I feel you’re going offtopic here. Let’s get one thing straight here: can an HE shell at least spall, not talking about making hole in the armour caliber sized, just produce at least some spalling behind the armor, than an AP of the same caliber and velocity can perforate?
There you go, the answer if obvious. AP are more effective anti armour weapon than HE shells. The only question is “by how much?” .
If you can get both on target? A massive, bugger-off HE shell the weight of a toddler (or more) will be absolutely catastrophic to its target and whatever’s inside.
Once again, the issue is getting it on target- Something made much easier with AP rounds.
Take the OPs argument and introduce the ikv 103
slpsgr m/65 HEATFS 400 mm of pen across the board at 4BR
What about your WW2 tanks now? any point leaving the spawn in them ?
And finds the Panzer IV a problem?
The game hasn’t really ever replicated WW2 well- I go back to my Sabres VS MiGs at its beginning statement, as well as M47s and T-54s vs King Tigers. It offers WW2 vehicles, but that’s the sole extent it’s really tried to play up the WW2 aspects to other than maps (which are still also mostly fictional in layout.)
Heavies are fine in the meta, if you don’t play like a chicken with your head cut off.
Most WW2 Tanks at a similar BR have:
All the IKV has going for it is that one shell. Imagine if all the Tiger II had going for it was the 88, but replace that amazing postpen with dodgy HEAT damage lol? No turret, no armor, nothing to fall back on or get a lucky bounce from…
If you die to an IKV 103, it’s almost entirely your fault. I can’t recall a single time I’ve died to that gimmicky little thing.
I play the same game you play and I see the same game and I know you are right but it WAS a case of how noticeable it was and how much it destroyed game play.
For many up to BR6 its manageable but over the last two years it has become a flood of late vehicles with zero care to the effect on game play,canon and making some vehicles obsolete or feel pointless in playing. Mix that with narrow maps and we have plenty to whine about.
Like I said re the OP ,A Churchill IV vs something that pens 400mm with ease? Why even take that long slow drive in game?
Because the Churchill can also pen it with ease?
The IKV has a grand total of 18.5mm of frontal armor. No turret, as mentioned. A much worse reload. Can’t shoot through bushes, or fences, or anything in its way, really… And has no machine gun to mow them down, either.
OP not being able to kill that in a Churchill speaks more to their skill level than anything else.
Heavy armour is a card to play ,it’s an angle like playing no armour, but to what advantage with HEAT slingers about?
What advantage do the HEAT slingers have other than the HEAT? Which, again, has its own flaws, especially with a 10s reload on a platform as downright garbage as the IKV 103.
Oh, right, and I also forgot to mention: Unlike the churchill, the 103 doesn’t even get a short-stop stabilizer. You’re forced to play full-on sniper in a tank with already crappy velocity :>
Only if it can see it.If it plays as I do in it then it hides behind a hill and uses its massive gun depression to peek over and one shot the Churchill.Great fun for me ,zero for the other guy who wasted his time in a tank that was not that great in it’s heyday.
It’s like the effect narrow maps is having on many vehicles that need to flank.They are getting squeezed out of the game.
Reload is fine when you duck back down behind that hill ,its called player skill.Then you pop up and one shot another fool in a WW2 tank.Like bringing a knife to a gun fight.
SAV 20.12.48 another WW2 mockery maker
Looking at it ,Sweden was the nail in the coffin for realism in War Thunder.It is an anything goes joke now even for he the most tolerant and it is supported by the likes of you.
The anime pillows guy wins.
A tank with one gimmick is strong when playing with that gimmick, in an extremely specific situation which requires a good map to use? My god, Sherlock, that applies to almost every other tank in the game!
Neither of those have any armor, whatsoever. Drop an artillery strike on them, sic a teammate on them, just wait for CAS to do its thing… They’re so absurdly easy to kill if you have a base level of competence, it’s VERY funny you bring up player skill.
Swedish vehicles are more realistic, went further into development in reality, and are better depicted ingame than the King Tiger 10.5 and Panther II (88) you probably love. Anime pillows are historically accurate silly, haven’t you seen the pictures from ongoing conflict?
So you use two examples that were removed due to breaking canon and being fictional …lol …well done Sherlock.
Oh that WW2 realism we dont do : )
Enjoy your game
Removed not for breaking any “realism” or “authenticity”, but basic laws of physics with how those guns were stuffed into the turrets. Swedish vehicles, for one, EXISTED, and for two, ARE PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE.
Im confused. 3 years is unnacceptable?
I am still laughing at you providing me with ammo to fire at you.The vehicles that Gaijin wont implement because they were not WW2 or did not get built while you defend a country that never fought a day in WW2 with vehicles that never even went into production.Lets get those fantasy German vehicles in to our fantasy War Thunder world …why not ?
While we are at it lets give every tank without a roof to MGs a roof mounted MG to take on CAS in our "Combined arms " game.
Let’s give France and UK APHE to make it balanced and fair.
I am with you lets forget history and go for the almighty balance.
It is in a vehicle that can decimate tanks at 6BR ,you are the one talking balance all the time.
“Physically impossible” and “Were built after the war with secondhand experience, yet still mostly inferior to WW2 vehicles” are a little bit different, if you didn’t notice.
France and UK also never had APHE for those vehicles. Point to me the made-up munitions for swedish vehicles, or continue to make apples-and-oranges comparisons in an attempt to get gaijin to make Enlisted II: OnlyTanks edition.
Literally any vehicle that has artillery module can “decimate” the IKV without even spending a round, lmao
The Soviets run tests with captured Panthers by firing 122mm HE shells at them. Since IS-2s carried more HE than AP into battle (due to their nature as a breakthrough heavy), this was a natural thing for them to test.
Even when you don’t achieve the kind of catastrophic ammo rack shown in the picture above, damage to the armour, including dislodging of the upper glacis, made the vehicle so hit inoperable.
As for the interior, the Soviets placed blast sensors into the Panther to see what kind of energies would go inside. And (I hate writing this since as a pet owner I find it really disturbing, but history is history) they also placed small animals inside the vehicle to see what would happen to them once it was hit by the HE shell.
They died, and so would humans. The exact way in which you die can change, but you’re not going to be combat-worthy and probably life-worthy after such a hit.
So the answer to your why question is quite simple.
First of all, HE is only a reliable tank killer at pretty big calibres. Even for the 100mm the Soviets judged it insufficient for example. Now, to continue with the Soviet example, if you’re using the T-34-85 as the tank that has to exploit the breakthrough after it’s already been created, it’s needless to say that it’s gonna need AP. An 85mm HE shell is not reliable enough against well-armoured targets.
When the calibres got bigger, the calculations changed. It’s particularly interesting to me that the IS-2 carried more HE than AP into battle because its ammo carrying capacity was already very limited and commanders were instructed to fire their rounds wisely. So as it happens they must have placed considerable faith in their 122mm HE shells.
It must also be pointed out that - not just for tanks, but for towed pieces too - Soviet doctrine had a very straightforward assessment: any gun of a large enough calibre is an anti-tank gun if you need it to be.
