Latest operation by a small unit of special operations walker squad known as "The Spooks" revealed that AA tanks defending the bridges on Yeager Island were different from the AA tanks protecting the convoys.
The AA tanks seen defending bridges in the mission "Bridge Demolition" are noticeably larger than the AA tanks of the convoy, and has 8 wheels as opposed to 6 of the other type. It also explodes into pieces when destroyed unlike the other.
See how the wheels are about the height of the walkers. Compare this to the picture of Convoy AA tank.
(Above two images blown up for better visibility)
*Above photo taken during Operation "Poo Struck Pants" (link to a news article on the Operation "Poo Struck Pants" by Wright Orientation)
Additional photos of this operation
@Kendog84 yeah I never really looked into the AI vehicles, so it’s kinda cool someone is
@Axartar
Same here, never really even played these training missions before. Glad I played them a few times recently though, the idea kinda hit me that those target tanks must be the convoy AA tank or something else.
@JacobJohnson92
Why are you copy-pasting Axartar's comment?
@Kendog84 hmmmm I’ve never really tried looking at them in detail, except the convoy ones, but they’re easy
@Axartar
Thanks, I could kinda do that with a normal plane.
I found that this thing appears in Missile/Rocket Training as "Tank" (I'm pretty sure they're the same as this one).
Kinda hard to make out the details though, since they despawn immediately after you fail the mission, and painted in really dark red. Thee model looked like it's just an enlarged convoy AA tank with extra wheels.
(Easier on Rocket Training, you have more time to fly your plane and land near one.)
@Kendog84 hmm. I reckon you could use a detachable drone if you wanted to see them in mission, and perhaps find a permanent daytime mod? Idk.
I wonder if I can post pics in the comments..https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/973002115993714688/1036641620449317084/IMG_4986.png
Oh, didn't work, can't embed
@Axartar
I see. I guess I don't mind it being uneditable though, I just kinda want to see how it looks (beyond just the dark silhouette, lol).
@Kendog84 maybe? They’re buried somewhere in the files, my guess is they aren’t made of simple planes parts so may never be editable
@Axartar
Aww, that's a shame! No worries though, kinda figured ground vehicles were more like pre-designed 3D models.
I wonder if it's possible to find them in the mission files and somehow spawn them in the free mode... Or maybe edit the mission and change the setting from night to day maybe
(I'm on iOS, so modding is unfeasible)
if you go into aircraft designs it shows you a handful of ai designs as well as your other designs, copy and paste an AI design and rename it. Go into the game and you can play with it. It doesn’t have the tanks tho, just bombers and race opponents mostly, so my bad there.
@Kendog84 I can’t remember exactly but if you fish through the ai vehicle designs in the game folders you can find some of the vehicles.
@Axartar
Oh, huh, how do you do that? I'd love to inspect this closer.
I know some AI vehicles like bomber and fighter are in the AircraftDesigns, but I dunno how to make them usable (I also don't know if the 8 wheeled AA tank is among those)
@Kendog84 oooohh nice, I mean with some of the NPC vehicles, you can copy their file for the vehicle, and add them into the usable plane files if you wanna have a closer look.
I'm sure some, if not many, people already knew this (there's at least one forum post with pics of this AA tank, talking about a glitch: https://www.simpleplanes.com/Forums/View/314063/Bug-AA-Tank-In-Bridge-Demolition) but I didn't until now and I was pretty mind blown. It was a pretty fun discovery.
I started the mission to test the HP of the AA tank (for weapon damage balancing), and did in fact landed my walkers next to the AA tank (all photos except one taken in one session of the Bridge Demolition mission). And boy was I surprised when I realized that the AA tank was massive...
HP of this vehicle was about 3,000.
I used modified wing gun with 50 damage, kinda messed up the count though.
*Walkers are about 1.7m tall