Why are Tier 4 tanks so bad?

[DankDansk]

I just upgraded from a Pzf. III to the Pzf. IV D, and I'm wondering why it's such crap.

A few reasons why I'm asking this: the Pzf. III is a very good medium tank. It easily fits into the catagory of Frontline tank, with an accurate main gun, strong frontal armor, and decent speed. When used correctly, it can be a nightmare to the enemy team, easily shrugging off shots that would cripple other tanks.

But then I upgrade. The Pzf. IV is a terrible tank when compared to it's predecessor. It's got paper thin armor, an innacurate gun, and huge target profile. It's only redeeming quality is it's decent gun, and that's ruined by everything else.

That isn't the only example. The BT-7 is a well designed tank, And is tough as nails for a light tank without sacrificing speed and mobility, making it great for flanking and distracting enemy tanks.

But then you upgrade to the A-20. The A-20 is the worst tank I have ever seen. It's slower than the BT-7, armor more akin to tin-foil than steel, and a larger profile, even larger than the Pzf. III. It's basically a light tank trying to be a medium tank and failing at it.

I checked the requirements to upgrade, and they are massive. I personally think that this is just a scummy way to get people to spend money.

Am I just imagining this or do you agree?

[Agustín Ariel]

Try the SAu-40 for some battles and then you will love PZIV and A20

[EL_Din_46]

You are not imagining that but I don’t agree. I did not like the pz IV D either, but since I’m playing all the tanks in the German line I just switched to the Hetzer, a tank I enjoy and do well in. Since I was having fun, the grind to get XP and credits for tier 5 was not a problem. I have fun with the Stug and pz IV G, and so on. It keeps getting harder and the tanks keep getter better. I bought the Steam dlc’s but other than that don’t spend much money. Whatever WG is trying doesn’t work on me.

But, boy, if you are impatient have they got a premium tank deal for you!

[EolSunder]

tier 1-4 tanks were nerfed a while ago. A little of tier 5 tanks were also. A-20 used to be a great tank, it also was hit with the big nerf bat. Most autoloaders were. Tier 5 leopard..nerfed. A-20 nerfed, many many many others nerfed.

Just go on the official forums to see which tanks in lower tiers are still viable to play, and which were nerfed into oblivion.

[76561198322013768]

Well Pz. IV D & A-20 isn’t all that bad for both tanks. The Pz. IV D has some half armor highlighted red at the front and a bit sides from bounce at tier 3 tanks but did you notice the HE shell were at 150-250 damages with only less decent penetration from the full upgraded gun and the A-20 is a straight slope front and side armor which it can be done by side scrape or cover scrape and the gun HE shell is the same damage like the Pz. IV D but probably or the same decent penetration with the same full upgraded gun there’s one thing you haven’t tried did you try the M7 tank?

Your Regards Kirito SAO BTSP

[DankDansk]

Messaggio originale di Kirito SAO BTSP:

Well Pz. IV D & A-20 isn’t all that bad for both tanks. The Pz. IV D has some half armor highlighted red at the front and a bit sides from bounce at tier 3 tanks but did you notice the HE shell were at 150-250 damages with only less decent penetration from the full upgraded gun and the A-20 is a straight slope front and side armor which it can be done by side scrape or cover scrape and the gun HE shell is the same damage like the Pz. IV D but probably or the same decent penetration with the same full upgraded gun there’s one thing you haven’t tried did you try the M7 tank?

Your Regards Kirito SAO BTSP

Haven't tried it. It seems well rounded.

Honestly, I like tanks that fit into a role, due to being a huge history buff and a strategy gamer. Both the Pzf. IV and the A-20, along with a lot of french tanks, fail at doing anything beyond sub-par.

I believe the Pzf. IV could make a great glass cannon sniper, even with light armor. The A-20 could make a great skirmish tank, even with it's weak cannon. The problem is that both lack important features to make them viable. The Pzf. IV D lacks the muzzle velocity to be accurate and tough, and the A-20 lacks the speed and maneuverability to keep up with tanks like the BT-7 and the Leopard.

The French tanks suffer from a bad case of Great War design. Most of their tanks are based off the tried and true FT-17, not a bad tank for it's time, but now horribly outdated. The French tanks are both lightly armored and lacking in shell caliber to go against other heavies like the Matilda and the KV-1.

What I don't think the devs understand is that you don't have to nerf tanks to balance them. Diversify them and give them description, let people choose a specific playstyle and a tank that fits it.

[DankDansk]

Messaggio originale di larryb:

You are not imagining that but I don’t agree. I did not like the pz IV D either, but since I’m playing all the tanks in the German line I just switched to the Hetzer, a tank I enjoy and do well in. Since I was having fun, the grind to get XP and credits for tier 5 was not a problem. I have fun with the Stug and pz IV G, and so on. It keeps getting harder and the tanks keep getter better. I bought the Steam dlc’s but other than that don’t spend much money. Whatever WG is trying doesn’t work on me.

But, boy, if you are impatient have they got a premium tank deal for you!

It's not that I'm impatient. It's just that it gets kind of frustrating when the A-20 tank (the tank you have to use to get any Soviet mediums and heavies) is garbage and your only viable option besides IV D is TD.

And then the premium tanks roll out and are obviously better. It goes a lot of people unfair advantages.

[76561198322013768]

Im sure the developers did saw it before cuz before it was used to be a insane penetration a lot back in the years now it’s gone well normal bad

Messaggio originale di mccartneyconnor280:

Messaggio originale di Kirito SAO BTSP:

Well Pz. IV D & A-20 isn’t all that bad for both tanks. The Pz. IV D has some half armor highlighted red at the front and a bit sides from bounce at tier 3 tanks but did you notice the HE shell were at 150-250 damages with only less decent penetration from the full upgraded gun and the A-20 is a straight slope front and side armor which it can be done by side scrape or cover scrape and the gun HE shell is the same damage like the Pz. IV D but probably or the same decent penetration with the same full upgraded gun there’s one thing you haven’t tried did you try the M7 tank?

Your Regards Kirito SAO BTSP

Haven't tried it. It seems well rounded.

Honestly, I like tanks that fit into a role, due to being a huge history buff and a strategy gamer. Both the Pzf. IV and the A-20, along with a lot of french tanks, fail at doing anything beyond sub-par.

I believe the Pzf. IV could make a great glass cannon sniper, even with light armor. The A-20 could make a great skirmish tank, even with it's weak cannon. The problem is that both lack important features to make them viable. The Pzf. IV D lacks the muzzle velocity to be accurate and tough, and the A-20 lacks the speed and maneuverability to keep up with tanks like the BT-7 and the Leopard.

The French tanks suffer from a bad case of Great War design. Most of their tanks are based off the tried and true FT-17, not a bad tank for it's time, but now horribly outdated. The French tanks are both lightly armored and lacking in shell caliber to go against other heavies like the Matilda and the KV-1.

What I don't think the devs understand is that you don't have to nerf tanks to balance them. Diversify them and give them description, let people choose a specific playstyle and a tank that fits it.

[DankDansk]

Messaggio originale di Imr.Qns:

As far as I can remember, Pz IV D is pretty much the same as it used to be pre-update 5.5 . We had to have patience coz of bad aim time and gun accuracy issues. But it packed a bigger punch than any other mediums of its tier. And I think it also had an armor profile on its turret that used to put tier5 Leopards in trouble.

A20... OMG ! That tank was like T62A's profile, Obj 140's mobility combined with tier10 B-C 25's autoloader gun. Back then, when I got A32 in a crate and I played it for more than +400 battles. I used to think A20 to be pretty inferior compared to A32. One day, we got an upper tier player in A20. He single handedly wiped out most of the enemy team. At the end , we were 2 v 5. He did not care if it was a Pz IVD, a matilda, a leopard or T1 heavy... he just hunted them down and finished them. Roll forward to update 5.5, we now have a big pile of junk yard scrap in the name of "balanced tanks".

M7 was a tier5 light-medium hybrid tank i think. But now its a heavium styled tank. Very tough armor profile, just enough mobility, and an acceptable gun. Currently, it is still a 'bad' tank but the best in tier4. The guns on M7, A20 and Pz IV D all feel same except for HE penetration differences. And these all have been made sluggish now. A20 has some trolling armor aspects when angling/wiggling.

How do you think we can do these issues?

[DankDansk]

Messaggio originale di Imr.Qns:

What do you mean by "doing" these issues? If you mean to convince the company to revert its policy of nerfing tech tree free tanks versus continuously releasing premium vehicles which demolish the weaker tech tree tanks... then its not gonna work. They also don't listen to veteran player base at all, they come up with their own ways to fix those "issues" that they think exist and come up with "ideas and changes" which vets disagree with. Recent example was the new provisions/consumables for British TD's.

If you mean how to handle the nerfed tanks in tier4... well, one way or another, we have to grind through it. After update 5.5, I thought the nerfs would be pretty less of an issue. Then, couple months ago, I tried playing tier3 and 4 on NA server coz I dont have higher tier there yet. OMG I just could not do any thing at all. The mobility and the gun handling was awful on every tank I knew previously. It took me weeks of playing them to adjust to newer and nerfed stats even though I was about +26k battles on EU server. I can imagine the frustration for newer player.

There is another post titled "Matchmaking", pretty recent one. We discussed a good deal of info on 'grinding' in perspective of tier3 and 4. You can check it out too. Its in General Discussion section.

Fixing them. Sorry. As for being frustrated, yes. I am. I wouldn't care of the T4 tanks were bad if I didn't have to pay money to switch the xp of older tanks to Free xp.

They're being pretty scummy.

[Goofy Cat]

The main reasons since the grand update when they remove alot of tanks that many people dont even know of, like the UE, amx40, some tier X. And many more. The tier tree has been a caos since then and it has only been worse. The reason why tier IV sucks is due to tier V's. Tier V's have much bigger guns then tier IV. The tier I-III is relatively smal. But tier V's have the guns that looks smiliar to tier VI's and so on. After you break that tier IV barrier it's so much more fun to play.

[EolSunder]

yes thats true. Since tier 1-4 were nerfed most of all, this means that tier 4 can either be a top of the battle if its tier 3-4, or the bottom feeder easy targets if they go against tier 5s. Since tier 5s weren't nerfed as much except for a few tanks (leopard) they can handle tier 4 tanks much easier. Before, a A-20 could compete against tier 5s, now, nope. A luchs could do ok as a tier 4, now, nope.

So just be careful in tier 4s. If you get in a tier 5 battle, stay behind your tier 5 targets. let them take the brunt while you flank, snipe, etc. If your in a tier 4 battle, your fine.

Breaking tier 4 battle just means you might survive easier. If your a 40% horrible player, your just going to drag your teams down. Sadly they fixed the game like this now so bad players move up in tiers very fast, and fill every tier now. It's just sad the teams i get this past month. Even being rusty taken a year or so off, just playing and seeing the trash in every game is laughable.

I'll either be top gun most of the time and watch the tier 8-9s doing 200 damage, or 0 damage lol. or ill be low damage a few times having picked the wrong side of the map to head to, swinging around, and my 40% noobs team is already slaughtered and 4 tanks are jumping on me. Just shaking my head looking at the battle report, and i still out shot a bunch of tier 7-9s who did 0-200 damage the whole battle. sad sad game now.

[EolSunder]

i know right? sad. Im just grinding a tier 7 tank, that new line, and man, its like playing with 8 year old kids every game. Get top gun 75% of the time, outshooting even the trash tier 8s, and STILL lose 75% of the games. Its just amazing and laughable every battle tier 7-8 tanks doing 0 damage, shooting 6 times and hitting 1, shooting 1 time in a fight, just amazing trash piling up. Oh, i did 3000 this game in the tier 7, which is more than my entire loser team combined.

Just fun that its free, and i laugh that 40% noobs are pouring hundreds of dollars down the drain for this game, and im outshooting every one of them every battle. Man it makes me laugh.

But like any adult who is in a group of 8 year olds, you can only take so much of 40% trash. My 30 days from the coupon is up in what, 10 days? And ill retire this useless game back into the "never play until they give me free premium time" storage.

[EolSunder]

dont give up, just don't take it seriously. Game tiers are filled with trash, nothing you can do about it. Try to be the top guy, always snipe and flank in ANY tank, and be the last man alive. Let the crying babies booo hooo and YOU be the best on the team. You can't change them, you can only change yourself

NEVER go up front, never let 6 40% trash back you up you'll be dead fast. always let them all die first. Run and flank and let their burning tanks litter the field. My greatest weakness is always wanting to go up and shoot stuff. Im dead in 30 seconds that way, my 6 losers are hidiing behind stuff not even helping. Let them die first.

Game isn't worth worrying about any more. Don't worry about win rate, etc. Just always try to be the best on the loser team. You won't be every game of course, either by bad luck, bad rng, go the wrong way, etc. But you can be most games if your a decent player.

[BellatorMonk]

EolSunder sums it all up pretty well. This has long been past a game to expect or bother trying to care about a Win Rate. 90% of the people you are playing with simply don't care about winning. To them it's just a mobile game to drive a tank to the front and die ASAP, camp and try to play as if they think they are being strategic and then of course the rest who simply AFK for a few hundred matches to try and grind silver for the next tier tank or some such.
Those of us who have/had played this game since Beta and/or sunk a pretty penny into it, are the fools in the long run.

[76561198840060826]

Messaggio originale di EolSunder:

tier 1-4 tanks were nerfed a while ago. A little of tier 5 tanks were also. A-20 used to be a great tank, it also was hit with the big nerf bat. Most autoloaders were. Tier 5 leopard..nerfed. A-20 nerfed, many many many others nerfed.

Just go on the official forums to see which tanks in lower tiers are still viable to play, and which were nerfed into oblivion.

yep. now they're all trash. miss the AMX 40 it was a beast. at least they buffed the leo again recently