Churchill VII is not a functional BR4.7 tank

[WhipperSnipper 284]

Had 100's of games in this tank, if it gets down tiered its a lot of fun for area denial but all the games I can count this year it has been up tiered (all my tanks are BR4.7, Avenger and Firefly). I avoid using it most of the time but sometimes its all I have left and having to fight Tigers, Panthers, IS and other heavies that are completely immune to its rank 2 popgun which struggles against Sherman's. Yet its strong armour is rendered useless against 75mm Kwk, 90 and 88mm guns that nail it in 1 hit at range. 

 Also the British requirement to hit a tank 5+ times makes killing anything of similar rank extremely difficult. A disabled, perfectly sideon KV1 at 100m, took 15 hits to die yesterday...

 

Either give this tank a better shell or drop it down a few levels.

[Valcour 1,141]

Part of that is that APHE shells in game are over performing compared to solid shot.  The MK VII can be a beast when it is at a higher BR, but the gun is the weak point.

 

[WhipperSnipper 284]

7 minutes ago, Valcour said:

Part of that is that APHE shells in game are over performing compared to solid shot.  The MK VII can be a beast when it is at a higher BR, but the gun is the weak point.

 

 

It shows the usual British system, either a good gun but crap armor or vice versa. Not much balance in the mid rank games. Not sure how its a beast at higher BR, it fights tanks that easily blow it up in 1 hit while laughing at its shell hits.

 My last game is a good example, 12 hits to kill this lowly Sherman, putting shells though every part of the tank occasional fire or crew damage but it would not blow up.

[Josephs_Piano 7,044]

4 minutes ago, OmgWtfBBQ said:

Not sure how its a beast at higher BR, it fights tanks that easily blow it up in 1 hit while laughing at its shell hits.

 

I think he meant when IT is at the high BR - ie 3.7-4.7 games.

 

5 minutes ago, OmgWtfBBQ said:

 

It shows the usual British system, either a good gun but crap armor or vice versa.

 

WT does not reflect reality.

 

It shows the reality of the war for allied tanks in 1944-45 - Churchills in particular were still used almost exclusively to support infantry assaults, so good HE was more important and there was "enough" anti-tank capabilities to deal with the cats when they did appear.

 

 

[torderxd 81]

Given an APCR it could be completely normal and balanced, not a bullet with explosive filler. 

1 hour ago, OmgWtfBBQ said:

Had 100's of games in this tank, if it gets down tiered its a lot of fun for area denial but all the games I can count this year it has been up tiered (all my tanks are BR4.7, Avenger and Firefly). I avoid using it most of the time but sometimes its all I have left and having to fight Tigers, Panthers, IS and other heavies that are completely immune to its rank 2 popgun which struggles against Sherman's. Yet its strong armour is rendered useless against 75mm Kwk, 90 and 88mm guns that nail it in 1 hit at range. 

 Also the British requirement to hit a tank 5+ times makes killing anything of similar rank extremely difficult. A disabled, perfectly sideon KV1 at 100m, took 15 hits to die yesterday...

Already in uptier it holds up excellently if you tip it.

I would still use the APCBC against low br, and the apcr against high br or something armored.

[TwitchyNGL 595]

13 hours ago, torderxd said:

Given an APCR it could be completely normal and balanced, not a bullet with explosive filler. 

Already in uptier it holds up excellently if you tip it.

I would still use the APCBC against low br, and the apcr against high br or something armored.

It never used APCR, it would have used filled M61 shell. 

[WhipperSnipper 284]

On 16/02/2022 at 11:56, torderxd said:

Given an APCR it could be completely normal and balanced, not a bullet with explosive filler. 

Already in uptier it holds up excellently if you tip it.

I would still use the APCBC against low br, and the apcr against high br or something armored.

 

APCBC is its best shell, weak 100mm pen. Slow 600ms velocity, high ricochet against sloped armour.. 

 It was a infantry tank but there are no infantry and it's HE shell is useless against 98% of the targets.

[Wiggly_Armed_Man 2,383]

Its armour is too powerful to go down and its gun is too useless to go up. It could be given the M61 shell with filler to increase its lethality a bit, but there's not much that can be done as it has Maus syndrome but to a even higher level. Maybe it should be called Churchill syndrome instead.

[Valcour 1,141]

The AC 1 Sentinal is in the same boat.  At 3.3(AB) its gun is marginal but the armor still holds up fairly well.

 

[BadOpinionHaver 2,092]

5 hours ago, Wiggly_Armed_Man said:

It could be given the M61 shell with filler to increase its lethality a bit,

This is sort of realistic and would make the Churchill 7 easily 10x better.

Same should be done with all British tanks with the 75mm.

[KryoK 209]

Personally, I've given up playing the Churchills. Too many under BR'd German tanks.

I did recommend at the last BR update that they have a look at the Churchills.

Guess they must be doing fine according to Gaijins stats.

[WhipperSnipper 284]

Well the last game half the server was T34-85's. Sneak up on one, put a shell into his tracks at 150m, he is disabled and unsure where I am, put 3 more into him, bounce, bounce, bounce, he spots me, I pop smoke and try and escape, boom, 1 hit dead... Meh.. the Churchills armour is only effective against Panzer 4's without the Kwk 75 and 75mm Shermans, pretty much everything else goes straight though it. 

[Wiggly_Armed_Man 2,383]

4 hours ago, Starlinum said:

Well the last game half the server was T34-85's. Sneak up on one, put a shell into his tracks at 150m, he is disabled and unsure where I am, put 3 more into him, bounce, bounce, bounce, he spots me, I pop smoke and try and escape, boom, 1 hit dead... Meh.. the Churchills armour is only effective against Panzer 4's without the Kwk 75 and 75mm Shermans, pretty much everything else goes straight though it. 

How did he penetrate you if you're using the Mk. VII? If you're angling then there's not many places he can go through you, especially at 150 meters. Also, you just shoot their turret like the other T-34s.

[RoryWatt18 219]

7 hours ago, Starlinum said:

Well the last game half the server was T34-85's. Sneak up on one, put a shell into his tracks at 150m, he is disabled and unsure where I am, put 3 more into him, bounce, bounce, bounce, he spots me, I pop smoke and try and escape, boom, 1 hit dead... Meh.. the Churchills armour is only effective against Panzer 4's without the Kwk 75 and 75mm Shermans, pretty much everything else goes straight though it. 

No point using the Churchill VII in a full uptier, if you see T-34-85s, Panthers or Tigers, just pick something else... such as the Avenger or Firefly depending on map.

Make sure to angle your tank, don't let them see your slight weak spot on the front hull.

Always try and be near a teammate, think of yourself as a shield supporting someone else.

Perhaps bring it out near the end of the battle, once everyone has died in their "good" vehicles you can clinch the victory

[TasteTheTea 3,203]

In my experience, the Mk VII still has a niche in just being a solid immovable damage sponge provided it's in a downtier (or on a large enough map in an uptier)...

 

The Mk III however...that thing is now useless at 4.3.

Edited February 17, 2022 by TasteTheTea

[TwitchyNGL 595]

Nah the Mk III is still okay. Hmm maybe they should give it APDS.

[torderxd 81]

11 minutes ago, TwitchyTrooper said:

Nah the Mk III is still okay. Hmm maybe they should give it APDS.

Do not have the br raised to 5.0. 

[Whiskey_077 1,785]

17 hours ago, TwitchyTrooper said:

Nah the Mk III is still okay. Hmm maybe they should give it APDS.

 

It should be back to 4.0, A new Churchill (IV/VI) can be add in 4.3 ( and add Aphe for the Mk VII). 

17 hours ago, torderxd said:

Do not have the br raised to 5.0. 

«The situation was somewhat improved by the development of more sophisticated ammunition in the form of the Armour-Piercing, Composite Rigid (APCR) shot and the Armour-Piercing, Discarding Sabot (APDS) shot, which was available from 1944 and made it effective against the frontal armour of Tiger Is and Panthers.» 

 

Slow, but lol pen panthers/KV/IS/Tiger.. 

[Valcour 1,141]

6 minutes ago, Whisky_077 said:

 

It should be back to 4.0, A new Churchill (IV/VI) can be add in 4.3 ( and add Aphe for the Mk VII). 

 

The IV(NA) would seem a good option for that slot.

 

[TasteTheTea 3,203]

On 18/02/2022 at 11:40, TwitchyTrooper said:

Nah the Mk III is still okay. Hmm maybe they should give it APDS.

At 4.3, that hasn't been my experience really. 89mm of simple, flat armour for a turret face and a gun that is inaccurate at longer ranges makes for a bad combination. I feel like if they gave it APDS, it'd be even more inaccurate and would probably earn a higher BR...

 

Save the APDS for the Churchill Mk III (1944)

[Muzlie 86]

In down tiers it is great fun, angle the hull and stick with team mates, although I have been killed a few times from really odd angles with the t34/kv1 76mm...

 

I think it is fine at 4.7 although should most definitely get an APHE shell (along with the Cromwell mkV), most heavy tanks in the game suffer in full up tiers, the only exception I can think of is the Object 279 which I have been unable to pen using my Challenger 1...

One issue we have at that BR are KV1s are under-tiered at 3.7, their armour is incredible, The KV1 C was moved up to 5.0 partly because its armour is so good. The Churchill Mk3 is sitting 2 BR brackets above the first KV1 despite having arguably worse armour, yes better pen on the gun but no APHE.This is especially painful when meeting KV1s in the Churchill Mk1 as the 2pdr really struggles to pen it. Also the Church Mk3 only went up in BR due to the German Churchill performing so well because it doesn't face German guns.

 

I would argue that the Panther & Tiger 1 should not be at 5.3, but honestly I don't struggle too much against them, although they certainly should not be seeing the Churchill Mk3.

 

In terms of APDS, I think that we should have a Churchill Mk 7 possibly at 5.0/5.3 re-gunned to the 6pdr & with APDS. There are reports that some Mk7s were changed to have 6pdrs for D-Day & could well have been issued APDS. However the BR would depend on Gaijin's Penetration formula, reports for the 6pdr APDS were 190mm pen at point blank, which would be good for 5.3. But the 17pdr APDS should actually be penetrating 280mm point blank, which it does not in WT being 52mm short at 228mm, an 18.5% decrease, a very unscientific 18.5% decrease on 190mm could give us 155mm of pen which would lend itself better to 5.0 although worth noting that early APDS round are overperforming on angled armour in game so it might do fine at 5.3...

 

So, in summary

Churchill Mk 1 to 3.0 again

Churchill Mk 3 to 4.0 again

Churchill Mk 7 to stay at 4.7 but get APHE

Churchill Mk 7/6pdr to be added at 5.0/5.3 depending on penetration.

 

Oh and Churchill AVRE either 4.0 with the 290mm petard or maybe 4.7 if it has the 165mm demo gun?

 

In my opinion of course.

 

And one last thing, the Church was known to be slow, but also incredible at crossing obstacles, it should have much better traction, although all tanks probably should since they added olive oil to every map...

 

 

Edited February 25, 2022 by Muzlie

[TwitchyNGL 595]

3 hours ago, Muzlie said:

Churchill Mk 5/6pdr to be added at 5.0/5.3 depending on penetration.

Churchill Mk V has a 95mm not a 6Pdr. A late uparmoured Mk III, IV or VI with APDS would be your best bet, still considerably less armoured than Churchill VII. I'm not sure if a slow moving tank with Tiger I levels of armour would be amazing at 5.3 even with APDS as that'd bring you upto about 180mm of pen but low damage.

[Muzlie 86]

2 minutes ago, TwitchyTrooper said:

Churchill Mk V has a 95mm not a 6Pdr. A late uparmoured Mk III, IV or VI with APDS would be your best bet, still considerably less armoured than Churchill VII. I'm not sure if a slow moving tank with Tiger I levels of armour would be amazing at 5.3 even with APDS as that'd bring you upto about 180mm of pen but low damage.

Yeah my bad, I meant Mk7...

[TwitchyNGL 595]

4 hours ago, Muzlie said:

Yeah my bad, I meant Mk7...

Mk VIIs don't have 6 Pounders.

[CoffeeBean100 2,896]

Is this still present? Always believed it was just a feature:

 

"The long leading tracks often glitch out and fail to stop a shell which hits them from the front at flat angle, so it is entirely possible to get knocked out with a single shot through them even by an AMX-13 (FL11) . This is surprisingly common, especially in AB, and so correct angling is always effective. Hopefully this issue is soon to be rectified." - War Thunder wiki