The "misfit" tank destroyers are a series of more obscure designs that could fit an hypothetical fifth tank destroyer tree in WOT.
These designs are much more likely to ever appear as premium tanks rather than as part of a regular tree, so they will be treated separately.
One of the most obscure STUG III variants is the design project of mounting an 88mm cannon on its chassis.
Such a powerful weapon would have made the STUG even more versatile as the larger caliber gun would have been extremely useful both against tanks and softer targets thanks to the heavier HE shell.
The concept reached wooden model stage and as seen from the picture, would have required a redesigned superstructure and likely made the tank itself heavier:
How would the tank behave in WOT?
Baby Jagdpanther II comes into mind.
Good alpha although not stellar penetration for its tier, coupled with a fairly mobile chassis.
Depending on superstructure armor (would it be 50mm or the heavier 80mm? I'd go for tier V premium with 50mm and decent mobility) it could also be fairly mobile but given it would be slightly taller than the base chassis camo would suffer a bit.
Now, would you like to see this tank as a tier V premium or as a regular tank?
wouldn't the new (heavier) gun and superstructure bring the pz 3 chassis to its very limits?
ReplyDeletei imagine this vehicle to be nowhere near the agility of the current stug
Tier V? Dont know... rather T6 with nerfed mobility, as Stug III is Tier V already.
ReplyDelete-FredTMK
Who would play a gimpled Jpz IV at tier VI?
DeleteCould get better MM.
DeleteIf it has the shorter 88mm than it could work for tier V!
ReplyDeleteOf course we're talking about the L/56, no way the long 88 could fit in there.
DeleteBut you can see exactly PaK 43 with monobloc barrel on the picture. And there was no 8,8-cm L/56 gun for tank destroyers - only AA and tank variants.
DeleteDoesn't seem the Pak 43 to me, too short.
DeleteThe Tiger II mantlet also can be seen.
DeleteStuG III with 8,8-cm gun better matches tier 6 premium.
ReplyDeleteIt's also needed to say that StuG III is a tier 5 TD оnly due to long 7,5-cm gun (what is of course unhistorical and StuG III better fits tier 4), but there were developed a special StuG III variant for this gun with bigger superstructure - this TD is also worth mentioning.
A long 75mm variant of STUG III was planned so what we get at tier V is semi-historical.
DeleteIMHO the short 88 doesn't belong to tier VI as TD top gun due to the abysmal penetration and is the equal of the 75 L/70 at best.
>A long 75mm variant of STUG III was planned
DeleteBut it looked completely different.
>the short 88 doesn't belong to tier VI as TD top gun
Right. But long - does.
Long 88 was not even proposed for the STUG, only the short one.
DeleteThere was absolutely no point to develop tank destroyer with short 88.
DeleteThe chassis would have never been able to carry an 8.8 gun. Even the Jagdpanther had many transmission problems because of the heavy weight at the front end.
ReplyDeleteEven the Jagdpanzer IV had problems even with with the 7,5 cm from the Panther.
An 8.8 on an StuG would never work.
The fact that the mock-up was built says something.
DeleteThe short 88 was not significantly heavier than the 75mm L/70, plus the rear casemate would have helped with weight distribution.
DeleteThe real existing Jagdpanther had the 8.8 and the Chassis was in all aspects superior to the StuG III which had'nt the Panther chassis but the PzkpfW III chassis. The JP had damaged torsion bars after 50-100 km of march-speed in early models. So mounting the 8.8 on an even weaker Pzkpfw III would work? The 7,5er had a hard time on the Pzkpfw IV chassis on the Jgdpz IV leading to similar damages on the torsionbars at the front. There is no technical way an 8.8 would be work on a StuG III. A StuG 88 would break down after few km.
DeleteLooks like the long 88mm imo, the gun probably go all the way back so that's why it don't seem so long outside the casemate. Low hp, good damage, low armour, high mobility at tier 6 sounds good to me.
ReplyDeletea) A long 88 at tier 6? Keep dreaming.
Deleteb) Overloading the chassis doesn't sound like it would lead to particularly good mobility to me.
Well the SU-100Y have a more powerful gun at tier 6 and it's a premium so why couldn't the germans have an equal gun??
DeleteIts confirmed long 88 in tier 6,just wait for nashorn in second line of german tds
DeleteI think it would make a great Tier 6 premium with limited matchmaking.
ReplyDeletetier V regular TD. mainly because the germans already have two premium TDS ;)
ReplyDeleteperhaps it could fit in a parallel position on the waffentrager TD branch, i.e., akin to the Ferdi/Jagdpanther II situation, or maybe as a crossing point from one TD branch to the other?
Still hope to see the Marder III sdkfz 139 as a low tier premium TD, and not a mere wooden model.
ReplyDeletewud be great t.5 prem
ReplyDelete