The Blighted "Brummbär"

[honest thistle]

I want for you for a moment to think about what is SPA in your mind, visualize artillery. Got it? good, now throw all of that out the window, because that is not what's in Hell let loose. The false "SPA"s in game are all horrid but I think emphasizing the worst one will do the whole topic justice, lets talk about the Brummbär.

The real Brummbär and her variants were infantry support guns, designed to provide direct fire support and destruction of fortified positions and buildings.

In HLL the opposite is true, the practical way to use "SPA"s is in a 300-600 meter sweet spot from your target. Any further and typically you will be in limited operational zone, to prevent firing and camping with the gun at ranges the devs have deemed unfair.

keeping these limitations in game would be fine if not for a few details.

The Brummbär is helpless in her current state. The devs have chosen the variant that was not only one of the least produced, but also one that lacks any form of self defense in terms of machine gun fire outside of its main cannon. This would most likely be fine if not for the fact the main gun cannot be fired on the move, and her limited horizontal aiming range compared to her peers. The "sight" and the mils in the scope are also too barebones to use, and calculating for the negative or positive slope you are on is tedious at best. She is too weak to give close support fire, and too map constrained to stand a chance when trouble comes. The experience is "satchel bait simulator".

I suggest modifying the model to the Ausf IV variant to include a machine gun (see pics), and her main guns horizontal range and speed be increased to keep up with her peers. Furthermore all SPA should be given better sighting systems (perhaps the gun automatically adding the slope mils), and the ability to shoot on the move, if the map limitations are to be kept in place. The "SPA"s added were meant for close support IRL, they would fit better into the game that way as well.

I would have liked to go futher into the issues of Hell Let Loose's "SPA"s but unfortunely I was limited by text size. I think the addition of these vehicles could be interesting and well implentent if you actually added proper SPA's that had open tops to balance them out for sitting at long ranges. Or simply modify the false "SPA"s you have in game to fulfill their actual roles irl. I should also note that the Brummbar got stuck numerous times on many maps, but especially on elsenborn ridge.

The sights mils system could go up in even 20 meter increments to make range estimation and calculation easier, and maybe changing the sight to automatically add + or - mils depending on the angle, when the "SPA" is at rest would really be a helpful feature

[honest thistle]

(Side note) If Hell Let Loose was to change these vehicles to perform their proper irl roles, adding new actual SPA would not be difficult as you would realistically only need to add 3. The M7 Priest (Used by the United States, and by the English on most of the maps/time periods the game has to offer, Tobruk being the only map that wouldnt work to my knowedge). A similar situation applies for the soviets, as they could get the SU76. (Stalingrad might be the only exception as the SU76 had just started production). The Hummel is the only tricky one, as although it works for the vast majority of the maps, it doesn't work for Africa. (Although the Bison I could be added for african maps)

I think removing the operational barrier currently in game and adding these pieces would actually keep things fair, the glass cannon form of artillery. The crew could easily be shot out by just one guy or the enemy recon team, however they could always have an op nearby as to not make the engagement a total loss / giving them a chance to defuse satchels or stop AT players. Make the open top a gameplay feature, make the cat and mouse game interesting!

[red nimbus]

Exactamundo. Every tank aside from the British SPA they chose were assault guns and not Mobile Artillery vehicles.

As for the excuse of “but the crew can be shot out!”, as I’ve stated multiple times in the mess hall and beyond, if you’re being constantly shot out of an open top artillery vehicle that is mobile, you’re clearly doing something wrong. You can position anywhere on the map. If you’re just sitting where recon is known to be lurking about then that’s your problem.

I think open tops are a well balanced sacrifice in my opinion.

[umbral tusk]

Exactamundo?

[blazing yacht]

https://tenor.com/view/trabalgoa-gif-25900158

[reef urchin]

I really dont care about historical accuracy as long as the gameplay is fun
Like we just got the biggest batch of new vehicules and we're still finding ways to complain.

Do they fit in the meta? Yes
Do they fix the awfull arty recon loop? Yes
You can’t have everything is what im guessing

[umbral tusk]

Yes , but then the game shouldn't be promoted as a "historically accurate experience"

[steady compass]

They already stated the (debatably weak) reasons for not adding opentop vehicles. The real problem lies in the playerbase and how they play the game. Recon would assume they are forced to camp mobile artillery since they can shoot them. Everyone else expects the same. Players also don't use the full effectiveness of combined arms and help each other out. Artillery shells hit hard from a distance but if that distance closes, they WILL need infantry support. Blame on why the gap closed can vary, so it wouldn't be smart to always blame poor positioning on artillery.

The actual course of action should be to find them and report it as intel found via reconnaissance (the whole name of the squad) AT focused squads then get to attack the location or a light tank or armored car would get it. The problem increases when no one readily wants to play a light vehicle or AT players are too busy frontlining to literally do their one job.

[main pollen]

We want better content, most players would rather wait and have less, better content, or no content, rather than frequent slop. The new batch of vehicles have significant problems that need to be solved.

[reef urchin]

Even better, report the enemy SPA to your team’s SPA.

[bleak salmon]

[honest thistle]

honestly open top vehicles is the perfect balance choice, a powerful tool that is countered by communication and recon. Given that the new arty squads have ops getting killed from your SPA wouldnt be a 100% loss, the recon team would still need to find your op

[honest thistle]

as it stands I do not see how they fit into the meta

they are too limited in close quarters to be effective, they are too limited to get into ranges outside of wandering AT, and even in their sweetspot they are still sitting ducks

they are not fun to use, not being able to shoot on the move is not fun, needing to pull out your phone irl to calculate shots is not fun, in the case of the brummbar not having any defenses aside from the main gun while stationary is not fun

the only thing they fixed was the arty recon loop, but that's purely by their existance, removing arty, adding actual SPA, or mortars would have done the exact same thing but not be nearly as butchered

I should state that I dont think everything in this game is doom and gloom, infact I think the vast majority of these new vehicles have the opportunity to be fun and interesting, just as i think update 18 had the opportunity to do the same for the game

but not being critical of what is essentially a bandaid fix for a game we all adore is a disservice to the player base

Make support guns be the direct fire beasts they were meant to be (maybe you would have to nerf the shells to have a slightly smaller radus amongst other fixes) .... Add actual SPA to the game with open tops, that still allows for flexibility in movement at the risk of being shot out of your vehicle. I dont see how a open top vehicle would be any less risky than any other buildable emplacement

[reef urchin]

Open top spa would be a pain for both the devs and arty enjoyers.
For its place in the meta, we are talking about 30m HE radius, very high AP damage, and the ability to strike from cover and from the backlines.
Idk why you would even try to go for direct fire with these new tanks, its just so slow to do anything.

The name of the game is using comms and bieng patient, and u can turn the game around with these things

All you have to do is wait for the opportune callout, shoot a few rounds, change position (to avoid ennemy SPA retaliation, ATs, satchels) and wait again for a new call

Thats (in my opinion) how you would have fun using the new SPAs

[honest thistle]

open top tanks are literally just arty guns that are able to move periodically to keep the gameplay interesting and enjoyable for the hunter and the prey. the reason im stating that the current "SPA" is useless is because its far too restricted in its role to be fun, theres zero need for communication or coordination with the new additions beyond marking targets

[honest thistle]

this is all on paper

[reef urchin]

True.

[honest thistle]

have you played with the new SPA significantly

[reef urchin]

No i admit i did not have the chance yet

I trust its more complicated than what i picture

[honest thistle]

grab a 3 man and try it out, especially try using the brummbar and using the gun yourself

imagine a panzer iv, without a turret, and machine guns, + you cant fire on the move

[reef urchin]

Ive seen vids it looks so slow

But the damage seems worth it

[honest thistle]

exactly, slow and not very fun, and by nature of having to calculate for the angle you are currently resting your tank on, plus your elevation, plus the random variation you are going to get due to there not being a dedicated arty calculator / the mils sight system is too vague

in my experience its not worth the effort, you would literally do more as a puma direct firing the point with HE

again my point wasnt to totally toss out the new additions, merely that they should be adjusted to fit their historical roles better

so they would actually be enjoyable to use... same thing if the devs were to add the hummel and the m7 for example

the downside is the open top, but the freedom to move will keep the gameplay interesting for the hunter and the prey, a powerful glass cannon just like old arty, but without the downside of needing to be camped

if a recon team did its job right (kill the 3 man open top arty crew) and then got rid of their op... that vehicle is essentially worthless until the crew can slowly make it back there, or the recon team gets anyone on their team to walk over there and kill the vehicle for good

its gives both sides the chance to come out on top

[honest thistle]

(also just an idea for open top SPA, instead of having to deal with the uneven ground slope when calculating mils, make the mils standardized if possible so there is no calculation needed, id imagine they should be possible if you make them work like the static arty, where the calculation takes place from the vehicle, but the shell itself is merely spawned in from the skybox with that data)

(and of course add significant muzzle flash and smoke to mask that)

[main pollen]

There is already a dedicated calculator for SPA ranges

[honest thistle]

Oh already?

Well thats lovely for the time being to make the stop gap fix vehicles more useable

[main pollen]

https://hll-armor-hub.com/#ranging

[honest thistle]

Very useful many thanks, still unfortunate that we have to use these

Even just giving slightly more mils equivalents on the side of the gun would assist in the lack of need for the calculator

[main pollen]

I mean we always needed a calculator before, will always need in the future

[honest thistle]

I meant in terms of the average player or new player

But the only reason we even need to use it is because the mils system that we can see on screen doesnt provide enough data to be accurate

Going up in 10 or maybe even 20 increments would do wonders

Amongst other problems

[modest stream]

If you don’t care about the historical accuracy then you’re playing the wrong game and a part of the problem

[red nimbus]

It’s that very headspace of “I don’t care about accuracy” that got us in this mess to begin with.

Not to the fault of the community ironically but the developers

They shouldn’t promote an accurate retelling experience if they don’t want to do an accurate retelling experience lmao

70% of the community are here for said experience since 2019/2020 when the game first released.

[reef urchin]

not to be rude but there are so many other things that could be flagged as inaccuracies, so yeah, its not new, and you were playing the game just fine all this time.
There HAS to be some degree of inaccuracy for a game like hll to work. If you want a perfect game do it yourself.

[reef urchin]

you just made these stats up im pretty sure

[red nimbus]

It was mainly a guess, I never said it was an accurate figure lmao

[reef urchin]

Of course, it has to be a believable and immersive experience, that IS why i got into HLL
anyway I'm done writing, all i wanted to say was that, the gameplay will always come first, and if it causes minor historical inaccuracies, its really not a big deal, in my opinion

[honest thistle]

When the gameplay, historical accuracy, meta, and fun are disregarded