It’s an answer but it isn’t what you like to hear. Jokes aside, since you are one of the more likeable US mains that knows how to control your emotion and more importantly, managed to not get chat-banned, I’ll answer you in semi-serious way on what I think. There are no credible evidence suggests gaijing nerfs or buffs vehicles because they are russian vs NATO as a political agenda. The game’s balance is generally tuned around br, player feedbacks (all the noise causes the bmpt to go from 10.3-11.3 in like two weeks), and historical in-game performance rather than national favoritism. Your percerived imbalanced often comes from complex game mechanic, and some form of incompetence by the game dev rather than deliberate favoritsm. I see you got yourself the t-80ud, why not give it a go and see if you perform it better than NATO counterparts after 100 matches?
Hueys and Chinooks dropping containers of ammo, towing creates from the spawn, Goony birds parra dropping supplies, IFVs filling all that empty space with ammo and running it out to the MBTs… it goes on and on.
I’m not American, I’m from Lithuania. I just chose this nickname.
I’d appreciate it if you played more than 20~ games in a vehicle before commenting about it, but regardless, I’ll still discuss this with you.
As we all know, Spall damage is determined by how much penetration you have after going through a plate. This means that shell mass is completely ignored in the calculation. As a result, APFSDS from weak guns such as the HSTV-L result in extremely low spall. To make this situation worse, low penetration darts like XM885 struggle with Russian ERA blocks, which eat them easily.
XM885 is also underperforming within the game and is portrayed incorrectly. Outside of the blatantly incorrect mass and shell dimensions, XM885 (Delta 3) barely penetrates 300mm when it should be on par with 105mm M774 according to US Testing.
Overall, while it’s most certainly not a bad tank, it’s still a light tank. Just because it can work at a certain BR doesn’t mean it should be that BR. The M10 Booker, 2S38, Namers, and such all can work well into 12.7, but that doesn’t imply they should be that BR.
I’m not sure what statistics you’re looking at because StatShark, the best information available to us, shows the HSTV-L in a less than 1 KD for December.
It should be noted that the HSTV-L should statistically have a better KD than the Abrams for its BR, as it will naturally attract better players compared to the Abrams. This is because nearly all HSTV-L players own an Abrams, while not all Abrams players own the HSTV-L. Players with both will naturally be more skilled than those with only the Abrams.
Even though the HSTV-L naturally attracts more experienced users, it still has a less than 1 KD.
i’ve been playing the game long enough to realize the HSTV-L is mostly played by CAS dudes by being a light vehicle which reduces the spawn cost of CAS vehicles.
That alone tells something imo. Not that its over or undertiered, just something.
Best top tier light tank in the game.
Do you play to tier light tanks regularly none of them are all that good, honestly on further though it is kinda better than the CV 90120 (in some cases its close) i say put them both at 11.7 and free my boy AGS from 12.0 too
To counter PARS, Walleye, Mavericks and paveways that Russia couldn’t counter at the time, the best they had was the laser guided ATGMs on the Mig 27 that required you to fly at the target until it hit and the KAB 500s that couldn’t track lock.
because night battle where a thing and Russia lacked a IR F&F weapon Kh-29s with an IR seeker where suggested, people got upset because nobody could find any documents for it anywhere, then Gaijin saw the the brochure for the Kh38MT and said fine we will use that one.
No FnF alternatives other than activating the second channel on the Khrizantema-VMs and you don’t want that
why not? its one of the least survivable auto cannon platforms
1st buff in YEARS and its a 0.1 to 0.5 sec reload, not exactly ground breaking when ther is a years old report on Podboi that’s outstanding that would give spall liners that if implemented correctly, it would be a 66% reduction in the spall cone and 90% reduction in fragment generation to EVERY Russian MBT from the T-55 on.
Because they have been dog water and artificially nerfed since the 1st Mig-29.
Only if a shell uses an apfsds long preset, which might not be the case for lower caliber darts and autocannons.
It literally says it has 1.06 K/D for December, what are you looking at ?
If you want to move a vehicle with that stats down by a step or two, what would you do with others that have even worse stats ?
The Mavericks had a range of 10 km, and were easily shot down by the Shilka, just like the A-10As themselves. The A-10A wasn’t OP.
The Russians had an excellent X-29, which was better than the Mavrik and is still better to this day.
The ONLY thing you need to ask is how it compares to the BMPT…not the '72.
How can Shilka easily counter A-10A ?
Kh-29s have it’s pros and cons when compared to Mavericks.
Bruh.
The feeling I get is that the HSTV-L is one of those vehicles where it’s BR doesn’t really matter.
It’ll out-maneuver anything, out-reload anything, out-accelerate anything, it’ll be vulnerable to anything, etc. regardless of whether it sits at 12.7 or 10.3.
It’s a vehicle with only two drawbacks: Post-penetration damage and penetration.
The lack of penetration isn’t felt that much considering you can just aim for weakspots and you’re usually firing at the sides anyways.
That just leaves the post-pen damage, if this were buffed to be equal to M774 the HSTV-L would instantly be the #1 tank in War Thunder.
I think they should correct the penetration and improve the consistency of spalling, but not quite on-par with main gun APFSDS, then move it to 12.7.
There are two rounds they tested with HSTVL as well.
The one we have in-game was the primary test round for years.
Then they did a limited test run of a higher powder charge before writing off the barrel, which has that alleged M774 performance.
I don’t remember the barrel wear conclusions though.
Either way, if we got the limited test run… easily 12.7.
Having 400mm penning APFSDS being fired so quickly would be insane.
It’d be as if you turned the French VBCI into a 2S38 and then increased the 2S38’s mobility even more.
Thats called balance, do you expect to have a missile with an advantage in every way imaginable, well i guess you dont have to the kh38 is already in game.
Nope, should he 10.7, very annoying to fight
Just click on it.
Not really.
Even if it had 600mm of penetration it would still be suffering from poor post-pen damage output.
It’s the lack of damage that can get you killed, not the lack of penetration.
How?!
You can one-shot it by aiming nearly anywhere, you’re significantly more mobile than it and it has trouble penetrating the vast majority of your frontal area (M1 KVT).
2S38’s should be food for the M1’s.
That’s not how that works.
HSTV-L’s APFSDS spalls poorly because of it’s type classification in the game code, not because it’s penetration is low.