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Ok now, whether you're Russian, American, or (sheesh) British faithful... you hate one thing during 1943: Tiger Tanks

Me, I love being russia because I dont like worrying about pesky casualties

Played my first PBEM as russia. Faced ALL tigers, Wurframs w/ ammo trucks (mispelled?), and mechanized engineers. Won it eventually, but wow my T34's and molotov-armed siberian teenagers had to learn some new tricks that battle.

I feel as though it is a serious mental feat for Allies to take out tigers in '43, especially its on an open map, they are elite, and supported by unlimited rocket artillery.

So I want to hear how everyone deals with these heavy tanks... and those goddamn wurframs if you have the chance... in 43 of course, dont tell me "with the JS-III or M36 Jackson"

thanks

Against an opponent who buys mass of tigers and wurfrahmens with ammo support, i wouldn´t play, because in my opinion he hasn´t understood the sense of the play (historical aspect)...

Marder

On an open field its difficult for sure. the most obvious way is by air attack,but if the tank is protected ny AA watch out. another way is to use smoke - alot of it it and move in with engineers. I have actually used 37mm AA guns and damaged the tracks to immobilize it then smoke and demolition. If you can get side and rear shots you have a good chance with 76 mm guns but not on frontal.

Drex, in my opinion this works only against ai, because a human will send your engineers some greetings with his wurfrahmens...

I think on open terrain 43 it´s nearly impossible to win against humane with mass of tigers, aa, and wurfrahmens...

Perhaps with lot of Il-2´s...

Marder

I've been in the same 1943 situation vis-a-vis the Tigers and Wufs(both as Canucks and the Red Army)several times so I can empahtize.

Takes some serious use of combined arms but you can beat em (best when opponent is overconfindent in the powers of the Tiger).
Use lots of smoke in front of your forces and mid map for confusion. Drop it using artillery or lots of mortars (need a lot)

Next work on suppression with air units or artillery. Need good recon or guess work.

Now move in slowly with infantry (preferably guards or paras) and heavy armor like the KVs or better let them move to you. If stationary make sure you have a far number of the high end ATs. The trick is to get them in close. Best to shoot ATs and tanks from a higher elevation. Better to use the legs in the woods, smoke or other difficult to spot terrain.

I haven't faced this yet in game, but I think I'd fall back on how the Russians did it historically at Kursk, and other places.

Accept the casualties and charge. The Tiger's advantage is range. Up close the T-34s, etc, can take Tiger's just as easily as they themselves get taken, and you should have a lot more tanks than he does. Use Arty on Counterbattery, maybe, for some of the wulfram probs, as well as Infantry close assaults - and tankdestoankii as well, if you can get them up close for assaults. Smoke, etc, of course, is a standard. It might even be better to use hordes of normal infantry rather than the more expensive guards, esp with limited ammo and weapon breakdowns on. Nothing like causing the 88 to breakdown firing at a rifle squad

Alex

infantry, infantry and infantry. Simple answer.

I play with tigers, so I know what is my pain in 43east front. I learned it hard way last autumn.

mosh

Think about using conscripts: They run away quickly from fire and fight hard after they can't retreat anymore...

ok thanx for the input. In my game I ended up dropping smoke on top of advancing tigers and then using the t34's speed to create pockets of isolated 5-1, 6-1, hell 10-1 numerical superiority. We were using CC, so I think that made it hard for the tigers to retreat quickly. But I gotta tell you even once you get 5 t34's charging a tiger, it can easily blow them all away at pt. blank range using opp fire. I literally had to surround tigers at pt. blank and play games with their facing in order to kill em. And yeah when the 76mm guns failed to penetrate then came the molotovs. Needless to say, it was a bitch and very demoralizing at first. My first 3 turns I lost about 1/4 of my armored force (15 tanks- KV's and t34s) and knocked out only 2 tigers. Somehow I got the hang of it though and the other tigers came easier...

I think that the best way is to use Sappers with 0 visibility and smoke.
Bombard the area with smoke.
Arange your Sappers so they are 5 hexes from etchother in width and depth
Let Sappers move MAX 2 hexes every turn and change it`s range off fire to 0 so it will not shoot at your oponents turn.
have some MachineGuns`s and Sniper`s cover the area were your Sappers are, try to use youre Sappers only against those Tigers but soften up first the enemys infantry with everything else you got, it works for me wery gooooood :p