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This is somewhat related to what I'm working on next for AV2 but it's such a general topic that I felt it might be a good discussion to bring up here.

Artillery. The Big Guns. Barrages of fire raining upon the battlefield heralded by a distant sound of thunder somewhere near the horizon.

In smaller-scaled games (meaning 15mm or less) or in tile-based games it's possible and feasible to represent realistic artillery with models that are present on the tabletop. When dealing with 25-30mm, though, things begin to get silly when you're playing on anything resembling a standard tabletop. 40K takes things to the extreme, with the massively barreled Basilisk, the missile-launching Manticore (to say nothing of the Deathstrike) and the MLRS Whirlwind all sitting on the table with massive and fearsome weapons that should be able to fire across the room, much less across the table. (Mortar weapons and other infantry-portable artillery are fine since those are usually more short-ranged support options.)

Now, the other extreme of that is to simply eschew the artillery models entirely. There are rules for artillery spotting, for being able to call in artillery, and for the effects of the barrages upon the battlefield (and if the designer is clever, decent counterbarrage rules). There's no need to have the models since they aren't present in the space represented by the table. This is clinical and effective but... tabletop wargaming is about building cool models and then pushing them around while rolling dice. That's where the design dilemma enters play.

There are midpoint compromise options such as requiring artillery models but simply placing them to the side. This has the best of both worlds but can run afoul of the limited space available in most gaming venues. I suppose that there could be a six inch "Artillery Field" on each side of the table where models are placed (and is treated as being some arbitrary distance away from the rest of the battlefield), but that cuts into the space available for the rest of the battle. I'm sure there are other options out there that might be interesting or useful, but... *shrug*

Do you have a preference for how artillery gets represented? Do you just say "screw realism*, bring on the big guns"?

*: Realism is known to not be a factor in 40K.

If its for the 25-30mm range, id say go for some kind of "spotting" action for the infantry to mark the area, then have the shells or whatever drop next turn. There's always going to be some kind of delay between marking an area and the ordinance arriving, and leaving a turn in between should reflect that ok.

The two best ways to organically incorporate artillery realistically in 28mm combat is either to incorporate a dedicated artillery liaison officer or to have the commanding officer fight for the artillery support available with the other not depicted front lines.

Totally depends on the kind of game one is interested in.

For Pulp Sci-Fi or Sci-Fantasy like 40k, it's fine to have artillery on the table ( I used to run 3 basilisks), as that game is so over the top (Two Reinforced Platoons on two soccer pitches) that nothing is to be taken seriously anyway.

For more realistic sci-fi, off-table is your best bet is for off table arty for anything over 6mm. Even at 15mm having indirect fire arty is not realistic, with exceptions for small mortars or when playing on large battlefields.

I play sci-fi in 10mm and the rules we use (a slightly modified version of "Panzer 8 sci-fi") allow for on-board and off-board indirect arty. We realize that with the distances involved on-table arty models probably aren't quite realistic, but we're willing to fudge realism just a bit.

In 28mm, it's hard to realistically justify anything other than light mortars and on-table spotters for off-table artillery . Even then, a real artillery barrage would probably nuke most of the average size game table, but I can see why designers would still include such elements.

Even at 15mm (roughly 1:87-1:100) artillery on table indicates something went horribly wrong- they should never be that close to the front lines. Even an 8 ft. table at 1:100 groundscale is a mere 800 ft- less than 300 yds and within effective rifle distance. That is fine for an infantry skirmish but is way too close for armor/artillery/etc. simulation.

For 25mm-40mm, on table artillery would be an objective at most. If we assume 1:48 ground scale, a 6 ft table gives you 96 yards, or slightly less than a football field. In terms of weaponry, a target pistol fired by a marksman could probably hit a target at that range, but most semi autos aren't very effective beyond 30 or so yards. By contrast, that distance is trivial for a sharpshooter with a rifle, especially scoped and would probably be the maximum range most shooters could engage at with any real accuracy. A 155mm howitzer could drop rounds out to about 15,000 yards (over 900 feet to scale) or so while a Long Tom could fire 20 miles!

But do you want simulation or a game? Different wargames focus on different ends of the scale. Some also use different figure and ground scales (GW seems to use a shifting ground scale somwhere around 1:100 for small arms and greatly goes from there).

There is no right answer- you have to decide what you want the rules to play like.

Personally, I enjoy different games depending on mood and setting. Serious historical? Better get that ground scale accurate or have a darn good reason. Quickplay rules? Keep it light and fun. Competitive? Balance is essential.

To be honest, outside of fantasy and pistols-and-shotguns Westerns, I've never thought of miniatures above the tinest of scales as actually being "to scale", but rather a representative "schematic" of some number of troops taking up FAR less space than they are taking up on the table. To me, that inch-high miniature on a 25mm-wide base isn't representing a single model, it is itself taking the place of a squad or two. Otherwise, you're looking at trying to wrap your head around tanks maneuvering around a baseball diamond. It just doesn't fit.

As you say, a game is a game, not a simulation. At the scales we mostly play at, we're playing Chess with prettier pieces and with different theme "wrappers". 28mm minis have sort of become the standard for sci-fi/fantasy because they're where detail starts to become interesting (though 15mm works really well for Napoleonic and earlier because weapon ranges are short enough to fit a whole realistic battle onto a (large) table).

In the end, I have chosen to put artillery off-table, largely because yes, the ranges just break the suspension of disbelief. In addition, I feel that not having to build artillery models will make it easier for people to play the game, especially if they're fielding some weird concept army that might have miniatures that are easy to find but is almost impossible to find decent vehicle models for. I still will encourage people to build artillery (especially the Orbital Artillery ships) and keep them set next to the table to track when it's fired and/or when it's been destroyed. I'd love to see a really cool space vessel hanging out next to (or even over) a tabletop.

I like Artillery off-table, both for reasons of scale and also because it doesn't feel right. There's a different compromise one could potentially use, though. You could have "standard" artillery, where the commander has to hope he or she can get a fire mission in a timely manner. If someone actually had a model, however, that person could purchase "priority" for their artillery, meaning it was designated for the on-table commander. It would give a bonus to players who wanted a bunch of artillery (although they would have to pay points for it).

From the scale perspective, I'm 100% behind scale being abstracted. Even if each model represents only one guy, that model is much larger on the map than he is in "real life".