I think the M-51 is a weak vehicle for 6.0 and It’s must to be lowered 5.7 or 5.3. Why? Let me explain:
Its armor is quite weak, and at this BR, there are almost no vehicles that can’t penetrate its hull.
The first ammo rack holds only 8 shells, which is an absurdly low number. After firing these 8 rounds, your already mediocre reload time becomes even worse.
Its poor engine performance makes it a sluggish vehicle, struggling to exceed 38 km/h in RB and SB, and 42 km/h in AB. This prevents you from reaching a good position early in the match or escaping in critical situations.
Its armament is underwhelming: While it boasts an impressive 400 mm of penetration, its post-penetration damage is minimal. Additionally, since the OCC 105 F1 is a HEAT shell, it detonates upon hitting obstacles like trees or fences, severely limiting the player’s options. Besides the OCC 105 F1, your only other choices are an HE shell and a smoke round, leaving you with very limited ammunition options.
In conclusion, the M-51 is a tank that restricts the player and struggles to compete against other vehicles. To make it at least somewhat viable, I believe its BR should be lowered to 5.7 or even 5.3.
The M-51 does not restrict the player from performing good. If I’m not wrong, my first Nuke was in the M-51, the free three spawns is a huge advantage yet doesn’t have nothing to do with its battle rating placement,
For its battle rating, the armor is decent for a M4 at battle rating 6.0, some times can easily hold some shots, but overall is a sniping vehicle, Considering it’s a HEAT cannon at such low battle rating, it excels at long ranges, the eight rounds in the first-stage ammo stowage is more than enough.
The HEAT behaviour also is not argument to lowering its battle rating, at battle rating 6.0 you’ll encounter obstacles and so on at battle rating 5.7 or battle rating 5.3.
The gun is the same as the AMX30 at 8.0. 400 pen high velocity HEAT is the best round at 7.0, not to mention 6.0.
You still have 76mm shermans at 5.7. The STAs at 6.3 have 320 pen HEAT and have much the same armor.
8 round first order ammo rack is pretty standard. The french 100mm deals with the same problem, but at 7.7.
In ANY other nation the M-51 would be utterly OP. That israel has no ther tanks at 6.0 is the only reason it can stay at that BR. Trying to downteir it is a joke.
I didn’t know the things you said.Sorry for my ignoranity
But I just want to say that insulting or belittling people over something this small and insignificant isn’t right. It might not seem like a big deal to you, but some people are easily hurt and may become hesitant to share their thoughts. I don’t want to act like a moral knight, so I won’t drag this out, but there’s no need to upset anyone over a game.
you have not played the vehicle enough to get a grips with it.
at 6.0 its facing tigers, panthers, t34 and other wafer thin targets you can easily dominate in the thinfrom any range you can dream of. you play arcade so range is not an excuse for aim as the game holds your hand to the fullest it can without just giving aimbot.
The gun on it is very good if you know how to aim a bit, reload isn’t great but there are way worse tanks with even less good guns with way longer reload than that.
Just stay back a bit, watch angles and heavy traffic routes, you will get kills eventually.
Someone posted a screenshot of your stats and it seems that you play arcade a lot, which is probably why you feel like this tank is underwhelming because arcade favours the heavy armor meta quite more than realistic, both modes are very different.
That being said, I think it’s one of the best 6.0 vehicles out there for experienced players, you can even bring it in the 7.7 lineup with the magach and be as good with it.
Gotta learn to use cover and concealment and never rely on your armor, always play any vehicles as if it was unarmored and you will become better with it.
Nah bro, it’s already really good at 6.0, was better-than-mediocre at 6.7, 5.7 or 5.3 would literally put it in the same BR’s as the Jumbo Sherman’s and the 76 Sherman’s, as well as the first few Pershing’s, and it outclasses those too.
And before someone or you pull the ‘you probably have only fought against it, so you have no clue’ I have indeed played it.
It has a super strong gun, sure. 400mm pen. That on its own is justifyable of 6.0.
For those of you, however, who want it higher, let me explain. Here are all of the flaws that people fail to mention:
Suspension is crap. Utter garbage. The Gun Stability therefore is… also crap. The thing bounces for at least 5 seconds before you can get a shot off.
Reload is long. Understandably so, but still. Its long regardless. You will never get a second shot off when you don’t one shot someone…
which is the third point. Its not a HEAT-FS round. It isn’t some miracle worker. Its HEAT. Yes it has great pen. Post pen? none. Also, that’s given that it pens. HEAT is wonky, and absolutely has failed to pen the UFP or LFP or Turret rings of vehicles if it hits one thing wrong.
Another point; armor. The M-51 can be front penned by 20mms, or at least back when the HVAP worked. Now, still, it can easily be front penned by 37mm. Its not lightly armored enough to be no armor, however also not heavily armed enough to be well armored. It sits in the perfect medium that screws you over regardless.
All that said, the vehicle sits perfectly well at 6.0. It has a decent gun with a decent round, but still requires some brain to play and isn’t nearly perfect enough to validate its move to a much higher BR.
One shot hit the Tiger turret face. On Maginot, long range shot. Its just not balanced. This 400mm penetration heat shell. For this BR, the pen values as well as the damage cone are too high. This turret face hit even damaged some shells pretty far away fromt he penetration spot, deep inside the hull.
Heat post pen damage is mainly calculated by how much pen power ‘is left’ after pen. 5.7 heavy tank Tiger has 100mm armor. The shell has 4x the penetration, so it does a huge amount of damage.
I’m tired of the M-51 spam and this hyper op shell with far to great trajecory. Its too easy to aim and the heat shell doesn’t lose penetration power, even at 1000m. This tank served during the 1960ties to 1970ties. How can any sane mind put them up vs Tigers and Panthers?
Wiki…
In combat against the Arab armies, the M-51 proved itself capable of fighting newer, heavier tanks like the Soviet-built T-55 to T-62. The M-51’s 105 mm gun could penetrate these adversaries using HEAT Ammunition. The M-51 served well during its time, and is regarded as an excellent example of how an obsolete tank (the Sherman) can be upgraded beyond the limits of its original capabilities.
Gajin…
In combat against the Axis armies, the M-51 proved itself capable of fighting older, heavier tanks like the German-built Panther or Tiger. The M-51’s 105 mm gun could penetrate these adversaries using HEAT ammunition. The M-51 served well during its time, and is regarded as an excellent example of how a modernized tank (the Sherman) can be upgraded even beyond the limits of typcial ww2 warfare to sealclub vehicles from 2 decades ago.
The M-51 is acceptable being at 6.0 and doesn’t need to be any higher or lower. Raising it in BR is for the clinically insane WehraBoos and IvanBoos that hate other nations having tank destroyers that can actually do something against their heavies with more than a modicum of reliability and lowering it in BR is simply unnecessary. Why? Because it will still pen everything while still being penned by everything even at lower BRs, so the change would be essentially a nothingburger and therefore unnecessary.
as my last message, it should stay at 6.0.
it’s sluggish, no armor, very unstabilized gun, OK muzzle velocity.
the only thing going for it is it’s shell which is decent but don’t expect it one shotting someone, unless it was well aimed or the enemy is an open top or very lightly armored.
