ORIGINAL: inqistor
Ho-301 seems to be very interesting weapon. Not much gun, but it actually resembles Bazooka.
"but the muzzle velocity was a very low 230m/s and the ten round magazine gave a firing time of just 1.3s. These characteristics meant that the weapon could only be used for one attack, pressed home at a suicidally short range. It was not a success." 'Fighting Guns', Anthony G Williams
If a weapon wasn't a war winner, there's generally a very good reason for it. Equally you need to compare like with like. The Ho-301 was an anti-bomber weapon, the VYa was an anti-tank weapon for the Il-2, the Ho-301's shells could be thin-walled for maximum explosive effect against lightly armoured aircraft, the VYa's had to be considerably more robust to punch the armour on tanks and other AFVs. The Ho-301 squeezed as much explosive in as possible to achieve its effect by blast alone, the VYa used a heavier shell and less explosive to achieve its damage by both kinetic effect and by blast. Individual stats do not tell the full story.
The naval equivalent of this would be comparing SAP and Common. Common might be good against unarmoured targets, but against sufficently armoured targets will leave little more than scorch marks on the surface. You need SAP to penetrate the plate and get the explosive, even if a lesser amount, to where it will do some good.
