Well, I've been playing around with this tank for a few days.
I do like it. I don't think the Panzer IV completely outmatches it like I did on the first day of using it.
However, I will say the major reason that I think nobody uses it is because of the Tiger. The T-34 literally can't hurt the Tiger. Doesn't matter how close it is, where it shoots from (unless you somehow catch one climbing up a 45 degree slope and you can shoot down into the top of it, unlikely at best in my opinion), or how many times it shoots.
The very best it can hope for is to track it, which is again a pretty long shot considering the Tiger has absolutely no problem popping the T-34 at any feasible range.
I did talk to Pyro about it, and he confirmed that with the ammunition that is modelled it is just about impossible for a T-34 to hurt a Tiger.
One thing that would remedy this is if the T-34 was modelled with the BR-350P APCT round.
The penetration data I found for the round (to the best of my knowledge the Soviets defined penetration as 75% of the fragments of the round going through the armor, the Germans was 50%) was as follows
Angle --- 100M ---- 500M --- 1000M --- 2000M ---
0 ------ 133mm --- 95mm --- 62mm ---- 28mm
30 ------ 96mm --- 68mm --- 45mm ---- 21mm
60 ------ 33mm --- 25mm --- 17mm ---- 11mm
The regular round that is modelled (BR-350A) has the following
Angle --- 100M ---- 500M --- 1000M --- 2000M ---
0 ------- 81mm ---- 73mm --- 63mm --- 28mm
30 ------ 76mm ---- 68mm --- 60mm --- 45mm
60 ------ 40mm ---- 37mm --- 34mm --- 31mm
The armor our Tiger has (I think) is
Location --- Front -------- Side ------- Rear
Turret ---- 102mm @8d -- 82mm ------ 82mm
Upper Hull- 102mm @10d - 82mm ------ 82mm
Lower Hull- 102mm @24d - 62mm ------ 82mm
Top armor is 25mm on turret and hull. I'm pretty sure the "lower hull side" means behind the treads, but I'm not positive on that.
The armor is unsloped, except for the front.
However, our T-34 as modelled has no hope of ever doing any damage to the Tiger, which I think is kind of screwed up.
The BR-350P round was, as I understand, kind of an "emergency" round in that only 4 or so were in each tank. It was introduced in the summer of 1943.
Since the T-34 has been introduced, the Tiger is 3802/69 against it. I'm relatively positive that the 69 kills were as a result of a T34 dropping more rounds into the treads of an already disabled Tiger than anyone else did for the kill.
I really think the T-34 needs a limited number of these rounds to be a viable tank in the MA.
Right now, you can use it on defense alright, as long as you don't go head to head against the Panzers coming in. Using it on offense is relatively suicidal, since all it takes is one Tiger to render any number of T-34s essentially useless (or dead).
I hope that HTC will consider adding this round to the T-34.
