Mortars: Useful or not?

[Panzer]

For me mortars are a late game commodity, when raid sizes grow to the point where a fight might end badly. Very useful against sieges, dont like them vs shipparts because the mechs might assault me due to low ship hp before I can kill them, sniper rifles are so much safer and dont consume ammo.
Never use incendiary because it lacks damage compared to explosive, and siegers put out the fire anyways. Havent used EMP all that much because they re even more situational than regular mortars, shield raids are too fast to get a good hit in, ship mechs get sniped anyways and vs sieges the explosive mortar is just better.
A portable short range mortar would be nice, less devastating but can be carried by a person, we could shell raider outposts that way or the odd raider might bring it along instead of a rocket launcher, to shell your defenses and colonists or the power supply in case you re holed up in some mountain.

[LordMunchkin]

You're fools if you think shells cost much steel. A mortar costs 250 steel to build - equivalent of 25 shells. So for the price of 4 mortars you can have 3 mortars with 25 shells, enough for several barrages.

A mortar or 10 more components? It's not even a question for me. As I and others have said many times over, everything mortars can do something can do better. There's also the opportunity cost for the labor. I'd much rather have my crafters focusing on making clothes, weapons, and armor than ammo. Construction isn't in nearly as much demand but my constructors often double as haulers so having a battery of mortars to build and inevitably replace (SOMETHING WILL HAPPEN) is just another logistics burden I do not need.

[JuicyPVP]

I use the Incendiary mortar is stall sieges. That's it. They are too inaccurate. Maybe make shooting or crafting (operating machinery? ) allow them to shoot more accurately scaling up to perfect shots with a 20 skill.

[haywire-2014]

I, personally, have used them ... maybe twice? First with no ammo, and secondly when ammo became a thing and they are just too inaccurate  to warrant the ammo, which can be better used for I.E.Ds, id say balancing wise, make them more accurate but increase aiming time, soo if you want a decent assault you need more than one, but itll take longer per shot, id use them then!!

[Sinosauropteryx]

I use them all the time, but mostly because I find it fun. I can't say whether they're more effective than snipers, or building more traps.

If you're up on resources (and I usually am) they aren't too much of an investment, even if you only get 1-2 volleys off on most raids. If resources are tight I won't bother with them. I think the niche they occupy right now is fine. I would echo one suggestion though, that the various types (incendiary, EMP) be attached to different ammo types rather than different mortar types.

[JuicyPVP]

I use them all the time, but mostly because I find it fun. I can't say whether they're more effective than snipers, or building more traps.

That moment when the shell launches and you follow it to the target.
I think if improved, they would be a great part of the game.

[PrincessZulu]

As many before have stated, mortars only shine against big immobile groups. i mostly
get them cause i love the idea of a bombarding and the sound is so satisfying when the shell goes off. I would like to see some more utility from them, like more types of effects like maybe a smoke screen reducing vision on the field (if there was a wind direction), maybe even being able to launch water bombs to fight forest fires from afar. Also launching captured pirate members at the attacking pirate crew would be hilarious

[JuicyPVP]

Wow- waterbombs suggestion is actually really cool.

[Haruru]

I never specially build them or craft shells, but after defeating a siege i usually install a few incendiary ones at base, only to set next siege camp on fire, as a preparation before attacking it with pawns. Otherwise they are too inaccurate and slow to fire on approaching enemies. During offence (which i used only a few times as a way to acquire supplies from some almost innocent tribals during migration), i thing that sniper rifles are preferable, as mortars are too heavy to justify bringing additional 3 muffalos, and as you are usually outnumbered you will need to draw enemies out to some easily defensible terrain anyway. For more uses for shells i thing that some weaker and stationary alternative to single-use rocket launchers would be nice (recoilless rifle on a tripod or something simmilar?)

[bclewis]

By far my most common use for mortars is using EMP mortars against centipedes.

[jtnoel]

I find them useful to deal with sieges. I wish accuracy was better. The shell requirement doesn't bother me. It is the speed at which it fires. I end up with at least 3... that is the min number for effectiveness to actually hit a target in a timely manner. The only change I'd make is to tie accuracy to some shooting or gunnery skill.

Fun recent game ended b/c of a seige. Pirates showed up preparing to shell my tribal huts. I was still at the banging rocks together tech level and figured I'd wait them out till they fell asleep. NOPE... they showed up with two incendiary mortars and I'd just put down brand new hardwoods. So I attacked and lost hard. It was awesome I felt I had to attack b/c of those things. I like the mortars.

[nashable]

I recently used a mortar to defeat the mechanoids defending a poison ship. I placed the mortar on the far side of a hill (about 30 tiles away) and didn't have to use too many shells to cripple the mechanoids, then sent in a ground team to mop them up and destroy the ship.

I would request the ability to pre-range/sight in a target (with potentially cheaper smoke shells or something you could build), once ranged accuracy would be quite good until you changed your target and would have to be re-sighted again. If not pre-sighted then shots would become more accurate over time, unless the target moves or the mortar changes target.

This allows for pre-defined and prepared spots for mortars to be accurate, would allow for some really nice defensive points around chokes, with good accuracy but not OP super weapon. I would disable the ability to target a pawn with the mortar and just have it target a position.

Benefits:
* Good against sieges and Mechanoid Ships - Might need both encounters to have their behavior changed when being shelled, i.e. they know that eventually they will be blown up by the mortars, so either change tactics (take cover/start tunnelling into the colony) or trigger an assault
* Cheaper/effective use of ammo as more shots would land on target
* Promotes building multiple mortars, each with their own prepared firing position
* Rewards players who think tactically about choke points and preparing their firing positions
* Rewards players who are reactive, as cheaper smoke shells allow mortars to become accurate as they fire over time

[Mehni]

I use them occasionally, but only late-game.

The EMP mortars are useful against the large melee-only pirate raids with shields. The inaccuracy doesn't really matter, the explosion radius is big enough to be effective. I've used them once or twice against mechanoid raids, but they weren't great. All they do is slow down the centipedes even more. As for the mech ship, meh. EMP grenades work fine and have zero chance of hitting my shielded units. I do like their longer stun though, but mech ships aren't a problem to begin with.

The explosive mortar is only useful against large raids that prepare for a while. They cause a ton of bleeding so you can forget about potential recruits, and most of the gear gets damaged.

Never used the incendiary mortar.

[NeverPire]

Explosive mortar is great against siege, especially when it reach the stack of mortar shells.

EMP mortar don't let mechanoids get the immunity and almost never miss thanks to is high radius so it turns mechanoids raids to joke.
Mechanoids can't move or riposte, colonists are not injured and take free shots.

It needs only 5-8 mortar per raid, which is less metal than a transport pod.

[christhekiller]

I've used Incendiary mortars mostly to distract besiegers while my snipers actually pick them off, but otherwise nothing has been especially effective. Though I haven't toyed with EMP mortars at all.