Today I’d like to discuss a way to counteract spawn camping in all ground modes: Field Guns. Field Guns and Anti-Tank guns (I’ll just summaries it by referring to Field Guns from now on) are an essential part of warfare across all era’s and all thetas, by all nations and even today are vital parts of large military ground operations for defense. What I propose is a system that works somewhat similar to the AAA defenses in Air modes, lacking in the ‘sustained damage’ function, and instead having guns loaded with solid shot and Sabot relative to the Br, while still retaining the destructible status for anyone who managers to pick them off one by one, but like in Air modes, the defenses will respawn after a certain amount of time has passed.
I want to start with a pro’s and con’s list before this goes further into details about the upsides and potential downsides (a summery)
Pro’s:
- Offers a defensive line around the spawn areas to deter and counter anyone choosing to abuse the in-game system
- Would highlight any areas of maps where perhaps the spawns need to be shifted or the maps altered in order to avoid long-range camping and sightlines into the spawn
- Increases there sense of battlefield diversity and sense of scale for the battle as a whole, aligning it ever so closer to that large-scale combined arms feeling that War Thunder is striving for more (with new objectives and mechanics and such)
Con’s:
- This is an RNG machinic, with all the downsides of such. This has the potential to lead to just random deaths that some players may feel are underserved, as it was not by a player or they were ‘jus passing by’
- May ask you to suspend your disbelieve a little more as direct fire field guns become less and less common
An explanation of two the points:
- Offers a defensive line…
In Ground modes as of right now, there is no way to really counteract camping. On some maps, the spawn is level with the terrain generally found along the map, sometimes with a little cover, other times with none, and sometimes the spawns are set in a ditch - giving the enemy to hull-down position to strike at you as you spawn back in, usually in progressively worse vehicles for most players. Currently the only thing outside of map design you have to defend yourself with is a spawn radar that tells you where the enemy’s are on the mini-map when they are in-range of the spawn, but this feature can only do so much when there are enemy’s you are unable to knock out yourself (i.e. too much armor or too little gun) or there are just too many of them, all firing machine guns, waiting for one bullet to click and your spawn protection run out…
(WW2)
I propose a system, a line of field guns around each spawn to shoot at enemy tanks with solid shot or Sabot depending on the Br. For Reserve and lowly Br’s, I propose something similar to the British QF 2-Pounder 40mm gun; praised as one of the best anti-tank guns of its time and certainly enough punch to go through any tank frontally at those Br’s and even more so. Or perhaps the German 5cm KwK 38 L/42, and for the Soviets, the 45mm 20-K tank gun - all would fare well against armor at those early Br’s. Moving up a little more these could be increased to the British OQF 6-pounder 57mm cannon, with a very respectable penetration still, but could even be moved up further to an outright QF 17-pounder 76.2mm (firing Shot Mk.8) to maintain absolute guarantee that the guns maintain the ability to counter any threat that may be abusing the in-game system. This could also be bolstered by the German 7.5cm KwK Panzerabwehrkanone 42 (the Pak. 42) anti-tank gun and the Soviet D-5T 85mm. The final iteration of the WW2 defensive guns would, to ensure supremacy to counter all threats, best be suited for the QF 17-pounder armed with Shot SV Mk.1 APDS, the 8.8cm Pak. 43, and the Soviet 107mm Divisional Gun M1940 (M-60). All these guns would be intended to fire only solid shot, as for the highest penetration and to counter some of the critiques validly levied against RNG systems, work on only disabling the vehicles (i.e. breach destruction, driver/engine hits, gunner/loader knock-outs, etc.) This thereby causing the attacker to rethink their strategy and by time for the defendant to leave the spawn or counter the attacker while they repair.
(Cold War to Present)
The list of field guns goes on and on, decreasing the range of choice more as the Cold war closes, but many of them feature high-caliber guns well over the 105mm mark armed with HEAT-T, HEAT-FS-T (doesn’t ‘nuke’ a tanks inside like an APHE still so I thought I’d suggest it), APDS-T, APDS-FS-T (combined with the thinner hull armor of most cold war MBT’s it would tear any one of them to pieces, such as the Leopard 1’s, AMX-30’a, Chieftain’s, etc.), with most nations transitioning to Gun Howitzers, such as the American M198 howitzer (155mm, which could very well still be used as spawn defense) but Russia does keep 2 notable field gun in service today: The 100mm Anti-Tank gun T-12 and the 2A36 Giantsint-B (152.4mm). The former has the capacity to fire Sabot and the latter with the expected selection of HE-F and other chemical munitions, but also a solid AP-T. This of course may not be able to pen all MBT’s frontally, but perhaps the guns could be more spread out across the back lines of the maps the higher in Br they get - it may only be a 49 Caliber, but it has a barrel length of 8.197 meters . . . Easily enough to penetrate and wreck an MBT in War Thunder.
- This is an RNG mechanic…
This mechanic is completely based on the War thunder AI, and as much of a laugh the plane’s pathfinding can be, anyone who’s spend some time with CDK missions will know gun AI in War Thunder is laser accurate… They aim center-mass and they almost never miss, and that is on moving platforms. They will almost always get your breach or your engine and crew. The downsides that come from this potential implementation is that there is no player skill involved, it would just be if the parameters are met for it to begin engaging enemies, it would almost guaranteed to instantly connect with something important. So to counter the potential unfairness, as opposed to a mine lets say where you’re driving along and then boom, you’ve been struck and disabled or worse, knocked out by something you never knew or could have know was there, this instead could have a limited range like the spawn radar or airfield AAA. This allows for players to known the positions roughly of a ‘line in the sand’ they should not cross, less they wish to be engaged, to cross in-front of the spawn around the middle of the map, 3/4 of the map, for flanking maneuvers to get around points or enemies, but still punish those looking to abuse the system by encroaching on the spawns directly.
The potential issue with the first system is that the guns are limited by range and terrain, so for those flatter, open maps I mentioned, the guns can be picked off from a far, and then after, the players as well, without posing any risk to the attackers and leaving us in square 1, such as on Carpathians (all maps) where the southern spawn can take vehicles better specified for long range, climb the hill behind their spawn with hard cover, ands then pick every enemy out of the North-West spawn off. They could also be placed in not ideal positions such as behind cover or the foot of a hill, such as on Conquest #2 Ardennes. So I propose a second potential as well: The guns have a range as far as their LOS, placed in positions where they do not have (or rather, should not have, direct LOS to the enemy spawn or objectives. Though admittingly this solution would be worse off as they would force flanking vehicles to duke it out with large caliber field guns before seeing any peer-on-peer combat. It would also be more of a test to show if a map has well designed spawns or not, as if players are getting sniped off of the objectives by bot guns, or worse, their spawn, it would show a needed rework for some map spawns.
I’m sorry that this is rushed and quite basic or worse, boring… I’ve never made a suggestion before. '^^ I just work up one morning and was sold on the idea of a hard-lining defense possibility to deter SC. I’m not terribly knowledgeable on field guns and I’d love if anyone in the comments knew more about them and if this is more or less feasible to you, and I hope it is an interesting consideration for you all too.
- Yes
- No