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So, I was looking through the vehicles (picking out which the enemy will use in an attack on the PC's) and noticed that it seems that they've just taken the armor thickness into account and not the effective armor thickness with accounts to angles.

For example, the BMP-1 has around 7-19 mm of armor on the front, depending on which piece you measure.
But the effective thickness is around 40-50mm due to the extreme angles of the hull at the front.
Meanwhile, the side and rear has 17-18mm or armor at flat angles.

And yet, in-game, the BMP-1 gest just a flat 5 armor rating to both front and sides.

That means that you can easily penetrate a BMP-1 from the front with a .50 cal sniper rifle, no matter where you hit.

But in real life, you wouldn't be able to penetrate the front of the hull due to the extreme angles.

I think I'll be going through all my vehicles and adjusting the armor values to the effective thickness value equivalent using the conversion rules in the back of the book.

Because they don't seem right to me. And if the BMP is wrong, then I'm sure a lot of other vehicles are wrong as well. Looking at Strv 103, I think they might be, as well... armor 8 would represent an armor value of around 100mm... And while the Strv 103 has only around 40mm of hull armor, it's at such an extreme angle that it effectively is more than 200mm thick to oncoming projectiles.

Then you have to adjust the damage of [strike]tank breakers[/strike] Javelins and other weapons designed to defeat slope. And take into account the strike angle of an attack. And...

Better to assume that the values presented already assume some slope effect is in play either by design or the vagaries of combat and extra successes used to buy damage represent the gunner, by design or luck, getting better attack angles.

I'm with Paladin here. If we start to take into account attack angles in the game it would turn into crunchfest pretty soon. Also penetrated shot might hit the tracks and IRL then the armor might not even in the way usually. Though the ability of a single .50 to damage a tank track is questionable at best to begin with. So yeah, an ultra realistic tank sim this is not. Nor is it meant to be.
Usually I handwave these situations by explaining that most armor that is rolling theses days is so shot through/patched up etc. that it might explain armor values that do not line up with player's World of Tanks knowledge:D

Then you have to adjust the damage of [strike]tank breakers[/strike] Javelins and other weapons designed to defeat slope. And take into account the strike angle of an attack.

I don't think you have to do either of these things. You have top attack weapons attack top armour, and you make the assumption -- which you are already making as-is -- that the angle of attack is more or less perpendicular to whatever the vehicle facing is.

It makes perfect sense to beef up frontal armor to account for slope ... that's why the slope was designed in. And it encourages players to consider working around to the flank instead of everyone staying still and shooting at each other, which seems to be the default mode of RPG combat.

Then you at least need to factor in that there are a lot more top attack weapons than javelins.

I'm with Paladin here. If we start to take into account attack angles in the game it would turn into crunchfest pretty soon. Also penetrated shot might hit the tracks and IRL then the armor might not even in the way usually. Though the ability of a single .50 to damage a tank track is questionable at best to begin with. So yeah, an ultra realistic tank sim this is not. Nor is it meant to be.
Usually I handwave these situations by explaining that most armor that is rolling theses days is so shot through/patched up etc. that it might explain armor values that do not line up with player's World of Tanks knowledge:D

Sure, that would be fine, for most vehicles.

But there are plenty of vehicles that *rely* on the extreme angle of their armour.

And of course I won't start calculating relative armour value based on the angle of attack of each weapon fired at the vehicle.

I'm just talking about the Front, Side and Rear head-on attacks.

Because let's just use the BMP-1 as an example (since that's what caught my eye at first).

In real life, the BMP-1 is rated to withstand incoming fire up to 23mm autocannons from the front, despite its very thin armour. This is because of the pretty extreme angles from the front.

In-game, however, it has a front armour value of 5. And a .50 cal has a base damage of 4, which means that you just need 3 successes to punch right through that armour from the front (which is supposed to be impossible in real life).

Now, if you look at the relative armour thickness based on the angle, it should have an armour value of 6 for the upper front hull, at least, since 7-9mm at an 80 degree cosine angle will give you a little over 40mm of relative armour. According to the conversion rules on page 110 of the referee's manual, that should give 6 armour. And the lower front hull is 19mm at 57 degrees, giving 40mm of relative armour.
That would make it immune to .50 cal fire since it's then 2 steps higher than the base damage of .50 cal weapons.

Again, I'm not talking about calculating angle of attack every time a vehicle is attacked, I'm just saying that vehicles that rely on extreme angles for protection should have that benefit.

Then you at least need to factor in that there are a lot more top attack weapons than javelins.

Honestly, how many top attack weapons are there in the game?
The TOW in the game isn't top attack. Neither is the Kornet.

So which top attack weapons do we have?

Javelin. And...Javelin. I can sort of buy TOW not normally being top attack on the assumption that all the -2B missiles have been expended and -2 and -2As are all that's left. (Where is the AT-14 statted, I can't find it?) But then there's the Mk19 and similar that will be top attacking (and are rated to penetrate a little shy of estimated effective 40mm; reduce strike angle and....)

Also note that the BMP's 5 frontal armor has a baseline negation of 23mm AP ammo's Dam 5 AR 0 and better chances against 23mm HE's Dam 4 AR +2.

Javelin. And...Javelin. I can sort of buy TOW not normally being top attack on the assumption that all the -2B missiles have been expended and -2 and -2As are all that's left. (Where is the AT-14 statted, I can't find it?) But then there's the Mk19 and similar that will be top attacking (and are rated to penetrate a little shy of estimated effective 40mm; reduce strike angle and....)

Also note that the BMP's 5 frontal armor has a baseline negation of 23mm AP ammo's Dam 5 AR 0 and better chances against 23mm HE's Dam 4 AR +2.

Well, since this is what it says on the description of the Javelin in-game, I don't think there's an issue with increasing the frontal armour of the BMP-1:
"As the Javelin missile hits from the top, the armor rating for the rear of the target vehicle as always used".

Now, if you want to use the Mk 19 as a top down attack weapon, you'll have to use it in the improvised mortar role.
Because in normal use it doesn't have enough of an arc to count as a top down weapon. No more than what most in-game cannons would count as top down weapons at long and extreme ranges.

As for the TOW 2B, that wasn't in production until 2004, so I don't think that's going to be an issue in the year 2000.

The AT-14 isn't in the book. I meant the Konkurs, not the Kornet. Konkurs wasn't introduced to service until 1998 IRL, which is a year after the war started, so I don't think it'll ever be in the game.

Now, if you want to use the Mk 19 as a top down attack weapon, you'll have to use it in the improvised mortar role.
Because in normal use it doesn't have enough of an arc to count as a top down weapon. No more than what most in-game cannons would count as top down weapons at long and extreme ranges.

Beyond 1000m it certainly does. Source: watching my rounds lobbed downrange and jokes about eating sandwiches while waiting for them to land.

Even closer than that, 40mm is less than (I apologize, I misspoke earlier) the rated penetration of the M430 HEDP grenade.

As for the TOW 2B, that wasn't in production until 2004, so I don't think that's going to be an issue in the year 2000.

I believe you are mistaken, confusing the deployment of the extended range TOW-2B variant, fielded as TOW-2B Aero, mainly for use by Super Cobras. TOW-2B production superseded TOW-2A production in 1992. Source: recollection of the TOW racks in my Bradley in Bosnia in 1996. Oh, and Redstone Arsenal's open-source history of the program. https://history.redstone.army.mil/miss-tow.html

I notice you don't address other factors about setting the BMP's front armor to match the 23mm ammunition it's supposed to defeat. It also defeats up to 73mm HE! (5 Dam vs modified Armor of (5+2) 7 = no penetration chance.) Even 105mm HE needs an extra success to penetrate a BMP with the current armor values.

There is some wonkiness with weapon damage vs. vehicle armor in this version of the game. Without redesigning the entire framework, I'm not sure how you fix it. Before changing any of the damage or armor numbers, I'd recommend experimenting with ad hoc vehicular armor modifiers for small arms. Even a +1 for a .50 cal would prevent it from ever penetrating Armor 5 on a vehicle. By comparison, making a BMP's front armor 6 proofs it against 76mm HE and requires multiple successes to damage from weapons up to 115mm HE.