Rocket inconsistencies.

[chuckfourth]

Hi All
Looking at the USA weapon 175 the "Holy Moses 5in" should range be 44 not 96?
The US weapon 174 "FFAR 5in Rckt" should also have its range dropped to 32 from 96?
see
http://www.tarrif.net/wwii/guides/a2g_rockets_2.htm
I also have my doubts about an accuracy of 5 for US weapons 173 174 and 175 they should probably be 1 as
"the rocket projectiles were inaccurate and took some considerable skill to aim properly and allow for the drop after firing"
from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawker_Typhoon
Though this is a quote for the Britsh 60 pdr Rocket looking at images of how the Holy Moses, etc are mounted suggests that it too had to be dropped before firing resulting in the same accuracy dropoff. also see
http://www.vmb-613.com/photographs/loading_hvars.html
"These weapons (Holy Moses) were unguided. Post-war survey results showed that they were not very effective against Japanese concrete reinforced bomb shelters and gun emplacements."
German rockets 173 and 174 and Russian Rockets 173 and 175 seem to have a size of 4 maybe this should be 1?
Best Chuck

[DRG]

I'll look into the range and accuracy issues but weapon size has no bearing on any aspect of that particular weapon type at all so they could be zero or 100 or anything in between

Don

[thatguy96]

I did notice that the FFAR (Weapon 175) and HVAR (Weapon 176) were identical in OOB12. The FFAR is more akin to the British RP-3.

Also, at Designtion Systems.Net it says that the HVAR's range was 3 miles which is consistent with the 96 range. Andreas Parsch's research is very reliable. The FFAR's range should be reduced though, and its stats should not be identical to that of the HVAR.

[DRG]

thatguy96 said:
I did notice that the FFAR (Weapon 175) and HVAR (Weapon 176) were identical in OOB12. The FFAR is more akin to the British RP-3.

Also, at Designtion Systems.Net it says that the HVAR's range was 3 miles which is consistent with the 96 range. Andreas Parsch's research is very reliable. The FFAR's range should be reduced though, and its stats should not be identical to that of the HVAR.

Yes but.... that website shows this under "warhead" for both rockets

Warhead 20 kg (45 lb) HE warhead (& others)

So yes the range should be altered for the FFAR to 32 ( and the 5" HVAR "Holy Moses" is fine where it is at 96 ) but it appears the warhead for both rockets is the same

Don

[thatguy96]

I would think that despite the warhead being the same, the penetration values for a rocket traveling at 485 mph at launch and one traveling at 950 mph at launch would be significantly different. I would think the HE Pen values might be different, even if the HEK remained untouched.

There was also a SAP warhead that Parsch talks about, but does not list in the table beyond "(& others)". I don't know much about physics though beyond what I learned in highschool, so I could easily be wrong.

[DRG]

thatguy96 said:
I would think that despite the warhead being the same, the penetration values for a rocket traveling at 485 mph at launch and one traveling at 950 mph at launch would be significantly different. I would think the HE Pen values might be different, even if the HEK remained untouched.

There was also a SAP warhead that Parsch talks about, but does not list in the table beyond "(& others)". I don't know much about physics though beyond what I learned in highschool, so I could easily be wrong.

Fair enough. If you find any HE pen numbers for that rocket let us know. In the meantine I'll dig around and see what I can come up with

EDIT >>> OK, looking at the MBT OOB's does indeed show a difference between those two rockets. I'll go with the MBT stats for it

Don

[chuckfourth]

Hello again
Hi Thatguy96 I have no doubt that Andreas Parsch's site is correct. However his site is not WW2 specific, for instance the MK 16 zuni wasnt used until after the war. Tarrifs site that I pointed out is restricted to WW2. As the Holy Moses was still in use during the Korean War I suspect that the 3 mile range would be for the post WW2 version. The period between the two wars is probably long enough to have improved the explosive used to propel the rocket giving the greater range. So tarrifs site (2200) is no doubt correct for the WW2 version and Andreas Parsch's site is probably correct for the Korean war version.
The Holy Moses SAP version according to Tarrifs site appears to be a solid shot. At the velocities these rockets traveled at they are not particularily good at getting through armour. for instance the British 60 pounder HE/SAP penetrates 33 mm of steel and the Holy Moses solid shot penetrates 38 mm of steel. This may only equate to half these figures when hitting proper armour. As the solid shot has no explosive you really need to have planes armed with either the HE or the solid shot versions, though I doubt the solid shot version were used much as they are designed to penetrate ships. If you are firing the HE versions then the extra velocity would be lucky to buy you IMHO an extra cm of armour penetration. Of interest from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawker_Typhoon
"Although great things were expected against the heavily armored tanks of the Wehrmacht, the rockets needed to hit the thin-walled engine compartment or the tank's tracks to really have any destructive effect. Analysis of destroyed tanks after the Normandy battle showed a 'hit-rate' for the air-fired rockets of only 4%"
Also I personally would be interested to Know how the HE Penetration and AP penetration values relate, ie a HE penetration of 22 is certainly not the same as AP penetration of 22 Ive found.
Best Regards Chuck.

[DRG]

In regards to range. We have two "sources" . One that deals with 5 inch rockets in general and may or may not contain stats for the post WW2 variety rockets and one that deals with WW2 specifically and claims a much reduced range for the same rocket

And then there's "the game "

Time for a reality check.

In this game the human player has NO input at all on when an aircraft fires rockets of this type. None.. That is entirely under "AI" control no matter if it's the player 2 "AI" or the player 1 it's the GAME that decides when to launch these class of rockets at ground targets

Here's a little test to run as experience is a better teacher. Set up a game with a variety of aircraft armed with rockets. Set the maximum visibility ( 90 ) and set it up on a map with few hills and trees so the aircraft have a clear view of any targets. ( set it up on a perfectly flat map with no terrain other than grass if you like )

Now buy a variety of rocket carrying aircraft using the "allies" button. Buy German FW 190's with RackPzgr 8.8cm, Buy Russian aircraft with RS-132's , Buy USMC with 4.5, 5inch HVAR and FFAR rockets and Brit Typhoons with the 60 pounders and send them out to hunt targets and you will find that the range the game is set to fire those rockets is, on average, five hexes ( 250 yards ) give or take one hex so ALL those rockets, irregardless of their maximum range, are fired at their targets from between 200 and 300 yards so whether the "maximum" range for weapon class 11 "rockets" is 44 hexes or 96 hexes is totally irrelevant.

"Maximum" range for weapon class 11 "rockets" never EVER comes into play for these things becasue the game is programed to get the aircraft in up close and personal before launching.


Don

[chuckfourth]

Hi Don
Yes you are very correct the range doesnt seem to have much bearing on anything, though various people have mentioned that it does in the DOS forum. So they put me on a red herring.
However, during my testing I noticed something I think is a bit odd. In 3 sets of 24 typhoons shooting at the fronts of 3 sets of 24 spotted pz 4 g's in March 44 with visibility set to 50. I got 15 16 and 15 tanks hit, with some of the tanks hit multiple times. This is without having a second run to use up the remaining couple of rockets most typhoons still had. For the typhoons (unit 095) I removed the ammunition from the hispano cannons so only rockets were fired. The tanks were spread out so no "shrapnel" hits.
My point would be that the hit rate mentioned above of 4% for typhoon rockets and the information that these 60 pounders were very inaccurate doesnt seem to be modeled very well in the game. Rather than a 4% hit rate the game has about a 65% hit rate for these rockets (per strike).
Now Ill add a bit more on the assumption that FireControl (FC) affects all four weapon slots.
I realise that these Rockets already have the lowest accuracy of 1 and that the planes very high (FC) of 15 (for the hispano cannons) may eclipse the weapon accuracy values. The only way I can think of to model the accuracy of the cannon and the (in)accuracy of the rockets when fired from the single (high FC) plane is to drop the FC values and raise aircraft weapon accuracy values. Perhaps this can be done so that overall the accuracy/fire control value remains similar but the weapons can then be differentiated. Maybe the rocket salvo could be modeled as a single blast rather than eight seperate rockets giving a lower hit rate. Similar concept to having the KWK 38 firing bursts. You of course may see other ways this could be solved.
Problem being of course that maybe all plane fired rockets are way too accurate making the rocket armed planes much better tank kilers/disablers than they really were.
If all weapon slots share the same FC value then bombs are also way too accurate (except dive bombers bombs).
Also I have always been puzzled that purpose designed ground attack aircraft and fighter bombers have the same FC values. I would have though a ground attack aircraft would have a better FC than a dive bomber. And that fighters (fighter bombers) travelling much faster, designed to be twitchy rather than stable and without proper sights would have a way lower FC than a ground attack aircraft.
Please feel free to move this thread to the WW2 General Discussion forum if you think it is about the game system.
Best Regards Chuck.

[DRG]

We made alterations to the code of both games weeks ago regarding secondary blast effects of those type of rockets so they are less deadly overall than before.

If you search through the threads I know you'll find other people complaining at one time or another that aircraft are useless at hitting anything which balances out your assertion that they are too deadly.

The Germans knew in 1944 that if you put a tank in the open ( "spotted" "with visibility set to 50" )when there were Jabos in the sky that tank was dead meat. You've rediscovered a historical truth .

We have no plans to further "de-tune" the aircraft .

Don