July '42, Allies overwatch.

[Other Means]

what would you use, Stuarts, KV's or T34's?

are the Stuart's ROF & optics worth investing in? are the optics better for long range? will it fontally penetrate a Stug at 500m?

just agreeing some params with a mate for a QB so i need to know.

cheers.

[Kingfish]

The KV is better suited in an overwatch role, where it's slow speed is not a factor. In addition, it's armor will allow it to go head to head with most German AT threats of that period.

The faster Stuarts and T34s should be sent down into the fight, where their speed would be put to good use in out flanking any German armor. The Stuart is fragile, but makes up for it to a certain extent with it's high ROF and multiple MGs. The T34's has a decent HE capability, and large ammo load. The cannister ammo in particular is deadly against infantry.

[HeinzBaby]

Hells teeth, you wouldn't catch me in a Stuart [Honey], only good for recce work, light armour, and pop gun, great turn of speed but burnt easy when hit [had the aero engine I think, high octane gas], very reliable. The Allies were always a generation behind the Gerrys and Russkies, the Kv's and 34's were great MBT's thou pity about crew quality..well in the early years..

[Zimorodok]

The manual states that ALL vehicles by all nations (exect Germany) have 'standard' optics...so the Stuart shouldn't have different optics than an T-34.

I tend to buy all the same tank when I play for the Rodina, T-34's are pretty cheap, and I doubt that the Soviet high command mixed things up too much. Also, when you lose some members of the front-line, or if you do bounding overwatch, you are not going to want your leading tanks to start out all strong (76.2mm), and then to go weak (37mm).

Plus, if you need to reposition or advance quickly, nothing is as speedy as a T-34. But nothing shugs off enemy fire like a KV....

My .02

Zimorodok

[Redwolf]

The Stuart does not have any kind of special optics. It will penetrate a 50mm front StuG but not a 80mm one.

Overwatch against armor or against everything?

If you have rarity off or luck you should go with the T-34/57 or a captured StuG.

With rarity, for overwatch just against armor I'd take a Valentine.

[Other Means]

rarity is definately on. thanks for the replies. a Valentine? i've never used one. can it duke it out/stand a chance vs Stug's at distance or should i do the usual Soviet close the distance dash?

[flamingknives]

The Valentine needs to be a Mk IX so as to have a 6pdr gun. The 2pdr doesn't cut the mustard against anything with more than 50mm vertical armour at any sort of reasonable distance and has no HE early on.

OTOH, the armour of the Valentine is good against anything smaller than a 50mmL42. The MkIII also has a 3 man turret, which is a big improvement in spotting terms.

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Other Means:

rarity is definately on. thanks for the replies. a Valentine? i've never used one. can it duke it out/stand a chance vs Stug's at distance or should i do the usual Soviet close the distance dash?

Not in your month, as stated above.

In your month your are screwed because no non-rare vehicle can penetrate a 80mm German front. After all, that's why I went to great length to define my armor ruleset

And again (for the last time) StuG != StuG. Not all of them have 80mm fronts.

[JasonC]

I'd take the T-34, for the large HE load and reasonable price. A long 75mm will kill it or a KV equally, either can kill in reply anything but a 80mm front StuG which nothing really helps very much against.

A 50L60 has a better chance against the T-34 but not a very good one until the range gets close (though a tungsten hit on the turret can hurt a bit farther out). While those are common in realistic German 1942 forces, they aren't in human selected ones.

To deal with the long 75 threat, you have to use cover to limit LOS, moving up to see only what you need to shoot at (which is one point at a time). It is suicide to just stand in the open, visible from the whole enemy side of the map, regardless of what vehicle you pick.