Not exactly a glowing report, don't you think? You see, I, like you, am wowed by what the Tiger did accomplish, but that is seeing only half the picture. The reality is that the Tiger, throughout all its iterations, was an expensive, slow, heavy, gas-guzzling, mechanically unreliable vehicle that was only able to show its offensive prowess in few instances and usually in small numbers. Given this and Germany's ever-chronic fuel problems after 1943, one wonders why they pushed forward with a design that had more drawbacks that positives. Germany would have been much, much better off focusing on Panther and Panzer IV poduction.
The King Tiger when compared to the Tiger I, was actually not that expensive. If i remember correctly, the King Tiger cost somewhere around 1.5 times as many reichsmarks to produce as the Tiger one, thats 2 king tigers for every 3 tiger I's. In terms of ability, it was a great leap forward without increasing the price
too much. But yes it was expensive.
Slow, the tiger II was not slow, It was just SLIGHTLY slower then the Tiger I, and was within 4-6 kilometers per hour slower then the the sherman tank depending on the terrain. At the same time, it was able to negotiate obstacles on the battlefield spectacularly, surprising when looking at it's size and mechanical reliability.
And yes, it was mechanically unreliable. In that if you pushed it too hard, it would break down... It's limit was much more fine then that of other tanks, thus inexperienced drivers often pushed it too hard and it broke down. It was more then capable of going a long time without breaking, as was any tank, if you handled it right... Really, handling the Tiger II was a feat of great skill.
Reliability was always a problem with new tanks... From the churchill, to the tiger, new tank designs had IMMENSE problems when it came to reliability that required time to pave out. The first panthers broke down in droves, as did the first tigers, and the first churchills as well among other tanks. In the case of all those tanks, the reliability problems were paved out over their evolution, even the last tiger tanks were mechanically sound... not suffering anywhere near the number of breakdowns as the first production models. The King Tiger, was a new design. And given the circumstances in which it was entered into the conflict, designers and builders just didnt have the time to pave out the bugs before the war ended.
And about the 'heavy' comments, really weight doesnt matter. It's weight distribution... You could have a 6-ton rodent of a tank sinking in mud and bogging down in even the most tame conditions, while on the other spectrum you could have a 100 ton monster going through some of the harshest quagmires and being able to handle them. Weight distribution, and the Royal Tiger had excellant weight distribution.
: The Me210A. The Me 210A was extremely unstable (stall/spin prone) and hard to fly. No Me 210B's were made. The 
