Tank Orientation

[andysensei]

Probably impractical to program, but...

It might make things much more interesting if a tank was given an orientation. In other words, the direction in which it is facing matters....a lot

Maybe a small dot or outline could be placed in one of the 4 corners of the square the tank is placed, or one of the sides. This indicated the direction the tank is facing. Any hit on the tank from a unit standing in a square within the quarter of the map to which that dot is facing is defended by a different (higher) armour value. Or more simply, by double the given armour value. This would have the effect of heavy frontal armour being more effective. Also, visibility should be better in this quarter of the map for the tank (due to the fact that the people in the hull (driver etc) can see through a slit here, but can't see anywhere else).


The tank can only move in the direction of the dot (or the exact opposite direction (reversing)). If the tank wants to move in one of the other 6 directions, it must consume a movement point to move the dot first, and only then move in that direction.


German or Russian tank destroyer such as that StuG IV or SU-122 etc can only fire in the quarter of the map in which the tank is pointed.


This change would bring in an element of needing to protect your flanks and avoid hits to the side. This effect could be particularly pronounced for some models, such as the Hetzer, which had particularly strong frontal armour relative to its side and rear armour.

[Midonik]

Well that would need @Stratego (dev) work, but maybe it's worth it.... I mean in micro combat tank's position maters a lot. It won't make a lot of sense in scale of like battalions and higher. Since I love possiblity of making maps in different scales, how about makeing it enable/disable option?

[andysensei]

Totally agree about unit (such as battalion) scale and individual tank scale.

The tank orientation idea would only make sense on the individual scale. Not when representing a large group of tanks.


However, the smaller scale (with orientation, and probably longer ranges, and maybe lower movement values??) might be a very different and refreshing variation.


Also, while the health bar makes sense for a tank unit, a varying chance of either no effect (shell bounces off the armour), or instant destruction of the tank (tank explodes) would be much better for individual scale. Health bar is not at all realistic on individual scale. And, if it was possible to make this alternative scale, making it different to the unit scale would be a good idea. (providing variety of different kinds of games)

[andysensei]

Or..alternatively, taking into account practicality, orientation alone without these other suggestions might be a good variation which could, as you say, be toggled on or off according to the wishes of the player.

[Dagravian]

Well, such orientation will work on top-down perspective, but that would require a total image revamp for all units here since almost all are sided and pointing to east/right... Mirroring the current imgs from left and right can work without being weird, but if we change their orientation to point to north/south, that would look very strange since unit imgs aren't top-down. But by adding orientation, attacking the frontal or behind of a unit could provide diferent damage rows based on fortified armor or vulnerable spots that it have... It is very interesting indeed, but too much stuff to be remade in order to add that...

And penetration/deflection are values to be defined, we kinda should think on ways to implement that, i actually know how (+or-), but that will require new parameters and new stuff on statsheet, things that could result on a total revamp in order to balance stuff to new mechanics...

[Midonik]

Well I think that the scale is bigger and we seriously need to decide that it's a important issue dang it I'm not capable of making any good maps cause it's so confusing.
The last one was I made was company sized and it was about working. So I guess the size of units aren't individual, but more subunits at least. Tho the tank image shows one tank so some people will imagine that it must represent one tank like they do with units in AoF/AoS (excuse how do they imagine a 100k men battle map with such sizes lol).
One tile is up to 2500 meters (based on ranges) so the area of one tile is 6250000m^2 = 6,25 km^2... Maybe Ratte was about that big, not Maus tho.
So I don't think we are dealing with individual combat where such things like orientation would really count. I would guess something below the battalion to fit in such area but I might be wrong. It's definitely operational, not tactical scale.
Still, for some maps smaller, even individual size would be cool. But... I don't think we need serval game modes for every possible scale.

[samuelch]

The solution can maybe just tanks can only counterattack once

[Belfry777]

I don't know if giving tanks counter attack once is a good idea. Because then we could swarm tanks with infantry, jeeps and other very cheap units.

[Midonik]

That's... Still better than spamming just tanks.

[samuelch]

It's realistic for infantry to overrun a tank. Then infantries can start throwing at grenades in close distance

[Belfry777]

I suppose that it could work.