After suffering through the rather simplistic armor rules of Squad Leader, the publication of Cross of Iron has not only made up for the inane simplicities of its parent game but has brought into the field of armor miniatures design a host of innovative and highly sophisticated concepts.

Whereas in previous games multi-shot weapons could unload all of their turn's firepower on a target they only saw for a second or two, for instance, in COI reload time has been cranked in, which requires some time to pass before the second or third shot can be attempted. This procedure is new to miniature armor rules, and, together with the penalty for only sighting a target a short time before firing (lack of target tracking) and the subsequent decrease in accuracy it incurs, makes COI the most realistic game now available for microscale armor combat.

Such other concepts as buttoned-up tanks, where accuracy decreases when the crew relies on periscopes and vision slits but the crew's vulnerability increases with "above hatch" sighting, multiple shots for other than slow firing weapons but with accuracy and breakdown penalties, increased lethality of shots taken from higher elevations and deliberate immobilization are design ideas that are both highly innovative and realistic, and make COI the best armor game around (at least from a hit/miss/damage standpoint).

While from a superficial perspective COI appears to be the ultimate in armor simulation, and there are a large number of ideas that have really pushed back the boundaries that previously limited the number of factors that could be ranked into a wargame with individual weapons, there are also a number of problem areas with the system that become nuisances every once in a while.

In other wargames or rules, the effect of a tank gun hit on armor is usually a straightforward affair, with the armor thickness compared to the piercing ability of the shell to determine if a penetration is made, and then if the shell pierces the armor, a "kill" or some very substantial damage results. For instance, at 500 yards the Tiger I's 88 could penetrate over 160mm of armor, so if a T34/76c is hit at that range frontally in War Game Research Group rules, it is an automatic kill, and in Tractics and Brew Up the T34 ends up as rubble 100% and 79% of the time (in Brew Up, the crew has to pass morals during the 21% of hits that penetrate without major damage, and they usually bail out). The result of this analytical hit/damage procedure is to relate a hit from the 88 as a sure kill, and the panzer/leader feels secure that if he can hit the enemy, they can be destroyed.

The designer and developer of COI have taken a different approach and instead of relating the penetrating capabilities of the shell to the tank armor it strikes in a totally mechanical fashion, they have decided to let the vagaries of fate enter into the final outcome in line with their general philosophy (anything can and will happen).

In COI the Tiger commander whose 88 lays a shell onto the front of a charging T34/76c at 280 meters will see the shot bounce off or fail to top the enemy an astounding 43% of the time! Or, to switch to the desert scene, the Matilda crew that hits a Mark IIId squarely against its 30mm armor at 120 meters will see its two-pounder shells going for nought 72% of the hits.

As an example of the results that can outdo the Squad Leader hit/kill chances for randomness and wild chaos, note the following matchups of AFVs that were pitted against one another during the struggle in the Eastern Front:

Firing Tank	Target Tank	% Kill After a Hit *
Mark IIIj Mark IIIe PzKw38t Mark IVf2 Tiger I Panther T34/85 T34/76c T34/76c BT 7-2 JS II Panther	BT7-2 BT 7-2 BT 7-2 T34/76c T34/76c T34/85 Panther Mark IVf2 Tiger I PzKw38T Panther JS II	71% 57% 28% 28% 57% 71% 28% 57% 28% 43% 57% 57%
* Frontal hits at 7 hexes.

Except for the very early mismatches or the Panther against T34s, the usual kill probability ranges from 20 to 57%, which is rather uncomfortable if one is involved in a one-on-one shootout since even though the ballistics charts say that your 88 could pierce twice the armor it just hit, John Hill thinks it just dandy that what you never expected (and certainly don't want) comes to pass.

Whether what Hill thinks is true is in reality what actually occurred I can't say, but the Germans designed the Tiger so that in a long range shootout the Tiger could trade shots with the T34/76s and because of its thicker armor and better gun, come out alive almost every time. From what I've read, the only time a T34/76 ever consistently killed Tigers was at Kursk from point blank range, so the 57% kill chance for Tigers) versus 28% for the T34/76s at up to 960 meters looks really fishy to me.

Even the Mark IIIe against the BT7 is hard to swallow, since in this case the 50mm gun on the panzer could penetrate about 50mm of armor at 280 meters, yet the 22mm of armor on the BT7 will only be penetrated and put the tank out of action 57% of the hits.

Of course, no matter how bad COI may look, it can't come anywhere near Tobruk, where 88 shells at point blank range would bounce away from the armor of the mighty Stuarts 50% of the hits, and 61% of the time against the Grant. If the Stuart rates a -1 DRM, in the COI system, then the 88mm Flak 18 hits will only fail to annihilate the light tank 17% of the on-target shots, which is still rather hard to imagine, but perhaps the 88 shells would go through the tinny armor so fast they wouldn't have time to explode, or even notice that they struck anything (was that armor or a thick dew we just went through?).

Ah, but COI does improve upon one aspect of Tobruk and most wargame rules that has always made wargamers suspicious and somewhat uneasy about their gaming. In Tobruk, about 16% of all hits would fortunately land on the track or suspension where they would immobilize the vehicle and coax the crew into abandoning the AFV. In Tractics and Brew Up the track breakage percentage is 10%, and the lesson is clear, line up guns with high fire rates (irregardless of their armor piercing abilities) and when the panzers jump into the open, pepper them with 15-35 shots. Knowing the law of percentages, one would open up with a Bofors AA gun for 17 shots at a Mark III at over 1300 meters , in the hope that at least one shot would catch the track.

Of course, gaming becomes less than fun when the Germans are afraid to throw their King Tigers into the Battle of the Bulge for fear that the American .50 cal MGs will shoot their tracks off (a friend hasn't played Tractics since an HMG stopped two Tiger IIs in one turn). And accounts of actual battles seemed to emphasize burning tanks rather than broken track lines.

In COI, the only time a suspension/track can be put out of action (and only from the flank or rear) with a shell is when you aim for it (with a reduced accuracy), but the distance for intentional immobilization is limited to six hexes (240 meters). The treatment of track hits in COI coincides very closely with the WRG policy on the matter, in that hits on the lower parts of tanks were rare beyond 250 meters due to the effects of slight rolls of the ground that screened off the wheels and tracks.

The elimination of the really freaky track hits comes as a great relief to us JS II fans who suffered greatly from Wirblewinds and 37mm flak guns (not to mention the Mark II with its auto-cannon) that always were able to stop more tanks than the Panthers by virtue of their "track record."

The COI handling of multiple shot weapons also bears some discussion, since it is really interesting and has subtle repercussions. In the game, most tanks get one shot per phase, with the towed guns, assault guns and flak mounts (and some artillery) getting two shots for the most part. This in itself is rather "middle of the roadish" since WRG only allows one shot, Tractics and Brew Up rarely allow mom than two, and Tobruk goes all the way and orbits with the 35 acquired shots by the previously-alluded-to Bofors wondergun. But COI lets you exceed the "normal" rate of fire with a reduction in accuracy and an increase in breakdown probability.

The result is that the JS II that only gets a shot every other turn in Brew Up has the same basic fire rare as the Panther in COI despite the slower ROF it actually had (and that gave the German tanks a very significant advantage). The Panther may, should the events warrant it, take an extra shot with the knowledge that the gun will malfunction on 29% of the shots (if two shots are taken in one turn, there's a 51% chance that the gun will fail to operate at the end of the phase). While taking an extra shot seems like a real good deal, and it would allow the Panther to simulate one of its advantages over the Soviet tanks armed with the monster 122mm cannons (whose ammo was so large and bulky it came in two parts), knowing that the gun won't be usable more often than not after the fireworks usually is enough to make most COI fans put it out of their minds.

It would appear that COI views the effects of pushing a tank crew and gun rather harshly, and the result is that the intensive fire rule only gets used on the last turn of a game or in a "do or die" situation, and that for the most part the tanks get along with one shot and prefer not to play Russian roulette with their weaponry in return for an iffy extra shot. Since most Russian tanks had low fire rates anyhow (T34s were infamous for their slow output of fire), it would make more sense to let the Soviets use the intensive fire rule as it now stands, but lessen the malfunction penalties for the panzers since they were highly trained (for the most part), and their large, roomy turrets with three-man crews (as opposed to the T34/76s two-man turret) made high fire rates more feasible.

As a final bit of trivia on tank fire, German turrets generally rotated at a faster speed than Russian ones, and American tanks had the fastest turrets around (and with a variable speed, too). It might be nice to give the better turrets a break by increasing the out-of-covered-arc modifier for the poor Soviets and other guys with lousy turret traverse.

Brazen Chariots: A Review of the CROSS OF IRON Armor Rules, Part 2
Tank Gun Effectiveness in CROSS OF IRON