Sherman M4 (Late) v PzIVH (Late) static v moving spotting test

[c3k]

I don't quite understand this aspect of your critique :

Then you say :

Why not ?

In both tests, the stationary tank is spotting with all crewmembers - why are they not comparable ?

Unless you're saying that the game models height/profile differences between the 2 tanks into the spotting algorithm ?

It is NOT the same. A Sherman (as target) presents a different silhouette than a PzIV (as target) would present.

If I said that a PzIV never sees a mouse at 1,000m, but a Sherman sees an elephant at 1,000m, would you tell me that there is something wrong with spotting? Is the Sherman too good? Is the PzIV too poor? Nothing can be drawn from the mouse/elephant test because you've changed more than one variable in the test.

Now, if you have a Sherman take 21s to spot an elephant at 1,000m and then a PzIV takes 59s to spot an elephant at 1,000m you have made a test and produced results that can be compared.

Instead of mice or elephants, we use tanks. So, pick a target tank. Any kind will do, just make it the SAME tank for both tests. Apples to apples is better than apples to oranges.

Ken

[c3k]

I'm trying to simulate a contact in a typical game, so i need to test red on blue, or more specifically, the unbuttoned CO's of each tank, as they, out of all the crew members, are going to spot an enemy tank first.

The reason i have a covered arc for the moving tank is to simulate what players do in a game, and that is to make sure the tank's unbuttoned CO is concentrating his view in the most likely direction of a suspected enemy location.

Well, if you're trying to test which side has an advantage, that's fine. However you cannot draw any absolute conclusions between the tanks based on this test. If you want to know if it's better to play as Germans or Americans, that's fine. If you think there's a spotting issue, then this approach is useless. I thought you were attempting to show that there is a spotting flaw (either PzIV is nerfed or Sherman is buffed). That was my mistake.

[Rocky Balboa]

C3k's point is well taken ... If there is a spotting issue related to the vehicles in Noob's test then as he said, it might be that the PzIV data is flawed or the Sherman data is flawed.

To determine which it might be then tests would need to be made using the same vehicle ... PzIV vs PzIV and Sherman vs Sherman

@Noob, Thanks for creating these tests and barring any unforeseen issues I will be using your setup to test the response times using c3k's blue on blue force suggestion. I'll post my findings here ...

[c3k]

C3k's point is well taken ... If there is a spotting issue related to the vehicles in Noob's test then as he said, it might be that the PzIV data is flawed or the Sherman data is flawed.

To determine which it might be then tests would need to be made using the same vehicle ... PzIV vs PzIV and Sherman vs Sherman

@Noob, Thanks for creating these tests and barring any unforeseen issues I will be using your setup to test the response times using c3k's blue on blue force suggestion. I'll post my findings here ...

Um, not quite.

A PzIV vs PzIV test compared to a Sherman vs Sherman test would, again, show nothing worthwhile vis a vis Sherman to PzIV spotting abilities. PzIV vs. "Tank X" and Sherman vs "Tank X" is what is needed.

[Rocky Balboa]

Um, not quite.

A PzIV vs PzIV test compared to a Sherman vs Sherman test would, again, show nothing worthwhile vis a vis Sherman to PzIV spotting abilities. PzIV vs. "Tank X" and Sherman vs "Tank X" is what is needed.

Thanks, my tests will begin with more of a general spotting test to determine a baseline for each vehicle as you suggested here:

If you want to compare actual spotting ability, you'd need to set up a blue on blue (or red on red) test of the second iteration.

PzIV -> Sherman AND Sherman -> Sherman: this would be an apples to apples test.

(Or, if you'd prefer, Sherman -> PzIV AND PzIV -> PzIV.)

[Baneman]

It is NOT the same. A Sherman (as target) presents a different silhouette than a PzIV (as target) would present.

Ok, cheers, I didn't know for sure that the game does model the profile of target vehicles into the spotting chance.

I thought LoS was calculated between Action Spots and then spotting was a chance when something was in a "visible" AS ( admittedly based on incomplete information gleaned from various official and non-official threads on the subject ).

Guess I should go and run some Sherman v Sherman and Sherman v Stug tests

[Redwolf]

Ok, cheers, I didn't know for sure that the game does model the profile of target vehicles into the spotting chance.

I thought LoS was calculated between Action Spots and then spotting was a chance when something was in a "visible" AS ( admittedly based on incomplete information gleaned from various official and non-official threads on the subject ).

Guess I should go and run some Sherman v Sherman and Sherman v Stug tests

Ahhh, careful.

The 3D model is used to determine hits all right.

Nobody said anything either way whether spotting chance uses the 3D model (unlikely) or at least takes the volume of the 3D model into account for the spotting chance. And of course the engine (unlike CMx1s) doesn't tell us anything that would enable us to figure it out.

[Amizaur]

Hmmm... It would be interesting to check:

Static Sherman vs moving Sherman - and note the spotting times

Static PzIV vs moving PzIV - as above

Moving Sherman vs moving PzIV

Static Sherman vs static PzIV.

The we would know what is the effect of movement vs static, based on two examples, and what is the effect of tank type (advantage of Sherman vs PzIV). Maybe the Sherman has JUST a big spotting advantage and nothing more. But maybe it's only related to moving/static as you observed in your first test.

[mikewhol]

I would also like to point out that not only are you testing spotting BUT ALSO engagement times too. If I remember all the books and games that Ive played over the years, it is generally accepted that the Sherman was a very quick draw gun slinger indeed. Also you cannot currently tell EXACTLY when a unit is spotted. That is assumeing that there may be a lag between spotting and reaction, I dont know, but it is another list of possible variables.

Still a very interesting test.

Mike

[c3k]

I would also like to point out that not only are you testing spotting BUT ALSO engagement times too. If I remember all the books and games that Ive played over the years, it is generally accepted that the Sherman was a very quick draw gun slinger indeed. Also you cannot currently tell EXACTLY when a unit is spotted. That is assumeing that there may be a lag between spotting and reaction, I dont know, but it is another list of possible variables.

Still a very interesting test.

Mike

(My bold.) Why doesn't the timer work? Select the "spotting" unit, watch down the road, when the "?" appears that's an initial spot, when it ID's, that's a final spot. In a lot of cases the time between "?" and ID will be very brief.

Ken

[Paper Tiger]

Also you cannot currently tell EXACTLY when a unit is spotted. That is assumeing that there may be a lag between spotting and reaction, I dont know, but it is another list of possible variables.

I have observed the spotting behaviour quite closely in the game. I was playtesting something where I had a Sherman drive FAST down to a road junction. The road to the junction was concealed by High Bocage as was the road running at 45o to the east. A Panther tank was sitting about 400m along that road behind some low bocage but otherwise perfect LOS. The tank commander was unbuttoned. This is what happened.

The tank screeched down the road and the instant it moved into the Panther's LOS, I heard one of the Sherman crew say 'Enemy Vehicle spotted' and at the same time, the turret started rotating to fire on the fully identified Panther. According to the green text in the bootm left corner, the gunner immediately went from Spotting to Rotating. The Panther didn't spot the Sherman. So the time from spotting to reacting seems to be zero.

It is possible to determine the precise moment a tank crew spots another vehicle from the audible clues and the crew text.

[noob]

Same test as shown at the start of this thread with two exceptions, no 20 second pause on the Sherman, and short cover arcs on both tanks to avoid combat, the Sherman's cover arc is positioned to make its turret point down the road.

The "0" shows that there was no unknown sighting before a known sighting.

The above numbers represent the game time minus the 7 seconds it took for the Sherman to break the plane of the hedge.

I will do 50 tests for the Sherman as static and the PzIV as moving, then 50 red on PzIV v PzIV and 50 Sherman v Sherman.

The Pz IV spots the Sherman first (confirmed) 31 times out of 50.

[noob]

The two outlier results of 138 and 200 seconds are worrying, i just cannot see how a tank CO would take over two to three minutes to spot a Sherman that had just moved into his LOS 742 m away on an open road with optimum weather conditions.

I understand there has to be an element of randomness to spotting times, but i think the spotting parameters need to be looked at as anyone taking up to a minute to spot a moving target in those conditions seems excessive.

[c3k]

It seems clear, but just making sure I understand it correctly: if the Sherman has lower numbers in your chart, that means it spotted the PzIV first? E.g., line one, the Sherman identified the PzIV in one second (after breaking the plane of the bocage), but it took the PzIV 10 seconds to do the same?

(Clarification only.)

Thanks,

Ken

[noob]

It seems clear, but just making sure I understand it correctly: if the Sherman has lower numbers in your chart, that means it spotted the PzIV first? E.g., line one, the Sherman identified the PzIV in one second (after breaking the plane of the bocage), but it took the PzIV 10 seconds to do the same?

(Clarification only.)

Thanks,

Ken

That is correct.

[noob]

The average time it took the PzIV to get a known contact was 21.88 seconds, and the average time for the Sherman was 19.3 seconds, which is counter intuitive given the Sherman is moving and the PzIV at rest.

[slysniper]

This is a similar test compared to the ones I posted earier.

The main difference being I had Sherman on Sherman and I did it in the 2.0 version of the engine, plus the motionless tank had some concealment to give it the advantage.

I ran 60 test.

Two things I notice here that stick out. The tank in motion managed to get the spotting advantage 16 times. Which seems wrong. But being that you are out in the open with the motionless tank, it can be said, it should be very easy to spot.

but why. In my testing. My motionless tank spotted the moving tank consistantly under 20 second, out of all my test I only had one result that was 33 seconds.

So from what I saw in my test and what I am seeing here. There does seem to be a problem with the Pz4 seeing a target quickly.

I will repost my test here also.

[slysniper]

What I see in your testing, the Pz4 does not manage to get similar results

But what I saw in my testing is that a unit in motion sees to well also, with your test that is hard to argue. But your times seem similar to mine, and I had the tank in concealment.

But all my times were to known identification. I did not record the ? times.

Ok, I finally sat down and did a little bit of testing last night to see what I would discover under the latest version of the game.

I saw some good and some not so good things. And by far, this is not enough testing to mean anything. But it was enough to get me a feel for what is going on and now I can try some other set ups to see how it impacts things. But as of yet, I do not have anything worth running a large number on that would show some issues.

The setup is this. I have a moving Sherman M4A1’s in the open, moving from cover to cover at 800 meters away from an enemy Sherman in tall grass under trees with heavy cover and trees behind it. (This might not be considered to be much concealment in the game-I need to test other types of hexes) but it is what I went with to see if it impacts play. Which I have not tested yet. The crews were Vets. With no mods and all units.

What I found the game does well is, Moving target in open are sighted very quickly. I saw no problems there. Within 13-15 seconds from the start of the game I always had sight of the moving Tank. I saw nothing in the test to think anything needs changed here.

Now the fun stuff.

At first I tested the moving Sherman with a hunt order and let both tanks fire at will. The results were the tank in the woods managed to shoot first every time. Spotting in 15 seconds and firing a few seconds later. With the enemy shooting at them the moving Sherman adv. spotting time were 28 seconds and then stopping and returning fire. So in general, not bad. Except for one thing, I had a battle where both tanks almost spotted each other at the same time.

So I adjusted the test so no firing would take place. Then I set the moving tank to not move to cover, but to zig zag moving towards the enemy. Let’s see what happens running at different speeds and see how long it takes the moving tank to spot the motionless tank in some concealment.

The motionless tank did fine with an adv. of 13 seconds to spot the enemy, nothing longer than 19 seconds.

But it is the moving tank that might have issues.

Here is what I saw. On the adv. It normally was taking twice as long for the moving tank to spot the motionless, tank. With 50% of the test taking over a minute for it to spot the tank. But that was the adv. Where I see a possible flaw is that 25% of my test had the moving tank spotting the enemy tank in 20 seconds or less.

With two tests actually having both tanks spot each other at the same time. This is not good.

Now I understand, that I should think of a tank in hunt mode as stopping at times and looking for the enemy.

So I ran some test at quick and fast to see if I could get similar results (there does appear to be added penalties). But I did get results of fast moving tanks still spotting the enemy tank twice in less than 23 seconds. (Now that is really bad- no fast moving tank should be seeing things all that well).

So In general, the moving tanks in the game adv. twice as long to spot something with a little variance for speed - not bad, at least there is a good difference (but similar results as if the enemy was firing, there should be much more of a difference). They have the ability to spot way to fast. Non motion targets at times. So I think a detailed test focused on this one issue might be what is needed.

So I was glad to see in principle it works, it just comes down to how often should a moving tank get eagle eye abilities where nothing is preventing it from seeing the enemy. (It is almost like it was sitting still and the enemy is not in any concealment either.

this shot shows what the moving sherman is trying to see

note: even if using Binos, this would not be easy to pick up quickly

Where as, even not in motion, it is pretty clear that we have a enemy tank out there

I do not expect the game to be totally realistic, but Some additional tweeking could be done to prevent moving units from picking up non firing units so quickly at times