Thus, an overmatched plate will be forced to rely on tensile stresses within the displaced disc, and will tend to break out in front of the attacking projectile, regardless of whether the edges cling to the parent material or not. It was found experimentally that the regions in the center of the plate produced the bulk of the resistance to penetration, while the outer regions, near front and rear surfaces, presented minimal resistance because they are unsupported. Plate greatly overmatching shot involves the projectile digging its own tunnel, as it were, through the thick interior of the plate. If the volume which the shot displaces has lots of area to cling to the parent plate, it resists penetration better than if that same volume is spread out into a disc with relatively small area where it joins the undisturbed armor. "Armor obliquity effects decrease as the shot diameter overmatches plate thickness in part because there is a smaller cylindrical surface area of the displaced slug of armor which can cling to the surrounding plate. So, when a Tiger hit a T-34, the 88 mm diameter of the Tiger's round overmatched the 45 mm glacis plate of the T-34 by so much that it made no difference that the Russian tank's glacis was inclined at an angle of 60 degrees from vertical. Furthermore, if the diameter of the armor piercing round overmatches the thickness of the armor plate, the protection given by the inclination of the armor plate diminishes proportionally to the increase in the overmatch of the armor piercing round diameter or, in other words, to the increase in this T/d overmatch. In real World War Two tank combat, however, other important variables intervened, such as the thickness to diameter (T/d) coefficient, which means that the higher the diameter of any given round relative to the thickness of the armor it is going to strike, the better the probability of achieving a penetration.
Theoretically, the higher the muzzle velocity, the more penetration any kind of AP round would have, all other variables remaining constant. During World War II, the Armor Piercing (AP) round relied on its own weight (and a 88 mm KwK 36 L/56 gun APCBC shell weighed 10.2 Kilograms, as opposed by an 75 mm KwK 42 L/70 gun APCBC shell, which weighed 6.8 Kilograms) to penetrate the enemy's armor. The other reason was the fact that at that time, armor penetration was mainly a function of thickness to diameter (T/d) ratio. This is one of the two reasons why the 88 mm KwK 36 L/56 was retained as the main gun of the Tiger I, instead of the Rheinmetall 75 mm KwK 42 L/70. In May 1941 the German general staff had demanded a new Kampfwagen Kanone (Tank Gun) specification for the Tiger it had to be capable of penetrating 100 mm at about 1,500 meters and the improved Pzgr.39 could approach that. Here's a great explanation, taken from, about the effectiveness of the 88mm and how overmatching came into play: By 1943, the German guns were getting big enough that the T-34's impressive armor was no longer so impressive, and bigger, powerful guns like the PaK 40 were there in greater numbers, and certainly could kill most T-34s.
Or rather, the lack of it in real combat, a KwK 36 88mm round would generally have gutted a T-34 in one hit, because it's a very big, fast round hitting armor which, yes, is sloped, but not THAT thick.
WT's penetration mechanics are something I absolutely hate, because of one word: Overmatching.
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