For MudMovers: What kind of tanks cannot be destroyed with Mk103?

[swiss]

Originally Posted by TinyTim

Another point worth considering in my humble opinion is that in reality an Mk 103 salvo could incapacitate a tank without destroying it (like in "piercing the armor, killing the crew and detonating its ammo load"). Optics, weapons, tracks etc. were all quite vulnerable to high calibre autocanon fire (and they still are nowadays!). Unfortunately it's 1 or 0 in IL-2 and you have to actually pierce the armor in order to knock the tank out or it stays fully capable no matter how much lead you throw at it.

Piercing the armor meant blow up the tank. Remember, they had no sophisticated fire suppression systems. Tungsten gets glowing hot when it penetrates(it's pyrophoric) teel - if it enters the crewcompartment: Bang.

[WTE_Galway]

Originally Posted by swiss

Piercing the armor meant blow up the tank. Remember, they had no sophisticated fire suppression systems. Tungsten gets glowing hot when it penetrates(it's pyrophoric) teel - if it enters the crewcompartment: Bang.

The point is that in the real world you do not need to cook a tank to take it out of action you can disable it or force the crew to abandon it. Taking out a track, disabling the turret, knocking out the engine are all historically achievable without piercing the armor.

However, as pointed out at the start of the thread, the IL2 damage model for armor is very simplistic and in the game its either destroy the tank completely or nothing happens at all.