Black Sea Discussions

[PoorOldSpike]

ATGM at-a-glance chart



Old hands will already know much of this stuff, but I try to make my posts noob-friendly to CMBS newcomers.
I've put all the facts and figures from earlier posts and tests into the chart to help us easily choose what to buy, a bit like a page from a mail order Thai bride catalogue.
The chart is divided by a vertical black line; the 4 columns to the left of it are the all-important vital statistics which we need to know; and the 5 columns to the right are nice to know but not strictly essential.

THE most vital column is the Kills/Hits column, as it tells us what the approx results will be out of every 10 shots against frontal naked armour (ie not protected by APS systems) of the T-90AM and Abrams SEP.
For example the Javelin rates 8/1, meaning it'll kill a T-90AM 8 times out of 10 shots, and hit it once causing damage, and miss once.
At the opposite end of the scale, most of the Russian ATGM's have a 0/9 rating, meaning they can't kill an Abrams SEP frontally, but will hit it 9 times and miss once.
Important- EVERY HIT WILL CAUSE CUMULATIVE DAMAGE even if the tank isn't killed outright, for example 4 Russian ATGM's splattered against the front of this Abrams causing terrible damage and immobilisation even though they didn't penetrate-



The other 3 "vital info" columns on the left of the chart are-
1- whether they can be fired from buildings
2- whether they have laser guidance (lasers might alert the enemy, allowing him to pop smoke)
(Incidentally, the PDF manual says the Javelin and TOW have IR/radio and Radio/wire guidance respectively but I'm not sure if that means there are different models of each in the game.
As regards wire-guided missiles, they're reputedly harder to jam by enemy countermeasures.)
3- ranges.

Of the 5 right-hand columns, the most important column is 'Auto-Dep' because it tells us that most of the ATGM's will automatically deploy when the team stops moving, i.e. we don't have to issue a 'Deploy weapon' order because they'll deploy themselves.
The only one that MUST be ordered to deploy is the TOW, as it won't deploy itself.
(Whd stands for warhead calibre)
Costs are for Regular experience, normal Motivation, Fit, 0 Leadership.
Incidentally some missiles are flagged as 'Semi-deployed' during play, it simply means you can either leave them like that and they WILL fire, but for more accuracy you can order them to 'Deploy weapon' and they'll put it on a small tripod.

The 'Top att' column simply informs us which missiles target the thinner top armour.

Which shall we buy? Well for the American player it's a no-brainer, as the Javelin is king!
For Ukrainian players the SKIF is the best bet (although they can also buy Russian-import ATGM's if they like.)
Russian players have a varied choice, the AT-14 Kornet is the only one that could punch clean through an Abrams front armour in tests, but it only happens rarely. Its laser also alerts the enemy.
So I think I'd plump for the AT-13 Saxhorn2, but no doubt everybody has their own preferences.

Footnote- as I mentioned, the Kills/Hits figures in the chart are against T-90AM's and Abrams SEP's with NO APS systems.
I ran tests against the APS-equipped versions and found that most missiles were intercepted and shot down by APS about 7 times out of every 10 shots; the remaining 3 either scored a damaging hit or missed.
HOWEVER the Javelin is in a league of its own against APS, killing the tank about 6 times out of 10, the other 4 resulting in a mix of damaging hits, interceptions by APS, or the odd complete miss.
(One last thing- the Kill/Hits figures will fluctuate during actual games depending on weather, day or night, crew experience and so on.)