AT Rifles & AC's

[Col Deadmarsh]

I haven't played enough of this game to actually figure out how effective these AT Rifles are and I didn't find any info in the archives.

So, how effective are they? It seems as if they can shoot through armored cars easily from 200-300 meters away. Does this mean that AC's have a short lifespan in this game? Are they worth their money if an AT rifle can shoot through their armor as they are scouting for you?

Also, are AT Rifles effective against tanks which have thin side armor?

[ladoga]

AC's are relatively safe if you dont do close in scouting with them. Just keep them further back supporting infantry which is doing the actual scouting.

[Sergei]

ATR's are low caliber, so while they can penetrate light vehicles with ease, they need lots of hits to kill someone or do lasting damage. I mean, I've had a German 37mm gun fire dozens of shots at an abandoned T-26 before it became Knocked Out.

Usually the main effect of ATR fire is that the crew gets panicked, but if you can keep up the fire, they can cause abandonment. Occasional gun or track damage can be caused even on heavy AFV.

[JasonC]

My experience is that enough ATRs will effectively prevent light armor from exposing itself, but it takes a whole cloud of them. Enough generally means 4 or more, with good LOS to the same areas, at long range. Fewer will annoy a little and button things, and might damage one vehicle or kill one light over the course the whole battle, but can't be relied on to stop anything.

Penetration is pretty easy against halftracks, early 8mm-10mm ACs, tankettes, and thin assault gun varieties (Hummels, Bisons, Marders). It is harder against 30mm fronts on later ACs - those will typically deflect shots from the front at range. Light tanks like Panzer IIs also deflect shots from the front, as do real AFVs from the sides (30mm plus side angle, typically).

Even the halftracks require multiple penetrations to hurt. A crew casualty is the most common actual behind armor effect. The crew is often moved to "shaken" or so, which adds to command delay and can interfer with order execution, but does not actually prevent firing. 1-2 ATRs hitting the same 'track relentlessly for several minutes will force abandonment. But that usually just means it backs out of LOS to avoid them, unless several ATRs at once open fire in wide open ground.

The good thing about them is they are quite hard to spot when firing from woods at anything over 100m or so. You should not wait for short range, thinking extra penetration will help. Instead fire early and often, using as much of the high ammo load as possible at ranges over 150m. Relocate once they get closer than that. The higher ROF version is worth it, because more shots per turn increase the expected BHA for typical vehicle exposure.

If you want to reliably kill even light armor, you want a long 76mm gun like the ZIS-3. 45mm ATGs will penetrate the AC and HT stuff and has better behind armor effect than an ATR. But can still take 2-4 hits to kill and not all shots hit. You can easily be picked up before then - unless the range is 800m, rare on most maps - and KOed. A 76mm will also be spotted but it will kill what it hits.

As for German ATRs vs. Russians, the difference is that all the early war Russian lights can be hurt - the T-26s and BTs, as well as BA armored cars and tankettes. The same limited BHA is the problem. The 28mm heavy "ATR" is really a PAK and will kill things more reliably. It is also hard to spot and can even penetrate early T-34 turret fronts with flat hits inside 500m. It is a highly effective light PAK.

[flamingknives]

I think that the Solothurn deserves a mention - a 20mm ATR that is a real menace to anything like a T26 or BT 7.

Unlike the German 28/20mm heavy ATR, it's very mobile and can hide in buildings.

[Col Deadmarsh]

As usual, a very detailed answer from you Jason. Thanks for the info.

As for German ATRs vs. Russians, the difference is that all the early war Russian lights can be hurt - the T-26s and BTs, as well as BA armored cars and tankettes. The same limited BHA is the problem.

When you say they can be hurt, are you talking about the German 20mm AT Rifle?

Also, what is BHA?

[Kozak]

In 1941 scenarios soviet ATR's can make life difficult of the axis commander because under the right conditions they can zip through the paper thin (20mm) side and rear of the PZIV turrets of that era, and even the side armour until the "E" version" which up-armoured the hull sides. All the T-35 and t-38s and PZII are similarly vulnerable from the side and rear. If on an elevation an ATR can hit the vulnerable top armour at shorter ranges.

Although the ATR will typically not knock out a tank, it will chew up the men inside. If you are playing Biltongs campaign rules losing a man in a veteran tank can have serious effects for the experience level of the tank if the replacement man ends up green or conscript.

Axis ATR's are capable of knocking out (rare) or forcing abandonment (more likely) of all of the 1941 soviet "cavalry" tanks -- BT, T-26's, T-37-38, the BA armoured cars.

With the T34 even the german 1941 tank guns have trouble from the front because of the sloped armour on the hull front, so an ATR firing on the side can force a T-34 to turn to the turret or hull to face the ATR which gives a German "short" 50 or 75 a better chance of penetrating the more vulnerable side hull or turret.

But even without killing the most serious effect that a axis ATR can have in 1941 is that it can keep soviet tanks buttoned. They don't usually have radios in this era and are typically green or conscript. So if buttoned they are out of command and any attack they are trying to coordinate instantly becomes a cat herding exercise if the command tank buttons.

None of this is gamey by the way. My uncle was a soviet Tank commander who started fighting the Japanese in Manchuria with BA-10's, fought the Finns in the Winter war in a T-26, and the Germans in various T-34s in Barbarossa until he ended up in Austria in 1945.

ATR's were hated almost as much as AT guns because you could never spot them. They could also quite easily detrack you or chew up your running gear or vision blocks. If you were the tank commander, even a miss or ricochet on the tank could cut you in half.

The Soviets used clouds of them, whole battalions sometimes. They were quite useful for seperating the german armour from their mechanized infantry to blunt a combined arms assault.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

i love ATRs. they are excellent in stealth operations both in offence & defence. few things are as sweet as taking out a KV with ATR fire.

the down side is that ATRs eat points from mortars & HMGs in combined arms battles and require great patience & long battles.

a squad of 4+ ATRs is surprisingly effective.

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Kozak:

The Soviets used clouds of them, whole battalions sometimes.

It should maybe be remembered that they were not as common in 1941, because they had to be developed and rushed into production. There is a good article in www.battlefield.ru about them. According to Potapov, less than 700 were produced in 1941. During the whole war, however, about 400,000 (!!!) were made. More

[JasonC]

When I spoke of effect vs T-26s and BTs, I meant the standard German 7.92mm ATR. Not the 28-20, which is really an ATG in game terms (very slow speed, penetration above a 37mm PAK, etc). BHA stands for "behind armor effect" - how much damage the small rounds do even when they do penetrate. Answer - not much. That tends to be the problem.

As for historical effectiveness of ATRs, they were nuissance weapons. In 1941 the German tank fleet may have been light enough to be vulnerable to them, but the Russians didn't field them in any appreciable quantity until 1942. It was really in the late spring and early summer of 42 that they showed up. Better than nothing in a hard year. By 1943, though, German armor had improved significantly and they were already long in the tooth.

Their effect on real German AFVs from Kursk on was mostly annoyance damage (to running gear and vision devices, in particular). If you read Russian manuals they were telling them to wait for close range side shots at particularly vulnerable points. But there is little evidence they were actually effective at such ambush fighting, probably because people didn't live long 100m away from a whole company of German armor.

The Germans do talk about their role but it isn't about the 100m flank ambush that hits just the right spot and goes in. Only a few incidents of stripped AFVs without MGs, or finishing off mine cripples, seem to fit that picture. Instead in the German accounts it is a blizzard of the stuff from range, mixed in with higher caliber, more damaging AP. Whose net impact is damaged and eventually unservicable tanks, without critical penetrations.

As for separating tanks from 'tracks, again there isn't evidence of it in German accounts. It wasn't really what they used halftracks for. Against an intact AT defense, full AFVs worked with infantry and artillery, at a deliberate pace, not with the transports.

And basically just shot their way through places. Armor was so tactically concentrated when attacking that a few ATRs on the field were not a major determinant of the outcome, in any one case. That took a much thicker gun front of full 76mm caliber ATGs, or defending armor, or both. ATR effect is "attrition" on that scale, 1-2 tanks dropping out from damage, not deciding anything.

One notes that the Russians fielded 400k ATRs and puts an ! after it. The Germans fielded almost as many screcks (289k), which are much more lethal weapons. But Russian ATRs can't have killed much. With 100k tanks and as many again ATGs, the Germans only had around 40k AFVs to lose to them all. So it was probably an exceptional top 1% of ATRs that ever accounted for a single German vehicle.

[atiff]

ATRs in the real world could have some significant effects, even in mid war. Jack Radey (he of Korsun Pocket fame) often mentions German tank commanders getting topped by ATR shots at vision blocks, etc. He has numbers like a company (can't remember Mk or year) losing 30% (or something) of it's tank commanders to ATR in an extended (multi-day) battle. Admittedly, this is mighty good shooting, but if Jack says it is fact I tend to believe him.

[JasonC]

"a company losing 30% (or something) of it's tank commanders to ATR in an extended (multi-day) battle."

A company means 10-15 tanks. Maybe less if understrength. 30% means 3-5 guys. In several days, means sometimes one or two guys got hit in a day of fighting. As an outlier, it is perfectly believeable things like that happened. (As an outlier, some Russians got 5 or more kills with ATRs - but a tiny number in the whole war). But it is more likely some of them were hit by ATRs while exposed - which a machinegun can do.

[ November 14, 2003, 12:12 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]