Gun Effectiveness

[Righteous26 70]

Is there a way to adjust the gun effectiveness in SF2? The <=30mm guns all seem to be much too powerful.

[+dtmdragon 2,703]

I think given the size of 30mm rounds, the kinetic energy they have when fired, plus the explosive armour piercing warheads, they are pretty accurate in the game.

[+EricJ 4,244]

You may want to open up the specific gun  _data file and mess with the muzzleVel to see if you can get something less damaging or less speedy. There is no hit point structure for the guns so you can't lower it or raise it to suit your level of damage and so on.

[Wrench 9,846]

yes, they are effective.

leave them alone. all of this has been covered in the last 18 years, and the guns are pretty much correct.

[Righteous26 70]

Not at all. Two 14.5mm rounds do not tear the flaps off an A-10 and knock the AIM-9s off. A-10s have been hit with missiles and 57mm+ guns and had less damage than what I saw in the game.

The GAU-8 30mm can't penetrate a T-72 from the front or sides at any range yet it takes only one or two hits to reliably destroy one regardless of angle.

[+dtmdragon 2,703]

Just remember for every round you can see there are 3-4 hitting that you can't as tracer are every 3rd or 5th round (can't remember the default game setting).

A 14.5mm HEI round leaves the barrel at 3,300 ft per second and imparts 29,850 Joules (22,020 ft⋅lbf) of energy. That's just the kinetic energy and doesn't include the explosive or incendiary effect of the warhead.

Sounds like plenty enough to knock off a flap or a couple of AIM-9 missile, lucky it didn't set the rocket motor or missile warhead off! 😁 just remember the A-10 survivability is about being able to take damage to core systems with multiple redundancy. It's not a flying tank with armored flaps etc.

Killing a T-72 from any angle is probably more of a game engine/ damage modeling issue. A T-72 could be completely destroyed from a 45 degree angle onto the top of the turret. However an attack from any other angle would still likely result in a mobility/ mission/ communication/ sensor/ Weapon kill. The game cannot model that so the tank is simply destroyed completely in the game.

Edited November 21, 2021 by dtmdragon

[Righteous26 70]

I use the numbers the computer gives me in the post mission summary to determine how many times I hit the enemy and how many times they hit me. Those numbers are for all hits not just tracers.

Ball rounds just punch holes in sheet metal. A 14.5mm round will not take a large component with it.

The warheads are usually shock resistant and not armed on the pylons anyway. It takes at least a 10g acceleration to arm a missile warhead. Shooting it won't detonate it.

If the motor is hit the missile will just leave the rail. This happened to an A-10 pilot in Desert Storm.

The pilot indicates there were 378 holes in the plane. He also states that the ordnance he was carrying had at least 40 holes in it. He lost part of the hydraulics but no major assemblies appear to have detached. 14.5mm rounds just don't do that to aircraft especially those designed to survive 23mm rounds which was the Warsaw Pact standard for AAA systems supporting tank units when the A-10 was designed. Several of the holes shown in the video are 20mm plus.

Here is the video link:

That plane has far more than two holes in it. The pilot indicates there were 378 holes in the plane. He also states that the ordnance he was carrying had at least 40 holes in it. He lost part of the hydraulics but no major assemblies appear to have detached. 14.5mm rounds just don't do that to aircraft especially those designed to survive 23mm rounds which was the Warsaw Pact standard for AA systems supporting tank units when the A-10 was designed. Several of the holes shown in the video are 20mm plus.

[+Nyghtfall 2,154]

Then stop talking on what has to be and what the reality is like and start changing the hell out of SF2 to your liking. But keep in mind: this will include trial and error and other timeconsuming parts on your end. I just mention this, because thats the part many "talkers" didn't want to see in the near past...

[+Trotski 936]

Point one, this is an old (ish) Flight simulator. Point two, this is not the hyper realistic DCS. Point three, there has to be some poetic/artistic licences taken, as this is a simulator, not real life, the guns in game however, are good, yes maybe your example is on the more extreme end of the scale, also I am not sure of the hitbox/damage box on the A-10 modelled in game, so it is possible that it is down to the damage model of this particular aircraft. Were the rounds incoming from the ground, or from the rear ( engaged by a bogey) Finally, A 30mm round with depleted uranium, will reach out and lovingly caress anything ( within reason) that it wants to, as mentioned above ...............

9 hours ago, dtmdragon said:

Killing a T-72 from any angle is probably more of a game engine/ damage modeling issue. A T-72 could be completely destroyed from a 45 degree angle onto the top of the turret. However an attack from any other angle would still likely result in a mobility/ mission/ communication/ sensor/ Weapon kill. The game cannot model that so the tank is simply destroyed completely in the game.

Edited 8 hours ago by dtmdragon

 I would agree that armour in some cases is relatively easy in some cases, however, I redirect you to my previous 3 points, rinse and repeat. 

Edited November 21, 2021 by trotski00

[Righteous26 70]

As I stated above I got hit by two 14.5mm rounds according to the debriefing at the end of the mission.

I fire at the vehicles from a much lower angle. The rounds should not be going through the top.

Keep in mind that muzzle energy estimates assume that the round imparts all of its kinetic energy to the target and that may be a game engine issue as a round that passes through a sheet metal structure can not impart all of its energy to said structure.

Simply adjusting the velocity or mass of the round opens up a new set of issues but adjusting the mass is likely the way to go as it should have less impact on accuracy.

Here's something from 1977 on the issue of penetration.

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/cold-war-coloring-book-taught-a-10-pilots-to-kill-soviet-tanks-a26385113bf0

The T-62 has less armor than the T-72.

[+Gepard 11,289]

Who cares. Its a game. Not the real life.

[Stratos 3,188]

I understand Righteous, and is not fair to compare us with DCS (in some aspect we are more realistic than DCS), but killing tanks is too easy in SF2, and that makes the game bit shocking sometimes.

[+Trotski 936]

Further to the discussion here, tank on tank engagements in game are also rather OP as well, if you watch a tank battle, they basically one shot each other, so it isnt just the Avenger, as I said, the sim is older, so the damage mechanics are maybe not optimised to the level you are expecting from SF, as Stratos implied, you seem to be comparing SF to DCS and that is not a fair comparison. SF does pretty much everything well though, but, if one wants to complain about "unrealistic" gun power, then one must also refer to the fact there is also not A to A refueling either, which is also unrealistic. I would suggest you merely except the strictures of the Sim as it is, and live with it. 

[+Gepard 11,289]

If you take a look into the armour values, so you will find, that TK use only the nominal thickness of an armour and not the penetration distance to calculate wheter a bullit will punch through or not. The penetration distance depends on the angle of bullit impact. TK also neglects the fact that armor plates are angled in the frontal area.

Example:

The front plate of a T-55 is 100 mm thick. So it is in reality and in game. But the armour plate is angled by 60°. This value doubles the way which a bullit must go to penetrate the frontal armour of a T-55. So it would be "more correct" to increase the frontal armour value in the T-55_data.ini from 100 to 200 mm. And this must be done for all tanks. You must measure which angle the armour plate has and then you must calculate which penetration distance the bullit must overcome. This value you must use in the data.ini for the tank.

[Stratos 3,188]

19 minutes ago, Gepard said:

The front plate of a T-55 is 100 mm thick. So it is in reality and in game. But the armour plate is angled by 60°. This value doubles the way which a bullit must go to penetrate the frontal armour of a T-55. So it would be "more correct" to increase the frontal armour value in the T-55_data.ini from 100 to 200 mm. And this must be done for all tanks. You must measure which angle the armour plate has and then you must calculate which penetration distance the bullit must overcome. This value you must use in the data.ini for the tank.

And do you think that will prevent the 20mm to destroy the tank? I'm really curious now.

[Wrench 9,846]

4 hours ago, Gepard said:

Who cares. Its a game. Not the real life.

Thank You!!!

[+Gepard 11,289]

2 hours ago, Stratos said:

And do you think that will prevent the 20mm to destroy the tank? I'm really curious now.

Since the roof of the tank is only 39 mm thick and a plane is shooting from above ... surely not.

But it may change the result of tank ground battles.

[+GKABS 8,771]

I will only say one thing just enjoy the flight simulator it's only a game with a excellent and talented community behind it.

[+Trotski 936]

1 hour ago, GKABS said:

I will only say one thing just enjoy the flight simulator it's only a game with a excellent and talented community behind it.

author author !! I understand the questions from new members, and this is quite a valid one, if a little argumentative, there are more thing "right" with SF, than there are "wrong" even if it is not quite as black and white as that. Also SF cannot be compared to the likes of DCS, or IL Series, as it is a totally different beast altogether, and still, in my humble opinion, the most user friendly, and all-round great flight sims. Long may she reign !! 

[KJakker 901]

Well do not go flying around any ships with my gun mods. I increased the bursting charge of time fused projectiles as the stock ones were useless. 

[+EricJ 4,244]

I've been tagged with flak a few times (it's a rare occurrence for me) and never been truly shot down. The last time was in a F/A-18C and it damaged (I  believe) my avionics without modifying the bursting radius of the flak. It may have been modded but I don't think so.

[ariel38 63]

23 hours ago, Righteous26 said:

Para nada. Dos rondas de 14,5 mm no arrancan las solapas de un A-10 y derriban los AIM-9. Los A-10 han sido alcanzados con misiles y cañones de 57 mm + y han sufrido menos daños que los que vi en el juego.

El GAU-8 de 30 mm no puede penetrar un T-72 desde el frente o los lados en ningún rango, pero solo se necesitan uno o dos golpes para destruir uno de manera confiable, independientemente del ángulo.

You can try modifying these values in the gun data:

 

WarheadWt=0.024700 (example of DEFA 553)

[+GKABS 8,771]

6 hours ago, trotski00 said:

author author !! I understand the questions from new members, and this is quite a valid one, if a little argumentative, there are more thing "right" with SF, than there are "wrong" even if it is not quite as black and white as that. Also SF cannot be compared to the likes of DCS, or IL Series, as it is a totally different beast altogether, and still, in my humble opinion, the most user friendly, and all-round great flight sims. Long may she reign !! 

I totally agree with you.