SPAAs against tanks is realistic and fair

As much as I want to agree with how much my barrel+breech (And vertical drive in some cases) is taken out across vehicles, that is an absolutely HORRENDOUS take, and would only make the game less enjoyable.

But, buffing the damage they can take is ALSO a horrible idea, because it’s already busted as is. A lot of times, barrels can be seen tanking shots that they have absolutely NO business tanking because it hit in a slightly weird way. Until Gaijin fixes that, why make barrels stronger?

I’d rather they just ignore any potential outcry (Like they should’ve also done with the Thai VT-4 incident) and make the barrels of all tanks/vehicles have proper physical collision models. That could fix a handful of issues in CQC (Like people shoving their barrel inside tanks, sticking their guns into walls while side-scraping, sticking it through walls to bait people into firing at their gun, etc), and force people to be slightly more careful in urban maps, since they won’t be able to turn the gun through buildings anymore.

Also it’d allow for barrel sword fighting, which many people can probably agree could be fun to do.

I was referring solely to barrels, not breeches.

Barrels are impossible to hide in any tank. Shooting the barrel tips of tanks in front of you is infuriating and also wildly unrealistic (only one recorded instance of a front-on barrel shot by accident in WW2). Having a “weakspot” which cannot be hidden means functionally your heavy tank’s armor rarely matters when every possible opponent that isn’t dumb always shoots your gun first!

If a tank’s design is such that its breech protrudes outside its turret, and it gets shot, that is a weakness of the tank’s design. At least breeches usually have considerable armor, so something that can pen your breech probably could pen your turret, too.

Barrels can be crippled by stuff with far less penetration than is required to go through your turret. That is why I find them infuriating. It should not be possible to have the whole gun disabled because someone hits your muzzle brake.

like what? why should this tactic, primarily used by vehicles that are OUTCLASSED in their current fight, be removed?

Not really, yes they are impossible to hide if you mean to engage the guy but you can usually hide it before going around corners or before cresting hills by just placing it behind the cover.

Can be considered annoying but this isnt good reason to remove a tactic that is required for some vehicles to perform

lots of tactics in game don’t line 1:1 up with irl but if you took a vehicle and shot the other tank’s barrel it would absolutely disable it irl. Just because it wasn’t really done often doesn’t mean it wasn’t possible or isn’t realistic.

This is copium. Your armor means that the enemy has to take a much higher amount of time deciding where to shoot and actually aiming compared to lighter tanks. This presents an inherent natural advantage regarding opening moves in engagements. Just because they can shoot your barrel with a precise shot does not mean your entire tank was invalidated. You can often drive right back into cover and repair because said armor prevents them from doing more.

2 Likes

I’m aware of that, I’m just throwing it in because the breeches of tanks in WT get taken out just as often as barrels, and on some tanks it is quite easy.
If you’re gonna take away barrel damage, you may as well take away breech damage, too.

1 Like

Yes. If you run into something you can’t pen, you should die, not have a “get outta jail free card.”

Maybe then “but muh jumBO” would drop in battle statistics enough to go back down in BR without said option available.

Barrels have way less tolerance to damage ingame and are not armored to anywhere near the degree. Tanks with large calibers and giant muzzle brakes are unfairly punished when they already have the downsides of lots of armor weighing them down.

“Balance” does NOT mean every vehicle must frontally pen every other vehicle somewhere, dude.

Urban maps make barrel shots easy. Doubly so if the tank has a giant muzzle brake, large caliber gun, or both. So no, barrel shots must go.

Do we not already have enough means to deal with heavy tanks these days between 1) rat maze maps they can’t be prepared for every approach through 2) CAS 3) Overpressure HE Artillery 4) HEATFS & APDS still being very common in 5.7+?

We don’t need barrel damage anymore on top of all that. All it does is ensure heavies remain irrelevant because no matter what they encounter, that something they encounter can frontally pen them somewhere.

That’s really dumb not gonna lie.

It isn’t one. You don’t die by having your breach or gun shot out. The other guy still has to find a way to penetrate you. Further, you could have just shot him first. Goes without saying but here we are.

And what happens when its 4.7 again and now 3.7-4.7 can’t penetrate it? Do they also plummet in BR?

Here’s an education for you. Shooting somebodys barrel out means you explicitly did not penetrate their tank… you shot the barrel.

Not really. If this happens to you often I suggest minding where you place your gun.

Fortunately, gaijin has no plans for this.

Most maps are either giant open field maps or corridor maps. Please. In both cases the heavy has the advantage so long as you aren’t flanked.

The overwhelming majority of heavy tanks are considered meta competitive vehicles for their BR, including but not limited to:

M4A3E2 (75), T26E5, T34, T29, Tiger 1 variants, Tiger 2 variants, KV-1 series, etc

2 Likes

Except it is actually, when the guy shoots your barrel out and then strolls up to your side for a finishing shot. And that’s IF the map even allows any sort of retreat, IF your tank has useful reverse speed.

I’d either 1) drop the Jumbo 75s to 5.0-5.3 and leave them there or 2) better yet, just un-nerf all APCR globally. The Jumbos would be juuuust fine if their best shell penned its correct 187mm and spalled like the solid AP does.

He still can’t shoot back, counts as a penetration in my book.

Heavy armor only is relevant in my eyes when your opponent has no choice but to either 1) shoot and non-pen or 2) don’t shoot at all.

I’m referring to the rolling pillboxes that don’t have the mobility offered by the “heaviums.” Maus, T95, Black Prince, Tortoise, etc. You get your barrel out on any of those and you may as well J out.

Failure of positioning on your part. You are point blank to him, without teammates, and you let him shoot your barrel out?

Then your book was written poorly.

This is not a reasonable standpoint. See:

These vehicles simply don’t fit the meta the game wants which is for you to not have awful mobility.

I think the Flakpanzer 341 is OP. Also i was once penned by a Duster while in a Pershing. All those SPAA like the Gepard are also OP they can ricochet shots of my OF-40’s turret face into the crew compartment and kill my crew. But i agree some SPAA are just sad and just dont work. Like the R3 T20 is just sad the hvap shatters probably 1/2 of the time. But some SPAA shouldnt br as accurate because well its annoying when a stabilized SPAA like the ZA-35 rushes and gets 10-12 kills with ease.

2 Likes

You don’t seem to comprehend that many big vehicles have much larger muzzle brakes and therefore are much easier to hit in sudden surprise frontal encounters.

You want to protect your built-in cheat. Admit it.

I will accept nothing less. Barrel damage is a far bigger cheat than anyone can dare claim CAS to be. And it’d solve the SPAAG problems quite substantially since now even if they spam your front suddenly you will still be able to shoot them.

Pretty low bar ngl, considering the Pershing side armor may as well not exist with how thin it is.

It’s got 76mm hull sides and 63mm turret sides, IIRC? That is approaching T-44 levels and isn’t “nonexistent.”

1 Like

Might be misremembering but I thought it was more like 67mm on the lower sides, max, possibly being lower. Also, I doubt that the turret is thinner than the lower side of the hull, since the turret side is generally going to try and be more protected afaik. You might have it backwards.

Either way, my point is that it has thin enough lower side armor that a good portion of lower caliber SPAA vehicles can generally get through when up close to it.
You’re best off not revealing your side armor in it, since most things can and will go through, even at somewhat steep angles.

Barrel damage should never be removed, but if you want a partial solution the camera from tank gunner sight could be forced in RB, and not just sim.

1 Like

In my opinion, being able to shoot with the barrel damage should be a thing, at least give it less accuracy and higher dispersion, if I have no parts in said vehicle, even with the barrel torn apart I can shoot after waiting it “repairs” then shoot again with odds that it will fail and I’ll need to “repair” again to, if God’s allow my poor soul, actually shoot this time.

Or, revert the change. It was fine beforehand, a great SPAA for doing AA things and worked against some ground vehicles in a pinch.

And why not? Because it would solve the vast majority of SPAAG complaints overnight, since most SPAAG are only able to kill tanks by first track-&-barrel torturing them so they can’t move nor shoot back. Without barrel damage existing at all, SPAAG would only at best be able to blind someone but not stop them from deleting said SPAAG.

And heavy armor which has no mobility would also benefit greatly.

Because it is unrealistic, and that type of unrealistic feature should not be in war thunder. It also allows uptiered tanks to more easily fight more armoured vehicles without being a free kill.

If a full sized tank rounds hits another tanks barrel, it should be destroyed.

1 Like

You have a solid point. However, in reference to the flakpanzer 341 it was unfair as gaijin boosted the pen of aphe but kept it at 6.3 where it waaaaaay over performed. This problem is ok tho since it got moved up. The main problem with spaa is the aphe bug, where aphe ignores armour when a tank is reversing. If this is fixed, spaa should be fine

Nononononononononono that would break the game. If the jumbo is 5.0 it would be able to wipe ever lobby it went into. Also APCR doesn’t have the 187 mm of pen because when armour is angled, the shell shatters. This is why apcr is bad, it is only useful against flat armour