I feel like its so oddly balanced like it is because of this exactly. If they’d treat it, and maybe the Panther II also, more like the Maus, make it available around anniversaries for research, let a few more people have it, then it’d get more attention. Thus giving it better balancing potential.
Personally I think it’d be incredibly easy to make the Tiger II 10.5 “realistic” enough to justify it’s existence despite its paper-tank status. Just like the Ostwind II. All you’d have to do is remove the second loader and slow the reload accordingly. Same goes for the Panther II, drop the 88mm and it’d be realistic enough to be allowed at least in anniversary events, perhaps even put back into the tech tree. But that’s just a pipe dream. I was shocked to learn you can’t even get any of them from Silver Lion lootboxes. I’d trade the Object-279, IS-7, Surblinde, heck even the E-100 for the Tiger II 10.5, I like the thing that much.
Dont forget, back then on the wiki gaijin mentioned the Tiger II 10.5cm using a stabilizer
“The tank was to be armed with the new 105 mm 10,5 cm KwK L/68 gun, equipped with a stabilizer”
which it never got </3
The round in game is actually wrong for the 10,5 cm KwK L/68. It should be the Pzgr.39 with ~100g Filler. And 16,9 kg weight, so more pen, lower after effect … kind of, well no more overpressure but over 100g TnTa will still be enough. https://community.gaijin.net/issues/p/warthunder/i/diSMwWDXjzp6
A while ago Gaijin said they wanted to move the Tiger II to 7.0, and briefly actually tried to move the T29 to 7.3. Then they walked back that decision under community pushback but still noted that they were performance outliers and an exception was being made by leaving them at their BRs.
Now, in one BR update, both tanks have received a nerf.
It’s the alternative solution, and I’ve got to be honest, on the whole? It’s better than them going up in BR, because it lets them play as heavies more, if that makes sense.
When it created the Tiger II 105, Gaijin combined three different proposed Tiger II upgrades into one vehicle: a new engine, a rangefinder, and the 105. The problem with this design is that while the rangefinder was slated for introduction, and while it was a given that the Tiger II and Jagdtiger would be getting a new engine had the war continued (though not necessarily the one featured in game!), the 105 proposal was sketched out and then discarded.
This is precisely because it did require a second loader and the RoF was considered unacceptably slow. However, the presence of a second loader is not Gaijin’s invention, it is accurate to the proposal, and the rejection was not based on the infeasibility of adding in a new crew member physically - just on RoF considerations.
In any case, reloads in the game are somewhat arbitrary since they’re used as a soft balancing mechanism. The Jagdtiger with two-piece ammo and two loaders in a roomy casemate has an 18.6s aced reload…
He isn’t massively overreacting, this is just further proof that their idiotic statistics based ratings are garbage, the T29 did not deserve a reload rate nerf considering it’s basically a worse Tiger 2 105 and was always the Tiger 2 H equivalent, it was never worthy of being above it let alone should it have ever been considered for 7.3.
It wasn’t better, it was a direct equivalent trading reload speed and velocity for better damage, having slightly better mobility and turret armor while having VASTLY worse hull armor - tell me, what major advantages did the T29 have to be a higher BR? (rhetorical, you don’t have to answer because you won’t find any). T34 is even worse in this regard as it had an even worse reload with vastly worse damage.
I also love how “rare” the Tiger 2 105 and Panther II supposedly are, yet I’m pretty sure if I started counting how many of them I see per match, its at least one of them every other match when I play from 6.7 to 7.7. Like I just died to one in my T29 that shot me straight through my turret cheek. Instead of ricocheting, it went through the first layer of the mantlet and the round fuzed and overpressured my turret, blowing up my ammo. Like, no joke I see more of them when I play 7.0 than I see the Maus at 7.7, its wild. I’ve seen teams with 3 or 4 Panther II’s all at once.
Seriously, with how common these two tanks already are, why not just nerf the “unrealistic” aspects of them and make them available for research around the anniversary like the Maus? Its a win-win for everyone. People who like them being exclusive still have a limit on who has it, and people who want it have a non-zero chance. On top of this, non-Germany players also win because they’d be more balanced once made a little more realistic.
But yeah, it actually hurts my soul to know that if I had played the game like 8 months sooner than I did I could have them, but now there’s literally zero chance of getting them. Like its crazy to think that I have a higher chance of getting the IS-7, Surblinde, or Object 279 than to get something as basic as a Tiger 2 with a 105 cannon, or a Panther that actually has a functioning reverse gear lol
There are so many solutions. Make them available on anniversaries. Or only available to people who have completely researched the German ground tree. Or give people who get to level 150 of a battle pass the chance to trade in the coupon upgrades in exchange for a vehicle that’s otherwise completely inaccessible (not just limited to the three German vehicles). Or hell, sell an “Ancestor Pack” on the store that has the three removed vehicles.
The only thing lacking is the will to do it.
It may be pure copium but I think they’ll come back one day. Just not for many many years.
Just like the IS-7, Surblinde, and Object 279, they could put them in Silver Lion packs as well. Possibilities are endless. I’ve even seen people say if they put all of the removed German vehicles into a paid bundle for a limited time they’d buy it
