The Manticoran Empire wrote:Manokan Republic wrote:
The advantage of a mortar is it's payload for the size of weapon that fires it, which is what I keep saying. I'm not saying I want to use it for ideal direct fire attacks only that it can be used for that. At close range, indirect fire is also still possible since you can just fire up at a higher angle. A 20mm autocannon isn't going to provide the payload of a 60mm mortar for example, and is also much larger and harder to mount. Direct fire capability isn't the goal, it's just a possibility. Again I've never said that I want to use it instead of an autocannon for the same role, I just want the same loading mechanism to be used to automatically load a mortar instead.
And I've explained why that isn't used. Mortars and Autocannons are used in very different ways and the difference in employment results in a difference in how the autoloading systems work. A mortar uses separate propellent charges to adjust the range they travel to. An autocannon doesn't. As such, an autoloading mortar HAS to adjust to the separate propellent charges and be able to alter the number of propellent charges to meet the requisite range requirement. An autocannon doesn't. You can't make an autocannon style mortar without loosing the range versatility of the mortar.
Not all mortars use different propellant loads, some mortars have rounds that are prepackaged. Again, your insistence that mortars can only do one thing and function in one highly specific way is ridiculous. Mortars can operate in a lot of different ways, and you don't need to change propellant loads when you can just angle the weapon differently, such as with the 60mm Brandt mortar.
The idea that it would be impossible to have an autoloading mortar because you somehow have to use varying levels of propellant is absurd. Nowhere written in stone was this ever a requirement of what a mortar is or how it works. It's essentially just a gun that shoots a low velocity high payload round.