Autocannon ammo loadout of AFVs

[Shan]

When looking at the thread on the Czech Pandur II armament some time ago, I found a point I'd like to discuss: the ammo loadout of AFVs in the game ---

1.) AFAIK one autocannon salvo counts for 10 rounds in the game - so a real-life loadout of, say, 200 HE rounds should be represented as 20 HE in the game - correct?

2.) As with tanks, the ammo loadout in the game should always comprise all ammo available on the vehicle - say, reserve ammo stored in the hull, et cetera, should also be included - reload times to fill up an auto-loader or a cannon magazine and such issues are not considered - right?

I do, however, believe that there are certain AFVs where this is not the case - only the ammo ready to fire is beig considered, and this leads IMHO to some very unbalanced situations.

Therefore, if I am right with points 1 + 2, I'd suggest we use this thread to collect evidence of incorrect ammo loadouts. (with nation + slot number plus a source for the real loadout at the ready so this can be used to improve the game...)

I do not have the game ready at the moment to provide you with more examples right now, but I'll do so later. Here are just the two I remember to be incorrect in the current OOBs but I'll check: The Czech Pandur II which in reality has 100HE/100sabot rounds ready plus 100/100 stored (see other thread for the source); the Yugoslavian BVP M-80 IFV which in reality has 400 20mm rounds in total but I am not sure about the ratio of HE and AP (source: http://www.vojska.net/eng/armed-forc...carrier/m-80/) while the improved M-80A in the 20mm version has 1,400 20mm rounds. (http://www.pmulcahy.com/tracked_apcs...acked_apcs.htm)


Contribuions welcome,,,

Shan

[Mobhack]

it is only a guideline that "10 cannon rounds = 1 burst", for example the WW2 German 20mm and the Post war UK Rarden are treated as mainly a form of big SLR, so more shots from a given number of rounds. Also, larger cannon might get the same effect from fewer rounds. Then - what about Vulcan type cannons?.

so - there is really no "grand unified theory" - it is up to the individual OOB designer to decide what the ammo loadout should be for a particular vehicle. Given a new vehicle, one might divvy up the ammo load by 10 to get an initial idea of the sort of ammo load there should be - but then the designer will make decisions of his own.

So - simply doing a mechanical divide by 10 exercise on all vehicles would not really help much, though it might throw up any oddities that might need investigating. But for th reasons that X has Y load - you would need to query the original OOB designer(s) - and some are no longer active.


Cheers
Andy

[DRG]

DO NOT, under any circumstances take everything on http://www.pmulcahy.com/ as an incontrovertible truth . If you want to use it as a starting point....fine. But then go find another source to back it up but DO NOT use it to prove a point.

The "Pandur" issue has already been brought up on another thread as you noted but so has the M-80 issue and both have been noted for correction on my MBT to-do list.

Don

[Shan]

Okay, thanks for your replies. A division by ten is just a hint, alright, so I'd need to come up with some clear examples where I find the ammo loadout is incorrect - I'll do it if I find some, other than the two previous ones.

And these sources were the first things I found with google - I don't have my own computer here with some hopefully better sources... I just wanted to start the thread for now and, based on your replies, invite anyone to bring up examples.

[Shan]

The V-150 Commando in its 20mm version carries 6+6 rounds HE/AP in the OOBs where I found it - for example with Trukey: Unit 52; Thailand: Unit 100; now, http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...150-specs.htm; Tanks of the world, ed. 8; and other sources all say it has 200 rounds ready + 200 reserve, 400 in total - this should then be 20/20 in the game I guess.

Besides, in the OOB of Saudi Arabia I found a version - Unit 123 - with the only armament being a 20mm cannon and only 12x HE ammo - that might be a mistake.

[kikka]

Another hint I found is
1. trying to find the burst ROF of a given weapon
2. calculating the # of projectiles fired during this second of fire
3. divide the real life ammo load by the result of 2 above.
4. Tadaaa
Does not give crazy results in terms of ammo load and respects the fact that a higher ROF gives higher lethality but less firing opportunities.
Just my 2 cts.
Cheers.

[Shan]

Another case of serious under-dotation - the South African Ratel 20 - Unit 27 - has a 10+10 round loadout in the game, while in reality it carries 1,200 20mm rounds (...and 6,000 7.62mm MG rounds...)- see http://www.geocities.com/sa_bushwar2/ratel or 'Tanks of the World'.

If playing with such vehicles versus an opponent who has (correctly loaded) BMPs, for example, you'll run out of ammo pretty soon, and reloading takes time, provided you have bought ammo carriers...

[Shan]

Another one - the German Luchs reconnaissance vehicle (Units 59, 68, 69) all carry 10+5 shots of 20mm ammo - this vehicle carries between 800 and 1000 shots, according to various online sources... so in my opinion another quite serious case...

I'm wondering about what other people think about this issue - please, post your comments! (btw - to avoid misunderstandings with the Admins: I know that if you don't reply this doesn't mean you're not reading this - but I'd like to hear what you think about this as well, and maybe you can tell us how the ammo points were originally calculated - the way like kikka says sounds reasonable, so it must be somehow like that)

[DRG]

Shan said:(btw - to avoid misunderstandings with the Admins: I know that if you don't reply this doesn't mean you're not reading this - but I'd like to hear what you think about this as well, and maybe you can tell us how the ammo points were originally calculated - the way like kikka says sounds reasonable, so it must be somehow like that)

Did Andy not already answer you on that in the second post on this thread.....???


10 shots per "burst" sounds about right but IDK for certain as there is no mention of that in the notes I still have related to OOB design, ( which does NOT mean there wasn't a formula used...just that I don't have a record of it ) I was not directly involved in that. Setting up the autocannon loadouts was something done YEARS ago then forgotten about because nobody complined about this or asked questions about it ( that I'm aware of )until you started this thread. Some vehicles loads would have been guesses made as it is even now not always possible to find sources with CONSISTENT ammo load stats ( " this vehicle carries between 800 and 1000 shots" is a good example of this ..what is it really 800...... or 1000? and what mix of ammo ?...... If I guess now-- guess what????... someone comes by in three or four or five years and asks where I got that info from........and then I get to start this all over again )

If someone wants to post some good HARD data on the actual ammo loads of autocannon armed vehicles I will be glad to look at it. Try to find something other than Wikipedia or pmulcahy for the source.

Don

[DRG]

Attached are two lists with all 485 ground units in the game that use weapon class 19--"autocannons".

One list is ordered by nation and one by the unit names ( so all units named "BTR-80" are in one block together regardless of nation )

Each list shows the HE, AP, Sabot and HEAT loads ( the last two only when the weapon is in weapon slot one but that would be mostly the case with thes unit classes )

The unit name, nation , UnitSlot, Year available and Weapon Name are all listed

Different nations may have different ammo loads for the same unit. That's an OOB designer decision based on info he may have picked up someplace ( the AMX-10's have a lot of different set ups for it's "32" shots )


Let me know what you come up with for these...

Don