Tank Loads for Africa at War

[Ashcloud]

Not sure what the best load is to hurt fortified infantry?


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[Richie61]

Hey Ash,

I use AP on infantry in bunkers mostly. Maybe 2 AP & a HE for luck.

Oz said this:
https://www.theblitz.club/message_boards...984&page=3

6. Change weapon loads when applicable.

In Vietnam, switch your 40mm GL's to canister when the enemy becomes adjacent. Recoilless rifles, antitank guns, missile launchers, and tank guns should switch back and forth between weapon loads when firing at hard or soft targets in all games. Canister rounds work good against soft targets in most terrain, give buildings and the like. When enemy soft targets units enter a fortified hex, I switch to HE. I fire at all vehicles with AP, if available.

[Rabbit]

According to the manual:
"Certain modern weapons have a high degree of specialization as anti-tank weapons, but are not as effective against infantry targets. These weapons are flagged as having an increased lethality against vehicles and targets in Bunkers and Pillboxes. When used against such targets, the lethality of the weapon is doubled. This feature is indicated by an ampersand (&) after the Fire value."

The manual also states:
"Vehicle Only loads only affect Vehicle targets and Infantry targets in Bunkers and Pillboxes. Also Infantry targets in Caves owned by the same side as the target are affected. These loads represent armor piercing loads that have no explosive ability of their own and thus have no effect against infantry targets in the open. While you are allowed to fire against any target using these loads, they will not have any effect on restricted targets."

Very simply put, you'll want use AP rounds if the infantry is in a bunker or a pillbox, otherwise you'll want to use HE.

I don't have access at the moment to Africa at War, so I'm not sure the exact differences between the loads you mentioned:
105 APFSDS (Vehicle Only)
105 APFSDSDU (Vehicle Only)
105 HEAT
105 WP
105 Flcht

I would suggest opening up the Weapons Data dialog box and looking at the specifics. To do that, click on "Help" from the menu and then click on "Weapons Data". It is divided into three sections, which you will want to look at in reverse order. The last section called "Vehicle Data" contains information about the vehicles, including the friendly names of what weapons they might have (shown in parenthesis). The middle section called "Weapon Data" is sorted by the friendly name of the weapons (shown in parenthesis) and gives some cursory information about each of the weapons - but the main information you get from this section are the weapon loads, which are shown in the last column of this section. You take these names and look for them in the first section which is called "Weapon Data". And this is where you get the real meat and potatoes, as it tells the lethality, penetration, effective range, etc. for each weapon.

Speculating purely on the names, it sounds like you might want to use the first two loads against vehicles and against infantry in bunkers and pillboxes, the third load against infantry in fortified terrains which aren't bunkers or pillboxes, and then the fourth and fifth ones against infantry in all other terrain (depending upon if you wish to use up an illumination round and perhaps if they have favorable range/penetration/lethality/radius values).

Hth,
Rabbit

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[Jeff Conner]

I agree with Bill just based on the weapon data I have looked at. I would add that WP rounds usually have pretty good penetration values, usually equal to or higher than most protective terrain (usually in the 16 to 24 range). They may or may not have a higher lethality than a HEAT round fired at an infantry target. HEAT rounds often have a lower lethality, but the ampersand flag that indicates their lethality is doubled against vehicles. But you may not want to put a smoke (WP is almost always flagged as a smoke round and sometimes as an illumination round also) round on your target hex until the end of your turn.

Jeff

Jeff

[TheBigRedOne]

105 APFSDS (Vehicle Only)

Armor-Piercing, Fin-Stabilized, Discarding Sabot

105 APFSDSDU (Vehicle Only)

Armor Piercing Fin Stabilized Discarding Sabot Depleted Uranium

These bad boys have penetration values of 200 and 260. The WP has a pretty weak penetration value of 4. The HEAT is 30.

[Jeff Conner]

That's Frank for you, always doing something different.

[TheBigRedOne]

One of the criticisms of AAW was always the lethality of the weapons systems in comparison to the actual development games. That 260 PEN value above is larger than anything in any game, even Modern War. Always a tough balance between realism and playability. I haven't played enough AAW to really know if the values are truly high.

[Jeff Conner]

Frank thought that the lethality values in the stock games were too low. When he had a chance to create his own, he raised them, sometimes by quite a bit. Since he was a Marine in Desert Storm, he might know what he is talking about. But apparently, he didn't think much of WP or HEAT rounds.

[Richie61]

Frank thought that the lethality values in the stock games were too low. When he had a chance to create his own, he raised them, sometimes by quite a bit. Since he was a Marine in Desert Storm, he might know what he is talking about. But apparently, he didn't think much of WP or HEAT rounds.

I too think that all the lethality values in the stock games are low. It would be nice to see Tiller/ HPS bump them up someday.

[TheBigRedOne]

Frank thought that the lethality values in the stock games were too low. When he had a chance to create his own, he raised them, sometimes by quite a bit. Since he was a Marine in Desert Storm, he might know what he is talking about. But apparently, he didn't think much of WP or HEAT rounds.

I too think that all the lethality values in the stock games are low. It would be nice to see Tiller/ HPS bump them up someday.

You can bump them up however you'd like it, but I don't think your PBEM opponents would appreciate it.

Given that the playtesting on all games was done with the levels given, bumping up values across the board would potentially affect the balance and victory settings of all the scenarios. There really is no easy way to do this, save play-testing every game with new values. That's probably not going to happen. The stock games will continue to get tweaks in terms of the engine, but nothing wholesale, most likely.

The values are what they are at this point. It's always a balance between playability and realism. The testing of Modern War really drove that home, especially in trying to model US armor. Armor is where most the consternation is, from what I've read, especially some folks feeling that German armor has been made too easy to kill and not deadly enough.

As for AAW, I agree, Jeff. I wasn't being critical of Frank's levels. If anything he allowed the community to see what increased lethality would mean in terms of playability. If you're a soft target in AAW and you expose yourself, you're going to get hurt, as you'd expect on a a modern battlefield.