King Tiger/Ferdinand/Elefants/Panthers (Merged)

[Afterburner]

Ya, so some random bombs or rockets fall from the sky instantly.

That's not air support, that's artillery! We HAVE artillery...

Air support won't be in for a loooooooooong time. But the King Tiger could be in soon. And it should be.

Artillery just falls randomly in a general area, but airstrikes would somewhat follow the target(wouldn't be spot on every time). It would be much better at taking out enemy tanks.

Though now that I think about it all that would really be needed to counter the King Tiger is the ability for tank commanders to call arty in from their tanks. Artillery is pretty good at taking out a tank if you can call it in fast enough. And realistically a command tank would have radios in it for that sort of work.

 

[Maus]

Your idea of air support is more reminiscent of the gulf war then WWII... In WWII, they had dumb bombs, and dumb rockets. Usually they'd just line up with a tank, fire a salvo that would subsequently spread everywhere as it headed towards the tank, and hope one of them hit... in game we'd definately have to see a plane for that to happen. As for bombs, pilots usually flew close to the ground while lining up with their target using their bombsight, they would then drop some bombs and hope some hit their mark...

Dive bombers were the most accurate, by far.

Think again...

and no, no tankers calling arty from their tank, unless it was a command tank. And you should be glad arty is as good at taking out tanks at it is, IRL arty was never that concentrated and that accurate... and it usually, almost always had to get a direct hit on a tank to destroy it, otherwise it's only hope was to cause some repairable damage like a busted track or something.

 

[Zbojnik]

The artillery strikes in Black Day of July Pre-Final are good for taking out tanks. Close together, rapid fire, and short artillery, that takes out clustered tanks.

 

[Afterburner]

Your idea of air support is more reminiscent of the gulf war then WWII... In WWII, they had dumb bombs, and dumb rockets. Usually they'd just line up with a tank, fire a salvo that would subsequently spread everywhere as it headed towards the tank, and hope one of them hit... in game we'd definately have to see a plane for that to happen. As for bombs, pilots usually flew close to the ground while lining up with their target using their bombsight, they would then drop some bombs and hope some hit their mark...

Why would be have to see the plane for that to happen? Would it break the game in any way? Most people wouldn't even notice, they would just be paying attention to the target to see if it was hit or not.

and no, no tankers calling arty from their tank, unless it was a command tank. And you should be glad arty is as good at taking out tanks at it is, IRL arty was never that concentrated and that accurate... and it usually, almost always had to get a direct hit on a tank to destroy it, otherwise it's only hope was to cause some repairable damage like a busted track or something.

Depends what the situation is. There were cases where you had large artillery batteries able to lay down very concentrated barrages, and then when on the move it would be less concentrated.

Any way you slice it the Tiger would have to hae a counter, whatever it might be. The easiest counter to add would be to simply make it, like you said in the other Tiger thread, that the T-34s spawn far more quickly and more often then the Tiger or King Tiger. Any of these rare tanks should only spawn a couple of times over the entire round.

 

[Grobut]

Your idea of air support is more reminiscent of the gulf war then WWII... In WWII, they had dumb bombs, and dumb rockets. Usually they'd just line up with a tank, fire a salvo that would subsequently spread everywhere as it headed towards the tank, and hope one of them hit... in game we'd definately have to see a plane for that to happen. As for bombs, pilots usually flew close to the ground while lining up with their target using their bombsight, they would then drop some bombs and hope some hit their mark...

Dive bombers were the most accurate, by far.

Err... you might want to google for a little aircraft called "IL-2", she was king of tank busting in WWII, not the Stuka, which was actually very poor at that role.

And before you mention the big cannon Stuka, there was a big cannon IL-2 aswell, and it was still faster, better armoured, held more ammo, and could still carry rockets and bombs, and it predated the Stuka G.

And ofcourse the Yak-9T.

Ivan and the black death was king of air to ground tank busting, not the Gerries.


And tank busting with bombs is more effective than you seem to imply, you put 200 Kg of high explosives anywhere near a tank, and thats a mobillity kill at the very least.

 

[Kipper]

Ohh please dont remind me.. every game you enetered, there would be 10 262's buzzing around, you'd bloody well think they where the only plane the Germans ever made

That really helped kill IL2 for me, the only thing you ever saw flying was experimental

 

[JudgeMental]

From a personal point of veiw, some of the tank servers I go on there is an almost indecent haste amongst gamers to:
A. Choose axis tanks for a big open map where the 'mighty 88' has an advantage
B. Run to get the Tiger or Panther.

Can you imagine the carnage that would result in the axis spawn area if there was for instance a Tiger2 and a HuntingPanther there?

Just think for a minute, all the axis tankies wearing their adidas trainers and sprinting to get to 'the holy grail' before anyone else. Imagine the whining you'd hear over the VOIP from those whose computers weren't 'leet' enough to get them 'in game' in time to get the tank.
Think of the team kills as ruthless commanders executed those with the temerity to be in front of them in the race to get to the uber tank.
Laugh at the crowds of tankies waiting in the axis spawn zone trying not to draw attention to themselves as they slowly sneak up to the spot where the tank will respawn.............
On second thoughts, please add the tanks LOL it will do far more damage to the Germans than anything the Russians could do

 

[Rak]

This subject has been discussed to death. There were only 485 King Tigers produced. That's why they're not in the game. Not to mention they were very slow, broke down frequently and consumed so much gas they couldn't be supplied readily. Their armour was made from inferior quality steel and quite brittle, so their performance might not have been what you think.
Only 392 Jagdpanthers were made.
How come nobody asks for Pz III variants or the Pz 38(t)?

And I'm telling you that Tiger II's and Panthers were nearly the only main battle tanks getting out of factories by the end of war. So they SHOULD be common in late war maps.

 

[JudgeMental]

Just to get serious for a minute. While I take Raks point that these were more or less the only types of tank being produced by the end of the war, the numbers when compared to Russian tanks are frighteningly unbalanced, and remember that these numbers weren't just fighting the Russians, they were also fighting the Brits and Americans. In other words those FEW tanks were split against 3 foes while the Russian ones were just fighting 1 enemy.

Comparison

T34/85 Production
1944 10615
1945 21108

IS2 Production
1943 35
1944 2210
1945 1150

Tiger 1 Production
1944 623

Tiger2 Production
1944 377
1945 100

JagdPanther Production
1944 226
1945 198

Panther Production
1943 1768
1944 3777
1945 439


All this brings me back to my earlier somewhat light hearted post that to give a degree of historical balance there would be maybe 1 of each variant (Tiger2 and JagdPanther) available in a map and it could give an undignified and very un-wermacht like rush to get to the uber weapon.

My source for this information: http://dictionary.laborlawtalk.com/World_War_II in the interests of balance feel free to quote any others.

 

[Amarok]

And I'm telling you that Tiger II's and Panthers were nearly the only main battle tanks getting out of factories by the end of war. So they SHOULD be common in late war maps.

That too. Well, the Jagdpanther saw little action at the east front. But the most Tiger II were used there. In at least three official tank maps were historically Tiger II involved : Arad, Ogledow and K

 

[Seth_Soldier]

I want a blowtorch to close german hatches and set a fire under their tank

 

[Gunwing]

The only problem I see with the King Tiger is that not many of them were made, and they were all full of major draw backs.

The King Tiger often could not go full speed due to the small engine the germans gave it. And it would often break down with an overheated engine, or broken tracks from the shere wight of the damn thing. Not to mention the fact that only about 200 were ever made for combat. And most never made it past the front lines and had to be ditched.

In short it was a crapy pice of junk that almost never worked right. Why in gods name would you ever wan't somthing like that ingame?

On the other hand I have nothing agenst adding the Jagdpanther. Witch by the way is said with a Y not a J for those that say it wrong.

 

[Mikser]

Err... you might want to google for a little aircraft called "IL-2", she was king of tank busting in WWII, not the Stuka, which was actually very poor at that role.

The Soviet state produced over 30 000 IL-2's. If we're being generous and presume that a Sturmovik could manage to knock out a single enemy tank during its 25-50 sortie career, we'd reach the conclusion that they've already knocked out more than half the German tanks produced during the war, leaving the remainder for the 100 000+ Soviet tanks, 50 000+ Soviet anti-tank guns, millions and millions of mines and infantry anti-tank weapons produced during the war to knock out. And that's if we presume that none of the hundred million or so Soviet artillery rounds fired ever managed to knock out a tank. And we'd have to totally disregard the western allies as well. Which is plainly absurd.

The obvious fact is that your average WW2-era bomber, fighter-bomber or ground-attack aircraft knocked out exactly zero tanks. This is because the direct-fire weapons like cannons were appallingly impotent against armoured plate, whereas more potent weapons such as rockets were appallingly inaccurate, and bombs only more so. This is only exacerbated by the poor approach angle, high approach speeds and the small size of the target. If the target actually moves and there's AA fire or interceptors in the air the accuracy goes down even further.

It is pretty well accepted that aircraft were responsible for perhaps 5-15% of tank losses. And that's quite alright - what lunatic would try strafing a tank when it's much easier and productive to strafe a train, a company of infantry in the open or a column of trucks? One approach achieves results, the other doesn't.

 

[Gunwing]

That is all total bull crap and you know it. The IL-2 was responsable for more than half the German tanks killed on the eastern front. The German Stuka was not tasked as a tank buster but as a dive bomber, for takeing out bunkers and things like radar stations.

There is a reason the Germans called the IL-2 the "Black Death."

Stop useing this line: it's commonly accepted.

Just because it is dose that make it true? Have you learned nothing from history? What if it truns out that your commanly accepted figures are wrong? what then? Did you ever stop to think about it before you started to use it as a defence?

 

[JudgeMental]

That is all total bull crap and you know it. The IL-2 was responsable for more than half the German tanks killed on the eastern front. The German Stuka was not tasked as a tank buster but as a dive bomber, for takeing out bunkers and things like radar stations.

There is a reason the Germans called the IL-2 the "Black Death."

Stop useing this line: it's commonly accepted.

Just because it is dose that make it true? Have you learned nothing from history? What if it truns out that your commanly accepted figures are wrong? what then? Did you ever stop to think about it before you started to use it as a defence?

Not to disagree with your primary point BUT the Stuka WAS used as a tankbuster, not in great quantities true but it was.


Stuka JU87 G1
VARIANTS:
Ju 87G-1 1944
Attacking moving tanks with conventional bombs was inaccurate, leading to a search for a way to improve the Stuka's antitank capability. In the summer of 1942, a Ju-87D-3 was fitted with heavy antitank cannon, resulting in the "Ju-87G-1", which featured a BK 3.7 / Flak 18 37 millimeter antitank gun with a six-round magazine mounted under the wing outside each main landing gear assembly. The gun pods were removeable and could be replaced with ordinary bomb racks.

Purely by the by though, this does seem to have deviated somewhat from the original thread
That is unless there is some link between Tiger2's ,HuntingPanthers and IL2's/JU87's

 

[KrazyKraut]

Ju-87s were used as tank busters and they were pretty good at that (esp. the "gun bird") for a rather old plane. Hardly any other plane was as steady when diving making bomb dropping relatively easy and accurate compared to other planes of the time. The highest decorated soldier in the Wehrmacht (as well as a fiery Nazi follower) scored most of his 500 tank kills with the Ju-87.

 

[Mikser]

That is all total bull crap and you know it. The IL-2 was responsable for more than half the German tanks killed on the eastern front. The German Stuka was not tasked as a tank buster but as a dive bomber, for takeing out bunkers and things like radar stations.

That's a real thigh-slapper. The Germans certainly didn't seem to think that they lost more than half of their tanks to aircraft. Neither did the Soviets. As for the Stuka, I should like to suggest that perhaps they occasionally attacked targets other than 'bunkers and radar stations'.

There is a reason the Germans called the IL-2 the "Black Death."

Of course there is. The reason wasn't, of course, that the IL-2's destroyed half of the German tank fleet, because they didn't. Believe it or not, the Germans had hundreds of thousands of vehicles and millions of men that weren't encased in armour plate.

Stop useing this line: it's commonly accepted.

Just because it is dose that make it true? Have you learned nothing from history? What if it truns out that your commanly accepted figures are wrong? what then? Did you ever stop to think about it before you started to use it as a defence?

'Learned nothing from history?' 'Use it as a defence?' What on earth are you rambling about? Am I on trial for warcrimes here?

 

[sander]

It is pretty well accepted that aircraft were responsible for perhaps 5-15% of tank losses. And that's quite alright - what lunatic would try strafing a tank when it's much easier and productive to strafe a train, a company of infantry in the open or a column of trucks? One approach achieves results, the other doesn't.

The russians even couldn't do this right, this shows how they attacked an column:

Maybe their planes were good but they had an poor training.
http://img177.imageshack.us/img177/623/naamloosrf5.jpg

 

[[DA]DIZ]

Dude are you telling us that during WW2 not one, only one, russian got the right idea about strafing a train ? That sounds like bs to me...no offence

 

[thedonster]

I'm still waiting for one of you Nazi-philes (you know who you are!) to explain why you're constantly whining for the King Tiger but never ask for much more historically and numerically important vehicles like the Pz II or Pz 38(t).
We all know the reason- you just want a vehicle that will give you an advantage in-game. .