Raam Sagol is really not recommended. 11.0 is not a good place for Israel, and the Merkava 3 have become seriously uncompetitive due to their uptiers to 11.7 against full lineups and objectively better peers.
The only premium I can somewhat recommend right now is the Shot Kal Dalet if you like 9.0, or Magach 3 ERA if you want a full lineup (8.0 is filled with options).
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Yes, Magach 3 (ERA) still remains the best choice of a premium for Israel.
One of the best lineups at 8.0 and it’s a solid tank.
The best overall option would be to put a talisman on the M-51, but that would work only for the first 2 ranks.
The 9.3 lineup is really fun with 2 Merkava, machbet and ayit for cas, if they would add an ifv it would be even better.
Ayit is the best all around 9.3 plane in game hands down
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Sadly Israel has no real IFV’s other than the brand new ‘Namer’ & ‘Eitan’ IFV, so it will be a while, because their “Convertible tank system” where it (Merkava) can be a IFV, AFV, of FMA.
There are turreted M113 and Achzarit variants incorporating anything from simple 25mm turrets, to 30mm and 30mm + Spike combos.
A turreted Stryker with UT30 turret is also possible as a mid-high tier addition.
I dislike the nation politically but I enjoy the vehicles, I have no problem using the Israeli TT as a Muslim. The main issue is how copy and paste the tech tree is and more variety would help a lot.
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A bit offtopic, but anybody here has material about modern 120mm israeli APFSDS? I pretend to make a bug report about M338 performance, but i can’t find enough info.
Of course, i’m talking about non-classified information.
By and large you’re right, but I haven’t heard of a drone carrying an RPG 7 VR warhead. Just because it’s heavy. It’s usually suicide drones with a tandem warhead.
(Maybe they exist, I don’t know enough about the field as an israeli.)
Most of what has to do with the defense / attack systems of the IDF is Very Very classified in these areas to the best of my knowledge. This is what I found on the Elbit Systems website:
“The M338 is the 3rd generation high-velocity flat-trajectory cartridge, with excellent accuracy and penetration capabilities against MBTs with modern armor and a heavy reactive protection shield. The cartridge incorporates a Low Vulnerability (LOVA) type propellant and is fully compliant with NATO STANAG 4385 and 4493. The M338 is compatible with NATO 120mm L44 and L55 smooth-bore guns”
from another site:
“IMI introduced a third generation of its Armor-Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Sabbot (APFSDS) round designated M-338. The new round improves the Kinetic energy (KE) penetrator’s performance of primary 120mm anti-tank rounds, and is suitable for all types of guns (including L44). M-338 uses a tungsten core designed for improved penetration and performance. Using new Low Vulnerability (LOVA) propellant enabled IMI to increase the M-338’s muzzle velocity with large safety margin while maintaining precision and operability over the entire temperature range defined by STANAG criteria. IMI used a uniquely designed tungsten alloy core, with unique mechanical properties and sabot design to improve accuracy at all combat ranges.”
Now I feel like an AI
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Funny enough, most of these characteristics aren’t modelled ingame (anti-ERA, LOVA, and high KE performance).
They could do it, but ehhh…Israel is not popular enough to care.
:^].
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The anti-ERA part you can make a bug report about. Gaijin will say you need to find a source for what specific ERA it is, but you can retort with “but in game ERA defeat all APFSDS without specifying model”.
The M338 is an early 2000’s product. It is parallel to the 105mm M426. But since then, Elbit produced the M428 4th gen 105mm APFSDS but no 4th gen 120mm that they’re willing to disclose.
So either they’re secretive about it, or the IDF just never requested something new because Russia and China never really put out anything serious in terms of armor. Which in turn means Russia’s most capable ERA Relikt is likely within what the M338 is designed to defeat.
M338 entered service around the same time DM63 (120mm) did (2005-2006), given similarities in properties (anti-ERA, muzzle velocity and SCDB/LOVA propellant) between both i tend to believe that they should perform equal when fired from the L/44 at least.
M338
M322
The thing is that i lack better proofs to push such argument.
EDIT: I don’t think the generation means something aside from the fact that is a improvement from the previous round.
105mm: M111 (1 Gen), M413 (2 Gen), M426 (3 Gen, 1990) and M428 (4 Gen, 2003)
120mm: M321 (1 Gen), M322 (2 Gen, 1990s) and M337 (3 Gen, 2000s)
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What exactly are you trying to prove? Maybe I can help.
That the penetrator of M338 match DM53/63 penetrator in length (685mm x 23mm)
That will require some serious pixel counting. But may I ask what are you trying to achieve with this?
I mean, if my assumption is correct
M338 would go from
611m 0*
353mm 60*
to
627mm 0*
367mm 60*
You can find the brochure for M338 here: https://web.archive.org/web/20180128080023/http://www.imisystems.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/120mm-m338.pdf
Is from the IMI page before being purchased by Elbit Systems.
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According to Wikipedia the 120mm cannon of the Merkava 4 is actually an mg253 and not an mg251 like the Merkava 3
While there is some correlation between the length and diameter of a KEP and penetration capability, it’s not uniform between rounds. So you’ll have to add another layer of evidence.
Generally speaking, Israeli rounds and German DMxx rounds are deeply related, some outright license produced versions, others just based on similar production technologies. The M338 should be parallel to the DM53/63 when both are fired from L44, but the M338 should, according to manufacturer be somewhat more powerful because it is “more energetic”, and the Merkava 4’s gun has an improved recoil system to accommodate that. But we cannot prove the extent of “somewhat better”. I think that’s all we can do.
Within that length you’ll also have to somehow accurately deduce what is the length of the actual tungsten piece without the anti-ERA tip which can be quite long.
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That is a misconception. According to IMI/Elbit, the MG253 is designed as a more compact version to fit inside an M60 (Sabra), while the MG251 was developed into the MG251-LR (Long Recoil) for the Merkava 4 to accommodate better rounds.
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I didn’t know about that.
It bothered me that they sold a modern Israeli cannon to the Turks for a long time