Armor Penetration Model?

[MarkSheppard]

I don't know, but it always seemed to me that one inch of steel armor = one armor unit

It's actually 1 unit of armor unit = 1 cm of armor.

The Formula to get Armor Thickness with slope taken into account is:

(i'll provide it in MS Excel format to make it easier for youa ll).

Armor Plate Effectiveness=(Thickness / (COS(Degrees from Vertical*0.017453293))

What this means is:
14mm of armor at 50 deg from vertical = 24mm
50mm of Armor at 55 deg from vertical = 87mm
and so on...

[MarkSheppard]

I did some tests with test stands and targets in WinMBT:

Gun had 10 AP Penetration, each time I ran a series, I changed the weapon range.



You can see how the penetration gets flatter out further the longer the weapon's range is.

[MarkSheppard]

Looking at that chart with the data laid out like it was gave me a brainflash, and I think I've finally figured out the penetration model:

NOTE: The following is my own deductions, it is not endorsed in anyway by SPCAMO, or the programmers!!!!

At a Gun's maximum range it will achieve only 33% of it's penetration.

At half of it's maximum range, it will achieve 66% penetration.

At a quarter of it's maximum range, it will achieve 82-83% penetration.

The variance in values between shots is the code that attempts to simulate real life in the game; e.g. simulating "lucky shots" that hit the tank in just the right spot to cause massive damage.

I did some tests to confirm my hypothesis before embarking on a statistical determination of the in between points; and have produced a spreadsheet that automatically adjusts itself to weapon range/penetration values; making developing guns for MBT/WW2 easy.

[Mobhack]

Now - you'll need to factor in warhead size !

A gun with the same stats, but with greater WH will have more "carry" for the larger round.

(WH size also factors in the kill routine, once a penetration has occured)

Cheers
Andy

[MarkSheppard]

A gun with the same stats, but with greater WH will have more "carry" for the larger round.

That makes quite a lot of sense; seeing as a bigger bullet will lose energy less over a distance versus a smaller, but faster round; you can see this in real live in the .45 ACP and the 9mm Parabellum debate.

(WH size also factors in the kill routine, once a penetration has occured)

Thanks for confirming my suspicions on this.

[Mobhack]

Also forgot - when the penetration value is exactly equal to the armour value, WH size determines the amount of shots that will actually penetrate. (Not part of the original SSI code which penetrated 100% if the AP value >=the armour value, we added the check for Pen==Armour).

So a WH of 1 or 2 say (e.g autocannon, ATR) whose Pen is exactly equal to the defending armour, will have a moderate chance of being stopped, whereas a tank gun of say WH 7 is rather more likely to manage to push through the defending plate in the equal armour situation.

Cheers
Andy