Do HEAT rounds feel underpowered to you guys?

[Donut]

I started using them since a big majority of other games uses HEAT ammo as ''end game, high end'' ammunition and i saw the explosive mass was massive with a decent pen and figured it actually looked pretty good

However it taking it into battle i feel like i'm not penetrating anywhere as much as i used to, From the Tiger to the Waffentrager i used to be able to one shot if not out right disable all the tanks within 1-2 shells and thats with the PZGR-39 rounds which are amazing

So i checked the pen and and im actually losing a ton of penetrating potential compared to the 39' rounds So if the HEAT rounds are so much worse whats the point in using them at all when i could just carry PZGR and HE rounds


An example i would point out was Earlier in the Waffentrager i was using HEAT rounds to shoot an IS-2 and literally none of them could pen, i spawned the same vehicle, in the same game and went to the same spot and used the PZGR-39 and i was able to one shot the IS-2 in the same spot i had been shooting previously

So should i just stick with using PZGR since the Heat shells are just bad in every way? like sure it has High explosive mass but if they dont pen anything theres not really any point when i can just used PZGR against all targets as general use

Going from 230mm of pen to 110mm in rough as hell man in this tier armor is thick as hell

[dLFN]

HEAT is pointless for the tanks you mention, I guess it could be a substitute for regular HE while still retaining some pen incase you get caught with your pants down but even then that seems pretty pointless. Just stick with the Pzgr since it's a very good round with great penetration and post pen damage. I'm not sure why so many German tanks have HEAT rounds.

Overall HEAT shells trade post-pen damage for a higher penetration value. In War Thunder HEAT warheads tend to be very inconsistent, sometimes they work well but sometimes they'll just scratch a crewmember. If I can avoid it I always use kinetic penetrators (APHE, APDS, APFSDS etc) over chemical rounds (HE, HEAT, HESH).

[Donut]

Originally posted by dLFN:

HEAT is pointless for the tanks you mention, I guess it could be a substitute for regular HE while still retaining some pen incase you get caught with your pants down but even then that seems pretty pointless. Just stick with the Pzgr since it's a very good round with great penetration and post pen damage. I'm not sure why so many German tanks have HEAT rounds.

Overall HEAT shells trade post-pen damage for a higher penetration value. In War Thunder HEAT warheads tend to be very inconsistent, sometimes they work well but sometimes they'll just scratch a crewmember. If I can avoid it I always use kinetic penetrators (APHE, APDS, APFSDS etc) over chemical rounds (HE, HEAT, HESH).

Ah okay cheers

Its interesting to see how games treat HEAT rounds differently Some games Use it as a godly ammo that only Germans get while you get it here were they seem very meh

I think for now i'll just stick with what im using, I mean if i know its going to one shot theres not really any point in switching

[Illusionyary]

Stick with the PzGr 39 shells. HEAT is entirely pointless on German guns once you go past like BR 3.0, although I would still take a couple to use as HE rounds in-case you find yourself firing at a lightly armoured truck or something where your PzGr will over penetrate.

Later on you'll start to encounter HEAT-FS rounds, these rounds have significantly more penetration than kinetic based rounds (AP, etc) and are worth using.

[dLFN]

Originally posted by Illusionyary:

Later on you'll start to encounter HEAT-FS rounds, these rounds have significantly more penetration than kinetic based rounds (AP, etc) and are worth using.

Even at higher BRs it's better to use mainly kinetic rounds due to their consistency. For example in the Leopard 1 I bring mostly APDS rounds but still a few HEATFS rounds for the rare situations where you need that extra pen. At top tier HEATFS is useless thanks to composites and ERA.

[Shiocchi]

HEAT/HEATFS is so rng, can't remember how many times this round doesn't detonate ammo racks even it's already turned black for a second time.

[Shyue Chou]

I generally take 5-6 HEAT-FS to kill a Tiger II. In my last game, I took over 7 HEAT-FS to kill a Tortoise. Even if one knows where to aim, it is still rather hard to effect a kill.

[Tom]

No, they feel inconsistent

[Terranical]

Originally posted by dLFN:

HEAT is pointless for the tanks you mention, I guess it could be a substitute for regular HE while still retaining some pen incase you get caught with your pants down but even then that seems pretty pointless. Just stick with the Pzgr since it's a very good round with great penetration and post pen damage. I'm not sure why so many German tanks have HEAT rounds.

Overall HEAT shells trade post-pen damage for a higher penetration value. In War Thunder HEAT warheads tend to be very inconsistent, sometimes they work well but sometimes they'll just scratch a crewmember. If I can avoid it I always use kinetic penetrators (APHE, APDS, APFSDS etc) over chemical rounds (HE, HEAT, HESH).

You could say that to AMX-30 tanks... smh. Even Gaijin doesn't care to fix the Obus G HEAT Warheads properly. They act like unique HEATFS, but you know Gaijin just doesn't care.

[Wiesell]

Originally posted by Donut:

I started using them since a big majority of other games uses HEAT ammo as ''end game, high end'' ammunition and i saw the explosive mass was massive with a decent pen and figured it actually looked pretty good

However it taking it into battle i feel like i'm not penetrating anywhere as much as i used to, From the Tiger to the Waffentrager i used to be able to one shot if not out right disable all the tanks within 1-2 shells and thats with the PZGR-39 rounds which are amazing

So i checked the pen and and im actually losing a ton of penetrating potential compared to the 39' rounds So if the HEAT rounds are so much worse whats the point in using them at all when i could just carry PZGR and HE rounds


An example i would point out was Earlier in the Waffentrager i was using HEAT rounds to shoot an IS-2 and literally none of them could pen, i spawned the same vehicle, in the same game and went to the same spot and used the PZGR-39 and i was able to one shot the IS-2 in the same spot i had been shooting previously

So should i just stick with using PZGR since the Heat shells are just bad in every way? like sure it has High explosive mass but if they dont pen anything theres not really any point when i can just used PZGR against all targets as general use

Going from 230mm of pen to 110mm in rough as hell man in this tier armor is thick as hell

You don't use them. HEAT shells are only good if the girth and the length of the round is huge. Explosive mass doesn't really matter in HEAT rounds because it's already counted in the penn numbers. It's like used outside of the armor, not post-penn. In fact, any form of HEAT either it's HEATFS or RPG rounds (BMP ones) are not that good compared to kinetic rounds (excluding APCR). If you only have HEATFS as the only good shell available, then that's that, just use it. Better using that than APCR or some bad stock shell.

Top tier HEATFS is laughable. Even if they're not affected by RNG at all, they still suck. Kinetic rounds like APFSDS are more reliable and they pen more. They don't get blocked by stupid obstacles or ERA's or slat armor.

[Hydra]

Depends scout vehicles that use HEAT like the Eland are incredible, it just generally sucks on regular tanks.

[Mac]

I'd sum up my experience with HEAT rounds in one word, that is "INCONSISTENT".

Sometimes they fail miserably and other times they work like a charm.

I've had instances where I hit the main body part of a vehicle and I only slightly injured one crew member and then I had instances where I hit the tank copula and the entire crew died in one shot.

I think there is just a lot of RNG involved with HEAT shots and their damage model. I've even had experiences where I shot the exact same spot twice and the first time nothing happened but the second shot just knocked everyone out immediately.

Edit: Also since you mentioned the penetration aspect a lot in your post I'd add that the best thing about HEAT is that they do not lose their penetration power over distance. So if you have multiple rounds to choose from then it is always a good idea to bring along some HEAT shells in case you wanna shoot at an enemy that is 1000 m away because for a HEAT shell it doesn't really matter if the enemy is 100 m away or 1000 m away. Of course you have to take the increased angle of impact into account over the longer distances but this can also work in your favor if the armor plate that you are shooting at is angled to begin with so it is not always a disadvantage either.

[Atom]

Originally posted by Donut:

Originally posted by dLFN:

HEAT is pointless for the tanks you mention, I guess it could be a substitute for regular HE while still retaining some pen incase you get caught with your pants down but even then that seems pretty pointless. Just stick with the Pzgr since it's a very good round with great penetration and post pen damage. I'm not sure why so many German tanks have HEAT rounds.

Overall HEAT shells trade post-pen damage for a higher penetration value. In War Thunder HEAT warheads tend to be very inconsistent, sometimes they work well but sometimes they'll just scratch a crewmember. If I can avoid it I always use kinetic penetrators (APHE, APDS, APFSDS etc) over chemical rounds (HE, HEAT, HESH).

Ah okay cheers

Its interesting to see how games treat HEAT rounds differently Some games Use it as a godly ammo that only Germans get while you get it here were they seem very meh

I think for now i'll just stick with what im using, I mean if i know its going to one shot theres not really any point in switching

Yeah, I haven't seen many other games with the penetration mechanics like war thunder so that might be why war thunder HEAT is bad

[Kay]

Originally posted by SnaggingWater65:

Armour quality i dont think is taken into account. For example Russian armour was very hard, to the point of being brittle, so hull breaks were not uncommon, spalling was a massive issue as well, but the game does not portray this. to my knowledge.

They used to have a modifier for very specific German armour to represent bad steel, but that was removed years ago.

The closest we have to what you're describing is the cap on armour effectiveness the T-34 driver's hatch has now, up to a maximum of 135mm effective thickness regardless of shell or angle, so as long as it doesn't ricochet a shell with 135+mm pen will go through.

Originally posted by SnaggingWater65:

Velocity of AA and all rounds is very low as well.

Though it may feel low in game, rounds have the correct velocity in War Thunder. Even with modern guns waiting almost a second for rounds to hit at 1km is accurate.

Originally posted by SnaggingWater65:

Armour does not have resistance tolerances, i.e multiple rounds in the same spot would punch through.

Yep, unlike Heroes and Generals armour does not get weaker from multiple impacts with a handful of exceptions (ERA and add on composite protection being blown off), the idea was floated a few times but was never implemented for various reasons, one of which being Gaijin didn't like players not knowing what their armour could stop or what other's armour could stop.

[akcreeper]

was op at start as most of them are in ger line so years of rng nerrfs made it the magic round if you know spots hit on point still only hurts this or that but hardly the whole thing only good for 3 under crew stuff now he got huge buff might have better luck if you already know stuff right now but i skip it try to use it and was not worth the rp price if the bouns not tied to all unlock would skip it every time unless its the only hi pen round in low br but higher might have better luck at stopping tracks all id say it could 100%$ kill

[trevorkrause]

Originally posted by Donut:

I started using them since a big majority of other games uses HEAT ammo as ''end game, high end'' ammunition and i saw the explosive mass was massive with a decent pen and figured it actually looked pretty good

However it taking it into battle i feel like i'm not penetrating anywhere as much as i used to, From the Tiger to the Waffentrager i used to be able to one shot if not out right disable all the tanks within 1-2 shells and thats with the PZGR-39 rounds which are amazing

So i checked the pen and and im actually losing a ton of penetrating potential compared to the 39' rounds So if the HEAT rounds are so much worse whats the point in using them at all when i could just carry PZGR and HE rounds


An example i would point out was Earlier in the Waffentrager i was using HEAT rounds to shoot an IS-2 and literally none of them could pen, i spawned the same vehicle, in the same game and went to the same spot and used the PZGR-39 and i was able to one shot the IS-2 in the same spot i had been shooting previously

So should i just stick with using PZGR since the Heat shells are just bad in every way? like sure it has High explosive mass but if they dont pen anything theres not really any point when i can just used PZGR against all targets as general use

Going from 230mm of pen to 110mm in rough as hell man in this tier armor is thick as hell

Gaijin killed the heat rounds long ago. Panzer 3 before could kill a tank with 3 heat rounds but after the nerf 15 rounds hit and no kill. Just like everything gaijin touches turns to dust.