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Hmm, I am having trouble getting a 50% win ratio with this tank.  It just feels like I have little to no effect on the battle.

When I'm in high tier battles, I can get 9 hits and still only get 188 exp, because my shots do no damage even when I hit.

In low tier battles, the tanks are really fast and I miss them most of them - I have a lot of trouble leading shots on zigzagging tanks because they change directions 3 times in the time it takes for my shell to travel to their approximate location.

Even worse, my crew is at 96%, but I end up doing no damage to stuff even when my reticle is fully zoomed in, because the splash radius is so tiny.


So what do I do to win with this arty??  Some people like Linoleumz and Agentice seem to do great with it, but I am really struggling.  Garbad says arty is easy; my experience that it is anything but easy.


Thanks!

Arty has to rely on other tanks to get the win - all you can do is make it easier for them by dealing damage.

The Priest is the tank that's really suffering post-HE rework.

i have 43% win ratio with Hummel and get 380-400 exp (alverage per battle). non premmy

its hard to hit a tank in movement , try hit the stopped tanks everytime , M7 priest dont have a good pen and dmg , its really hard to earn a lots of exp in high tier battles.

Don't forget, it is really up to the teams that you are on.  It really isn't you, if they loose, so do you, keep trying though.  That is one reason why I sold all my
arty except the SU-26 and I am bout ready to do that.

Ok, check out this replay (fully kitted Priest with a 96% crew and rammer)....

http://dl.dropbox.co...casus.wotreplay

This is, IMHO, how most arty should be played.  As an arty driver, you have 3 basic tasks:

#1:  Support your tank columns.  Shoot enemies that they expose.  No, you can't kill bigger targets, but you can help damage them, and even a shot for 50 damage could make a difference.

#2:  Counter-battery fire.  As an arty driver, you should know the typical spots arty sets up.  Watch for tracers from those spots and return fire, even if you can't see who fired.  If your shell disappears without an explosion, you just got a hit.

#3:  Self defense.  Don't always expect your tanks to defend you.  Every once in a while, you're going to have to give a light tank a face full of HE at close range.

Remember, it's not about your kills, it's about supporting your team and doing all the damage you can.  You're not going to win the battle solo, but you can be a determining factor on whether or not your team wins the battle.

The real beauty of the M37 and Priest, ironically enough, is that they DON'T have a huge, high powered cannon.  

Shots that make a Grille, Wespe or Hummel pause and think, the Priest can happily just hammer out a shell and see what happens.  You've got tons of ammo, it's pretty cheap, and you reload quickly.  

Accept that you're a supporting gun only (unless you get lucky with a low-tier match), figure out where to shoot from to maximise side shots on the usual attack routes, and try to hit soft spots as best you can.  The Priest is actually a really fun arty piece to play.

(I'll admit, a few emergency HEAT shells do come in VERY handy, if that's an option for you!)

 ForcestormX, on Feb 25 2012 - 16:23, said:

 HOTA_CHATON, on Feb 25 2012 - 16:35, said:

Eh, I don't see how it's fundamentally different from a tank, aside from firing indirectly.  If it's a tier 5 game and I take out several of their tier 5 tanks to snatch a close win, I really do feel like I was the one of the people who got the win.  The difficulty is being able to lead the shots on moving tanks enough of the time.

 MN_Smurf, on Feb 26 2012 - 13:04, said:

Thank you for the replay, it's nice to see a good M37/Priest driver in action.  I couldn't find a lot of good arty replays, other than Garbad's "lol arty is so easy look at me pwn everything", which doesn't help me considering that I'm struggling with it.

What puzzles me, though is that you spent several minutes staring at an enemy's arty spot.  Even after you saw the tracers, you wouldn't fire very often at first - it seemed like you were trying hard to make your each shot land, and not making use of your full RoF.  Is it good to put that much emphasis on counter-battery rather than tank support?

 GearaDoga, on Feb 26 2012 - 19:17, said:

Good point, thanks.  I suppose I should start trying to take into account which side of the tank my shell will hit, rather than simply trying to hit at all.  Time to move on to more advanced aiming!

 Silty, on Feb 26 2012 - 20:21, said:

Yeah, to a certain point any hit is a good hit...  But there's a world of difference between slamming a shell into a KT's front glacis (he won't feel a thing) and dropping one onto his rear engine deck (solid damage, maybe engine damage, possibly even a fire!).

The horrible RNG on arty shots makes it tricky at times, but if you try to always consider the path your shells will take to get to that impact point rather than just the impact point itself, things get a bit easier.

First off the priest is hard to grind but if you can get to the m41 its worth it.

Some tips I can give to make it more bearable.

As a priest you should actually try to take out the mediums. You'll hardly do any damage to a heavy. Let the grilles deal with the heavies (there's a reason why tank companies prefer grilles over priest).

If you can counter battery. When you blind (tracer) counter battery you want to make your first shot count despite the rate of fire.
This is because if you miss odds are you will not find him again, because he'll be long gone.

Last time I checked there wasn't an "I" in team <-- yup, still not there.  Never had a Priest but still there's been many many battles where I've killed 5 of the enemy team in one of my artys and our team still managed to loose.  

 Silty, on Feb 26 2012 - 20:21, said:

Smart arty drivers relocate after every shot.  I was trying to figure out what kind of driver I was dealing with and what their pattern was.  Two shots from the same spot leads to a shot because they don't think anybody is looking.....and at that point in the battle, the center push had the most momentum.  My elimination of 2 of their arty before I shifted to the tanks closer to the bridge is part of what allowed that push to succeed and get the cap.

Well, I just realized that half the time, this thing doesn't even damage KVs on a direct hit!  That's complete BS, arty should at least be able to reliably damage heavies that are only one tier higher.

I just came out of a tier 5 game where 7 of my shots were direct hits, and I only got 279 exp despite winning.  Do you guys think I should stop even trying to damage KVs, and just let the rest of my team deal with them?

 donsatv, on Feb 27 2012 - 02:09, said:

I meant to express the belief that artillery can, in fact, turn the tide of a game.  Contrary to giving up and just damaging what you can, I believe an artillery should be actively working with the team to try and win the game for them, just like any other tank.  I'm just struggling to do this with the M7 Priest, in particular.

 MN_Smurf, on Feb 27 2012 - 03:47, said:

I'd think smart ones don't set up in the obvious spots myself.  I can't view your replay, but assuming what I've read; that SPG got two shots off (or more) before you acted.  In that time he could have swung a fight somewhere, all while you were watching for puffs of smoke.  I suppose I'm just not a fan of focusing on CB, but to each his own.  I'd just rather be putting rounds into peoples heads and making them seek cover.


My advice, with your aiming time being about the same as your reload time (with rammer and vents), plug away at lower tier tanks.  If you can put 7 rounds into 3 tanks and kill one, badly wound two others, that removes one or more guns from the fight.  Dinging the KV will not eliminate a threat, and alot of tanks can counter a KV's turrets traverse anyway.  Get the low hanging fruit, each tank removed of any tier is a set of eyes gone, and a gun removed.

 r2rknot, on Feb 28 2012 - 18:44, said:

I'd rephrase that as "I'd think smarter ones don't set up in the obvious spots".  As for the rest....the tanks didn't have any available shots on their arty.  I did.  That makes counterbattery a higher priority for me.  My tanks up the center were in a 3 on 2 situation.  I'll take those odds when I'm facing arty that I can kill in 1-2 shots.  As it was, I killed their Grille and Bison and ended up running off their Wespe after a near miss.  I then shifted fire and helped eliminate the tanks, without loosing one of my own.  I had two Wespes supporting the other column up the ice road.  IMO, it's better to send accurate, effective fire than just be spamming shells that you hope find a target.  Better to kill them where they stand than send them running to have to be killed later.

Sorry Silty, Tier 4 artillery is a gloomy tier. All except for the Grille, that is. M7P fires fast, but with its matchmaking, it can no longer really achieve the success M37 or Wespe can. Against tier 7 and 8, you fire tennis balls, you are lucky if you even do 5% to a heavy. Against a KV3 I have had a surprising amount of non damage direct hits, really. Against the KVII, sigh....I expect to do 1O%. Seriously, after the HE altering, 1O.5 is no longer a danger to the KVII even, other than its tracks. Splash is low too, meaning you need those direct hits. 0nly thing I can say is, at least it is not the SU5. SU5 has even lower damage than the 1O.5, and it is a 15cm for goodness sake. Its like the damn Bisons weapon. Its larger splash means nothing, because its damage is low to begin with. Even if you use its high Pen to do true damage, the damage it deals is silly. And adding insult to injury, its range is terrible, and it has a terrible load out of ammunition.

I do not know how I did fine with the SU5, I really do not. Its win rate was really low though, accuracy and kills were high. My M37 is currently doing well, but I doubt it carries over into the M7P. Trust me, if you want to do well in tier 4 arty, get a grille.

0h, and Garbad is right. Artillery is very easy. Even with the M7P, you will have those rounds where you are in tier 5. And you start doing massive damage to TDs especially. In direct fire, it is also very useful. BDR and T1H can be badly hurt still by the 1O.5, and M4 Shermans, PZIVs, StuH, SU85, M1O are horribly vulnerable from flank hits. Even in tier 6 battles, expect to see a lot of these targets. And that means doing lots of damage. Perhaps 1OOO a round. 0f couyrse that will have you acting as a bad** artillery, always attacking weak targets instead of supporting frontlines, but hey thats what heavy arty is for. Not the Priest.

0ne last thing, do not counter arty with the M7P. It may  seem accurate, but at 1OOO+m it is not, and that splash is terrible. Also, in counter battery fire the M7P has a disturbing tendency to not destroy other arties even in direct hits - I see S51, Panther Artillery, hummel, and M12 surviving 1O.5 hits all the time. Extremely fustrating.

Yeah, the M7 Priest is probably the second worst arty in the game (second to the SU-5 lolz).  If it's any consolation, the M41 is a great big barrel of fun.  Just think of that as the light at the end of the tunnel  

As for advice, all I can really think of is aim for weakly armored tanks like enemy arties and keep mobile (you're pretty fast compared to other arties, use that to your advantage).

 Dirizon, on Mar 01 2012 - 08:52, said:

The problem is that low-tier matches are very chaotic, and nobody ever stays lit up for the time it takes for my reticle to zoom in.  It actually takes longer for the reticle to zoom than for the gun to reload, even if you just shoot and don't move your reticle.  And it's necessary to do so, because the Priest only does damage on a direct hit.

So I keep getting tier 5 matches where I see a target, start zooming in on him, then.. ARGH! he disappeared.

Rinse, repeat!

I have crew in the high-90s, too..

I like my priest. But if there is one thing in it that makes a difference its the M2A1.
The fact that this gun goes ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE MAP means you will catch someone napping. Make them suffer for it.


Just remember that its firing arc is VERY LOW.This means that theses targets will have a larger shadow from cover to hide in.

Most of your shots with it are not going to land on top of your target, so much as come in from the side. When i aim i place the target about halfway between the closest edge of the recticle (to my spg) and the center of aim.  You will find better success this way.

Oh and before i forget. You can still use a gun laying drive / shell rammer combo with this tank.

My crew is at 98% so im still loaded before the gunner is Quite ready (though he is still pretty close)
With this gun thats about 8 rounds a minute.

Love that RoF now cause it only goes down hill from there.

I have had good luck with it,couple of topguns and it fires pretty fast..

Tier IV Artillery stands a chance of catching relative newbie artillery napping.  With the Priest, I sometimes don't even wait for a tracer before I fire into common camp areas, and never hesistate to lob a round if I do see a tracer.

With my S-51 (Tier VI), I find that it seems like 80% of artillery moves to avoid counter strikes, and it's less worth my time to find them than it is to focus more on helping a flank.  I'll still fire -1- shot to see if they do move, though.

My journey with the Priest started a long time ago, but due to frustration with it, I've got only 7,500xp towards the next SPG.  I started the S-51 after it, and am already 70,000xp towards the Object 212 (it helps to get a steady 800+xp per round)

I want to see if I can load that replay later and watch it through if it's good.  If you don't do anything I do differently, then I'll know the game just hates me.

I wonder how much 90%+ crew matters, too.  It seems like a lot of tanks 'get good' when the crew passes 90-95% skill.  My KV-1S used to bounce 80% of my AP shots, but now that my Crew is 93% trained, it seems like I'm penetrating with 80% of my shots.  Makes my head hurt.  

My Priest Crew is only 88% trained and it seems like I miss 75% of the time even with a fully aimed reticle and the target tank occupying the first half of that.