Mountain Guns
Mortars and heavy machine guns aren’t the only static heavy weapons you’ll be able to operate in Isonzo!
Italian mountain gun in action.
Mountain guns are specifically designed to be more portable than regular artillery pieces for use in areas where it isn’t practical to tow an entire gun. They can usually be broken down into smaller pieces that can be carried by mules, horses, or people. They take their name from mountains - the prime example of difficult terrain - though they’re also called pack guns or pack howitzers because they can be ‘packed up’. Nowadays there are standard artillery pieces light enough to be transported by helicopter which removes the need for dedicated mountain guns - not to mention the variety of other weapons which can serve the same purpose as artillery.
Italian troops manning a Cannone da 65 near the Sass di Mezdi.
In-game engineers can construct them at preset locations, like mortars and heavy machine guns. Once built, they are used to provide direct fire support - they’re too long ranged to be used in an indirect fire role on Isonzo’s battlefields, but that’s what you have mortars for! They pack more punch than mortars, and when aimed carefully their splash damage can hit enemies in cover that would be impossible to hit with machine guns. Just make sure to have a rifleman or two with ammo box equipment to keep them supplied, because they have a relatively high rate of fire!
Italian Cannone da 65 Model 13
Beginning service with the Italian army a year before the war started in 1913, it was used throughout the First World War by mountain troops. Firing 65mm shells, the Cannone da 65 could be broken down into five loads, or moved by horse with the simple trailing arm.
It was also used in the Fiat 2000 heavy tank (only two of which were made), and was given to regular infantry when the mountaineers got new guns after the war. It was popular thanks to being lightweight and reliable.
Austro-Hungarian Gebirgskanone Model 1915
This Austro-Hungarian artillery piece had a somewhat troubled beginning. Originally designed by the Skoda company before the First World War began to fill a request to standardize and replace existing mountain guns, it was found to be the best candidate available… but it didn’t quite meet one of the design specifications. It broke down into six pieces rather than five, and so Skoda were asked to produce a lighter 7cm version instead of their initial 7.5cm design.
They did this, but testing indicated that their new 7cm design was inferior to the 7.5cm version. At that point Austro-Hungarian command decided to go ahead with the original design (after all, six versus five pieces didn’t make that much difference). Because of this delay, the first Gebirgskanone Model 1915s started to arrive in April 1915, a whole year later than they were first planned to be delivered! Although perhaps a little physically fragile, the Gebirgskanone Model 1915 was a capable gun and earlier production would have been beneficial for the Austro-Hungarians.
Enlist to fight on the Italian Front!
Before we start our recon of the upcoming dev blogs, we wanted to share a new competition to celebrate the announcement! You can win a game key and other Isonzo goodies by entering our raffle - all you have to do is sign up for the WW1 Game Series newsletter on our website to enter the raffle and get all the latest news from the development frontlines! Who knows... maybe one of you’ll be the lucky soldier who’ll be receiving an Isonzo goodie pack, including one of the first Isonzo game keys and a special Isonzo poppy grenade!
You'll also find WW1 inspired Isonzo propaganda posters! You can download them and use them as your wallpaper, banner or even print them out and hang them up!
More dev blogs to come before launch day!
Isonzo is releasing on September 13th, and you can already wishlist it. Until then we have plenty more dev blogs lined up, including another map, melee weapons, and more!
