FAPDS is missing for the Gepard 1A2. It was Gepard 1A2’s main ammunition type for anti-air and vs. hard/semi hard ground targets. It was the core of the upgrade from basic Gepard to 1A2. FAPDS had much higher velocity and more flat trajectory, upping the effective range vs. any kind of target.
This would be a truly interesting ammo type in War Thunder and the most advanced Gepard version 1A2 (Ger only). Full belt of 35mm DM33 (FAPDS) and the reserve drums for 35mm DM23 (APDS). FAPDS would have bit less penetration power than APDS (around 100mm), but more post pen fragmentation. While APDS (127mm pen) pens more with less fragementation post pen.
There are even prototypes with thermal viewers and test footage with those sights. Others prototypes had modded muzzle brakes with coils to use the 35mm AHEAD ammo.
Gepard is full of opportunities and could get some interesting upgrades. Sadly its not Russian.
M163 (and other Vulcan based SPAA) is a similar case. The Mk.149 sabot is the preferred round against air targets due to increased range, however it’s completely missing ingame.
Just got home from School. Spading the SPAA at the moment, so can share more recent ones if anyone requests anymore soon.
EDIT: Irrelevant for this topic below, but first game of the day 😂Playing Soviet vehicles on Chinese TT I never played is a nice learning curve for me. Slowly adapting to its playstyle.
Sometimes I do spawn on it first, sometimes I don’t. Really depends on my mood. But whenever I do spawn on them first its because I just unlocked it and couldn’t wait to try it out without a line up. Then I go back to using it when I need it.
PGZ09, Falcon, ZA-35 are going .3+ a Br now. However, they will still destroy tanks regardless. PGZ09 can will still do great at 9.0, Falcon barley used for AA, mostly as IFV. Za-35 will still be manageable for air, but slightly lowered its effectiveness. For its IFV like role, still going to melt tanks.
I think this Br nerf, if it really is one, was just to let 7.3 tanks have some breathing room against them since its the most used.
Because WT’s current gameplay encourages it, plain and simple.
To be effective in any SPAAG, radar or otherwise, you gotta move to a spot where planes don’t expect you to be so you can surprise them with a hail of bullets before they can react.
Yet, average players have consistently shown they will not under any circumstances move outside the confines of their own spawn if their SPAAG vehicle is incapable of defending itself against enemy tanks at least through side or rear shots. The sole exception is cap rush J out, but that is not terribly common anymore with all the light tanks getting scouting cost reductions on aircraft.
Thus, I think it’s overdue for snail to move in the opposite direction. Enable and encourage tank-busting SPAAGs instead of continuing to tell them to kill tanks via the gameplay setup but then punish them when they do just that. This includes but is not limited to: restoring full APCR belts for SPAAGs lacking them, removal of idiotic shell shattering entirely, rebuffing all APCR, sharp-nosed APDS, and small-caliber APFSDS postpen, removal of doctrinal shell count limits on SPAAG AP(FS)DS, addition of missing anti-tank shells for various SPAAGs, so on and so forth.
Separately, (re)buff SPAAG’s ability to swat down planes to the point where using any SPAAG successfully in its intended role at any BR is about as easy as using CAS is at the same BR. This means things like short-range lead indicators for ones lacking radars, making Stingers and Starstreaks work correctly, nerfing the very overperforming LDIRCM making some helis immune to almost all missiles (because there is no other solution to that issue besides nerfing it), so on and so forth.
The game has been trying to box in people to do one thing for years, and it isn’t working. Doing the same thing and expecting a different result is insanity, is it not?
Nope. Current 35mm spaa are BETTER MBTs than the ACTUAL MBTs at their BR with more effective guns than the 105s and 120mms the MBTs have. The damage they do is ridiculous and unfair.
Sure, they will also go up 2.0 BRs from their current position, so gepard will be 10.3, and the gepard with stingers will be 11.7, sound good?
Part of the “encouragement” would be intentionally lowering them all to force people to get used to all SPAAGs actually being a threat to tanks. The more they scream, the lower they go, until the screamers cry themselves to sleep, grow a set, and go learn to kill them, which isn’t hard because for all the strength of the 35mm Oerlikons, their turrets are made of glass. Right now the XM246 is a little stupid, and that should be addressed.
I fail to see how any SPAAG which can be hosed down by 14.5mm MGs and killed is “a more effective MBT than actual MBTs.” Ambushing a flanking party of stupid people with a bunch of side shots before any can react? Yeah I can see that. But those 35mm Oerlikon platforms will be stopped by armor thicker than 60mm in most cases, they don’t have a lot of gun depression compared to most non-Russian MBTs, they’re massive, and in many cases the hulls of them are not well-armored either (Finnish one is the exception to a point).
This is a joke. I can’t take you even remotely seriously. 35mm spaa are already, as of right now, better than MBTs at the same BR as them. You are almost always better off playing a gepard or za35 or xm246 over playing any MBT at the same BR. These SPAA auto-delete everything they look at, are extremely easy to use, and cost 80sp to spawn.
You’re basically just admitting to trolling for attention here. This is obviously not reasonable. I think you just want attention.
Because they have far faster react times than any mbt being both more mobile on the hull and having far more mobile turrets, combined with the need to basically not aim at all and instantly obliterate anything they glance at? Frontally? Easily?
You clearly do not play this game.
Frankly I don’t think you’re very good at this game at all and you’re just here to troll for attention.
Yep, looked up your stats. Mediocre player who does not actually play the BRs at all that are being spoken about.
People love to complain about CAS, but then when some counters to CAS are actually able to be effective, they get screamed about until they are no longer effective at defending themselves, after which they sit uselessly in spawn and their effectiveness vs CAS plummets, leading to resumption of complaints about CAS.
I personally would rather see people scream about SPAA than scream about CAS if given the choice. I’ve played the Gepard and gotten some funny tank kills with it, but most of those were either side shots through thin side armor (which any tank could do from much further away at a greater variety of angles) or cupola shots (a BS feature for any APHE). Barrel damage-induced kills are indeed obnoxious, but you don’t solve that by nerfing SPAAG - you update how barrel damage works.
No, I’m sick of the screaming and the devs caving to said screaming which more often than not makes the entire game worse. Hence I want to see the screamers broken by wearing themselves out until they give the fuck up.
This is a problem of city maps forcing engagement at point blank, first and foremost. Outside short range the 35mm Oerlikons lose their effectiveness. You solve this by opening up maps so city is no more than one of the three objectives, not by nerfing SPAAG.
This is a problem of armor holes, which only remain an issue because the devs still have not made every tank use a fully volumetric armor model. You solve this by slowing down new vehicle addition and making all tanks use fully volumetric armor models with no more seams between plates or MG port holes.
This is a problem of barrel damage enabling vehicles with weak guns to prevent opponents from shooting. You solve this by making shooting barrel tips no longer prevent successful firing of the gun.
This is a problem of cupola shots being allowed at all, as a side effect of APHE postpen being ridiculous. You solve this by globally reducing APHE postpen.
None of these are exclusively the domain of SPAAG - SPAAG just happen to be good at exploiting these issues that existed long before any 35mm Oerlikon was added. You don’t solve any of these by nerfing SPAAGs - unless your only goal is to throw a rug over these and other puke stains instead of actually cleaning them up properly…
I have played the game for 10+ years, man. Every major vehicle type outside higher tiers, because that level of grind and stale gameplay have turned me very much off.
Nope, I am here to offer new ideas which have not been tried before. I see a game I enjoy slowly stabbing itself to death because it refuses to try innovative solutions to its long-term problems.
The game has been attempting to hem people in by repeatedly nerfing SPAAGs, hoping they get used for their intended job of hunting CAS. It hasn’t worked. Thus, I had the “controversial” idea of proceeding in the other direction, of restoring and buffing their tank-killing ability alongside making their use against CAS considerably easier, both in spite of and to spite the people screaming about SPAAGs being “OP.”
I have played the Gepard, FYI, and its about halfway spaded. I have gotten some kills in it that I think were bullshit (M48s and M60s through cupolas). I have gotten many more which were not bullshit (like hosing down a Conqueror who drove past with his hull side visible that’s only 38mm thick), especially light tanks.
But I refuse to have any arguments about individual vehicle stats, because I see such arguments as infantile. Anyone who sweats enough can artificially inflate stats to be whatever they want them to be - I just choose not do do such, because at the end of the day, it’s a GAME, not a JOB.
By all means, make me laugh some more by proving your immaturity since you choose to bring up player stats. The fact that you resort to stat-whoring suggests you have no actual arguments left. There are many people here and on the old forum I disagreed with, sometimes quite strongly, but I have never even once sunk low enough to stalk someone’s player statistics. If we’re talking vehicle characteristics, player statistics should not be particularly relevant, now should they?
This has nothing to do with CAS. This has to do with SPAA being better than MBTs at the same BR at being MBTs. You are better off playing xm246/gepard/za-35 than leopard 1/amx-30/amx-32/m60 etc right now.
They NEVER cater to complaints.
You’re just trolling for attention.
My entire french lineup at 10.0 is frontally penetrable by the 35mm spaa’s from 500-800 meters out.
SPAA do this far better than MBTs because they have no possibility of failing to kill instantly with 30 nuke APHE shells entering the cabin instantly and with faster rotating turrets and more mobile hulls.
High caliber APHE overpens cupolas. SPAA doesn’t and nukes the interior. You can also miss with high pen guns. You cannot miss with 35mm’s rate of fire. I have cross mapped tanks into their cupolas from 1km+ away.
Dumbs down the game instead of fixing the problem vehicles.
Your stats do not show what you claim.
You’ve suggested to just make the entire community resent the game. Congratulations.
Name 3 nerfs to SPAAGs.
Trolling.
So little experience.
No. You have to be good. Not being good = not getting good stats.
I’m just saying you have no idea what you’re talking about and you’re here to get attention.
