Anti-Tank Rifles

[Citizenkane]

What is the affect range of the Soviet Anti-Tank Rifles on a Panzer III's. I had them shooting at me at 450+ meters? :eek:

[MikeyD]

Admittedly, an anti-tank rifle doesn't have much of a chance of doing harm against a skirted PzIII. But that doesn't seem to have stopped the Russians from peppering them with fire. They'd aim for vision slits, hatches, cupolas. I heard of a Tiger I with more than a hundred hits from various weapons (mostly anti-tank rifles)!

In the demo I've been able to concentrate fire on a vehicle from several sources and directions. I didn't get any penetrations but eventually the tank's crew moral dropped like a stone and their effectiveness in the attack dropped along with it.

[Citizenkane]

Yes, I noticed the AI shooting from a distance at my tanks over and over. I didn't lose moral. All it made me do is hunt them down and kill them. I would have waited till a tank got close and ambushed them if it was me.

[ September 10, 2002, 03:32 PM: Message edited by: Citizenkane ]

[tiborhead]

POSSIBLE SPOILER FOR ANYONE WHO HASN'T PLAYED THE DEMO!!

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I managed to have some success with them against the Germans in the Citadel scenario. Instead of keeping the initial setup, I decided to move all of my AT rifles up the patches of scattered trees near the front. I issued hide commands and had them establish a cover armor arc facing back toward my own lines. I had about two per patch of trees, I think.

As the German tanks passed near my positions, most of them just kept going, not spotting the AT rifles. The two teams on my right side were spotted however, and quickly eliminated. The tank hunter teams didn't fare so well at all, but what are you going to do?

Once the tanks passed the remaining AT rifles by about 20 meters, I opened fire trying for a rear penetration. I had the most luck on the left side. I scored at least 15 hits, about 4 penetrations before the crew finally bailed. The funny thing is, no one seemed to pay the AT rifle much attention. Either the German TC didn't deem the AT rifle much of a threat, or they just didn't see them.

[ September 10, 2002, 04:16 PM: Message edited by: tiborhead ]

[demoss]

I've found that even firing AT Rifles are pretty darn hard to spot. I don't think your boys are being ignored - they're more likely not spotted (though they may well have generated an "infantry sounds" contact).

[Citizenkane]

I think in the fairness of game play, the Germans should have gotten some infantry in that battle. The only bad thing to that is it would have taken the Anti-Tank teams out of the equation do to fast elimation :eek: . I guess you have to do certain things to show off some of the feature of the game.

[Michael Emrys]

The absence of German infantry is historic. The Soviet artillery did a pretty good job of stripping them away from the armor early in the battle. If you are going to include the German infantry, you would then need to include the Soviet artillery, lots of it, to maintain historic equivalence. My guess is that Steve wanted to keep the demo a reasonable size for downloading. There is in fact a considerable downsizing of the forces engaged. There was more of everything in the historic battle, even at this stage.

Michael

[ September 11, 2002, 10:54 AM: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[Citizenkane]

Who wants to play a battle they can not win. Game play has to play in battle design even in a historical battles. You want some type of challenge, but that is my opinion. I guess you have some die-hard history nuts who will play any game no matter the possibility to winning.

When I design historical battles I play both sides and analysis game play and try to stick to historical relevance as close as possible.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by demoss:

I've found that even firing AT Rifles are pretty darn hard to spot. I don't think your boys are being ignored - they're more likely not spotted (though they may well have generated an "infantry sounds" contact).

Yup. It seems to me that the ATR folks are only a little better off than Uberfinn Ukko Frukkonen with his A/tk toothpick.

The bad news is that the weapon is effectively useless.

The good news is that it's useless out to a pretty good range, it has no ammunition conservation problem, and the firing signature is inconspicuously tiny.

That's three plus points to one negative. So clearly the ATR is a better bet than the Panzerfaust, which gives you only one shot, derisory range, and a huge backblast, but kills tanks.

By the same reasoning, so is the toothpick.

Don't use logic like this at home, folks.

All the best,

John.

[gredeker]

Originally posted by John D Salt:

The bad news is that the weapon is effectively useless.

... against medium tanks in 1943. I suspect that Mr. ATR will be much more valuable in 1941-42, especially against halftracks, ACs, and other light armor.

[KG_Jag]

I don't think that the lack of Soviet infantry had anything to do with demo size. The bmps were already there for the other battles. As the the anti-tank rifles, they are new but next to useless in Citadel. So, they must be included due to the first factor.