Tanker Time - T-34, the Soviet workhorse - Part 1

Apologies for putting this up late, but I have kinda been caught up in watching Sherlock (I missed it the first time around and spent all of yesterday watching the first two seasons). To make it up to you guys, this will be a two part entry, both covering the same tank. Now, I know what you are thinking, why two posts on one tank? Well, the T-34 is a special tank. It was used a LOT. The T-34 used at the end of the war was vastly different to the one used at the start, while still being the same tank. Hence, the two parts. This is also our first venture outside of 'stronk fascist box tenk' territory too!

The T-34-76, the last mass produced model before up gunning to the T-34-85

The T-34 is probably the single tank we have to thank for the designs to come out of World War 2. It was incredibly balanced in terms of mobility, speed and protection, and when first encountered by the Germans in 1941 they termed it 'the deadliest tank in the world'. But why was it so good?

Well, lets start with the armor, shall we? It was 45mm thick, which you might think a little thin - and you would be right. It was VERY thin. But also very light. And very angled. This gave the T-34 and effective armor value of around 90mm on the frontal slope. This was simply unpenetrable for the early German tanks, and even a lot of infantry-operated anti tank weapons. This, paired with the excellent V-2-34 engine offering a whopping 500 horsepower, gave the T-34 its incredibly mobility. The T-34 could move through deep mud and snow with ease, while the German Panzer IV could not.

And now, the gun. In this part we shall only cover the 76mm F-34, due to it being the last (and most commonly used) cannon before moving on to being called the T-34-85. This gun could pierce 92mm of armor at 500m when firing APCR shells - this was overkill when considering that the T-34 faced at best around 60mm of frontal armor in 1941. Now, this isn't to say that the T-34 was a god amongst tanks, far from it. The tank commander also doubled as the tanks loader, which is bad enough - but the T-34 lacked the excellent optical viewfinders that the Germans had. This led to tank platoons being slow to find targets, and when they did find their target they lost all situational awareness of other targets around them due to the restricted fields of vision and overworked commander.

A T-34 in World of Tanks, sporting the 1942 turret model and the F-34 gun.

Despite its flaws, the T-34 was still a very influential design. It worked incredibly well, and was cheap too. While the Germans were designing bigger and better tanks like the Panther and Tiger, the Russians were simply churning out more and more T-34's. Costing around 135 thousand rubles to manufacture, they could afford to - by the end of the war Germany had produced no more than 6,557 Panther tanks and 2,027 Tiger tanks - while Russia manufactured 35,119 T-34-76's and 29,430 T-34-85's. The difference was staggering.

Fresh T-34's on their way to battle.

In regards to its performance in World of Tanks, the T-34 needs to play very carefully. At Tier 5, its armor is not nearly as impressive as it was against its historical foes - it can be penetrated by virtually every tank it can see. So, what does that tell you? The T-34 should use its mobility to get to a sniping position and flank its opponents, while using that same mobility to get out of dodge if needed. The gun is excellent if you can get the hang of the incredibly obnoxious aim time - fully equipped the T-34 can fire once every 1.7 seconds or so. While it lacks alpha damage, it makes up for that with incredibly DPM. And yes; you should be using the 76mm gun and not the 85mm gun. Why? The 85mm is just simply inferior. Less penetration and rate of fire do not compensate for the gained alpha damage at all.

Suggested equipment load out would be a Tank Gun Rammer, Ventilation, and an Enhanced Gun Laying Drive. This will speed up the rate you can lob shells at your enemy and also cut down on that horrible aim time. Crew skills are setup in the usual way - Commander training Sixth Sense and everyone else on Camouflage, before training everyone with Brothers in Arms as a second skill. Consumables are standard Fire Extinguisher, Repair Kit, First Aid Kit, although you *could* replace the Fire Extinguisher with food for the 10% buff to crew skills if you feel the credit price is worth it.

And that friends, is all I can tell you about the T-34-76! Be sure to stop by tomorrow for the second part, where I will talk about the modifications the Red Army made to this already amazing machine, and also what this means for the Tier 6 T-34-85 in game! Das Vidaniya!

Tanker Time - Mighty Box Tank! Tiger I

Welcome back for the second tanky post! This time we are covering one of the Tier 7 German Heavy tanks, the Tiger I. Often criticized for being a fat, unarmored matchbox, I feel it is definitely in the running for strongest Tier 7 in the game. Why? Well, you will find out shortly! Enjoy!

Look at the glorious simplicity of this majestic beast!

Continuing the format from last week (seems to work, not had any complaints!), we will start with some history behind this iconic piece of German hardware. Designed in 1941 to specifically combat the Russians T-34, the overall design was similar in most respects to the Panzer IV medium tank, but obviously in order to be attain its status as King of the mid-war tanks, it needed a certain... kick. That kick came in the form of a thick 100mm frontal armor plate (reaching 120mm on the turret mantlet), and the dreaded 8.8cm KwK 36 L/56. This gun was among the deadliest on the battlefields during its time, and coupled with the excellent optical equipment German tanks were equipped with it has been reported that Tigers have knocked out enemy tanks at ranges of at least 4 kilometers away. Thats insane! The armor, while seeming fairly thin for a Heavy tank, was deemed immune to the M4 Shermans gun in frontal attacks - another of its common foes.

Despite these excellent points, the Tiger I did surprisingly have an Achilles heel - it required frequent and often extensive maintenance. The engine and drive mechanism was, at the time, completely new and designed specifically for the Tiger I's requirements. This wasn't the worst part however - the suspension system designed for the Tiger was both ingenious and completely stupid. Each track was driven by 24 road wheels, overlapped of course. This meant that replacing a tyre on an inner road wheel would require the removal of up to 9 other wheels. During the Winter offensive on the eastern front these wheels would require frequent checks due to becoming caked with mud and then subsequently freezing. Some of the best crews could change a track in 20 minutes, but it usually took longer. A LOT longer.

A view of the Tiger I's ridiculous Road Wheel setup.

The biggest problem faced with the production of the Tiger however, was the considerable cost attached to it. It required a huge amount of fuel to run, not to mention the initial cost of production - it was more than twice as much as it costed to produce a single Panzer IV! Only 1,347 Tiger I's were produced by the end of the war (compared to an astonishing 3,800 IS-2 tanks fielded by the Soviets). For these reasons, even though it was arguably one of the most formidable tank designs of its time, the Tiger never really had a significant impact on the war.

An elited Tiger I - note the unhistorical 8.8cm KwK 43 L/71 meant for the Tiger II

In World of Tanks, the Tiger isnt nearly as infamous as it was back in the day - this is due to it facing tanks several tiers higher than the piddly Soviet T-34 or American M4; namely the Soviet IS, Chinese IS-2 and American T29 on its own tier. On unlocking the tank you should have researched every gun aside from the top 8.8cm gun, the gun you want to be using until you unlock it is the 8.8cm KwK 36 L/56 due to its superior characteristics compared to the others. Unlocking the KwK 43 L/71 will give you a considerable boost to your penetration and accuracy, while taking a small hit to rate of fire and aim time.

A Comparison of the two 8.8cm guns available to the Tiger I

First thing to research would be the tracks in order to mount the sheer weight added by the turret and top gun, and from there you can go turret -> gun -> engine, or if you feel it is too sluggish you can grab the engine first. Equipment should ideally be Enhanced Gun Laying Drive too buff your accuracy, a Large Caliber Tank Gun Rammer to reduce your already ludicrous 6 second reload time on the top gun, and a Ventilation Class 3 to give a buff to your crew as a whole. Your crew will ideally want to take Sixth Sense (Commander), Preventative Measures (Driver) and Repairs on the other crew members. Second skill will ideally be Brothers in Arms to further increase your killing potential.

Playing the Tiger I might be difficult at first, but when you figure out just how absurd its gun is you will enjoy destroying many an enemy during your travels. The mobility on this thing is fantastic for a heavy, and while the top speed isn't the best, its certainly good for its tier. The turret traverse is abysmal but when coupled with track traverse it is passable. The Tiger I shines in places where it can lock down an alley and rain fat 8.8 shells on its foes. Side-scraping will allow you to survive longer and also hide your Lower Front Plate - one of your biggest weak points. Why is it a weak point? For the same reason its a weak point on the Panther - frontal hits in your LFP will usually hit your front mounted transmission and set your tank on fire - Fire Extinguishers are certainly worth the investment when driving this tank!

I hope this has convinced you guys to look into the Tiger I as a Tier 7 heavy, and hopefully earn it a permanent spot in your garage like mine! I just love how strong it performs due to being underestimated :3
Next week you can look forward to an article on the Soviet T-34! Until then, keep your LFP hidden and rain some hell! <3

Tanker Time - The Mighty Panther

Howdy folks! Marc here with the first of many (hopefully!) posts about my days spent playing World of Tanks. This first post, if you couldn't guess already, is going to be about the German Panzerkampfwagen V Panther tank - or Panther, for simples ;)

Look at this sexy piece of machinery! Its glorious.

Okay, we will start off with a little history concerning the Panther. It was designed in 1942 to replace the Nazi's Panzer III and Panzer IV tanks, and started production in 1943. It was designed to compromise on some of the fearsome Tiger tanks drawbacks (we will cover the Tiger next week!) and allow Fritz to field strong medium companies. In comparison to the Tiger, it had a gun with higher penetration and muzzle velocity, front armor that, while slightly thinner than the Tigers, was sloped offering a much better nominal thickness offering near invulnerability to the tanks it commonly faced - namely the Americans M4 Sherman medium tank and M18 Hellcat tank destroyer. While it was far cheaper to manufacture than the Tiger (and only slightly more expensive than the Panzer IV) it came at a time when German tank crews were on the decline, and German air superiority was a thing of the past - supply lines were hit and many Panthers were left for scrap. Sad times!

A burnt out Panther Ausf. G from the Battle of the Bulge.

Next up - where does the Panther stack up in World of Tanks? Well, to start with, its a Tier 7 medium tank, this is a tier higher than the latest Sherman variants it saw, and a tier higher than the Hellcat too - however, don't despair - its statistics more than make up for it. With 85mm of frontal armor sloped at a very nice angle, it is capable of bouncing shells from a lot of Tier 6 guns, but most Tier 7s will go straight through. Side armor is an unremarkable 50mm and flat, so you want to hide that whenever possible. The Turret is fairly strong though, offering a very good 120mm on the front (covered by a very large mantlet - that's an extra 20mm of spaced armor!) means this tank is very potent in a hull down position if it isn't feasible to snipe from 300 meters.  Moving on, its main strength is its weight. Now, you might think that's strange considering I just told you to snipe, but hear me out. This tank weighs a LOT for a medium - in some cases more than same Tier heavies. Weighing in at around 45 tons and able to mount a 700bhp engine makes the Panther very strong as a ramming vehicle. It has a great top speed, but is very sluggish to accelerate due to its weight, so bear that in mind. Finally, the gun it is able to mount has excellent stats for its tier (if you disregard its low alpha damage) - 198 average penetration with 150 average damage, coupled with an excellent accuracy rating, aim time and rate of fire make this thing a DPM MACHINE. Like, seriously dude this thing can penetrate pretty much any Tier 8 tank from the front (weak point aiming is a breeze with the accuracy) and the few Tier 9s it meets are swiss cheese from the side.

A fully upgraded Panther tank in the garage

The Panther is an incredibly fun tank to drive, and will likely teach you a lot about various high level game mechanics (the use of hull down, and camo and spot range abuse). Once you get the hang of placing yourself at key locations, you will want to drive no other tank, believe me. However, it does have a variety of teething troubles from stock - first of all you will want to train your Commander in the Sixth Sense skill, your Driver in Preventative Measures, and your Loader in Safe Stowage. Why? Because you need to know when you are spotted, your tank has a rather German trait of having a front mounted transmission - shots to your lower front plate will frequently set your tank ablaze, much to your dismay, and a large amount of shots will hit your Ammo Rack - like seriously, the whole tank is basically ammunition. Not good! After you train those skills, we can talk equipment. You always want a Gun Rammer on your medium tanks (where possible!) for a start. A camo net can be useful early on (until you get second skills trained - take the Camouflage skill here!) and for budget tanking a Ventilation system will improve your tank greatly. You can also switch this out with Binocular Telescope or an Enhanced Gun Laying Drive depending on play style and if you have the credits to mount them.


Well, thats it for this week! I hope you enjoyed reading - if you have any questions, or feedback, be sure to drop a comment below! :3. Look forward to more awesomeness next week with what is probably my favorite tank, the Stronk German Tiger! As always, have fun, and remember to aim for weak spots!