Armed Assault Wiki
Register
Advertisement

The 2S9 Sochor is a self-propelled, heavy artillery vehicle used exclusively by CSAT forces in ArmA 3.

Overview[]

  • Role:
    • Indirect fire support
« The 2S9 Sochor is a lightly armored self-propelled artillery piece used by the OPFOR army. It's based on the T-100 chassis and fires 155 mm projectiles. The T-100 chassis interior had to be heavily modified to allow support for the 155 mm cannon with auto-loader. Sochor is also equipped with a Remotely Controlled Weapon Systems turret fitted with 12.7 mm HMG and 40 mm GMG. The modification paid off and several Asian countries are now in the process of modernizing their heavy artillery division with the 2S9.
Field Manual
»

Design[]

Armed with a 155 mm howitzer cannon as its primary weapon, the 2S9 is a powerful gun-based fire support vehicle that is capable of firing a mixture of high-explosive, smoke, cluster, and even precision guided shells on targets at extreme distances.

Armament
The standard loadout of the 2S9 gives it 32 rounds of high-explosive (HE) shells for the main gun. In addition to the standard HE shells, 6 different sub-munition types are also available, forming a total of 24 more shells that can be loaded. These include:

  • 2 rounds of infrared-guided (heat seeking) shells
  • 6 rounds of scatter shells that can cover an area with anti-personnel (AP) mines
  • 2 rounds of cluster shells that can saturate an area with a hail of explosive fragments
  • 6 rounds of deployable white smoke shells that can cover the impact zone instantly in a thick cloud of smoke
  • 2 rounds of laser-guided shells
  • 6 rounds of scatter shells that can cover an area with anti-tank (AT) mines

For self-defence, the 2S9 also has an RCWS turret fitted on top that is armed with a dual-mount 12.7 mm heavy machine gun and 40 mm automatic grenade launcher.

The externally mounted RCWS comes pre-loaded with a single 200-round belt of 12.7 mm ammunition and has a single belt to reload from. The GMG on the other hand, feeds from a 96-round 40 mm high-explosive (HE) grenade belt and also has only a single belt to reload with.

Arma3-sochor-00

2S9 carrying out a fire mission at nighttime.

Features
The 2S9 shares the same chassis as its MBT parent, which grants it the heavy armour of an MBT while sharing the excellent manoeuvrability and speed of the T-100.

Drawbacks
Although it shares the same advantages of the T-100 in terms of mobility, it also retains the same weaknesses as well - such as an exposed rear engine while lacking the heavy armour of its NATO counterpart.

Protection-wise, many parts of the hull's plates are less durable and render the 2S9 even more vulnerable to damage from anti-vehicle launchers. It also cannot adequately defend itself against enemy threats that get too close without having to resort to attacking in direct fire mode, so having friendly units provide escort is essential.

Crew Capacity
The 2S9 has a seating capacity of three personnel for a crew consisting of the driver, gunner and commander.

Camouflage[]

  • Hex: Arid Hexacam camouflage pattern. Useful for forested, grass plains, and desert environments. Changes any applied camo nets to use a two-tone desert camouflage pattern.
  • Green Hex: Tropical Hexacam pattern camouflage. This is used in heavily forested and tropic environments. Attached camo netting will use a two-tone woodland camouflage pattern

Protection[]

The 2S9 has a base armour value of 425. It uses a mixture of Composite Armour plating and Explosive Reactive Armour panels.

It has four separate ERA blocks shielding the glacis plate and both sides of the hull. The 2S9 cannot be fitted with slat cages.

The following highlighted positions serve as weak points on the 2S9:

Arma3-sochor-hitpoints

LEGEND
Green = Hull
Orange = Engine
Violet = Fuel tanks
Light blue = Treads
Maroon = Turret
Gold = Howitzer barrel

Note that in order to inflict actual damage, a munition must first penetrate through the surrounding armour plates and directly hit the component's weak point. Any strikes on non-highlighted parts will cause little (if any) noticeable damage.


Hull[]

The hull can resist up to 850 points of damage. Will cause a catastrophic kill if fully depleted.

Munition type Damage reduction (%) Velocity reduction (%)
Armour Piercing None 20
High-Explosive 80 50
High-Explosive Anti-Tank 80* 20
Tandem High-Explosive Anti-Tank 80* 10

(*) Reductions only apply to the explosive component of the munition i.e. Tandem HEAT explosive charge

If the hull has been compromised, no reductions will be applied to the velocity/raw damage of incoming projectiles.

Hull ERA[]

Arma3-vehiclearmour-sochor-erahull

ERA blocks are installed on the front and sides of the hull (rear excluded; along the frontal half only).

Hull ERA blocks will shield against 100 points worth of damage. They can only protect against a single projectile per block, and will cease to be functional once detonated.

Engine[]

Located in the tank's rear. It can take up to 467.5 points worth of damage. It takes only 20% damage from high-explosive (HE) type munitions.

30% of incoming damage onto the engine is always inflicted onto the 2S9's "health" pool. It will not however, cause a catastrophic kill if destroyed unless the 2S9 is critically damaged.

If damaged: Reduces power output, acceleration is decreased and it may become impossible to climb uphill.
If destroyed: Inflicts a mobility kill on the vehicle; 2S9 is instantly immobilised.

Fuel tanks[]

The 2S9's fuel tanks can only resist 212.5 points of damage before they rupture. They receive only 60% damage from HE-type munitions.

30% of incoming damage onto the fuel tank is always shared with the 2S9's main "health" pool. Destroying the fuel tanks cannot result in a catastrophic kill unless the 2S9 is at critical health status.

If damaged: Gradually leak fuel over time, but it will stop at a threshold of 80% of the 2S9's remaining fuel capacity.
If destroyed: Causes it to rapidly lose its entire fuel capacity in just a few seconds.

Treads[]

Both treads can resist 650 points worth of damage. No amount of damage inflicted on them is shared with the 2S9's main "health" pool.

Destroying either one of the treads will hamper the 2S9's handling but will not prevent it from moving. Destroying both will severely degrade the 2S9's handling and can prevent it from moving while on rough terrain.

Turret[]

The turret can only survive a meagre 340 points of damage. No amount of damage incurred is transferred onto the 2S9's "health" pool.

Munition type Damage reduction (%) Velocity reduction (%)
Armour Piercing None 20
High-Explosive 80 50
High-Explosive Anti-Tank 80* 20
Tandem High-Explosive Anti-Tank 80* 10

(*) Reductions only apply to the explosive component of the munition i.e. Tandem HEAT explosive charge

If the turret's armour has been compromised, no reductions will be applied to the velocity/raw damage of incoming projectiles.

Howitzer barrel[]

The turret's howitzer can survive even less damage, being able to incur just 255 points of damage before failing. No damage inflicted on this component is transferred onto the 2S9's main "health" pool, however.

Destroying this component will lock the barrel and prevent the gunner position from adjusting its elevation/depression. It should also be noted that unlike the turret, the barrel is only capable of reducing 60% of incoming damage from high-explosive (HE) munitions.

RCWS[]

The commander's RCWS turret can resist up to 250 points worth of damage. No amount of damage incurred is transferred onto the 2S9's "health" pool.

Munition type Damage reduction (%) Velocity reduction (%)
Armour Piercing None 20
High-Explosive 60 50
High-Explosive Anti-Tank 60* 20
Tandem High-Explosive Anti-Tank 60* 10

(*) Reductions only apply to the explosive component of the munition i.e. Tandem HEAT explosive charge

If the RCWS turret's armour plating has been compromised, no reductions will be applied to the velocity/raw damage of incoming projectiles.

Components[]

  • Camo Net (Hull): Drapes the entire hull with camouflage netting (the turret is not covered). Partially conceals covered sections from thermal sensors.
  • Camo Net (Turret): Identical to Hull camo netting but for the turret only instead. Note that some components like the RWS or the commander's optics are not concealed.

Armament[]

The gunner position handles the primary Howitzer 155 mm, while the commander controls the dual-mount RCWS HMG 12.7 mm/RCWS GMG 40 mm remote weapons turret.

For optics, the commander's turret has variable zoom capability and can toggle a day, night or black-/white-hot thermal vision mode. The gunner's howitzer lacks thermal optics and can only switch between day or night vision:

Howitzer 155 mm[]

Arma3-vehicleweapons-2s9sochor-howitzer155mm

NOTE: Refer to the Capabilities and Manual Firing sections for a more detailed explanation of the Howitzer 155 mm's usage.

Shell name Base damage value Damage type Initial velocity (m/s)
HE 340 High-Explosive 810
Guided (Primary) 300 High-Explosive 810
Guided (Secondary) 1,200 High-Explosive N/A
Cluster (Primary) 300 High-Explosive 810
Cluster (Secondary) 35 High-Explosive N/A
LG (Primary) 300 High-Explosive 810
LG (Secondary) 1,200 High-Explosive N/A

155 mm self-propelled howitzer.

It has a muzzle velocity of 810 m/s. Without a firing solution selected, the Howitzer 155 mm can fire one shell every 7 seconds (~ 8 rounds per minute). It also takes 7 seconds to switch between munition types.

Blast radii, guidance type (if applicable) and penetration depth vary depending on the type of shell loaded. Smoke and AT/AP scatter shells do not have explosive payloads as they are fitted with dummy warheads designed to disperse submunitions instead (and are therefore not listed here):

  • High-Explosive (HE): 30 metre blast radius, has a penetration depth of 121.5 millimetres (direct impact only).
  • Guided: 4 metre blast radius, infrared-guided; will attempt to home in onto "hot" vehicles within a radius of 800 metres. The submunition separates from the main shell once it is 500 metres above the impact zone. The IR seeker has a 10% chance to lose lock against smoke countermeasures.
  • Cluster: Will separate into multiple smaller explosive fragments once the dummy shell is 200 metres above the impact zone. The primary shell will disperse these fragments in a 35 metre radius. The fragments each have an 8 metre blast radius and have a 7% chance of failing to detonate, leaving behind Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) pieces.
  • Laser Guided (LG): 4 metre blast radius, laser-guided; can only lock onto laser spots within a radius of 800 metres. The submunition will "launch" from the dummy shell once it is 500 metres above the impact zone and begin seeking a laser spot.
    • The gunner is also able to toggle a live camera feed from the shell once it is separated. If no laser spot can be found, the shell will simply strike the point below where it separated from the primary shell.

RCWS HMG 12.7 mm[]

Arma3-vehicleweapons-2s9sochor-rcwshmg127mm
Base damage value Aerodynamic friction Initial velocity (m/s) Penetration depth (mm)
30 -0.00086 910 35.49

General-purpose 12.7 mm heavy machine gun.

The RCWS HMG can attain a fire rate of up to 600 RPM and requires 20 seconds to reload a fresh box or to fully rearm from a logistics vehicle. Accuracy-wise, it has a fixed dispersion of 0.0012 rad regardless of distance.

The Fire Control System is only able to automatically zero on stationary targets and requires 1 second to finish adjusting. Manual zeroing is also possible, though only in increments/decrements of 100 m (up to a maximum of 2000 m).

RCWS GMG 40 mm[]

Arma3-vehicleweapons-2s9sochor-rcwsgmg40mm
Damage type Base damage value Aerodynamic friction Initial velocity (m/s)
High-Explosive Anti-Tank 100 -0.001 241

40 mm automatic grenade launcher. Fires grenades fitted with high-explosive anti-tank (HEAT) warheads. They have a blast radius of 4 metres.

It can attain a fire rate of up to approximately ~ 349 RPM. It also requires at least 20 seconds to reload a fresh belt of grenades or to fully rearm from a logistics vehicle. Accuracy-wise, the GMG has a dispersion of 0.005 rad.

The FCS can only zero onto stationary targets and requires 1 second to finish adjusting. Like the RCWS HMG, manual zeroing is also possible with adjustments being made in increments/decrements of 100 m. However, it is restricted to a hard cap of 1500 m which cannot be exceeded even by the FCS.

Capabilities[]

It fires all 32 HE rounds in four minutes and 12 seconds, averaging at just under 8 seconds per shot. This makes its fire rate considerably slower than the Mk6 Mortar, although its damage and blast radius per shell is significantly greater.

The Sochor has five range modes available for firing:

  • Close range: 826 to 2,415 metres (ETA 30-22 seconds)
  • Medium range: 2,059 to 6,021 metres (ETA 48-35 seconds)
  • Far range: 5,271 to 15,414 metres (ETA 78-56 seconds)
  • Further range: 14,644 to 42,818 metres (ETA 130-96 seconds)
  • Extreme range: 22,881 to ~67,112 metres (ETA 162-117 seconds)

Overlaps occur in the following ranges:

  • 2,059-2,415 metres (Close and Medium)
  • 5,271-6,021 metres (Medium and Far)
  • 14,644-15,414 metres (Far and Further)
  • 22,881-42,818 metres (Further and Extreme)

Unfortunately, this means that when simply using the built-in artillery computer, the 2S9 can only perform MRSI strikes in narrow nearby bands, or in the large band beyond ~23 km. It is also unable to have more than two volleys landing on the same target at the same time.

Note however that the built-in computer tends towards using low-angle trajectories. The Sochor is capable of firing at up to an 80 degree angle from flat ground. This means that it is technically capable of getting multiple volleys to land on the same target simultaneously, but it would require manual calculation of the appropriate trajectories, or the use of spreadsheets or third-party applications.

Manual Firing[]

By default, the turret can be manually raised and lowered with the page up and page down keys. For precision aiming, the rate of adjustment can be slowed by holding down the shift key (by default) while aiming up or down.

It is also possible to adjust range mode without the artillery computer, though this is more difficult. By default, using the F key will cycle through the different range modes, from Close range through to Extreme range and back to Close. It is also possible to bind a key to go from longer ranges to shorter ranges, though there is no default binding for it (Weapons > Previous weapon).

Although there is no indicator without the artillery computer to determine which firing mode is currently active, it is possible to work it out by using the rangefinder to point at an object within Close range (826-2,415 metres) and cycling through the firing modes until the red X on the crosshair goes away, indicating you've returned to Close range.

Trivia[]

  • While the Sochor is not specifically based on a real-world design, the idea of combining a tank chassis with an SPH turret (which is also shared with the NATO M4 Scorcher) is similar to that of the real-world Russian-made "2S35 Koalitsiya-SV". Like the in-game Sochor, the 2S35 utilises a self-propelled artillery gun mounted on a tank's chassis (derived from the "T-90" MBT in the 2S35's case).[1]
  • Its GRAU index ("2S9") is shared with an older Soviet-era self-propelled mortar vehicle, the "2S9 Nona".
  • The Sochor was not originally featured as an asset in the Alpha and Beta. It would only be included as a usable vehicle after the game's full release (as part of Game Update 1.00).[2]
  • Before Game Update 1.10, an engine bug would cause AI-controlled Sochor crews to ignore FIRE ARTILLERY commands given to them by a human player.[3]
  • Prior to Game Update 1.34, the Sochor's IR-guided artillery shells did not work as intended and would always miss their targets (the shells never locked onto vehicles).[4]
    • Additionally, any shells that detonated prematurely before hitting their targets would inflict no damage. This applied to both the regular HE and dispenser-type shells.[4]
  • The Sochor's IR- and laser-guided shells had different base damage values at release, with LG shells inflicting greater damage (800) compared to IR-guided shells (600). This was changed after Game Update 1.58 so that their damage values were standardised (they now deal the same amount of damage).[5]

Gallery[]

References[]

  1. Pike, J 2023, 2S35 Koalitsiya-SV Self-Propelled Howitzer, GlobalSecurity.org, viewed 6 February 2024, <https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/coalition-sv.htm>.
  2. van 't Land, J.J. 2013, SPOTREP #00010, Arma 3, viewed 25 August 2023, <https://dev.arma3.com/post/spotrep-00010>.
  3. van 't Land, J.J. 2014, SPOTREP #00017, Arma 3, viewed 14 October 2023, <https://dev.arma3.com/post/spotrep-00017>.
  4. 4.0 4.1 van 't Land, J.J. 2014, SPOTREP #00036, Arma 3, viewed 14 October 2023, <https://dev.arma3.com/post/spotrep-00036>.
  5. Kovařič, V 2016, SPOTREP #00054, Arma 3, viewed 14 October 2023, <https://dev.arma3.com/post/spotrep-00054>.

External links[]

See also[]

Variants[]

Vehicles of comparable role and configuration[]

Vehicles of ArmA 3
Wheeled AFV-4 GorgonAMV-7 MarshallHatchbackHEMTTHunterIfritKartMB 4WDMSE-3 MaridOffroadProwlerQilinRhino MGS (UP) • StriderSUVTempestTractorTruckQuadbikeUGV StomperVanZamak (MRL)
Tracked 2S9 SochorAWC NyxBTR-K KamyshCRV-6e BobcatED-1D Mini UGV (ED-1E) • IFV-6a CheetahIFV-6c PantherFV-720 MoraM2A1 Slammer (A4 UP) • M4 ScorcherM5 SandstormMBT-52 KumaT-100 Varsuk (X Futura) • T-140 Angara (T-140K) • ZSU-39 Tigris
Rotor-wing AH-9 PawneeAH-99 BlackfootAR-2 DarterCH-49 MohawkCH-67 HuronDemining DroneMH-9 Hummingbird (M900) • Mi-48 KajmanMi-290 TaruMQ-12 FalconPO-30 OrcaUH-80 Ghost HawkUtility DroneWY-55 Hellcat
Fixed-wing A-143 BuzzardA-149 GryphonA-164 WipeoutCaesar BTTF/A-181 Black Wasp IIKH-3A FenghuangMQ-4A GreyhawkTo-199 NeophronTo-201 ShikraUCAV SentinelV-44X BlackfishY-32 Xi'an
Aquatic Assault BoatMotorboatRHIBSpeedboatSDVWater Scooter
(Parenthesis) denote variants.
Karts DLC | Helicopters DLC | Apex DLC | Jets DLC | Laws of War DLC | Tanks DLC | Contact DLC
Arma3-factionicon-csat CSAT - Vehicles (ArmA 3)
Wheeled IfritMSE-3 MaridQilinQuadbikeTempestUGV SaifZamak
Tracked 2S9 SochorAkinaka ED-1D (Sayyah ED-1E) • BTR-K KamyshT-100 Varsuk (X Futura) • T-140 Angara (T-140K) • ZSU-39 Tigris
Rotor-wing Jinaah AL-6Mi-48 KajmanMi-290 TaruPO-30 OrcaTayran AR-2
Fixed-wing K40 Abalil-3KH-3A FenghuangTo-199 NeophronTo-201 ShikraY-32 Xi'an
Aquatic Assault Boat (Rescue) • Speedboat HMGSDV
Parenthesis denote variants.
Helicopters DLC | Apex DLC | Jets DLC | Laws of War DLC | Tanks DLC | Contact DLC
Advertisement