We need to talk: Anti-Tank in North Africa and the Eastern Front

[river siren]

1️⃣ The maps/battles: Tobruk, El Alamein, Kharkov, Stalingrad, Kursk, and Smolensk.

2️⃣ The issue: Of these maps/battles, the Bazooka, Panzershreck, nor PIAT existed (or were issued).

3️⃣ The fix: Remove the Bazooka, Panzershreck, and PIAT from these maps/battles, and, if applicable, replace with their existing (and issued) counterpart. Specifically, the "standard issue" loadouts' PIAT would be replaced by a Boys' Anti-Tank Rifle and the "elephant gunner" loadout would be removed for the British Eighth Army, the "standard issue" loadouts' Panzershreck would be replaced by a Panzerbüchse 39 for the German Africa Corps and Germany (on Kharkov, Stalingrad, Kursk, and Smolensk), and the "lend lease" loadout would be removed for the Soviet Union. In addition, other classes, such as one featuring anti-tank grenades or magnetic charges, would add to the much needed variety of anti-tank.

4️⃣ Why? Historical accuracy.

5️⃣ "I dOn'T cArE aBoUt HiStOrIcAl AcCuRaCy." Welp, that's unfortunate. However, if you are one of those guys, it would change the game's anti-tank dynamic, promote teamplay, and balance factions.

[drowsy shale]

[mossy rampart]

something I've wanted for ages, this change would also make tanks a bit more powerful on these maps and could encourage more tank use through the team, which for maps like El Alamein and Kursk would be perfect considering the huge role tanks had in these battles irl
and ofc along with anti tank grenades, molotovs need to do some chip damage to tanks, not to a point where a single person can disable or kill a tank but where ambushes with multiple people using molotovs becomes a somewhat viable tactic.
also the lend lease loadout is an embarrassment to BM's handling of balancing.

[river siren]

[wet sierra]

[lime cobalt]

[late bough]

[regal pasture]

[rough wharf]

The fact we never got anti tank grenades or magnetic charges is criminal

[iron kiln]

[obsidian thicket]

[unborn sonnet]

[iron kiln]

Or **Panzerfausts **for the late war maps (vast majority of them - all US vs GER maps, Driel...).

[river siren]

Edited to fix certain grammatical issues and improve clarity.

[regal pasture]

[flint totem]

[earnest geyser]

[rough wharf]

I'm still bumbed about that too, panzerfaust crate should be the starting AT kit with the panzershrek at lvl 8 considering how rare they actually were

[errant cosmos]

[void talon]

[zenith quail]

They could at least make the barrels a weakspot that lighter weapons can damage. Something like 15 hits with a PTRS to make it noticeably inaccurate at longer ranges. Not easy to pull off, but imo bazookas and AT-rifles need another way to damage tanks from the front.

[river siren]

I don't foresee it being too difficult to change the hitbox like that. So .

[mighty crescent]

[cunning cobalt]

👍

[river siren]

A panzerfaust box would be interesting to see.

[mossy rampart]

I did think of a panzerfaust box idea a while back
a loadout for AT which lets them place a box in which any player can pick out one of four panzerfausts
once they're used up the box of course disappears
the panzerfausts then being very short range one time use rocket launchers basically

[split badger]

They could literally have the coolest AT weapon for Tobruk #1309024167626014750 message

[unborn sonnet]

[fringe fern]

[river siren]

This with the Armor Rework could make for extremely fun, yet challenging engagements for both sides!

[wet sierra]

[buoyant heart]

I enjoy the though of Anti Tank Rifles being more common, however I feel like they are so weak that it would lead to tanks becoming even more oppressive than they already are on some of these maps (Kursk and El Alamein namely). However, if they just buffed either the penetration of the ATRs, the damage of them, the effect of disabling tank systems like tracks/turrets, or just make it so that ATRs can quickly disable tracks/turrets it would be fantastic. I would love to use the ATRs more often to track heavy tanks to make it easier for a team mate to kill the tank with a satchel or for a tank/AT gun to get a solid hit, but the sheer number of rounds needed makes it a fruitless task

[regal pasture]

Imagine if an antitank rifle could go through a tank and kill a crew member like what would’ve happened in reality

[regal pasture]

[mellow flume]

Smolensk? That map ain't in the game right?

[mossy rampart]

Its not, unless Smoggless knows something we dont 🕵️

[river siren]

Just a gamble, if it ain't Smolensk I'll change it to the actual.

[zenith quail]

They could introduce ~37mm AT-guns at AT lvl 1 that could penetrate medium tanks from the side, but I can't think of a way to make them balanced compared to the normal AT-gun. They'd have to be a free buildable (maybe restricted to something nearby, like an OP), and the damage should be quite low to compensate. Recon tank needs 6 shots to kill a medium from behind, so maybe start with that. Harassing damage from the flank would force the tank to back off and repair, and the AT gun would be rebuilt (forcing the enemy to deal with that squad). Better than AT-rifles at least.

[polar crypt]

[mossy rampart]

I think AT guns just need some improvements overall, way to akward just to place and once they're down you cant even move them

[buoyant heart]

I think AT guns are fine atm, the only time they start performing poorly is when the enemy has armor already watching ridgelines and stuff looking for armor/AT guns

We also definitely don't need another super buff so we are 2 shotting heavies to the front again

[jolly lodge]

[fading light]

I agree they are weak but I don't think anti-tank rifles or rocket launchers are very effective against tanks. Sure the rocket launchers are better but someone pulled up the stats and it said that 50% of all tanks that are destroyed in the game are destroyed with satchels. The meta if you want a tank destroyed is just to place a satchel on it. I personally don't think replacing rocket launchers with anti-tank rifles would make that significant of a difference.

[idle cipher]

Why don’t we think as a bigger picture why not have more variety of anti guns that are deployed as we already have the pak 40 why not give these guns the ability to move once placed like post scriptum. Realistically this was the best way to counter tanks and gave the ability to take them out from far ranges

[zenith quail]

The AT gun currently is great, sure, too great even. A light AT-gun (free buildable within 50m of your squad OP, perhaps on a cooldown) would bridge the gap between AT-rifles and AT-guns though, and low lvl AT players would have a choice. Losing because AT hasn't unlocked the AT gun is foolish. Alternatively just move the AT gun to lvl 1.

[placid peak]

It's not, but it's the most possible to be the next soviet map that was announced for this year

[idle cipher]

Also why can’t we give the AT gun HE shells like it would give players more incentive to use it and place well defended positions to counter both armor and infantry.

[polar crypt]

I dont know if that was a thing back then

[edgy obsidian]

A Flak 88 would be so cool for a future AT loadout, not sure though if a stationary heavy cannon would be unbalanced.

[placid peak]

100 or 150 supplies to build one and make it use up 10 munitions per shell

[regal pasture]

I think building the big cannon from the small box , isn’t realistic. + it requires space, better add stationary default ones , but for operating this , it requires 6-8 squad, if I’m not mistaken

[zenith quail]

At first it seems to me that the AT-gun would become even more OP, but at least the infantry would have more options then to break stalemates. And for the tankers, they would seldomly be saved just because the AT gun had an HE in the tube that he had to get rid of first.

[coral apex]

something to be called in by commander

[idle cipher]

What about other things like 17 pounders and even American 76M guns or Soviet like the 85 mm divisional gun D-44 that were just as effective as the 88

[clear cloud]

I would also, highly, recommend they add in AT grenades if they do this so that heavy tanks do not become borderline immortal

[drowsy shale]

The 88 was the deadliest gun of the war, it was anti everything, the others might have been effective and good, but nowhere comparable to the 88

[light coral]

[idle cipher]

The US 90M and Soviet 122M anti tank guns we’re more effective than the 88 in terms of penetration and post penetration damage of the armored vehicle and had a bigger HE shells blast and fragmentation 88M Flak 41 was a good gun no doubt but it’s age showed and even the 8.8 Pak 43 still couldn’t outcompete the 90M and 122M in terms of penetration of armor and post pen damage

[zenith quail]

The 122mm is a field gun, and terrible at dealing with tanks. The Pak 43 was superior in anti-tank to both of those.

[idle cipher]

D-25T 122M gun was a purpose built AT gun made in 1943 and could easily pen the front mantle of a panther and still have enough power to go through the other side cleanly and could even pen the tiger 2 front plate at 800 meters as seen outside the town of Oględów, toward Staszów when they engaged multiple tiger 2s and reliably penetrated their armor at long ranges. It had more pen than the 43 and better post pen effects

[zenith quail]

A 7 ton field gun modified to fit into a tank. Not really an anti-tank gun like the Pak 43, or the D-10, which have much greater muzzle velocities and rates of fire because they were designed to do so.

[idle cipher]

The D25-T was designed from the ground up to be an anti tank gun it doesn’t share almost any similarities besides caliber to the original field gun you know this right ? And the only thing the pak 43 did better was fire rate since the D25 T fired two piece ammunition

[fossil bloom]

A high rate of fire was a must have for any successful WW2 era AT gun. Multiple shots are required to successfully eliminate a tank, a slow rate of fire heavily affects its role as an AT gun. Take the IS-2 for example, it had a gun comparably to the long 88 on the King Tiger but a much slower reload speed

[drowsy shale]

Its not only about its anti tank effectiviness. The others already wrote what I wanted to write
@idle cipher Oh yes it was wayyy slower, a higher calibre doesnt automatically make the gun better, not even speaking of the fact that German Panzer crewmen were better trained and more combat effective than Soviet ones

[idle cipher]

Paul we are talking of the same gun on the IS2 D25T it wasn’t that slower than the tigers main gun in reality most loaders were able to cope well

[light coral]

[regal pasture]

I think remove Panzerschrek and Bazooka from the both sides would be balanced, for EF maps. Just keep it with AT rifles only

[river siren]

Exactly.

[livid gyro]

It is incomprehensible that they have not yet added the Panzerbüchse 39 (PzB 39) anti-tank rifle to the game. I think that the current developers can not or are unable to add new weapons, they only know how to make new maps.

[obsidian coral]

its not that complicated: the reason you dont see it cause it would be as shit as the soviet anti tank rifle that nobody plays.
For the Anti-tank rifles to be of ANY point, you'd need rework on tanks.
In other games, where you can also injure the crew or ammo on the inside, it makes sense.
Maybe one day they'll become useful, with another tank rework. Then there'd be a point to have more AT Rifles.

[mossy rampart]

That's why they should remove the rocket launcher loadouts from the eastern front aswell as the pait and panzershrek loadouts in north Africa and have the at rifles be standard
And then throw some at grenades in for good measure

[obsidian coral]

odd choice for a "thats why", when my point was that AT Rifles are awful in HLL. Remove the other anti-tank weapons! Make it so nobody will damage a tank!
If you want to hand out AT Rifles to everyone, AT Rifles should have a point in being used.

So how many rounds do use to destroy an enemy Tanks @zenith quail - and are these tanks not moving into cover / getting reparied at all?

[zenith quail]

they're neat for the times when you dont have a pocket support. being able to kill several tanks and vehicles solo, and from even 600 meters out is something the other loadouts cant replicate, not quite. also infinite track destruction.

[river siren]

There should be a PTE for this! We would be able to see how it works out.

@jolly lodge In real life, sure. But what did they use when they had nothing else? They used alternative options or tanks if the AT rifle didn't work out. I just want to support teamplay and I'm a tanker so I want more tank on tank battles.

[jolly lodge]

It wouldn't because AT rifles didn't accomplish sh it against tanks in 9/10 cases. They were already outdated when the war started.

[regal pasture]

Add PzB for 6 lvl loadout for AT class

[drowsy shale]

Panzerbüchse should be standard on those maps

[oak ivy]

[river siren]