Jochem

Translated in english:
If Gauntlet isn't running then:
variable baseName = HMS Valiant
variable name = Valiant
variable mission_designation = AW_Valiant
 
If mission_designation is something (code checks if variable exists, although I think it should be isNil instead for variables) then:
run the mission with the given name (AW_Valiant)

Translated in english:
If Gauntlet isn't running then:
variable baseName = HMS Valiant
variable name = Valiant
variable mission_designation = AW_Valiant
 
If mission_designation is something (code checks if variable exists, although I think it should be isNil instead for variables) then:
run the mission with the given name (AW_Valiant)

So here i'm just going to leave some tips and tricks for those of you who are thinking on using vehicles a bit more and are possibly considering getting into the play of using Mechanized Assaults to help infantry cross large open terrains without getting shot in their everything.
 
Let's quickly talk over each crew member and some common orders:
 
Note that only the MBT's use a crew of 4 while IFV's use 3 and most APC's use 2.
 
Crew
 
The commander: The commander is in charge of the tank and basically the man of the house; he tells the driver where to go, gives the gunner targets and instructs the loader what shell to load (although the gunner loads shell in Arma 3). It is considered to be the most difficult position in the tank as he has to manage not only the tank, but also incoming radio calls, so expect a lengthier pause between radio calls, especially in combat. Most vehicles provide commanders with smoke launchers to conceal the tank from incoming fire and shells and can also lay down smokes on the move for infantry to use as they move along. In addition the commander gets a wide array of optics such as night vision and thermal. 
 
The gunner: All in the name, the gunner is the guy who shoots stuff with a wide array of weaponry, this can consist of: Main cannons from 20mm all the way to 120+mm, co-axial machine gun, TOW/Stinger launcher. The gunner also has the ability to use different optics such as night vision and thermal.
 
The driver: The driver is the guy that gets you from point A to B, he should have a good mind for maneuvers and know what most of them are. Don't worry if you don't know them, we will be going over some of them later on! 
 
The loader: This is simple. He loads the gun (or atleast faster in arma 3 than the gunner), he acts as an extra pair of eyes for the commander/gunner/driver and can sometimes utilize a machine gun mounted on the roof of the tank either manually or through a computer.
 
Here's some common orders:
 
Orders the VC will often say to all the crew:
 
"Turn in! / Button up!" The crew turns in and closes their hatches to avoid taking small arms fire.
"Keep your head on a swivel / Keep scanning" The crew will keep checking their sectors, often done in close areas although the same can be said for large open plains.
"GET OUT! / BAIL! - The crew needs to get out the vehicle and run like hell! This is done if the engine or hull goes red, meaning a vehicle cook off is imminent. Is sometimes done if the track is blown off although sometimes it is better to stay inside, usually if the tank has hit a mine or taken a RPG to the track, better to stay inside and investigate before bailing out.
 
Orders the VC can give the driver:

"Driver forward" The driver press "W" and goes forward at normal speed.
"Driver forward slow/fast" The driver press "Q" for slow and "Shift+W" for fast.
"Driver forward five meters" The driver moves the vehicle forward 5 meters.
"Driver slow down" The driver slows the speed down.
"Driver increase speed" The driver increases the speed.
"Driver keep speed thirty" The driver increases/decreases the speed to said speed.
"Driver reverse" The driver press "S" and reverse the vehicle.
"Driver reverse ten meters" The driver reverse 10 meters.
"Driver left, left, left, left correct" The driver press "A" and keeps turning the vehicle left until he hears "correct".
"Driver forty five degrees left" The driver turns the vehicle roughly 45 degrees left.
"Driver right, right, right, correct" The driver press "D" and keeps turning the vehicle left until he hears "correct".
"Driver forty five degrees right" The driver turns the vehicle roughly 45 degrees right.
"Driver orientate two eight zero" The driver looks at the bearings and adjusts the vehicle to said bearings.
"Driver do one eighty" The driver turns the vehicle 180 degrees.
"Driver slow to halt" The driver stops the vehicle gently.
"Driver halt" The driver stops the vehicle as fast as he can.
 
Orders the Gunner can give the driver:

"Driver forward"
"Driver forward slow"
"Driver forward five meters"
"Driver reverse"
"Driver reverse three meters"
"Driver slow to halt"
"Driver halt"
 
Orders the VC can give the gunner is:

"Gunner load AP" The gunner loads corresponding armor piercing ammunition.
"Gunner load high explosive" The gunner loads corresponding high explosive ammunition.
"Gunner switch MG" The Gunner switch to the machine gun as the selected weapon.
"Gunner switch Cannon" The Gunner switch to the cannon as the selected weapon.
"Gunner switch GMG" The Gunner switch to the grenade machine gun as the selected weapon.
"Gunner orientate two five zero" The gunner turns the turret to bearing 250.
"Gunner fire" The gunner fires on the target he is currently looking at or searching for.
"Gunner weapons free" The gunner is free to engage any identified targets.
"Gunner hold fire" The gunner holds fire.
"Gunner contact bearing zero one zero, enemy APC, range three hundred, fire" The gunner turns the turret while switching to the cannon, loads corresponding armor piercing ammunition, zero his gun to 300 meters, reports contact spotted and starts to engage the contact.
"Gunner up, up, up, down" The gunner elevates/decrease his gun elevation in the direction he is told until he spots what the VC wants him to spot. ones spotted the gunner reports it to the VC.
"Gunner left, left, left, right" the gunner turns the turret in the direction he is told until he spots what the VC wants him to spot. ones spotted the gunner reports it to the VC.
 
It's vitally important to work together as a team. Good crew members who are not communicating will result in a dead vehicle!
 
Ammo
 
The list of most common ammunition types:
APFSDS: Armour Piercing Fin Stabilized Discarding Sabot. Often called “sabot” or “AP”. Basically has the best penetration for almost all ranges, except extreme ranges. It's penetrating power comes from the extreme velocity it is fired. Note that it can over pen light vehicles although in Arma this does not matter very much.
 
HEAT: High Explosive Anti Tank. A big shell that explodes shortly after penetrating a target. Very good against soft to medium armoured targets. Has no drop off in penetration and is used for extreme ranges.
HE: High Explosive. Explodes on impact and has almost no penetration power. Cheaper than other ammo types and very effective against light armour and infantry. Does not bounce.
 
Note: if an ammo type is followed by ”-T” (like: “APFSDS-T), it means that the shell act's as a tracer and gives a light trail when fired (same effect as rifle tracers).
 
Armour and countermeasures
 
In this section, I'll cover the different types of armor and other measures taken to protect a tank. I'll start with armor:
 
Steel armor: This type of armor isn't in use anymore but I thought I would mention it because it was the main type of armor during WWII. Just a steel plate and nothing more. Composite armor: The main armor used on modern MBT's. Its designed to have higher armor values then steel by having less weight. This is why a T-90 is way better protected then a Tiger, despite having a lower weight. It can consist of a lot of materials, but aluminium and titanium are widely used. Depleted Uranium armor: Very strong armor made out of depleted uranium, something you get as garbage product from enriching uranium. The only tank that I know it's being used on is the Abrams. A tank is never made entirely from this armor due to the extreme weight it has. Chobham armor: This is believed to be the best armor in the world, only used on the American Abrams and the British Challenger. Almost nothing is known about this, but it is believed to be some sort of ceramic armor. Other protective measures:
ERA: explosive reactive armor: a slap-on armor plate that consists of cubes that explode outwards when hit. This will decrease the penetrating power of the shell or missile. Once hit the cube is destroyed and not more usable. Smoke launcher: Most modern tanks are equipped with smoke launchers. These launchers will fire off projectiles that produces smoke to give a full 360 smoke screen around the tank. Some tanks can also generate smoke by injecting chemicals in the engine. APS: active protection system: A system that detects incoming missiles and shoot those down. Not common on tanks and the only in front line use tank that uses it is the Merkava mk4. Basic Vehicle Tactics
 
First of all is the positioning of the vehicle. Positioning a vehicle is the most important thing you can do in battle, poor positioning leads to death. Always try to keep a range from the target so have time to; target, identify, call it in, range, engage
 
Also it's always advisible to turn the front of the tank towards the enemy (I know, but some people I see do not do this in times when they can). Some more advanced positioning tactics are:
 
Hulling down: this means only exposing the turret by covering the hull with a rock or crest.
 
Sidescraping: A tactic that allows you to peek corners without the risk of taking heavy damage.

 
Also remember, be mindful of where you are going to be sidescraping, make sure that your flanks are secure and do not put yourself in a situation where you will end up reversing into someones clothes store and getting stuck if you need to escape the area.
 
Maneuvers
 
Bounding maneuvers are incredibly useful to move around open spaces without exposing your flanks, these are done when 2 or more vehicles are present.
 
Herringbone: Herringbone formations are great when you want to look to either side of, say, a road, allowing two vehicles to watch either side and act as buddy's for eachother.

 
Coil: Coil Formations, like Herringbone, is designed to get the front of the vehicles to look at certain areas only this time, to look in all directions. Best use for this is when you must hold an open plain area where you may be attacked from all directions.

 
Peeling: Peel maneuvers are used when contact is spotted in front and 1 vehicle must move into a better position, or both vehicles need to leave the area to get to a more efficient area. To do this, the vehicle that is on the far side of the direction your or moving will stay, while the furthest away will reverse, turn to the correct heading then move to the left or right of the vehicle at the far end of the column. Vise versa and you will eventually find that a platoon of vehicles in a line formation suddenly shifted 300m to the right without taking RPG's. Remember, slow is smooth and smooth is fast, never move all at once if you run the risk of exposing your flanks to the enemy, the last thing you want is an armada of RPG's flying towards each vehicles side.
 
Shoot and scoot: Shooting and scooting is simple, you move to cover, fire, then move again. This is used when dealing with multiple enemy vehicles, or suppressing RPG's teams that are danger close.
 
Firing on the move: This maneuver is done when there is multiple contacts with anti armor weapons or if there are armored vehicles present. It is also useful to note that doing this in a confined area WILL NOT WORK, so don't bother. Basically, the vehicle will maintain a steady speed but try to stay fast, so the gunner can efficiently knock out targets without running the risk of the gun bouncing up and down too much for him.
 
Falling into a line formation: This is used when a platoon of vehicles travelling along has been ambushed. To do this, the platoon sergeant or whoever is in charge of all the vehicles will order the vehicles to reverse away and point their fronts to the enemy.
 
Jumping out: This is often done when a column formation has been called in to decrease the chances of multiple vehicles being destroyed from the front but the vehicles must "jump out" into a line or wedge to get all guns on targets to the front.
 
That's all the maneuvers i'm going to say for now, maybe someone else can say some they know in the comments?
 
Driving through a confined area/town
 
Situations like this can and will happen and it is best to know how to handle it as it can be one of the hardest situations to deal with. A close confined space for a vehicle is never good, it will not perform as it's best and is extremely vulnerable to being swarmed or flank shot. Therefore, you will want to keep eyes everywhere you can so utilize your crew. A good tactic is to have your driver focusing front, as that is where he is going, have your gunner focus left and the commander focus right. If you have a loader available, have him focus where the gunner is looking so he can assist in calling out targets as it is much harder for a gunner to see.
 
The formation infantry should take in a town:

 
A Slammer covers infantry as they cross a road:

 
A Slammer neutralizes enemy's in a building as infantry take cover:

 
PLEASE NOTE: If you are doing this, stay at a slow speed! 10-20km/h is where you want to be at, rushing through a town is not good as you run the risk of missing an alley way, being immobilized by someone in the next alleyway and having a guy at the alleyway you just ran by, shoot you in the ass. Besides, infantry support can only jog at a steady pace of about 10+km/h so keeping slow is where it's at, don't make em sprint, just because you don't get tired doesn't mean they don't too.
 
Mechanized Warfare tactics
 
Okay, now that you know how most vehicles work in a basic sense, lets look a little more in depth. Infantry grunts! Pay attention, some of this involves you too.
 
Using the Bradley as transport
 
Okay, so you need a ride to the AO in the back of a Bradley, well it has seats so that's good but lets talk about correct tactics and etiquette when in using these.
Inform the commander on radio that you wish to use the vehicle and if possible, wave to him from the front of the vehicle to make him known of your presence. Failure to do things like this may end getting you squished if the Bradley needs to reverse. Keep chatter to a minimum please! The vehicle crew needs to talk a lot more than you do, especially in a combat zone so try to keep chatter to a minimum. GO GO GO! Okay, so your here and the commander has ordered you to disembark, like a helicopter, perform security to the vehicle BUT keep to both sides of the vehicle and try to keep the rear and definitely the front clear. Using the Bradley for support
If you need ammo, the Bradley will most likely have it if you are using standard issue weapons for US militants. HOWEVER, like requesting a ride, please try to inform on radio to the Bradley and/or run in front and give it a wave or wiggle, this informs the crew and reduces risk of being ran over if the Bradley must reverse. Open field with no cover huh, oh look, a Bradley, DON'T BE SHY! The Bradley is not only there to "steal all the fun", it is also there to assist you in other ways. Remember to call the Bradley on radio and see if it is possible for a "rolling cover" support. More often than not, this is easily available and you can use the Bradley as cover to get across a field without taking any or too many casualties or taking 30 minutes to cross 1 of 5 open fields.  
IFV's are also great battering rams! Utilize that:

 
Infantry Support
 
Infantry support is DEADLY useful, especially in close confined areas. This is simple, stick with the vehicle as it moves through a town or takes up a position in say a village or something and make sure it doesn't get flanked. Without infantry support in a town, the vehicle is most likely going to be a coffin on tracks waiting to be hit.
 
Here's an example of a common ambush position against vehicles:

 
Remember to keep your armor pieces safe, these kind of areas are extremely dangerous as you an quickly be attacked from all directions in a close confined space, something a vehicle CANNOT deal with without infantry support.
 
NOTE!: If you are following along side a vehicle, stay clear of it's front and try not to cross a road from the front, the last thing you want is to be clipped by its guns or take a shot to the leg and be squashed by a track. In addition, if it is a MBT, stay clear of it's front completely as the main armament's shockwave upon firing is enough to knock you out or kill you.

Hello friends.
 
So, I'm back!
 
It's been a tough one but I managed to convince Raz and Danny that I am worthy of coming back and am no longer a complete douche.
 
Sorry to all those who I affected up towards my final ban, I was way out of line and shouldn't of carried through with what I did.
 
Most of you probably won't know who I am, to answer:
 
I was one of the first of the group of people to play on EU3 and was a common player on their up until February when I got banned permanently.
 
Once again, sorry, I will do everything to prove I'm not back to terrorize.
 
-Mini
 
PS. If anyone needs any help with Medic, Leading, Pilot or Vehicle, I'm here to help, don't be shy.

Ingame Name*: hellspawnednl
Why do you think you were banned?: Apearently insulting channel names on ts (wich i made 1 raz warned and removed it and i didn't make anymore afther that)
Why (in your personal opinion) should your ban be lifted?*: Because i didn't make anymore afther that so i don't see what i did wrong afther the warning.
Which administrator banned you?: not sure
When were you banned?*: 1/june/2015

Ingame Name*: Johnson
Why do you think you were banned?: For creating an inappropriate TS channel name ("I love Krauts")
Why (in your personal opinion) should your ban be lifted?*: It was a one off and, at the time, I did not see this channel name as being possibly offensive to anyone due to the common use of nicknames of citizens of country for example "Ruskis" which is very commonly used in EU3 and I've never seen it as offensive to anyone nor have I ever seen anyone offended by it. Also AW is fun as fuck and I am all for making it better than it is now or has been in the past so I partially agree with the ban if it was found offensive to anyone.
Which administrator banned you?: Not too sure as I was offline when it happened
When were you banned?*: 31/5/15

After a while of only using RHS tanks I have grown to be sick of their handling
[don't say 'its just because it is in development' please]
but seriously, I have would like to reinstate the Burnes Challenger 2 on EU3
[http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=27205]
REQUIREMENTS:
AGM [ACE works instead]
AGM[http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?178253-Authentic-Gameplay-Modification]
ACE[http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=28557]
RAM [RHS works with it] or we could wait for the non RAM version.
[http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=24451]
 
This will make people happy [mainly the gunner and driver on tank crews]
 
proof that it works with ace:
[http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=446161487]
what its like:
[http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=446161508]

Well, thats kinda the point of a tank, isn't it?
 
And I know back in the day you couldn't destroy it and it was indeed a bit silly, just give it a try once it's updated to use ace functions and the damage model is nerfed. Not complaining you guys took it out, it was over the top, but it will be amazing once updated. And yes i'm biased casue it's my favorite tank of all time, and no nothing will change that. Oh yeah, one more thing, I remember it stating it was never intended to work with vanilla armor, it was made with RAM(an armor mod) in mind and will have a ridiculous amount of armor if used without this mod. 
 
Again, if the only reason you hate the chally for is the armor, just wait for the update and you'll love it.

The tank guide 
Intro
In this guide I'll go over the basics of armoured warfare and discuss some more advanced tactic as well. I'll do both real life and in-game aspects (with or without RAM) and finally, I'll go over all the different tanks. This guide is based on my experience with tank games (World of Tanks, War Thunder, and Arma 3) and all the historical books/films I've read/seen. If you think I got something wrong, please tell me so I can check it. Enjoy!
 
 
What is a tank?
Before we start discussing about tanks, we first need to know what a tank exactly is. Wikipedia gives the following definition of a tank: “A tank is a large type of armoured fighting vehicle with tracks, designed for front-line combat“. I would describe a tank as a vehicle balanced between crew protection, fire-power and mobility. The balance will be different for each model, and is chosen around a specific goal. So comparing a scout tank to a main battle tank is absurd, because they were designed for other tasks.
 
 
Types of tanks
I'll divide tanks into different categories:
MBT
Light tank
Scout tank
Tank destroyer
In this guide I'll cover mainly the MBT because it's the only one of the list that is available in vanilla Arma 3.
 
 
Crew
Modern MBT have a standard crew of four: commander, gunner, driver, loader. In some tanks (i.e. the French Leclerc) is the loader replaced by an autoloader.
 
The commander: The commander is in charge of the tank. He tells the driver where to go, gives the gunner targets and instructs the loader what shell to load. It is considered to be the most difficult position in the tank as he has to manage not only the tank, but also incoming radio calls. Most tanks provide commanders smoke launchers to conceal the tanks.
 
The gunner: This is obvious. He shoots stuff and blows things up. He also has access to an MG to mow down infantry. Got optical/night/thermal sights.
 
The driver: I'm asking myself why I started explaining crew slots. He drives the tank OK?
 
The loader: Loads the gun and in some cases has a machine gun when turned out.
 
It's vitally important to work together as a team. Good solo crew members who are not communicating will result in a dead tank!
 
 
Ammo
The list of most common ammunition types:
APFSDS: armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot. Often called “sabot” or “AP”. Basically has the best penetration for almost all ranges, except extreme ranges. It's penetrating power comes from the extreme velocity it is fired.
 
HEAT: high explosive anti tank. A big shell that explodes shortly after penetrating a target. Very good against soft to medium armoured targets. Has no drop off in penetration and is so thus used for extreme ranges.
 
HESH: High explosive squash head. Ammo used by the British. The shell explodes on impact and releases a massive amount of small iron balls. Used to injure crew and is effective against most targets, including infantry.
 
HE: high explosive. Explodes on impact and has almost no penetration power. Cheaper than other ammo types and very effective against light armour and infantry. Does not bounce.
 
Note: if an ammo type is followed by ”-T” (like: “APFSDS-T), it means that the shell act's as a tracer and gives a light trail when fired (same effect as rifle tracers).
 
Armour and countermeassures
In this section, I'll cover the differant types of armour and other measures taken to protect a tank. I'll start with armour:
 
Steel armour: This type of armour isn't in use anymore but I tought I would mention it because it was the main type of armour during WWII. Just a steel plate and nothing more. Composite armour: The main armour used on modern MBT's. Its disigned to have higher armour values then steel by having less weight. This is why a T-90 is way better protected then a Tiger, dispite having a lower weight. It can consist of a lot of materials, but aluminium and titanium are widly used. Depleted Uranium armour: very strong armour made out of depleted uranium, something you get as garbage product from enriching uranium. The only tank that I know it's being used on is the Abrams. A tank is never made entirely from this atmour due to the extreme weight it has. Cobham armour: This is believed to be th best armour in the world, only used on the American Ambrams and the British Challenger. Almost nothing is known about this, butit is believed to be some sort of ceramic armour. Other protective measures:
ERA: explosive reactive armour: a slap-on armour plate that consists of cubes that explode outwarts when hit. This will decrease the penetrating power of the shell or missile. Once hit the cube is destroyed and not more useable. Smoke launcher: Most modern tanks are equipped with smoke launchers. These launchers will fire off projectiles that produces smoke to give a full 360 smoke screen around the tank. Some tanks can also generate smoke by injecting chemicals in the engine. APS: active protection system: a system that detects incoming missiles and shoot those down. Not common on tanks and the only in frontline use tank that uses it is the Merkava mk4.  
 
Basic Tactics
Time for some basic tactics. These will consist of tactics viable in vanilla.
 
First off all the positioning of the tank. In Arma, its best to keep a distance from the enemy. Thanks to laser-rangefinding a tank can be accurate up to 2km (technically it's possible to range up to 11.4km but the sights don't have the zoom to support that kind of range). At this range it's also quite easy to ID targets and avoid friendly fire.
 
Also it's always advisible to turn the front of the tank towards the enemy (I know, but you never know I guess). Some more advanced positioning tactics are:
Keep the tank hull down: this means only exposing the turret by covering the hull with a rock or something. Sidescraping: a tactic to peek corners explaind in this picture:  And never ever have cover on three sides of the tank. this will make it impossible to escape and make you and easy target.  
Tanks in Arma 3
Before I finish I'll quickly go over all tanks in vanilla Arma 3.
 
M2A1/M2A4 Slammer: know as the Merkava 4 in real life and used by the Israeli army as their primary MBT. This tank is an unusual design focused on crew protection. To maximize the frontal armour, the tank's engine was placed in the front to serve as another layer of armour. As a direct result the back was free to store ammo OR house some soldiers (this is modelled wrong in Arma). The tank is using a 120mm gun(M2A1) or a 105mm gun(M2A4) and is the master of street and urban combat. In Arma unfortunately, this means every shot to the front will damage the engine and that the amount of real life armour made the top speed and acceleration bad, so I wouldn't recommend this tank in Vanilla Arma 3. Also, the M2A4 has some added armor plating and an commander MG but trades it in for a weaker 105mm gun. Altough irl this would be considered insane, it is better for street combat due to the extra MG, but bear in mind the gun is very weak.
 
MBT-52 Kuma: Know in real life as the Leopard-2SG. An up-armored version of the German Leopard-2 tank, this tank is fast and mobile has a good gun but has not the best armour (because of REASONS, remeber the UP-ARMORED). Very popular tank in Vanilla Arma 3 and definitely the best choice for any tank group that wants a tank that fit's into the BLUFOR army.
 
T-100 Varsuk: Fictional tank based upon a Russian prototype designated object-640, named by fans the Black Eagle. It uses a 125mm gun and is reasonably mobile and has good armour. A rail gun variant was planned for release with the game but got scrapped due to considered too futuristic.
 
 
That was it for my tank guide. I hope you enjoyed it and are a bit more interested in tanks then before.
 
-Jochem "Waffles", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armor Division

Ahoy der fellow EU3'ers. 
 
Jochem and myself will be hosting a gamenight on the 4th of April at 1600UTC (4pm UTC)
 
The basic plan:
 
There will be 3 towns and all will be heavily defended and somewhere in the mix will be an officer. We must find the officer, kill him and take his Intel. The Intel will lead us on a new mission, that mission I will keep a secret... 
 
There will be some twists in the mission here and there due to the mighty Zues.
 
I will be acting as PLTCO on the mission with Jochem and I also doing Zues.
 
 
To sign up for the gamenight, please sign here:
 
 
Click me!
 
 
We will be allowing arsenal during the gamenight but we ask that you get a loadout ready as we will not be waiting around, anyone who disobeys and spends the next 30 minutes at base decided which skirt goes with which top will be shoved into the AO without warning.
 
 
Hopefully all goes well and I will see you out there!

That would be very nice!
 
Adds more or a NATO theme to the server too.

One up, always nice to see some variety and have some new toys.

The tank guide 
Intro
In this guide I'll go over the basics of armoured warfare and discuss some more advanced tactic as well. I'll do both real life and in-game aspects (with or without RAM) and finally, I'll go over all the different tanks. This guide is based on my experience with tank games (World of Tanks, War Thunder, and Arma 3) and all the historical books/films I've read/seen. If you think I got something wrong, please tell me so I can check it. Enjoy!
 
 
What is a tank?
Before we start discussing about tanks, we first need to know what a tank exactly is. Wikipedia gives the following definition of a tank: “A tank is a large type of armoured fighting vehicle with tracks, designed for front-line combat“. I would describe a tank as a vehicle balanced between crew protection, fire-power and mobility. The balance will be different for each model, and is chosen around a specific goal. So comparing a scout tank to a main battle tank is absurd, because they were designed for other tasks.
 
 
Types of tanks
I'll divide tanks into different categories:
MBT
Light tank
Scout tank
Tank destroyer
In this guide I'll cover mainly the MBT because it's the only one of the list that is available in vanilla Arma 3.
 
 
Crew
Modern MBT have a standard crew of four: commander, gunner, driver, loader. In some tanks (i.e. the French Leclerc) is the loader replaced by an autoloader.
 
The commander: The commander is in charge of the tank. He tells the driver where to go, gives the gunner targets and instructs the loader what shell to load. It is considered to be the most difficult position in the tank as he has to manage not only the tank, but also incoming radio calls. Most tanks provide commanders smoke launchers to conceal the tanks.
 
The gunner: This is obvious. He shoots stuff and blows things up. He also has access to an MG to mow down infantry. Got optical/night/thermal sights.
 
The driver: I'm asking myself why I started explaining crew slots. He drives the tank OK?
 
The loader: Loads the gun and in some cases has a machine gun when turned out.
 
It's vitally important to work together as a team. Good solo crew members who are not communicating will result in a dead tank!
 
 
Ammo
The list of most common ammunition types:
APFSDS: armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot. Often called “sabot” or “AP”. Basically has the best penetration for almost all ranges, except extreme ranges. It's penetrating power comes from the extreme velocity it is fired.
 
HEAT: high explosive anti tank. A big shell that explodes shortly after penetrating a target. Very good against soft to medium armoured targets. Has no drop off in penetration and is so thus used for extreme ranges.
 
HESH: High explosive squash head. Ammo used by the British. The shell explodes on impact and releases a massive amount of small iron balls. Used to injure crew and is effective against most targets, including infantry.
 
HE: high explosive. Explodes on impact and has almost no penetration power. Cheaper than other ammo types and very effective against light armour and infantry. Does not bounce.
 
Note: if an ammo type is followed by ”-T” (like: “APFSDS-T), it means that the shell act's as a tracer and gives a light trail when fired (same effect as rifle tracers).
 
Armour and countermeassures
In this section, I'll cover the differant types of armour and other measures taken to protect a tank. I'll start with armour:
 
Steel armour: This type of armour isn't in use anymore but I tought I would mention it because it was the main type of armour during WWII. Just a steel plate and nothing more. Composite armour: The main armour used on modern MBT's. Its disigned to have higher armour values then steel by having less weight. This is why a T-90 is way better protected then a Tiger, dispite having a lower weight. It can consist of a lot of materials, but aluminium and titanium are widly used. Depleted Uranium armour: very strong armour made out of depleted uranium, something you get as garbage product from enriching uranium. The only tank that I know it's being used on is the Abrams. A tank is never made entirely from this atmour due to the extreme weight it has. Cobham armour: This is believed to be th best armour in the world, only used on the American Ambrams and the British Challenger. Almost nothing is known about this, butit is believed to be some sort of ceramic armour. Other protective measures:
ERA: explosive reactive armour: a slap-on armour plate that consists of cubes that explode outwarts when hit. This will decrease the penetrating power of the shell or missile. Once hit the cube is destroyed and not more useable. Smoke launcher: Most modern tanks are equipped with smoke launchers. These launchers will fire off projectiles that produces smoke to give a full 360 smoke screen around the tank. Some tanks can also generate smoke by injecting chemicals in the engine. APS: active protection system: a system that detects incoming missiles and shoot those down. Not common on tanks and the only in frontline use tank that uses it is the Merkava mk4.  
 
Basic Tactics
Time for some basic tactics. These will consist of tactics viable in vanilla.
 
First off all the positioning of the tank. In Arma, its best to keep a distance from the enemy. Thanks to laser-rangefinding a tank can be accurate up to 2km (technically it's possible to range up to 11.4km but the sights don't have the zoom to support that kind of range). At this range it's also quite easy to ID targets and avoid friendly fire.
 
Also it's always advisible to turn the front of the tank towards the enemy (I know, but you never know I guess). Some more advanced positioning tactics are:
Keep the tank hull down: this means only exposing the turret by covering the hull with a rock or something. Sidescraping: a tactic to peek corners explaind in this picture:  And never ever have cover on three sides of the tank. this will make it impossible to escape and make you and easy target.  
Tanks in Arma 3
Before I finish I'll quickly go over all tanks in vanilla Arma 3.
 
M2A1/M2A4 Slammer: know as the Merkava 4 in real life and used by the Israeli army as their primary MBT. This tank is an unusual design focused on crew protection. To maximize the frontal armour, the tank's engine was placed in the front to serve as another layer of armour. As a direct result the back was free to store ammo OR house some soldiers (this is modelled wrong in Arma). The tank is using a 120mm gun(M2A1) or a 105mm gun(M2A4) and is the master of street and urban combat. In Arma unfortunately, this means every shot to the front will damage the engine and that the amount of real life armour made the top speed and acceleration bad, so I wouldn't recommend this tank in Vanilla Arma 3. Also, the M2A4 has some added armor plating and an commander MG but trades it in for a weaker 105mm gun. Altough irl this would be considered insane, it is better for street combat due to the extra MG, but bear in mind the gun is very weak.
 
MBT-52 Kuma: Know in real life as the Leopard-2SG. An up-armored version of the German Leopard-2 tank, this tank is fast and mobile has a good gun but has not the best armour (because of REASONS, remeber the UP-ARMORED). Very popular tank in Vanilla Arma 3 and definitely the best choice for any tank group that wants a tank that fit's into the BLUFOR army.
 
T-100 Varsuk: Fictional tank based upon a Russian prototype designated object-640, named by fans the Black Eagle. It uses a 125mm gun and is reasonably mobile and has good armour. A rail gun variant was planned for release with the game but got scrapped due to considered too futuristic.
 
 
That was it for my tank guide. I hope you enjoyed it and are a bit more interested in tanks then before.
 
-Jochem "Waffles", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armor Division

It has happened to me loads of times mate, usually when I break down though it's a lot more noticeable as I had no idea this had happened.
 
It's fine though, people just gotta be patient and not insult others, if they are mad take it out on the CSAT right?
 
Gotta be good, Ainsley is watching...
 
 
-Minipily "Mini", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armored Division

I know you guys have been working your asses off trying to get EU#3 more and more content and missions and stuff but, out of curiosity, how would you feel about a WWII, invasion based mission maybe specialized for game nights?
 
The idea of only having one shot to storm a German held beach with 30-50 other people is pretty damn amazing. And then after taking the beach it could be objective based to take the rest of whatever map it would be on. I know for a fact that this has been suggested to you lot before *cough* *cough* but I'm pretty sure people would love it.
 
Probably not as much you lot would love to make such a time consuming event am I right?
 
Shoot me down if you disagree. I like EU#3 the way it is, the game nights are the shiz and I still have a shit tonne of fun on it so cheers for that!
 
Would put pictures but I forgot how. I'm sure you lot know what I'm talking about. Landing crafts, blood, bullets and some guy called Ryan.

You don't actually need to own Iron Front, you can just download the lite version. (Some lower res textures and no SP missions included)
 
Would love to see this because this is alot more skillful then modern day *cough*Thermal and guided munition*cough*.

-Jochem "Waffles", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armored Division

For those wondering also, I have talked to a member of staff too, nobody is exempt from the rules. It would be nice if the fun times you all have on our servers would be the time actually playing than the time spent messing around.

God speed in whatever you choose to do Mini, and never forget:

Started this thread to address a few things and try to outfuck myself with some of the fellow ahoy family, here goes...
 
First of all I would like to apologise to anyone who I have annoyed and to those who I have definitely annoyed, yeah stuff has gone bad with me and I aint been the best guy but there's a lot of issues going on right now and I just wanna let ya'll know.
 
1. I got IRL shit happening, kinda stressful and not just that but I got a few bad things happening which I would rather not talk about.
2. I get insulted many times ingame, mainly EU3 because of me being a prat at times and because some people just don't like me for some odd reason, I have addressed this with other people on the server who understand.
3. EU3 has lost it's touch for me, I feel a major loss in people wanting to do new things since EU3 was launched and with newbies I find myself and others teaching more than learning new things.
4. List goes on for other stuff I'd rather not type.
 
So again, sorry and i'm trying my best to change things but right now I'm just gunna have a cooldown time, possible just change to a realism unit, possibly... *whispers in ear* possibly...
 
Overall Ahoy World is the best group I have ever had the pleasure of playing with and quiet frankly you deserve better, sorry.
 
If i'm gone, i'm gone, i'll be in the corner if you need me.
 
- Minipily "Mini", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armored Division
 
P.S: If any admins need to know about the EU3 incident, talk to Josh or me, I have witnessed more problems that has been addressed and my incident with Dildor isn't anywhere near as bad as what other people did, not naming names but some you wouldn't believe would be doing something they did.

Howdy, this is just gonna be a general guide for using artillery effectively and without ruining peoples fun on the EU3 server. I'll go over what I consider platoon and squad level support and the procedure for being called in when in those positions.
 
First off, platoon level support. Tends to be in the SPG and MLRS units, very destructive when on target which is why it should be down to command staff to call in strikes from them. Doesn't mean Squad leaders can't request it, just means command would have to authorize it.
 
The self propelled gun in EU3 is the M4 Scorcher (or Sholef, under AGM designations) and come with a variety of shells for different fire missions. This flexibility almost makes up for it's rather bad spread at long ranges, however the 155mm GPS guided and laser guided shells are very accurate for long range fire. Along with the commander seat, to kill any party ruining CSAT that try to get to you.

 
The multi launch rocket system is the M5 Sandstorm (or Seara in AGM) and is a fictional adaption of the Merkava chassis. It carries a complement of 12 230mm Titan rockets and has a reach beyond the current map. I'm not kidding, plonk one down on the central airfield and set it's zeroing to full then check the arty computer. Whilst it's limited in flexibility of it's fire missions, it is very good at what missions it can perform. It's also considerably more accurate at longer ranges due to being rocket powered to boot.

 
A typical fire mission request from command would look something like this
Command: /callsign/, this is command. Requesting 2 guided rounds and 1 mine cluster round on the "kill all the children" mark. What's the ETA on the rounds?
/callsign/: Copy that command, guided loaded, ETA is 50 seconds. spread is 150 meters on target (shows the default spread even with guided shells equipped, but it is about 90% more accurate. Also, this shit in the parenthesis wouldn't be said over comms.)
Command: Roger that, clear for fire.
/callsign/: Firing. -after firing rounds- Rounds complete, Splash in 38 seconds (Splash is often used to describe the impact of the rounds, could say impact or delivery instead if you preferred however).
At this point it's common courtesy to keep command updated on the time to splash and when all rounds have hit. If there's a chance a squad may get hit due to a freakishly inaccurate round and command hasn't warned the squad as such, I'd say you have the authority to get them to move away from the spread zone.
 
Now, on to squad level support. In terms of artillery, this tends to be the Mk6 mortar or yelling at command for heavy hitting fire on a mark, but I'll only cover the mortar in this post.
 
The Mk6 Mortar is some crazy future mortar that incorporates a complex-at-first-glance targeting computer and an artillery computer for shots out of your line of sight. Using the small 82mm shells, the punch it packs is a a lot smaller than dedicated artillery units but is more accurate at the closer ranges it will be deployed at and has the benefit of being man portable in a team of 2. It has a small variety of ammunition (smoke and flare rounds along with HE), allowing for some flexibility in fire missions. The fire mission request would be similar to the one shown above, however the mortar operator would either be a squad member of a deployed specialist rather than command itself.

Courtesy of Killzonekid for these images.

Conceptually, this would be great! And from a developing standpoint, this would make things (atleast that's what I think) easier. You don't need to spawn in ai, give them waypoints, etc. You just need to create a task at a location and tell the player what to do.
 
The problem right now is that we just don't have enough players to offer an enjoyable experience to everyone. 5vs5 on a map like Altis isn't (imho) very enjoyable. I asked Josh about PvP and he told me this was the exact reason why we don't have such a thing right now.
 
Another thing that might give problems is team balancing. Because you're playing against players who (most of the time) can think intelligent, one team can be way better than the other one. This will cause players switching teams, making the balance even worse. 
 
So yeah, for gamenights this could be fun, but for normal play during the week, give me those stupid A.I soldiers.

Conceptually, this would be great! And from a developing standpoint, this would make things (atleast that's what I think) easier. You don't need to spawn in ai, give them waypoints, etc. You just need to create a task at a location and tell the player what to do.
 
The problem right now is that we just don't have enough players to offer an enjoyable experience to everyone. 5vs5 on a map like Altis isn't (imho) very enjoyable. I asked Josh about PvP and he told me this was the exact reason why we don't have such a thing right now.
 
Another thing that might give problems is team balancing. Because you're playing against players who (most of the time) can think intelligent, one team can be way better than the other one. This will cause players switching teams, making the balance even worse. 
 
So yeah, for gamenights this could be fun, but for normal play during the week, give me those stupid A.I soldiers.

The tank guide 
Intro
In this guide I'll go over the basics of armoured warfare and discuss some more advanced tactic as well. I'll do both real life and in-game aspects (with or without RAM) and finally, I'll go over all the different tanks. This guide is based on my experience with tank games (World of Tanks, War Thunder, and Arma 3) and all the historical books/films I've read/seen. If you think I got something wrong, please tell me so I can check it. Enjoy!
 
 
What is a tank?
Before we start discussing about tanks, we first need to know what a tank exactly is. Wikipedia gives the following definition of a tank: “A tank is a large type of armoured fighting vehicle with tracks, designed for front-line combat“. I would describe a tank as a vehicle balanced between crew protection, fire-power and mobility. The balance will be different for each model, and is chosen around a specific goal. So comparing a scout tank to a main battle tank is absurd, because they were designed for other tasks.
 
 
Types of tanks
I'll divide tanks into different categories:
MBT
Light tank
Scout tank
Tank destroyer
In this guide I'll cover mainly the MBT because it's the only one of the list that is available in vanilla Arma 3.
 
 
Crew
Modern MBT have a standard crew of four: commander, gunner, driver, loader. In some tanks (i.e. the French Leclerc) is the loader replaced by an autoloader.
 
The commander: The commander is in charge of the tank. He tells the driver where to go, gives the gunner targets and instructs the loader what shell to load. It is considered to be the most difficult position in the tank as he has to manage not only the tank, but also incoming radio calls. Most tanks provide commanders smoke launchers to conceal the tanks.
 
The gunner: This is obvious. He shoots stuff and blows things up. He also has access to an MG to mow down infantry. Got optical/night/thermal sights.
 
The driver: I'm asking myself why I started explaining crew slots. He drives the tank OK?
 
The loader: Loads the gun and in some cases has a machine gun when turned out.
 
It's vitally important to work together as a team. Good solo crew members who are not communicating will result in a dead tank!
 
 
Ammo
The list of most common ammunition types:
APFSDS: armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot. Often called “sabot” or “AP”. Basically has the best penetration for almost all ranges, except extreme ranges. It's penetrating power comes from the extreme velocity it is fired.
 
HEAT: high explosive anti tank. A big shell that explodes shortly after penetrating a target. Very good against soft to medium armoured targets. Has no drop off in penetration and is so thus used for extreme ranges.
 
HESH: High explosive squash head. Ammo used by the British. The shell explodes on impact and releases a massive amount of small iron balls. Used to injure crew and is effective against most targets, including infantry.
 
HE: high explosive. Explodes on impact and has almost no penetration power. Cheaper than other ammo types and very effective against light armour and infantry. Does not bounce.
 
Note: if an ammo type is followed by ”-T” (like: “APFSDS-T), it means that the shell act's as a tracer and gives a light trail when fired (same effect as rifle tracers).
 
Armour and countermeassures
In this section, I'll cover the differant types of armour and other measures taken to protect a tank. I'll start with armour:
 
Steel armour: This type of armour isn't in use anymore but I tought I would mention it because it was the main type of armour during WWII. Just a steel plate and nothing more. Composite armour: The main armour used on modern MBT's. Its disigned to have higher armour values then steel by having less weight. This is why a T-90 is way better protected then a Tiger, dispite having a lower weight. It can consist of a lot of materials, but aluminium and titanium are widly used. Depleted Uranium armour: very strong armour made out of depleted uranium, something you get as garbage product from enriching uranium. The only tank that I know it's being used on is the Abrams. A tank is never made entirely from this atmour due to the extreme weight it has. Cobham armour: This is believed to be th best armour in the world, only used on the American Ambrams and the British Challenger. Almost nothing is known about this, butit is believed to be some sort of ceramic armour. Other protective measures:
ERA: explosive reactive armour: a slap-on armour plate that consists of cubes that explode outwarts when hit. This will decrease the penetrating power of the shell or missile. Once hit the cube is destroyed and not more useable. Smoke launcher: Most modern tanks are equipped with smoke launchers. These launchers will fire off projectiles that produces smoke to give a full 360 smoke screen around the tank. Some tanks can also generate smoke by injecting chemicals in the engine. APS: active protection system: a system that detects incoming missiles and shoot those down. Not common on tanks and the only in frontline use tank that uses it is the Merkava mk4.  
 
Basic Tactics
Time for some basic tactics. These will consist of tactics viable in vanilla.
 
First off all the positioning of the tank. In Arma, its best to keep a distance from the enemy. Thanks to laser-rangefinding a tank can be accurate up to 2km (technically it's possible to range up to 11.4km but the sights don't have the zoom to support that kind of range). At this range it's also quite easy to ID targets and avoid friendly fire.
 
Also it's always advisible to turn the front of the tank towards the enemy (I know, but you never know I guess). Some more advanced positioning tactics are:
Keep the tank hull down: this means only exposing the turret by covering the hull with a rock or something. Sidescraping: a tactic to peek corners explaind in this picture:  And never ever have cover on three sides of the tank. this will make it impossible to escape and make you and easy target.  
Tanks in Arma 3
Before I finish I'll quickly go over all tanks in vanilla Arma 3.
 
M2A1/M2A4 Slammer: know as the Merkava 4 in real life and used by the Israeli army as their primary MBT. This tank is an unusual design focused on crew protection. To maximize the frontal armour, the tank's engine was placed in the front to serve as another layer of armour. As a direct result the back was free to store ammo OR house some soldiers (this is modelled wrong in Arma). The tank is using a 120mm gun(M2A1) or a 105mm gun(M2A4) and is the master of street and urban combat. In Arma unfortunately, this means every shot to the front will damage the engine and that the amount of real life armour made the top speed and acceleration bad, so I wouldn't recommend this tank in Vanilla Arma 3. Also, the M2A4 has some added armor plating and an commander MG but trades it in for a weaker 105mm gun. Altough irl this would be considered insane, it is better for street combat due to the extra MG, but bear in mind the gun is very weak.
 
MBT-52 Kuma: Know in real life as the Leopard-2SG. An up-armored version of the German Leopard-2 tank, this tank is fast and mobile has a good gun but has not the best armour (because of REASONS, remeber the UP-ARMORED). Very popular tank in Vanilla Arma 3 and definitely the best choice for any tank group that wants a tank that fit's into the BLUFOR army.
 
T-100 Varsuk: Fictional tank based upon a Russian prototype designated object-640, named by fans the Black Eagle. It uses a 125mm gun and is reasonably mobile and has good armour. A rail gun variant was planned for release with the game but got scrapped due to considered too futuristic.
 
 
That was it for my tank guide. I hope you enjoyed it and are a bit more interested in tanks then before.
 
-Jochem "Waffles", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armor Division

The tank guide 
Intro
In this guide I'll go over the basics of armoured warfare and discuss some more advanced tactic as well. I'll do both real life and in-game aspects (with or without RAM) and finally, I'll go over all the different tanks. This guide is based on my experience with tank games (World of Tanks, War Thunder, and Arma 3) and all the historical books/films I've read/seen. If you think I got something wrong, please tell me so I can check it. Enjoy!
 
 
What is a tank?
Before we start discussing about tanks, we first need to know what a tank exactly is. Wikipedia gives the following definition of a tank: “A tank is a large type of armoured fighting vehicle with tracks, designed for front-line combat“. I would describe a tank as a vehicle balanced between crew protection, fire-power and mobility. The balance will be different for each model, and is chosen around a specific goal. So comparing a scout tank to a main battle tank is absurd, because they were designed for other tasks.
 
 
Types of tanks
I'll divide tanks into different categories:
MBT
Light tank
Scout tank
Tank destroyer
In this guide I'll cover mainly the MBT because it's the only one of the list that is available in vanilla Arma 3.
 
 
Crew
Modern MBT have a standard crew of four: commander, gunner, driver, loader. In some tanks (i.e. the French Leclerc) is the loader replaced by an autoloader.
 
The commander: The commander is in charge of the tank. He tells the driver where to go, gives the gunner targets and instructs the loader what shell to load. It is considered to be the most difficult position in the tank as he has to manage not only the tank, but also incoming radio calls. Most tanks provide commanders smoke launchers to conceal the tanks.
 
The gunner: This is obvious. He shoots stuff and blows things up. He also has access to an MG to mow down infantry. Got optical/night/thermal sights.
 
The driver: I'm asking myself why I started explaining crew slots. He drives the tank OK?
 
The loader: Loads the gun and in some cases has a machine gun when turned out.
 
It's vitally important to work together as a team. Good solo crew members who are not communicating will result in a dead tank!
 
 
Ammo
The list of most common ammunition types:
APFSDS: armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot. Often called “sabot” or “AP”. Basically has the best penetration for almost all ranges, except extreme ranges. It's penetrating power comes from the extreme velocity it is fired.
 
HEAT: high explosive anti tank. A big shell that explodes shortly after penetrating a target. Very good against soft to medium armoured targets. Has no drop off in penetration and is so thus used for extreme ranges.
 
HESH: High explosive squash head. Ammo used by the British. The shell explodes on impact and releases a massive amount of small iron balls. Used to injure crew and is effective against most targets, including infantry.
 
HE: high explosive. Explodes on impact and has almost no penetration power. Cheaper than other ammo types and very effective against light armour and infantry. Does not bounce.
 
Note: if an ammo type is followed by ”-T” (like: “APFSDS-T), it means that the shell act's as a tracer and gives a light trail when fired (same effect as rifle tracers).
 
Armour and countermeassures
In this section, I'll cover the differant types of armour and other measures taken to protect a tank. I'll start with armour:
 
Steel armour: This type of armour isn't in use anymore but I tought I would mention it because it was the main type of armour during WWII. Just a steel plate and nothing more. Composite armour: The main armour used on modern MBT's. Its disigned to have higher armour values then steel by having less weight. This is why a T-90 is way better protected then a Tiger, dispite having a lower weight. It can consist of a lot of materials, but aluminium and titanium are widly used. Depleted Uranium armour: very strong armour made out of depleted uranium, something you get as garbage product from enriching uranium. The only tank that I know it's being used on is the Abrams. A tank is never made entirely from this atmour due to the extreme weight it has. Cobham armour: This is believed to be th best armour in the world, only used on the American Ambrams and the British Challenger. Almost nothing is known about this, butit is believed to be some sort of ceramic armour. Other protective measures:
ERA: explosive reactive armour: a slap-on armour plate that consists of cubes that explode outwarts when hit. This will decrease the penetrating power of the shell or missile. Once hit the cube is destroyed and not more useable. Smoke launcher: Most modern tanks are equipped with smoke launchers. These launchers will fire off projectiles that produces smoke to give a full 360 smoke screen around the tank. Some tanks can also generate smoke by injecting chemicals in the engine. APS: active protection system: a system that detects incoming missiles and shoot those down. Not common on tanks and the only in frontline use tank that uses it is the Merkava mk4.  
 
Basic Tactics
Time for some basic tactics. These will consist of tactics viable in vanilla.
 
First off all the positioning of the tank. In Arma, its best to keep a distance from the enemy. Thanks to laser-rangefinding a tank can be accurate up to 2km (technically it's possible to range up to 11.4km but the sights don't have the zoom to support that kind of range). At this range it's also quite easy to ID targets and avoid friendly fire.
 
Also it's always advisible to turn the front of the tank towards the enemy (I know, but you never know I guess). Some more advanced positioning tactics are:
Keep the tank hull down: this means only exposing the turret by covering the hull with a rock or something. Sidescraping: a tactic to peek corners explaind in this picture:  And never ever have cover on three sides of the tank. this will make it impossible to escape and make you and easy target.  
Tanks in Arma 3
Before I finish I'll quickly go over all tanks in vanilla Arma 3.
 
M2A1/M2A4 Slammer: know as the Merkava 4 in real life and used by the Israeli army as their primary MBT. This tank is an unusual design focused on crew protection. To maximize the frontal armour, the tank's engine was placed in the front to serve as another layer of armour. As a direct result the back was free to store ammo OR house some soldiers (this is modelled wrong in Arma). The tank is using a 120mm gun(M2A1) or a 105mm gun(M2A4) and is the master of street and urban combat. In Arma unfortunately, this means every shot to the front will damage the engine and that the amount of real life armour made the top speed and acceleration bad, so I wouldn't recommend this tank in Vanilla Arma 3. Also, the M2A4 has some added armor plating and an commander MG but trades it in for a weaker 105mm gun. Altough irl this would be considered insane, it is better for street combat due to the extra MG, but bear in mind the gun is very weak.
 
MBT-52 Kuma: Know in real life as the Leopard-2SG. An up-armored version of the German Leopard-2 tank, this tank is fast and mobile has a good gun but has not the best armour (because of REASONS, remeber the UP-ARMORED). Very popular tank in Vanilla Arma 3 and definitely the best choice for any tank group that wants a tank that fit's into the BLUFOR army.
 
T-100 Varsuk: Fictional tank based upon a Russian prototype designated object-640, named by fans the Black Eagle. It uses a 125mm gun and is reasonably mobile and has good armour. A rail gun variant was planned for release with the game but got scrapped due to considered too futuristic.
 
 
That was it for my tank guide. I hope you enjoyed it and are a bit more interested in tanks then before.
 
-Jochem "Waffles", Bomb 1-1, 2nd Armor Division

Youtube is still converting it (it was a wooping 10gb in size XD) upload was done in 2,6 hours and youtubes encoding took a long while aswell.
 
Action Points :
 
1:05:00 Command chopper down
1:07:00 Tank flipped by hunter ramming it
 
see anymore that you think look nice let me know