One thing that bothers me (I could be mistaken) is that once a spotter "fires" a marker, he can't remove it himself. There have been times where I called in a strike on an enemy flag, only to have a group of friendlies rush in to try and take that flag. End result, one dead friendly squad due to TK, and maybe the gunner even gets kicked for negative score.
On the other hand, if we have the ability to remove a spot target, it would help signal the gunners to cease fire and/or move to another target. They have visual confirmation both with the adjust wheels and the overhead view if their target has changed or been removed.
Unfortunately, it's hard to make an artillery based Cease Fire command that works properly. It's possible that multiple artillery units are firing at multiple targets, so how would you tell only a specific gun crew to check their fire? If you broadcast a generic "Artillery, Cease Fire" command then all guns will stop, regardless of target. And that could end up costing your side a flag or losing troops. I think the only real way to fix the problem is just use the team chat and yell out "Arty, check fire on the church!". But then again, all artillery gunners can see friendly units moving into their impact zone both on the minimap and the overhead observer cam.
As for smoke, that one is also a little tricky. The troops on the ground don't know which gun is firing at which target, so how would they tell a specific gun to fire smoke? If you just yell out "Arty, pop smoke" then what about the gun that needs to be firing HE at an enemy flag? Giving the wrong gun crew the smoke command might cause a negative outcome. The gunner should know using the minimap and overhead view the general location that is their target. If you need smoke on the church for example, just yell in team chat "Arty, need smoke on church". As long as the gun crew has a spotter painting the church and they have smoke available, they should be able to follow through.
What I personally would like to see is some way for squad leaders to mark on the map where they need artillery support, and require a spotter to actually place the fire mission. The SL could place a smoke marker on the church for example, and the closest available spotter would then paint the target and use a smoke round. You can adjust the commo-rose depending on the equipped weapon, so it might be possible to give spotters the ability to place a variety of markers on a target that only the gun crews can see. From there, gun crews simply need to select the shell based on the target type. HE, smoke, illum, etc can all be simulated as ammunition types depending on the map.
Of course, such a system might be getting a little too complicated for casual players. It's nowhere near as close to the real thing, but I understand that it might make using artillery more difficult and draw some people away from using it. Again, it's all about balance I guess.
