It’s been one of my my favourite rounds on some tanks.
The British 17pdr is a great gun, good reload, insane pen just on the AP.
The US 76mm on the M41A1 and the T92 is really fun too. Punchy, good reload pretty decent apds.
But my all time favourite so far is the British 20pdr apds. I recently started grinding England and bought the centurion action x. Let me tell you, that thing is a monster. I upper front plated a king tiger with it with ease, lower front plated a Maus. It’s point and click on panthers and t-34’s and t-44’s. The only thing I’ve ever had penning is the Somua SM’s upper front.
I honestly don’t really get the hate and I can only remember a few times it’s messed me up
(If the video attatches you’ll see)
I think it’s a godsend on some tanks(centurion action x my beloved)
for me a lot of times it creates little to no spall, and to me there’s also generally a better round than APDS at most BR’s, IMO, even if they have less pen
Core issue is not apds itself but which specific modifier/preset it uses.
Modern apds shells are really good and relatively consistent thus fun to use.
(e.g. 105mm DM13 on Leopard 1 or TAM)
The same can not be said for early apds (preset is called tank_apds_early or similar), which has abysmal post-pen damage, abysmal angle performance and is much more likely to shatter on overlapping/angled plates.
(e.g. 57 mm slpprj m/49 on Pvkv IV)
Shell shattered
Shell shattered
Non penetration
Ricochet
The commander is unconscious!
Yeah, that’s why I hate apds, although it can be decent on a few tanks
If I had to choose between APDS, HEAT and HESH (usually Sho’t and Tiran 4S loadout). I would take apds all the way to be my main ammunition, HESH being second.
Peple say APDS its unreliable, yeah they are kinda right, but comparing with HEAT, they are a lot better. HEAT can be intercepted by objects and even tree branches, also it may not penetrate bc of bad angle, tracks or bad armor coding, and when it penetrates it may not to any damage bc of fuel tank, or little damage.
Shatter is something that should be reviewed, since some bullets fragment more easily than others. The easiest to fragment are those from the Centurion and Conqueror, followed by the T-55, then the L28A1, and finally the M728. But the real problem with shatter is that it only occurs when a bullet penetrates armor of a certain thickness, passes through a gap, and then encounters another layer of armor. This means the bullet wouldn’t break if it passes through a fender only a few millimeters thick, or if it hits a spare track attached to the armor. What I mean is, it’s not possible for an IS-3 to stop a Conqueror APDS simply because it has a spare track that breaks the bullet, since that track is fixed to the hull, leaving less space. This would cause the bullet to lose some extra penetration by hitting a hard object before reaching the armor.
I honestly wouldnt mind shatter if the shattered pieces didnt just disappear into another dimension, they should still go through the BMP and wreck the thing, not act like a paintball
i really wish if gajin buffed the apds fragment instead of giving apds very high pen.
higher pen made worst for other tanks at 7.7+ armor mean nothing and the apds don’t do damage it’s like APCR.
instead gajin could buffed fragments and kept same pen values.
These rounds are already made of tungsten alloy, making that much less likely to happen. In fact, we talk about shatter as if the bullet explodes upon penetrating armor, when what actually happens is that when the bullet penetrates an armor plate, it loses structural integrity. Therefore, upon impacting the next plate, the bullet loses penetration, which was significant in the early APDS rounds and much less so in later versions like the M728 or L15.
For example, the Schürzen plates used by the Germans (the plates on the sides of the Pz4H) were designed for 14.5mm bullets. These bullets, upon penetrating the first 5mm of the plate, would deflect and lose structural integrity. Consequently, upon impacting the next 20mm of the side plate, the bullet had lost the ability to penetrate those 20mm.
Because it’s very unreliable and usaly result in very different out-come from the same shot
By example at times ive flanked a tiger II and shot it’s ammo raccked, but it did so few spalling the spall actually went INBETWEEN the ammorack, which was completly full
While at time ive shot a tiger II from the front in the left side of the turret and it nailed their ammo behind them
