The Panther family

[PoorOldSpike]

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/PantherFamily.gif

Which is the best? Very hard to say, for example although the VG(late) has a tougher turret than the rest because it has no shot trap, it suffers from manufacturing flaws in its upper hull front armour.
Interestingly skirts don't alter the armour data, but presumably they give slight protection in combat.
And even though the VG(late) has no shot trap, it's armour data doesn't change either, but no doubt it gets a slight combat bonus.
Personally in quick battles I'd probably buy whichever of the 6 models was cheapest for that time period.

[PoorOldSpike]

In case newcomers to Combat Mission are wondering what "shot trap" means, these pics explain it.

Five of the six Panthers have shot traps and look like this, note how an incoming enemy shot (red line) will ricochet downwards through the thin top hull armour-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/panrhshotrap.gif



But the Panther VG(late) has no shot trap, note how the lower mantlet area was given a protective "chin" at the factory-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/panth-no-trap.jpg

[PoorOldSpike]

I just ran more tests to find out if the VG(lates) "chin" really does give it more protection, and the results seem to say "yes"-

First I set up a typical head-on 300 metres shootout test between 12 x vet Firefly VC's and 12 x vet Panther VA(earlies) which do have shot traps (ie chinless)-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/FirefvPanVA-1.jpg

I ran it 3 times and the total losses were 7 x VA(earlies) for 35 x Fireflies, in other words the Panthers completely dominated.
(Interestingly the Firefly crews chose to fire only AP, even though they had tungsten on board)

I then switched the VA(earlies) for VG(lates) with chins (ie no shot traps) and ran it 3 times.
This time only 1 x VG(late) was lost, but 35 x Fireflies were lost.
Once again, the Fireflies chose to fire only AP.

Conclusion- the VG(late) therefore appears to be the toughest Panther model of them all because its chin protects its turret.
Incidentally, although relatively few Panthers were knocked out in the tests, some did suffer damaged guns and immobilisations.


I then set up the same tests but switched the Fireflies for Sherman 76mm's.

A total of 5 x shot trap VA(earlies) were lost for 36 x Sher 76's, total domination by the Panthers.
The Shers all chose to fire tungsten even though they also carried AP.

In the next series of tests, 3 x chinned VG(lates) were lost for 36 x Sher 76's, again it was total domination by Panthers, the chin seeming to reduce their losses.
Yet again, the Shers chose to fire tungsten.

[PoorOldSpike]

Russian AT-Rifle PTRS v Panther VA (no skirts)

The ATR's scored over 300 hits over 7 turns but couldn't penetrate the Panthers yellowy side armour, the Panthers weren't even scratched and not one was lost-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/ATRvnoskirts.jpg

Conclusion- ATR's can't penetrate Panthers sides even without skirts

[PoorOldSpike]

Russian 45mm ATG Mod 38 side shots v Panther VA (no skirts)

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/45vpannoskirt.jpg

Data from 3 tests-

Total Panther losses=9
Total 45 ATG losses=36
(Note the Panthers began side-on, but began pivoting to engage the guns)
(The 45's carried AP and tungsten, some crews chose to fire AP, some chose tung)
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/45ATGvPannoskirts.jpg
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Below- Russian 45mm ATG Mod 38 side shots v Panther VD (with skirts)

Data from 3 tests-

Total Panther losses=7
Total 45 ATG losses=36
(Note the Panthers began side-on, but began pivoting to engage the guns)
(The 45's carried AP and tungsten, some crews chose to fire AP, some chose tung)
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/45ATGvSkts.jpg

Conclusion- skirts may give some protection against light ATG's, but not very much

[PoorOldSpike]

The following two tests were to find out whether the PIAT does better against no skirts or skirts.
(I used PIATs instead of bazookas because they have no backblast and will stay unspotted by the Panthers for longer, lest the Panthers return fire distorted the test results. As usual, the Panths began pivoting to face the PIATS when they spotted them)

PIAT side shots v Panther VA (no skirts)
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/piatsvpan.jpg


PIATS destroyed and pinned=All
Total Panther losses=22 over three tests.
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/PIATvnoskirts.jpg

[PoorOldSpike]

PIAT side shots v Panther VD (late) with skirts

PIATS dest and pinned=All
Total Panth losses=18 over three tests
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/PIATvPanSKIRTS.jpg

Conclusion- Skirts seem to give slight protection against PIATS, but not very much

[PoorOldSpike]

Incidentally there don't seem to be many photos around of Panthers with the 'chin' on the lower mantlet to prevent shot trap; this is one of the very few I've come across-

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Photos/panth-chin.jpg

[Earl of Grey]

Oh, there are a lot, believe me - it's just that not many bother to name the pictures accordingly (the Panther G late being that - a late version) and on a lot of pictures the chin is somewhat obscured.

Have you incidentally chekced shell trajectory on those Panthers without chin mantlet that got taken out? I'd like to know which projectiles actually penetrated the hull top...

[PoorOldSpike]

..Have you incidentally chekced shell trajectory on those Panthers without chin mantlet that got taken out? I'd like to know which projectiles actually penetrated the hull top...

No I didn't check where the shots hit, although I think with hindsight perhaps I should have done, but my policy with all my tests is to draw the line somewhere, otherwise testing would be a fulltime job and there'd be no end to it.
For example each test would have to be run a hundred times at different ranges, and the angle at which each individual shot struck would have to be meticulously logged, along with the result (ricochet/partial penetration/ armour flaking/ full penetration)
Then after all the data was collected. I'd have to spend hours painstakingly analysing it and drawing conclusions.
That's why I prefer the simpler approach of just lining units up and seeing how they do when they're having the sh*t shot out of them, I'm just a grunt wargamer, not a bleddy accountant..:)

PS- to digress, notice how the colours (particularly red) are blurred and runny in some of the screenshots, that's because I accidentally saved them in JPEG format instead of the much crisper GIF.
(JPEG is okay for photos but not for screenshots)

[Earl of Grey]

I can understand it's a lot of work - but I'm not so sure that even in reality the chin mantlet was giving better protection. On paper surely - but there have never been any reliable accounts of lots of Pantehrs getting killed because of the shot trap to my knowledge. There must have been a few - else they woudln't have changed it - but I doubt that the majority of write-offs was due to a shell penetrating the hull top. It'd be really interesting to run a scientific test in CM.

[Bert Blitzkrieg]

What surprises me that out of the tests there seems to be no significant penalty for the "frequent flaws in upper hull armour".

I once played the "Rockets and Roll" scenario and a lot of my Panthers were KO-ed in regular frontal engagements with Fireflies from around 500 meters by frontal penetrations. Almost 1:1 loss ratio. Appearently my game was a fluke or there were some other factors in play.

[Earl of Grey]

Well, Spike hasn't actually told us how many Panthers got KO'ed through the frontal hull. But a gunner aiming for the center of mass would probably hit the turret rather than the hull anyway...

[PoorOldSpike]

This excerpt from 'Tank Men' indicates that Allied tank gunners knew the Panthers lower mantlet area was a weak spot (scroll to about halfway down)-

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub2/NOR6.jpg
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub2/NOR7.jpg

[Earl of Grey]

Certainly possible that Allied tank gunners knew it - Panthers have been captured and exposed to firing tests. But hitting that small a part of a target tank (which itself isn't necessarily standing still or at an opportune range) is mathematically very improbable. Let's assume it was a real danger which made the engineers devise a new mantlet - although the older style mantlets were fitted right until the end of the war.

[PoorOldSpike]

If we look at these two screenshots again, we see that Battlefront's data makes no distinction between the chinless model (top), and the chinned model (bottom).
With both models the turret front armour is 100/curved, and its colour is the same shade of green in the small 2D picture.
So we can possibly conclude that chins make no (or very little) difference in gameplay, although I might do further tests in the future.
In QB's I'd buy the chinned model if its price wasn't too high, otherwise I'd forget it and buy the cheaper chinless model-

NO CHIN
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/panrhshotrap.gif




CHIN
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/Competitons/panth-no-trap.jpg