Badwolf66

Tank evolution seemed to have slowed in the 00's and early 10's but it seems to be speeding up again now with the T-14 the upcoming M1A3 Abrams and the possible French-German Leopard 3

Now Ukraine is upgrading its aging T-72's in PT-91 Twardys.

Perhaps this could be in a future module?
 
http://www.defence24.com/news_ukrainians-ready-to-upgrade-their-t-72-tanks-up-to-the-polish-pt-91-twardy-variant

I've heard rumours of a Shock Force sequel so I thought this blog may come in handy if it were to ever happen, Syria has done some serious overhauling on some of their T-72's, I don't know how the game engine would simulate it but it would be interesting.

Enjoy the blog

http://spioenkop.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/syrias-steel-beasts-t-72.html
 

This blog is a bloody gold mine!

Very interesting article, and very interesting blog! reading through it now

I hope that T-90 will one day be able to prove itself in real tank to tank combat hopefully against the Leopard 2,
If the T-90 beats the Leopard 2 that will shut up the Leo Fanboys up for awhile.

I hope that T-90 will one day be able to prove itself in real tank to tank combat hopefully against the Leopard 2,
If the T-90 beats the Leopard 2 that will shut up the Leo Fanboys up for awhile.

I hope that T-90 will one day be able to prove itself in real tank to tank combat hopefully against the Leopard 2,
If the T-90 beats the Leopard 2 that will shut up the Leo Fanboys up for awhile.

The Armarta has a Terminator/Doctor Who feel to it and the side guns remind me of a Daleks plunger and gun.
is it only concept art or is it the actual tank?

I hope that T-90 will one day be able to prove itself in real tank to tank combat hopefully against the Leopard 2,
If the T-90 beats the Leopard 2 that will shut up the Leo Fanboys up for awhile.

CM games work on a real basis, nothing like most rts games which give a fictional value x to armor or weapons.
In those games, if X is armor and Y is weapon, if X>Y the vehicle survives, if X<Y the vehicle dies. Rock paper scissors, just that.
 
In CM games there are a lot more variables taken into account, thus reducing the rng (random number generation - casuality) a lot.
 
This means that the armor of a vehicle is modelled as the real vehicle, for example: front armor is stronger than side armor, front armor can have weak points, there are different armor thicknesses based upon the precise spot etc. but their values are based upon reality (as much as references can give or proof or are estimated by devs). Same goes for the weapon systems, many calculations are taken into account when the game needs to decide what happens when a given weapon (or projectile) hits a given armor location.. angles of impact, technical characteristics of the projectile, speed etc. And the armor can be of very different kinds or have different layers (armor-era-spaced-stand off etc.)
 
Moreover, vehicles have Subsystems and crew that can be damaged or destroyed, thus influencing the said vehicle capabilities.
 
About ERA, example:
If an ERA block is hit, and works as it was designed, said block will be not visibile anymore in the 3d model of the vehicle and it won't be there the next time a projectile might hit there..
 
About the challenger, we have M1A2 SEP v2 now in game, and while being very difficult to destroy it's not at all an invincible tank.
 
In the interface you might notice some level bars and color indications (dots) which you might think give a value to some characteristics such as speed, acceleration, armor protection etc. but keep in mind those are only generic visual aids for the non-expert player intended to give a broad idea of what's what.
 
So, in the end, CM is a ton time more complex than you initially thought.

Good explanation there by @Kieme. I'll just add two things. As he said the actual ballistics are modeled and each round tracked. Also after a round penetrates the armor the damage done on the inside will vary with the amount of energy the penetrator has left. Also there appears to be some abstraction for damage to subsystems even though many things get damaged because they are in the path some other things might also get damaged too.

To expand a little further
Every polygon of the 3D model has its own armour rating. And hits can penetrate, penetrate partially, cause armour spalling off the back of the plate, or bounce.
 
And some of these can be damaged even if the incoming shot doesn't penetrate the armour.
 
And that "not-invincible" nature is a combination of weaknesses in the frontal armour array and many other factors, all of which are, as far as is possible, derived from the real characteristics of the vehicle. The same will apply for the Chally2 and Leo when they get included in a module.
 
Echo that. And that's just the vehicular combat. The trajectory of every small arms round is also calculated, and intersections with the pixels of the targets determine whether there's injury (subject to an "abstracted" saving throw to account for protective terrain and other features). Every individual pixelTruppe has their own morale status too; what you see in the interface is an average.

Yep, that definitely happens. More often with vehicles that are not stuffed full of systems and consumables (and infantry) than with tightly-packed explsions-waiting-to-happen like BMP-3s When the first target is sufficiently lightweight, and the projectile sufficiently powerful, you can even get more than one vehicle being cored out by the one shot. Mostly happens with top of the line KE rounds hitting the side armour of light AFVs.

That is the way to look at it. I like your line "reality can have its glitches". That will serve you well.