Weapon accuracy/use

[Lightning War]

I have several questions relating to vehicle weapons in CMAK.

1. Whilst the weapon/armour penetration ratings are self explanatory, how is it possible to discern the accuracy of a given weapon and thus its likeliness to hit a target at varying ranges?

2. Although the computer may sometimes offer you the option of whether to use the main gun or not, is it possible to choose at any time which weapon/shell-type your vehicle uses? For example, how would I get a tank to area fire a smoke shell rather than HE?

3 Is it possible to get a vehicle to fire a finite amount of ammunition, per turn, rather than simply blast away for a whole minute?

4. How is it possible to tell the blast radius of any given type of HE ammunition?

Thank you for any help!

[jBrereton]

1) Not really, no.

2) No. With the smoke shells, there is a dedicated 'smoke' order. For everything else, the TacAI picks shell types.

3) No

4) Press the Return key. It's listen under 'blast'.

[The Schwabian]

1) i'm pretty sure you can't...

2) well you can't choose exactly what type of ammunition the tank will use, but for smoke you can use the "smoke" command.

3) i remember somet theories from a while ago including things along the lines of setting rotate commands for most of the turn to eat up time so that the tank can only fire a couple rounds. but other than that i don't think it's possibly to limit the ammo used in a turn.

4) in the information screen? it says blast radius=#. is that what you're looking for?

hope this helps

[JasonC]

"how is it possible to discern the accuracy of a given weapon"

To many factors influence the hit chance. A good approximation though is to look at the muzzle velocity - the higher the number the flatter the trajectory and the easier the shot. Shots under 1 second flight time tend to be accurate. Shots out to 1.5-2 seconds are manageable but significantly lower accuracy (range estimation error enters). Beyond about twice the muzzle velocity (2 second flight time approximately), hit chances are low for each round.

Among the other main factors are - target hull up or down, sillouette rating (size), target motion, rate and crossing angle, firing crew skill level, acquistion (ranging from previous shots), and improved optics ratings, if any, for longer shots.

For HE fire at infantry and gun targets, slope effects are also important - it is significantly harder to hit a target on a falling slope than on a rising one. (Shots "graze" the slope, with the fall of the shell approximately equal to the fall of the slope, thus a minor error in the height leads to a long error in the range).

The LOS tool will tell you the hit chance on the current shot, but only right before that shot is taken.

"is it possible to choose at any time which weapon/shell-type your vehicle uses?"

Smoke yes, use the "K" key. Other round selection no, the crew picks based on what it thinks it needs to hurt the target. Don't expect that shell selection to be perfect (it wasn't in real life). Rare special shell types are more likely to be used if there are more of them (e.g. a tank with 1-2 APCR - "T" ammo - is less likely to use it at range, than one with 6-8 rounds of the stuff).

"Is it possible to get a vehicle to fire a finite amount of ammunition, per turn, rather than simply blast away for a whole minute?"

Not by any command, but some use a workaround by forcing a rotation - or some such - to avoid having the target lined up throughout the move.

"How is it possible to tell the blast radius of any given type of HE ammunition?"

They don't have specific blast radii. They do have a blast rating, which is a numerical estimate of the firepower and similar scale to infantry FP. In practice, blast tends to be more effective per unit of numerical rating than infantry FP, because it ignores many forms of cover.

Cover has large effects, with bunkers, then trenches the most effective against serious artillery. Stone buildings are decent cover until they collapse, but they will collapse. Rubble and rough are pretty good. Unrubbled wood buildings are the best target for direct fire HE.

Woods are relatively poor cover vs. indirect HE, since much of their exposure rating is concealment which HE ignores. The best use of thick woods against direct HE is "skulking" deep enough inside to break LOS entirely. Brush and wheat aren't any use vs. HE, other than reassuring the men a little compared to being shot in the open.

Units can take "alerted" results 20-30 meters from a large shell, but the serious damage only happens quite close to the aim point if they have foxhole cover or better. A significant exception is airbursts (special VT ammuntion available to Americans late 44 to end) or treebursts (everybody, a third to half of all rounds landing in woods), which can have large effects out to 30m sometimes.

Aerial bombs have by far the largest blast effects - well those and the Sturmtiger round or the naval gunfire in CMBO. Those will take out light armor at a distance, readily. Frankly the bigger the HE caliber the more it is overmodeled, while the smaller ones - the mortar rounds especially - are shortchanged. 150mm and up stuff is already pretty nasty.

Beyond that you just have to experience it, to see what a given caliber typical does to units in a given type of cover.

[birdstrike]

You should really bother to read through the manual. I guess you'll find it pretty useful at times.

1. Muzzle velocity is a good start. The higher the velocity, the more accurate the gun. There also is some information about hit percentage displayed when you draw the target line to a unit.

2. AP/HE is picked by the TacAI based on target and amount of ammo left. Vehicles are targeted with AP, unless there is none left. For Infantry/guns HE is used respectively.

Use the command interface or press "K" to fire smoke shells at a ground target.

3. Not really.

4. Educated guessing.

There was a little blast bubble back in CMBO, but it is no longer.

Um, don't mind that... I see I'm last again.

I'm too slow at typing.

[ December 08, 2006, 06:49 AM: Message edited by: birdstrike ]

[MikeyD]

Hit chances also increases with better (I.E. long-range German) optics and with the skill of the operator. There's definitely a difference between the hitting abilities of a Conscript and Elit tank crew!

The accuracy of some guns do seem a bit wonky. It feels (seat-of-the-pants testing) that the little 75mm infantry gun is often a more accurate shot than the mighty 88! :mad:

[ December 08, 2006, 08:45 AM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[Corvidae]

1) Weapon accuracy varies in direct disproportion to target threat levels,

(if your target is an empty kubel, you have a reasonable chance of hitting it at any range on the first shot, regardless of conditions.

if its a Tiger sitting on your TRP, and you have it boresighted, at 100 meters with no dust or smoke or brush to mess up LOS, and your crew are veteran, and in command,,, you are screwed, Your long 17 pounder AT gun will miss every time.)

2), No chance in hell, If you have smoke you can force your gun to fire it by creating a covered arc to stop it from turning to deal with every other threat/non threat, And then issuing a smoke command, This helps, but is no guarantee. Very often guns will behave as though the crew has been diving into the brigade rum ration.

3) yes, by getting it hit by enemy return fire,

4) see info screen, [enter] button

[Lightning War]

Once again, thanks for the great advice all!

This game is superb but it seems to take such a long time to finish even a 700pt battle...

[Other Means]

Commonwealth troops get VT arty too. 5.5 inch VT arty is a joy to behold.

[The_Enigma]

This may be a bit obvious (sp?), if the gun or tank is aiming at a building for example, they will cease fire when the places falls down and thus wont cont to waste ammo firing into the ruins.

such a long time to finish

Alas, the time will come when your completly drunk, its the middle of the night/morning and you cant sleep and your knocking off pbem or TCP/IP games like you dont know what

[Other Means]

Originally posted by the_enigma:

Alas, the time will come when your completly drunk, its the middle of the night/morning and you cant sleep and your knocking off pbem or TCP/IP games like you dont know what [/QB]

Amen.

[Lightning War]

Originally posted by the_enigma:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> such a long time to finish

Alas, the time will come when your completly drunk, its the middle of the night/morning and you cant sleep and your knocking off pbem or TCP/IP games like you dont know what </font>

[The_Enigma]

If playing CMBB as the Russians ... you could consider it roleplaying

... trying to make tactical decissions while drunk and half sleep ... isnt really recommended

[Lightning War]

Originally posted by the_enigma:

If playing CMBB as the Russians ... you could consider it roleplaying

... trying to make tactical decissions while drunk and half sleep ... isnt really recommended

Like the Russians in the main screen, stumbling to the shell-hole in the wall only to see that they've overslept and been overrun by the wehrmacht.

...At which point they realize they left the gramaphone on... :eek:

[Kingfish]

Originally posted by the_enigma:

This may be a bit obvious (sp?), if the gun or tank is aiming at a building for example, they will cease fire when the places falls down and thus wont cont to waste ammo firing into the ruins.

Most of the time, but not always. I still haven't figured what the exact trigger is, but there are rare instances when the tank or gun will continue firing into the rubble. I believe (not positive) it has to do with how far into the building the target line is projected.

[The_Enigma]

I never really tend to aim to far inside the building, so when they come down my tanks/guns cease firing and ive also inflicted decent casualties.

The opening barrage of one QB i played TCP style, i knocked out a building in the first minute with some Stugs ... took my enemys main players out ... his FO's!