Air to ground rockets

These automatically hit on a 6, but my opponent last night argued that a roll of 2 thru 5 has no pinning effect whatsoever because it doesn't explicitly state that in the section on aircraft weaponry; presumably he thinks they just disappear harmlessly into this air...... but I'm pretty sure grunts under rocket attack hit the dirt just as fast as if they were shells bombs or mortar rounds

By the rules rockets are either direct fire AP or HE. They hit on only a 6. If you hit infantry with HE you then roll 4 D6 needing fours to wound. You are applying artillery rules to them and that is incorrect.

How so? A 5 inch HVAR carried a 45 pound warhead - the same amount of hurt as a destroyer's main gun - in fact the WW2 ones were modified 5"/38 shells - a pair of those (or more!) landing in your neighborhood is definitely going to have some effect even if it one of them doesn't directly hit the tank sitting 50 yards away..................

"A rocket has an armour
penetration value as for guns, and
always attacks a vehicle’s rear (actually
top) armour value. They also have an
HE rating for Area Fire."

In other words, they behave just like HE shells and mortar rounds.......

But it's NOT indirect fire like artillery. So rolling a 2-5 has nothing to do with the process. It's DIRECT fire, not indirect and that's just how the rules work-- if you want to house rule it go ahead but continuing to argue about it won't change my mind (or anybody's that wants to play the rules as written, I'd imagine). The size of the rocket and all the facts you may want to provide, no matter how correct, won't change that. If you need an explanation then it's because rockets were notoriously inaccurate and they just went way off course. Or were duds.

Rules as Written - when used in 'Direct fire' the rockets are hit or miss (no 'area hire' effect). If used for 'Area fire' (suppression) then the relevant rules apply.

In a Barbarossa game last week my opponent picked a chit for objectives held at game start/first turn, pulled an Air Attack, successfully rolled for an I-16 armed with 6 rockets and in his first turn got 2 '6s' direct fire and brewed up a Pz IIIF. The other 4 missed rockets had zero effect on the SdKfz 221 and 222 nearby.

Exactly right-- a miss is a miss. If we had to keep track of every missed shot then we'd have to scatter HE that missed, try and figure out what else that errant AP shell might hit, and worry about where all those small arms rounds go when you miss their target. It'd be a bit tedious.

Also bear in mind that the rockets are a small salvo compared with a fire mission so don't have the saturation effect and shock/shrapnel concentrations that a barrage would.