Saint_Fuller

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

So, as the game stands, it's Geritol: 1 Ritalin: 2.....Tension mounts as we enter the final quarter! 

Agree with all of this. Insofar as community scenario designers go, most will make scenarios they themselves want to play (this is certainly true of me, and I suspect, George) and these types of scenarios are rarely 'winnable' equally by both sides. Let me toss my two pence in. 
The simple truth is that the reality of combat means creating a properly balanced scenario is not likely to occur. A clever scenario maker can make the 'unwinnable' scenario winnable through allocation of points, but the reality of the fact is its not likely to be fun for the majority of H2H players. A perfect example is my 'Power Hour' scenario for Black Sea. It was designed to be played, primarily, as BLUFOR v AI but I balanced it and playtested it for H2H as well (to which I'm grateful to @IICptMillerII and @Saint_Fuller for their time and effort). The Russian player has the unenviable task of holding forward positions against a strong breakthrough force. They simply do not have the combat power to stop the attack if it is competently (if unimaginatively) handled by the US player. If they maul the force sufficiently enough they will win, as the US force has strict casualty parameters to balance things out. This is to simulate the fact that a sane commander holding a defence in depth would never presuppose that his forward units could actually stop an initial determined effort; a forward position's mission is to maul the enemy and get out of their way when they are no longer capable of doing so. That's a realistic mission....but not necessarily a fun one. 
When I designed the scenario, I presumed that:
a) the average human player would not particularly enjoy the experience of watching his Russian force get mauled; or
b) that a US player would appreciate how the strict parameters would translate against a human opponent.
My assumptions proved correct: the scenario got rave reviews from those who played it in singleplayer but got generally panned at the Blitz by Russian players, despite them winning more often than not. The long and short of this spiel is that its difficult to actually design a human on human scenario that isn't surreal and a 'realistic' H2H scenario relies on assuming there's masochists like myself or Fuller who are willing to play the 'tough' side and not balk at taking massive casualties. That's not everyone's cup.

I think something like that 3-tone scheme was also used by the US Army for AFVs before the sandbox wars and its descent into Desert Tan Hell started.

I think something like that 3-tone scheme was also used by the US Army for AFVs before the sandbox wars and its descent into Desert Tan Hell started.

I was guessing ICM, because I can't imagine a 70s-80s war scenario where the submunitions aren't being flung around like candy to delete tank formations.

Picture from your very own testing.

So. About that 1x1cm square.

Yeah, when they have the time to precisely zero in the gun on an immobile target in the open with a great number of rounds, they reliably start hitting close to center mass on the target. It's to be expected. The rounds still have a decent spread across center of mass, as is also to be expected.

What are you asking for here, the implementation of some kind of RNG where even after the enemy gunner has accurately dialed in the range and found the target, the shells should just occasionally randomly curve to miss your Wunderpanthers anyway?

E: anyway this talk about "I put my tanks in the open to cheese hits by putting the hull armor at center of mass" is not really an issue with the game honestly - yes, a Panther is possibly more survivable in a situation where it sits still in the open because now it can take hits on the strong hull armor and not its glass jaw of a turret, but if you are sitting still and counting on your armor to save you from hits, you have committed major tactical mistakes to begin with

the best defense is not getting seen or hit in the first place (your armor is your last, not your first, line of defense), which is why real militaries fight their tanks in hull-down BP engagements using shoot and scoot tactics

Not much I think I can add on top of the last few posts.
We know that CM aims for centre mass and we know that's both realistic and infinitely easier to code than using a thousand variables to calculate exactly where the gunner should aim.
We know that for some German tanks, presenting a hull-down target means the centre of mass is shifted from the effective armour of the hull front plate up to the less effective armour of the turret mantlet and the vulnerable muzzle/gun barrel.
I think the question has gotten to be: how does the player manage that? In one corner we have "expect to get hit, get into the open so centre mass is the better protected hull front"; and in the other corner we have "don't risk getting hit at all, play pop-up from a hull-down position".
There's an argument for both, but I know which point of view I would rather my opponent held.
Two things I'd add would be:
Testing is good, but unless it includes ingame behaviour then it's of limited use (and if you fight from a static exposed position with the pause command overriding the (reasonably sensible) TacAI then I'd love to play you). Ideally what we would need are examples from actual games under ingame conditions when players are trying to win. And finally: no one complains about this happening to Shermans. There are elements of this discussion that feel a lot like "Invincible Panzer Syndrome" vs reality. Heavy armour doesn't exclude any tank from basic tactical principles- it's insurance against the worst case possibility.

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

Picture from your very own testing.

So. About that 1x1cm square.

Yeah, when they have the time to precisely zero in the gun on an immobile target in the open with a great number of rounds, they reliably start hitting close to center mass on the target. It's to be expected. The rounds still have a decent spread across center of mass, as is also to be expected.

What are you asking for here, the implementation of some kind of RNG where even after the enemy gunner has accurately dialed in the range and found the target, the shells should just occasionally randomly curve to miss your Wunderpanthers anyway?

E: anyway this talk about "I put my tanks in the open to cheese hits by putting the hull armor at center of mass" is not really an issue with the game honestly - yes, a Panther is possibly more survivable in a situation where it sits still in the open because now it can take hits on the strong hull armor and not its glass jaw of a turret, but if you are sitting still and counting on your armor to save you from hits, you have committed major tactical mistakes to begin with

the best defense is not getting seen or hit in the first place (your armor is your last, not your first, line of defense), which is why real militaries fight their tanks in hull-down BP engagements using shoot and scoot tactics

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

anyway if you can't grasp the basic tactical principles of how to fight tanks and the reasons why tanks engage from hull down in the first place I'm not sure how to get that across when several other people have also tried and failed to explain that

but to reiterate: the advantage of a hull down BP engagement is in being harder to spot and then range in on (and subsequently hit), while still being able to engage your enemy unhindered, and to be able to retreat back into cover and pop up back again in another position

if you sit in a position long enough to start taking hits and count on your armor to save you, you are failing at the very fundamentals of armored combat and deserve everything about to happen - and trying to cheese the hits by going up into the open (instead of retreating and re-positioning to avoid getting hit in the first place) so you can take hits on your stronger glacis is both an incredibly gamey thing to do, and indicates a failure to understand what the actual mistake is here to begin with

your armor is your last, not your first, line of defense - this is such a fundamental tactical principle that I am not sure how to put it any simpler

and as I am not in any real mood to bash my head against this particular wall any more, peace out

anyway if you can't grasp the basic tactical principles of how to fight tanks and the reasons why tanks engage from hull down in the first place I'm not sure how to get that across when several other people have also tried and failed to explain that

but to reiterate: the advantage of a hull down BP engagement is in being harder to spot and then range in on (and subsequently hit), while still being able to engage your enemy unhindered, and to be able to retreat back into cover and pop up back again in another position

if you sit in a position long enough to start taking hits and count on your armor to save you, you are failing at the very fundamentals of armored combat and deserve everything about to happen - and trying to cheese the hits by going up into the open (instead of retreating and re-positioning to avoid getting hit in the first place) so you can take hits on your stronger glacis is both an incredibly gamey thing to do, and indicates a failure to understand what the actual mistake is here to begin with

your armor is your last, not your first, line of defense - this is such a fundamental tactical principle that I am not sure how to put it any simpler

and as I am not in any real mood to bash my head against this particular wall any more, peace out

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

Picture from your very own testing.

So. About that 1x1cm square.

Yeah, when they have the time to precisely zero in the gun on an immobile target in the open with a great number of rounds, they reliably start hitting close to center mass on the target. It's to be expected. The rounds still have a decent spread across center of mass, as is also to be expected.

What are you asking for here, the implementation of some kind of RNG where even after the enemy gunner has accurately dialed in the range and found the target, the shells should just occasionally randomly curve to miss your Wunderpanthers anyway?

E: anyway this talk about "I put my tanks in the open to cheese hits by putting the hull armor at center of mass" is not really an issue with the game honestly - yes, a Panther is possibly more survivable in a situation where it sits still in the open because now it can take hits on the strong hull armor and not its glass jaw of a turret, but if you are sitting still and counting on your armor to save you from hits, you have committed major tactical mistakes to begin with

the best defense is not getting seen or hit in the first place (your armor is your last, not your first, line of defense), which is why real militaries fight their tanks in hull-down BP engagements using shoot and scoot tactics

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

Tank gunners aim center mass because that is the only practical option.

Aiming for specific parts of the tank is some gamey **** straight out of some arcade tank "sim" game like War Thunder, where distances are compressed hilariously and engagement ranges are consequently stupidly short.
 
This is a modern thermal gunsight. That object at 0:12 that gets shot at? That's a T-55, skylined, in the open, on a hill, under 12x magnification.

Good luck finding let alone hitting comparatively tiny "weak spots" when the reticle is the same size as the entire damn target, with your WW2 daylight optics and fire control methods amounting to "estimate the range and then adjust by observing fall of shot".

The point of hull down is that it forms a battle position. Its only one part of the formula of breaking an enemy targeting solution. The other one is time. Why should we take anything away from a 'test' that doesn't mimic a battlefield condition where a competent player repositions a tank in BP frequently? I also enjoy the casual ignoring of @Pete Wenman's results. It's okay Pete, the reasonable people see you. 

This test is flawed. If you leave your tank either out in the open or in a hulldown position after it has been spotted to just keep getting shot at, of course it is eventually going to take damage/be destroyed. And the turret being more vulnerable than the hull is a product of real life. BFC did not make the hull armor on the panther thicker than the turret, the actual Germans did. In the modern titles tanks tend to have turret armor that is better than the hull, because that is how most modern battle tanks are designed. 
No one, and I mean no one, in a competent military is taught to stay in one place after the shooting has started, regardless of return fire. BP engagements are mobile. Tanks will come up to the hulldown position, fire a round or two, and then reverse back into cover. Rinse and repeat. Tank fighting positions are specifically designed for this. They have a built in platform to allow the tanks to reverse into cover. This principle is so fundamental that they teach engineers who drive the bulldozers who dig the fighting positions how to do this during the intro course. If you could put an M1A2 Abrams in a hulldown position and let any WWII AT vehicle fire at it indefinitely, it would likely kill the Abrams. Law of averages wins in the end.
Hell, there are real world examples of this principle too. Iraqi tanks in Desert Storm were dug in but did not move at all, nor were their fighting positions designed to allow them to move. They were supposed to stay in place, and they died very quickly, despite being in hulldown positions, because they just sat there. 
There are plenty of AARs on this forum, some even by myself, that show hulldown being effective. But I won't belabor this post with anecdotal evidence. Point is, it doesn't matter what tank/vehicle/asset you have. If you leave it in place and expect it to survive everything thrown at it, you're going to have a bad day. 
@Pete Wenman's test concurs what I and others I play CM with/against see all the time in game. I guess the moral of the story is, if you perceive hulldown to be bad, then stay in the open. 
Edit: Ninja'd by @Rinaldi

The (poor) sarcasm is doing you no favors. Jackass move.

This is a bad argument. They keep all relevant information (sales figures, cash flow, etc.) secret ostensibly to "protect it from competition." Just pointing to longevity is ridiculous, for all you know they could have been limping along for 20 years, it's literally impossible to know how successful they are. 
I'll tell you what's not a sign of a good company, releasing an update with a game breaking bug (I consider it game breaking because it effectively makes the single player unplayable, unless you enjoy effortlessly gunning down fleeing AI troops) and charge $10 for it. Then going over a year and a half without any sign of a fix on the way. Bonus points for the fact that the update to fix 4.0 will also likely require you to pay for it because BFC loves its customers so much that they nickle and dime them for basic bug fixes. 
But hey, I gotta give some credit to BFC, they've clearly mastered the art of building up a dedicated fanbase. Paying customers are demanding some action to fix their game, and we got @IanL throwing out terms like snowflakes, because screw them for wanting to be able to play their $60 game without using janky workarounds. 
 

How long are we going to keep this going?
Fact: The Bundeswehr does not have enough money to maintain its equipment.
Fact: The Bundeswehr can't do its job, because it can't maintain the equipment it needs to do that.
Conclusion: the Bundeswehr needs more money so it can do its job.
I've provided the evidence, both the raw data and literal admissions from the German government that the Bundeswehr is not capable of doing its job, to prove my claims.
You've yet to provide any at all for the claim that I'm wrong in any capacity, only "no u" denials and odd rambling about how we can't just trust the data because... something something muh unreliable statistics.
I must admit I look eagerly forward to whatever sources you have to back your claims up. I do however expect you're going to keep up this dancing around and refusing to provide anything to back up your claims though, so until you shape up, I think we're done here.

That's kind of the direction I took it too.   If you looked at my old Company at a few weeks into a gunnery/training exercise, we'd only be slightly better shaved (because the US Army is still pretty serious about that, although tanker mustaches wouldn't be uncommon), a lot of our gear would look pretty trashed (well worn, but also knocked around/we'd wear our most torn up stuff to the field).

Simply a lot of dirt, lowered hygiene, some unbuttoned pouches doesn't make for a non-functional unit.  The German solider has a highly inflated opinion of his own capabilities from my experience, but it's in the way they're within the realm of being "very capable" just they look around the room and believe themselves to be a few dozen steps above their peers because Deutsche! * but I'd still put good money on them in a fight if it came down to it.

*Take his all with a grain of salt, but working with other countries:

French: The most frustrating mix of very component and very relaxed you will encounter.  Like I imagine a French pilot in a crashing plane would do everything reasonable to keep it from crashing, once that had happened mutter "merde" to themselves, shrug and have a smoke waiting for the plane to explode while the American would die trying to fashion a new engine from the gum wrappers in his pocket and some duct tape up to the point of impact.

British: They're very tired.  Like they're professional but they're really quite sick of whatever nonsense you colonials/continentals are rousted up about.  It doesn't matter if the field itself was invented last week, somehow they'll act as if Wellington himself had an Electronic Warfare Company at Waterloo, and the British have been doing it forever.  In the event they are incorrect this will rarely be acknowledged.  Whatever kit you have is also entirely too much for the job.  You have two radio nets available in your tanks?  We get by with one.  You have only one radio?  Our tanks are connected by no 4 wire and a Lance Corporal or something.  

Poles:  Less exposure, but they seem constantly a little amused.  Americans have tanks?  Who knew?  These computers you have, they turn on when you want them on?  Magic!  Your food, has it caused anyone to explode.  No, I don't mean in the bathrooms I mean literally, do not ask.  Fascinating!  May I have?  You're never sure if they're taking the piss or actually impressed.  Generally good dudes though, if absolute murder to get their names right.

German: Thinks they're the legacy of the Prussian military machine that made Europe quake, is the legacy of social welfare state that has money for post kindergarten's omni-sex bathroom and masseuse for teachers, not for fuel for tanks.

Japanese: Everyone is in total agreement with this plan we made two weeks ago for the operation we are committing to in two hours.  The movements of the enemy are inconsequential to this fact, we are all in agreement, this is where we are going to go because we are in agreement (this is where I had to add in one caveat.  The Japanese are aware of this, and getting a lot better at working on the fly, it's just when they're not a "good" unit they default a lot to "this is the plan we follow because it's the plan we agreed on" vs "this best meets the intention")

Russian: I'm a spy.  You know I'm a spy, I know I'm a spy, I'm going to pretend to be sneaky about this because we are playing a game about it, but we all know why I'm here.  Yep, I just took out my camera and took some shots.  Oh bother the Chinese guy is in the way again.

Chinese: YOU STUPID AMERICANS DO NOT KNOW I AM SPY.  I AM CLEARLY NOT AN INTELLIGENCE AGENT I AM JUST A CHINESE PERSON MYSTERIOUSLY APPEARING IN A PLACE WITH NO CHINESE PEOPLE.  I AM SNEAKILY TAKING A MILLION PICTURES OF EVERYTHING YOU HAVE BECAUSE YOU ARE NOT PAYING ATTENTION TO ME.  I AM SO SNEAKY.  I AM THE ONLY PERSON IN THIS ****TY AFRICAN VILLAGE IN PERFECTLY CLEAN KHAKIS, MY SHOES ARE NOT DUSTY, AND HAVE THREE THOUSAND DIFFERENT SENSORS HANGING OUT OF MY BACKPACK BUT YOU ARE TOO STUPID TO SEE ME BECAUSE I AM A SPY.  HAHA DUMB AMERICANS WHY ARE THEY ALL LOOKING AT ME SO MUCH?
Thai: WE ARE ALL GENERALS PLEASE DIRECT US TO THE ONE PRIVATE IN THE THAI ARMY SO HE CAN CARRY OUR BAGS.

Korean: It's a lot of solid, squared away soldiers with a generous helping of weird people hiding out in weird corners (the ROKA captain showing up with a Gucci tote and an umbrella to a field exercise was a major wtf) and a dose of semi-subversive conscripts ("Hai, Mr American Captain Man, please allow me to tell you how terrible my chain of Command is and are you in needing of a KATUSA by chance?")

Americans: WE ARE HERE TO HELP BY IGNORING WHATEVER WISDOM YOU MAY HAVE AND ATTEMPTING TO AMERICAN OUR WAY OUT OF ALL PROBLEMS WITH MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF MONEY, EXPLOSIVES, OR BOTH WHICH WE WILL FLAGRANTLY LORD OVER YOU WITHOUT REALIZING IT ON ALL OCCASIONS.