AT repack time [POLL]

[mofetagalactica]

Example:
-76mm at gun 3 sec repack time from 6 sec.
-57mm at gun 1,5 sec repack time from 3 sec.

Same with other AT guns across the factions board.

[MarKr]

How do you suggest to solve the reload glitch? With this suggestion 17pounder would be able to shoot approximately every 3 seconds, PaK43 every 4 seconds.

If your answer is something along the lines of "I don't care I just don't wanna have AT guns like now because some people abuse the glitch", then I'm sorry but this has 0 chance of passing.

[mofetagalactica]

How do you suggest to solve the reload glitch? With this suggestion 17pounder would be able to shoot approximately every 3 seconds, PaK43 every 4 seconds.

If your answer is something along the lines of "I don't care I just don't wanna have AT guns like now because some people abuse the glitch", then I'm sorry but this has 0 chance of passing.

There was only one guy that was abusing that bug and he dosn't even play anymore, if its just a problem then add more aim time or something, i don't know but the current repack times sucks after every doc got one way or another kind of light arty, big artillery, beffier straffe and mostly important the new hability of the spotter to reveal cammoed units (wich are easily found 'cause you can see the green cover of the AT gun by just "scanning" with your mouse)

[MarKr]

Sorry, but "that guy doesn't play anymore" is not really a good argument. Someone else will start using it sooner or later if it isn't somehow solved.

Longer aim times don't help either. We went that way before and it led to the AT guns being unable to take a shot at armored cars driving through their fire archs. Based on the reports so far, reverse mechanics seem not to have an impact on the path finding and the speed changes are the next possible source. Given how they are frowned upon by many people it is likely they'll get removed or significantly reduced, thus aim time addition will get us back where we were with "AT guns are useless".

[H.Drescher]

I disagree, I think the current way AT guns work as area denial weapons for tanks is much better than how they were. I honestly think AT guns are perfectly fine right now. They must be planned with foresight, not used as a reactionary weapon like a tank.

There is only one AT gun that even functions like vanilla right now and its exclusive to the British Royal Airforce tank glider. It's long range "siege" weapon since it's not very good at killing tanks, but very good at killing infantry and emplacements.

[Diablo]

I disagree, I think the current way AT guns work as area denial weapons for tanks is much better than how they were. I honestly think AT guns are perfectly fine right now. They must be planned with foresight, not used as a reactionary weapon like a tank.

That's a good point. In a way, this creates a meaningful difference between AT guns and infantry with handheld AT. Bazooka/Panzerschreck teams are much more flexible, they can attack every direction and move at a moment's notice. On the downside, they provide less range and penetration power/damage.
I like it.

[Krieger Blitzer]

I would keep the repacking time as it is, however.. i would also significantly reduce the accuracy of tank cannons firing AP rounds vs AT guns (from 75% to around 40%) as well as reducing the accuracy of AT guns shooting vs other AT guns (from 100% to around 50%) as AT guns should be hard to hit, except with HE rounds & Handheld AT weapons.

[Sukin-kot (SVT)]

I would keep the repacking time as well, but I think there should be a higher modifier for penetration probability with the first shot from the ambush, maybe damage modifier as well. If Panther drives to the ambush of 17 pounder it should have 75% chance to die. Currently, it just happens too often when tanks can front rush even the heaviest guns.

[Warhawks97]

The ambush bonuses have been standardized a long time ago. 50% more accuracy, 25% more pen and damage. That makes 812,5 damage max for 17 pdr.

Once we had like double damage and pen but that ended up that basically every engagment ended in a one-shot kill.


In terms of pen i would keep it at 25% boost which is already quite massive. As for the damage it might could be as high as 35% boost. That would already be quite a difference. The 17 pdr ambush damage would go up from 562,5-812.5 to 607,5-877,5.

I would keep the repacking time as it is, however.. i would also significantly reduce the accuracy of tank cannons firing AP rounds vs AT guns (from 75% to around 40%) as well as reducing the accuracy of AT guns shooting vs other AT guns (from 100% to around 50%) as AT guns should be hard to hit, except with HE rounds & Handheld AT weapons.

thats already the case. Tanks have 0.5 base accuracy vs anti tank guns which further decreases over distance.

[Diablo]

I also think that AT guns should be a little bit more evasive against tank guns shooting AP.

[Red]

Personally, I think AT guns are way too mobile in the current BK verions, they have too much range, but the lack in punch. So "other" in the poll.

To elaborate:
The strong AT guns are really heavy. E.g. the UK 17 pounder weighs 3 tons, the US M5 weighs 2.2 tons. The Pack 40 weighs in at 1.4 tons.
At least from my understanding, from historic accounts as well as current time historians, those guns had to be put in place by a vehicle, and then they were set. In case they were set up on a hard surface, like a road, it would be possible to turn them, but if set up somewhere else, the wheels would sink in because of the heavy weight per square inch and it would not be possible to move or turn them at all without a towing vehicle. (I understand the Pack 40 was a bit more mobile, as it was also lighter, but for the 17 pounder, the M5 and the Pak 43 this seemed to be very much the case.)
And therefore, in case an enemy flanked a heavy AT gun, the AT gunners were pretty much screwed.

On the other hand, a tank entering the arch of a heavy AT gun was in major trouble.


So what could this mean for the game?
I recently read a suggestion that heavy AT guns should be emplacements. I would say heavy AT guns should be stationary.

But to make a precise proposal:
Each faction should have a light and a heavy AT gun.

The heavy AT gun is not build at a base building, but rather a "tow truck" is built at the base building, and this "tow truck" can then "build" the heavy AT guns. The "tow truck" would function much like the Stormtrooper Halftrack in this regard. Once a heavy AT gun is built this way, it automatically camoflages and cannot uncamoflage. This has the effect that it can turn, but it cannot move somewhere else.
A "tow truck" could be a german Sd.Kfz 251, a US M3 or a UK Bren Carrier, each armed with an MG. (Please note that the "tow truck" would cost fuel, so it would not be possible to build a heavy AT gun without any fuel.)

I do not know if the following part is technically possible to implement, but I would like to mention it none the less:
The "tow truck" is also able to "salvage" a fully operational heavy AT gun, much like german pioneers can salvage tank wrecks. The salvaging takes to same time as the "building" of the heavy AT gun, and once finished the heavy AT gun ist destroyed, but the cost of the heavy AT gun is credited to the player. This would basically be like loading the heavy AT gun back on the "tow truck".


The next issue I would like to address is the range.
Currently I have the issue, that if the AT gun immobilizes the tank, the tank might be unable to engage the AT gun's position because of range restrictions. Please note, that I am purely talking about gun range, not line of sight!
So I would advocate that the range of the AT guns and tank guns is brought in line, possibly based on some clustering (e.g. super heavy gun, heavy gun, medium gun, light gun).


The next issue is punch, or "killing power".
This is probably the hardest to balance, because I again believe in equivalence regardless of whether a similar gun is used in a tank or as an AT gun. Because of this I see the most viable way to go via the camo/ambush bonus.

As I am not very famliliar with all the variables coming into play here, I will keep it quite general:
AT guns should be deadly to tanks if they can penetrate their respective armor.
But also on the other hand, AT should not be able to take more hits than a tank.

I have had experiences going both ways: AT guns unable to handle tanks they should more or less easily dispose of, and tanks requiring multiple hits to knock out AT guns. (I got the feeling it is much harder fo a Pershing to kill an AT gun than to kill a tank that mounts the same gun


Happy to discuss and elaborate more if you have questions!

[Warhawks97]

Personally, I think AT guns are way too mobile in the current BK verions, they have too much range, but the lack in punch. So "other" in the poll.

To elaborate:
The strong AT guns are really heavy. E.g. the UK 17 pounder weighs 3 tons, the US M5 weighs 2.2 tons. The Pack 40 weighs in at 1.4 tons.
At least from my understanding, from historic accounts as well as current time historians, those guns had to be put in place by a vehicle, and then they were set. In case they were set up on a hard surface, like a road, it would be possible to turn them, but if set up somewhere else, the wheels would sink in because of the heavy weight per square inch and it would not be possible to move or turn them at all without a towing vehicle. (I understand the Pack 40 was a bit more mobile, as it was also lighter, but for the 17 pounder, the M5 and the Pak 43 this seemed to be very much the case.)
And therefore, in case an enemy flanked a heavy AT gun, the AT gunners were pretty much screwed.

I pretty much share this opinion.


So what could this mean for the game?
I recently read a suggestion that heavy AT guns should be emplacements. I would say heavy AT guns should be stationary.

But to make a precise proposal:
Each faction should have a light and a heavy AT gun.

The heavy AT gun is not build at a base building, but rather a "tow truck" is built at the base building, and this "tow truck" can then "build" the heavy AT guns. The "tow truck" would function much like the Stormtrooper Halftrack in this regard. Once a heavy AT gun is built this way, it automatically camoflages and cannot uncamoflage. This has the effect that it can turn, but it cannot move somewhere else.
A "tow truck" could be a german Sd.Kfz 251, a US M3 or a UK Bren Carrier, each armed with an MG. (Please note that the "tow truck" would cost fuel, so it would not be possible to build a heavy AT gun without any fuel.)

I do not know if the following part is technically possible to implement, but I would like to mention it none the less:
The "tow truck" is also able to "salvage" a fully operational heavy AT gun, much like german pioneers can salvage tank wrecks. The salvaging takes to same time as the "building" of the heavy AT gun, and once finished the heavy AT gun ist destroyed, but the cost of the heavy AT gun is credited to the player. This would basically be like loading the heavy AT gun back on the "tow truck".

I was thinking about something similiar. In Vanilla (coh 1 and 2), other mods (for coh 1 and 2) and other games usually treat it like that. Some of them keep only the pak 40 as slow movable at gun.

In fact the m101 howitzer weight about as much as the 76 mm M5 AT gun and the german leifh 18/40 105 mm howitzer was even less than two tons. And non of these weapons can be moved and are destined to die as soon as counter artillery comes in.


The guns could either get deployed by some sort of truck or simply build by pioneers at the frontline like howitzers. Or pioneers can build them as soon as some sort of supply truck is stationed nearby.

The next issue I would like to address is the range.
Currently I have the issue, that if the AT gun immobilizes the tank, the tank might be unable to engage the AT gun's position because of range restrictions. Please note, that I am purely talking about gun range, not line of sight!
So I would advocate that the range of the AT guns and tank guns is brought in line, possibly based on some clustering (e.g. super heavy gun, heavy gun, medium gun, light gun).

i made a topic about it.

My idea was that guns and their range is dependent on their "category" (calibre, barrel lenght etc).

For the most part tanks like panzer IV, stugs, sherman 76 etc would have 75 range by default. When moving this range is reduced by 33-44%. depending on its default range. So while moving they could only acquire and shoot at targets that are 45-50 range away.

Heavier guns like Panther, Tiger and so on would have 80-85 range. But again only able to acquire and shoot at targets no further than 40-45 range away.

The AT guns of that calibre behave the same way.

Stationary modes that boost range and ambush gun range boosts would all be gone. I think in general that would make tank battles in general more fair and immobilized tanks to be able to fire back.

On top of that, range brackets, accuracy and pen drops could also be a lot better by doing this.

The next issue is punch, or "killing power".
This is probably the hardest to balance, because I again believe in equivalence regardless of whether a similar gun is used in a tank or as an AT gun. Because of this I see the most viable way to go via the camo/ambush bonus.

As I am not very famliliar with all the variables coming into play here, I will keep it quite general:
AT guns should be deadly to tanks if they can penetrate their respective armor.
But also on the other hand, AT should not be able to take more hits than a tank.

I have had experiences going both ways: AT guns unable to handle tanks they should more or less easily dispose of, and tanks requiring multiple hits to knock out AT guns. (I got the feeling it is much harder fo a Pershing to kill an AT gun than to kill a tank that mounts the same gun


Happy to discuss and elaborate more if you have questions!

Thats an issue with tank health in general that varies from like 550 (m10) to like a 1000 or more for heavy tanks.

I would keep the health gap smaller ranging from arround 500 to max 800 HP. Super small tanks like hetzer would have less HP simply because a shot going through the armor would essentially hit everything inside that small tank.

The HP would depend on size of the tank and what safety messures it has rather than on armor thickness for the same reason.
It seems weird to me that a Hetzer or JP IV for example has more health than an M10or sherman or even more health than a Panzer IV despite being more cramped with every shoot going through the armor would hit basically everything inside.