Hard Attack,Soft Attack

[Kuriltai]

Playing a Kharkov Campaign of the Volcano Man Alt McNamara variety and decided to compare some unit values.
Kharkov was the first campaign scenario I tried way back when the game was first released.Tried it as the Russian player and only made it about 20 turns in when I surrendered.The company sized armor was useless and as a General,so was I.
Now with the Volcano version,it is much improved.Playing as the Germans,the Russian Tank Brigades are now a force to be reckoned with due to the shortage of German AT capability.I decided to compare some unit value's to find my best units to deal with the host of T-34's rampaging around.
German PzIII/IV Mixed battalions have a hard attack of 10 while the Russian Mixed(T-34,KV-1,T-70) has a hard attack of 12.I realize the numbers can be changed if you don't like them,but I was wondering what all goes into the Attack value's.I know it's gun size,ammunition and all that technical stuff,but what about the intangibles such as crew quality ,training ,tactics,small turrets and radio's or no radio's.

Kuriltai

[Volcano Man]

[milan]

Jentz states following numbers for the German summer offensive:
3. Panzer: 25 PzII, 66 PzIII(50mm short), 40 PzIII(50mm long), 21 PzIV(75mm short), 12 PzIV(75mm long).
23. Panzer: 27 PzII, 50 PzIII(50mm short), 37 PzIII(50mm long), 17 PzIV(75mm short), 10 PzIV(75mm long).
14. Panzer: 14 PzII, 41 PzIII(50mm short), 19 PzIII(50mm long), 20 PzIV(75mm short), 4 PzIV(75mm long).

It was a big mix of various tanks :) Somebody can make calculations and check if they are correct.

milicko

[Kuriltai]

I guess the point I am trying to make is the intangibles should not only relate to unit quality(morale A,B,C,D,or E),but also to a units ability to use their weapons systems to there best ability(Shooting).The intangibles I listed should be worked into the Attack values.Using my example,a German Battalion had advantages in tactics,optics and probably crew quality etc which would translate into IMHO,A bigger HA factor.A Russian mixed battalion would suffer due to slower turrets,poor crew training, smaller crews and no radio's.There should be a little more to it than 50mm vs 76mm.
Perhaps I am just bitter because my 45 strong battalion can't kick the crap out of his 20 some Mixed battalions. :hissy:
I should probably stick to Armor vs Armor,but the some intangibles would apply to the 88 as well,optics and the longest range on the battlefield.(VM, I know you changed the range but the kill ratio should be higher IMO)
Lastly, Congratulations to Volcano Man,You made a game out of this scenario.

Kuriltai

[milan]

Just checked more pages of Jentz and founded some interesting AAR of Kharkov Battle.
It seems that appearance of PzIV with long gun was a surprise for Russians.
But what surprised me was the efficiency of PzIV with short gun against Russian armour. Some 6 PzIV from III/Pz.Rgt.6 knocked out 5 KV and 24 T-34 tanks. They were shooting with new kind of ammo - HEAT I think. So this tank was far more dangerous in 1942 than in 1941. However, it was not efficient as long barreled gun since it was harder to hit the target due to low speed of projectile.
This makes me think that hard attack for this type of tank is underrated (only 4 in S42).

milicko

[Volcano Man]

Well, I disagree that the "intagibles" should do anything other than boost quality, since quality effects attack effectiveness and everything else. Also, given the intent of the McNamara based db (standardization), I will never pad or change a rating just to give an edge to a unit, instead it is done only with quality.

That said, it is not all bad news. :) milan pointed out something that I missed, the fact that there indeed were some F2s present. This means I forgot to average that rating into the mixed units. So, the same way I averaged the T-34, T-70, and KV-1 mixed units, then I need to re-average the PzIII kz, PzIII lg, PzIVe/f1, PzIV f2 together. I just did that and you will be happy to know that they have a better hard attack factor which is probably what you are looking for. I will fix it in the next update but in the mean time the ratings for the mixed "PzIII/PzIV" units are now:

HA: 16/1
SA: 14/1

...the rest remains unchanged as it averages out the same.

Thanks for pointing it out.

[Kuriltai]

Milan:
Appreciate your input.Your example isn't from the Kharkov 43 battles is it?I am no Armor experten. :) Could you tell me the title of the Jentz your example and the OOB are from ?
As Volcano's post states that the F2 was not yet available and your OOB shows 26 PzIV Longs(L/43?) perhaps its a difference in OOB sources that accounts for the German HA value's.
As far as the Russians go,I had a look at the original scenario and a tank battalion had:5 KV-1 HA=7,10 T-34 HA10/2,10 T-60 HA=4.The McNamara KV has a HA =17 and the mixed HA =12.For comparison purposes only.

Anyway this is diverging into a direction in which I did not intend to go as my first post and question was about the factors that go into a HA number and intangibles that I thought should enter into the equation.

Kuriltai

[color=red] VM: looks like we were typing simultaneously.

After looking at the fire rules,I see what you you mean about Quality effecting HA.Perhaps I should actually read the rules sometime.(but I don't see it happening. ;) )
Are you saying that the new German Mixed HA will be 16 as it is 10 now.

[Volcano Man]

Well, I had thought that there were no F2s at Kharkov in '42 (in the original post) but if I am incorrect then that would be the boost you are looking for. So if Jentz is describing Kharkov '42 (and I suspect he is since the soviets were surprised by their appearance) then I will go with those above numbers. But I will wait for milan to reply before I change anything.

[Ricky B]

The Germans began mfg the F2 model in March of '42, so by late May they probably had produced 200 or so, some of which headed to North Africa but the rest to the east front. So I am sure Milan's numbers are for K'42 as you guess, where there would have been more short barreled '75s than long - the southern Panzer Divs got first shipments of the new tanks at this point, in preparation for their summer offensive.

Rick

[Kuriltai]

I gather from Ricky B that 26 Tanks would not be out of the question then.Also these would be of the L/43 variety not the L/48.
Again is the new value 16 ?

Kuriltai