How to properly use HESH?

[-🆁- Javier]

title! I'm just starting to using that kind of ammo

[83athom]

Shoot at the lesser armored parts of the enemy, no matter the angling (in fact, the more angled the better). Especially aim for sections right next to the ammo stores or crew.

[Eftwyrd]

shoot the thinnest armour you can see without worrying about effective thickness, its the true thickness your penetration value works against but even the lower values you get at extreme angles present nowhere near the protection the actual effective thickness would afford. the chances of bouncing against all but the most extreme angles is miniscule so dont worry too much about it.

there is a random variation of around +/-20% of the stated penetration of your HESH so there is a certain amount of RNG involved, it pays to know the thickness of the armour you are targeting so you know when a failure to penetrate is just bad luck and follow up shots might do better

otherwise just enjoy the massive ammounts of spall shredding the enemy crew as the game models it like a very large HE going off

[Lunaire]

Originally posted by 83athom:

Shoot at the lesser armored parts of the enemy, no matter the angling (in fact, the more angled the better). Especially aim for sections right next to the ammo stores or crew.

Actually due to the massive HESH nerf this is no longer true, at angles of 60° the penetration of the HESH shell decreases and the decrease in penetration gets worse the more the armour is angled, I did some testing with that with the 105mm HESH against the UFP of the panther, the HESH shell has 100mm penetration at 60° and the UFP has 80 at (I think) 60°, so it should penetrate no matter what, well this is the case, but if the UFP is angled more by shooting at it from the side, it can consistently cause the HESH shell to fail to penetrate.

And not to mention that the damage effect of HESH was also crippled, even if you manage to penetrate the panther with the HESH, it won't oneshot them, even the 183mm HESH shell can't oneshot the panther either (I think so atleast, it was a while since I last tested that), and when I shot at both the UFP and LFP of the Tiger 2, it only managed to kill the driver and machine gunner and be blocked by the transmission respectively.

So yeah, you really shouldn't use HESH at all, unless you're shooting at lightly armoured SPAA, but if you must then you should flank and shoot at the side of enemy tanks.

[Eftwyrd]

Originally posted by Hotfire90:

So yeah, you really shouldn't use HESH at all, unless you're shooting at lightly armoured SPAA, but if you must then you should flank and shoot at the side of enemy tanks.

ive been happily one-shotting russian MBTs with my ru251s HESH just fine since the nerf, infact i still vary rarely use anything else. just takes some getting used to

[Obamenau]

You don't.

Hesh is terrible since gaijin "balanced" it in 1.71.

[Foxtrot39]

HESH only work with the brit 183mm TD

[Obamenau]

Originally posted by Foxtrot39:

HESH only work with the brit 183mm TD

Not even that lol

I shot a panthers UPF with the FV4005 in test drive and got a "hit".

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

I survived quite a few FV4005 hits with medium tanks since the nerf, shows you what kind of number they did with HESH.

[-🆁- Javier]

MMMM ok guys thanks for the info.

I'm using the Vickers MBT right now, but I thnk I'll use HESH just when flanking or so

[O Pai!]

I heard gijing pratically killed HESH because of their russian players crying about how it killed their 60 degrees angled armors, gaijin also killed APDS acording to this very good source here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Warthunder/comments/7ngxcp/why_apds_is_bad_against_soviet_armor_exposed/

This company is simply low.

[Satin lover]

Originally posted by Mindstream:

You don't.

Hesh is terrible since gaijin "balanced" it in 1.71.

I rek ♥♥♥♥ with my ontos with hesh. Only problem i have is when i shoot one spot everything dies or gets destroyed. Thats both good and bad. Most times the target survives and i cant find a good spot to hit but when you one shot a leo I its so satisfying.

[HudsonM1A2]

Necro thread. Locked.