Having trouble with Mortars

[dotsnake]

So when an enemy creates a small base with mortars or when the crash ships with mechanoids spawns, I use my best shooters (7-11 level) and make them equip 4 mortars, and target the enemy mortar/ship. 20 minutes later (I switch colonist when they get mental breakdown). The Mortar/ship is untouched. I've managed to injure some of the enemy, but my primary target are untouched (and yes, I manually set the targets).

TL;DR

4 mortars and 4 of my best shooters firing at the same target for a long period of time(then switching colonist when they get mental breakdown). How is it possible for my target to be untouched? (maybe a little scratch sometimes).

There was one time where the enemy went insane because they ran out of food, and started killing each other WHILE i was bombarding them with 4 mortars. I only killed 2 of them. The rest killed each other or left. I sent some of my colonist to finish the remaining one. That's how bad mortars are.

[eatKenny]

mortar has force missing radius so the shooting skill isn't relevant, it's pure luck. normaly 6+ mortars will do some real damage against siege base, if against the crash chip and mechanoids bombarding isn't really efficient, you should send your snipers and support them using EMP mortar.

or if you want try your hand at some nasty long range artillery check out my mod "Turret Collection"
https://ludeon.com/forums/index.php?topic=6895.0

[Cimanyd]

As far as I know, shooting skill has nothing to do with mortar accuracy (and why would it?). And I've tried them, in my experience they aren't great but they aren't nearly as bad as what you're saying. Three explosive mortars continuously firing (switched out colonists often, since it doesn't matter who's manning them) were easily enough to hurt siegers a lot, and in one case, destroy both of their mortars so the remaining injured siegers assaulted the colony. Most of the shots miss, yes, but the ones that hit do damage.

A crashed part is a smaller target with a lot of health, trying to mortar it is probably a worse idea. I'd suggest a different strategy entirely, set up turrets and colonist (or at least sniper) positions before cracking it open. If you can kill the scythers right away when you open it, you can snipe the centipedes and then kill the part. Alternatively, if you can destroy (or badly damage) the ship part right when you open it (turret explosions help, as does friendly fire from the centipedes), the mechanoids will head to your colony.

And use explosive mortars, not incendiary mortars. Incendiary mortars are only a minor nuisance against you, and are even more useless for you.

[skullywag]

aim at things around the mortars, i hit them way more that way, seems to be a theme with all guns in this game lol!

[Wex]

And use explosive mortars, not incendiary mortars. Incendiary mortars are only a minor nuisance against you, and are even more useless for you.

Well, if you are in the forest, walled by some stone walls, with floor buffers, try shooting at siegers with 3 incendiary rounds.
Some men just wanna watch the world burn.

[Cimanyd]

And use explosive mortars, not incendiary mortars. Incendiary mortars are only a minor nuisance against you, and are even more useless for you.

Well, if you are in the forest, walled by some stone walls, with floor buffers, try shooting at siegers with 3 incendiary rounds.
Some men just wanna watch the world burn.

With one incendiary, either it lands in the middle of the siege camp and the siegers beat it out, or it misses and it starts raining before the fire gets to them (large fires cause rain). By adding more mortars, you might increase the low chance of some kind of good outcome happening, but I think an equally higher number of explosive mortars would still be better.

[christhekiller]

Ive had good fortune with incendiary.

If you use it to support an assault on the siegers then it's great. Because a large portion of the siegers won't engage and will instead go to beat out fires. What I'll usually do is send in my best fighters (armed with high-end weapons) and I'll have my lesser skilled fighters support with incendiary.

It'll also lure a few of them away from the camp so you could pick off non-M24 wielding raiders with your M24 guys to reduce their numbers.

[Cimanyd]

Ive had good fortune with incendiary.

If you use it to support an assault on the siegers then it's great. Because a large portion of the siegers won't engage and will instead go to beat out fires. What I'll usually do is send in my best fighters (armed with high-end weapons) and I'll have my lesser skilled fighters support with incendiary.

It'll also lure a few of them away from the camp so you could pick off non-M24 wielding raiders with your M24 guys to reduce their numbers.

Yeah, I can see how incendiaries could be useful. I just think that an equal number of explosive mortars would always or almost always be better.

[christhekiller]

Ive had good fortune with incendiary.

If you use it to support an assault on the siegers then it's great. Because a large portion of the siegers won't engage and will instead go to beat out fires. What I'll usually do is send in my best fighters (armed with high-end weapons) and I'll have my lesser skilled fighters support with incendiary.

It'll also lure a few of them away from the camp so you could pick off non-M24 wielding raiders with your M24 guys to reduce their numbers.

Yeah, I can see how incendiaries could be useful. I just think that an equal number of explosive mortars would always or almost always be better.

The trouble with the purely explosive mortars is that they need to actually hit the targets. And 99% of the time they miss completely. But incendiary only needs to start fires nearby and they'll break off people to beat them out. As long as it's near their camp they'll leave it to fight the fires which is all I need

[Wex]

Ive had good fortune with incendiary.

If you use it to support an assault on the siegers then it's great. Because a large portion of the siegers won't engage and will instead go to beat out fires. What I'll usually do is send in my best fighters (armed with high-end weapons) and I'll have my lesser skilled fighters support with incendiary.

It'll also lure a few of them away from the camp so you could pick off non-M24 wielding raiders with your M24 guys to reduce their numbers.

Yeah, I can see how incendiaries could be useful. I just think that an equal number of explosive mortars would always or almost always be better.

The trouble with the purely explosive mortars is that they need to actually hit the targets. And 99% of the time they miss completely. But incendiary only needs to start fires nearby and they'll break off people to beat them out. As long as it's near their camp they'll leave it to fight the fires which is all I need

Of course, if you play in the desert, the choice is only one. And it's not incendiary.

[UrbanBourbon]

4 mortars is nothing. You'll want 12 or more. Double it, and the booming should be glorious. The micromanagement could kill you though. Mortars cannot be manned or managed enmasse, which is kind of weird. Just alpha being alpha, I guess. A workaround could be to mod the mortars to be better but more expensive, so that you'd need fewer of them to get the same result while maintaining the same cost for the effect.