Panzer Armor

[Aured]

I noticed that two of my Panzer IV G's (I think that's what they were) were different in appearance. One had armor skirts on the turret (picture two), and the other didn't (picture one). Does this make any difference to game play or is it just an aesthetics thing?

[Vanir Ausf B]

Does this make any difference to game play or is it just an aesthetics thing?

The skirts make HEAT projectiles slightly less likely to penetrate. When the East Front games come out they will presumably have a more pronounced effect on Soviet AT rifles, which is what they were actually intended to defend against.

[Bil Hardenberger]

Vanir is correct.. however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

[Vanir Ausf B]

however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

That is good to know. But that brings up a question. I just loaded up a CMBN QB and purchased 10 Pz IV G "latest". When the game began all 10 appeared with turret schurzen, but only 6 had any hull schurzen. Under the hood are are all vehicles of the same model considered identical? If so, are all Pz IV G latest treated as if they have hull schurzen or do not have hull schruzen?

[Rokko]

Vanir is correct.. however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

I do not believe this is true.

[Vark]

Will skirts be damaged/removed if travelling through dense undergrowth, or as a result of near impacts by heavy HE, as historically happened.

[Baneman]

Will skirts be damaged/removed if travelling through dense undergrowth, or as a result of near impacts by heavy HE, as historically happened.

I imagine that this would be the sort of thing BFC may take into consideration when/if including hit decals.

Seems unlikely to be in the near future though. That's my guess anyway.

[Bil Hardenberger]

I do not believe this is true.

You doubt me?

I'm sure the game takes into account whatever effect the skirt would have if the tank had them.. however it does not use the representation of what you see on the screen as to whether the tank has a skirt in a specific location or not... if it could have one then it would get the bonus (if any) whether it is there or not.

[akd]

Vanir is correct.. however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

Unless Charles says otherwise, I'm also doubtful. Skirts can register as a hit location when they are present. I have not noticed them registering as hit locations when absent.

edit: the exception may be skirts with randomly missing panels.

[John Kettler]

If the model as visually depicted doesn't, in fact, reflect what an inbound projectile encounters, then why bother depicting it in the first place? I thought the whole point of 1:1 representation was to get away from abstraction. The reality is that a skirted Panzer IV, unless from a fresh or refurbished unit just arrived of which it's a part (the famous IV/Hs at Normandy), would have varying skirt configuration because the events which removed one or more skirt panels would generally be tank specific. My understanding is that if a shot hits where the skirt isn't, then the tank may have a problem. See, for example, the East Front pic in Weapons of World War II in which a Panzer III/J sans skirts takes an ATR hit smack through the lower hull perpendicular to the ATR. Skirts would've stopped that, or at least, given the very close range, have degraded the penetration performance.

Further, it's my understanding that the skirts, while designed to deal with the ATR threat, turned out to be good inadvertent protection vs the bazooka and PIAT. This was because early shaped charge munitions had relatively shallow cone liner angles optimized for a direct hit. Premature standoff detonation via skirt or other obstacle defocused the jet, either defeating it outright or severely degrading it.

I think we need clarification from BFC, particularly on the first item.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Bil Hardenberger]

edit: the exception may be skirts with randomly missing panels.

I do believe that's what we are talking about.. at least that's what I'm talking about.

[Blazing 88's]

Vanir is correct.. however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

If true... that blows.

...I'm sure the game takes into account whatever effect the skirt would have if the tank had them.. however it does not use the representation of what you see on the screen as to whether the tank has a skirt in a specific location or not... if it could have one then it would get the bonus (if any) whether it is there or not.

I would assume this at least, anything less would be a disappointment.

[Vanir Ausf B]

I do believe that's what we are talking about.. at least that's what I'm talking about.

That would make more sense. I think we were confused as to what you were referring to exactly because the panzer in the OP wasn't missing individual panels. It had no schurzen anywhere.

[Aured]

N-Never mind about the armor guys, my Panzer still got w-wrecked. T_T

[pord]

I'm confused. When playing this game, does tank B get more turret protection modeled than tank A? Or is the skirt merely cosmetic?

[MikeyD]

Those skirts, if distant memory serves, weren't armor steel (or am I misremembering?) so an AP shell would go though it like it was cardboard. It may have an affect against marginal penetrators like .50 cal, though its been a long time since I've had occasion to test that theory. It definitely makes the chance of a zook penetration harder. I've seen that time and again.

A good test might be to set of a red-on-red test, see how the Italian 20mm Solothurn, 20mm Breda or 20mm flak gun fire is affected my armor skirt and no armor skirt. Most allied guns would either be too big to too small to see a change in outcome.

[Erwin]

I think the issue that pord is raising is that if CM2 is an accurate 1:1 representation, then the added armor of skirts etc would have to be taken into account.

If skirts and other added armor are not taken into account and they are merely eye candy that's no biggy (to many of us at least) but it would be good to know.

[Vanir Ausf B]

They are not merely eye candy. What is merely eye candy is the occasional missing panel, according to Bil.

[MikeyD]

The stand-off armor is coded-in but if you're imagining the skirt armor would have anything but marginal effect against tank fire think again. I've seen a shell go clean through a PzIV turret and knock out a second vehicle on the other side. An additional 8mm isn't going to make a bit of difference.

[Bil Hardenberger]

Mikey they aren't meant to stop an incoming tank fired AP round... they are designed to force HEAT rounds like from a PF or bazooka or even a tank fired HEAT round to prematurely detonate thus ruining the destructive effect of their focused explosion. I doubt they had much effect against tank fired HEAT rounds though (too much kinetic energy for that small bit of metal to make much difference) but I'm certainly no expert.

[wokelly]

Further, it's my understanding that the skirts, while designed to deal with the ATR threat, turned out to be good inadvertent protection vs the bazooka and PIAT. This was because early shaped charge munitions had relatively shallow cone liner angles optimized for a direct hit. Premature standoff detonation via skirt or other obstacle defocused the jet, either defeating it outright or severely degrading it.

I think we need clarification from BFC, particularly on the first item.

Regards,

John Kettler

I have never seen anything to actually suggest side skirts had any effect whatsoever on HEAT warheads from Bazooka's or Piats. You need a fair amount of space to actually start to degrade the molten jet, something like the equivalent of 3-4x the diameter of the round before anything starts to weaken. The side skirts were never spaced far enough away to have an effect. I saw someone do theoretical calculations on the WWIIOL forum years ago, I think the conclusion was that it may stop a penetration by a bazooka round hitting at a very steep angle, like 60 degrees.

If the German actually felt they had an effect, I think you would have seen them on Panthers and Tigers. Both tanks were vulnerable to side shots by zooka/Piat's, yet they never got any protection like the Mark IV. The panther had some skirts for its lower hull around the tracks, but that was because Russian ATRs could penetrate there. Makes me think the Germans were unaware of any benefits against HEAT warheads, or that there were no benefits.

Not sure how the game handles them.

[ASL Veteran]

The western allies in 1944 didn't have or use any ATRs, yet the Mark IV still has the skirts in the west too. The skirts add a lot of weight to the vehicle and from what I remember the added weight made the vehicles difficult to steer. One would think that if the skirts had no effect on HEAT rounds the Mark IV wouldn't keep their skirts on in the west. :eek:

[MikeyD]

One thing allies had was marauding Mustangs. We didn't field ATRs but we were still firing lots of medium caliber ordnance their way. Some German tanks even placed light armor squares above engine air grilles, so you kind'a get the idea what they were defending themselves against.

[Vark]

Chance of being strafed and being KO'd quite low, chance of engine overheating after the air intakes partially blocked by armour quite high!

Obviously the Pz IV's kept the skirts because it made them more likely to be mistaken for a Tiger!!

[Kwazydog]

Vanir is correct.. however the visual representation is just that.. visual. Has no effect in game on whether an incoming round will take into account whether a skirt is present or not.

Actually the opposite it true guys.

The skirts are separate parts of the model and are treated as such for LOS and damage results. If you get given a Pz-IV with a missing skirt, and a heat round happens to pass through that section, the hull will take the full brunt of the impact. The same was even true in CMSF for M1 and T series skirts, so in theory those wacky fold out wing type skirts on the earlier soviet tanks could actually pre-detonate an incoming missing (even saw it happen once hehe) and could, in theory, make a difference.

If you are seeing otherwise please let us know as I am doing a lot of extra naming of objects for no reason if so hehe.

Dan