com-intern

Really the big trick Battlefront is missing is that these games are packed with detail but essentially none of it is explained. If the game explained why something happened or changed it'd go a long way to improving player interaction because right now you practically need your own military library to get much depth out of the series. And while I'm okay spending $80 for Bloody Streets most people aren't so the fact that the game is detailed doesn't really matter.

 

There are a ton of little factors but to engage it in the broadest terms the farther back you go in time the less deadly being spotted is. Essentially combat is a SEE -> SHOOT -> KILL loop but the efficiency of that loop changes.
Black Sea to Shock Force sees a reduction in that efficiency. Shock Force to the WW2 games sees a reduction. '44/'45 to '41/'42 sees a reduction.
  To put it in the simplest in 1941 fighting is quaint. You've got nearly all bolt-actions, the scary 37mm gun, what is a shaped charge? jump ahead to '45 and its MORE DAKKA. More automatics, more semi-autos, more shaped charges, larger caliber guns , etc....

Really the big trick Battlefront is missing is that these games are packed with detail but essentially none of it is explained. If the game explained why something happened or changed it'd go a long way to improving player interaction because right now you practically need your own military library to get much depth out of the series. And while I'm okay spending $80 for Bloody Streets most people aren't so the fact that the game is detailed doesn't really matter.

 

There are a ton of little factors but to engage it in the broadest terms the farther back you go in time the less deadly being spotted is. Essentially combat is a SEE -> SHOOT -> KILL loop but the efficiency of that loop changes.
Black Sea to Shock Force sees a reduction in that efficiency. Shock Force to the WW2 games sees a reduction. '44/'45 to '41/'42 sees a reduction.
  To put it in the simplest in 1941 fighting is quaint. You've got nearly all bolt-actions, the scary 37mm gun, what is a shaped charge? jump ahead to '45 and its MORE DAKKA. More automatics, more semi-autos, more shaped charges, larger caliber guns , etc....

Really the big trick Battlefront is missing is that these games are packed with detail but essentially none of it is explained. If the game explained why something happened or changed it'd go a long way to improving player interaction because right now you practically need your own military library to get much depth out of the series. And while I'm okay spending $80 for Bloody Streets most people aren't so the fact that the game is detailed doesn't really matter.

 

There are a ton of little factors but to engage it in the broadest terms the farther back you go in time the less deadly being spotted is. Essentially combat is a SEE -> SHOOT -> KILL loop but the efficiency of that loop changes.
Black Sea to Shock Force sees a reduction in that efficiency. Shock Force to the WW2 games sees a reduction. '44/'45 to '41/'42 sees a reduction.
  To put it in the simplest in 1941 fighting is quaint. You've got nearly all bolt-actions, the scary 37mm gun, what is a shaped charge? jump ahead to '45 and its MORE DAKKA. More automatics, more semi-autos, more shaped charges, larger caliber guns , etc....

There's a difference, though, between the engine and the data - or maybe there isn't with CM, but in theory at least, giving someone the ability to add data e.g. weight, speed, calibre, ,muzzle velocity, rate of fire for a given vehicle, gun or small arm isn't the same as letting them muck about with how the engine crunches that data. That, of course, should be BF's and BF's alone to mess with. In addition, BF could act as gatekeeper for new additions, the data for much of which is already known, so they could do things like make sure nobody is trying to sneak a 90mm gun onto a Matilda.  

1. It'd be more realistic

I've brought this up before but firing at center of mass assumes that you know the center of mass. You obviously would not always be able to ID center of mass. Its a lived experience anyone has had so I think this would be obvious.

2. I've had in-game occasions where a gun opens up on a target in the first few seconds of a turn and continues to fire for the remaining minute (or until they die) doing no appreciable damage.

Recently I had a Soviet 37mm AA gun fire at a Panzer IV for two full turns before the Panzer IV reversed over the hillside. Luckily the fire-rate was high enough that the constant smoke blinded the crew - but if the gun had put all those rounds into/around the turret it would have likely knocked the tank out.

I generally agree with your take except for  this caveat.

1. CM relies heavily on user made content in the form of QBs and scenarios. A number of these present you with challenges that are decidedly unrealistic. Even some official scenarios and campaign missions do this. When that happens the more edge case issues that CM has have a tendency of showing up. So even while you really shouldn't be getting into the situation the realities of map design and scenario design can force your hand.

Essentially I don't think its quite as rare as people think depending on the scenarios and QBs you play.
 
IMO your take here is backwards. CM is artificially rewarding open ground positions. Hull down positions are effectivally operating as they should while open ground positions are given a bonus to survivability for certain armor.

Take this test result
 In what world do three elite crews sit back and ram home round after round into the upper glacis of a Panther with no effect? To me it seems rather obvious that a gunner would eventually realize they are having no effect and at minimum begin walking rounds elsewhere on the target. Essentially if I had a magic wand I'd have gunners choose a semi-randomized area around the center mass and then change that every ~10 rounds.



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Just to be clear I don't have a huge issue with how the system works as it stands as I think it does operate well enough.

No problem, very interesting threads. Yes, here's a few examples from Schneider's Tigers in Combat III which I have at hand. One taking off the muzzle brake, a penetration along the length, and a glancing blow into the the shroud. The last is the result of firing a damaged gun! Yikes! I guess the take away is that the game can't really depict what the damage actually might look like. 




Do not attempt this at home kids!
 

Yes. Indeed, at distance, in the open, the Panther is always going to wipe the floor with the earlier marks of Sherman. In hull down their ability to withstand hits is severely reduced. Tigers though present a slightly nuanced problem in as much as their mantlets could withstand more punishment. That's not to say though that one should leave them sitting in a hull down position once targeted.
In Wolfgang Schneider's Tigers in Combat III there are some reproductions of interesting Soviet instruction manuals for tank and anti-tank gunners, issued soon after their first contact with the s.Pz.Abt in 1943. They highlight areas of Tigers to target: frontally - vision blocks, tracks, machine guns, optics and commander's cupolas; from the side - turret side, fuel tanks, between the tracks & upper hull, wheels, drive sprocket, commander's cupola, loader's hatch and gun barrel. All of which seems to tally quite nicely with the kinds of damage reports returned by the Werkstatt. In one of the same documents the gunners are exhorted to Bombard with all weapons, Use guns of every calibre, Throw incendiary devices and use All anti-tank weapons. 
In the 30 September 1943 report I mentioned above, by a commander in the s.Pz.Abt 506, the types of damage suffered by the Tigers does seem to support how the Soviet troops tackled the Tigers: 6 Tigers lost by direct hits from around 1000m, the tanks burnt out and exploded in enemy territory; 1 Tiger knocked out by a T-34 at 200m by two penetration to the hull side; 4 divers', 4 radio operators', 1 loaders' and 2 commanders' hatches blown off; 8 cannon and 4 gun gimbals damaged; 3 final drives broken by hits to hull armour; 3 instances of armoured cover and 6 of glass viewing blocks of driver's viewpoint shot-up; one armour protection to exhaust destroyed; 15 hatch-cover latches destroyed; running gear of 21 tanks badly damaged by projectiles, including 6 drive sprockets and 2 guide wheels; 6 radiators damaged by splinters from hits on the turret; 14 engines rendered inoperative caused by enemy fire; 3 air intakes and 2 ventilator fans destroyed; etc
Not to mention some very deaf crews thanks to the hammering on their hulls!

Also, it depends on range. At close ranges (500m), the enemy tank will spot you and start placing rounds on your turret very quickly even if you're hull down, so that's also a hull up choice for me.

yea as a player this is something to keep in mind. I think the most obvious decision from a wego perspective:

* Attempting shoot and scoot Hulldown
* Before a major engagement has occurred (ambush position) Hulldown
* Once you are/are likely to be in a shoot out open ground (preferably keyholed)

Essentially you are trying to make the decision on whether you will need the concealment more than the armor. Once a real fight breaks out the armor is probably preferable since getting hit is just a matter of time.

If I played real-time mode, that's what I would do. But I play in turn based mode, so I have to find a balance between the chance to spot and hit the enemy tank and my own tank's survivability. For Shermans, that means hull down - for Panthers, it means hull up. At least that's my take on it.

It sounds like you live in the fantasy land of scenario design.

CM isn't reality and its not unusual to find yourself in scenarios where you are essentially engaged in straight up brawls with enemy big guns. If you play CM for a day it would not be unusual for you to see more Tigers than the entire American army did.

Edit:

Hell if you are a longtime CM player there are decent odds you've seen more Tigers in game than were ever produced.

Here are some original statistics from Lukas Friedli's excellent volumes Repairing the Panzers (my bold):
Volume 1 pp190-191 a section on Losses of s.Pz.Abt 503 makes for interesting reading. A 10 October 1943 report for the period 5 July 1943 - 21 September 1943 showed 18 total losses of Tiger I, with 240 Tigers in and out of the Werkstatt (ie recovered or broken down vehicles). Damages/Repairs listed included: 142 technical failures (engine burn outs etc); 227 damages due to shelling (incl 35 turret damages, 19 caused by mines and 2 friendly fire by a StuG, the rest hull damages); 52 weapons damages (6 turret jammed due to PaK hits, 3 turret jammed due to HE hits, 10 KwK 36 inoperative due to PaK hits, 2 mantlets inoperative due to 7.62cm PaK hits, 1 commander's cupola newly adjusted, 12 commander's cupola exchanged, 4 optics inoperative due to shelling, 5 optics inoperative due to normal use, 7 ball mounts due to PaK hits, 2 by friendly fire from a StuG).
If anything this example shows that damage to the main gun by the enemy was more common than, for example, damage to the optics and mantlet, in this report almost 20% of damages to weapons are to the main gun itself. And what was that StuG up to!!
Another report, this time in Volume 2 pp60-61, from s.Pz.Abt 506 on 1 January 1944 covering repairs carried out from 20 September 1943 - 31 December 1943 shows Weapon damage: (where the turret needed to be lifted for 40 Tigers in total) 6 gun barrel replaced caused by enemy, 3 mantlet replaced caused by enemy, 2 turret replaced caused by enemy, 1 muzzle brake replaced caused by enemy, 6 elevating gear repairs caused by technical issues, 3 traverse gear repairs caused by technical issues, 12 cupola repairs caused by enemy, 3 visor repairs caused by enemy, 2 visor repairs caused by technical issues, 7 ammo racks replaced caused by technical issues, 6 ammo racks replaced caused by enemy, 12 hydraulic drive fluid renewals caused by technical issues, 5 hydraulic drive control repairs caused by technical issues, 9 MG mounts repairs caused by enemy, 4 hatch lid repairs caused by enemy, 4 firing mechanisms replaced caused by technical issues, 2 recoil brake repairs caused by technical issues, 27 turret traverse mechanism repairs and checks caused by technical issues.
An experience report by the commander of the same unit dated 30 September 1943 for action over seven days and nights from 20 - 26 September stated that: "6 Tigers were lost from direct hits" (unrecoverable) and "8 guns and 4 gun mantlets were damaged by hits, 3 of them heavily" whilst other damage included "the intercom system failed on17 Tigers due to vibration caused by shelling" (I assume from their own main gun!).
Again these examples show that main gun damage was quite common and enough to at least require a visit to the Werkstatt.
The PanzerWrecks series of books does feature a few images of damage to main weapons which appear to have occurred from frontal hits ie chunks taken out of muzzle brakes and glancing blows along barrels. Great source for all you damage nerds out there.
LS
 

You don't need to put it simpler, because we already understand this quite well. Nobody here is arguing that we want to sit in one position for a long time and shrug off hits.

Given QB and scenario design you are often straight-jacketed into certain positions. Yes in reality you might have more room to maneuver and more time but there have been more than a few scenarios where the alternate positions are a stones throw away from the current position.
 
I think that would be obvious. Shermans rarely if ever have hull superiority whereas there are regularly situations where the German player will have access to tanks that can shrug off rounds. @RobZ winrate test should make it obvious why you might want to do that.




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Principally from a player perspective none of this is a MUST. However, it is something to be aware of when playing the game. Its a tool you can use to your advantage. Does that mean you drive your tanks around in the open constantly? No. What sort of idiot would do that? But you should be aware of the stats and be aware that it can be advantageous to fight from the open.

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Warthunder does have maps where you engage targets 2.000+ meters with WW2 era vehicles and none of the arcade hit displays.

But principally you are talking about the arcade mode and the smaller maps. On the larger maps in the more realism oriented modes what I see more often than specific "gamer science shots" is players bracketing targets for a hit. HITTING and then repeatedly firing wherever they initially hit. Depending on the situation  that often means that you have repeated hits off the center of mass because that happens to be where the first round landed.


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Overall though I don't get why some of y'all are talking as if folks want some uber pinpoint shooting on the part of the gunners?

Given QB and scenario design you are often straight-jacketed into certain positions. Yes in reality you might have more room to maneuver and more time but there have been more than a few scenarios where the alternate positions are a stones throw away from the current position.
 
I think that would be obvious. Shermans rarely if ever have hull superiority whereas there are regularly situations where the German player will have access to tanks that can shrug off rounds. @RobZ winrate test should make it obvious why you might want to do that.




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Principally from a player perspective none of this is a MUST. However, it is something to be aware of when playing the game. Its a tool you can use to your advantage. Does that mean you drive your tanks around in the open constantly? No. What sort of idiot would do that? But you should be aware of the stats and be aware that it can be advantageous to fight from the open.

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Warthunder does have maps where you engage targets 2.000+ meters with WW2 era vehicles and none of the arcade hit displays.

But principally you are talking about the arcade mode and the smaller maps. On the larger maps in the more realism oriented modes what I see more often than specific "gamer science shots" is players bracketing targets for a hit. HITTING and then repeatedly firing wherever they initially hit. Depending on the situation  that often means that you have repeated hits off the center of mass because that happens to be where the first round landed.


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Overall though I don't get why some of y'all are talking as if folks want some uber pinpoint shooting on the part of the gunners?

This is exactly my point dude. The game should FIX it, not rely on its players to not "cheese" the game mechanics. You just admitted that this is an issue than can be cheesed and is "gamey" which is the exact reason I'm making this post at all. The game has to fix it, not the people playing it.

I think Saint_Fuller’s post shows a major problem in this thread, which is certain people just refusing to give due consideration to  @Bulletpoint and @RobZ’s arguments. The strawmanning legitimate criticisms of the game results in bad counter arguments that don’t address actual points made.

It's clear to me after reading the responses that very few in this discussion actually understand what the issue is. I'm not saying tacAI should not aim for center mass, I have already stated earlier that this is exactly what they should do. But the issue is their aiming precision, not the gun accuracy. If we put a laser pointer in the tacAI gunner optics, that laser would point constantly on a 1x1 CM square on the targets center mass. That is the issue.  If we did the same with a human, that laser would be very many places on the target, still center mass, but not exact pixel perfect center mass. This is what makes the AI too accurate, and this is the issue I have been talking about all along.
The hull down statistics is more or less a response to the "hull down myth", which we see doesn't hold up in all cases. And part of the reason for this is the perfect aiming of the tacAI that makes the overall hit zone very tiny and locked to a spesific area, in this case the upper hull.
@Saint_Fullers post is infact supporting me on this. They aim center mass cus they are not precise enough to aim for spesific areas, yet the tacAI in this game is so precise they can consistently hit the ball machine gun mount if the game told them to aim there.
For the "advanced calculations" required to make the AI aim different places is an odd response, the game already handles this stuff with zeroing shots. It doesn't even need any advanced calculations, just make the AI have a random offset from the pixel perfect center mass point, so they aim more spread out, but still center mass.
I already Agree on many of the more obvious and logical points you guys bring up as that's not the issue I'm pointing out.
 

Thats what i would assume to happen, in all my tests it always takes more shots against a hull down opponent. If the game didn't reflect this then that would be very worrying, but it does that just fine as you show yourself. The point im making with hull down beeing worse for certain tanks is that they have the armor to take hits on the hull, and the AI will aim for the hull when they are on open ground and thus it increases their survivability compared to hull down. Im doing some tests as we speak and will share results soon, it shows exactly what im talking about.

Oooh boy this thread got petty for a bit.

RE: Scenario Size

Play in CMx2 tends to be smaller across the board. The maps themselves are smaller and the forces are also smaller. But this is almost certainly a direct trade-off between bigger scenario size and detail of the simulation. CMx1 had what... 20 meter Action Squares compared to CMx2's 8 meter Action squares. 2.5 times smaller so that a 2,000 meter stretch has gone from 100 squares to 250.

That increase in detail has a cost and while in most cases I think the cost has been worth it I do miss the larger scenarios (and the ease of creating them) in CMx1. I will also say that Modern titles take the brunt of the hit.

RE: Hull Down

The way the game does targeting makes it inadvisable for certain vehicles to remain in hull-down once they are spotted. Since a hull-down position will guarantee turret hits and if your turret armor is weaker than hull then you are setting yourself up to be penetrated. You also increase the odds of gun damage which is especially pernicious for tanks that are otherwise proof to enemy fire.

Effectively once a vehicle is spotted the shooter has perfect information regarding that vehicles so some of the benefit that hull down would grant you such as blending of turret with terrain and the inability for the shooter to accurately correct fires is lost. This in turn makes the decision whether to go hull down or not an actual one since you are trading away your hull-armor.

Oooh boy this thread got petty for a bit.

RE: Scenario Size

Play in CMx2 tends to be smaller across the board. The maps themselves are smaller and the forces are also smaller. But this is almost certainly a direct trade-off between bigger scenario size and detail of the simulation. CMx1 had what... 20 meter Action Squares compared to CMx2's 8 meter Action squares. 2.5 times smaller so that a 2,000 meter stretch has gone from 100 squares to 250.

That increase in detail has a cost and while in most cases I think the cost has been worth it I do miss the larger scenarios (and the ease of creating them) in CMx1. I will also say that Modern titles take the brunt of the hit.

RE: Hull Down

The way the game does targeting makes it inadvisable for certain vehicles to remain in hull-down once they are spotted. Since a hull-down position will guarantee turret hits and if your turret armor is weaker than hull then you are setting yourself up to be penetrated. You also increase the odds of gun damage which is especially pernicious for tanks that are otherwise proof to enemy fire.

Effectively once a vehicle is spotted the shooter has perfect information regarding that vehicles so some of the benefit that hull down would grant you such as blending of turret with terrain and the inability for the shooter to accurately correct fires is lost. This in turn makes the decision whether to go hull down or not an actual one since you are trading away your hull-armor.

Reading Bruno's post and he does come off as frustrated but I think this thread links quite a lot with @RobZ 's good testing with tank gun accuracy. This discussion is inherently an extension of how guns target tanks and talking about it without linking in that thread is a waste of time IMO. Because damage is not just about what the round should do once it hits but whether it should hit at all. I did some simple tests recently in Red Thunder V3 and saw an uptick in gun damage in hull-down positions to the point that I feel comfortable recommending that heavy tanks (i.e. tanks that will likely not be penetrated by the average gun) should not enter hull down positions as it increases the risk that they will suffer gun damage.

Overall it seems like something is off with targeting routines and I suspect its that the shooter has perfect knowledge of the target once it has been spotted. There are no 50% spots and so on that you naturally get in reality.


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I was shooting cans over the weekend with a friend and he was repeatedly missing a shot. I eventually got out my binoculars to see in detail what was happening and it became clear that he couldn't tell the orientation of the can. The top of the can was reflecting the sun and was a very easily spottable target. However, the can was oriented at 45 degrees while he assumed it was sitting straight up.

This basic misinterpretation doesn't seem to be happening in CM and instead you have unspotted and spotted targets.

That confuses me.  It was MUCH easier to run a scenario on a 4IKx8K map in CM1 with a REGIMENTAL task force on each side.  Try that in CM2.  I can't recall any CM2 map or scenario that large that would run on much less than a Kray.  CM2 maps are smaller cos of most folks' current consumer PC processing power limitations.
In the GAME there is evidence that being hulldown can be worse for some tanks due to the AI targeting routines than being exposed.  This is not about RL, it's the way it is in the GAME.  In order to play the GAME well, one needs to be aware of in-game phenomena like that.

Norbert Számvéber's books are really good sources for a lot of what's happening in 1945. In Hungary, for the most part. Well researched, well formatted, and informative at the scale needed for this work.
There's another Hamilton book- out of print, but good for this level of information.