The mortar doesnt need to glow when its ready, because it shouldnt have a 1h charge time. No army would ever take 1h to load a shell, thats way tooooo long.

It should just be instanty loaded...

I'm going to put in a vote in favor of mortars. There are kinks to iron out, but for those of us ok with not ascending once a week, they add a level of interest to the game.

Im in a situation where I have a handful of mortars that are close to some territories that I don't need to get anytime soon, but those territories will still be significant even after I've maxed out hospitals. so I'm just taking pot shots when the cost isn't too significant. I don't do the math to figure out if it's the most efficient possible use of my money. I just like to see the territories get knocked down.

but for those of us ok with not ascending once a week

Shots fired !!

For the record, I agree that mortars are a good idea BUT that the kinks > benefits.

And why aren't there Techs for mortars? Should be low level (not final tier) Techs that increase hit% & damage done & reduce cost, etc - just like hospitals, army camps, mercs, etc.

If they're meant to be somewhat useful for new players only, then maybe they're better (still some issues though) but for post 1st/2nd ascension players, they're totally useless.

Edited 9/3/2021 18:26:08

:) like I said, it's fun taking pot shots.

Agreed, there should be techs or cheap advancements available for them. I think my biggest disappointment with this game is how redundant techs, advancements, and artifacts are. On the modifiers tab I have 5-10 things boosting ore production, army production, or money boosts, but nothing for digs, nothing for mortars, barely anything for hospitals. Sadly, that would be too big of a change to hope for.

Tried the mortar for the first time today and no beginners luck for me. Had 70% chance to hit but the only hit made was directed towards my wallet 😂 2,5 billions for nothing...
I can't see I will try this feature again anytime soon.

An idea for the future would be if they were reasonably cheep for a lower % chance to hit but you should also be able to pay expensively for a guaranteed hit.

Edited 9/14/2021 12:20:26

A mortar crew consists of at least three members: the squad leader, gunner, and the assistant gunner.

Make the mortar operation crew dependent, with accuracy based on crew experience. The more experience, the better the performance. Use the AP points system.

Edited 9/15/2021 21:06:03

Mortars as constructed now are a waste of time and resources

Should be renamed "bottle rockets"

is it me and maybe my misunderstanding of it all, but are mortars just useless ,,

The majority tends to agree with you pasterma, they have little value in their current format. I suspect a rework is upcoming, b/c from what I understand, most people just ignore them. Too long, miss too much, too expensive, too inconvenient.

The most annoying thing about mortars is that just like arena, I can't disable the pop up thing when I capture a mortar.

thanks for your nelightment... never used them before either. and won't

I've maxed out Increased Mortar Damage. Can confirm that mortar is still useless and I still won't use them. And I won't unlock auto-mortar because I don't want money to be wasted on mortars during battles.

Yea the popups are annoying. Same with powers, digs, maybe 1 or 2 other things. Powers have an option to disable the popup but it doesn't work.

What's also annoying about mortars is that you have to remember which ones you've loaded and go back to them yourself an hour later. Unlike hospitals, mercs camps, etc, there's no list in the menu tabs to show you where they are, cost of upgrading, how many shots loaded, how many shots remaining, etc. Not that it matters b/c I won't use them until some future upgrade makes them useful, but just some things I noticed in my initial testing.

On the bright side Math, when that fictitious future update does make mortar useful, you've already got the AP Adv to gain from them. lol

One thing Ive noticed about Mortars is on hardened levels loading them seems really cheap so far. Ive played 3 hardened levels and at least the first 2 loads are less than 200M. Havent loaded one 3 times.

Not yet there...
very happy to see some improvement but still way off... example: loading for a 50% chance to hit on the biggest target in range (which if successful would mean a reduction of 50M armies on the target) cost 387M. At a mercenary camp for that same amount I can hire 88M armies, for sure (not 50% chance) and I can use these where I want... so still about 352% worst than mercenaries, and I'd rate those a pretty poor investment after the first few cheap camps...

Considering the limited range and time required I think mortars still need to get at least 4 times better than they currently are to be even worth a try...