Attack ground and target size questions

1. I very often see that some pro players use attack ground when attacking enemy. It have pros? It don't get some "debuffs" to accuracy when you shooting to ground instead of enemy squad?

2. There is bug that from attack ground you can shoot to enemy rear armor from frontal. But what better try to use attack ground or use default attacks?

1. You are ignoring sight blockers e.g. smoke. So you can shoot without vision. That is needed versus smoke-cancer.

2. That will mybe never happen with PaKs, maybe with Piats. ^^ if you have vision, ever use the auto-attack. Only some arty-units and Piats can still be optimiced with ground.

1. To supplement, if you attack ground, exclusively scatter values are used, not accuracy, because you're not shooting at, well anything.

2. Doesn't have anything to do with attack ground, just happens sometimes when in-game calculations derp out, very rare case tho.

Also, with some luck, using attack ground at the max range of the weapon/vehicle might cause the shell to scatter long and hit beyond its maximum (targeting) range. It's a common tactic to use attack ground as a hail mary shot when the enemy vehicle moves out of normal firing range.

But what about attacking enemy infantry by tank? It's better use default attack or try to use attack ground to hit on center of squad?

But what about attacking enemy infantry by tank? It's better use default attack or try to use attack ground to hit on center of squad?

It depends. Usually it's best to use attack ground on vehicles with large AOE profiles, such as the Brummbar, KV-2 and Pershing/Tiger/IS-2/Tiger II, so you can target the middle of the squad and deal maximum AOE damage. Otherwise the autotarget will usually fire at one of the spaced out models and not hit the other members of the squad.

I personally always use hold fire on the Brummbar and use attack ground to fire, as manually aiming at the middle of a squad and/or into their path is way more effective than the autofire. I usually let heavy tanks autofire except when I see a clumped up squad (or several), then I use attack ground to try to hit the middle of the squad/blob to maximize damage.

For vehicles with smaller AOE profiles, such as medium tanks, it's not really worth the micro to attack ground.

Complimenting Sanders response:

1-There's no "debuff" by letting the tank aim at infantry, vehicles or support weapons.

ACCURACY:
Units using ballistic, to put it simple anything that isn't small arm fire, rolls and checks whether or not you get a hit.

Accuracy X Size.
Vehicles tend to have "low accuracy" compared to infantry, because they will be facing units which have ± 18/26 bigger size. While there are exceptions (mostly AI vehicles) this is the reason it is largely unlikely for a tank to score a perfect hit on an infantry model. Which is why scatter is important for vehicles.

Scatter:
Basically, after a miss, how much the shell will deviate from the original target. Low scatter vehicles makes for decent or great AI units.

2-The "bug" applies on either case, be it a normal attack on a vehicle or attack ground. This happen because even on miss rolls, the shell can still impact an enemy vehicle. What determines if a shot counts as frontal or rear is where the shell lands on the hitbox. Angle doesn't play a part.


3- So why attack ground at all?

-When you lose sight. Whether it be because the unit hide behind a shotblocker, smoke or way outside of your vehicle LoS.
-Against spread out squad models. A vehicle will target a specific model which might not be the most effective in a particular case.
-Praying to RNGesus to hit outside your range. Due to overshooting (scatter) or terrain height, you might land lucky shots as the shell can continue to travel forward.