"How far back were the guns" Topic

Planning a 1918 Western Front game and was worried about how many guns I'd need for the defenders. One player said they wouldn't be needed because the guns would be too far back. I thought that would be true of the heavy artillery, but I figure field guns would be deployed close enough. So how far back would field guns be deployed?

Have you decided on a rule set? What scale of game are you playing? Is the basic unit on the table an individual soldier, a squad, a platoon, or a company? Do you know what the ground scale is – inches on the table to yards or metres in real life?

Robert

British 18pds only fire shrapnel at 400-600 yards until after November 1914.
Me and a fellow ex serviceman are developing our own rules, test played once Mons Bridges, they work quite well.
we use 1 stand a half company of 100 men. 8 stands equal the 4 companies with Coy C/O's on pennies and Battalion on two pence piece as is the HMG section.
1" = 50 yards.
We played and had to do a fighting retreat 3km back to the fall back positon. If you want a copy of the rule to play with just ask.

I think you have missed some zeros off those ranges if you are talking about what the guns COULD do. In practice they rarely had the opportunities for longer ranged fire at Mons or many times during the retreat.

There is nothing definitive as some was based on the terrain, some on requirement and some on barrel wear/ammunition and tactics employed.

The Germans often used field guns and even 5.9's as anti-tank guns after mid 1916. So you might very well have a gun or two on the field as it were. At Vimy for example, the Germans deployed two batteries of 7.7s within 400 yards of the front line trenches for Anti-tank purposes and another 2 5.9s 200 yards behind these guns.

Shawn

Sorry shrapnel effective range was 400 – 600 yards checked with the artillery school at Tidworth.

the GHQ artillery notes no 5 gave instructions that the fuzes on 18lb shrapnel shells should not be set for less than 1000 yds and that the effective zone for shrapnel was between 1800 and 2400yds when used for wire cutting and could be used up to 3500yds in that role

Crack on I believe the artillery school. At Mons and Le Cateau the shrapnel WAS used at 400-yards walk the area you can not see much further than 300 years at best. Oh and by the way Dads Dad was at Mons with the RFA& that data stands true as his notes bear testament, I believe data from the users and not some manual, being ex forces we did things the manual said you should not, hey who cares mil guys will always do what is best for them and not some manual or forum :-).
'When World War I began, British field guns (13 pounder and 18 pounder) were equipped solely with shrapnel shells, with an approximate 3-1 ratio of field guns to field howitzers (5 inch and 4.5 inch).

The 18-pounder shrapnel shell contained 374 small spherical bullets. A time fuze was set to initiate the shell in the air in front of the target. This blew off the shell nose and fired the bullets forward in a cone like a shotgun : they were effective up to 300 yards from the burst. For maximum effect from the cone of bullets the angle of descent of the shell had to be flat and not plunging. At a theoretical maximum 20 rounds per minute, it could deliver 7,480 bullets per minute at a far greater range than machine-guns. The gunners and officers of Regular Army field artillery batteries were expert at closely supporting the "fire and movement" tactics of the infantry with accurate shrapnel fire.

There are so many examples of little tricks we used to use to circumnavigate the regulations. 'ADAPT IMPROVISE and OVERCOME'

At the Somme, it was proved that shrapnel was not effective at cutting wire. HE was better but war planners had thought the war would be fast and mobile so had more shrapnel shells than HE in stock.

bgb, could I give your rules a try? I have hordes of 6mm WW1 stuff looking for a decent set

Only play tested once but yes of course drop me an email, mkassessors@yahoo.co.uk, any comments and additions or thoughts are welcome, keep an open mind is all we ask. :-)

I also agree ranges were further, but we are only using the effective ranges of a max 3000 yards for shrapnel, and that is only if line of sight permits.

Thanks Shawn. Looks like I have a reason to include a couple of 77s with my Germans.