Effect of Artillery on Vehicles. [Cross Reference]

[tar]

There is an interesting bit of data about the effects of HE artillery on armored vehicles in the TacOps discussion board:

Artillery and Armored Vehicles

[JasonC]

He's right, it was one of the first things I noticed in TacOps. Arty is wimpy unless it has ICM bomblets in that game. (Full disclosure - arty was my branch of service in the US reserves).

Real world experience is somewhat different. 155mm barrages consistently turned back tanks during WW II. Some of that was striping infantry off of them, and plenty was the tankers not sticking around to test their vunerability. But significant numbers of tanks were disabled by barrages of shells that large, enough that the rest withdrawing was a rational reaction.

In CMBB, incidentally, I have seen immobilizations and shock results from 150mm HE near misses, and occasional gun damage. But not KOs. 8 inch stuff, on the other hand, I've seen take out Tiger Is with close enough near misses. I consider the behavior of large caliber HE in CMBB to be considerably more realistic than that seen in TacOps.

[Beta1]

yeah 300mm stuff is quite usefull as an AT measureon defence if you have some TRPSs as you can drop it in quick and a near miss can immobilise several tanks at once even if they are heavies. Light armor doesnt stand a chance and you really dont want to be in an open top!

[JasonC]

The use I found for it is as the Russians on defense. Take a green 203mm module and TRPs, and if your placement is good you can even kill (or immobilize, often just as good) a Tiger with them. If you don't manage that, at least the accompanying infantry will notice you tried...

[Andreas]

81mm on-board mortars do work against T26, and I would presume other light tanks. It takes a lot of mortars, and rounds, but they can make a difference.

[JasonC]

Anything works against a T-26, it is not an accomplishment. I'd consider that a waste of good 81mm ammo, unless there were not other AT weapons of any kind available (then, to be sure, it is useful to know it can work). On map 81mm is best used on guns or MGs. If you want to hurt real tanks, take very heavy off board stuff.

[xerxes]

I just lost a Stug to a Soviet 120mm prebombardment, knocked my uberarmor clean out.

Guess I shouldn't have setup my Stug on that hill overlooking the battlefield in plain sight.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by xerxes:

I just lost a Stug to a Soviet 120mm prebombardment, knocked my uberarmor clean out.

Guess I shouldn't have setup my Stug on that hill overlooking the battlefield in plain sight.

Heh. No I guess not.

You only had one? That was unhistorical. You should have given yourself three or four at least. Unless you were trying to depict one of those last stand defenses by surrounded forces.

Michael

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by JasonC:

He's right, it was one of the first things I noticed in TacOps. Arty is wimpy unless it has ICM bomblets in that game. (Full disclosure - arty was my branch of service in the US reserves).

Just in defense of TacOps artillery:

In almost all scenarios you have some amount of ICM ammo for your artillery, in addition to plenty of HE ammo. Compared to typical CMBO scenarios you have as much ICM as you have HE for CMBO and then you have 2-6 times as much HE and some smoke. (artillery doesn't seem to be a factor in CMBB scenarios, I am talking of CMBO scenarios for the US side here).

Even the small amount of ICM you have in the typical TacOps scenario makes artillery the main vehicle killer in a TacOps game. Most of our multiplayer sessions and most of my two-player games are decided by vehicle loss and artillery causes it.

It is true that TacOps' HE effect on vehicles is probably less than in reality, but I assume that Major H wanted to emphasize the difference between ICM and HE. That means, for successful playing you have to make good use of the ICM you have and think hard not to waste it. His military contracts probably requires this as well.

On the other hand, Zaloga's "tank attack" has a nice shot of an airburst (I think from 155mm) over a M1 which seemed to have survived well, but probably with loss of antennas and some vision equipment.

[JasonC]

My experience of TacOps was not that ICM was the number 1 vehicle killer. (From arty yes, but not overall). It was that HE does nothing, except suppress dismounted infantry which is too slow to do anything anyway. Smoke monkeys with LOS lines and is important at times.

ICM slightly attrites in the opening phases of battle, and forces slight intervals instead of completely bunched up formations throughout. Vehicles avoid more than that simply by remaining in motion most of the time. I found this true despite the ease to setting TRPs all over creation to speed fire missions (without those it'd be hopeless). HE is normally fired just to register the guns.

Only large rocket strikes, on full square km, have an appreciable effect on the vehicle battle. These are necessarily limited in number in any given engagement but can have a dramatic effect. Other arty is too thin on the ground in numbers, too limited in effective (ICM) ammo load, and too iffy calling fire at moving targets, to be more than a minor supplimental arm.

The number 1 killer is ATGMs, with tank main guns a close second. The edge to ATGMs comes mainly from their range. Sneaking LOS lines is the main tactical occupation, because vehicle firepower is so high anything in view is dead inside two minutes unless it kills the shooter first.

ATGM shooters tend to be "breakaway" weapons. The first shooter generally kills, but often dies to overwatch in return, so overall ATGM shooters tend to "exchange off". In rare cases a range edge, shoot and scoot, or more often keyhole LOS taking on only a single enemy unit, can allow an ATGM shooter to survive. These small ambush tactics are the turn to turn bread and butter of TacOps, in my experience.

The most heavily armored tanks are somewhat more robust in company sized formations, and can sometimes withstand fire while outshooting such opponents as manage to sneak LOS lines to them at one time. On the downside, they require medium rather than long range to be fully effective - meaning 2 km or so rather than 3-4.

They then either dominate everything within that shorter range area, taking slight losses only while killing everything in their path, or lack the odds or range to reach everything that can reach them, and die en masse. When to unleash a compact heavy tank company and when to hold back in cover tends to be the biggest, one or two time, tactical decision in each battle. (That and MRL strikes, which can be a counter to exactly such a "sortie").

Dismounts provide eyes and the ATGM team portions can shoot as above, but generally one-off, dying after their shot. Because they can't remain invisible when firing and practically always fail to reposition. (Slightly gamey use of the extend range of vehicle pick up of dismounted teams, with he vehicle out of LOS and the dismount in e.g. at a crest line or edge of woods, is about the only way to fire and live with these).

But all of this probably belongs in a TacOps forum rather than here. (Also, it has been a while since I played it).

[ September 19, 2003, 03:34 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]

[manchildstein (ii)]

another effect of HE on AFVs is via the direct fire approach... the 150mm or 152mm HE is deadly against just about anything... if i've got an ISU-152 with HE-only i'll try to engage armor if the circumstances (first shot, good odds of hitting; or just a plain overwhelming number of ISUs engaging the target) are right... the tac ai might not like it but the proof is in the pudding... when that "6-inch" shell hits it's more often than not "lights out"... and accompanying opposing infantry is 'stripped' by the near misses...