Armored Warfare News

Commanders!

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

• Type 99A2-140 Tier 10 Premium Main Battle Tank
• VT-5 Tier 9 Premium Light Tank
• Vickers Mk.7/2 Vanquisher Tier 8 Premium Main Battle Tank

Between May 14 and May 21, 2020, the following items will be available:


[h2]Type 99A2-140[/h2]


The Type 99A2-140 is an experimental version of the most advanced Chinese Main Battle Tank in existence – the Type 99A. Unlike its production counterpart, however, it is not armed with a 125mm smoothbore, but massive 140mm smoothbore cannon. This is a theoretical upgrade to the vehicle – while the People’s Republic of China was considering upgrading the firepower of its Main Battle Tanks to face latest western and Russian MBT models, a 140mm gun was never installed on this chassis and was only mentioned in passing by certain Chinese sources. Now, however, your enemies will have the opportunity to experience what such a vehicle with you in command would be like to face in battle!



In Armored Warfare, the Type 99A2-140 is a rather unique Tier 10 Premium Main Battle Tank. It is essentially a version of the progression Type 99A2 Tier 10 MBT with one difference – the 140mm gun, trading its rate of fire for penetration and single shell damage. It is very fast and mobile (with its maximum speed being well over 90 km/h), protected by ERA and APS both and capable of using an acceleration-boosting active ability that pushes its engine far beyond the limits of common Main Battle Tanks. If used right, the vehicle is extremely deadly and one of the best Tier 10 MBTs on the battlefields of Armored Warfare.

The Type 99A2-140 MBT is available in our Web Shop via Loot Crates. Collect 100 blueprint pieces from these crates to obtain the vehicle.






[h2]VT-5[/h2]


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.






[h2]Vickers Mk.7/2 Vanquisher[/h2]


The Vickers Mk.7/2 was one of the last members of the famous Vickers MBT British tank export series. It was built around the advanced Vickers turret (with a wide range of guns offered as options), combined with a modified Leopard 2 hull. A single prototype was built in 1985, but failed to attract any customers. The tank was never mass-produced but the lessons learned by Vickers from its development were used when designing the Challenger 2 MBT. You can read more about it in our dedicated article.



In Armored Warfare, the Vickers Mk.7/2 is a Tier 8 Premium Main Battle Tank with a special “Vanquisher” British-themed camouflage, well-armored in the best Albion tradition.





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

See you on the battlefield!

Commanders!

The Enigma's Legacy Battle Path is coming soon – in fact, we are launching on June 2, 2020!



You can, however, secure your place amongst the cataclysm survivors even today, as three bundles are available on MY.GAMES Market:

• Enigma's Legacy access with 3 days of Premium Time
• Enigma's Legacy access with 7 days of Premium Time and 42.500 Battle Coins (enough to reach Level 19)
• Ultimate Enigma's Legacy bundle with 42.500 Battle Coins, Object 490 Tier 10 Premium MBT and Commander Alexander Cortez

What awaits you in this Battle Path?

• Overhauled mechanics
• Four Premium vehicles, including the coveted Type 10 MBT
• Four Enigma skins for the reward vehicles
• Camouflages, decals, flags and many other exciting rewards

You can read more about all of the improvements, rewards and rules in our dedicated article.



See you on the battlefield!

Commanders!

Today, we’d like to tell you more about the real life aspects of the Japanese Type 10 MBT. So sit back, pour yourselves some tea and relax, as we dive into the history of this vehicle.



When it comes to tank design and preferences, Japan has always been the odd one out. The Second World War Japanese armored vehicles – while being perfectly adequate for their intended role – had a rather poor reputation when fighting American and British armor, simply because they weren’t (until late in the war) designed to do that. They were designed to fight poorly armed Chinese warlord armies that had – at best – some basic rifles, machineguns and perhaps even field artillery, but very little in the way of their own armor.

It is therefore no surprise that the Japanese would end up heavily outgunned on land by the Americans and, after the war’s end, would adopt proper (in fact, American) tanks. The post-war history was already described in our earlier Type 74 article but, suffice to say, the role of the Japanese Ground Defense Forces became (and remains to this day) an entirely defensive one with the protection of the Japanese islands being its main objective. However, the mountainous terrain of Japan required some out of the box thinking and the Japanese came up with interesting solutions, including the famous adjustable suspension of almost all their MBTs.

Politically, post-war Japan was and remains an ally of the United States of America. With this fact came the consequence of the Soviet Union being the primary threat with an invasion always being considered a possibility. However, this threat came to an end in the early 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed and, for a short period of time, it seemed as if the danger went away with it. This affected the militaries all around the world, often leading to massive budget cuts and the cancellation of many upgrade and procurement plans.



In Japan, this was reflected by the fact that the Type 74 replacement plan with a new MBT (the Type 90 MBT, specifically) was slowed down and the (by-then obsolete) Type 74 would remain in service for another two or three decades. With 341 vehicles produced between 1990 and 2009, there were never enough Type 90s to replace the older Type 74s, but at least the truly ancient Type 61 MBTs were finally all replaced in 2000.

But, as always, the collapse of one power left a vacuum in its stead and such states of things never last. With Russia crippled and barely able to maintain its previously giant military, the 2000s saw the industrial and military rise of China as the next challenger to the American world hegemony. With its onset came new threats to Japan and once again, a need arose to develop modern MBTs to give Japan the edge to fight off an enemy potentially outnumbering the defenders several times over.

The Japanese were essentially left with a decision what to do. One idea was, of course, to upgrade the existing fleet of service MBTs or to develop something new. Both directions were considered and some upgrade development was also conducted, leading – amongst other things – to the appearance of a modified Type 74 MBT called Mod G (or Type 74 Kai), but there’s always a problem with this kind of upgrades in the sense that there’s only so much you can do with an older tank to increase its value without basically rebuilding it from scratch.

You can upgrade its armor to a degree and you can improve its electronics, or even change its main weapon to something else, but, in the end, you will still have a three-decade-old steel hull to work with and the costs keep on mounting. Sooner or later, you’ll have to start something new anyway. And, as a side note, putting more stuff on a tank makes it heavier. And that’s what happened with the Type 74 Kai upgrade program. It worked, but was really expensive for what it offered and that would be its downfall.



Another solution was ramping up the production of the Type 90 MBT, but this machine came with its own set of issues. At 50 tons (12 tons more than the Type 74), it was not really what the Japanese had envisaged as an ideal MBT since its weight made it difficult to operate in Japan’s remote areas, especially on the island of Hokkaido. It was also once again quite expensive, its production was slow (on average 19 vehicles per year) and any upgrades made to it would inevitably run into the same problems as described above, especially when it came to its weight.

It was therefore decided to start working on a brand-new new MBT using the most advanced technologies possible in order to make it just as good as other MBTs but at a fraction of their weight and, at the same time, it was also decided to replace a portion of obsolete MBTs with wheeled fire support vehicles (this branch of development would eventually result in the adoption of the Type 16 MCV).

It’s unclear when the initial development of this tank actually started. The research of some components likely goes back as far as the 1990s but the real development work likely only started at the turn of the century, specifically in 2002 or so. The first prototype was available around 2004 and the real testing began around February 2008 with the reported price of a prototype being 700 million Yen (roughly the same as that of a production Type 90 MBT).

Two prototypes were showcased in 2010 alongside a Type 90 during a JGSDF Fuji training facility event and the vehicle finally officially entered service in January 2012. The mass-production was launched in 2010 with the rate of 13 vehicles per year and is currently ongoing, as such:

• 2010-2012: 39 vehicles
• 2013: 14 vehicles
• 2014: 13 vehicles
• 2015: 10 vehicles
• 2016-2017: 12 vehicles
• 2018: 5 vehicles
• 2019: 6 vehicles
• 2019-2020: 12 vehicles

In total, it seems that 111 vehicles have been built to date at roughly 950 million yen per with the total cost of the development program being roughly 50 billion yen.



The Type 10 is also often called Hitomaru. The name comes simply from the words “Hito” (one) and “Maru” (zero). It has a crew of three men (implying an automatically loaded gun) and weighs 40, 44 or 48 tons. The last piece of information might sound a bit weird so let’s dive right into that.

As you already know, the Type 10 MBT was designed to meet the requirements of the Japanese military when it comes to off-road capabilities and this is directly tied to its weight. Simply put, the Type 90 MBT was way too heavy and the goal of the Type 10 design was to provide roughly the same level of protection but with generally lower weight.

The way the designers at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries achieved this goal was by making the armor of the tank modular, consisting of a basic hull and NERA modules. The Type 10 MBT has relatively thin basic armor that’s, according to some sources, made out of nano-crystalline steel. What exactly does that mean is anyone’s guess, but the composition of the steel seemingly makes it very light while keeping its protective properties intact. The frontal protective capabilities are possibly enhanced by carbon-fiber-based composites.

As a result, the basic weight of the vehicle in its transport form is mere 40 tons, a value unheard of for a tank of this size. In this form, however, the tank is resistant to heavy machinegun bullets only and – frontally – to non-tandem HEAT RPGs.

In its combat form, the tank weight increases to 44 tons by the addition of extra armor plating. However, it only reaches its full potential in the high intensity combat configuration that weighs 48 tons. In this configuration, the vehicle should be able to frontally resist modern 120mm APFSDS rounds at 250m or more along with more advanced tandem HEAT warheads from infantry-carried weapons such as the RPG-29 Vampir. While relatively lightweight, these launchers are nothing to scoff at – they are tied to some high-profile incidents such as penetrations of modern Merkava tanks.

Additional protective measures include:

• 76mm smoke grenade launchers
• Laser warning system (linked to the smoke grenade system to form a soft kill APS)
• Automatic fire extinguisher
• NBC protection
• Noise and heat trace reduction system

Domestic Japanese hard-kill APS for this tank is currently in development, but the published info about this system is mostly just theoretical with its mock-up resembling a single-barreled version of the turret-mounted Iron Fist APS.



The tank is armed with an indigenous 120mm smoothbore gun (that is, unlike the Type 90 gun, not a copy of a Rheinmetall design). This gun, developed by Japan Steel Works, bears the designation Type 10 and comes in three different lengths: L/44, L/50 and L/55. The Type 10 MBT carries the L/44 version that has roughly similar performance as the Type 90 gun, but weighs 10-20 percent less.

The gun fires the following ammunition:

• JM33 APFSDS (approx. 800mm of penetration at 60 degrees at 0 meters)
• JM12A1 HEAT-MP round
• Type 10 experimental APFSDS (with its 748mm long penetrator, it can allegedly penetrate 1000mm of armor at 2km, although the value is not known)

The gun is loaded automatically from a bustle-mounted ammunition rack and is capable of firing roughly 8 rounds per minute. The vehicle carries 22 rounds of ammo (14 in the autoloader, 2 rounds behind the gunner and 6 rounds in the hull).

The gun is controlled by an advanced FCS with a Thales weather sensor. The commander has the following systems at his disposal:

• Panoramic day/night sights
• Thermal imager
• Laser rangefinder
• AI assistant that searches for targets and identifies their type
• Access to integrated C4I system

The gunner has the following systems at his disposal:

• Day/night sights
• Thermal imager
• Laser rangefinder

The exact gun depression and elevation value are not known but are thought to be considerable, especially given the presence of an adjustable hydraulic suspension that can tilt the vehicle to all sides.

The propulsion is provided by a Mitsubishi V8 diesel engine producing 1200 horsepower at 2300 RPM. Interestingly enough, the engine is paired with a CVT transmission that effectively has no gears and therefore allows the vehicle to go forward as fast as backward (70 km/h). The high mobility objective was achieved and the Type 10 MBT can be transported as easily as the Type 74 MBT with nearly the same off-road capabilities.



The real ace up its sleeve is, however, the abovementioned C4I Battlefield Management System. With it, the tank can connect to other tanks or even other unit types. You can already see the pattern emerging with most modern AFVs (such as the Hunter) relying on such systems. They do offer a tremendous advantage and act as force multipliers.

And that’s pretty much the state of things right now. The Type 10 MBT production continues at low rates that serve as much to retain the tank-building capability as to actually build the tanks themselves, making it the most expensive MBT in the world when it comes to the cost per piece.

Traditionally, the tank is used only by Japan since the export of Japanese arms is pretty much prohibited by law. This is unlikely to change easily, although, recently, Japan is taking steps to bring the status of its military forces closer to those of other militaries and away from focusing purely on mainland defense.

What will happen remains to be seen.

Commanders!

As you already know, the main feature of the upcoming Update 0.32 will be a new Battle Path campaign and, today, we’d like to tell you more about it. Its name will be Enigma’s Legacy.

The world is in turmoil – on June 16, 2044, a supervolcano exploded, filling the planet’s atmosphere in ash and dust and causing something not unlike a nuclear winter. As the terrified population scrambles to find shelter, Enigma’s endgame is finally revealed. Predicting this outcome all along, Enigma built a series of vaults for its members and allies, including the factions you’ve fought so hard – PLM, NPAA and the Lions of Nequiel. But Enigma is no more and the world has changed. You must aid your former enemies in exchange for supplies and the location of one final unoccupied vault that you must reach before the destruction becomes too widespread.



Mechanics-wise, the Enigma’s Legacy Battle Path will be similar to the Last Patriot one with the principles being roughly the same. Once you acquire access to the campaign, you’ll be earning Battle Coins and spending them on Battle Path progress. Battle Coins will be earned either by just playing or by completing missions. Four mission sets along with repeatable daily Battle Coin Missions and Challenges will be available like the last time. The mission sets will consist of:

• Kill-oriented missions
• Damage-oriented missions
• Support-oriented missions

Completing all three mission sets will unlock the fourth, ultimate mission set.

The campaign will feature several Premium vehicles available as a part of the campaign’s basic level progress. These will be:

• Type 74 Tier 5 Premium MBT for unlocking the Battle Path (achieving Level 1)
• Seongun-915 Tier 6 Premium MBT for achieving Level 10
• SBS Pindad Tier 8 Premium AFV for achieving Level 30
• Type 10 Hitomaru Tier 10 Premium MBT for achieving Level 50

Reward Vehicles:











Additionally, the Hunter AFV Tier 9 Premium AFV will become available after the launch of the Battle Path a part of the Enigma Loot Crate, containing its blueprints as well as other goodies. The missions will then reward you with special animated “Enigma” skins for the Battle Path vehicles.

Enigma Skins:









Apart from the abovementioned Premium vehicles, the Battle Path levels will contain other rewards such as Battle Coin boosters, camouflages, decals, avatars, Gold, boosters and much more.

The Workshop will also be making a comeback, allowing you to further improve your prize vehicles by completing Battle Path missions or Challenges. You can also use the Workshop to upgrade the older Last Patriot Battle Path vehicles.

With that being said, we’ve implemented several changes to the Enigma’s Legacy Battle Path compared to the Last Patriot one:

• Mission sets will no longer be unlocked by using tickets, but by Battle Path progression (the first set will be unlocked on Level 1, the second on Level 10, the third on Level 30)
• The final mission set will require (apart from completing the other mission sets) reaching Level 50
• Set Missions (unlike daily Battle Coin Missions or Challenges, which have their own requirements) now require the use of a vehicle from this Battle Path (one of the four abovementioned ones)
• No new Commander will be available this Battle Path

Other than that, the mechanics will remain the same, as will the entry price. The existing mechanics will be described in detail in the FAQ section upon the Battle Path’s launch.

We hope that you will enjoy this Battle Path that is due to launch at the beginning of June and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!

Commanders!

The complete Spirithaven Special Operation has been around for a while now with players mastering all of its aspects in order to obtain the achievement prizes. However, now’s your chance to show how good have you really become – welcome to the Spirithaven Speedrun contest!



As its name suggests, the goal is actually very simple – gather a full team of five players and beat the Spirithaven Special Operation missions on the Extreme difficulty (using Tier 9 or Tier 10 vehicles) as fast as you can.

Here’s how you can participate:

• Assemble a team of five players (you included and form a platoon)
• Play the Spirithaven Special Operation and record your time until May 17, 23:59 CEST
• Submit the result (along with a replay of your attempt) to the dedicated contest channel on Discord (make sure you read the detailed rules below)

There will be four winning teams in this event (one per each of four Spirithaven missions). Each winning team will receive the following prizes:

• Type 90 Tier 7 Premium MBT for the entire team (or its price in Gold)
• Access to the upcoming Enigma’s Legacy Battle Path for the entire team

Please note:

• Only one submission per team and per mission will be accepted (one team can therefore submit up to four results, one per each Spirithaven mission)
• Team composition cannot change and are considered locked from the moment of the first submission
• Any changes in composition of a locked team will lead to the affected submissions being disqualified (if a team submits the first result and then replaces one team member and submits another one, only the first submission will be accepted)
• Individual players who are already locked in one team cannot participate in this contest as a part of another team, such an attempt will lead to the entire new team’s disqualification (when in doubt, team leaders are advised to make sure their members are not locked with another team already by checking the previous submissions)
• Each team must choose a name and elect its leader, who will be responsible for submitting any results (submissions from other team members will not be accepted) with the first submission defining both and any other submissions having to include them
• Each submission must therefore include: Team Name, Team Leader Name, Team Members, Result Screenshot, Result Replay (from any of the team’s members)
• Should two or more teams achieve the same time, the earliest submission takes precedence
• One team can only win in one category
• All submitted battles must take place between the publication of this article and May 17, 23:59 CEST

Good luck, commanders, and, as always:

See you on the battlefield!