GV battles are usually between a group of moving or fixed vehicles. The best way to notice enemy GVs early is from the Commanders turret position. The best way to locate a closing enemy is to listen for them and hear where they are coming from. The commanders position gives you the perfect place to do this. You can move the gun left or right and the noise will be the loudest in the direction he is closing from. The sound of the approaching vehicle will get louder and louder as it closes of course. Most turret mgs can traverse the whole 360 degree field of view but there usually is one place where they stop. On a Panzer its the 9 o'clock view roughly. The turret mgs usually do not have the ability to circle around and around. The ballistics of this turret mg is very close to the ballistics of the main guns AP rounds. This can be used as a rangefinder if the enemy is fairly close but this delay in getting the first shot off could be dangerous.

 

 

Of course the main gun is the killing tool of the tank. The main gun will traverse and circle the whole 360 view and there is no stop in it's movement. You will most likely need to use the zoom feature to see far out and locate and ID enemy vehicles. Usually there is NO enemy icon for ground vehicles when viewed from a ground vehicle. This shouldn't be a problem because friendlies still have them. Also, friendlies will not be shooting at you, hopefully. You need to become familiar with view thru the main gun and the apparent size of enemy vehicles. That will be your primary range indicator, the size of the enemy vehicle. This can be tricky because it's size will depend oh how much you have your view zoomed. What I do is zoom in slightly so you still see the 'circle' of view thru the main gun with the edges of the circle at the edges of your screen. That would be your initial view to spot them. When you do spot them you can zoom in further for more detailed view. I usually zoom in so the 2.0 or 2.8 range indicator on the gun is near the bottom of the screen for secondary visual and then zoom in as appropriate for shooting.

 

 

We have three types of round for the main gun. AP, armor piercing, for heavy vehicles like tanks and M8s. HE, high explosive, for structures and light vehicles like M16s or M3s. We also have SMK, smoke, rounds to mark targets or for range indicators. You can throw a SMK round out to 2.8 or 3.0 and use its smoke to help you gauge range on targets. To actually see the round type selected and the range marks in the main gun you may have to use max zoom. The range scale for each round is different due to the ballistics of each type of round. AP rounds have a lower and straighter trajectory. HE and SMK rounds have a higher and more arc-like trajectory.

 

 

 

Commands.
You will use most basic GV commands to move the vehicle and man it's various machine guns.
Also the fire keys are basically the same with the secondary fire key activating the main gun.
You will use the backspace key to cycle thru your AP, HE and SMK rounds if you have them.
You will definitely use zoom mode, z key to toggle it and [ and ] to move out and in.

 

 

 

Critical items.
Like real tanking, the first shot is critical. You definitely do not want to give him many shots and you should take the time to aim and get that initial first shot kill if you can. Knowing where to hit the target is very important to give the target damage opposed to watching you rounds bounce off and do no harm.

Click to enlarge