tanks vs rpg's

[ranXerox]

I'm just wondering.. I've experienced alot of penetrations from rpg-7(or similar) against even the best of tanks, and to the frontal armour. Many M1-tanks lost due those rpg-7(which maximum penetration is 380mm). Is this because of some strange randomizer in the game, as it counts how many points it can penetrate? To my knowledge, it is almost 100,00% impossible to penetrate M1's frontal armour with those old rpg's..

Just now we're playing China vs. Taiwan battle in 2010 with my friend and I just lost taiwanese M1A1ROC to RPG-69(chinese RPG-7) hitting it in front, from maybe 300 meter away(yes I know it means nothing with HEAT, but it was not an ASSAULT).

Can someone explain this?

[JaM]

Look at penetration values and then look at where exactly RPG hit when it penetrate. Im 100% sure that they dont penetrate frontal armor of M1. Maybe it was some sort of lucky shot that was fired at tank and it hit the top armor... but if you have armor 70 HEAT and RPG has pen 38, RPG will never penetrate!

[kesh]

Occasionally you get a message saying something like "shot hits targets weak point for +whatever penetration". I've seen the +whatever range from 1 or 2 up to the 50s.

[JaM]

i never saw this with RPGs, only with tank rounds fired from close range.but if you look at it, it is realistic. Some hits could hit turret ring and penetrate. (this should represent +50 hit) but it will not help you much with 33 pen against 90 HEAT armor...

[PlasmaKrab]

That's right, penetration bonus can account for the numerous weak points crowding any AFV.

And yes, sometimes you see a round getting a huge bonus but still not penetrating... that can be quite infuriating.

RanXerox, JaM is right, you should look closely at the hit reports given when your tank is hit, that will tell you which part exactly as been hit and what the penetration and armor ratings used were (depends on the hit angle).

[Busko]

Are you sure this hits were on the front armour?
Because a lucky rear or side shot (maybe when you're manouvering to get out of an ambush) can happen...

[ranXerox]

My mistake. It was PF97 and it hit to the side of M1A1ROC. Sorry. But now I wonder how weapon like PF97 which is not even at-weapon, blow up mbt? I think it's AP value is 9.. To my knowledge, PF97 is a thermalpressurebomb more than anything else..

And why PF97 has way more better ap-value than PF98, that uses bigger explosion(bigger heat-value) and they both are not at-weapons?

[PlasmaKrab]

ranXerox said:And why PF97 has way more better ap-value than PF98, that uses bigger explosion(bigger heat-value) and they both are not at-weapons?

Huh, the Chinese OOB gives HEAT penetration of 27 for the PF-97 aka RPO-A RFT and 80 for the PF-98 heavy RCL... or did you mean that the PF-97 (flame weapon) was overly effective against tanks?

Apparently there was a bug related to the long-range napalm weapon and calculating penetration and accuracy or something. IIRC that is being fixed in the upcoming patch but I cannot find the post where Don or Andy said something precise about that right at the moment.

[ranXerox]

Yeah, just wondering how PF-97 can destroy M1A1, even with hit to the sidearmor? Is it truly that powerful blast it generates that it can destroy anything on its way?

And also, how PF-97's PEN-value is 9 and much more powerful PF98's PEN-value is only 3? Even that PF98's HEAT-value is 80 and PF97's HEAT-value is 27?

[PlasmaKrab]

Wait a tick here, the "HE pen" value refers to the ability of the basic HE-frag-MP-Pers-etc. round to bust armour. Most possibly an FAE can have some more penetration (due to high pressure and high temperature) over a basic frag warhead (same technology as your standard issue hand grenade).
Now I'm not up to the fine mechanical details on how these warheads work, you'll have to find a specialist for that.