Thus far i have grinded 4 Tier 9 Heavies on PC, so i want to talk about 3 of them.
TL;DR: IS-3-II>E75>>>>M103
M103
The M103 compared to other Tier 9 Heavy's, its very average. There isnt really one thing i can say with confidence that i feel this tank does well, while there are multiple bad things about it.
In WoT there are the ''paper statistics'' then theres the veichle when its actually in action, all these paper statistics are fine/average but in action and as a sum of those parts the tank is overall quite bad in my opinion. Below i will list and talk about the cons of this tank that makes me hate it.
The Turret and tank in general is incredible weak to HE, it does have big tracks that can absorb it but it also has a gigantic turret with weak armor and roof. Now HE doesnt deal THAT much damage, 200-300 maybe, but the crew members in this thing dies all the time. There have been multiple situations where equal and lower tier heavies has shot at my turret roof and weakspot and killed multiple crews, infact one situation i literally only had 1 crew alive after a 277 shot HE at my roof and killed 2 crew members, then being hit by an arty killing the other 2 crew. Only had my gunner left. Unlike the E75, the M103’s roof and weakspot can be shit quite easily with HE from below.
The Weakspot is huge and never bounces if hit, looking at it in the garage it might not look TOO bad, but in action its very easy to hit, unlike some american and russki capola, this one is weak. The T95 for example the capola's are shaped in such a way that you have to hit it straight on to pen, unless you hve 330+MM Pen, On the M103, the hardest part of the cupola shooting from any angle is the edges which you then need about 185-190mm Pen to penetrate.
The Turret is very big and very weak making it very hard to work ridglines and use the decent 8 degrees of gun depression (the E75 and IS-3-II also has 8 Degrees of gun depressoin) . The M103 is the same height as the E100, think about that. It is the same heigh as an E100, but no armor on the sides and a weak cupola.
The M103 is a lot slower than the stats would have you belive. The tank has 15.12 Specific Power with my setup, and the IS-3-II has 13.96 but is faster in every single way. A gigantic problem with the tank is that it only has 29Degree traverse speed with my setup, which is lower than both the E75 and IS-3-II. While the statistic's tell one story, the tank in action tells another.
The M103 on paper seems like a really good tank and it has some good things, the gun handling isnt bad, the DPM is average, but the sum of the tanks parts do not work in action as well as the other 2 tanks.
Overall the M103 just feels like a stepping stone to the T110E5, where the T110E5 is the M103 just a little bit better at everything and being just a little bit better at everything with a good turret, makes the T110E5 strong. There isnt anything this tank can do better than the E75 or IS-3-II.
E75
The E75 is a good tank that stands on its own, and i would argue in certain situations its even better than the E100. I The tank feels like a sweetspot in many ways, it has just the perfect amount of Alpha/Reload Speed ratio, Really good and reliable armor where it matters, and its weaknesses can be worked around unlike the M103. Its an unflexible tank with a clear purpose that it does wonderfully, CQC Slugging. I am going to try to go a little deeper into it. Below are some things to note about the E75.
The E75 Turret is strong and is rather small compared to the M103. The E7 weakspot is hard to hit and almost every tank has to shoot up at it. The sides are strong and can get you trollbounces.
The 530 Alpha feels really nice to use and i cant praise this enough. It seems like such a small thing but it allows you to trade favorably against SO MANY TANKS. The E75 with my setup has 2400DPM, which is almost the same as the M103 and IS-3-II's 2500DPM, yet i have 130 more DMG per shot. On my setup i have Vert Stabs, Smooth Ride and Snap Shot, this tank is so strong at the old 'Sidescrape and Trade' or 'Sidescrape and Chill' that in such a situation it is stronger than the E100 IMO.
The height of the turret and the small Cupola makes it super cheesy to spot with and more people needs to take advantage of this. There are quite a lot of barriers and walls you can simpley drive on, push the turret up, and spot over, and its a REALLY underrated aspect about this tank that neither of the other 2 can do. (IS-3-II is so small and the M103 turret is weak)
The E75 is also rather weak to HE because of the way the turret is shaped, the frontal lobe of the turret (so to speak) is angled forward, and while the only thing that can overmatch it is 181MM+ Guns, its weak to HE because of it. The plate is super angled but only 60 Armor, so be aware that smart enemies will abuse this.
Its easy to play around the weakspots of this tank. The Cupola is on the Left Side of the turret so sidescraping with the right side of this tank makes it hard to hit, you can also put your gun up and slightly sideways (depending on where you are being shot from) to hide the Cupola with the gun. Even the Lower front plate isnt that weak, and a good sidescrape can hide it well or angle it in such a way that even some T10 tanks need Prem ammo to pen it, aswell as the tank having good side armor and big tracks. Sidescraping god.
Overall the E75 is kindof fantastic, but it does have a skill ceiling and requires mastery of the tank to play it correctly. It has great armor, great Alpha, and the mobility is good compared to how well armored it is. The E75 is a tank that while it is a tier 9, you certainly dont feel outmatched vs T10 tanks.
IS-3-II
The doubled barreled tanks are very interesting and this one doesnt feel like a heavy to me. The amount of damage this tanks can output so easily is nuts to me. To me the IS-3-II feels like a hybrid between a TD, HT and Medium.
This tank is the ridgeline beast as the very workable 8Degrees gun depression is so strong combined with the strong and low profile russki turret. Im not sure i would even call the weakspot a weakspot.
The mobility of this tank is one of its greatest strenghts. It can be used to get into some very good early positions too get some early shots, and on certain maps it can get into some really nice spotting positions, like a medium. It travels suprisingly quickly up mountains and turns incredibly fast.
Overall this tank is hard to talk about as statisticly there isnt any part about the tank that stands out, but to bring it full circle in a poetic way, unlike the M103 the IS-3-II is better than the sum of its parts. I really cant overstate how good this tank is at dealing damage.
What is your opinion on these tanks? would love to hear it!
