Quote:
Originally Posted by Pibwl
T-26 family:
337 T-26 M1937s - Kolomiets' book recognizes it as "model 1938".
Radio chance should be more - some 20 (now 10), since more tanks had radio by then, although M1938 itself was not numerous transitional model (code 1)
338 T-26 M1939 - gun ammo was even 186 (165 had tanks with radio).
They remained in use in small quantities on some theatres until the end of war, even against Japan - although there should be made another entry, so that it's not chosen by the AI instead of T-34.
Radio chance should be more - some 20.
In official documents they were known as T-26-1 - maybe call them T-26-1 M1939?
517 T-26 M1939+ - might be called T-26E (no official designation, but E was commonly used for Russian "ekranirovanny" or "s ekranami"). First were made and used in combat in 2/40 (now 4/41). There are knowns photos from combat in 2/44 (now ends at 12/42)
Hull sides and turret sides were also strengthened with some 20 mm plates (possibly even 30-40mm plates were sometimes used)
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About the radios: have you considered that the game engine always gives formation leaders radios? So for the radio chance to be say 20%, it would require that in real life one of every five non-command tanks had a radio. The availability of radios did increase towards the end on the 1930s, but if I remember correctly, it only meant that all platoon command tanks were equipped with a radio, whereas among early production T-26 M1933 only the company commander's tank had a radio (which can't be modeled in the game).
The front hull armor value for the T-26 is somewhat of a problem. Most of it is close to vertical with 15mm plate, but the middle part is 7mm at 80 degrees (40 mm penetration path) and the lowest part (impossible to hit with AT guns, but still possible with ATRs) is 15mm at 62 degrees (32mm penetration path). Whether these constitute enough of the frontal surface to increase it to Armor Value 3 in game terms is not clear.
The turret on the other hand is round, and so is the gun mantlet, or since M1938 most of the turret frontal area consists of the large rounded gun mantlet. It's probably the rounding that made the designers of the OOB to give it Armor Value 3. If that is really warranted or not is again not clear.
About the T-26E: there does not seem to have been a real standard for this upgrade. Finnish experience with them indicates that they were very under-powered and unreliable. Consequently the Finnish army never up-armored their T-26s in a similar manner (unlike the Finnish T-28s which were all upgraded to T-28E standard). There is no way to model mechanical unreliability in the game, but if armor is added from the current rather modest upgrade, the speed should be cut down even more.
Concerning AAMG: I agree that most of the time T-26s did not have the AAMG fitted. There is really no other way to do model that in the game than to make two different variants and give the AAMG variant radio code x1 so that the AI does not pick them very often. Human players can still do so if they wish to, and there's really nothing wrong with that. The AAMG seems to have been a little more common with the T-28 M1938 that with the T-26, but still not universally fitted.