So I tanked a bit for the first time today (my own certed tank)...

I had about 5000 certs ready for it, and I dumped it all in my vanguard. Maxed Racer, AP with reload 4, Halbert reload 2, shield, and Auto-Repair.

I learned a few things:
1- Flashes now have more grip than tanks. I actually am considering drifting as a method to turn around corners with style.

2-It's way too easy to pad your k/d like this and it produces way too good result for literally no effort (standing with a tank column and shooting enemy tanks/infantry).

3-Literally the first time in the game I felt "safe". Like, I knew nothing could instagib me at that particular moment providing I had minimal awareness.

4-AV turrets are more of a joke than I thought. I simply stared at them and traded fire, if I use the shield I'll take nearly to no damage, without shield it's still an easy kill.

5-Having to manually start a reload when switching to gunner seat sucks (solo-vanguarding)

Overall it felt cheesy, but shooting aircrafts was really fun.

If you felt "safe" in a tank as per your definition of the term, you've never played a Sunderer.

you got a single Titan AP kill today and got killed by an Annhilator...
i see the cheese...

Tank a bit more, this is EXACTLY what I thought when I first started tanking.

Just wait until you're exposed to Tank Buster Libs, C4 fairies, Vortex MAXes, Lancer nests, Tank mines goddamn EVERYWHERE (especially in water on Amerish and Hossin), cloaked Flashes with Fury and a HA on the back sneaking up behind you, waiting for you to be near death or to drop your shield just to finish you off, and best off all, Harrassers/Lightnings/other MBTs charging at you when you've out-gunned them so that their tank shell falls on your Vanguard and kills it. (Oh, and considering you drive a Vanguard, you don't have to worry about ******* RAVENS)

Still, it's all worth it though because tanking is still the greatest fun you can have in PS2.

This is why you don't join tank columns. It's massively dull.

Go rampage about solo behind enemy lines. You'll never feel safe again.

This is why it never good to listen to threads who open up with, "I had one session in/with X vehicle/weapon, and now I'm an expert."

Ew you sat in a tank column? How boring.

This thread is bs. I was going to elaborate but there's no reason to.

Klypto: Vanguard kills: 32k

Nice farm, man. Try to fly sometimes. I'm stretching here to reply to your comment since you didn't elaborate ..

AP tanking you pay up pretty heavily with Kills Per Minute for higher KDR and Insane SPM.

You can get 4x+ more KPM on foot with decent SPM and far less downtime.

I'm not sure what to take from this. I'm not a stat chaser...

Dear Jawarisin, you basically just said "I was in a Tank Zerg and it went well". This is not how most of the tank battles go.

have you ever looked at the insane amount of kills ESF farmers get?

Also, I see he doesn't just kill infantry, except on the HE and HEAT he gets about 1 vehicle kill per 1,5 infantry kills. That's pretty good and shows that he's a tank hunter rather than a Farmer, as it takes a ton more shots to kill vehicles than it does infantry, especially if you are good with the AP canon.

So I'm not sure what you are getting at, the fact that he's a dedicated tanker, or that he's got great stats? If you add the hours of your 3 accounts and look at the time he spent in the Vanguard, you actually see that you aren't that far behind in kills on your infantry for instance if the times were equal. This guy spend an aweful lot of time in a Vanguard for the total time he played, you spend an aweful lot of time in ESF's for the time you played. I don't really see a big difference other than that Klypto seems to have the hallmarks of a Tank Hunter rather than an HE infantry farmer. And Tank Hunting is a much more risky and tough business.

And alligators can fly.

I can see your random no-proof fact. Show me any database that is up to date that says 1 titan AP kill

AP Vanguard is hard work... Takes effort and dedication to the cause...

The stats just reflect it and are not the aim of the pain you endure doing it.

1. Drifting in Vanguard is a way of life.
2. Sitting with a zerg playing wack-a-mole is fairly easy. Can lead to good KDR, but KPM isn't going to be that great unless you find a real good farm and SPM will be crap unless you go actually find vehicles to fight. Have fun with that; it bores the snot out of me, If that's all you plan on doing you kinda wasted Certs on AP though and could have gotten away with HEAT..
3. Again rolling with the zerg does lead to a feeling of safeness. Don't let your guard down. You can be in the middle of 150 friendlies but don't expect them to look out for you. LAs and particularly people whose feelings you hurt by killing them will come up with VERY creative ways to c4 you. While you may feel safe with the click of a button you can be dead. The real challenge and danger comes in going behind enemy lines or attacking heavily defended sunderer's on your own.
4. In a 1v1 fight trading shots they are pretty much useless. With a gunner it's even worse, but they are extremely effective when used situationally or as a cog in larger fights. They also produce devastating results when used for suprise attacks. Boring, free, stationary base turrets shouldn't IMO really be a threat in a 1v1 versus a tank someone spent resources on and found a gunner for.
5. Get a gunner. ESF weapons should share the same trait. No reloads when you switch Kinda BS that they can already maintain fire at all times from 2 different weapons. Particularly annoying with hornet users who switch to nose gun constantly while their hornets reload.

Your TDLR essentially says tanks are cheesy and boring. I hate the word cheesy because its a catch-all buzzword used for 2 reason. 1. To pad the users ego and make others become impressed that what they were doing was so easy that it felt cheesy. Or 2. As a general term to describe something that is OP or to easy to use. I'm actually intrigued as to why an experienced player would walk away with that second feeling. Care to elaborate on your take away? Do you intend on continuing to tank?

So nicely asked

Well, as I said, I JUST dumped 5000 certs in my vanguard, so I'll definitely keep tanking and try out a few new things. I can definetly see myself use it when it's half off, or when I just want to relax. I know I am hated by a lot of tankers/libbers, but I didn't really get any problem on that side yet.

Well, actually, I used the tank a few occasions, My first one was on Hossin, and it went fairly well. I killed a few lightnings, a gal or two, a prowler, a few base turrets, a sunderer and, of course, infantry. I hadn't expected to do this well in a tank at first. I did miss systematically all my shots on ESFs (except one!) but that was fun and challenging.

I think what the problem was is that everything is "slow" on the ground. The odds of me missing an AP shot on an enemy tank is nearly non-existant once I figured the correct height (for distance), they can't move fast enough to throw my aim off really (unless we're talking really really long distance, but I haven't done any of that yet).
I didn't feel like infantry had a real chance against me, I mean all it take was 1 hit and they died, the rockets didn't do THAT much damage and I have the vanguard shield to fall back on. I haven't lost a tank vs tank engagement yet although I did have to use the vanguard shield a few times.
My score per hour wasn't the best since I was following a zerg, but I assume it's better than what an average player can expect for doing anything else (~30k/hour un-boosted/not all access). My k/d went up quite fast too. The second time I used it was on indar, I pulled a few from Tawrich tech plant and had good success here again (~50 certs per vanguard).

All in all, it just felt too easy. When I'm playing on infantry, I can get out-numbered, or there's plenty of things that can hit me. I have to try to get headshots, and anything else infantry does. It's also kind of "the basic" state. When I'm flying, I actually have to make efforts to move around, get a good angle. And god forbid if I'm daltoning; then I put my try-hard face on (which doesn't help) and fail miserably time after time, slowly getting better.

Tanking on the other end, was just slower-paced overall. It wasn't hard to land the hits and staying alive was simply about being a little conservative. And I know once I get the hang of the AP shell good enough that I can hit ESF's more reliably, it will get even better.

So yeah, I think your second definition fit perfectly. I didn't feel like it was any hard nor like there was any real challenge to it (except hitting aircrafts) but it gave a great k/d and a decent score per hour. All of that for the minimal effort of standing not too far from friendlies and shooting whatever I saw. I don't see it as "overpowered", because a tank is supposed to be just that; but it definitely felt like I was cheesing my way through.

https://www.planetside2.com/players/#!/5428147970871342881/killboard/?view=timeline&filter=kills
march 29 4:05
single Titan AP kill and outside of that only heavy, infil and aircraft

Yeah... that was my most recent one, that I pulled behind an enemy tank/AA nest above broken arch road (I pulled from vanu archive (flew there)). We killed a prowler, and then we slipped down to hill in full view of a bunch of them that shot us. That's literally the only "bad" run I've had.

But by your logic, you don't have more than 100 kills on your account, because that's all I can see on your recent kills (do you see where this is flawed?)

I guess I'm better adressing this right now before it gets out of hand. When I was on hossin, I was literally the only tank attacking the base (well we had a friendly sundy with infantry pouring out). I went around.

On indar, you could say that the zerg formed around me. I was the firs there with my vanguard. After 2 or so ressupply, I was joined by a repair sundy. And then slowly and slowly, more people pulled tanks. But I've had solo runs also. Though granted, I didn't run half across the map in vanguard alone.

It went well both with and without the zerg. I just didn't feel like it was such an issue/need to precise. Guess I was wrong. Sorry, I should of said so earlier.

The DA stats site hasn't even tracked your Vanguard stats yet, this usually means there isn't enough data for the site to make any sort of judgment or meaningful stats from.

http://stats.dasanfall.com/ps2/player/JawarisinNC

The Titan AP also doesn't even show up in your list of weapons, likely because you don't have enough kills with it yet. Your weapon with the least amount of kills there is the infantry Frag with 85 kills total. Lets give you the benefit of the doubt here, and assume that your Titan AP has in fact 84 total kills. Would you pick up an infantry weapon, get 84 kills with it, and then consider yourself an expert on its usage? Should your opinion on the balance state of that weapon be considered valid? But we're not even talking about the balance state of a single infantry weapon in a sea of other infantry weapons, you are making a critique about a type of vehicle, which is a massive game aspect with a handful of its own weapons, gear, and playstyles.

You should feel bad.

I think tanks are only actually cheesy when youre pulling an infiltrator with stalker cloak and an HE lightning/mbt and are shelling infantry or something similar.

Thats not to say i wont ***** at myself for a couple minutes when i get hit by a p120 AP from 150m away, and people complain about magriders being sniper tanks.