I would rate the Tiger I initiative higher than the Tiger II. The Tiger Abteilungs other than at Kursk were chosen almost elite troops with massive support and plenty of experience. The Tiger II units much less so as the numbers of experienced crews fell due to losses and curtailed training programs and the tank itself sluggish and underpowered

But you have to also consider guns better than the 88L56 and the limitations imposed by a few categories we can use. The SSU 122 only has 6, is the short 88 as good as that? A gun 50% bigger

I put together a fan card for the British Matilda II tank.

It came to 13 pts using the formula:
Stat line is 4-3-1-5
Semi-Indirect Fire, Heavy Tank, Slow

What do you think...I am toying with a 2 for the firepower rating, but that seems problematic for the game. I gave the Lee tank's 37mm a 2, but primarily because of the problem of having one tank commander and two separate guns. I can't wait to try it out against some other desert tanks...need to make the cards for those now!

I am thinking for the poor Italians, an M 13/40...3-3-0-3 (Maybe a 4 damage?? and even lower initiative?), slow tank. I am thinking a national trait of "improvvisazione." [Improvvisazione: The Italians made due with their poor equipment and made field modifications to improve their vehicles or simply to keep them running. At the beginning of the game, the crew can add one point to their initiative or their damage rating for free]. If you were to use the British Sherman as a basis to compare, the M-13/40 would value out at a mere one point and slow makes it like negative numbers....-4!!! I think I will have to use the M13/40 as a new standard for the comparisons and wing a point value for it...perhaps start it out at 4 points? What do you guys think? If I did that the Semovente with the short 75mm gun might come out 2-3-1-3 with assault gun, slow tank, improvvisazione, which looks to give it a net +4 over the M-13/40 for a total of 8 points (The extra defense die for its lower silhouette, improvements in frontal armor). The Semovente with the longer 75mm gun would get firepower 4, so a net improvement of +5 from the short-barreled Semovente giving it a cost of 13 points. The Italian numbers here seem okay.

On point. And there needs to be some clear difference between short (L56) and long (L71) acht-komma-acht as in real muzzle velocity and consequentially penetration values are much higher (though addmittedly accuracy was somewhat worse) and the L71 is rated at Attack 6.

P.S. One more thing for hithero. It's spelled Blitzkrieg. ;)

Edited by user Monday, July 11, 2016 7:50:29 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

What do you think about different slows:
Slow1: Roll a dice, on 2-6 its slow, just one move
Slow2: Roll a dice, on 3-6 its slow, just one move
And so on
With that we can difference for maus, e100 and so on

Actually I would think about giving the Archer very high initiative. Of all the TDs we have so far this is the ultimate ambush predator in that it rarely manoeuvred in the way we would associate. Archer tactics were to get in a prepared position and then use its size and camo to shoot first and kill, then pull out backwards (fast). It really is a sniper. The only ways I can see of representing this in the current game is give it an advanced deployment option - ie let it start 2 sticks in, give it high initiative, and maybe even give it a plus on the Cautious roll

This only applies to Brits in WW2 - not sure how they were used in '56

All true, but it does have limited traverse in that it is not a turret, but it (probably) has the best traverse of all the limited traverse guns - 45 degrees either way IIRC. Being open topped would also mean high initiative.

I think it depends on circumstances, but from my reading I cant find anything that suggests the Anti Tank units in 21st AG preferred the Achilles - if anything maybe they preferred the Archer because they knew it was easier to hide. There is a caveat there of course in that the units that got Archer tended to be those that were initially attached to infantry formations so probably were thinking of it from the perspective of it replacing towed 17Pdrs

Yeah....still I see the Archer as lower point than an Achilles. It is slow and an assault gun. Maybe treat slow as less of a penalty? If you only deduct 1 for slow and 2 to reduce its initiative to 4, then that gives you a 15 point glass hammer. Kind of debunks some of the "code" ideas here though.

Don't forget that Lee/Grant special rule where it loses a defense die if it has no cover (big target). I would consider bumping the Stuart gun to a 3. The Lee is lower for its turret gun since the commander is very busy directing moves and targets for the primary gun...not a problem for the Stuart. By adding the 5 pts for fast and an additional 7 to bump the gun to 3, the Stuart comes in at a more reasonable 16 pts. If it were given the recon key word, then it might be closer to the 20 pts of a basic Sherman....interesting.

Edited by user Friday, December 23, 2016 8:13:36 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

How do you rank the next 2 tanks.
- Kingtiger
- Jagdtiger

Edited by user Saturday, February 25, 2017 1:31:43 AM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified