quicker it gets damaged. The more unstable the position the quicker it breaks.

[Pineapples]

I've just been trying to practice mortars in game master and I'm having the exact same problem. Sometimes I can fire ~10 rounds, sometimes ~4, then the mortar suddenly falls apart.

[Sgt. Osiris]

I just did three test runs on Entre-Deux near the radio tower. I was aimming at the house north-east which gives you clear line of sight of impact. I used the American mortar, but originally had issues with the Russian mortars so I assume it's the same. The target was 320 meters away. I used HE rounds with 0 rings.

First: Failed at 14
Second: Failed at 5
Third: Failed at 17

When the mortar exploded the last round fired did not leave the tube. Something else I noticed was that not all of the rounds fired impacted? I was mortaring a position I had clear line of sight on so I could see/hear the splashes. The misfires appeared to be more frequent if I quickly fired two mortars in succession. I know the mortar shifts as it's shot, but I did not see or hear any impacts.

First: 2 shots failed to fire
Second: 4 shots failed to fire
Third: 4 shots failed to fire

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

Maybe it's just an overheating mechanic?
But I just made a test. Blew it off the base in 5 shots when pointing extremely low.
But at totally erect ;) it just kept working pretty well. Didn't really count, but it was a few dozen.

EDIT:
Figured it out. The more propellant charges the quicker it gets damaged. The more unstable the position the quicker it breaks.

What does unstable mean, pointing lower? Is this written down somewhere?

[fatigue]

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

Are you pointing it too far forward?
Made a few tests yesterday. It seems if it's in an unstable position it breaks the bipod and blows it off the base.

That doesn't happen irl, you can get base plate drift before it's set but your mortar system isn't going to blow up and disappear unless you also blow up and disappear.

[fatigue]

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

EDIT:
Figured it out. The more propellant charges the quicker it gets damaged. The more unstable the position the quicker it breaks.

This is ridiculous. So this is how they nerf the range of the mortars. Why don't they just allow 3 charges instead?

Also I had a mortar tube break with 0 charge, pointed nearly straight up for only firing 250m. This should be the easiest thing for a mortar tube to handle and it broke after 2 round of HE.

ALSO there seems to be some BS with duds. I have on video several rounds being duds. I fired a round to check range and nothing happened. Fired 2 and only one blew up.

[andrieu_pizza]

Noticed a bullet decal appearing after firing - on the right side of the funnel of the US mortar.

[Sgt. Osiris]

Originally posted by fatigue:

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

EDIT:
Figured it out. The more propellant charges the quicker it gets damaged. The more unstable the position the quicker it breaks.

This is ridiculous. So this is how they nerf the range of the mortars. Why don't they just allow 3 charges instead?

Also I had a mortar tube break with 0 charge, pointed nearly straight up for only firing 250m. This should be the easiest thing for a mortar tube to handle and it broke after 2 round of HE.

ALSO there seems to be some BS with duds. I have on video several rounds being duds. I fired a round to check range and nothing happened. Fired 2 and only one blew up.

Mortars take a lot to get online and require coordination to be effective. I hope this isn't intentional. They want to nerf something they should look at the attack helicopters. You can get nuked as soon as the game renders the helicopter. That's one person taking out entire bases or stopping caps compared to mortars.

At least that's another confirmation there are duds now. I thought I was going crazy.

[Commando950]

Yep, noticed this too, it is incredibly annoying. I'm really hoping this is just a bug and not a balancing decision. Surely is given how bizarre and inconsistent the behavior seems to be.

Maybe the backblast on mortars is bugged and it damages itself? It should probably be reported to bug tracker.

EDIT: Definitely gotta be a bug. Done some quick testing and only the composition version of the mortar breaks. If you use the mortar in the vehicle list rather than the composition it will seemingly not break. If your mortar breaks you can still keep the composition and then spawn the mortar vehicle through Game Master to replace the one that broke and it still won't break.

[fatigue]

Originally posted by Sgt. Osiris:

Originally posted by fatigue:

This is ridiculous. So this is how they nerf the range of the mortars. Why don't they just allow 3 charges instead?

Also I had a mortar tube break with 0 charge, pointed nearly straight up for only firing 250m. This should be the easiest thing for a mortar tube to handle and it broke after 2 round of HE.

ALSO there seems to be some BS with duds. I have on video several rounds being duds. I fired a round to check range and nothing happened. Fired 2 and only one blew up.

Mortars take a lot to get online and require coordination to be effective. I hope this isn't intentional. They want to nerf something they should look at the attack helicopters. You can get nuked as soon as the game renders the helicopter. That's one person taking out entire bases or stopping caps compared to mortars.

At least that's another confirmation there are duds now. I thought I was going crazy.

I was recording a video on how to use the mortars and several of them were duds. I remember you btw, I was the one firing illumination rounds when the tube broke and you were like "wtf" and tried to take out your shovel.

[fatigue]

changelog said mortars were shooting themselves and that's why they were breaking. That's really good. Hopefully it also fixes how terribly inaccurate they were.

[andrieu_pizza]

Originally posted by fatigue:

changelog said mortars were shooting themselves and that's why they were breaking. That's really good. Hopefully it also fixes how terribly inaccurate they were.

HAH! That explains the decals.
Geez, sometimes when I use the editor I feel as if I have schizophrenia.

[fatigue]

Originally posted by andrieu_pizza:

HAH! That explains the decals.

The second I read it in the changelog I remembered your post about those decals. I am very glad it was a bug and not a feature.

[fatigue]

want to add it seems like the inaccuracy has been fixed. Mortars are striking where they should, prior to the previous update. This was a good update for mortarchads.