Err,...."Unproductive" Penetration (?)

[Freyberg]

Just yesterday I got a partial frontal penetration from a sniping shot on a Panther, and was amazed to see the crew bail out. Having been caught out by tanks re-crewing before (and since he was unsupported), I thought I'd better quickly close in and finish off the dismounted tank, but the crew (crafty b#stards!) immediately remounted (within seconds) and destroyed two of my Shermans in quick succession. Won't make that mistake again...

I love this amazing, unpredictable game.

[A Canadian Cat]

but the crew (crafty b#stards!) immediately remounted (within seconds) and destroyed two of my Shermans in quick succession. Won't make that mistake again...

I love this amazing, unpredictable game.

Oh man I have not seen crews do a fake out that way before

I do not think that was a mistake, you should take advantage when you can. To bad it did not work out for ya.

[Michael Emrys]

Should have wiped out the crew before shooting at the tank. A tank without a crew is useless, but a crew with pistols—or worse—is a force to be reckoned with.

Michael

[Bulletpoint]

I once snuck a bazooka team behind a Stug and they caused a penetration with their second shot. After a little while, the three crew came out of the tank in good order, and started firing leisurely at the bazooka team with their pistols, killing one of the AT-guys at 86 metres range almost immediately and paralyzing the other with fear. I only saved the day because I had more troops waiting nearby. I just assumed the crew were fanatical nazi marksmen, but in hindsight they might have been robots from the future...

[Sublime]

No the crew thing is an issue with the game. Crews have always been overpowered in CMBN onwards - routinely you can have a German infantry squad kill a tank with fausts, and get mowed down by the pissed off crew... though I hafta admit it seems a lot better in recent iterations of the game. And nowadays I see a lot more of crews just getting wasted out of the tank, or never making it out at all.

[Lethaface]

"Partial Penetration" means different things depending on whom you talk to, but generally it means that at least some of the actual projectile material made it through the armor. Whatever fragments of the projectile made it through the armor would also certainly be accompanied by pieces of armor flaked off from the reverse side of the armor near the penetration point -- spalling.

Fragments of the penerator and also the armor spall can be moving quite fast, and are also often very hot due to the inevitable friction of the penetration event. So even after a partial penetration, you could certainly have a substantial amount of hot metal flying around the fighting compartment of the tank.

Now... take a look at where the ammo is stored in a Sherman. Details vary some from model to model, but among other things, in most designs there is a main gun ready rack on the turret basket floor. These rounds are fairly exposed, and depending on hit location, it's pretty easy to imagine how a fragment from a partial penetration or armor spalling might hit one or more rounds and touch them off.

Thanks for the explanation. Deriving from the name 'partial' I had concluded that the penetration was only partial, as in not really a penetration. Although I'm aware of spalling, it hadn't occurred to me that these particles could also be white hot and such able to set off ammunition.

Makes more sense now.