Armored Cars

This is kinda spitball-at-the-wall idea, but i’ve been thinking on something that could add a little more flexibility to gameplay in campaigns, and maybe an interesting dynamic. Armored cars were used pretty extensively during the early war period, since they were immune to small arms fire, but fodder for anything stouter.

Armored cars would be cheap, mobile machine gun positions that don’t take up a vehicle slot, ideally an armored car squad could be its own thing entirely, something to push points or hold areas that isn’t as worrying to lose as a real tank.

Like a tank, they’d be blind, but only lightly armored, easily killed with well-timed det packs or even the lightest anti-tank weapons.

There are two dynamics i’m considering:

The ‘standard’ dynamic, where armored cars carry guns that can pen other armored cars, I.E. .50s and 20mms. This is like how tanks currently are, where besides infantry, other armored cars can stop troublesome armored cars.

For this dynamic, i think the best options are:

Axis: Sd.Kfz 231. It’s got the same 10-shot 20mm as the Pz. II, and a generic 7.92 MG
Rbbd87f16e4bd5987b95abb8d2b886ca6
It’s got 15mm on the front, 8 on the sides, and 10 on the back, armorwise.

US: the M2 Half-track. It’s carrying a .50 caliber M2 machinegun, which will punch through around 20-23mm of armor, if i’ve done my research right. Less than a 20mm will do, but the axisonly have 10 shots til reload.


It’s got at least 12mm of armor frontally, and the thinnest part is 6mm, but i’m having trouble with specifics.

Soviets: Here’s where i run into an issue. The soviets don’t really have an equivalent for this dynamic. So here’s my two tentative suggestions:

The Landswerk L-180, a swedish armored car with a 20mm madsen main gun. This is basically the same thing as the german KwK 20mm, even having a 10-shot magazine option. My reasoning is that they were sold to Estonia and Lithuania in the late 1930s. We know the soviets captured at least a few of them, but no exact numbers.
Landsverk
Only 9mm of frontal armor, 5 for the sides, but it’s got a 15mm thick turret all round.

–OR–

The Ba-27. Like the Ba-11, it’s got a single-shot main cannon as a primary gun, but instead of the Ba-11’s unstoppable 45mm cannon, the 27 has, well. It’s a Puteau SA-18, I.E. the same gun as the renault FT. 37mm, only 600m/s, it can punch through around 30mm of armor, if that. Basically just a slightly wider 20mm.
Ba27
Only 7mm of armor all around, but it’d have some reasonable anti-infantry use with HE shells.

As for british vehicles, i’ll wait til Tunisia is a thing, but god knows they had enough armored cars to choose from. I’ll talk about the other dynamic in the second post.

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There’s a soviet premium a/c in M<oscow - Ba-11 - never actually fought at Moscow of course, and had a bugged hitbox for a long time that made it pretty invulnerable…

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The second dynamic i’m suggesting is the “Impotent” dynamic.

In this dynamic, armored cars can only be used as anti-infantry tools, period. Only lighter MGs, armor doesn’t really matter at all.

Axis gets the Sd.Kfz 221: One 7.92 MG, and that’s it.
sdkfz222_1
14mm of armor up front, but only 5 eveywhere else

US: Give them a british light armored car or scout car, they all have about 10-15mm of armor, the scout cars only had .30 MGs normally. Have a dingo for example.
Dingo

Soviets: The BA-64 armored car fits perfectly, 7.62 machinegun, equivalent armor to the rest really.
BA64
They made 9000 of the things after all.

Ideally, the Armored Car squad, especially with light armored cars that can’t hurt each other, should be incentivized to leave the car pretty often, which, them being disabled by popped wheels with any regularity, and being weak to infantry, should happen a lot.

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I know this whole armored car stuff probably won’t be added, but i really do want to avoid a BA-11 situation again. I’ve fought the things and they’re nigh-impossible to kill for some reason. Hence why the only armored car i suggested with an actual cannon has the weakest, lowest-velocity gun you’ll find.

Puma on normandy is an armored car
The Sd.Kfz. 234 ( Sonderkraftfahrzeug 234 , Special Purpose Vehicle 234), was a family of armoured cars designed and built in Germany during World War II. The vehicles were lightly armoured, armed with a 20, 50 or 75 mm main gun, and powered by a Tatra V12 diesel engine.[3] The Sd.Kfz. 234 broadly resembles the appearance of Sd.Kfz. 231 (8 rad ).[2]

Sd.Kfz. 234
Sd.Kfz 234-2 front-diagonal view.jpg\ 300x223

and the soviet have one on moscow
The BA-11 or Broneavtomobil 11 (Russian: БА-11 or Бронеавтомобиль 11) was an armored car developed in the Soviet Union. It was intended to replace the BA-10, but production was prevented by the Nazi German invasion of 1941. The BA-11 was a heavy armored car designed based on a strengthened ZiS-6K chassis. Used during 1941-1942 on the Leningrad front, it was designed to attack infantry, cavalry, and medium armored cars. With 13mm of frontal armour, it was only slightly less protected than the most common soviet light tank of the era, the T-26, which had 15mm of armour. It had very poor off-road mobility due to being overloaded and lacking all wheel drive, so only 17 were built and all of them were lost in 1941-42. One BA-11 was modified with ZiS D-7 96hp diesel engine, it was known as BA-11D. Trials were successful, but uselessness of BA-11 removed necessity of BA-11D serial production.

BA-11
БА-11 вид сбоку 4.jpg\ 220x106

and probably the british have this like first tank
The Daimler Armoured Car was a successful British armoured car design of the Second World War that continued in service into the 1950s. It was designed for armed reconnaissance and liaison purposes. During the postwar era, it doubled as an internal security vehicle in a number of countries.

Daimler Armoured Car
Daimler Armoured Car Mark 2.jpg\ 300x253

absolutly.

i made a few ideas during the alpha.

and i think armored cars along side halftrucks are really needed.

perhaps unlockable with a section dedicated for the mechanized infantry.

lastly, regarding the americans, there are a few armored cars:

the M8 greyhound:

or the M3 scout car:

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Only murica dont have one actually

i wouldnt mind having kubelwaggens or bmw motos on my german squads and a option to spawn with them.

but, maps aint big enough to justify vehicle usage.

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well, real closed armored cars, no.

they don’t have any.

but they can relay on halftrucks, and scout cars.

No i say in the game
the german have puma on normandy
the soviet the BA-11 in moscow
Usa…

i guess giving them british equipment will not please everyone.

but has become an option since in berlin, russians can use shermans 76 ( premium though ).

No actually sherman 76 is a variant of sherman used by soviet union during the war is like the
image
Sherman vc of italy in war thunder
This tank are nationalized by the buyer country

it’s different.

immagine

Its only enlisted give them like premium unit probably for milk money maybe when they add new toy this become free

:woman_shrugging:

i just want me armored car.

A hug? :man_shrugging:

no.

it means, i don’t know.

what do you think shruggin means?

What about M8 Greyhound?

I would like to see infanrty vehicles but I think that there has to be a limit for therm, like for tanks. Just a separate “light vehicle slot” to avoid turning this game into low BR war thunder matches.

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I made a point to only include armored cars that don’t have proper cannons on them, since i really don’t think that armored cars should be able to reliably hurt tanks at all. Be a nuisance? sure. Disable tracks? …Maybe?. I would like them to really only be anti-infantry and anti-armored car, rather than just glass cannon tanks that can punch above their weight class.