M4 Sherman tank

[Toadmaster]

This is my first attempt at a vehicle, any comments, criticisims or corrections happily accepted.

[Toadmaster]

M4 Sherman – Medium tank

Val Char Cost Notes

5 Size 25 3.2x1.6", -5 KB, -3 DCV

53 STR 18 Lift 37 tons, 10d6 HtH [0]

10 DEX 0 OCV:3 / DCV:3

18 BODY 6

12 DEF 30

3 SPD 10

 

Movement

Ground: 13†/ 26â€

 

Defense 18 / 12

 

Description:

This was the primary US medium tank during World War 2. It was also widely used by other Allied nations. The M4 proved to be a very rugged and reliable tank and was well received when it was introduced. Unfortunately the 75mm M3 gun had been designed for use as an infantry support weapon and its anti-armor capability was marginal, the M4 was also prone to catching on fire when hit, which led to the nickname “Ronsonâ€, a common brand of cigarette lighter known for the slogan “it lights every timeâ€. These traits did nothing to inspire the confidence of M4 crews and it was generally considered to be inferior to the German tanks it faced. There were many improvements made to address these problems, the best of these was the introduction of a high velocity 76mm gun. Most of the M4’s built were gasoline powered but some used diesel engines. Nearly all of the diesel powered tanks were issued to the USMC or the USSR , the performance was nearly identical regardless of the engine type, although the diesel powered versions were less likely to burn. The M4 has a crew of 5. A .50 caliber machinegun is provided on the turret deck for the tank commander. The main gun has a coaxial .30 caliber machinegun mounted alongside it in the turret. By 1944 many M4’s were also armed with a 2†smoke mortar in the turret top, this weapon could be operated without leaving the protection of the armor. Another .30 caliber machinegun is located in the hull front; the gun is operated by the assistant driver.

 

Abilities & Equipment

 

Motorized Tracked Military Vehicle: 11 pts End [1cc]

Ground movement +7†(13†total); Only on appropriate terrain (-1/4), 1 continuing fuel charge (easily obtained fuel; 5 hours; -0)

 

75mm M3 tank gun: 238 pts Range 1000"

Rmod +7

Multi-power (283 pts), 97 charges (+¾); OIF Bulky (-1), Real weapon (-¼), Charges must be assigned to slots when re-supplied (-¼)

 

Armor Piercing (188 pts)

RKA 5d6, +7 Increased STUN multiplier (+1 ¾), Beam (-¼)

 

High Explosive (149 pts)

Energy blast 17d6, Explosion (+½), Increased maximum range (+¼)

 

Incendiary / smoke (283 pts)

Energy blast 6d6, Explosion (-1 DC per 2â€; +¾), Increased maximum range (+¼), Continuous (+1), Uncontrolled (+½), 0 Endurance (effects last for 1 minute; +½), (120 pts)

RKA 3d6, Area of effect (9†radius; +1¼), Increased maximum range (+¼), 0 Endurance (+½), Reduced penetration (-¼), Linked (-½) (101 pts)

Change environment – Smoke (-3 to sight group), 16†radius, Increased maximum range (+½), Uncontrolled (+½), 0 Endurance (effects last for 1 minute; +½), Linked (-½) (62 pts)

 

 

.30 cal M1919A4: 94 pts (2500 rds of ammo)

RKA 2d6+1, +1 STUN multiplier (+¼), 0 Endurance (+1), Autofire (10 shots; +1), Increased maximum range (+¼), Beam (-¼), OIF Bulky (-1), Real weapon (-¼)

+1 OCV, Rmod +2

+4 OCV, linked to Autofire (+1 for 3 shots, +2 for 5 shots, +4 for 10 shots; -½)

 

 

Second .30 cal M1919A4 mounted in hull, Limited arc of fire (60 degree arc; - ½) 3pts (2500 rds of ammo)

 

 

.50 cal M2HB: 143 pts (500 rds of ammo)

RKA 3d6, +3 STUN multiplier (+¾), 0 Endurance (+1), Autofire (10 shots; +1), Increased maximum range (+¼), Beam (-¼),OIF Bulky (-1), Real weapon (-¼)

+1 OCV, Rmod +4

+4 OCV, linked to Autofire (+1 for 3 shots, +2 for 5 shots, +4 for 10 shots; -½)

 

 

2†smoke mortar: 13 pts (20 rds of ammo)

Change environment (-4 vs sight group) 2†radius, 0 Endurance (+½), Uncontrolled (effects last for 1 minute; +½), Gradual effect (1 turn, post-segment 12; -¼), OIF Bulky (-1), Real weapon (-¼) 0

 

 

Heavy armor: 8 pts

Hardened armor (12 DEF)

 

 

Front armor: 10 pts

+6 DEF, Hardened (+¼), Limited coverage (front 60 degrees; -1)

 

 

Radio: 5pts

Radio perception / transmission, OIF Bulky (-1)

 

 

Skills

 

Targeting system: 4 pts

+2 vs. Range with turret weapons (main gun, coax machine gun)

 

 

Total abilities & equipment cost: 618 pts

 

 

Disadvantages

-25 Distinctive features: US Army tank (Not concealable; causes extreme reaction)

-5 Physical limitation: Turret weapons must point at same target (Infrequent, Slight)

-10 Physical limitation: Ammo and fuel easily ignited when hit, any damage result indicating damage to fuel or weapon systems will cause a fire resulting in a massive explosion (3d6 generalized killing damage) 1d6 segments after taking damage. (Infrequent, greatly)

-10 Reputation: Easily set on fire by combat damage.

 

 

Total disadvantage points: -50

Total vehicle cost: 568

Actual cost: 114

 

[Chris Goodwin]

I haven't mathed it out or anything, but to a brief glance it looks good.

[Victor]

Originally posted by Toadmaster

-25 Distinctive features: US Army tank (Not concealable; causes extreme reaction)

 

This would be my only quibble, at the moment. Extreme Reaction is... well, a bit extreme.

[James Gillen]

Most military vehicles in 5th Edition (for example Terran Empire) have a similar Distinctive Feature.

 

JG

[Alibear]

Originally posted by Toadmaster

Armor Piercing (188 pts)

RKA 5d6, +7 Increased STUN multiplier (+1 ¾), Beam (-¼)

 

High Explosive (149 pts)

Energy blast 17d6, Explosion (+½), Increased maximum range (+¼)

 

 

I have to question the 5d6 +7 stun mod?

 

I kinda expect bricks to be bouncing shells of the old ribcage..but not in this case.

 

And the 17d6 explosion? How big is that blast? YMMV

 

The rest looks good to me though.

 

 

 

In the Shermans defence against the Tiger and such, they were produced in much, much greater numbers.

[Toadmaster]

I took the first 2 disadvantages from the Abrams and Bradley writeups in TUV. I don't know that I would have put them that high either but then again maybe if I was looking over my pop gun rifle at a tank I might feel differant, on the other hand if I were commanding a Tiger I'd probaly be thinking DF-easy target.

 

As far as the damage and stun mods, I have a chart I made that gave me those based on +1 for each doubling of the calculations, it works well at the lower levels so I assume it should be right for the upper levels, for the HE I just use a 1d6 per 5mm of the gun, which again seems to match previously published figures (120mm would equal 24d6, the M1's 120mm gun does 8d6 RKA which would be 24d6 as a normal explosion).

 

This is also intended for heroic games, for a supers game I advocate wimping tanks down.

 

 

My description is kind of hard on the Sherman but I actually fall into the group that thinks it was a pretty effective tank, but popular opinion tends to be it was a POS. I read somewhere that the experience showed that 5 Shermans were needed to counter 1 Panther, luckily it was built in number to allow a 10 to 1 advantage.

 

Thanks for the comments, I figured if I can get the bugs worked out of this one the rest should be easy.

[Gary]

I think size 5 is too small. That's only 3.2 tons whereas a real sherman was about 30 tons. I'd up the size to size 8.

 

A few other problems:

 

1) The tank's main gun as written is too accurate vs single humans. In real life, the chance of hitting a moving man with an AP shell is almost nil. Even hitting his hex with HE is essentially nil. The way it's described, a 11- will hit.

 

2) The rate of fire is too high. A spd 3 means 15 rounds per minute. I highly doubt that a WW2 sherman could fire 15 rounds per minute. I'd change it to spd 1 for the MG.

 

3) This is being a little picky, but I think the turret armor was inferior to the hull armor. For the front, I might make the def 18, and 15 or 16 for the front turret.

 

4) The 1 DC per 5 mm does not even come close to modelling WW2 tanks. For example, there is a massive difference between the 75L24 gun of early Mk4's, the 75L48 of the Mk4H, and the 75L70 gun of the panther. Similarly, the 75 mm gun of the sherman is far weaker than the 76 mm gun, which is far weaker than the 17 pounder gun of the firefly, even though all these guns are 75/76 mm.

 

IRL, a sherman was a POS compared to a tiger or panther. It wasn't meant to fight other tanks head to head. The US army had an asinine doctrine of having tanks fight infantry, and tank destroyers fight enemy tanks. They didn't seem to recognize that in the chaos of battle, enemy tanks had to be faced by whatever was on hand. The US didn't have the time or luxury of withdrawing their tanks and inserting tank destroyers whenever enemy tanks appeared.

 

Incidentally, it's true that it takes 5 or more shermans to counter a panther, but it takes only 1 fighter bomber.

[Toadmaster]

Originally posted by Gary

I think size 5 is too small. That's only 3.2 tons whereas a real sherman was about 30 tons. I'd up the size to size 8.

 

A few other problems:

 

1) The tank's main gun as written is too accurate vs single humans. In real life, the chance of hitting a moving man with an AP shell is almost nil. Even hitting his hex with HE is essentially nil. The way it's described, a 11- will hit.

 

2) The rate of fire is too high. A spd 3 means 15 rounds per minute. I highly doubt that a WW2 sherman could fire 15 rounds per minute. I'd change it to spd 1 for the MG.

 

3) This is being a little picky, but I think the turret armor was inferior to the hull armor. For the front, I might make the def 18, and 15 or 16 for the front turret.

 

4) The 1 DC per 5 mm does not even come close to modelling WW2 tanks. For example, there is a massive difference between the 75L24 gun of early Mk4's, the 75L48 of the Mk4H, and the 75L70 gun of the panther. Similarly, the 75 mm gun of the sherman is far weaker than the 76 mm gun, which is far weaker than the 17 pounder gun of the firefly, even though all these guns are 75/76 mm.

 

IRL, a sherman was a POS compared to a tiger or panther. It wasn't meant to fight other tanks head to head. The US army had an asinine doctrine of having tanks fight infantry, and tank destroyers fight enemy tanks. They didn't seem to recognize that in the chaos of battle, enemy tanks had to be faced by whatever was on hand. The US didn't have the time or luxury of withdrawing their tanks and inserting tank destroyers whenever enemy tanks appeared.

 

Incidentally, it's true that it takes 5 or more shermans to counter a panther, but it takes only 1 fighter bomber.

 

For size I go by the dimensions and then bump the BODY and STR up to match the weight. I figured the DCV penalties and such should be based on the vehicles size and it seems easier to adjust for weight than to do the reverse. That is just how I interpreted the size table, not that it is right. How are others doing it?

 

The accuracy issue may be true, again it is just based off a table based around each doubling.

 

In one of my other posts I was looking for a solution to the rate of fire (basically having to reload between each shot), but the only suggestion so far was to put the charges into single round clips, haven't given that much thought yet, so not sure what I think of that. But I agree the main gun fires too fast.

 

Yeah the turret and hull were differant but HERO is already vague enough at this level that I figured it wasn't worth the effort.

 

The 1DC per 5mm is just for HE rounds, I also add 10% for low velocity gun like the 75mm M3 or 7.5cm L/24. The DC for kinetic rounds is based off of muzzle energy.

 

Finally I also agree the Sherman gets compared to the Panther and Tiger far more than is fair, compared to the Panzer 4 which was really the most likely encounter it was pretty evenly matched (Panzer 4 had a better gun, the Sherman had better armor) but the Panzer 4 kinda looked like a Tiger when decked out with all the shields and stuff. I'll have to keep that in mind as a positive DF when I do the Panzer 4.

[Gary]

How would you model the fact that tank combat was either kill or bounce? There are some other intermediate effects such as immobilize or stunning the crew, but most shells either killed the enemy tank immediately or bounced.

 

In hero, most likely you'll nickel and dime the opposition, taking 5 or more hits to kill an 18 body opposing tank.

[Tim]

According to "Death Traps, The Survival of an American Armored Division in WWII." by Belton Cooper ; he states that after being hit, and either abandoned or the crew killed, unless the tank burned the tank could be back in service within 48 to 72 hours. (He worked in the 3rd Armored maintenence unit.) So most tanks themselves are not destroyed, it's the crew you have to watch out for.

[Toadmaster]

As far as simulating tank combat, I don't know yet, I've been playing with a number of ideas because HERO is a little abstract at that level, basically a 75mm M3 does 5d6, an 88mm does 5 1/2 and a 120mm as on the Abrams does 6 1/2d6 (not 8d6). So there isn't much wiggle room.

 

Death Traps is a good book, I was actually thinking of giving the Sherman a +1 to mechanics rolls because it was apparently very forgiving of battle damage and parts easily exchanged from one to another, anyway my impression was that it was easier to maintain than many others of the time. I would think that crew hits will probably be the prime method of eliminating a tank but I haven't played out a tank battle with HERO yet.

[Tim]

I was a little suprised at just how hated the Sherman was. Goes to show, don't believe the hype.

 

I think the +1 to Mechanics, is a good idea.

[Gary Ciaramella]

Originally posted by Toadmaster

For size I go by the dimensions and then bump the BODY and STR up to match the weight. I figured the DCV penalties and such should be based on the vehicles size and it seems easier to adjust for weight than to do the reverse. That is just how I interpreted the size table, not that it is right. How are others doing it?

 

I would tend to assign a size based upon the vehicle's dimensions and then adjust the weight with density increase. A friend here does make the point that assigning a smaller size would affect the negative DCV modifier imposed, but I think that could be taken care of by a negative DCV level.

[Markdoc]

>>>I was a little suprised at just how hated the Sherman was. Goes to show, don't believe the hype.<<<<

 

That's because you haven't served in one:)

 

Neither have I, truth be told, but I have been in one. If you get the chance, sit in the radio-op/co-gunner seat and look at the breech block in the "fired" position.

 

Ya gotta keep your head hard back against that little leather headrest to avoid touching it with your nose. Now imagine a really hot breech block, weighing about 1200 pounds, coming back at you at your face at about 200 MPH, while you are bouncing around over uneven ground.....

 

That's the most obvious example, but tankers in general were not complementary about the design/comfort of the Sherman. The fact that glancing side hits on the early version heated the armour up enough to ignite the badly placed fuel tanks was just a bonus (hence the "Ronson" nickname: lights first time, every time!)

 

OTOH, it was reliable, cheap to produce and "good enough" - virtues which made it beloved of manufacturers and quartermasters.

 

cheers, Mark

[Edsel]

My father was a gunner (Cannoneer) in the 755th Tank Bn during WWII. Sadly he passed away four years ago but he told me a lot about his experiences in the M4 Sherman and the earlier M3 Grant.

 

He had two tanks knocked out that he was in during the war. Both were hit by German cannon fire, but neither one brewed up. One of these hits merely ripped the boggie wheels and tracks off but the other penetrated the turret.

Eventually his tank third tank was also knocked out but he didn't wake up until about week later so he doesn't know whether it burned up or not. That time he got to come home (in a hospital ship).

 

Dad was a life-long mechanic and was very happy with the reliability of the tank. His biggest gripes were that the armor was too thin and the gun too weak.

 

One tactic he says they employed was to carry as many WP rounds as they could get ahold of. You could then smoke up a German tank and manuver around on it to get a side or rear shot at it.

[Toadmaster]

Originally posted by Edsel

One tactic he says they employed was to carry as many WP rounds as they could get ahold of. You could then smoke up a German tank and manuver around on it to get a side or rear shot at it.

 

I've heard that before, supposedly that tactic also caused some (presumably less experienced) tankers to bail out, since the smoke tended to fill the tank, some crews thought their tank was burning.