IS-7 Triple MoE Guide
13Disciple | 8-Dec-18
Achieved Dec-2017
Achieved Dec-2017
Often recommended as the first tier 10 you should grind for because of its forgiving armor profile, and good mobility; the IS-7 remains one of my favorite tanks to play. Its gun has been power creeped somewhat, leaving it extremely weak against the most heavily armored tanks in the game. That weakness can to some extent be mitigated by its speed, giving it an ability to hunt down weaker opponents before engaging the biggest threats from an advantageous angle.
NOTE: This guide is my perspective, and is not guaranteed to help you. Other players may disagree with my suggestions and that's OK. If you are having trouble after implementing what I recommended in this guide, I suggest you experiment with load outs, crew skills, and play style to see what works well for you.
Crew Skills
Commander: Sixth Sense, Repairs, BiA, Recon
Gunner: Repairs, Snapshot, BiA, Armorer (retrain to designated target after Armorer @ 100%)
Driver: Repairs, Smooth Ride, BiA, Clutch Braking (Off Road Driving also a good pick)
Loader: Safe Stowage, Repairs, BiA, Adrenaline Rush (concealment or firefighting also good for the 4th skill)
Loader (Radio Operator): Repairs, Situational Awareness, BiA, Call for Vengeance (concealment or firefighting also good for 4th skill)
Equipment
Innovative Loading System (Improved Gun Rammer) | Verticle Stabalizer | Coated Optics
In my opinion the triple MoE can be achieved with a standard Gun Rammer.
Ammunition
Ammunition is more of a personal preference. I ran 5 AP / 15 APCR / 10 HE
Standard ammo is average at 250 mm penetration. Which seems high until you realize that RNG can drop your penetration to under 200 mm. This ammunition is good for lightly armored tanks, and most tier 8's. I also suggest liberal use of the HE rounds. Especially on hull down tanks or well armored tanks you don’t stand a chance of penetrating with gold rounds (more on this in the firepower section). Really you can run w/e ratio you want - if you find yourself running out of a certain ammo type, don’t be afraid to adjust your load out.
Consumables
Large Repair Kit | Extra Combat Rations | Large Med kit | Directive: Firefighting
Special note on consumables, I ran an automatic fire extinguisher, along with standard repair and medkits, until I was around 88% MoE. After that I switched to large kits, and food. I also applied the firefighting directive to make up for the lack of fire extinguisher. You can purchase a single directive for 2 bonds or alternatively and I recommend this, you can buy a bundle of 100 fire fighting directives for 180 bonds - saving you 20 bonds in total.
Firepower
The firepower of the IS-7 is a little bit of a struggle. The gun handling was buffed in December 2017, which helps make up for the 2 big weaknesses of the gun. It does have a very comfortable alpha at 490 damage, but its held back by its relatively long reload and abysmal gold penetration. The gun handling buffs help this by allowing you to get shots into weak spots easier. I alluded to it in the ammo load out, but HE ammo can help quite a bit. When you are facing off against hull down well armored tanks (ie: Super Conqueror, T110E3, other IS-7) My suggestion is to switch to HE and start smacking them down 100 HP at a time. Be careful to hide your hull, and only do this when you are confident that you can get your shot off without taking return damage. Eventually the damage will add up and that hull down monster will either begin to back off, or push harder. Slowly succumbing to small(ish) caliber HE damage can play mind games with your opponents. Obviously switch back to gold or regular ammo when opportunities present themselves. Since the gold ammo has such low penetration values, take notes of tanks you struggled to penetrate and look up their armor models on tanks.gg. Keep in mind that your penetration at 303 mm means that an RNG minimum roll is 223 mm. Many tanks such as the Type 4 and Type 5 will be a 50/50 chance of penetration with gold. Getting comfortable with the gun and knowing which ammo to use when is key to improving your damage per game.
Mobility
A bright spot for the IS-7 is its mobility. The speedy nature of this tank means it can take up important positions before super heavies and moderately fast tanks such as the T110E4 or E5.
When observing the map identify key map locations where you can abuse your armor, keep in mind the enemy tank composition and note which tanks will be in position to resist your movements. You’ll be able to out run some of them, but the WZ-111-5a and the 113 are especially quick and most mediums will also be able to contend your map positioning. Something you also need to keep in mind is that the top speed of this tank is very high at 60kph, however even with a strong ratio of 17 hp per ton, it's going to struggle to get to its top speed. That means this tank is somewhat slow at climbing hills, but very fast at driving down them. Knowing that your tank will have a speed boost when descending, makes your initial map location choice important. If you choose a high position, that means it may take extra time getting there, but once there you are well equipped for playing hull down, and you are also going to be quick at pushing down the hill, or conversely retreated off the hill and falling back to your team. As with other faster tanks, the mobility also means you will be capable of sweeping up extra damage at the end of matches if you manage to survive that long. Many times you’ll get an extra shot or 2 of damage simply because you were alive to take it.
Survivability
The best feature of this tank. The armor of the IS-7 is very forgiving. Let's start with the obvious - turret armor. Arguably the best turret armor in the game. In my 3 marking session with the IS-7 I only experienced one frontal turret penetration. It was a premium round from a Jpz E100 - and it hit the flattest part right next to my mantlet. This turret can bounce nearly all gold rounds. Its only real weakness is HE. One might be lead to believe with such outstanding armor that you could potentially complete your campaign missions for blocked damage. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, because the armor is so exceptional, practically nobody will bother shooting at you with anything other than HE when you are angling well.
Apart from the turret, the tank is also equipped with a pike nose hull. The armor isn’t all that thick, but the steep slope means that the effective armor is quite good. The downside is that if your opponent is able to catch one of the those plates relatively flat, it's an easy penetration for him.
The firepower of the IS-7 is a little bit of a struggle. The gun handling was buffed in December 2017, which helps make up for the 2 big weaknesses of the gun. It does have a very comfortable alpha at 490 damage, but its held back by its relatively long reload and abysmal gold penetration. The gun handling buffs help this by allowing you to get shots into weak spots easier. I alluded to it in the ammo load out, but HE ammo can help quite a bit. When you are facing off against hull down well armored tanks (ie: Super Conqueror, T110E3, other IS-7) My suggestion is to switch to HE and start smacking them down 100 HP at a time. Be careful to hide your hull, and only do this when you are confident that you can get your shot off without taking return damage. Eventually the damage will add up and that hull down monster will either begin to back off, or push harder. Slowly succumbing to small(ish) caliber HE damage can play mind games with your opponents. Obviously switch back to gold or regular ammo when opportunities present themselves. Since the gold ammo has such low penetration values, take notes of tanks you struggled to penetrate and look up their armor models on tanks.gg. Keep in mind that your penetration at 303 mm means that an RNG minimum roll is 223 mm. Many tanks such as the Type 4 and Type 5 will be a 50/50 chance of penetration with gold. Getting comfortable with the gun and knowing which ammo to use when is key to improving your damage per game.
Mobility
A bright spot for the IS-7 is its mobility. The speedy nature of this tank means it can take up important positions before super heavies and moderately fast tanks such as the T110E4 or E5.
When observing the map identify key map locations where you can abuse your armor, keep in mind the enemy tank composition and note which tanks will be in position to resist your movements. You’ll be able to out run some of them, but the WZ-111-5a and the 113 are especially quick and most mediums will also be able to contend your map positioning. Something you also need to keep in mind is that the top speed of this tank is very high at 60kph, however even with a strong ratio of 17 hp per ton, it's going to struggle to get to its top speed. That means this tank is somewhat slow at climbing hills, but very fast at driving down them. Knowing that your tank will have a speed boost when descending, makes your initial map location choice important. If you choose a high position, that means it may take extra time getting there, but once there you are well equipped for playing hull down, and you are also going to be quick at pushing down the hill, or conversely retreated off the hill and falling back to your team. As with other faster tanks, the mobility also means you will be capable of sweeping up extra damage at the end of matches if you manage to survive that long. Many times you’ll get an extra shot or 2 of damage simply because you were alive to take it.
Survivability
The best feature of this tank. The armor of the IS-7 is very forgiving. Let's start with the obvious - turret armor. Arguably the best turret armor in the game. In my 3 marking session with the IS-7 I only experienced one frontal turret penetration. It was a premium round from a Jpz E100 - and it hit the flattest part right next to my mantlet. This turret can bounce nearly all gold rounds. Its only real weakness is HE. One might be lead to believe with such outstanding armor that you could potentially complete your campaign missions for blocked damage. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, because the armor is so exceptional, practically nobody will bother shooting at you with anything other than HE when you are angling well.
Apart from the turret, the tank is also equipped with a pike nose hull. The armor isn’t all that thick, but the steep slope means that the effective armor is quite good. The downside is that if your opponent is able to catch one of the those plates relatively flat, it's an easy penetration for him.
Side scraping flattens your pike armor reducing it's effectiveness
The side armor is another big plus. Something that will likely be familiar to you if you ground through the obj 257. It has a sloped hull all along the side of the tank, along with a bit of spaced armor. This means that when you do make a mistake and you are caught in the open with the side of your tank exposed, its common to bounce and ricochet incoming rounds. This will bail you out when you make mistakes, but don’t rely on this armor to save you from bad plays. This could give you bad habits in matches. Always treat incoming rounds in the side of your tank as a mistake (unless it was a calculated risk) even if they do no damage.
An image of the V-shaped hull from the front. the black area is spaced armor
Images were pulled from tanks.gg
Play Style
Earning the triple MoE in the IS-7 is closely dependent your ability to work the armor profile to your advantage. There are several strategies you can employ to assist you. My suggestion is to seek a hull down location first. Your turret is nearly impervious to damage. Exploit a good hull down location until artillery reminds you that you are still mortal. If you see the enemy has 2 or more artillery, then It might be wise to avoid hull down locations if there is a more advantageous map position you can take. Many maps will provide hard cover large enough for side scraping or reverse side scraping.
Earning the triple MoE in the IS-7 is closely dependent your ability to work the armor profile to your advantage. There are several strategies you can employ to assist you. My suggestion is to seek a hull down location first. Your turret is nearly impervious to damage. Exploit a good hull down location until artillery reminds you that you are still mortal. If you see the enemy has 2 or more artillery, then It might be wise to avoid hull down locations if there is a more advantageous map position you can take. Many maps will provide hard cover large enough for side scraping or reverse side scraping.
Behold the Monster that is a hull down IS-7
You can do regular side scraping, but this will expose your upper front plate while also flattening it out for the enemy. For any tank firing heat (which has no normalization, but is extremely resistant to auto bouncing) it becomes a weak spot easy to exploit. The armor is still relatively strong at 250 mm effective and the exposure is still small. You expose a very small portion of this plate and rock forward and back to try and bait a shot into your side armor. Unless they are on top of you, the dispersion RNG should help you avoid damage. Even if you aren’t baiting shots this will still be effective against tanks that are of lower tier, or tanks with poor accuracy/firing from a distance. The real advantage of side scraping here is that it takes no time to set up, and you can employ the use of almost any hard cover.
Bait shots to the area inside the circle by short quick forward and reverse movements
The IS-7 is also capable of a reverse side scrape. The difficulty is knowing when to use this technique. The issues arise from the time it takes to turn your vehicle around, and the space you have available. Do not do this when there are many teammates around you. The space becomes overcrowded and you won’t be able to move to get shots, or you’ll end up exposing yourself too much. You’ll need to time it well, because you don’t want to be overrun by enemies by the time you are set up, and you don’t want to get all the way turned around when your team is pushing the flank. This ‘game sense’ is something you learn from experience. I suggest focusing on the mini map and doing your best to predict the enemies actions and let that drive your choice for reverse sidescraping. To give you an idea, I deployed a solid reverse side scrape once or twice every 20 matches or so. The idea of this technique is to send damage down range that cannot be returned. Do not bother doing this against targets that primarily shoot HE rounds (Type 5/4). Its OK to trade with small caliber guns firing HE rounds. If you can dish out 490 average damage and only take 100 damage in return, that’s a good trade. However that should be your last resort. Always exhaust your options for un-returnable fire before accepting a damage trade.
Correctly reverse side scraping makes the IS-7 nearly impervious
The next technique is another that may require some practice to begin to understand. This is all about maximizing your pike armor. To summarize the idea is to rotate your hull to maximize your armor profile by anticipating incoming fire, and baiting shots.
When you know you are about to be shot at make sure you rotate the plate that you believe the enemy is going to shoot at, away from them. If they are aiming at an upper plate turn your tank to angle the upper plate, rotating around can still bait shots at the lower plate and force ricochets. Despite it being a weak spot, it's still has OK armor, and for some one not shooting gold, a sharp angle could bounce incoming rounds.
Last bit of armor technique is the face hug! Only engage this activity in 1 on 1 situations. The reason for this is that your turret and upper plates are well armored. By driving directly at someone and pushing your hull against theirs, you essentially hide your lower plate from their view. Always keep your pike nose straight on towards the attacker's gun. You can still rotate away if you know which plate they are going to shoot at, but the idea is that even with low DPM you will be virtually undamaged by an enemy you are face hugging. Obviously this is situational and does not work against some tanks. Tanks that are taller can still hit your upper plate, and if you get close to them you flatten that armor out. Don’t face hug tanks like the Super Conqueror or E100 (who can hit your cupola), or HE tanks like Type 4/5s. If you are engaged in a face hug and attacked by a second enemy your best strategy here is to face hug the highest health tank and shoot at the other. Or face hug the highest DPM tank, and shoot at the other. The idea is that by face hugging one, you mostly prevent damage from that tank, while you finish off the other.
Moving on from armor, let's talk about the tank overall. Apart from strong positioning, the dispersion of the gun lends itself to engaging at close range. This tank is a front line brawler and you should use it that way. Never try to hold a flank by yourself, even as top tier. Your DPM can’t handle it. You do have some serious armor, and pose a big threat. When top tier bully those smaller tanks, and respect the same tiers opposite you. Try to avoid very heavily armored tanks if you can, and engage their flanks later in the battle. The glorious turret armor also makes the IS-7 ideal for spotting! This is why I run optics on this tank. You can peak ridges against anything that isn’t shooting HE and spot it with impunity. Make sure you are always looking for opportunities to exploit your strong view range and armor to help your weakly armored back line. You are a front line tank, take the fight to the enemy.
When you know you are about to be shot at make sure you rotate the plate that you believe the enemy is going to shoot at, away from them. If they are aiming at an upper plate turn your tank to angle the upper plate, rotating around can still bait shots at the lower plate and force ricochets. Despite it being a weak spot, it's still has OK armor, and for some one not shooting gold, a sharp angle could bounce incoming rounds.
Last bit of armor technique is the face hug! Only engage this activity in 1 on 1 situations. The reason for this is that your turret and upper plates are well armored. By driving directly at someone and pushing your hull against theirs, you essentially hide your lower plate from their view. Always keep your pike nose straight on towards the attacker's gun. You can still rotate away if you know which plate they are going to shoot at, but the idea is that even with low DPM you will be virtually undamaged by an enemy you are face hugging. Obviously this is situational and does not work against some tanks. Tanks that are taller can still hit your upper plate, and if you get close to them you flatten that armor out. Don’t face hug tanks like the Super Conqueror or E100 (who can hit your cupola), or HE tanks like Type 4/5s. If you are engaged in a face hug and attacked by a second enemy your best strategy here is to face hug the highest health tank and shoot at the other. Or face hug the highest DPM tank, and shoot at the other. The idea is that by face hugging one, you mostly prevent damage from that tank, while you finish off the other.
Moving on from armor, let's talk about the tank overall. Apart from strong positioning, the dispersion of the gun lends itself to engaging at close range. This tank is a front line brawler and you should use it that way. Never try to hold a flank by yourself, even as top tier. Your DPM can’t handle it. You do have some serious armor, and pose a big threat. When top tier bully those smaller tanks, and respect the same tiers opposite you. Try to avoid very heavily armored tanks if you can, and engage their flanks later in the battle. The glorious turret armor also makes the IS-7 ideal for spotting! This is why I run optics on this tank. You can peak ridges against anything that isn’t shooting HE and spot it with impunity. Make sure you are always looking for opportunities to exploit your strong view range and armor to help your weakly armored back line. You are a front line tank, take the fight to the enemy.
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Suggested Average Combined Damage for 3 Marks of Excellence
The expected combined damage for the IS-7, is around average compared to most tier 10s. As of the writing of this article for the NA server, to earn a 3rd MoE on the IS-7 you need a combined average damage of around 4250*. This means you’ll want to try and average your combined raw damage, and assisted damage to over 4.5K. Games that are between 4 and 4.5K will for the most part leave your MoE where it is (only changing up and down by minimal amounts). Anything less than 4K will lower your Mark, and anything above 4.5K will raise it. The higher above 4.5K the more it’ll raise. *Note that the average combined damage of the server is recalculated every day at server reset, and the numbers can be different by region. These expected values are based on the game balance, and players at the time that the mark was achieved. If that doesn't make any sense to you I suggest you review my article on How MoE Work. |
