Jul 23, 2020

Armored Warfare - Silentstalker

Commanders!

This week, we’ve prepared another set of attractive items for you:

BM Oplot Tier 9 Premium Main Battle Tank
Rosomak Wataha Tier 8 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle
BWP-2000 Tier 7 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle
Object 187 Tier 7 Premium Main Battle Tank
ZUBR PSP Tier 7 Premium Tank Destroyer
T-72M2 Wilk Tier 6 Premium Main Battle Tank

Between July 23 and July 30, 2020, the following items will be available:

BM Oplot

The Oplot is a heavily upgraded T-84 Ukrainian Main Battle Tank, which is based on an older design called T-80UD. It is currently the best tank the Ukrainian military industry can offer. You can read more about its history in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the BM Oplot is a Tier 9 Premium Main Battle Tank with a playstyle similar to the T-80U. Power-wise, it’s roughly on par with the T-90MS of the same Tier, but it has a very unique ability. Its advanced Duplet armor consists of several ERA layers, making it able to negate more than one HEAT shell impact. It takes several precise hits aimed at the same location to break through it, making it a very resistant vehicle on the battlefield.

Rosomak M1 Wataha

The Rosomak is the current standard wheeled IFV of the Polish military. Originally designed by Patria, it was modified and locally license-produced in Poland. It has already seen combat in Afghanistan and fared quite well. Poland plans to obtain more of these vehicles in the future. The M1 is an upgraded Rosomak for the use in Afghanistan. You can read more about it in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the Rosomak Wataha is a Tier 8 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle. Compared to the standard Tier 7 Rosomak, it features improved protection as well as the ability to fire Spike guided missiles. It can serve as an excellent heavy scout, a light AFV interceptor and, if needed, as an effective tank killer thanks to its ATGM launcher. Wataha stands in Polish for “a pack of predators” (in this case, wolves) and this vehicle is a ferocious beast indeed. It comes with a Polish-themed military camouflage, a Polish flag attached to its antenna and special Wataha imagery.

BWP-2000

The BWP-2000 IFV was a Polish attempt from the mid-1990s to develop a replacement for the license-produced BMP-1 in the Polish military, since it was getting obsolete by that point. Its protracted development led to its cancellation at the onset of War on Terror, leaving Poland without a modern tracked IFV to this day. You can read more about it in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the BWP-2000 is a Tier 7 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle armed with 60mm cannon as well as a set of ATGM launchers. When it comes to AFV playstyle, the BWP-2000 is definitely more of an infantry carrier and fire support vehicle than a scout due to its large size and powerful armament as well as the ability to deploy Mechanized Infantry. It can take quite a bit of punishment and deal it in equal measure.

Object 187

The Object 187 was a Soviet era program, developed to improve upon the excellent but ageing T-72 Main Battle Tank. Several prototypes were built, featuring a number of advanced elements compared to the older Soviet tanks, such as the new long 125mm smoothbore gun with a typical muzzle brake. The result was an excellent MBT that was, however, never mass-produced due to the 1990s Russian military budget cuts – the Russian army chose a less advanced but cheaper T-90 instead. You can learn more about it in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the Object 187 is a typical Russian style Main Battle Tank – it’s suitable for an aggressive play style and is a good choice for the players who prefer to take on their opponents at close ranges.

ZUBR PSP

The ZUBR was a Czech privately-funded project by PSP Bohemia from the 1990s to develop a successor platform to the aging Soviet-era BMP-series IFVs and various other obsolete specialized vehicles. Even though it was quite advanced for its time, it was ultimately unsuccessful due to the end of the Cold War and the subsequent cuts in European military budgets, including the Czech one. You can read more about it in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the ZUBR PSP is a Tier 7 wheeled Premium Tank Destroyer. What makes it fairly unique is the fact that you can choose from two different weapon systems for this vehicle:

Cockerill CT-CV turret with 105mm gun
Four-barreled TOW ATGM launcher

Each of these weapons changes the gameplay style of the vehicle considerably and it is up to you, how you configure this powerful machine.

T-72M2 Wilk

The T-72M2 Wilk (Polish for “Wolf”) is one of the results of the Polish attempts from the late 1980s to upgrade its aging fleet of T-72M1 tanks in order to provide an effective counterpart to the western Leopard 2 and Abrams MBTs. The Polish development program resulted in several prototypes built between 1987 and 1990, featuring a more powerful engine, better Fire Control System and a Polish ERAWA explosive reactive armor kit. The Wilk program was concluded in 1990 but the lessons learned from it were used in the construction of the Polish PT-91 Main Battle Tank. You can learn more about its history in our dedicated article!

In Armored Warfare, the T-72M2 Wilk is a Tier 6 Main Battle Tank. It’s based on the T-72M1, which is an export version of the T-72A. That, along with improved mobility and the ERAWA ERA kit, puts it one tier above its predecessor. Performance-wise, it’s comparable to the T-72B Main Battle Tank with its experimental Polish DRAWA FCS and the improved autoloader increasing its performance.

We hope that you will enjoy the offer and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!

Jul 23, 2020

Now available: Hunter AFV

Armored Warfare - Silentstalker

Commanders!

We’re happy to announce that the final vehicle of the Enigma’s Legacy Battle Path campaign, the Hunter Tier 9 Premium AFV is now available again directly in the game for a week along with a special present. This present contains a 1 day temporary version of the Hunter and 3 days of Premium Time and will become available at 16:00 CEST.

Another alternative name for this vehicle is NGAFV (or Next Gen AFV), since it belongs to a whole program to replace the obsolete M113 APC in Singaporean service and to operate alongside its predecessor, another indigenous Singaporean IFV called Bionix. Hunter is the name of the production model of this program. The Hunter AFV is the pinnacle of bleeding edge of technology. In this sense, it can be compared to the AS21 Redback and both vehicles share several characteristics, not the least of which being relatively large size. This bulky IFV offers considerable levels of protection and firepower. It is expected to serve in the Singaporean army in large numbers in the near future with its mass-production having recently begun. You can read more about its history in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the Hunter AFV is a Tier 9 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle. As its description above suggests, it is a rather standard-sized IFV with good levels of protection and excellent firepower (consisting of a 30mm autocannon and a Spike ATGM launcher). It also features a recently introduced type of armor, NERA. Simply put, NERA is an ablative armor kit that deteriorates whenever it gets hit. In other words, the vehicle starts with excellent protection levels but it will lose some with damage taken as the battle progresses. Apart from that, the vehicle is adequately mobile and quite universal. It can, of course, also deploy Mechanized Infantry.

This vehicle can be obtained from Enigma Loot Crates. You need to assemble 100 blueprint pieces to assemble the vehicle. The Last Enigma Loot Crates are available in exchange for surplus Battle Coins directly in the game (as long as you have the Enigma’s Legacy access). They include the abovementioned blueprint pieces (along with a chance for the Hunter to drop directly) as well as pieces of Special Enigma Loot Crates. These Special Crates have to be first assembled and, upon doing so, they drop improved loot, including:

Exclusive Premium vehicles (including those from previous Battle Paths, up to Tier 10)
Exclusive commanders (including Battle Path ones)
Battle Path boosters

These Loot Crates can be obtained in the Crates section in the Battle Path window for the following prices:

1 Crate for 1.500 Battle Coins
5 Crates for 7.000 Battle Coins
10 Crates for 12.500 Battle Coins

We hope that you will enjoy this vehicle and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!

Jul 21, 2020

In Development: 2T Stalker

Armored Warfare - Silentstalker

Commanders!

As we’ve announced already, there is a new set of Contract Mission coming in Update 0.33 along with a brand-new reward vehicle, the Belarusian 2T Stalker Tier 8 Premium AFV (this vehicle was previously announced as a Tier 9 one, but its parameters have since been adjusted). Today, we’d like to tell you a bit more about it.

The 2T Stalker (named so after the role and missions it was supposed to carry out, it has nothing to do with the Stalker movie, let alone videogames) was a heavy Armored Fighting Vehicle, developed by Minotor-Servis, a company based in Belarus, as a private venture primarily for export. The goal of this project was to design an armored vehicle, which would be able to operate independently behind enemy lines and act as both a capable recon platform and a deep raider.

To that end, a lot of emphasis was put on it being stealthy with powerful optics and radar/sensor suites (of an undetermined type, possibly PNSR-5K or PNSR-8K) installed in its turret.

The Stalker also carried powerful armament in the form of a 30mm 2A42 autocannon and two retractable missile launchers with two tubes each, one being a twin 9K114 Shturm ATGM launcher and one for the Igla SAMs. The 9M120 missiles fired from the 9K114 launchers penetrate up to 800mm of RHAe (after defeating the target’s ERA) at 6000 meters thanks to their tandem warheads (later models increase the penetration to 950mm and the range to 8000 meters). Thermobaric warheads (9M120F) are also available.

Interestingly enough, the autocannon did not allow for very high elevation (-3.5 to +9 degrees, unlike for example the BMP series), indicating that the SAMs were there to take care of helicopters as well as other aerial targets while the automatic cannon was there for ground targets only, making its use limited in urban and mountainous areas. The vehicle carried 500 (some sources claim 700) rounds of 30mm ammunition.

Additional anti-infantry firepower was provided by a 7.62mm PKT machinegun with 2000 rounds of ammunition, 30mm grenade launcher and the Stalker also carried 12 anti-tank mines to lay down ambushes.

The commander and the gunner both had several sets of stabilized day/night optics at their disposal along with a laser rangefinder and an automated target tracker.

The vehicle had a newly developed hull (specifically designed to make it stealthier than usual, including in the IR spectrum), although the motive system used various elements from the GM-355 tracked platform. The hull was made of welded steel with the frontal armor (specifically (40 degrees to each side from the axis of the vehicle to each side) protecting the crew against 30mm autocannon rounds at 300 meters. The rest of the hull was only resistant to small arms and machinegun bullets. Some other sources claim that the front was resistant to 35mm armor-piercing shells and the rest of the hull to 14.5mm armor-piercing bullets. It’s even possible the project was upgraded this way as the development went on.

Additional protection was provided by a laser warning system, integrated turret-mounted Tucha smoke grenade launchers and a NBC system.

The 27.4 ton Stalker was powered by a V-46 series diesel engine (likely the 780hp V-46 or the 840hp V-46-2S1 variant) located at the rear of the hull on the left side, allowing it to go as fast as 95 km/h. The suspension was based on the GM-355 chassis and was, at least according to some sources, hydropneumatic, allowing the vehicle to change its clearance from 130mm to 570mm. The self-entrenching device, installed in the front of the vehicle, allowed it to dig itself in rather quickly.

Interestingly enough, the project had started with a crew of three men but would later switch to the standard Russian recon vehicle configuration of five in order for the crew to operate its many sensors effectively. The gunner and the commander would sit in the turret, the rest of the crew (driver, communications officer and sensor operator) in the hull.

The project was first mentioned in 1999 and by 2001, a single prototype was ready and presented to the public at the IDEX 2001 expo in Abu Dhabi. However, despite being truly an interesting design and the promises of the Belarusian government to order 30 or so pieces, it failed to find any customers and the project was terminated.

As we mentioned already, in Armored Warfare, the 2T Stalker will be a Tier 8 Premium Armored Fighting Vehicle, available as a reward for the next set of Contract Missions. As the description above suggests, it’s going to be a rather stealthy, if large, vehicle but before we take things any further, here’s the thing. We haven’t really balanced it for the upcoming Tier 7-10 changes yet, so everything written here is very much a work in progress, more so than usual. It’s very likely that the characteristics will change, although this text should give you an idea what we are aiming at.

With that being said, let’s start with this vehicle’s protection – or the lack of, because the Stalker will be, despite its size and weight (27 tons), only resistant against bullets. Autocannon rounds will likely go right through (except for ricochets). There will not be any hard-kill APS either; the whole vehicle will be very vulnerable. But armor’s not really what this AFV will be about anyway.

The firepower will not be bad though. We’re talking about a single 30mm autocannon and an Ataka ATGM launcher with two tubes, some 850mm of penetration and tandem HEAT warheads.

Now, you may be thinking that this isn’t right since the screenshots clearly show two double launchers. The situation here is more complicated though. As we mentioned before, in real life, one of these launchers belongs to a short-range SAM system. The thing is, we don’t have airplanes in Armored Warfare, so we originally thought to replace the SAM launcher with another Ataka ATGM one and have the vehicle fire four missiles before fully reloading, not just two. After some discussions, however, we realized that combined with the excellent stealth and mobility this vehicle offers, it might be a bit too much, which is why we are now thinking of leaving only one ATGM launcher available, the way it was in reality. Which solution would you prefer and why? Let us know on Discord!

One other special characteristic of sorts can also be divined from the attached screenshots. As you can see, the launchers are elevated far above the actual hull of the vehicle. In game terms, you’ll be able to fire at enemy targets using your ATGMs even when your entire vehicle is hidden behind an obstacle. This will be, however, quite tricky to pull off and the damage over time dealt this way will not be high due to the longer reload time of the missiles.

The ATGM firepower will be possible to enhance with an additional progression module, allowing you to have one more missile in the air as well as faster reload time. Another firepower-related additional progression module will offer better autocannon ammunition, although, generally speaking, the autocannon damage output will be lower than on other AFVs or TDs (such as the BMPT Mod.2000).

So far, we have mediocre firepower and very poor protection but not to worry, things will get better from now on.

For one, the vehicle will be very agile and fast. We’re talking some serious acceleration and hull traverse because, after all, this is supposed to be a recon vehicle. But the Stalker will also be quite stealthy and will have excellent viewrange. Its basic camouflage factor will be around 36% and the basic viewrange will be around 430 meters. The latter parameter will be possible to boost via the Radar active ability. This ability will increase the viewrange parameters to whopping 475 meters, but only when the vehicle is standing still and, at the same time, it will reduce the camouflage factor by 5%. It’s also worth noting that this ability too will only be available via additional progression.

In summation, what we have here is a relatively fragile recon vehicle (although not as fragile as various four-wheeled vehicles) with good camouflage, excellent viewrange and great mobility. As such, it’ll be capable of both active spotting (moving in front of your team to spot enemies and retreating upon contact) and passive spotting (finding a good position with cover and staying there, not drawing attention to yourself). In combat, the Stalker will be able to set up ambushes and deal with enemy active scouts rather effectively, but head to head combat with MBTs is definitely not advised, the Stalker does not carry enough firepower or armor to be successful in that regard.

We hope that you will enjoy this machine and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!

Jul 16, 2020

Offer: AFT-10, VT-5, PTZ-89, Type 96B

Armored Warfare - Silentstalker

Commanders!

This week, we’ve prepared another set of attractive items for you:

AFT-10 Tier 10 Premium Tank Destroyer
VT-5 Tier 9 Premium Light Tank
Type 96B Tier 8 Premium Main Battle Tank
PTZ-89 Tier 7 Premium Tank Destroyer
Chinese Camouflages
Enigma’s Legacy Loot Crate with Battle Coins and Battle Coin Boosters

Between July 16 and July 23, 2020, the following items will be available:

AFT-10

The AFT-10 is a tracked ATGM carrier based on a ZBD-04 IFV hull that carries eight massive Red Arrow-10 guided missiles. In their latest version, these modern ATGMs are capable of devastating even the most modern MBTs at extreme distances and the AFT-10 was designed to do just that – to stop enemy assaults dead in their tracks. You can read more about it in our dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the AFT-10 is a Tier 10 Premium Tank Destroyer. Its massive ATGM launcher immediately draws comparison with another Tier 10 vehicle, the Kornet-EM. But where Kornet-EM is all about speed, stealth and missile ambushes, the AFT-10 is about one thing and one thing only – uncompromising firepower. It is capable of unleashing devastating missile salvos that can knock out even Tier 10 MBTs in seconds. Additionally, its missiles have a very high penetration value, which means that no matter the angle, no target is truly safe from its reach.

The AFT-10 TD is available:

In our Web Shop via Loot Crates. Collect 100 blueprint pieces from these crates to obtain the vehicle
In a Total Destruction bundle on MY.GAMES Market

The AFT-10 Total Destruction bundle contains the following items:

AFT-10 Tier 10 Premium TD
Commander Alisa Korhonen
30 days of Premium Time
9.000 Gold

VT-5

The VT-5 is a modern Chinese Light Tank that was developed specifically with export in mind. There are many reasons why a country without its own tank development should opt to purchase a Light Tank instead of a full-scale Main Battle Tank. It’s equally as fast if not faster with equal firepower but, what is most important, it is affordable. The VT-5 excels in all these categories. While its armor cannot match that of an MBT, it can protect its crew against most infantry threats thanks to its ERA and cage armor sets. It also has a powerful 105mm gun capable of firing guided missiles, it is packed with advanced electronics and is supremely agile thanks to its 1000hp diesel engine. Simply put, wraps cutting edge technologies up into an affordable bundle. You can learn more about it in a dedicated article.

In Armored Warfare, the VT-5 is a very powerful Tier 9 Premium Light Tank. Fast and agile, it features solid levels of protection (the configuration in the game is the one featuring the ERA kit as well as the turret cage armor) and a good rate of fire. Additionally, its gun is capable of firing guided missiles. It’s an ideal machine for players who value speed and agility, as it offers plenty of both. The VT-5 is capable of dancing around its opponents on the battlefield, outperforming even some AFVs in mobility.

Type 96B

The Type 96B MBT, as its name suggests, is an evolution of the Type 96A, featuring such elements as an upgraded fire control system and a much more powerful engine, resulting in considerably better mobility and speed. Unlike the Type 96A, however, the Type 96B is a prototype, designed for the Chinese military team to use during the annual Tank Biathlon event in Russia. In 2017, the Chinese team won the second place, being defeated only by Russia. You can learn more about its history in our dedicated article!

In Armored Warfare, the Type 96B is a Tier 8 Premium Main Battle Tank. Gameplay-wise, it’s very agile and fast for its class and uses advanced ammunition, making it highly suitable for players who prefer mobility over armor protection, even though it can take a lot of punishment as well.

PTZ-89

Lacking any advanced main battle tanks in the 1980s as well as proper funding, China resorted to more creative means to destroy enemy MBTs, including gun-equipped tank destroyers. The PTZ-89, or Type 89, is one such vehicle. It was developed in the 1980s, but was only ever produced in small numbers. It was armed with an indigenous 120mm smoothbore gun with loading assistant. Its firepower was judged to be inferior to the Soviet 125mm smoothbore and the caliber was discontinued in the 1990s along with the production of this vehicle.

In Armored Warfare, the PTZ-89 Tier 7 Premium Tank Destroyer is an excellent tracked sniper. What it lacks in armor, it more than makes up for in its firepower, delivering lethal blows at long distances. It is quite mobile and easy to operate, a perfect addition for any vehicle collection.

Chinese Camouflages

We’ve prepared three historical Chinese digital camouflages for you that are based on real life patterns.

Please note that each of these camouflages can be installed on any vehicle that has the camouflage customization feature available (any vehicle with the exception of vehicles with permanent skins) and that each of these camouflages can be used in all three environments.

Enigma's Legacy Loot Crate

This Loot Crate contains Enigma’s Legacy Battle Coins and Boosters.

Battle Coins are the primary currency of the Enigma’s Legacy Battle Path campaign and are used to progress through it and to obtain its prizes.
Battle Coin Boosters are usable only during an active Battle Path and increase your Battle Coin income by 900 percent for two hours.

Please note that you have to obtain the access to a Battle Path to use both items.

We hope that you will enjoy the offer and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!