Why cant the tanks look down it's pre stupid

[GrillMaster ✿]

Evey doc on tanks ive watched it talked how they woould pop over a hill fire go back. here u cant look down 2 cm and cant shoot anything. i find it pre annoying.

[Democracy Officer Shmoogy]

Turret depression son

[GrillMaster ✿]

Originally posted by Princess Celestia™:

Turret depression son

Anyhow. anbody with insight to question at hand

[Aegis270]

What you're talking about is gun depression, which is something not all tanks are good at doing. When you have a long gun barrel over the front of your tank, it can't aim down very much before it hits the front of the tank. When you have a small turrent or a large calibre loading mechanism, you can't angle the gun down well from inside the turret, there isn't room. I would assume Gaijin did their research on this and made it historically accurate. I would also assume in real warfare, they would have time to crest the ridge, fire, and get back for the reload before every gun on the battlefield was trained on them, unlike here where you get lit up the second you poke your head over a ridge.

[GrillMaster ✿]

Originally posted by Aegis27:

What you're talking about is gun depression, which is something not all tanks are good at doing. When you have a long gun barrel over the front of your tank, it can't aim down very much before it hits the front of the tank. When you have a small turrent or a large calibre loading mechanism, you can't angle the gun down well from inside the turret, there isn't room. I would assume Gaijin did their research on this and made it historically accurate. I would also assume in real warfare, they would have time to crest the ridge, fire, and get back for the reload before every gun on the battlefield was trained on them, unlike here where you get lit up the second you poke your head over a ridge.

Alright thanks. Yah it was a vally and Shermans would poke over both sides of hill and get the germans. Good luck finding it now history chan dsnt show history anymore

[Aru Rikuhachima™]

Originally posted by Aegis27:

What you're talking about is gun depression, which is something not all tanks are good at doing. When you have a long gun barrel over the front of your tank, it can't aim down very much before it hits the front of the tank. When you have a small turrent or a large calibre loading mechanism, you can't angle the gun down well from inside the turret, there isn't room. I would assume Gaijin did their research on this and made it historically accurate. I would also assume in real warfare, they would have time to crest the ridge, fire, and get back for the reload before every gun on the battlefield was trained on them, unlike here where you get lit up the second you poke your head over a ridge.

Try simulator mode if you want that last part.

[fatboy76]

That reminds me of an episode of greatest tank battles on the history channel. As I recall, to maintain a hull down position and expose as little of the tank as possible, the tank commander actually looked down the open bore of the shermans cannon rather then use the sights as they approached a railroad on a slight ridge, with enemy tanks on the other side. Making sure as little of the sherman tank was exposed to enemy fire as possible. The enemy attempted to fire on the sherman but repeatedly hit the train tracks because of the shermans low profile, while the sherman was able to return effective fire as they were able to fire upon the entire enemy tank.

Hull down positioning was and still is a critical part of tank combat. This refers to a position in which your primary hull is blocked from enemy fire but your turret/cannon is exposed allowing you to fire while your tank is almost completly obscured from the enemy perspective, which is obviously quite a desireable position to be in during tank combat.

WW2 tank doctrine, IRL, didnt really call for the fire, backup, reload, reapproach, fire, rinse repeat style. Simply because you would loose sight of the battlefield and your target. They didnt actually have Radar in tanks back then. :) Also, while maneuvering back and forth you take the chance of exposing critical parts of your tank to damange and you also have to reaquire and reaim after you reapproach and most likley stop before firing, which takes critical moments in battle. Its just not a good idea, making it a quick way to die in realistic/sim mode.

The best tactic, besides safety in numbers, is to find a good hull down position which will allow you to put fire on the enemy and then hold on to that position, dont move an inch. Done correctly, you can pretty much be assured of taking minimal damange, if any, while you put shell after shell into enemy targets. Just be sure to watch your flanks so you can reposition if they are threatened.

It is VERY difficult to do any meaningful damange to a tank in a proper hull down position.

In general, you need to observe the surrounding terrain and objects to find the best hull down position available which suits the vehicle your driving and tactical situation. Different tanks are able to depress there gun further then others, the more the depression, the more effective you will be on inclines utilizing a hull down position. But there are many ways to get hull down other then utilizing a hill.

The amount of gun depression/elevation is shown in each tanks stats within warthunder.

[towgunner]

Russian tank tactics, well russians really didnt train their crew like the germans did, they just swarmed the krauts til they were overwhelmed, also russian tanks have very poor gun depression historically, its not so much the size of the gun, as the design of the turret. Germans are slightly better, via taller tank turrets so there wa room for the gun breech to move up inside the turret without hitting the roof of the turret. American tankers were gifted with some of the best tank training next to the germans, and they were also blessed with excellent gun depression, in pretty much all their tanks and lessons learned from WW@ that stayed that way with perhsing which was even better. letting them do thosehill over attacks without letting the hull show, and still be able to gun on taget from theyre excellent gun depresion.
What it comes down to is, realistically a t34-57 wouldnt take on a tiger like they do here in this game cause it'd be a deathwish, no there was like 10 of them. thats russian tactics.

[Songbird]

Two words: gun depression

It also exists in real life. Learn and use it and you will be just like your heroes in hollywood.

[Tarman]

Whats with the "pre" ♥♥♥♥? Can't you be bothered to write in English?

@Towgunner Everything I have read implies the Pershing was an improvement over nothing let alone the Sherman. The Patton came along though and saved the day. The Pershing was out by 51 in the first year of the Korean War.

[Apocalypse_Later]

Gun depression also has to do with the size of the gun breach inside the turret, not just the outer hull. It can only aim down so far before the breach hits the ceiling of the turret.

[GrillMaster ✿]

Originally posted by The Tarman:

Whats with the "pre" ♥♥♥♥? Can't you be bothered to write in English?

@Towgunner Everything I have read implies the Pershing was an improvement over nothing let alone the Sherman. The Patton came along though and saved the day. The Pershing was out by 51 in the first year of the Korean War.

no i cant thx for ur input ♥♥♥

[Deedee Megadoodoo]

Originally posted by towgunner:

Russian tank tactics, well russians really didnt train their crew like the germans did, they just swarmed the krauts til they were overwhelmed, also russian tanks have very poor gun depression historically, its not so much the size of the gun, as the design of the turret. Germans are slightly better, via taller tank turrets so there wa room for the gun breech to move up inside the turret without hitting the roof of the turret. American tankers were gifted with some of the best tank training next to the germans, and they were also blessed with excellent gun depression, in pretty much all their tanks and lessons learned from WW@ that stayed that way with perhsing which was even better. letting them do thosehill over attacks without letting the hull show, and still be able to gun on taget from theyre excellent gun depresion.
What it comes down to is, realistically a t34-57 wouldnt take on a tiger like they do here in this game cause it'd be a deathwish, no there was like 10 of them. thats russian tactics.

ppfffffHAHAHAHAHA. You're one of those guys yelling "RUSSIAN BIAS!" everywhere aren't you?

[towgunner]

not really, look at tanks destroyer per loss by german tanks and vice versa during the war. i dont think its bias, i think its reality, a tiger 1 could outshoot a t34-85 further pen frontally than the 85 had a chance to get so flanking maneuvers, were obviously used to beat an enemy that way. when the IS with 122 was introduced germans couldnt enjoy attacking frontally anymore, hence the upgraded tiger 2 design, russia and germany led the way in tank design during the war always trying to "one up" the other.