Panzer IVH

[Drexler]

I´ve played a few a games as Axis defender using Panzer IVH as my choice of tank. Though it seems they have plenty of firepower they appear to weak when it comes to armor.

I´d like to hear other players view on the pros and cons of these tanks.

[Jack Carr]

The panzer mkIV in CMBO has to be concerned with every enemy vehicle short of a half track. M5A1 Stuarts and Greyhounds take on the mkIV frontally and win most of the time due to their high rate of fire. In my opinion the mkIv has to be used in the same manner as the German tank destroyers. I usually hold them back and hide them until I can almost be guaranteed of getting in the first two shots at the enemy armored target. If you look at the specs on this tank it appears as though the turret is the weak link. If I were the attacker, the mkIV's would be at the rear of my attacking force. Panther and Tiger breed would go in first. As you say, nothing wrong with the main cannon but the armor deficiency becomes obvious very quickly.

[MikeyD]

The PzIV is an old design. It was arguably the best tank Germany had in 1941 and unlike the PzIII was just big enough that it could be upgunned and uparmored. But an old tank that been upgunned and uparmored is still an old tank.

I suspect both the PzIV and Stug III are going to come out looking MUCH better in CMBB than in CMBO. For awhile they were the only tanks that could consistently deal with the T34.

[Redwolf]

Pair them with a 250/9 to scare away Greyhounds and Daimler ACs. Don't go hulldown when the opponent is 37- or 40mm armed.

I wouldn't be too concerned about Stuarts, they are almost as expensive as a Sherman and cost armor points, so anytime you get shot up by a Stuart it could as well be a Sherman, point-wise.

[ August 14, 2002, 11:06 AM: Message edited by: redwolf ]

[Jack Carr]

Redwolf brings up a good point here. The key words are "pair them". That is certainly good advice when it comes to mkIV's. Pair them up with another vehicle and their effectiveness/survivability will increase. More so against the AI then a human opponent but you gotta figure that two guns firing at a target are better than one.

[Jack Carr]

Neither here nor there about your original post but I do like to use the mkIV simply because from a historical perspective, it was one of the most numerous German AFV's on the battlefield. I don't know about anyone else but I try to keep it historically accurate when I can.

[Sergei]

I also like the ol' good IV's. Can't wait for CMBB, where early on they really are the heaviest that Germany has (excepting Göring, of course). But many people have rather narrow minds about tanks. If you ask about the best tank in the war, they'll give you something like Pershing, Königstiger or IS-2, but ignore T-34 or Panzer IV, which served for far longer.

[YankeeDog]

Against plain (i.e., 75mm) Shermans, I usually try to engage from as long a range as possible with the PzIV. The PzIV's gun seems a bit more accurate than the Sherman's, so it does better at the longer ranges. At closer range, the Sherman's gyro and faster turret come more into play.

In a straight tank-on-tank matchup, I actually think Stuarts are more of a threat to PzIVs than plain Shermans. the 37mm is extremely accurate and has a very high ROF. Plus, the Stuart has a smaller silhouette, so it's harder to hit. True, the 37mm doesn't usually penetrate the front hull armor, but it can everywhere else from the ranges you typically see in CM. Considering that the 37mm is going to get about 2 shots for every one from the Sherman's 75mm, they give me fits when I'm playing with PzIVs.

Cheers,

YD

[Kilgore]

There are two excellent articles on Pz. IV's and vehicle combinations , over at TH Forums ,both by Redwolf.

Thanks Redwolf and everyone else concerned at TH for a really outstanding site. It's really appreciated..

[Redwolf]

Actually most people seem to name StuGs or Panthers as the most effective Panzers, based on the number of enemy tanks they disabled, totally ignoring the fact that these numbers are of course connected with the number of StuGs (respecitivly Panthers).

And for a lone pair of StuGs being the only AFVs along 20 km of Eastern Front in the Winter of 44/45 it is to be expeted that they find a lots of targets coming at them, thereby shooting many enemy AFVs for their own low numbers. This makes for an impressive kills/StuG count but still doesn't make the number meaningful since the German unit still gets simply overrun and the effectivity is effectivly zero.

[TSword]

I use the P4 mainly as a firesupport tank, and as was already mentioned as a TD, in essence they have to be treaded about the same as Shermans.

In real the P4 was somewhat superior overall to the vanilla M4 (75 mm short), because of it's better gun, but inferior to the later M4's with 76 mm.

I had several matches vs. the AI lately where i had to use Stuarts most of the time (I use a QB-Campaign generation ruleset). Very often i encountered P4's. Front on beyond 400 - 500 m the Stuart has no guarantee to penetrate the P4 especially when the P4 has not yet engaged the Stuart (His turret will have an angle to the Stuart) even a slight angle will bounce off most rounds. One has to use 2 Stuarts to kill a P4 for sure and use their speed (they are ridiculously fast..) to close and flank simultaneously. In this way i get one P4 for one Stuart usually (a fair business points wise, and depending on the tac-situation a very good one from time to time..).

So in using P4 use them in pairs one always in overwatch of the other to take out flanking racing Stuarts or M8 (although those are best dealed with a cheap SPW 250/9 or 20 mm Flakgun). Or even better a Panther (Panther is also cheese for Stuart from the flank) in the front and 2 P4 for flank protection.

Greets

Daniel

[Andrew H.]

I like to use the Pz IV G - it as a faster turret than the Pz IV H. FYI.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by Drexler:

I´ve played a few a games as Axis defender using Panzer IVH as my choice of tank. Though it seems they have plenty of firepower they appear to weak when it comes to armor.

Harrumph.

Having just lost two Pz IVs in a head-to-head shootout with a single Daimler against the AI, this is a bit of a sore point with me at the moment.

I didn't mind so much when I lost three Conscript Pz IVs against a single Crack Sherman in similar circumstances, because conscript is conscript, crack is crack, and the Sherman is at least a tank.

All the best,

John.

[Redwolf]

Small guns in CMBO always tend to elite.

There is a misproportion between the amount of ROF and precision you get when you a) get it out of your purchase points for unit quality or select a unit with a smaller gun. There is nothing wrong with the smaller gun having more precision and ROF in principle, but the amount of point we have to pay to upgrade the bigger to to the same ROF and precision does not fit. At least not with the very high chance of knockout of penetration of small guns.

[ August 14, 2002, 06:02 PM: Message edited by: redwolf ]

[General Tacticus]

Quick Battles tend to be a little claustrophobic for the PzIV in 1944/45...find a scenario where there are good LOS (say, 2km or more..) and the PzIV is a fine tank (..damn it will be good on the eastern front when it first arrives... PzIVF2.. yum).

[[Wiking]]

What I want to know is was the PzIV really as weak as it is in CMBO?

[Drexler]

Thanks for the advice, appreciate it

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by SS_Obergruppenführer:

What I want to know is was the PzIV really as weak as it is in CMBO?

I've wondered about this too. From what I've gathered reading here, the answer is "No."

1) CMBO limits engagement range, so the PzIV can't take full advantage of its gun.

2) CMBO doesn't treat the PzIV's small weakly armored turret as a _small_ weakly armored turret.

3) CMBO doesn't model the mantlet, which would add some armor where the PzIV often needs it most.

4) CMBO might treat the Sherman's gyro to favorably, and probably don't treat the PzIV's optics favorably enough.

If that isn't correct it should act as good grog bait, and we'll find out what is correct.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by SS_Obergruppenführer:

What I want to know is was the PzIV really as weak as it is in CMBO?

I've wondered about this too. From what I've gathered reading here, the answer is "No."

1) CMBO limits engagement range, so the PzIV can't take full advantage of its gun.

If that isn't correct it should act as good grog bait, and we'll find out what is correct.</font>

[Redwolf]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

4) CMBO might treat the Sherman's gyro to favorably, and probably don't treat the PzIV's optics favorably enough.

Optics not at all modeld in CMBO.

Hit probablities of moving shooter against standing target and vice versa plain broken, announced to be CMBB-corrected in a recent thread.

[ August 14, 2002, 08:22 PM: Message edited by: redwolf ]

[General Tacticus]

Does CMBO really "limit engagement range", or does it simply accurately reflect the closed in terrain found in Western Europe?

Obviously, in some (many ?) cases this is correct ie bocage. But I believe that the Commonwealth forces faced terrain that was more "tank friendly", with long LOS (by CM standards). Also the charge across France after Mortain was in fairly open country. etc...

I think that in most cases in CM the designer of the scenario wishes combined arms to be the order of the day, so there is lots of cover for the infantry. Also, QB maps tend to be quite shallow...

Disclaimer : I've never been to europe, and I'm not much of a grog, so I could be very wrong in the statments re terrain above.

[ August 14, 2002, 08:29 PM: Message edited by: General Tacticus ]

[Tarquelne]

Does CMBO really "limit engagement range", or does it simply accurately reflect the closed in terrain found in Western Europe?

I think more the latter than the former, but from the perspective of those poor little CM PzIV crewmen it doesn't really matter.

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by SS_Obergruppenführer:

What I want to know is was the PzIV really as weak as it is in CMBO?

I've wondered about this too. From what I've gathered reading here, the answer is "No."

1) CMBO limits engagement range, so the PzIV can't take full advantage of its gun.

2) CMBO doesn't treat the PzIV's small weakly armored turret as a _small_ weakly armored turret.

3) CMBO doesn't model the mantlet, which would add some armor where the PzIV often needs it most.

4) CMBO might treat the Sherman's gyro to favorably, and probably don't treat the PzIV's optics favorably enough.

If that isn't correct it should act as good grog bait, and we'll find out what is correct.</font>

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by redwolf:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Tarqulene:

4) CMBO might treat the Sherman's gyro to favorably, and probably don't treat the PzIV's optics favorably enough.

Optics not at all modeld in CMBO.

Hit probablities of moving shooter against standing target and vice versa plain broken, announced to be CMBB-corrected in a recent thread.</font>

[Andrew H.]

Originally posted by Tarqulene:

From what I've gathered reading here, the answer is "No."

1) CMBO limits engagement range, so the PzIV can't take full advantage of its gun.

2) CMBO doesn't treat the PzIV's small weakly armored turret as a _small_ weakly armored turret.

3) CMBO doesn't model the mantlet, which would add some armor where the PzIV often needs it most.

4) CMBO might treat the Sherman's gyro to favorably, and probably don't treat the PzIV's optics favorably enough.

If that isn't correct it should act as good grog bait, and we'll find out what is correct.

I have some quibbles with these points.

(1) I think that the engagement range for WE is about right. From what I remember from microarmor, the sweet spot for the PzIV vs. the Sherman is at ranges over 1000 meters, with 1250 being even better. There are locations in WE where the LOS exceeds this range, of course, but there aren't lots of them, and they tend to be not in locations where you have to attack along them (as opposed to desert or steppe terrain).

(2) There are larger turrets than the Pz IV's, to be sure, but if CMBO treats a turret as 35% of a tank, that's about right for a Pz IV based on my eyeballing of the turret. It's not teensy.

(3) The mantlet on the G and H has the same thickness as the turret front (50mm). It does have a *slight* curve, but it's not like the curved mantlet on the Panther. The mantlet is also pretty small - it looks like it extends 4" to the left of the gun (as you face the tank) and about 8-12" to the right, with the coax sticking through a hole in the right.

(4)I don't think that optics should matter much at CMBO ranges. On the defense, however, defending tanks should have the advantage of having range sticks out, or of just knowing how far away "that treeline" is.

In general, though, I think that the Pz IV is pretty much right. (The fact that it is hurt by overaccurate tanks firing on the move isn't a problem with the Pz IV's modeling, but is a game thing). You rarely hear allied tankers complaining about the Pz IV in '44 or '45, which makes me suspect that it was not something that they felt overly concerned about.

There were plenty of complaints about the f2 in the desert, though.