Tanks, thermal imaging, weapon loadout and ammunition

[Hellbeard 10]

Reading a discussion about how the thermal scopes are game breakers I wrote this short bit. I'm going to shoehorn my personal issue of how to improve tanks because I'm a tanker and I'd like tanks to be awesome.

I hope folks might discuss and share from their own experience.

Optical vs. LCD:

Seems insane to me that any tank manufacturer would drop the optical channel altogether. The camera and display can't compete with optical vision- it's refracted light in eyeball retina resolution vs. luminescent light at what the camera can sense, after transmitted to the computer and what the screen can reproduce. It will probably always be inferior barring some hyper vision brain chip.

The daytime vision should be optical. The thermal imaging should be displayed on a screen.

Which brings us to-

Thermal imaging:

To be fair, thermal imaging really is a huge benefit in a combat setting. Though it doesn't really work like everything looks like optical vision except people and vehicles stand out super contrasted.

First of all, there's *no shadows in thermal imaging. That makes everything look super flat. Like a 2D plane. That means you have a hard time telling what's near and far and what things stand on and whether they are obstructed from view or what the hell it is you're looking at.

There's ambient temperature that can affect contrast. There are things that become hot in the environment like rocks facing the sun or metallic items. There are different heat dissipations according to conditions. Things might obstruct heat signatures making them look different.

Lastly, the display can't show you things in infinity resolution of your eyeball. For one thing it has to be some super rugged combat screen that has pixels the size of lego bricks. The other is that the more resolution there is to the sensor of your thermal imager the higher the price, the bigger the space and more power it needs.

I'm familiar with what's probably a little outdated now as far as thermal imaging goes but my talking-out-my-ass-guess is that a thermal scope like the infantry gun mounted ones should be something like 100x100 pixel resolution and have a battery life of 15 minutes.

It's not about balance nerfing, it's about not giving super powers to the players.

Even in the tanks, the resolution of the imaging is too detailed in my opinion.

*pre-empting - shadow areas will be cooler but that's nullified quickly by ambient temperature.

APFSDS-T:

We had a lengthy discussion in the beta forum (tanks, tanks, tanks... problems).

The KE round is extremely, severely, unrealistically, underpowered.

Penetration is not cumulative, it's binary; you either go through or you don't. Damage may be cumulative per se, but the long rod penetrator can and will do enough damage with the first round to kill any and all targets it meets in combat(starting with the most heavily armored one)*. A second round will confirm the kill.

For any sort of fidelity to real reality the APFSDS-T needs to be dialled up by a factor of two million.

*with the caveat that some angles, hit locations and sheer luck may prevent destruction on any one shot.

HE-T:

Tanks have a limited amount of ammunition. That's why they carry rounds that can get the job done. An HE round, a pure HE round, I mean a round that has contact detonation and makes an explosion and nothing more, is so completely obsolete that no tank carries such an ammunition for at least 20-30 years if not more (I'm no historian though).

Modern tanks either have a multi purpose round- one that can engage and destroy multiple different types of targets or highly specialized rounds. On one end of the spectrum you have your Kinetic penetrators which are only for engaging hard targets. On the other you have fragmentation, canister, airburst, proximity, bomblet ejection and the flechette - good against infantry and soft skinned vehicles. Then there are multiple flavors of HEAT - good for hard and soft targets, HEDP - good for hard targets and infantry, HE/MP good for a spectrum of targets such as infantry, dug in infantry, structures, helicopters, light armor etc. etc. There are various kinds with different methods of effect and different modalities of operation.

Why the hell would anyone stock their tank with HE(exclusively contact explosive)?

They won't.

It's silly.

Please consider a complement of HEAT and APAM to replace the current HE-T.

Smoke-

Some tanks shoot flowing smoke grenades. Merkava shoots bursting smoke bombs. I think the T series have some aerosol spray with IR spotlights or something.

It should be changed.

Drivers of AFVs have the capacity to make the engine exhaust generate smoke! They should be able to do that.

WEAPONS-

You'd be hard pressed to find specimens of tank in the last hundred years or so that doesn't have a co-axial machinegun. That's because it's really effective and smart to use such a thing. As a matter of fact, you should expect MORE co-axial and fire-controlled weaponry not LESS.

The t-100 should have a co-axial.

The Merkava should have a commander's machine gun.

They may probably also have HMG's and GMG's and mortars and missiles.

Turned out crew members should be able to use crew served weapons, personal weapons and grenades.

Interiors-

While I'd love for every crew member to have an interior (I WOULD), At the very least the driver has to have one.

The driver has three viewports you can see in the model and should have also screens showing cameras.

At the moment you can only look dead ahead. The driver has decreased situational awareness but come on.

Mounting spots-

If you want to climb a tank from the sheer cliff face of its side, you're gonna have a bad time.

Please write your own suggestions and/or discuss what I had written. I'll probably remember more stuff later on.

Edited September 23, 2013 by Hellbeard
Spelling, grammar

[PantherAl 11]

Seconded:

Also, The Merkava has a loader, and someone should be allowed to mount in the loader spot, and serve not just the loaders MG, but the loaders 60mm Mortar.

Secondly, regarding Ammo. Both tanks should have beam riding missiles. This is something the Soviets/Russians pushed hard, and the Israeli's copied with the LAHAT.

[Kushluk 21]

Optical vs. LCD

Fair point, but BI is unlikely to completely revamp existing tanks and their configs just for this.

Thermal imaging

I very much agree with these points, however this is an engine issue and is not limited to tanks.

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=2899

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=13671

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=13320

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=13544

AP/HE/HEAT/HEDP etc

Although correct, we will likely need to wait for realism overhall packages like ACE to provide this functionality (ie. ACE) Since a large percentage of typical public players do not have the knowledge or prowess to efficiently use these advanced munitions, I think it should stay this way.

Smoke Munitions/Generation

I don't know enough about these systems to comment effectively.

Weapon Systems (Coaxial etc)

I believe the weird lack of certain weapons for the was implemented on purpose by BI developers to effectively 'balance' each cross faction MBT. It appears this new trend of 'balance over simulation' is here to stay due to the increasing mainstream popularity of ArmA III on steam and its introduction of more 'gamey' users and PVP.

Turned out crew members should be able to use crew served weapons, personal weapons and grenades.

Engine Limitation - http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=2452

Interiors.

If you sneak a peak inside the Gorgon AFV, you will find a nice surprise. You may find the addition of more detailed interiors are introduced in a future patch. Regardless of the engine supporting the concept, development time for these was likely shifted to other more urgent issues. Detailed third party mods of current generation MBT's like the Abrams and Challenger are likely to start appearing soon, my suggestion would be to wait.

Mounting spots.

I don't really understand what you are trying to say here, do you mean the locations where 'get in driver' and 'get in gunner' appear?

[dayglow 2]

FYI a quick google search show most rifle mounted scopes have a 640x480 or 800x600 display size.

[odie0351 67]

Definitely agree with you on most of this. hell I'd be happy if all the AI loader was there for is so we could say the loader is represented. That being said I would prefer at the least an animation of him loading the gun...irrelevant at the moment without interiors though:eek: Also most of our thermal sights on the infantry side(PAS-13 series being the main one I've had experience with...and some of those were nearly older than I was when I was using them) tend to have several hours of battery life, and we always made it a point to carry a ridiculous amount of spare batteries for them. And our NVG's for that matter.

Quote Originally Posted by Hellbeard View Post

Weapon Systems (Coaxial etc)

I believe the weird lack of certain weapons for the was implemented on purpose by BI developers to effectively 'balance' each cross faction MBT. It appears this new trend of 'balance over simulation' is here to stay due to the increasing mainstream popularity of ArmA III on steam and its introduction of more 'gamey' users and PVP.

Really wish they would go more for realistic when it comes to such things and leave matters of balance to mission makers and such. oh well:p

Edited September 23, 2013 by Odie0351

[mistyronin 1181]

+1 Agree completely with the OP. And I also think that the Merkava should have the mortar position, it's one of its distinctive features.

[raspu86 92]

I just did a quick test on the Gorgon. It certainly is one of the better detailed vehicles ingame and obviously with a full 3d interior. Sit in the driver seat and turn out. You will get a small glimpse on the 3D driver seat.

[blackjacktom 10]

I believe the Gorgon was imported from the ACR dlc for Arma II and has an interior because there is no separation between the crew and passenger areas. I wouldn't take it as a sign that vehicles in Arma III are going to get interiors.

[mistyronin 1181]

I believe the Gorgon was imported from the ACR dlc for Arma II and has an interior because there is no separation between the crew and passenger areas. I wouldn't take it as a sign that vehicles in Arma III are going to get interiors.

Yeah it's the Pandur from ACR, but I still dream that the devs will add all the interiors left.

[instagoat 133]

I've tickets regarding the APFSDS problem here:

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=14019

And a ticket with a suggestion for fixing the bad interiors problem here:

http://feedback.arma3.com/view.php?id=12555

At least, such a solution would be better than what we have. As far as the LCD's are concerned, I couldn't care less, since it is just a matter of overlays. The problem is that the optics are too sharp, but that has always been the case (Arma does not have any simulation of optics anyway, as far as the graphics engine.).

Ammunition in Tanks is borked, I agree. Technically both T-100 and Merkava should be able to fire ATGMs from their main guns, too. I think they should add second versions of both, with all additional weapons/features enabled, ie, mortar for the merkava, pintle mounted MG's for commander, coax for the T-100, HEAT, HE-Frag Apers, possibly even Canister rounds. I do not want to rely on mods to fix up the game, the whole Idea of Arma 3 to begin was that mods should expand instead of fix the game this time. Unfortunately, it seems the game isn't quite there yet... again.

[Tonci87 163]

Well I think I agree with all of this 100%

Using Tanks is so much more fun in Arma +ACE than it is in Arma 3. I bet it will take a long time for Rolling thunder to come to Arma 3

[Hellbeard 10]

Thanks for the support and comments guys!

I'd like to say that in my opinion the thing that makes ArmA unique, and that drives my interest in it, is that it is a simulator more than a shooter. The more a simulator it is, the more it's close to what I like. When you simulate combat, you don't need to "balance" things. Reality has its own balance built in. If you have to cripple a tank and turn it into a travesty in the name of "gameplay" I prefer it be left out completely.

A tank in the future shooting WWI ammo? Hobbled by removing weapon systems because tanks are too strong? Here's a bit of news from the history of warfare. Tanks really are very powerful. That's why everything since WWII. It makes me sick to see a tank without a co-axial because "gameplay" and the lowest common denominator. Like an ArmA player who's already shown commitment by learning a new way of computer infantry combat will think that operating a tank is something that needs to be simple! INSANE!

Hey, I think you should have to choose between a soldier who can only throw grenades and a soldier who can shoot a rifle. But not both, that's too powerful and not balanced.

I can't bring myself to play ArmA like this. I'll wait for ACE if I have to.

Who is this wide audience that gamified combat is catering to? ArmA fans like it because it's not like the other dumbed down games. If I wanted "game-balance" I'd play some mindless shooter that's prettier and a hell of a lot more fine tuned than lopping off the co-ax or ammo types. Tanks should be tanks.

Another point:

LAZING FOR DISTANCE.

Tanks can lock on a target, and then they really do LOCK ON. Tanks can measure distance by lazing. It's not one thing. To enter the range manually like in ancient Egypt is ridiculous. To have to commit only to the distance of the thing you're allowed to have a "lock" on is silly. Get rid of the target lock as it is. Get real TRACKING and lazing for distance. Lazing automatically transfer the measured distance to the fire control and "zeros" the sight.

PARRALAX COMPENSATION.

Yeah, up super close you'll hit different than what you aim but super futuristic computers from the 70's and 80's have solved this for close to far ranges by adjusting the sight to fit the ballistic path by compensating for the offset. They know the ballistics, they know the distance, they compensate. To hit lower left on everything is an insult.

RE: Barrell launched missiles-

I think realistically, in the near future you'd have either fire and forget, self guiding and or remote-camera-operated missiles. Beam riding seems to me to be already antiquated. It's not beyond the realm of reason but I'd think you would probably keep your ammo storage for effective direct fire ammo and maybe have some external launchers.

RE: Mortars

A mortar is a neat little job to have around if you're a squishy sack of fluids. Tanks already have superior direct fire capability. I believe that mortar fire is a waste of a tanks time. I believe that logically tanks should have a barrel mounted or independant CRWS automatic grenade launcher which is ideal for covering the mid-range between the medium machinegun's and the main gun's effective areas of engaging infantry.

Edited September 23, 2013 by Hellbeard

[Hellbeard 10]

Re: target lock.

I don't know about AA missiles or FOFs, maybe someone with experience can shed more light. It occurred to me the game will exclude certain things from being allowable to lock on according to their type. AT missile won't lock on helicopter and AA missile won't lock on to a vehicle.

Isn't that strange? The locking is on a signature that's distinct to the guidance, but only from the environment. Can an AA missile guidance system differentiate the heat signature contrast of a flying object rather than one that's on the ground? It can target other factors, I suppose like radar emissions. Maybe multiple ones. My point being, having the AI or pattern recognition for a missile guiding computer to tell the difference between what it may or may not lock on to by type is too far fetched. If it has some tropic guidance like particular wave patterns of target emissions or something similar then it might make sense. Why won't an AT missile allow to lock onto a helicopter? What's so special about it?

[lavbo0321 5]

And what about the missing loader and TC CITV????

Hellbeard, did you ever play M1 Tank Platoon 2????

EPIC game. It seems the kids who are making Arma never really played an awesome military sim in their lives.

Sad really. Arma has such amazing possibilities just wasted...

[-=seany=- 5]

I agree that Arma's tanks at this stage could use a serious overhaul to give some much more enjoyable realism. We already have mods that have done it perfectly: ...ACE FireControlSystem..again...

[Hellbeard 10]

And what about the missing loader and TC CITV????

Hellbeard, did you ever play M1 Tank Platoon 2????

EPIC game. It seems the kids who are making Arma never really played an awesome military sim in their lives.

Sad really. Arma has such amazing possibilities just wasted...

If I played it I don't recall. I think it came out when I started playing with real tanks so lacked time to play with simulated ones.

I'm a big ArmA fan and I really like ArmA 3. I appreciate Bohemia Interactive very much.

I hope I don't come off as too scathing when I try to stress how important I think some things are.

To my eyes, with cumulative 15 years(still counting) of experience as a tank crew man as regular and active reserve, the things that look like tanks in the game don't really share any of their reality counterpart attributes.

Like a butterfly pretending to be an owl.

It's as if you presented me with a department store mannequin and said that it were the same as regular humans but balanced for gameplay. I know you can't artifice a person, to a lesser extent it would be herculean to create a totally faithful tank simulator. But at least tape a speaker to its face and screw wheels on the feet; and don't chop off one arm and one leg because they're too powerful.

It's absurd.

Ultimately, we will get the game we want(I hope). I'm disappointed that it has to be later rather than sooner and that the shortcomings I had chalked up to lack of refinement of the development was actually a game made for some other player, a wider audience type.

ArmA 3 is a great tool for making that milsim game which doesn't exist yet. I appreciate that.

[cthulhu616 3]

agree with most of that...

when BI said, that they will focus on infantery, they really said... sry guys, but we don't want to extend the engine and instead make little tweaks to things we already have...

i mean, arma 3 is really good in many terms, but it lacks in the most important aspects...

after all that infantery stuff was done (wound system and what ever they want to do) they should really start to make the engine more than just an infantery focused game (I'm not talking about a "Armed Assault: DCS", but a little more realism to everything). and this contains all the things which were suggested by the OP.

[nodunit 397]

Yeah..the infantry was great but they really failed to capitalize and show off a good portion of the engines new features. PhysX for example, all we saw was a very early tech demo of very light crates, since then we haven't seen any examples of objects being pushed or interacted with in some way. For example using a tank to push one of those big cargo containers, or have a vehicle that could haul other vehicles would have been perfect! Oh sure it makes reckless driving a momentary concern in that you can flip vehicles but that is taken away when it automaticly flips back, and the collision is still behaving wonky as ever in places, such as palm trees defeating tanks!

The thermal system could be perfect as well if only they'd remove that cursed auto contrast, HDR, whatever it is that kicks in after a second or two! It opens up navigating with it and not seeing assets with thermal maps only IE fleshies and vehicles.

to give some understanding of how much more clarity there is and is lost, here are two example images.

http://feedback.arma3.com/file_download.php?file_id=5168&type=bug&show_inline=1&file_show_inline_token=20130924e20923ae5842b28e3e2f153bcb63197332cba34e

http://feedback.arma3.com/file_download.php?file_id=5169&type=bug&show_inline=1&file_show_inline_token=2013092417087f9713278eb860433633f2be74c5dc981eac holy crap that looks great right?

The PIP is dissapointing, yeah its kinda nice on mirrors but it doesn't project shadows so you get no sense of depth, it is still just as limited as it was in TKOH IE by default you have 1 zoom level and 1 filter mode, either color camera, thermal, NVG or mirror. If it's thermal then you can only have grey, no green or orange which leads to oddities such as this

and there isn't even a white hot to black hot option!

The sad part is the above applies to tanks and every other vehicle...EVERYTHING can benefit from better lasing, thermals, PIP, even more since the tech is now so even across the board.

Imagine if one of the tanks had a modified interior, very simple..a light inside to cast a soft, dim hue while a PIP screen sits in front of all crew stations, allowing them to see and survey all sorts of things, being able to zoom the camera source or change it to a necessary optic...if they did that I wouldn't be able to kiss their feet enough or recommend it to my friends, I'd probably go on a crusade.

Edited September 24, 2013 by NodUnit

[pipin78 10]

agree with most of that...

when BI said, that they will focus on infantery, they really said... sry guys, but we don't want to extend the engine and instead make little tweaks to things we already have...

i mean, arma 3 is really good in many terms, but it lacks in the most important aspects...

after all that infantery stuff was done (wound system and what ever they want to do) they should really start to make the engine more than just an infantery focused game (I'm not talking about a "Armed Assault: DCS", but a little more realism to everything). and this contains all the things which were suggested by the OP.

Yeah but infantry focus on a 270 square Km map it's a bit silly..

[xendance 3]

Yeah but infantry focus on a 270 square Km map it's a bit silly..

Mechanized infantry tends to be the main force of today's (and probably in 2030) armies. I don't see why focusing on infantry is silly in that regard.

[pipin78 10]

Mechanized infantry tends to be the main force of today's (and probably in 2030) armies. I don't see why focusing on infantry is silly in that regard.

When you're fighting insurgents maybe.. In 2035 apparently we will be fighting iranians in the mediterranean.. not quite the same.

But this is not my point.. It's silly to have such big spaces like the central plains only to engage at rifle ranges..

[lavbo0321 5]

If I played it I don't recall. I think it came out when I started playing with real tanks so lacked time to play with simulated ones.

I just found out you can still play it on Windows 7. It is not as pretty as Arma3 but it is a true sim.

http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/m1-tank-platoon-ii/screenshots/gameShotId,13134/

check out the movement screen. If only we had this is Arma 3.

[Opticalsnare 12]

What on earth were they thinking, did nobody at BIS turn round and actually say something like "guys the tanks kinda suck" i think were just gonna have to wait till our community makes some better units.

Tanks should be armed to the teeth with like at least 3 weapons

120mm Main Gun

20mm Secondary

12.7mm HMG

7.62mm COAX

Smoke Launcher

Anti-ATGM Defences

Laser Designators

ATGM's

Edited September 24, 2013 by Opticalsnare

[LoneCrow66 10]

I use HE for infantry all the time. You need it, in fact probably more than the anti tank rounds..

[Hellbeard 10]

I use HE for infantry all the time. You need it, in fact probably more than the anti tank rounds..

I think you misunderstood. Tanks should have rounds for engaging infantry, soft skins and various other types of targets.

Those rounds usually are of the exploding variety so they have an HE somewhere in there. The point is that an HE round, even a fragmenting envelope HE round, has almost if not completely been phased out of all tank ammunition loadouts barring really old tanks that have a lot of cheap stockpiles and no money or cares to replace it.

In future tech world, the idea that you'd use a sharpened-flint-spear as an anti personnel weapon is on the same level as using a pure contact explosive/HE round. You have options that are so much more advanced already deployed and in use TODAY that the thought of an HE round in 20-whatevs is completely bonkers.

Important note for Eastern and European tank technical jargon speakers- by HE I mean a contact explosive and nothing else. To prevent a futile 4 page argument.

I want to say that I am very happy to see so much support for the sentiments, ideas and points of discussion in the thread. Thanks for adding your voice. I really hope someone is paying attention. If you agree with the ideas or have your own how to improve combat vehicles please contribute and we might make a difference!