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★ 113 Review: Undercover Hybrid Intelligence Agent ★


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 Dr. Frankenstein: Aye, the thing of 59's and Patton's... it has done the thing with the mediocre. I must be of strivings to do better... I know! Time to morph the thing with the Obj. 140 and the thing of IS-7's!

Overlord: Slow down there Frank. You have a good sense of how to combine tanks, but you can't tell the difference between a burnt pizza and a 5 star dish. Your sense of beauty is... off. So is your method of implementation - taking a tank's turret and putting it on a hull isn't quite what I had in mind with the 59-Patton.

Dr. Frankenstein: Aye, fine. But you still have to do the thing with the Creditings of me. Is of O.K.'s?

Overlord: Yes Frank, you'll get Credit for the idea. Now go, eat your dinner.

 

In this guide, I shall cover all of the various Pros and Cons of the 113, explain the gun choices and/or performance, equipment choices, give you a general overview of its gameplay style and compare it to other Tier 10 Heavy Tanks. Let's get started, shall we?

 

Table of Contents:

  • General overview (Pros and Cons)
  • Equipment, ammo and consumable layout
  • Gun choices and / or performance
  • Gameplay style
  • Comparison to other same-class tanks of its Tier
  • Overall Rating

 

General Overview:

 

Pros:

  • One of the most mobile Tier 10 heavies, top speed of 50km/h (which unlike something such as an IS-7, the 113 will actually reach the top speed, and reasonably quickly).
  • Very good turret armor
  • Exceptionally well-angled upper plate, at 67 degrees - which is practically an auto-bounce angle; with slight angling, on level ground, it becomes immune
  • Surprisingly impressive accuracy for a 122mm, at .35
  • Very reasonable aiming time of 2.59 seconds; very good for a 122mm
  • Good alpha damage of 440 a shot
  • Good overall gun handling stats, and exceptional gun handling during turret traverse.
  • Extremely good "stock" DPM of 2,525.82, which is better than all other Tier 10 heavy tanks, with the exception of auto-loaders. Fully set up, the DPM surpasses 3,000.
  • Very good HP/ton ratio of 16.78, very good for a heavy tank; only surpassed by the AMX 50B
  • Great track traverse speed of 36 degrees/second, which is the second best of any Tier 10 heavy tank
  • Very low profile vehicle, can actually sit underneath the gun depression of the E-100, Maus and Type 5 Heavy.
  • One of the most "troll" commander's hatches (only the left one though) in the game, has 4 view ports covering it frontally, and some very strange angles as well.
  • Good HP pool of 2,300
  • Extremely low chance of engine fire, at only 12%
  • Good gun elevation of 18 degrees. In almost all "normal" battles, it should be more than enough
  • Extremely good HEAT penetration of 340mm, more than enough to completely butter IS-7's, or any tank with flat armor.
  • Soon to be buffed vehicle, with very nice changes upcoming

 

Neutrals:

  • Has two commander's hatches, which can be targetted. They are fairly small however, with some strange angles on the side. The left one is surprisingly difficult to penetrate in particular.
  • Alright turret traverse of 27.11 degrees/second. Nothing special, but it's enough.
  • Alright ammo capacity of 34 rounds. You shouldn't run out of ammo, but it does put limitations on how much leeway you have with ammo selection.
  • AP penetration has 249mm of pen. It's not bad, but for a Tier 10 heavy tank, it is on the low side.
  • Fair shell velocity of 950m/s. It certainly could be better, but it's not terrible either.
  • Fairly good camo values for a heavy tank, enough to keep you hidden in large enough bushes (especially with that low profile), but let's be honest - the camo isn't anywhere near that of a medium.
  • Alright side armor. The base value is 90mm, but you have 20mm of spaced armor and 20mm of tracks covering 2/3rd's of your side, giving you 110mm effective side armor. Sadly, the 20mm of spaced armor doesn't actually count as spaced armor - only as extra armor plating.

 

Cons:

  • Very vulnerable ammo rack. It will only get damaged with shots to the side, but it gets damaged very easily. Be careful to not over-expose your side armor, otherwise you may have some ammo rack problems
  • Very weak lower plate - in fact, it's only 137mm effective... expect any shell with a decent caliber that hits your lower plate at any angle to penetrate.
  • Fuel tanks are present in the lower plate. The lower plate is reasonably small, but if you let people shoot you in it (especially shooting up into it), expect them to be damaged and sometimes break. Automatic Fire Extinguisher is a must.
  • Driver loves to die when you're hit with HE. Against regular shells, he does a reasonable job of surviving, but HE will kill him with ease.
  • The tank relies on armor angling rather than thickness. This means that HE shells can do quite a bit of damage to you if you're not careful.
  • Even though tank is very low profile, which is usually a good thing, it's a double-edged sword on the 113 - you're so close to the ground, that quite a few heavies can shoot down into your upper plate, partially negating your angling. Taller the tank, more you want to avoid it at close ranges.
  • Very unfortunate terrain resistance values. Your HP/ton is actually better than that of all of the Tier 10 Soviet mediums (non-reward), but the terrain resistance values will cripple that advantage to a noticeable extent. It's still much better than the IS-7's though, which is why you can still reach your top speed, whereas the IS-7 is a case of serious false-advertisement
  • Very bad gun depression of 4 degrees. Will get buffed to 5 degrees, but either way it's still bad.
  • Poor hull-roof armor of only 40mm. This means that any gun 122mm and above will be able to over-match you (which further amplifies the need to avoid taller tanks)
  • Poor rear turret roof armor of 40mm. This can also be over-matched by 122mm guns and above. The front half of the turret roof is 100mm however, so it really depends where on the turret roof you get hit.
  • Turret has a few small portions at the very outer sides of the bottom of the gun mantlet where it can be penetrated by regular shells occasionally. Premiums shells can go through the area fairly easily. Luckily, it's a small area however, and the rest of your turret will bounce practically any shell.

 

Equipment:

 

Personally, I mount Improved Ventilation, Gun Rammer and Vertical Stabilizer on the 113. Coated Optics are an option, but it's a matter of preference.

 

Recommended:

 

Improved Ventilation: Never a bad thing to mount. The 5% boost is rather nice, and helps rather nicely with the gun handling and mobility when combined with food.

 

Gun Rammer: If you can mount a Gun Rammer on a tank, you should; regardless of the vehicle. 113 especially should have a Gun Rammer, as your DPM goes up to 3,000 with one; which is the best of any non-autoloading Tier 10 heavy tank.

 

Vertical Stabilizer: Vertical Stabilizers are a very important piece of equipment on almost every tank in the game. Even though the 113's soft stats are rather reasonable, especially considering the mobility, a Vertical Stabilizer will significantly help; and allow the 113 to very reliably snap-shot enemy vehicles.

 

Optional:

 

Coated Optics: Coated Optics are rather viable on the 113, in place of Ventilation. The 113 plays a lot like a medium tank, and excels when in a wolf-pack with other medium tanks. The gun is also rather accurate, and the tank is low profile - all in all, mounting Optics can allow you to actually play some vision games with your opponents, especially when engaging heavy tanks from a distance.

 

 

Ammo:

 

My ammo layout on the 113 is 18 AP, 13 HEAT and 3 HE.

 

The 113's gun is very consistent and reliable in what it does, thus you'd think I wouldn't mount much HEAT, even with the lowish AP pen. However, the vehicle is a hybrid, and as such, sometimes needs to engage heavy tanks; and punish them with your incredible DPM. The HEAT penetration on the 113 will make the IS-7's hull armor seem under-powered, and will butter E-100 and Maus turrets with ease. Putting the DPM into action, if both of you are loaded during each initial engagement, you can put in 3 shells into an E-100 for every one shell he can throw to you. Thus, having that extra HEAT pen to entirely butter such tanks and maximize your DPM potential is something which I heavily emphasis with my ammo layout.

 

I carry 3 HE shells around for the occasional waffle. You could probably bump it up to 4 HE rounds, but I certainly wouldn't go above that - you simply don't have the ammo capacity to do that safely.

 

 

Consumables:

 

For Consumables on the 113, I use an Automatic Fire Extinguisher, Small Repair Kit and Combat Rations. Combat Rations and First Aid Kit are interchangeable.

 

Automatic Fire Extinguisher: Because the 113 has fuel tanks in its lower plate, and the lower plate is as weak as it is, you really want to have an Automatic Fire Extinguisher; no exceptions.

 

Small Repair Kit: It's a fairly standard consumable on almost every tank. The 113's ammo rack is rather fragile, so you definitely want to have a repair kit available.

 

Combat Rations: In order to emphasis on the tank's mobility and gun handling, I put on Combat Rations instead of a First Aid Kit. With Combat Rations and Ventilation, you greatly make up for the poor terrain resistance values, and you get gun handling which is absolutely incredible; allowing for very easy snapshots even at speed and distance. Be warned however, you should only mount Combat Rations if your Commander DOES have the "Jack of All Trades" skill. The driver does die fairly often to HE from artillery, thus you don't want to get rid of the First Aid Kit unless you have something to counter it (BIA + Vents + Rations + Jack of All Trades will give you a 70% driver as a replacement for a dead one, which is very survivable).

 

Alternate:

 

Small First Aid Kit: Unless you have Vents and Jack of All Trades, you should not replace the Small First Aid Kit.

 

Large First Aid Kit: Why not? For those pesky moments when the fluffy sky clicking piggies of artillery death rain decide to target you.

 


Guns:

 

The 113's gun is a 122mm which is superior to just about any 122mm you can find on any heavy tank.

 

Below, I've compared the 113's 122mm to the IS-4's 122mm. On the left is the 113, on the right is the IS-4. A blue value is superior, whilst a green value is relatively tied.

 

Guns:

Rate of Fire:         5.74                          (5.21)   
Aiming time:        2.59                          (2.78)
Accuracy:             .35                            (.36)
DPM:                   2,525.82                   (2,294.29)
Penetration:         249/340/68             (258/340/68)
Damage:             440/440/530           (440/440/530)  

Shell Velocity:      950/950/950          (940/920/940)

Soft Stats:           .19/.19/.08             (.25/.25/.08)    
Ammo capacity:   34                             (30)

 

The verdict? The 113's gun is superior in every single way to the IS-4's gun, except for 9mm less AP penetration. Everything else about the 113's gun is either entirely superior or identical to the IS-4's gun.

 

122mm 60-122T:

 

The 113's gun has it all. Accuracy, aiming time, gun handling, DPM, alpha damage, etc. The only realistic downside to the 113's gun aside from the 4 degrees of gun depression is the 249mm of AP penetration, which still isn't all that bad; very survivable.

 

The 113's gun is consistent and reliable, and excels at easily tearing apart opponents. Against any heavy tank, you'll be able to not only entirely out-DPM it, but also aim your shells a lot more quickly. Your effective DPM in battle, assuming your gun depression suffices, will be absolutely astounding. The gun is entirely superior to that of the IS-4 and IS-7's. You can without-a-doubt rely on the gun to get the job done.

 

 

How to play it:

 

The 113, despite having many positive aspects to it, is one of the trickiest vehicles in the game for people to get used to. The reason for this is the fact that the tank is a very strange hybrid - it's a perfect blend of an IS-7 and Obj. 140. You'd think such a combination would make it simply over-powered, but instead you get a tank which has a lot of potential, but takes a while to utilize to its maximum potential.

 

I simply could not realistically state all of the various quirks about the 113's playstyle, since it's so unique in the way it plays. However, I will list the most important things.

  • When possible, wolf-pack with mediums tanks at close to medium ranges
  • Avoid engaging vehicles which are taller than you if possible. If you have backup, you should be fine though.
  • Use the mobility to keep relocating. You're exceptionally mobile for a heavy tank; make use of that mobility.
  • The tank is an exceptional team-support tank. The reason for this is that regardless of the situation you put it in, the 113 will always have something good to bring to the battlefield. Work with your allies; put whichever strengths you can to use, and have your allies compensate for whatever cannot be used in the situation.
  • Angle the armor whenever possible, your armor becomes very effective when angled side to side; and becomes immune when when angled when engaging enemies which cannot shoot down at your armor.
  • Sniping is possible. Fully setup with my recommended layout, the accuracy becomes .32; which is very reliable.
  • If your team has no vision, you can find a reasonably large bush and spot from it. The 113 is low enough profile to fit in many bushes, and has decent enough camo to stay hidden in medium bushes, at some distance. Only do this out of necessity however.
  • Go hull-down whenever possible
  • Face-hugging is most optimal on tanks which are the same height or smaller than your tank.
  • On level ground, with basic wiggling, you'll be practically invulnerable against medium tanks.
  • Keep moving after shooting; never let the enemy aim at your tank.
  • Snapshotting should be used very often actually. Whenever the enemy is aiming at you, take a shot and get to safety. Don't sit still, don't aim, and especially don't let the enemy aim at you.
  • Shooting on the move can be very effective with that great gun handling, however you must be very careful - the extremely limited gun depression means that rough terrain could easily throw off your aim. When driving over bumpy terrain, time your shots carefully.
  • Don't ram vehicles. You only weigh 44 tons, and your armor relies entirely on angling, not thickness - ramming won't end very well for you.
  • Against very tall vehicles, you can sit underneath their gun depression. Do be careful however, it the terrain favors the enemy, or if they have enough gun depression, they may be able to get slight shots at your hatches or possibly even turret roof. If you keep moving and wiggling, you should have zero issues though.
  • Flank TD's and slow vehicles whenever possible! Put a shell into their tracks (should be very easy with your great gun handling), and then get right behind them. Most TD's can be circled without tracking them at all.
  • Flex to what the enemy is doing! You're very mobile, and have a lot to bring to the battlefield in varying situations. Analyze the battle, figure out which one of your various strengths is best suited at the moment, and put it to use!
  • If an ally is low on HP and needs an escort to safety, the 113 is the tank to do it. You're fast enough to easily get into the way of any shells which come towards your ally, you're fast enough to get them out of danger quickly, and your armor should be able to keep you safe when used properly.

 


Comparison to same-Tier Heavy Tanks:

 

HP: Good. 2,300 HP is a very reasonable quantity, and should easily get you through battles. It's also enough to survive 3 150mm shells, which can be rather significant at times in comparison to some other vehicles.

Armor: Good. Your hull is angled 3 degrees away from being at an auto-bounce angle, and your turret is very strong. You do have a very weak lower plate, although it's not overly complicated to hide or to make your enemies miss it. However, what brings seemingly auto-bounce armor to only "good" is the fact that because you're so low profile, other heavy tanks will be able to shoot down into your armor and often times negate its angling. Against vehicles of the same height however, such as any medium tank, your upper plate will actually be auto-bounce. You have two commander's hatches, although they have some strange angles to them, and the left one will bounce or absorb on average 50% of shells that hit it. The turret is very strong, and can only be penetrated with very high amounts of pen through very small areas outside of the bottom edges of your gun mantlet. Your armor is superior to all medium tanks, and will definitely get you through battles if you use it properly.

Mobility: Best in class. Even though AMX 50B is technically faster, it lacks the traverse speed to actually circle a few opponents. Beyond the 50B, no other heavy tank comes even close to the 113's mobility. Also, unlike something such as the IS-7, 113 will reach it's top speed and reasonably quickly.

DPM: Very Good. The 113's DPM is the second-best out of all non-autoloading Tier 10's, only surpassed by the FV215b. Fully equipped, the 113's DPM will surpass 3,000.

Penetration: Good. The 113's AP penetration is 9mm less than a handful of other heavy tanks, but its HEAT has 10mm more penetration than quite a handful of heavy tanks. All in all, the penetration is good and should be more than enough to get through the enemy if you know how to aim.

Alpha damage: Good. 440 alpha is very nice to have on a tank with the kind of DPM which the 113 can boast about. 440 alpha goes a long way with that reload.

Aiming SpeedGood. 2.59 second aiming time is on the better end of the spectrum of Tier 10 heavy tanks. The gun handling is very good as well, which will allow you to quickly aim in.

Accuracy: Very Good. .35 accuracy is also on the better end of the Tier 10 heavy spectrum. For a 122mm gun however, it's very good.

Shell Velocity: Average. 950 m/s shell velocity is perfectly average for a Tier 10 heavy tank.

View Range: Standard. 400m of View Range is what pretty much every Tier 10 heavy tank gets, so it's not good or bad... it's technically "Best in Class", but at the same time average.

Camo Value: Very good. The 113 actually has one of the best camo values of all of the Tier 10 heavy tanks. It's still fairly low, although with the low profile of the vehicle and mobility, you can occasionally take on a passive spotting role in some situations.

Battle effectiveness: Very good. The 113 is a very effective vehicle. Regardless of the map, MM or how the team is doing, the 113 will always have something to bring to the battle which will allow it to be very effective. Unlike most other heavy tanks, the 113 is not situationial by any means. Do keep in mind that the way you play it will constantly be changing based off of the situation, but the 113 is able to do that thanks to its many good characteristics. The main reason the 113 is getting buffed, and isn't very popular is the fact that it's very hard to learn. A tank which is always changing its playstyle based off of the situation, and is always going to be doing something unique and entirely different from other tanks, is simply going to be very complicated to learn. However, once you figure out how to properly play the 113, it's truly a beast.

 

Overall Rating:

 

7.5/10 (Very Good)

 

The 113 is indeed a beast in the right hands. It can always bring something good to the battle, it makes an exceptional team-work vehicle, can be very independent, and is very flexible. The biggest downsides of the 113 are the vulnerable ammo rack, very weak lower plate, lower plate fuel tanks and "alright" side armor, which doesn't do all that much to counter the ammo rack. However, none of these downsides should be much of a problem if the 113 is used properly - just keep in mind that you're most likely going to be using up at least two of your consumables every battle.

 

The carry potential of the 113 is massive. However, it being such a unique vehicle, obviously has a unique manner of carrying. Yes, it's a good vehicle independently, although it's very well-balanced. What this means is that the 113 best carries battles by making a significant impact with your allies, and being the exceptionally flexible team support tank it is. By always having something good to bring to the battlefield, and having the best DPM of all non-autoloading Tier 10 heavies, it is able to greatly assist your allies when they need it. This results in more allies alive with more HP, thus making victory more likely. If the 113 is played properly, even if the team on a flank does begin to die, it can make a large impact, and do more than enough for it to be able to finish with the flank even when the last allies wilter away.

 

The 113 is a very capable, flexible and fun tank with a lot of carry potential. It's simply rather difficult to get used to, and has a very unique (and sometimes complex) playstyle. However, once you figure out that very unique and intricate playstyle, the 113 becomes an extremely good and rewarding vehicle.

 

 

Thanks for reading! I hope this guide was helpful! I genuinely wish all of you the very best of luck and fun, both in real life and on the battlefield.

 

(Ah, isn't the 113 sexy? 113 welcomes you! Smile_Default.gif)

 

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