Panthers need adjustment

Or the superior suspension

Or the superior range

If you guys just want to snipe vehicles while using no micro skills why not use stugs?

Panthers are frontline armor, that is why they have ridiculously high armor values that get increased with veterancy.

If you keep using the unit wrong, then they will perform badly, obviously.

not to mention that buffing panthers will make certain strats super effective like blitzkrieg from Encirclement doctrine.

I think that as a unit they are fine, just too expensive for what they are. At this price, 60 range shouldn't be out of the question.

Smith's assessment's definitely highlights...pretty much all of it. Simple buffs to the unit itself is probably not what the entire situation really needs.

ofc let's just forget about the same feature on german tanks lol

The Panther didn't have those. I don't think any of the German tanks had them, actually - though I hear the suspension of the Panther might have provided some help on the move/firing from stopping anyway (the latter of which was the only true practical benefit from the stabilizer for Sherman tank crews as it turned out).

I think that as a unit they are fine, just too expensive for what they are. At this price, 60 range shouldn't be out of the question.

I'd say that's far too dangerous. 60 range is something many 100+ fuel AT-specialized vehicles rely on, from Elefants to Jacksons. There's too much risk of it becoming some variant on the Comet's complete bullshit if you traded the AI for +10 range.

...and frankly, it's still be fairly weird then because it'd still reload a second slower than a Comet while clearly being AT-based and having the same damage per hit. I really think it's a slope not worth standing on, I wasn't a fan of the IS-2+Tiger range changes either.

I was just considering the "Tank destroyer" role it was supposed to fill. As it stands the Panther is pretty useless (comparitavely) at everything short of firing from a stopped position at range.

Sub 150 fuel TDs with 60 range is not really helping the situation.

ofc let's just forget about the same feature on german tanks lol

Or the superior suspension

Panthers had hideously complicated suspensions. If you really wanted this to be a simulation instead of an arcade, your Panther would randomly get stuck or not start due to problems with the road wheels, and the suspension wear out in 150km. You'd have to get out and watch helplessly at the POS Sherman with the 75mm smooth bore gun drives past you on its way to Mainz. Give credit to Daimler-Benz for creating the only vehicle ever to be less reliable than a Chrysler (Fiats don't count as vehicles for obvious reasons).

Panthers had brutally simple suspension. Torsion bars, I believe. I also believe that the panthers failed from their under sized engines.

I am 100% for your engine crit idea. Like, anytime the tank reaches top speed it has a small chance to engine crit, or w/e. Always a fan of historical flavour.

First things first:
- T3 & T4 needs to be more accessible

By more accessible I do not mean "skipping T3 should be made easier than ever". No. I mean shifting costs around so that you can start your build with either T3 or T4. However, at no point should you feel "stuck" or "married" to either tier. You should be allowed to combine tiers

If you really believe this, you'd be content to sum the costs of T3 and T4, divide by 2, then apply the resulting price to both T3 and T4.

If not, then your statement is flawed.

Just to bring an end to this insufferable OT discussion about stabilisation: None of the systems used in WWII allowed any tank to fire on the move. Not the Sherman's gyro-stabilisation, not the Panther's suspension. Heck, that technology didn't even exist in the 60s - the Leopard 1 featured one of the most advanced stabilisation systems at its time, and it still couldn't fire on the move and hope to hit anything.

The only thing these systems allowed were for the gunner to pick up and identify targets on the move, severely reducing the time needed between sighting a target, stopping, aiming at it, and firing. Rough targeting could be done while moving, reducing the time standing still and thus severely decreasing the chance of being hit at longer ranges.
The Panther's suspension on the other hand didn't provide such benefits at all - if the tank drove over a small bump, it helped. But certainly not enough to allow any kind of effective targeting and firing on the move, especially not off-road!


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IMO there's two ways the Panther could go to make it a useful vehicle. On one hand, it could be made into a Comet clone (after the Comet nerfs that is). That would be a reasonable and well positioned state. On the other hand, it could be turned into what it was meant to be: A pure anti-tank vehicle. Get rid of that stupid pintle-mounted MG, and buff its DPS - either by increasing damage or by decreasing its reload time.

The StuG on the other hand should have its rate of fire lowered in exchange for some sort of anti-infantry buffs. Ideally, the StuG should gain the same HE/AP switch the Sherman has. That way the StuG both sees the necessary nerfs and changes to not overshadow the Panther.

At the same time, we should think about the Ostwind. As it stands right now, the Centaur beats it in all aspects except mobility (the Centaur also beats the Ostwind in a 1 on 1 MVGame), which is nothing the Ostwind can make use off due to its ridiculously low accuracy (and the movement penalty of course). It's like putting a sprint runner into a long distance run, and be surprised that he can't use his speed to his advantage.
If the StuG gains more anti-infantry power, the Ostwind will be less useful than ever, unless it also gains something. I suggest a switch that disables movement entirely, but adds suppression to the main gun. At the same time, the Ostwind should longer be able to be dug in with certain Ostheer doctrines, as that could make it insanely OP.

Expert tankers could fire (and hit) on the move. The gunner in Wittman's tank crew was noted for it

Expert tankers could fire (and hit) on the move. The gunner in Wittman's tank crew was noted for it

One crew doesn't = the thousands of other ones...

The thousands of other ones are the baseline.

Panthers had brutally simple suspension. Torsion bars, I believe. I also believe that the panthers failed from their under sized engines.

I am 100% for your engine crit idea. Like, anytime the tank reaches top speed it has a small chance to engine crit, or w/e. Always a fan of historical flavour.

The Panther's engine and transmission had to be replaced every 800 km. Special carriages/mounts were made for field engine and tranny swaps. A talented crew could do it in a day but it sometimes took a few days.

When I was referring to shooting on the move, I was thinking creeping at 10km/h, not full throttle. Hehe. Otherwise you are absolutely correct. The tiger I believe was an exception due to slow speed, suspension, and sheer size would created a smooth enough ride to fire relatively well on the move.

One crew doesn't = the thousands of other ones...

The thousands of other ones are the baseline.

I agree with general sentiment, firing on the move is sub optimal but I also believe it wasn't that uncommon. British tank doctrine in the early war used it until they figured out it was one of the reasons they lost so bad. However it you were going to try it, a better suspension and gyro stabilised gun would logically make you better at it.

The torsion bar suspension system was fairly good on the move but a disadvantage was the tank would bounce when coming to a halt which would be a disadvantage in trying to do the sudden stop and fire that is a pro tactic in game irl

Just to bring an end to this insufferable OT discussion about stabilisation: None of the systems used in WWII allowed any tank to fire on the move. Not the Sherman's gyro-stabilisation, not the Panther's suspension. Heck, that technology didn't even exist in the 60s - the Leopard 1 featured one of the most advanced stabilisation systems at its time, and it still couldn't fire on the move and hope to hit anything.

The only thing these systems allowed were for the gunner to pick up and identify targets on the move, severely reducing the time needed between sighting a target, stopping, aiming at it, and firing. Rough targeting could be done while moving, reducing the time standing still and thus severely decreasing the chance of being hit at longer ranges.
The Panther's suspension on the other hand didn't provide such benefits at all - if the tank drove over a small bump, it helped. But certainly not enough to allow any kind of effective targeting and firing on the move, especially not off-road!

Interesting... and informative, +1.

The tiger I believe was an exception due to slow speed, suspension, and sheer size would created a smooth enough ride to fire relatively well on the move.

Incoming Tiger OTM accuracy buff?

Interesting... and informative, +1.



Incoming Tiger OTM accuracy buff?

Except that the Sherman did have a working single axis gyro. It wasn't tied into turret rotation so it helped some but not as much as modern gyro would have. A lot of the crews didn't know how to use it so they probably should've had the same poor moving accuracy that other tanks had. One of the vet abilities could've been reading the instruction manual......

When I was referring to shooting on the move, I was thinking creeping at 10km/h, not full throttle. Hehe. Otherwise you are absolutely correct. The tiger I believe was an exception due to slow speed, suspension, and sheer size would created a smooth enough ride to fire relatively well on the move.

Have your ever driven any kind of vehicle off-road? Even simple grassland and plains will make for a bumpy ride to the point where trying to use binoculars as a passenger will be a pretty frustrating endeavour - and a tank gunner's sighting equipment was nothing but a monocular in most cases back then. You won't be able to reliably aim the gun, let alone get a shot off on target, regardless of speed. As I said, that technology didn't even exist in the 60s and only came about during the late 70s with advancements in digital firing computers (the Abrams and Leopard 2 probably being the most notable examples of incorporating those technologies to great effect at that time).

The Tiger's off-road speed also wasn't that much lower of many other tanks at the time, its cross-country capability was even higher than the Panzer IV's or that of the Sherman (unless the Tiger broke down, that is ).

That said, COH2 is not that much about realism. The Sherman got the lower movement penalty for balancing reasons - most of which have been buffed away by now. The Cromwell and Comet got the lower penalty because Lelic. This is especially ridiculous if we consider why the movement penalty was introduced in the first place (COH2 didn't have it at the start): To lower the chance of wiping infantry units on retreat by driving after them. So why any vehicle that is effective at dealing with infantry (like the Sherman on his HE shells, let alone the Cromwell and Comet) has a lower movement penalty is something Relic will never be able to logically explain. Which proves again that we're talking about Lelic here.

Except that the Sherman did have a working single axis gyro. It wasn't tied into turret rotation so it helped some but not as much as modern gyro would have. A lot of the crews didn't know how to use it so they probably should've had the same poor moving accuracy that other tanks had. One of the vet abilities could've been reading the instruction manual......

Just look at my post, the stabilisation did nothing to help fire on the move. It wasn't even meant to do that. It allowed the gunner to more easily identify potential targets and rough-aim the gun while moving, decreasing time spent standing still. Nothing more.

If you can get your hand on an old-school, mechanical artificial horizon, you can see for yourself that while the horizon does hold relatively still if you start shaking the thing, it will wobble around regardless of its stabilisation. That is acceptable for differentiating between up and down in a plane, especially as the horizon itself is only a couple of millimetres away from the gyroscope. But we're talking about engaging targets that are potentially more than a kilometre away.

For exactly that reason I don´t get why some people even build the T-34/85. The T-34/76 is way more cost efficient and the 85mm gun still doesn´t offer that much more. Both tanks usually need to flank. Yet you get a lot more T-34/76s for the cost.

85 gun does much better wiping inf with their AoE, couple that with the MG

For exactly that reason I don´t get why some people even build the T-34/85. The T-34/76 is way more cost efficient and the 85mm gun still doesn´t offer that much more. Both tanks usually need to flank. Yet you get a lot more T-34/76s for the cost.

Well when you've already gone Guard Motor...