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CM:BB 20mm penetration stats for comparision.


Thomm

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Under the assumption that the range dependence of the penetration capability of the 20mm cannon in Drop Team follows the same characteristics as the CM:BB German 20mm cannon I just extracted the following data from the CM:BB unit data window:

___0 m: 41 mm = 100% (extrapolated)

_100 m: 37 mm = 90%

_500 m: 25 mm = 61%

1000 m: 15 mm = 37%

2000 m: 3 mm = 7% (!)

It would be interesting to know if the same trend is modeled in Drop Team, since it is easy to engage tanks at very large distances!

Best regards,

Thomm

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The 76mm has better penetration and it is slowed down a lot less because of distance. It has a kill factor of about 30& which I believe means something like every 3 hits on component will disable it. Don't really know what I am talking about. The 20mm has a kill factor of only 5.0 but I believe every 20mm shot is actually more (yes, you lose 3 ammo for every shot, but I believe you actually fire 5 per every ammo point consumed). If that is correct you have a _much_ higher kill factor for the 20mm. And according to the DropTeam.Log this is correct. The 120mmAP has a kill factor of 50 and the HEAT has a factor of 100. So, hitting with HEAT to critical parts is a sure kill. That is why the 120mm is a good gun.

The penetrations are as follows. 300 for 20mmAP, 350 for 76mmAP and 430 for 120mmAP. The 120mmHEAT has a penetration of 200. The side armor of Thor is 150. Combine this with the fact that the maximum multiplier for angles is 0.5, and it means that you are actually able to penetrate the side of Thor from _any_ angle with the 20mm from close range. I don't like it. This results in a situation where the 20mm is really the best gun to use in close range fighting, the only thing it has problems with is the front of Thor (armor 300 -> should not penetrate ever), but everything else it kills easy. And here close range means something less than 500m. As I see it, it should be able to penetrate the side of Thor only from, say, 30 degree angle or even that there is some weak spots in the armor which are the only parts of the side it is able to penetrate. But this is just my opinion. What is not my opinion, is the fact that the 20mm is in every practical way better than the 76mm. With the 76mm the only real advantage is that you have much better effect at range. But you will need many good hits to kill anything with it anyways, so it doesn't matter. Also, with the 76mm there is no such thing as sure kill.

Ok, reading the logs for the penetration amounts. As follows:

r b a m f or %

1250 300 0.58 0.82 56.3 69.0 23

1000 300 0.76 0.75 81.5 108 36

750 300 0.70 0.77 148 192 64

500 300 0.35 0.89 224 252 84

200 300 0.67 0.79 227 287 96

100 300 0.67 0.79 233 295 98

r = range in m

b = base penetration

a = angle in radians (1.57 = 90 degrees)

m = modifier due to angle

f = final penetration, this has propably both range and angle in the value

or = penetration with only range calculated in. or = f / m

% = how much left of the base penetration due to range

Note, different planets have different atmospheres, so these aren't universal. But it seems the curve doesn't look like the one in CMx1. This is on the raid map. Also, these figures suggest that the 20mm is able to penetrate the side of Thor from 500m up to the angle of 75 degrees!

Also, the ATGM has a kill factor of 100, which means that when it hits it will do a lot of damage. But, it happens to also be very, very good at hitting targets. It is actually my number 2 favorite for close combat fighting. ;)

Note to readers: I really don't know the inner workings of the game, so it might be that I am really wrong about this stuff.

BTW you can pretty much ruin the game in the ice fields map by spamming AA turrets everywhere and trying to fill all the area with AA defence. Add in EWVs. Add in sensor jammers. Even if you are not able to take out the enemy, he will use a major portion of his assets trying to find a landing spot. The bots will go crazy. If you give them manual drop orders, it is pretty much guaranteed they will use out the item they are trying to drop. If you don't give them manual orders, it is pretty much guaranteed you won't be using 120mm Thors in this map.

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Ok, that table is a bit hard to read. Anyhow take the first colum, it is range. Take the last column, it is the %. Compare with CMBB stats. ;)

Also, It seems that if the rating of 15 calculated shots per every burst with the 20mm is correct, it means that the gun has actually a kill factor of .54. This is higher than the one for 120mm AP! I don't know, but this feels like it is ingame. You don't need many bursts to destroy Thor from side if you know where you are shooting.

Ok, still once I want to note that I don't know what is happening ingame, so I might be seriously wrong.

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Well I certainly have the impression that the 20mm is the best close in weapon. The 76mm is completely useless. I've killed several Thors with 20mm, just by driving up close and firing into the sides.

The 20mm reloads much faster too, you can get about 10 bursts from the 20mm between 120mm shots.

I don't think 20mm guns should be taking on tanks, otherwise what's the point of having the 76mm gun and ATGMs? They're more accurate I guess...

It's a bit lame that the 120mm gun has only 60% or so more penetration than the 20mm, and the 76mm is hardly better at all!?

Also, slope modifier shouldn't have a 50% limit on it, a narrow angle on side armour should protect you as well the front armour.

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For prettiness:

</font><blockquote>code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">r b a m f or %

1250 300 0.58 0.82 56.3 69.0 23

1000 300 0.76 0.75 81.5 108 36

750 300 0.70 0.77 148 192 64

500 300 0.35 0.89 224 252 84

200 300 0.67 0.79 227 287 96

100 300 0.67 0.79 233 295 98 </pre>

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"Why assume a WW2 20mm has the same characteristics of a future-20mm weapon?"

Because projectiles of certain size and mass tend to have similar characteristics?

From the table posted above, it looks like they do follow a similar performance curve - CM:BB is 37% @ 1000m, DT is 36% at 1000m. Just the DT curve drops off later.

The problem is that the base penetration is 300, and that's enough to beat most of the armour in the game, and secondly that the lethality is higher than any other KE weapon in the game due to the rate of fire.

[ March 24, 2006, 08:50 PM: Message edited by: Bnej ]

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A WW2 20mm is a very different thing from even a modern 20mm let alone a future weapon. Penetration is about mass, material, geometry and velocity (we're talking KE rouds here) 20 mm rounds over time will all be around the same mass, but materials, geometry and velocity are seriously different. Velocity is the key and the path to high velocities is a long barrel and a big bang. the calibre, 20mm, limits the bang although modern propellants are a lot better than WW2 types. So it comes down to barrel length. Barrel length is usually expressed in calibres. A WW2 german 20mm is around 55 calibres with a muzzel velocity around 800m/s while a modern 20mm is around 100 with muzzel velocities around 1,000./s. Add in fancy materials (DU) and clever geometry (saboted long rod) and you have a 20 mm with a lot of penetration. In the future? Who knows. We already have some experimental guns delivering 1,500m/s...... The othe aspect of high muzzel velocities, is flat trajectories. Haven't played the game as yet so can't comment. All the foregoing remarks apply to the other calibres too!

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Originally posted by Drusus:

BTW you can pretty much ruin the game in the ice fields map by spamming AA turrets everywhere and trying to fill all the area with AA defence. Add in EWVs. Add in sensor jammers. Even if you are not able to take out the enemy, he will use a major portion of his assets trying to find a landing spot. The bots will go crazy. If you give them manual drop orders, it is pretty much guaranteed they will use out the item they are trying to drop. If you don't give them manual orders, it is pretty much guaranteed you won't be using 120mm Thors in this map.

Yes, I agree. I was playing with Drusus yesterday and witnessed this cunning scheme.

While it was a respectively laid defence formation and really slowed us humans down, it was unfair to use it against AI. AI will just get your tanks killed.

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Los,

the fact that the calibres are 20mm, 76mm, 120mm, respectively, kind of invite a comparison to past and contemporary weapons, don't you agree?

Of course, Drusus' approach of digging out the actual data of the game is more scientific, but it is encouraging that there is some correspondence in the data ... which was what I hoped for when making my initial post.

It would be mucho cool to have a percentage-of-penetration-power bar next to the reticule that is adjusted based on the actual range (and atmosphere density). Not absolute values, but relative ones.

Best regards,

Thomm

PS: While I was shaving today in the morning I was thinking that on the Ice map it would probably be a good idea to carry the own flag on top of a hill where a Hurricane cannot glide up to.

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Well going by those figures, it seems that 76mm really has no use, 20mm is only slightly weaker but has a crazily high rate of fire which easily makes up for the small power difference..

120mm Doesn't seem to be significantly more powerful, but of course has much grater effective range..

Perhaps the 20mm really needs to be toned down a bit?

Saying that futuristic 20mm rounds are more powerful than ww2 or current ones is fine, but if 20mm rounds are tons more powerful, wouldn't the 76mm and 120mm rounds have scaled up similarly in damage? Instead of 20mm just catching up with them?

Anyway I'm sure they are collecting all the stats from the servers and will be able to see what's too power and what's too weak ;)

[ March 25, 2006, 06:06 AM: Message edited by: Netherby ]

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i still think 120mm is a bit weak. for example, 2 hits with HEAT on a paladin (or was it shrike?) didn't really damage it. i didn't see it have any problems continuing fighting....and that isn't a rare situation. i almost don't use AP anymore even at close range

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Originally posted by RIPper_SVK:

i still think 120mm is a bit weak. for example, 2 hits with HEAT on a paladin (or was it shrike?) didn't really damage it. i didn't see it have any problems continuing fighting....and that isn't a rare situation. i almost don't use AP anymore even at close range

I have experienced the same effect (or lack thereof) of 120mm HEAT on a Paladin. I scored a solid center mass hit (fuel cells?) and expected a nice big explosion, but the vehicle kept going!

Best regards,

Thomm

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The truth is that the 20mm is more powerful than the 120mmAP at close range _if_ you know where to shoot. And everybody will, eventually. The Thor is dead if you get a 20mm vehicle to about 500m from it and into side. If you hit the fuelcells with your burst, you will do about 75% damage with one 20mm burst. If you hit it with 120mm AP you will do about 50% damage. With 76mm you will do about 30%. Decide which one is best. 120mm HEAT is very powerful on the other hand, so it balances things. But the 76mm doesn't have any good sides, only bad.

As the system works (this is what I have found out, I don't know for sure) there is base penetration. 300 for 20mm AP, 350 for 76 and 430 for 120mm. Then there is directkillfactor or something like that. .05 for the 20mm, .303 for the 76mm and .50 for the 120mm. If you hit something it is first calculated if you penetrate the armor. If you did, it seems that it doesn't really matter how much you penetrated. I am not sure, but I think it doesn't matter, anyways. After that it is calculated if you hit some of the components. If you did, the components effectiveness is decreased by the directkillfactor, it is maybe randomized a bit, or then there are things unknown to me taken into account.

There is hit points per component, but I don't know if they are actually used. If I remember correctly the driver has 10HP while the fuel cells have 50HP and the engine of Thor has 80HP. But it seems that these hitpoints aren't used in case of direct hit. Remember, I don't know what I am talking about, and I don't have the game here at work, so the numbers might be wrong. But the effect of this is, if you fire at the fuel cells of Thor, the 20mm will take it to around .25 effectiveness. Remember that the 20mm is 3 shots with each shot actually being 5 internally. I believe this to be unintentional BTW. This results in effective kill factor of 3x5x0.05=0.75. If you fire at the fuel cells with 76mm, direct hit again, you will cause it to go around .70 effectiveness.

On the other hand ATGM has a direct kill factor of 1.00 and it seems to hit critical parts of atleast the Apollo almoust every time it is fired in locked in mode. Means quite high chance of first hit kill. The game goes usually like this. The bots pick out Thors with 120mm. They are fun to fight against. Then the bots run out of Thors, and begin using the ATGM based systems. This part of the game is absolutely frustrating. The AI is _very_ good at gaining locked in status. Especially compared to its ability to use the direct fire guns. And it is very good at firing at close range with the ATGMS. This makes the ice map really, really boring to play in when the AI is using the ATGM systems.

Your options are supposed to be killing the ATGM launchers or go out of view. Well, if the AI gains lock in, then it doesn't help if you go out of view or kill the enemy. And am I supposed to kill him with first shot of my 120mm? With AP? Ain't happening. Not even if I am the best shooter there is. Hitting with HEAT at moving targets is hard. And not a sure kill either. And after first shot it is usually too late. Have you ever tried to play shoot & scoot with the AI using ATGMs. Well, can't do it. You will propably be totally annihilated. The AI has too good situational awarness and is too good at gaining locked in status.

Back to the physics of armor penetration. There is also a factor called fragmentation. I don't remember the numbers. But the only one with really good frag factor is 120mm HEAT. 20mm doesn't have any fragmentation at all.

Yes, the 120mm has a greater range, but the problem is that you need multiple hits with it. And, if you hit different parts of the vehicle, then the effects don't add up (not true for HEAT). The same is even more true with the 76mm. You can fire at the driver of the Thor with the 76mm and even with direct hits, no chance of killing him with first shot. Shots that don't hit anything important seems to be wasted completely with the 76mm.

If you take the component to 0 effectiveness, it is destroyed. The components has a factor called burn (or explode or something), and if it is 1.00, then the componen will explode if it is destroyed. If a component explodes, it destroys the object it is in. That means the hull or the turret.

The problems, as I see, with the system is as follows. And I believe these are problems with the system, not with the numbers being wrong:

1) The 0.5 minimum of the angle multiplier. Does not make sense.

2) I believe that it doesn't matter how much you penetrate the armor. This results in the 20mm being the best weapon overall.

3) The problem with perfect hits having no direct kill chance, even with 120mm AP from close range fired directly at the fuel cells. This goes hand in hand with number 2.

4) The HPs of things doesn't seem to be taken into account properly. Not sure about this.

If these are fixed (well, fixed to what I like anyways, it is wrong to say they are broken), then it is easy to mod the game to your liking. Don't want the 20mm be so effective? No matter, edit it. You want to make the system so that it doesn't matter where you hit? Can do. Increase the frag factor. Decrese the direct hit factor. Now you have something much more like the traditional FPS hit points system. The underlying system is incredibly moddable. Don't like the Paladin rollover? Make its center of mass lower. There isn't much you can't mod.

I believe the game will begin a life of its own. The great thing about the mod system is that you don't have to have the modified values with your local copy, it is enough that the servers values are modified. Actually, if you play at a server that has modified values, you can't tell it. So, this means that it is easy to test different value mods. I will be running a server called "Drusus Test" from time to time, there _will_ be different values used. Be warned.

I point this out once more. The underlying system is good. With few minor fixes it will be great. There is no need for great consensus about what is the true value of 20mmAP penetration. I could see it fun to have a tank that has great kill chance when it hits & long range (talking about 60-70% sure first shot kill). Downsides? Slow, really slow turret, and long reload time. Maybe would be fun, maybe not. Maybe you like it, maybe not. I understand that different people like different things. So, this is where modding comes in. The game needs just a userbase to do the mods. And I think we have atleast one volunteer. ;)

I am actually getting a bit interested about the armor penetration & effects of direct hits. Is there any good online resources about this (the more mathematics, the better...) or books about this?

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Originally posted by Rollstoy:

I have experienced the same effect (or lack thereof) of 120mm HEAT on a Paladin. I scored a solid center mass hit (fuel cells?) and expected a nice big explosion, but the vehicle kept going!

I believe you didn't hit the fuel cells. If you did, the result is usually catastrophic. The fragmentation damage isn't that great on the other hand. I believe you need atleast 3 hits to kill with the fragmentation damage, even the paladin.

About the use of 120mmAP. The only valid uses I can see are trying to hit fast moving targets. Then there is firing at the Thor hull front from close range. Thats it. You might be tempted to use AP at long range, but remember, the penetration isn't that great at long ranges, you are better of using HEAT. You need atleast two hits against any target, propably more, particularly against fast moving targets in which case you can't really aim for the internal components. So the AP isn't that great. HEAT is.

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Originally posted by Drusus:

About the use of 120mmAP. The only valid uses I can see are trying to hit fast moving targets. Then there is firing at the Thor hull front from close range. Thats it. You might be tempted to use AP at long range, but remember, the penetration isn't that great at long ranges, you are better of using HEAT. You need atleast two hits against any target, propably more, particularly against fast moving targets in which case you can't really aim for the internal components. So the AP isn't that great. HEAT is.

I've been using 120mmAP at under 2000m and over 4000m. The HE and HEAT rounds scatter a lot more than AP does, so at longer ranges HEAT is just not precise enough to kill. At close ranges I'm generally pretty bad at aiming, so I go with the round most likely to penetrate wherever I hit. Maybe I'll start using HEAT more when my gunnery is better.

I kinda think that AP rounds should do more damage against more heavily armored targets. A light armored vehicle hit by AP will have a clean hole all the way through it. But against heavier armor the AP round and the armor it strikes will liquify due to the pressure, causing a jet of molten metal to shoot into the vehicle, much the same as a HEAT round.

I'm not sure that would be feasible to simulate as a game mechanic. AP rounds really do a lot more damage when they hit more solid targets.

I find the 76mm kind of useless too, but I'm not sure that means there's a problem. In the real world there aren't many guns of that calibre being used any more. Smaller calibre cannons can penetrate almost the same armor but need much less space to store ammunition and can fire much faster, while the 76mm HEAT round isn't large enough to do damage competitive with larger calibre HEAT rounds. In the real world the mid-calibre cannons fell into disuse.

I'd be kind of interested to see the 76mm replaced by a larger-bore low-pressure gun.

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After a bunch of Thor vs 20mm Paladin battles I think the main reason 20mm seems so godly is that even when facing front on to the Thor it can almost always still aim down the side and score lots of hits, due to the angle modifier capping at 0.5 it still easily penetrates at even the most acute angle imaginable, coupled with the very high rate of fire and multiple shells per burst it very quickly rips your internal components up..

Considering it will take the Thor 2-3 hits to knock out the Paladin, in which time the Paladin can land many many hits, the Thor will lose every time unless they foolishly aim at the frontal armour..

Against the Apollo it is even worse, since the 20mm rounds will penetrate the frontal armour!! In the time it takes the 120mm to reload for the 2nd shot you will have killed it easily even by shooting the front..

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The 120mm is very much capable of first shot kills. The problem is that you have to hit the fuel cells with HEAT for this to happen. Unfortunately it isn't at all easy to shoot at the fuel cells of a fast moving vehicle. But the 20mm has a lot of shots to fire at the slow moving Thor. That is what makes the difference. And if the Thor doesn't kill you with first shot, you really are pretty much guaranteed to kill the Thor off. My feeling, based on nothing, is that HEAT should have a high chance of killing Paladins and Shrikes with first shot, even if the hit didn't hit the fuel cells. And the 20mm should only be able to penetrate the sides from near straight angle & close range.

I think I will be using some time next week doing a mod. Propably nothing serious, but just for testing purposes. I have already some ideas...

1) downgrade 20mm penetration and slightly the effect, upgrade 76mmAP and 120mmAP. 76mm and 120mm will have considerably more fragmentation damage. 76mmAP will have a possibility for 2nd shot kill, 120mmAP will have a possibility for 1st shot kill. HEAT will be almoust completely fragmentation based. Almoust sure 2nd shot kill even if you don't know what you are shooting at. If you know then first shot kill, as is now.

2) slightly upgrade the side armor of Thor, downgrade the rear armor.

3) slightly downgrade ATGMs, no first shot kills with these anymore. The ideal fix is to have countermeasures and minimum range.

4) Make the EWV go away, split it to different vehicles. At the moment it has too many goodies for one vehicle. Maybe downgrading 20mm is enough, don't know.

5) Keep Hurricane as powerful as ever. Make it even more rare. This is a vehicle you want to use in key situations but you don't want to lose this. Same to the Thor with heavy mortar. Artillery isn't supposed to be lost. ;)

I don't know how these will work. My earlier tests have shown that achieving anything like balance isn't easy at all. And I know the current system is fun except for the ATGMs which I just hate at the moment. The biggest problem seems to be the combination of ATGM vs Apollo. It is _really_ boring to fight these. Thor is also very vulnerable. The other problem is that the ATGMs are _excellent_ short range weapons, comparable to 120mm HEAT, only with slower rate of fire. But as I understand the developers know this already.

The truth is that the 20mm isn't all that great if you have an opponent who knows what he is doing with his Thor. And the truth is that the side must be penetrable. Maybe the effect just shouldn't stack up so fast. Now it is 2 bursts and byebye if the shooter knows what he is doing. Or maybe it should be 1 shot with the Thor and byebye Paladin. Or maybe it is great just as it is now. Except for the 76mm. ;)

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Originally posted by Netherby:

After a bunch of Thor vs 20mm Paladin battles I think the main reason 20mm seems so godly is that even when facing front on to the Thor it can almost always still aim down the side and score lots of hits, due to the angle modifier capping at 0.5 it still easily penetrates at even the most acute angle imaginable, coupled with the very high rate of fire and multiple shells per burst it very quickly rips your internal components up..

I didn't know that the angle modifier was capped, maybe that's what needs to be changed?

I think that part of what makes 20mm so effective is that most of our opponents, most of the time are bots. If we get a mobility kill on a bot they suicide. A player will try to traverse and kill the Paladin if they become immobilized, which makes things much riskier for the Paladin. Paladins seem to be a one shot kill with a 120 at ranges where the 20mm is deadly. The only time 20mm seems particularly deadly against heavily armored players is when they can't find where they're being shot from.

It would be kinda nice if the tanks had coaxial machineguns. If I could I would hose down a wheeled vehicle while waiting for the main gun to reload.

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The Paladin is one shot kill with the 120mm regardless of the range. If you hit something important with HEAT. The problem is that with HEAT it is really hard to hit a fast moving vehicle at long ranges. The nastiest kind of 20mm is the Hermes, you can't see it coming. It is 2 to 3 bursts and you are in flames, no need to kill yourself. Immobilization is not a problem here. The problem is that shooting to the center of mass from sides result in explosion.

The angle you need to hit the center is something like 70 degrees. That is, with this angle you can shoot to the center of the tank past the front armor. If the armor thickness of Thor is 150, then the effective armor value should be over 400 at this angle. Much more than the 20mm can penetrate. In the game the value is somewhere around 250 or something like that. The 20mm can penetrate that much. And when it penetrates, it seems it does as much damage as when shooting from 1 meter distance to the rear of the tank.

The 20mm should be good when firing from flanks and close range. Absolutely. That is what it's purpose is. It shouldn't be as good as it is now when firing from almost directly to the front of a MBT. 70 degree angle should be actually almoust optimal for the MBT, it should gain biggest possible effective armor values due to the angle! If you want a demonstration about what this means in game, try to assault the Ice map base with Thor when there is somebody with Hermes in there.

The Thor doesn't need more defences. It has good armor at the moment. The problem is that it is too easily "flanked" because of the 0.5 cap to the penetration angle.

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Thoughts:

Today, the 30 mm cannon on the A-10 Thunderbolt can penetrate the armor of any modern tank and kill it with a few direct hits. Using depleted uranium shells this is very doable up to a mile away.

As long as the right shell and muzzle velocity is used to justify the capability then I have no problems with the concept.

Likewise the M1 Abrams has a 120 MM smoothbore gun and fires a high velocity depleted uranium (DU) penetrator with a ballistic tip sabot round that can penetrate any modern tank. One or a few rounds from this could also kill a tank depending on the hit location.

Another aspect to all of this is Crew safety.

If the crew compartment is compromised and the crew hurt the tank becomes less effective as a fighting unit. The whole idea behind the AP round is to get into the crew compartment an spray liquid hot metal into the crew, killing or wounding the them and stopping the tank.

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On the other hand, I've been blasting away 20 mm AP from a Hermes into the underside of a tank trying to get over an obstacle - to no effect. Distance: across the "courtyard" of the ice base.

There were sparks to indicate that I hit the tank.

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Originally posted by pipilongbeard:

Thoughts:

Today, the 30 mm cannon on the A-10 Thunderbolt can penetrate the armor of any modern tank and kill it with a few direct hits. Using depleted uranium shells this is very doable up to a mile away.

As long as the right shell and muzzle velocity is used to justify the capability then I have no problems with the concept.

Likewise the M1 Abrams has a 120 MM smoothbore gun and fires a high velocity depleted uranium (DU) penetrator with a ballistic tip sabot round that can penetrate any modern tank. One or a few rounds from this could also kill a tank depending on the hit location.

Another aspect to all of this is Crew safety.

If the crew compartment is compromised and the crew hurt the tank becomes less effective as a fighting unit. The whole idea behind the AP round is to get into the crew compartment an spray liquid hot metal into the crew, killing or wounding the them and stopping the tank.

I wouldn't take the A-10 gun as an example for all small cannons. It's a huge, heavy gun, that happens to fire a very small bullet. It's generally hitting the top armor on a tank rather than the front or side armor. It fires at an extremely fast rate, increasing the chance of penetration. It's tested to kill 1970s tanks later designs have significantly tougher armor (even the Abrams which was designed much later has had greatly improved armor through several upgrades). A better comparison would be the 25mm gun on Bradleys and Strikers. That can mobility-kill the toughest current tanks from the rear, and can kill T72s from the side, but it's a lot more questionable than the A-10's 30mm gun.

I think that one of the things that's different here is that a center-mass shot in DT hits the anti-matter fuel cell, which is likely to destroy the vehicle regardless of the type of round. The same shot against a modern tank hits the crew compartment, so a center-mass hit with a 25mm just doesn't have the same effect as a 120mm. One modern 25 mm round is not likely to do enough damage to a modern tank anywhere to get a catastrophic kill (assuming the fuel and ammo are protected). At worst it will damage one system.

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