Tanks - Damage improvements

[dragon01 902]

OK, this is not strictly a tank-related thing, but it fits here anyway. Now that Blackfish got a proper FCS (still need to test it), could we have the devs take a good look at the damage values? In particular, the 20mm cannon, despite its impressive visuals, seem to act more like a minigun. The cannon should also have a bit more frag damage, this being HEAT-MP. I need to have a look at the autocannon, but it might be underpowered as well.

[Yoshi_E 179]

@Asheara Please take a look at the hitpoints  "hitcomturret" and "hitcomgun" for the vehicles: AMV-7 Marshall, CRV-6e Bobcat, IFV-6c Panther and IF-6a Cheetah.

A simple burst with a normal gun on the commander optics sets the hull and the main turret into the "badly damaged" state.

 

 

 

Also a lot of lights have duplicate names (can be found on almost all armored vehicles):
      "#light_l",
      "#light_l",      <----
      "#light_l2",
      "#light_r",
      "#light_r",      <----
      "#light_r2"

[scavenjer 112]

2 hours ago, dragon01 said:

OK, this is not strictly a tank-related thing, but it fits here anyway. Now that Blackfish got a proper FCS (still need to test it), could we have the devs take a good look at the damage values? In particular, the 20mm cannon, despite its impressive visuals, seem to act more like a minigun. The cannon should also have a bit more frag damage, this being HEAT-MP. I need to have a look at the autocannon, but it might be underpowered as well.

They're already existing weapons: 40mm from Marshall, 20mm from blackfoot, 105 from slammer up...
While I agree on some points, I personally don't see a reason why the 105 should get HEAT-MP at all, pure HE would be better IMHO.

20mm and 40mm did get accuracy tweaks (more dispersion), this is most likely the reason they feel a bit underwhelming.
 

I've posted several comments on the general discussion about this very topic, the autocannons do IMO too little damage to jets for example (though same could be said for kajman).

Also keep in mind that infantry can wear vests and uniforms that greatly reduce splash damage and generally make infantry very tough.

[dragon01 902]

The 40mm turned out to be fine. Just checked the 105mm, it's more or less good as HEAT, now that we can aim it properly. The "MP" part does suck, though, IRL it's a fragmentation component that should kill uncovered infantry in a rather considerable radius. As for 20mm, Blackfoot's cannon sucks, too. However, on Blackfish, it's typically fired from far away (1500m or so) making the dispersion render it completely useless. Blackfoot has an option of getting somewhat closer, at least. You can dump half your ammo at a bunch of infantry and have them come out lightly wounded at best.

[scavenjer 112]

I did some more testing when I read that certain shells had tweaked ricochet chances/values.
I tested using the Slammer UP 105mm APFSDS rounds.

 

Second hit on Slammer (first hit LFP and did nothing), very little to no damage, it passed clean through the turret ring.
 

 

Second hit on Varsuk (first hit UFP and initiated ERA but did nothing else), hit right under the mantlet went to halfway into the turret and disabled the turret.


Second hit on Kuma (first hit turretring and knocked out gun), did no damage whatsoever it seems like and bounced between skirts and main armour several times..?


First hit on Mora with cage armour, destroyed cage armour but stopped on the cage armour...?!

 

Second and third hit on Mora with cage armour, shell hit destroyed cage armour and instantly stopped, cage armour on front got destroyed on third hit but again stopped the APFSDS shell..

 

Ehhh, not entirely sure what to think about this....

 The improved bounce chances or angles are good but the damage models themselves still seem placeholders, am I correct in noting that?

 

Overall it seems cage armour is quite a bit too strong against KE shells and doesn't actually get "destroyed", visual model is gone but phyiscal seems to still be there.

[scavenjer 112]

8 minutes ago, dragon01 said:

The 40mm turned out to be fine. Just checked the 105mm, it's more or less good as HEAT, now that we can aim it properly. The "MP" part does suck, though, IRL it's a fragmentation component that should kill uncovered infantry in a rather considerable radius. As for 20mm, Blackfoot's cannon sucks, too. However, on Blackfish, it's typically fired from far away (1500m or so) making the dispersion render it completely useless. Blackfoot has an option of getting somewhat closer, at least. You can dump half your ammo at a bunch of infantry and have them come out lightly wounded at best.

I agree, like I commented earlier and before, IMO the autocannons (20mm-35mm excluding wipeout and neophron) are too weak considering they increased the dispersion on them.

They take too many hits to destroy/disable certain helicopters and jets. 20mm has always been fairly useless vs infantry though.
I'd love to see an increase in damage versus the aforementioned vehicles and perhaps infantry, but I'm aware it needs testing and there's currently little time before the deadline (and technically this isn't even on-topic for tanks).

[SuicideKing 233]

27 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Overall it seems cage armour is quite a bit too strong against KE shells and doesn't actually get "destroyed", visual model is gone but phyiscal seems to still be there.

Don't even think that KE should be stopped by a SLAT cage - should pass clean through it imo.

[scavenjer 112]

22 minutes ago, SuicideKing said:

Don't even think that KE should be stopped by a SLAT cage - should pass clean through it imo.

Yes ofcourse, that's what I meant, though technically the cage could destabalise a shell hitting it, but that's ofcourse very unlikely. IMO should just slow down a KE round by a tiny amount <1%

[Strike_NOR 898]

And while on the topic, the SLAT armor shouldn't really suffer much damage from the APFSDS because 

 

1. The odds of actually hitting the bars is really low.

2. The bars are so small, the rod/dart will pass through it like butter, meaning very little energy (damage) is transfered to the SLAT module itself. 

 

It's like trying to destroy a wire fence by shooting it with a 50cal sniper. Even if you hit a piece of wire, it'll just snap and the fence is still structurally 99.9% intact.

 

 

High caliber HE, IED'S, Mines, Missiles, large HEAT, Bombs and collisions on the other hand, should damage/weaken the SLAT armor significantly.

[scavenjer 112]

Just started doing another round of testing.
Sidenote: does anyone know how to consistently view the black box of information on an impact point?
@Strike_NOR showed me how to use the diag but I'm not sure how people are able to show that info so easily as I have to "search" the impact point and can't just point my crosshair at it to show the black box :/

1. HE still blows up all ERA panels but I'm sure you guys are aware of this and still busy finding a fix.
2. Tank APFSDS sometimes doesn't blow up ERA but this is fairly inconsistent, 40MM and lower doesn't seem to blow up ERA with MP-T or APFSDS at all.
3. Tank APFSDS seems to not be able to penetrate the side armour of the Slammer UP, and does light damage, (clarification it does penetrate the side armour but stops inside said side armour...?
4. Tank APFSDS destroys any tank from the side within a couple of shots if it hits the ammunition directly, (maybe make it one shot or less though?) good stuff! (Does not seem to work if no ammunition is present, good!)
5. Tank APFSDS seems to kill crew reliably now if it direcly hits them (good but I'd like to see it have more of an indirect effect as well so a penetrating hit to the turret kills both crew and you don't necessarily need a direct hit)
6. The slammers seem way too tough
7. The Kuma turret ring is extremely weak, even 30MM APFSDS goes right through and kills the gunner/commander
8. SLAT armour still stops APFSDS on the first shot
    

[Strike_NOR 898]

4 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Sidenote: does anyone know how to consistently view the black box of information on an impact point?

 

Afaik, you hit ESC and select the Splendid camera (screenshot simulator) and use this camera to move around. Once you have moved the camera to a good spot, you simply use the mouse to hover over the impact point you want detailed DIAG info on. It should indicate by the small cross changing color and a red ring appearing around it.

 

6 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

HE still blows up all ERA panels but I'm sure you guys are aware of this and still busy finding a fix.

 

I think devs already said (or maybe @x3kj) that indirect damage ignores object occlusion for own vehicle. In other words, if the indirect HE damage hits one side, then the vehicle itself will not mask the opposite ERA panels, and hence they explode.

 

7 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Tank APFSDS destroys any tank from the side within a couple of shots if it hits the ammunition directly, (maybe make it one shot or less though?) good stuff! (Does not seem to work if no ammunition is present, good!)

 

I think the ammunition is not simulated(yet?). And what you are experiencing is purely luck. (Do not think there are any relations between vehicle ammo count and hitpoint/firegeometry).

 

8 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Tank APFSDS seems to kill crew reliably now if it direcly hits them

 

This has always been the case AFAIK. However, due to the weird ricochet nature inside tanks, the shells often dip down before even reaching the crew - leading to rare crew kills. What would help though, is if the crew suffered "spalling" damage, even if the main projectile doesn't exactly hit the crew.

 

10 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

The Kuma turret ring is extremely weak,

 

Well... should it not be? I mean it's just a large ball bearing isn't it? 30mm APFSDS is quite potent towards softer armor, and besides, striking the turret ring isn't exactly easy with the 30mm dispersion.

 

11 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

SLAT armour still stops APFSDS on the first shot

 

Yeah, this should be addressed!

[scavenjer 112]

8 hours ago, Strike_NOR said:

 

Afaik, you hit ESC and select the Splendid camera (screenshot simulator) and use this camera to move around. Once you have moved the camera to a good spot, you simply use the mouse to hover over the impact point you want detailed DIAG info on. It should indicate by the small cross changing color and a red ring appearing around it.

 

 

I think devs already said (or maybe @x3kj) that indirect damage ignores object occlusion for own vehicle. In other words, if the indirect HE damage hits one side, then the vehicle itself will not mask the opposite ERA panels, and hence they explode.

 

 

I think the ammunition is not simulated(yet?). And what you are experiencing is purely luck. (Do not think there are any relations between vehicle ammo count and hitpoint/firegeometry).

 

 

This has always been the case AFAIK. However, due to the weird ricochet nature inside tanks, the shells often dip down before even reaching the crew - leading to rare crew kills. What would help though, is if the crew suffered "spalling" damage, even if the main projectile doesn't exactly hit the crew.

 

 

Well... should it not be? I mean it's just a large ball bearing isn't it? 30mm APFSDS is quite potent towards softer armor, and besides, striking the turret ring isn't exactly easy with the 30mm dispersion.

 

 

Yeah, this should be addressed!

Thanks for the tip, I couldn't find the comment about this earlier.

Yeah I know the devs are aware, still it's worth mentioning again for those that haven't tried this patch.

I emptied all ammunition in the editor from tanks and they seemed to take more hits to kill, ofcourse, 10 or so tries isn't good for statistical analysis.

I think I've only ever died once while in a tank previously and that was due to a bomb.... they definitely tweaked something and as you say, spalling would help.

The turret ring is a lot tougher on MBTs than you think, generally speaking most of them have some spaced armour infront of it etc to destabilise shots, regardless on the Kuma it's extremely easy to hit and really wouldn't be fun to get killed this way by someone panicking  and dumping all his 30mm ammo at you and getting a lucky hit.

As you can see, the turret ring looks different than the one in-game does. 

Considering the bouncy nature (previously) of AP shells they tended the bounce straight into the turret ring which honestly seems to cover about 25% (exaggeration) of the tank in-game

Edit: much clearer picture of what I'm trying to say.

[Asheara 214]

On 2/26/2018 at 9:31 PM, x3kj said:

My questions regarding how the new firegeo/hitpointcomponent based hitpoints work are these:

 

1. What is the condition for a projectile to cause damage to a hitpointcomponent? Does it just need to touch the surface, or does it need to penetrate?
2. Are there any further damage modifiers than the one in the armorsimulationconfig class? For comparison, "memorylod hitpoints" damage depends on amount of speed lost during penetration, plus projectile parameters (hit, explosive, actual speed vs. typical speed parameter). Does damage via hitpointcomponents behave exactly the same, or do they only take the config based parameters into account (projectile properties as mentioned, plus hit modifier in armorsimulation cfg)?
3. The armorsimulation config has speed modifiers. This leads me to believe it affects bullet travelspeed. What exactly does the speed parameter in there do, what effect does it have on the projectile ballistic simulation/ flight path. Which of the three is true: [A] Projectile ignored the .rvmat and .bisurf of the firegeo from this component and only uses the speed modifier Projectile does calculate penetration normally by .rvmat in firegeo but does ALSO modifiy exit speed by the speed parameter in armorsimulation [C] Projectile travelspeed and vector is not affected by the parameter, it just uses .rvmat in firegeo - like for any other part in firegeo ? If C, then what's the purpose behind the speed modifier?
4. Do hitpointcomponents behave different for indirect damage than memorylod based hitpoints (i assume not?)
5. Do the projectile simulation classes (shotBullet, shotShell, shotMissile, shotRocket) lead to different behaviour on hitpointcomponents or are they treated all the same?

 

 

Yes my damage script/config-system uses custom config properties and hitpoint names that are processed within the damage script - which makes it fairly flexible and handy to configure.

 

Regarding the random time until explosion on hithull>0 damage:  I dont see it as big issue having some random delay until explosion. Real tank explosions/cookoffs can also be quite random with delay at times. The biggest issue is AI however. They immediately know when conditions for explosion are met and jump out immediately (within 1 frame). This is unrealistic, because it takes considerable time to recognize a critical failure like this (while beeing dazed from impact), react and and climb out of a tank. In arma its like some spring puppet toy with button on it. Push button and *BRRR* instant puppet ejection.

 

1. I believe touching the surface is enough, it still has hit the component. But I can maybe get more detailed answer from programmers
2. Further damage modifiers - whole black magic which worked before works now as well. The sphere hitpoints are still calculated for explosive damage, works the same as before. Damage is affected by size of explosion, size of sphere, how close they are, whether or how much they overlap... Damage via components works exactly the same in terms of config parameters for projectiles. CfgArmorSimulations "hit" parameter only modifies those which have been previously defined.
3. (B) is right! Projectile does calculate penetration normally by .rvmat in firegeo but does ALSO modifiy exit speed by the speed parameter in armorsimulation
4. Hitpointcomponents don't behave in any way for indirect damage - for that, there are still those "memorylod" hitpoints in hitpoints lod. They are still necessary to have there precisely for this reason - indirect hit.
5. I have no idea, would need to ask programming, but I'm not aware of any specific differences. however, i believe it will respect some differencies between those classes as they are there for a reason. But honestly, I don't know, I'd need to ask :)

 

On 3/1/2018 at 6:38 PM, Yoshi_E said:

@Asheara Please take a look at the hitpoints  "hitcomturret" and "hitcomgun" for the vehicles: AMV-7 Marshall, CRV-6e Bobcat, IFV-6c Panther and IF-6a Cheetah.

A simple burst with a normal gun on the commander optics sets the hull and the main turret into the "badly damaged" state.

 

Also a lot of lights have duplicate names (can be found on almost all armored vehicles):
      "#light_l",
      "#light_l",      <----
      "#light_l2",
      "#light_r",
      "#light_r",      <----
      "#light_r2"

 

Thanks, I'll definitely take a look. Or well, arrange it. Turrets, their hitpoint and balance are going to be tweaked / fixed in near future, quite possibly this week or start of the next one.

@scavenjer Thanks for noticing! It is actually one of the global and more pressing issues we are trying to fix about now. It is on our to do list for programming, but your input is definitely helpful! Better repro and all. But yes, we are aware of this one. The technology of the new feature still doesn't 100% work as intended.

I'm not certain who asked about this one, but yes, damage values are still a placeholder, and still not tweaked. We're terribly sorry about that, but now with upcoming devbranch release we've been having our hands full with clearing out as many bugs as possible. It's two encoders against the world! I know it's not ideal and I would rather have it done by now as the release is pretty close, so time for tweaks and feedbacks, but... not there yet.

Apologies for taking long time to reply! At least it wasn't fully spammed when I returned :) Following the forums and such can be quite time consuming and the devbranch release robbed us of this time ;) 

[Asheara 214]

On 2/23/2018 at 9:08 AM, mondkalb said:

Heya @Asheara please consider scalability of the system for community warhead types by adding baseclasses to

class Armor_CAGE
class Armor_ERA_Heavy
class Armor_ERA_Light

A class Default for these to inherit from.

This way community creators can simply add their own Warhead types to class Default and rest assured that all other Official and Community-Made Armor-Simulations (that inherit correctly from class Default) will have the new Warheads, too.
An easy way to establish compatibility across various mods without requiring explicit compatibility class patching.
A baseclass will make this a lot easier to config-patch, too.

 

It's done! Devbranching inbound :)

Aaaand for anyone who asked about those weird reflections, deflections and other movements of the projectiles within the tank - also aware, it has been shown to programming, hopefully it will get somehow fixed or tweaked, but mo promises :) There's still new feature which could use some fixing ;)

[Strike_NOR 898]

1 hour ago, Asheara said:

It's done! Devbranching inbound :)

 

Nice! Thanks to @mondkalb for pointing that out :)

 

1 hour ago, Asheara said:

Aaaand for anyone who asked about *snip*

 

Glad to hear it's being looked at, hopefully you'll find some time to tweak these for more consistent performance. It seems these high deflection angles are the root cause of many incidents where the vehicle takes unnatural amounts of damage, while sparing the crew. While realistically, this should be opposite and the crew suffers damage, while the tank persists. If the shot goes more straight through the vehicle, it is more likely to hit the crew on the way, while it is less likely to hit other "invisible" walls inside the tank (that cause full damage multiple times.)

[teabagginpeople 398]

1 hour ago, Asheara said:

 

It's done! Devbranching inbound :)

 

Awesome work. 

 

 

1 hour ago, Asheara said:

 

 but mo promises :) There's still new feature which could use some fixing ;)

Oooooohhhhhhh sheeet this dlc is coming in hot.

[Asheara 214]

37 minutes ago, teabagginpeople said:

Oooooohhhhhhh sheeet this dlc is coming in hot.

 

Tell me about it. *runs around in panic with a fire extinguisher*

[scavenjer 112]

You're doing all of this with two people?
Wow, nice job, you weren't kidding when you said you had your hands full!

[mickeymen 324]

Hi. I have a question for the developers.
Along with the improved damage system, is it not possible to also make a physical reaction to the hit of heavy shells?

I mean to create a small sway of armored vehicles after getting into it from 105mm or 120mm
Today in Arma3 there is no any visual physics impact of heavy weapon and this does not look good.

If physical reaction of hit (sway) were implemented along with the amount of personal damage from each heavy weapon and weight of target then it would be great

[hellfish6 7]

The tyres/tires on the Rhino are very fragile. I'm constantly damaging or destroying them on small objects like rocks and those low rubble walls. I don't remember having so many problems with flat tires with the other wheeled armored vehicles (Marshal, Marid, Strider, Gorgon, etc)... is the damage threshold different for the Rhino's tires?

 

Could I make a plea to at least include a repair kit in the vehicle inventory so I can change the tires and not just abandon the vehicle?

[Sanya 97]

What about realistic tandem warheads of rpg alamut?

[scavenjer 112]

Did some more quick testing:

 

Rhino MGS destroyed collision model is a bit too high.

Not to mention somehow it took an APFSDS and stopped it ..... (did instantly explode, maybe that's why the shell stopped so quickly?)

 

 

Varsuk vs Angara
Note how the 125 AP went through the hull side and stopped on some internal armour while the side turret shot went through and through (went into another Angara parked next to it, turret ring and kep going into a Kuma side hull where it again went through and through.
distance 5m

https://streamable.com/l1sqz

 

Note, the Angara's turrets were both disabled (including gun stuck).
On a sidenote: why does the Angara have 360° smoke dispensers when they're only positioned forward and sidewards in an arc?

I count 18 smoke grenades launched, but only 5 per side near the turret ring...?

[Hvymtal 1251]

It is important to remember that the angara has an unmanned turret. Realistically, a fully prnetrating hit like that would cause at least a partial ammo rack explosion.

 

I believe some of the smoke launchers are supposed to be APS in real life, but are not represented as such in game as APS is not modeled. Sad, I was kind of hoping it was :(

[Damian90 697]

17 minutes ago, scavenjer said:

Did some more quick testing:

 

Rhino MGS destroyed collision model is a bit too high.

Not to mention somehow it took an APFSDS and stopped it ..... (did instantly explode, maybe that's why the shell stopped so quickly?)

 

 

Varsuk vs Angara
Note how the 125 AP went through the hull side and stopped on some internal armour while the side turret shot went through and through (went into another Angara parked next to it, turret ring and kep going into a Kuma side hull where it again went through and through.
distance 5m

https://streamable.com/l1sqz

 

Note, the Angara's turrets were both disabled (including gun stuck).
On a sidenote: why does the Angara have 360° smoke dispensers when they're only positioned forward and sidewards in an arc?

I count 18 smoke grenades launched, but only 5 per side near the turret ring...?

 

Just like in real life T-14, the T-140 turret have nearly no armor. Its because its unmanned so armor is not needed much there and entire armor weight can be more efficently distributed on hull.

 

These launchers on the turret base are APS interceptors launchers.

[scavenjer 112]

2 minutes ago, Damian90 said:

 

Just like in real life T-14, the T-140 turret have nearly no armor. Its because its unmanned so armor is not needed much there and entire armor weight can be more efficently distributed on hull.

 

These launchers on the turret base are APS interceptors launchers.

Yes exactly!
So many people think the T-14 has incredible turret armour lol... nice to see someone knows and understands the design.
While I agree it should to through the turret, I actually meant to point out how resistent the hull side is against APFSDS.

As far as I can tell the T-14 has very little space (LOS) on the hull sides, atleast compared to the front.

 

All the crew is sitting next to each other... so yeah I think one side shot should kill the entire crew.