SU-85; The Thread

See, I don't want to sound harsh but this needs to be addressed bluntly.

Vet or not it does not matter - The SU-85 has additional range & it provides it's own line of sight. In no situation can you play defensive against SU-85s, other than PAK40's or Elephants which come FAR too late and both have glaring weaknesses (Artillery / Ram & Engine Damage).

All of this can be solved by requiring the SU-85 to have a unit scout for it. As of current it can play aggresive or defensive and switch these functions in a heartbeat. In games against good players I can count on one hand the amount of SU-85 kills I've made with shrecks and I can probably count the same number of squad deaths my PG's have sufferered to SU-85 when there supposed to be a "Hard" counter.

Fortunately Relic are balancing the early game, mid game and then late game and so we can hopefully see something in upcoming patches to address the SU-85 and Stug situation.

You bring up a good point. In other games Tank Destroyers are represented as glass cannons with weak armor and strong cannon. They've got range and and damage on their site but sacrifice mobility and durability.

Elephants and ISU-152 kinda follows that principle but the SU-85 is way too mobile. I also think that Elephants need a reduction of their front armor.

Agreed. The elefant's armor is fine though, it was like that IRL. Powerful, insane armor but slow as shit.

See, I don't want to sound harsh but this needs to be addressed bluntly.

Vet or not it does not matter - The SU-85 has additional range & it provides it's own line of sight. In no situation can you play defensive against SU-85s, other than PAK40's or Elephants which come FAR too late and both have glaring weaknesses (Artillery / Ram & Engine Damage).

All of this can be solved by requiring the SU-85 to have a unit scout for it. As of current it can play aggresive or defensive and switch these functions in a heartbeat. In games against good players I can count on one hand the amount of SU-85 kills I've made with shrecks and I can probably count the same number of squad deaths my PG's have sufferered to SU-85 when there supposed to be a "Hard" counter.

Fortunately Relic are balancing the early game, mid game and then late game and so we can hopefully see something in upcoming patches to address the SU-85 and Stug situation.

Don't get me wrong I agree with 100% of what you are saying, and this ties in to all of the arguments I have made much earlier in the thread.

I was just promoting the stug because i want it to be better and maybe its optimistic of me but it might be viable current patch, but i will only be able to confirm this after bout 50 games of testing it. Relic still needs to adress the su85 (wasn't touched in this patch), but i want to figure out possible makeshift solutions until they do. I find mines are one of the best counters.

My plan will be: (im just theory crafting here)

* go for early game domination with grens/flame ht.
* Unlock riegel at cp 1(brought down to 1cp this patch)
* plant riegels at chokes and get a stug asap.
* hold stug back and kill m3's with it to vet it if possible
* use stug/riegel combo to (possibly) stop su85 from pushing
* get mortar, to mortar the su85 and repair engis once it is immobilized by the riegel.
credit to Stephenn for the last bullet point, I saw him doing this to great effect
The same basic strat might also work with combination of panzer tactitian and late game pak43 or elefant since elefant doctrine also has riegels and scopes which should help the strat.

Agreed. The elefant's armor is fine though, it was like that IRL. Powerful, insane armor but slow as shit.

Aye, Elefants I believe had like 20cm of steel.

If there was a tough-as-nails tank destroyer, that was propably it.

Problem is, you'll do the anti tank mines once against a good player. Then they'll get sweepers. Now what do you do when he uses a sweeper + SU-85 combo?

Hell he could use M3's to clear out "Expensive" mines for very little cost.

Problem is, you'll do the anti tank mines once against a good player. Then they'll get sweepers. Now what do you do when he uses a sweeper + SU-85 combo?

Hell he could use M3's to clear out "Expensive" mines for very little cost.

true true.. Although even pro players sometimes hit mines. Maybe you kill his sweeper, or he doesnt expect it. It isn't infallible but i think it might work.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpKAXhHVLho#t=40m

sweet jesus, those things do alot of damage.

Stugs are not proving effective enough vs SU85s, imo.

Stugs are not proving effective enough vs SU85s, imo.

stugs are not proving effective
at all
in general

Those things are really, really OP.

Scenario: 1 Panther + an MG + PAK vs 1 SU-85 + 1 Guards.

I slug it out because getting close to buttoning guards is suicide and fleeing is not an option because losing my PAK and the VP means gg. Result? PAK misses thrice, hits once, gets deflected once. Panther misses twice, hits twice, gets deflected once. Panther has almost no health, retreats, gets blasted while the PAK misses once again. 1 Panther and a PAK fail to kill an SU-85. How is this possibly balanced?

SU needs its vison cone reduced/removed, armor decreased by a lot, and speed decreased (2 of those 3). It's not a glass cannon when it can slug it out with 2 dedicated AT units and win, including one that comes later and is more expensive. Sorry.

In case someone calls German bias, I'm a 60% Russian player. And as soon as I get a SU-85 and guards/AT nades to screen it, I know armor is no longer a concern. It will blow any Panzer thrown its way to bits easily simply by reversing. Any attempt at flanking is met with angry Russians with a Hussein Bolt button and AT nades/magical button, when it's not purely stopped by mines. Beyond a huge micro failure, the thing is unkilable. It needs a nerf, along with a T-34 buff to help. It's simply not good balance when Soviets need to rely on a completely OP unit in order to compensate for their otherwise weak AT.

Stugs are not proving effective enough vs SU85s, imo.

Conscripts are not proving effecting enough vs Ostwinds.

FIX IT RELIC!@!~!!!!

This thing is too good. I wish T3 had some viable AT options , then this thing would get the nerf it deserves. Like many have said, this is the soviet player's best choice, and for some cases, only choice for mobile AT once mid-game hits. T1 to T3 doesn't work, even with guards, so people who start with that building have to go T4 (or T2 if you wanna hold out for heavies). Either the t34/76 should be more AT capable, or add in a doctrinal unit that acts as AT (4cp AT gun/su-100? Although this most likely won't happen). The 85mm upgrade for t34/76 seems like the best option imo...

If anything, this unit needs to be more sluggish and/or fragile. And give the STUG its range back!!

I like how people argue that the Su-85 is "balanced" because it´s the only AT-option for Russians. The logic is flawed. An OP unit is an advantage for the faction, despite other options being weak. You can skip the weak ones and use the OP one.

I would gladly have Panzergrenadiers tuned down to the point where they are useless and the damage output, speed, range etc. for regular Grenadiers buffed so no conscript could ever beat them. Then I could say: "It´s balanced. It´s the only viable infantry Germans have."

Germans need something to fire back that is not a PaK and not doctrinal. It´s plain silly that the Su-85 outranges everything by at least 10 metres. StuG should get the same range, Panther needs an identity also. Killing tanks isn´t really what it´s good at if it can´t fire at Su-85s. It´s easily kited.

stugs are not proving effective
at all
in general

Other than the fact that SU85 is insane, Stug isn't that bad. They are good emergency counter to T34 and T70 if you can't hold out the extra minute for PIV, and late game multiple stugs are a great counter to IS2/ISU (if no SU85s are on the field).

Pointless discussion.

Nobody cares anymore.

Move along.

Please don't touch su85, they're fine as they are. They are the only non doctrinal tank that can stand up to axis armour.

Please don't touch su85, they're fine as they are. They are the only non doctrinal tank that can stand up to completely negate axis armor (and totally kills the vehicle late game).

Just corrected that for. No problem, my pleasure.

In my eyes it was pointed as good as possible, that the combination of...
- early arrival
- low cost
- high mobility
- outstanding weapon performance
- decent armor/health
...let the SU85 become a unit that pretty much breaks gameplay, at least for me. I have no fun playing with it, and of course even less fun when playing against it.

Agreed with Nullist, I am a little tired of this discussion. I gave my best to point out my observation and interpretation of data. Relic will change it, when/if they feel it is needed.

Until then I guess I will stick with Guild Wars 2.

Regards
ace

Other than the fact that SU85 is insane, Stug isn't that bad. They are good emergency counter to T34 and T70 if you can't hold out the extra minute for PIV, and late game multiple stugs are a great counter to IS2/ISU (if no SU85s are on the field).

One minute wait for panzer iv is always worth it. the stug should be cheaper on fuel, or SOME kind of improvement to justify its existence. what did they do to the unit since the closed beta?? I remember the stug being a great little tank back then.

I feel this is relevant so I'm re-posting this here. Its about SU-85's sniping pgrens.

U know what? Let's make a test. Just bring the squad of grens close to su and get it to at least a light cover. Post the replay so we could all see how much time it will take for the su to destroy those grens. Even more, we could do the same with pgrens and just see what happens. Fair enough?

All right sir, Challenge accepted.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B35rkBbK6-w
[game played by peter (one of the devs) after the patch.]
Specifically look at 23:40 to 23:50. The german pushes out of his base with a huge blob, leading with schrek'd pgrens.

What happens is this:

• Just to clarify so you don't ask... the conscripts shoot at the pgrens for a little while at first before retreating, but the amount they contributed is very small and has no effect on the point I am trying to illustrate.
  

• First shot of SU-85 kills one squad member of the pgren squad.
  

• Second shot does nothing
  

• Third shot takes out two more pgren squad members, bringing it down to one man with a slither of hp left, after which the last member is killed by antoher su85 shot.(the camera moves away, but you can see it dying cos it dissapears from the UI, and nothing else was shooting at them at that time. The shocks only arrive after they are dead.)

Bear in mind that this happened at long range. The SU-85 is even more accurate at sniping at closer ranges (i.e. the range the schreks have to be to shoot it).

(I know the german guy blobbed but this has no effect on proving my point since the SU85 was shooting at the pgrens which were in front.)

Now if this doesn't show to you in the most clearest of ways that su85's do snipe pgrens, I don't know what will.

My point is they shouldn't be so damn effective at killing their own hard counter.


Now, all that being said I do have some good news. I tried out using stugs vs su85's last night and got some success. The lag between issuing orders and units responding has been greatly improved. I find stugs used with panzer tactition somewhat effective at keeping su85's at bay. Stugs should still have longer range, but it has been a step in the right direction to make them slightly harder to hit at least(smaller target size) The su85's low scatter does negate this somewhat though so I dont think the problem is at all "solved" yet.

Using the stugs takes more micro than it takes to micro the SU-85 cos of its superior range, so I still feel the complaints about the SU-85 have good grounds. It's damage is fine. Its ability to snipe pgrens and paks is pure bullshit. Its reverse speed is too damn high. If they fix the reverse and sniping problems then they have done a lot already. I dont see why in the world it should out range a stug It wasnt like that IRL. SU85's insane range makes it very hard on a map like pripiyat cos of the limited flanking avenues(trees on side protect it).

Doctrinal counters pak 43 and elefant, are well.. doctrinal and too late. Enough said.

Also this:

Maybe the power of the Su-85 is to compensate for a lack of anything else tank wise. Germans can get multipull diffrent types of tanks, a stug(if it was not quite as bad) and a P4 where as the SU 85 is the only "tank" in t4 and as such should be very very good at what it does?

Just my thoughts as to why.

Then they should have put in the SU-100 instead and made it cost the same as a panther.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SU-100

The current SU85 would give a more reasonable cost vs reward if it costs the same as a panther. I am actually against increasing its cost, in favour of rather buffing the t34 and decreasing the su85's range, reverse speed and infantry sniping capabilities, or otherwise increasing the stug's range/LOS.

The SU-85 was actually similiar to (worse armor wise, similiar damage wise, a bit worse range wise) than the stug IRL. The current in game SU85 is more like the SU100 than the real SU85. Maybe then just make it more expensive and call it the SU100, but it is too good for its current cost and encourages extreme camping play by russians. On chokey maps this is exponentially worse.

The lack of other viable "tanks" (note SU85 and stug are td's not tanks) in the soviet arsenal is not an excuse for SU85 being op. Then they have to give the soviets a better T34 that can stand up a little better to p4's or one that is up-gunneable to 85mm. The current T34 is most useful for ramming which was an extreme rarity on the eastern front. The T34 was not as good as a p4, but it certainly wasnt a battering ram.