Sd Kfz 7/2 37 mm

[Agua]

Well, target size may be some portion of the problem, but I just put three skdfz in a 40m x 20m space surrounded by woods and placed a Sherman Jumbo 76(w) in with them. I removed all HE from the Jumbo. In three trials, only 2 of 9 skdfz were taken out with AP. One took 6 rounds of AP before it died, another taking 9 rounds. Jumbo MG did take out 4 of them. In two of the three trials, the Jumbo's gun was damaged and in two of the trials, the Jumbo was immobilized. At this close range, there's something more than just "hard to hit" going on here.

[following posting: Make that in all three trials the Jumbo's gun was damaged.]

[This message has been edited by Agua (edited 04-02-2001).]

[Wilhammer]

Since we have 2 threads on this, I will paste here what I wrote there, since this appears to be the "dominant" thread.

I just played this out, and I am dismayed at the results.

Essentially, unarmoured vehicles, guns and infantry are of the same target classification. This is borne out of the fact that the Ostwinds as targets have hit and kill chances, while the unarmoured do not.

The Ostwinds, after 3 trials, were all destroyed in under 30 seconds, while at the end of the turn the 7/2s had only 2 or 3 of their number killed. Since they had better survivability, they inflicted more damage on the Shermans than the Ostwinds did, which is ridiculous.

Why not just give unarmoured vehicles very light armor, like 1 or 2 mm?

In practical CM terms, unarmoured vehicles are NOT classified as vehicle targets by the CM engine.

Therefor, because SOFT targets like Infantry, Guns and unarmoured vehicles are subject to "spotted target tight area fire", the blast radius of the HE round is very important. You, in effect, never hit a soft target, you get firepower damage against it.

The question now is how do you deal with it "game" tactically?

A gun armed unarmoured vehicle can thus act like a very mobile ATG or Field Gun. So, instead of buying the immobile 50mm PAKs, buy these armed trucks.

[russellmz]

Originally posted by Barleyman:

Hmm, this reminds me of some British bi-plane torpedo bomber which was supposed to be good because it was so flimsy most AP and HE rounds would go straight through without causing much damage..

Not too hot for pilot protection!

swordfish...prob most famous for crippling the german uber battleship bismarck so that the slower brit battlewagons could finish it off. cool story...

------------------

russellmz,

Self-Proclaimed Keeper for Life of the Sacred Unofficial FAQ.

"They had their chance- they have not lead!" - GW Bush

"They had mechanical pencils- they have not...lead?" - Jon Stewart on The Daily Show

[KiwiJoe]

Yeah I think all they have to do is increase the chance of it being knocked out by HE blast. I seem to have little trouble with jeeps... any rifle or mg fire sherds them REALLY easy. And HE blasts that land reasonably close knock them out most of the time.

[Guest Michael emrys]

Been following this thread for a while now. Sure sounds like something screwy is going on. In the real world, any hit anywhere on the gun (just the gun, not the whole vehicle) with 37mm HE should almost certainly knock it out and produce a casualty or two among the crew. A hit by even a 20mm AP anywhere except the gunshield should stand a good chance of knocking the gun out and perhaps producing a casualty. A direct hit by a 75mm HE should definitely kill the gun and produce several casualties. And so forth.

From what's been posted, I draw a number of conjectures.

One is that BTS programmed the game to make it harder to hit soft targets with AP than a comparable sized armored target. On the face of it, this makes a certain amount of sense, as your average truck has only a small proportion of its silhouette vulnerable to an AP hit. Unfortunately, the program fails to recognize that vehicles like the 7/2 represent an exceptional case. Namely, they possess a large mass that is vulnerable to AP shot damage.

Secondly, it appears that the trajectory of HE direct fire rounds may not be tracked in the same exact way that AP rounds are. That is, there may not be such a thing in the game as a direct hit with HE, only varying degrees of near-misses with the blast radius and strength thus being the critical factors.

If so, just add this onto the lengthening list of things that need to be fixed "one of these days".

Michael

[Kanonier Reichmann]

Originally posted by Wilhammer:

I just played this out, and I am dismayed at the results.

Essentially, unarmoured vehicles, guns and infantry are of the same target classification. This is borne out of the fact that the Ostwinds as targets have hit and kill chances, while the unarmoured do not.

The Ostwinds, after 3 trials, were all destroyed in under 30 seconds, while at the end of the turn the 7/2s had only 2 or 3 of their number killed. Since they had better survivability, they inflicted more damage on the Shermans than the Ostwinds did, which is ridiculous.

Why not just give unarmoured vehicles very light armor, like 1 or 2 mm?

In practical CM terms, unarmoured vehicles are NOT classified as vehicle targets by the CM engine.

Therefor, because SOFT targets like Infantry, Guns and unarmoured vehicles are subject to "spotted target tight area fire", the blast radius of the HE round is very important. You, in effect, never hit a soft target, you get firepower damage against it.

Wilhammer, the reason why they aren't treated as very lightly armoured vehicles is beacuse once that is done then infantry units won't target them due to their inability to penetrate armour with their light arms. Unfortunately it results in unrealistic modelling of what should be a very vulnerable vehicle to all kinds of fire.

Regards

Jim R.

[Dschugaschwili]

Originally posted by Kanonier Reichmann:

Wilhammer, the reason why they aren't treated as very lightly armoured vehicles is beacuse once that is done then infantry units won't target them due to their inability to penetrate armour with their light arms.

Already now there are infantry weapons that have both a firepower and an armor penetration rating (at least MGs, possibly arty/mortar shells too). It shouldn't be too hard to give infantry squads a similar behaviour as MGs already have, targeting vehicles if they have a chance of knocking them out. And giving squad weapons a (small) armor piercing ability shouldn't be too hard either. And if that's implemented, it's surely better than anything else that's been proposed here until now.

Dschugaschwili

[This message has been edited by Dschugaschwili (edited 04-03-2001).]

[pritzl]

I hope someone from BTS will weigh in on this topic and let us know how soft vehicles are treated and why or why things are not working as intended?

[Wilhammer]

Be sure to catch the othe thread on this issue; http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/Forum1/HTML/017981.html

This gets wierder every time I do unarmoured.cmb.

I just saw a 7/2 (I modified the scenario for all elites and Axis starts hidden) move and STAY hidden (I was Axis player).

Also, I noticed something I have been blind to; you cannot button an unarmoured vehicle!

[aka_tom_w]

Sorry to bring this up again

THESE THINGS ARE DEADLY

They are without a doubt the "gameyest" pick in any player selected buy for a QB.

They are cheap and efficient armour killers, they KO M18's with ease and last night I had a Firefly KO'd fronatally by one of these death machines.

If you spend the points (not many, really) and buy 3-4 of these SdKfz 7/2 37mm AA HT's and if you keep them very close together the amount of firepower they can deliver to any one given target in a short one minute turn is STAGGERING! (and, that is Armour Piercing firepower, and plenty of IT!)

These little death wagons are Way too CHEAP and WAY WAY to hard to kill!!!

This and the smoke usage issue are the two latest bugs that won't be fixed any time soon if ever.

I hope progress is going well for CM2!

-tom w

[This message has been edited by aka_tom_w (edited 04-05-2001).]

[Wilhammer]

I played a QB last night, 1000 points vs the AI, unlimited American Attack. I bought a company of Rifle 45 and spent the rest on (10)7/2s and on a Stug III.

The AI bought 2 companies of American 45, 2 Sherman 76s, a Stuart and 2 M3A1.

The 7/2s quickly destroyed the Stuart, and immobilized the Shermans. 1-M3A1 went down quickly, the other scampered away.

The 7/2s layed down rapid fire on the 2 non-mobile Shermans, and I just crested the Stug to take out the Shermans one by one. The range was over 600 meters, so the 37 mm did not penetrate the hull, but the rapid firepower got quick mobility kills, thus rendering them sitting ducks and buttoned up. 3 of the 7/2s died from nearby HE hits that took a long time to score, and one more died from a .50 cal MG.

As the American approached, the 37 mm tore them all to shreds.

The cost of one of these is less than 2 MG 42 teams, and less than a towed 37mm Flak, and equal to about 1-1/2 50mm ATGs, but I would have to rate its effectiveness as equal to a Panzer IV against Tanks, and worth 2 Pz IVs against infantry.

I suspect if you play against a German player that you agree to exclude it or minimize from the available inventory. In an umlimited 1000 pt QB, you could spend all your bucks on 20 of them and easily win the battle, IMHO.

I know we all want CM2, but I for one prefer the Western Front and would like to see a patch on CM to correct this and the smoke issue.

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Wilhammer:

I know we all want CM2, but I for one prefer the Western Front and would like to see a patch on CM to correct this and the smoke issue.

I agree

Should they be easier to kill?

YES but how to actaully code that into the game seems to be the topic of some debate here.

Should they be more expensive?

I think so but How much more expensive?

I hope we are not just flogging a dead horse on this issue.

BUT BTS did say that there would be NO more patches for CMBO because it was considered patched, repatched, patched again and finalized, so maybe we just have to live with this one. (But IMHO this is a BIG one.)

-tom w

[This message has been edited by aka_tom_w (edited 04-05-2001).]

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Wilhammer:

I suspect if you play against a German player that you agree to exclude it or minimize from the available inventory. In an umlimited 1000 pt QB, you could spend all your bucks on 20 of them and easily win the battle, IMHO.

.

This is interesting, in an umlimited 1000 pt QB if you did buy 20 of these things I think you could defeat ANY gamey or no gamey force composition, because these things are GREAT against infantry and with 20 of them they could cover each other and you WOULD get one or two of them out to the flank to nail any heavy allied tanks with flank shots. If not KO the heavy Allied tanks, track hits and gun hits are a certainty rendering them easy pickings for shots from other death wagons.

I would bet a skilled gamey player could buy 20 of these things and defeat ANY allied combination of forces.

-tom w

[Pvt.Tom]

First, I am not debating that something is wrong with this vehicle.

Second, I does not appear that BTS is going to fix it, they are going to continue working on CM2 (fine with me)

Third, I don't think I have ever played a PBEM Game where anyone had a Sd Kfz 37mm, am I missing something? Are there loads of people out there buying 10 of these and kicking butt?

What is the big deal? This isn't going to get fixed so agree ahead of time not to use them and everything will be fine.

[Wilhammer]

I never, ever saw or considered buying one of these things (I thought they were sitting ducks) until I started reading the threads about it. Testing the hell out of things is right up my alley, and this does expose a problem, and if it is a dangerous one, IMHO.

I'd like to see it fixed. If not before CM2, perhaps just after CM2 is released.

I was eagerly awaiting the patch for AOS2, BTW, and it came out yesterday, and I was VERY dissapointed with it. So, I am in a "PATCHY" mood.

As others point out, genetleman's agreements will have to handle it for now. Admittedly, I might of played 1/3rd of the canned or downloaded scenarios, and I cannot recall it in any OOB.

[Wilhammer]

aka,

I tried my suggestion, 20 7/2s in a 1000 Point QB vs the AI with a +25% advantage. It chose one Sherman 76, one Stuart, 2 M3A1 HTs, and a reinforced company of Infantry and 2 Arty spotters.

I also took 4 lmg teams so I could hold the Flags. Everyone was average quality. Absoultely no HQ units.

Medium Map, Clear, Feb 45, slight hills, village, moderate trees.

I was semi-competent with my 7/2s, and they took heavy losses. Most of the losses stemmed from running out of HE ammo and acting reckless with most of them.

After turn 2, no more allied vehicles. By turn 30, the battalion had been stopped cold, and 14 of my 7/2s had been stopped, 2 by OBA, 2 by 60mm mortar, the rest by MGs or small arms fire at close range. 2 of them burst into flames. One crew got chewed up pretty bad defending against a damaged platoon, but got relief when I pulled out my 2 reserve 7/2s and laid down the firepower, chopping up that platton badly.

The Americans suffered 207 casualties, 61 KIA, while I had suffered just 8 casualties, 2 KIA.

The crews survived quite well, and with 8 members, it was like getting a weak dismounted squad. I did the gamey thing and put them in the backside of buildings and fought off a few determined wrecked squads and HQ units with them.

As I said, I tried to be a little stupid in handling. The AI handled them mostly, and was quite good at it. Thinking its soft sides made it vulnerable, the AI tended to move them out of LOS, so I would have to reverse them back into battle, but for the most part, I just pushed the GO button for 30 turns.

[This message has been edited by Wilhammer (edited 04-05-2001).]

[This message has been edited by Wilhammer (edited 04-05-2001).]

[Guest Big Time Software]

A quick response...

The main, overwhelming problem is not the vehicle itself but the whole issue of "Rarity". The fact is that they were quite deadly, but they were also hardly ever seen in a frontline battle type situation. At least not a pitched battle type environment like CM simulates. So putting even one of these flak weapons into a battle will produce results that will appear to be quite unrealistic when thinking about combat in an average sort of way. This is as true for flak vehicles as it is for any other rare, but potent, type of weapon.

Putting large numbers of these weapons into place is just silly. It tells one nothing about how good or bad the modeling is. Put in 20 Jumbos and tell me how good PzIVs are, or 20 Jagdtigers and see how good Cromwells are, etc., etc. One can not make a totally unrealistic scenario and expect to learn anything about realism through its conclusions. Faulty logic from the get go.

As for patches to CM1... there are none planned. Certainly none for the short term. We are full bore CM2 and that is not going to change. Constant tweaking and fixing of CM1 has already delayed us far more than we would have liked. No game can ever be perfect, so therefore there will always be "unfinished business" remaining. At some point a game has to be considered "done", and 1.12 is it.

Might we issue a 1.13 sometime in the future? I don't know. It hasn't been rulled out, but we also have no plans for one. Even if we do release a 1.13 at some point, we most likely will not do any major coding changes. Addressing the basic issue of soft skinned vehicles as targets for HE will definitely require such work, so it will almost certainly not be found in any potential future patch. Again, no game is ever perfect so by definition that means there will be imperfections to be found. There is no way around this bit of reality.

Steve

[Pvt.Tom]

Thank you Steve, on with CM2!

[Abbott]

Very nice to see you posting again Steve, thank you.

[Wilhammer]

Thanks Steve.

I know the whole 20 7/2 battle was silly, but it does serve to put the probelm under a magnifying glass.

I'm done with it.

Now back to "CMreality" .

[pktaske]

Well, it sure is good to see BTS chime in on this...sounds like we gotta live with what we got..as a help, has anyone tested these vs. 75mm howitzers and the such? I don't have much time myself to pull this off bu I would be interested to see how it plays out...one thing is for sure, a sure way to get these things wacked is to bring em in close (<200m) to infantry and the such...keep em back and they're vitually untouchable.

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Big Time Software:

A quick response...

snip

Addressing the basic issue of soft skinned vehicles as targets for HE will definitely require such work, so it will almost certainly not be found in any potential future patch. Again, no game is ever perfect so by definition that means there will be imperfections to be found. There is no way around this bit of reality.

Steve

OK, thanks for the informative response Steve.

That sounds like the end of that.

-tom w

[This message has been edited by aka_tom_w (edited 04-05-2001).]

[KiwiJoe]

Sounds like these things should just be banned from QBs so we can all just get on with it NP they were quite rare from what I understand.

[tecumseh]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Big Time Software:

[QB}The main, overwhelming problem is not the vehicle itself but the whole issue of "Rarity".<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Cm is really a remarkable game...

The problem is one side can purchase a unit that is more powerful than its cost would indicate. Yet the official word from Steve is that this is not a bug, or even a problem, because purchasing lots of these units is not historical.

That just totally made it click in my head how astonishing a feat making CM is, keeping historians, military types and WW2 enthusiasts happy, and still producing a game that is playable by everyone else, who just want a fun, balanced computer game. The sd kfz 37mm should be a symbol of how (lets face it) the problems with this game are molehills compared with the mountains of entertainment ya get back.

Grogs can limit the use of the 37mm on historical grounds, gamers can limit its use by mutual agreement on fairness, and while we happily play we know that CM2 is full-steam ahead without interruption. Cool

[pritzl]

There is still the problem of the crew never suffering losses while still with the vehicle, even during catastrophic explosions, but that is relatively inconsequential.