This is just gonna be a reasonable lineup of italian and british tanks for Tunisia, since you’ll need 4 or more per side. (long-form post ahead, sorry)
First Tanks: Both first tanks should be relatively fast, lightly-armed and armored tanks.
British:
The only tank for the british that meets this goal is the M5 Stuarts they received from the US, and painted in desert camo. (which i think is really pretty)
We have these already, they’re good tanks. 9.5-50mm of armor and a main gun that can penetrate 50+mm of armor with M51 shot.
Italians:
For italians, i’ll nominate the Somua S35. The french wound up giving a lot of these over to the Germans and Italians after 1940, and for a starter tank it fits pretty well, especially against the stuart.
The italians would’ve painted it a dark olive green and slapped proper insignia on the things, which shouldn’t be too hard to texture for darkflow. Here’s an example of an italian Renault R-35 with this color scheme.
Stats wise, the Somua has 47mm of frontal hull armor, 42mm frontal turret armor, 40mm on the turret and hull sides, and 20mm on the roof. All of these are penetrable by the Stuart’s main gun. The S35’s main gun has around 40mm penetration at 30 degrees, which means that certain parts of the Stuart can be frontally penetrated.
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Second Tanks: Ideally the second tanks should be better in some ways than the first tanks, but worse in others, a la the M8 not having a roof, or the Pz. III B having less armor than the Pz. II.
British:
British tanks are painfully bland around this time, so it’s really hard to find something that slots into that comfortable zone of ‘better than a stuart but not too much better’. For this spot i’m tentatively nominating the Crusader III. Both previous crusaders mounted the QF 2pdr gun, which works against italian tankettes alright but doesn’t perform better than the Stuart’s 37mm M3 gun.
The Crusader 3 has armor comparable to the Stuart, going by WT’s numbers, with 30mm turret armor, and lighter front hull armor at 36mm relative thickness at head-on, moreso at an angle. The real benefit to the Crusader III is its QF 6pdr main gun, which has quite reasonable penetration using APCBC rounds.
Italians:
Again, italian tanks are sorta crummy overall, so it’s hard to find something that works nicely.
My best bet is probably sticking with the Samovente, but hell if not having machine guns sucks ass. So to avoid having to reccommend the Samovente, why not try something like the M14/41?
It’s got 30mm of frontal hull armor, 42mm of turret front armor, and 25mm side/rear armor. Sorta wimpy but it’s italian, what can you do.
It’s 47mm gun can punch through 58mm of armor within 100m, which a lot of enlisted tank fighting occurs within, and 43mm at 500m, which is very long range for enlisted. This means it can hit back against both Crusaders and Stuarts, but not much else. It’s real strength is that it has not one, not two, but FOUR 8mm Breda MGs, two of which have their own little turret in the hull. We know you guys can make multi-turret views work now, so that’s a big plus against infantry.
Third Tanks: Third tanks should in general just be a straight upgrade over the first tanks, instead of a sort of sidegrade like 2nd tanks.
British:
Here’s where you give them the M3 Grant, it’s got enough gun to slap all tanks and infantry of equal rank or below, and it’s not shabby on armor overall.
It’s M2/M3 75mm gun can also punch through 91mm at 100m, and 81mm at 500m, which is important for the following:
Italians:
For the love of god don’t make the italians use the Samovente. It’s not having an MG and also not being very fast make it practically useless. At the third tank I’m finding it hard to even bother using an italian tank, and the brits already use two american tanks by now, so i’ll throw Giuseppe a bone and suggest the third tank be german.
Historically and stats wise, I feel the Pz. IV Ausf. G fits the bill. It was around in 42 and 43, served in north africa, and while not as heavily armored as other tanks, it can stand up to 37mm fire relatively well, and is no more vulnerable to 75mm fire from the Lee or 57mm fire from Crusader than other tanks might be.
It’s got 50mm front armor on the turret, hull, and superstructure, 30mm on the sides of each, and for the rear of the body, 20mm. The turret has 30mm all around.
It’s 75mm KwK 40 L/43 can punch through 99mm at 100m and 91mm at 500m, pretty similar to the American 75mm in the Grant.
Fourth Tanks (final?):
These are really tentative and based on what i’ve heard the devs have considered adding:
British:
It only makes sense the brits get the Churchill MkIV, it’s fat and heavily armored, and when carrying the 75mm US main gun, can punch through a reasonable amount of armor. Churchills with US guns received M3 cannon, with M72 shot, which would penetrate 109mm of RHA at 100m, and 92mm at 500m.
It’s front hull and turret armor is roughly 90mm, sides and rear of turret 76mm, and rear of body 50mm. It’s a tough nut to crack for most tanks on this list.
Italians:
Evening up the score for domestic and import tanks with the Brits, 2 for 2, the 4th and final italian tank ought to be the Tiger I. I know it’s overhyped and demanded, but again, it’s historically accurate and compared to it’s equivalents, not exceedingly OP (it’s only a little OP, but the devs have said it’s going in i guess).
The Tiger I has 100mm front body and turret armor, a 120mm thick mantlet, 60mm side hull and 80mm side turret armor. Dead on, the Churchill (and maybe the Grant’s) 75mm gun should be able to penetrate it from the sides readily, and at extreme close range, should be able to penetrate the hull and turret front plates.
It’s 8.8cm main gun has 171mm of penetration against a 30 degree angled plate at 100m, and 156mm penetration at 500m. There’s really nothing that’s going to stop it, but it might occasionally bounce a lucky shell.
Overall, tunisia should be sorta a funky midwar campaign with funky tanks, embrace the shitty italian tanks and don’t use the Samovente. Please don’t use the Samovente it sucks so hard.
