ME262 wrong guns?

[chuckfourth]

Hi Don
OK fair enough, you and Andy do indeed deserve a rest after porting the game to Windows. For my part Ive identified a lot of faults in the OOBs of a similar nature to the Bren gun carrier and panzergrenadier "problems" that you have fixed in this latest patch. I guess I wont post these until after youve put the SPMBT update into place?
Best Regards Chuck.

[chuckfourth]

Hi Don
I am still looking at aircraft accuracy ect but I have a question about the less contentous aspect of my post.
In my second post in this thread I pointed out that the German ground attack aircraft with 30mm, 37mm, 50mm and 75mm Cannon have had their tungsten ammunition removed. Obviously they dont make much sense without this ammunition. I wonder if this is because it has been decided that these rounds were in fact unavailable or maybe this is still being decided or something that missed the patch like the revised 3 inch mortar carrying bren gun carrier?
Best regards Chuck.

[Mobhack]

The game system uses HE AP kill for air guns (times number of AP as a multiplier of cannons).

Therefore there is absolutely no point in putting a tungsten AP round (and simply upping the HE-AP would lead to mass destruction of all "splash" hits).

The system SSI decided on works OK for multiple HMG, 20mm cannon etc. It does not really work well for flying gun type tank killing planes - but there were precious few of those in any case. If they had been wonder weapons - the warring nations would likely have made more of the things, methinks


Cheers
Andy

[chuckfourth]

Hi Andy
Only one nation was faced with tens of thousands of well armoured fast tanks and they made most of these weapons. They arnt wonder weapons nor am I saying they are. What I am saying is that they are underrated in the game wich you agree with. However you are arguing that game mechanics prevents the weapons getting there correct pen values, but im not so sure.
To be exact there are 4 of these weapons in 30mm 37mm 50mm and 75mm calibres mounted in about 13 different planes. However after v6 of the game they all had there HE/Ap kill factors reduced to the current, incorrect low values. These weapons did play a large part on the eastern fornt.
Heres a quote from
http://www.achtungpanzer.com/gen9.htm
but please read the entire article.
"Rudel's squadron of nine tank-busting Ju-87 G-1 was assigned to support of the 3rd SS Panzer Division "Totenkopf". On the first day of the Operation Citadel, during his first mission, Rudel knocked out four Soviet tanks and by the evening, his score grew to twelve"
I did some tests
I used a 7.5mm Bcannon in a JU88 with HE AP Kill reset from 13 to 17. I shot at 12 KV tanks each tank had its 6 adjacent hexes occupied by infantry or size 4 trucks (half half). Result, no casualties and no trucks damaged in the adjacent hexes, some rare pinning. So Im not sure what you mean by "mass destruction"? I repeated the test with the adjacent hexes filled with more KV, again no damage to adjacent tanks, some rare buttoning. It would appear to me that increasing the HE/Ap kill factor to the correct values doesnt cause "mass destruction".
Also something else that doesnt make sense to me, if its no problem to have the 7.5 Bcannon at a HE/AP kill of 13 then why cant you change thr 3.7 Bcannon to its correct value of 14? If the "mass destruction" of 13 is acceptable for the 7.5 Bcannon why is the "mass destruction of 14 not acceptable for the 3.7 Bcannon?

I have gone to mobhack and for the 75mm BKannon given it a sabot penetration of 17 and sabot range of 25 and changed the HE kill and HE penetration to 0. I then put this into a ju88, unit 934, (class 243 "ground attack") for this unit I changed the HE value to 1. changing it to 0 unfortuneatley removes the unit from the bombardment screen.
If the target is correctly identified as armour it will fire the sabot round. However it seems that a poorly aquired target will be shot at by the "default" HE round. So maybe very close to a workable solution.
Would you be able to tell me the diferences between the two classes? 44 and 243? Ive read the help which doesnt tell me a whole lot
It appears there are two good approaches either simply increase the HE/AP kill value to the correct values or possibly with some work, allocate the sabot ammo.
Best Regards Chuck

[Marek_Tucan]

You have to fill the same hex with other vehicles.

[narwan]

And try it with other armored vehicles that have less armor (in the 1-5 range) around it and in its own hex and with open topped vehicles around it and in its own hex (HT's especially). I've no idea what will happen but only trying out KV's as armored targets won't suffice as a test.

Narwan

[chuckfourth]

Hi Narwan
Heres the test,
The 7.5 bcannon set to HE pen of 17 and HE kill of 1. Shoot at 10 Kvs 2 planes for each hex and *4 for no of guns. I have a jeep a bren gun carrier and an infantry squad sharing each hex with the KV, no damage to infantry, no damage to jeeps 1 bren damaged but it may have been a target. 4 Kvs with one or 2 star damage 2 immobilised.
Now run the same test with HE pen of 0 and He kill of 0 and sabot pen of 17 and sabot range of 25 and again the bren the jeep and the infantry basicly untouched but the KV are pretty much all destroyed!
So HE pen of 17 seems very different to Sabot pen of 17. Would someone be so kind as to confirm this?
I would suggest that the guns in question (weapons 207 208 209 and 168/169) have their HE pen and HE kill set ot 0 and the correct sabot values added making them the tank busters they should be, because at the moment they are pretty useless. (probably any planes carrying these weapons should reside in class 243 "ground attack")
The only down side I can see is of course more work for the programmers, because there still needs to be the 1 HE round allocated to the plane so that it appears in the bombardment window. But even with this left as is the planes work much better with the sabot allocated.
So to address Andys concerns there is no "mass destruction" and the plane will fire the sabot round at armour.
Best regards Chuck.

[DRG]

There is NO difference between aircraft classed 44 or 243. 243 was added to allow OOB designers the luxury of splitting their aircraft if they so desired. Both classes do the same job.

Don

[DRG]

chuckfourth said:
<snip
I would suggest that the guns in question (weapons 207 208 209 and 168/169) have their HE pen and HE kill set ot 0 and the correct sabot values added making them the tank busters they should be,

You ran one test with one weapon and think you've got this all figured out but you don't. "Sabot" is only available to weapons used in weapon slot one so your ju-88 test worked just dandy becasue in that case that weapon is used in slot 1

Please look at this list

users of weapon ID 207 3.7cm BKannon:
120 - Ju 87G-1 Stuka : Slot 2 dates: 06/43-12/46
234 - Ju 88P-2 : Slot 1 dates: 09/43-12/46
234 - Ju 88P-2 : Slot 2 dates: 09/43-12/46

users of weapon ID 208 5cm Bord Kannon:
235 - Ju 88P-4 : Slot 1 dates: 09/43-12/46
902 - Me 410A-1/U-4 : Slot 1 dates: 09/43-12/45

users of weapon ID 209 7.5cm BKannon:
129 - Hs 129 B-3/Wa : Slot 3 dates: 05/44-12/46
233 - Ju 88P-1 : Slot 1 dates: 09/43-12/46

users of weapon ID 168 30mm MK-108:
122 - Bf 109G-2/R1 : Slot 3 dates: 03/43-12/46
124 - Me 262A-2a : Slot 1 dates: 10/44-12/46
124 - Me 262A-2a : Slot 2 dates: 10/44-12/46
237 - Fw 190F-8 : Slot 3 dates: 09/44-12/46
243 - Fw 190 D-12 : Slot 2 dates: 01/45-12/46
898 - Bf 110NF : Slot 3 dates: 01/41-12/45

users of weapon ID 169 30mm MK-101:
128 - Hs 129 B-1 : Slot 3 dates: 03/43-12/46

There are 12 different aircraft on that list of the weapons you wanted changed ( two aircraft use the same weapon in two different slots) . 5 use those weapons as first slot weapon and 7 do not so if anyone just trotted off and made that change you suggested nearly 60% of those aircraft would have useless guns. Totally and utterly USELESS guns. You should have tested that. You've had over 12 weeks since you posted that "test" and if your recommendations were followed any aircraft using those weapons in any slot other than weapon slot one is not even " firing plasticine" they are firing air becasue the game needs to see sabot ammo in the SABOT ammo slot to fire SABOT AMMO and there is no such ammo slot for weapons 2, 3 and 4.......is there ? So what would those guns be firing ??

NOW do you understand why we don't use SABOT ammo for aircraft or anything else except a main weapon ?

OK, what's "plan B" ??

Don

[DRG]

chuckfourth said:
Quotes from
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/tankbusters.htm
30mm MK-101/103
"Various AP rounds were used, but the most effective was the Hartkernmunition, which had a penetrating core of tungsten carbide sheathed in a light-alloy shell with a sharply-pointed profile. This could penetrate 75-90 mm / 300 m / 90 degrees (depending on the type of armour)"

OK, aside from http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/tankbusters.htm
have you got any other source that backs those penetration figures up?

Don