@Suibno, considering your lack of experience, I would say be more cautious about how you approach a target. While you are in an M18 Hellcat, your speed is your focus. “No armor is the best armor.” You’re going to hear a lot of these terms.
Don’t try to act like a frontline vehicle you perform better at flanking since your gun will kill if you start learning weak points. Someone else can dive a bit more into that. Rather not write an essay all I can say is, to try to focus on lower Battle Ratings, where you can better understand armor. Speed Running never gets you far nor gives you proper experience.
The biggest thing I have learned in the game is to be patient. You want to drive to the edge of where you know the enemy will start appearing and make sure that you have hard cover to shoot from. Watch the mini map to see pings and pay attention to where your teammates die and what killed them.
Stay still in the area you chose until you need to move to capture a point or advance forwards but always move with intentionality such as not moving across wide open fields that you have a 90% chance of getting shot from. Know where your next cover is going to be and why you want to be there. Are you trying to flank a point that your teammates need help on? If your teammates are all around a certain area then you might be able to move a little more freely to your next spot. If you are alone in an area, then you likely need to move much more cautiously, checking corners and listening for engine sounds.
I would say the large majority of my deaths are still because I get too impatient and just want to get to a point or a vantage point without having to be careful while I am moving there. Learn the maps, learn the spots where enemies will most likely be watching, and find your own spots that you can lock down the enemy team.
I started as a ground player and reached the tier you are at before realizing this is a combined arms game and I need to learn how to play air as well. Now I always grind air and ground at the same time, keeping them caught up with each other. Don’t worry about paying money for the game unless you are comfortable with it but by far the best bang for your buck is to buy a decent amount of premium time. If you do decide to remain free to play then just enjoy the ranks as you progress and accept that the grind is going to take a little longer. On the plus side, you will have more time to hone your skills before progressing in ranks.
I just want to say a quick thank you to everyone here! I returned to my 4.0 lineup w/o SPAA, started flanking and using my rangefinder properly. In the game I just did i got 6 kills, and in the first one i did today 5, which are the most i ever gotten in rb! My next thing to probably do is to scout more often with my chaffee, but apart from that i also do need to angle a little more.
Welcome to higher BR’s. Things will only get more expensive as you climb the ranks (otherwise people would be at rank VIII in a couple weeks in some cases)
The playstyles change drastically as you change BR’s. Now (with the Hellcat especially), you arent meant to go toe to toe with other armor… the M18 really doesnt have armor. You should use its mobility to flex and support on the battlefield (and spot targets). Frontal engagements (especially against heavies) dont pan out well for it without knowing exact weakspots to hit on whatever you are shooting at (unless it is another lightly armored vehicle).
Planes are a whole other breed entirely. Go into ARB at 1.0 and just tinker and learn. You wont jump straight into aircraft and excel unless you are exceptionally gifted and it comes natural, or the other team is so inept that they just fly into your shots willingly. I get my butt handed to me in ARB when I used to do well in it. I went to Sim battles for a bit and god knows I cant fly RB now unless I go back and relearn all of the techniques since it is a different playstyle (much like tanks compared to air).
Angling is only really viable in some vehicles (looking at heavies especially)… even then, once you enter the realm of HEAT / HEATFS / APFSDS it means little to nothing.
That is 100% of your angling problem right now. None of those (except the M4 if you are lucky) are going to do anything while angled…
TLDR: Play as if you have no armor… being seen = dead (which most of your lineup isnt designed to take a hit anyway outside of the M4, which will only bounce poor shots or rounds with just shy of the required pen… which experienced players will still one shot because of the gun port. Another thing to consider, it isnt a race to higher BR’s. Get comfortable with the tanks you use. Use them until you know them like the back of your hand then move up. With a few exceptions, you will still be able to use some from your old lineups (especially the Hellcat) as you climb, and you will be able to wreck higher BR vehicles with it because you will know how to make the tank work for you.
Without money WT will cease to exist - make sure you are REALLY happy not helping it survive.
The more tech trees and types of vehicle you play, the more you can use free repairs to minimise expenditure - when you ground troops are all damaged you can go play air or naval, or a different nation while they repair.
not getting seen is your best defence against dying, so possibly learning to hide and use binoculars to find targets?
You have a fairly light lineup so even more emphasis on my previous point - don’t get seen!
Also consider making more crew slots - the fist few for SL are reasonably cheap.
There is no “magic solution”…i am a bit ahead (i have some 7.0+ lineups) and i also noticed everything became much harder…
The other players are better (on average) and everything costs more…so it takes longer.
I simply “accepted” vehicles take longer to research and i actually started taking more time to learn the vehicles, since i now have to use them longer…
I also went back and started unlocking cammos…it is a reason to player lower BRs and it is actually fun.
Also…you can play other nations…and take them to 6.0 as well…
I know this is NOT what you were asking…but freemium game models imply an increasing cost to progress…
You can buy premium to increase rewards…but sooner or later you will run into a similar issue…and it costs money :)
People also say getting better…(more kills less deaths) will make a big difference AND IT REALLY DOES (i can see it on games i do well)…but i personally reached my “skill limit”…so i don’t do so well on most games…
One thing I wanted to point out is that angling is mostly a tank specific strategy. Some of the Shermans benefit slightly from angling but not enough to be concerned about it most of the time, because their armor is already designed to be angled from the front based off of placement. Also, if you angle some tanks like the M4A1 Sherman, then you will actually make it easier to pen you from the front so you don’t want to angle that tank at all.
Tanks like the reserve tier Stuarts and the 3.7 Chafee are light tanks and don’t really benefit from angling at all. Trying to angle them will not increase your armor enough to matter and will just be one more thing to keep track of.
Ok, so after all the tips I did get better, although i do need a bit more practise.
In a nutshell, here’s what i do now:
start off with an assault ground arcade because it can help me get a booster and i rarely loose money from it, rather i gain. (i use my “5.3” (quoted as i play realistic, real one is 6.0))
Play in a 4.0 lineup, only including the m10 gmc, chaffee and m4a2. Despite the m4a2 not being spaded and not even having the M62(?) shell, i can take out one person before getting destroyed.
Before you ask, YES i flank with my chaffee, and YES it’s sucessful.
If i become more confident, i could try going in only the m18? Idk.
If you have any tips or tricks, tell me! I am happy to change this as listening to you all did help me play better :)
Additionally, if anyone is wondering, this is how much more silver lions i got after 2 DAYS of playing, not weeks, DAYS!
For some context, i started out with ~12k (stated in first message(?))
Although quick question, seeing how the m40 was earlier called “better as an anti tank”, which ammo should i use for it? I can never seem to pen anything, so it could be my aim.
for the tanks not the spaa although that spaa is actually mounted on a vietnam era tank hull so you have neutral steering that you can use to your advantage (also m41 is the tank that the hull is from)
