AMX 30 B

AMX 30 B is a tier 10 French medium tank. This vehicle sports a very impressive mobility profile with high acceleration, top speed, and traverse speed. It also features an incredible gun, good in all aspects, and a surprisingly decent armour profile for how fast this tank is.

1. Armour
2. Playing against an AMX 30 B
3. Gun
4. Mobility
5. Equipment, provisions, & consumables
6. Gameplay advice
7. Overall
8. Is it worth getting?
9. Most recently sold for:
10. Camo cost:

Armour

Drag slider right -> to view 250mm AP
Drag slider <- left to view 300mm HEAT

Flat ground facing head-on:
-Upper-upper plate 135mm, auto-ricochet to guns smaller than 121mm
-Upper plate 125-130mm
-Turret cheeks 180-245mm
-Gun mantlet 275-480mm
-Cupola 105-130mm

On flat ground:
In the images above, you can see the AMX 30B has 2 angles on its upper plate.

-The “upper-upper” plate is 40mm thick, so even though its an auto-ricochet, tanks with gun calibers that are at least 120.1mm can penetrate it (120mm or smaller will bounce). This is due to overmatch. 

-The upper plate, while only 130mm of effective thickness head-on, is very well angled at 65 degrees. This means that when the hull is turned enough (like shown above), it will also become an auto-ricochet. This cannot be overmatched by 122mm guns, and only the Jg.E100 and FV183 will be able to overmatch this.

Note that due to the way ammo works, HEAT and HE will be able to ignore these auto-ricochet angles. So if a tank has high-pen-HE (such as HEP or HESH), they will not fail to penetrate the upper plate.
The same goes for HEAT ammo, since both can go through 85 degrees of angled armour.

Hulldown:
The tank is actually surprisingly strong in hulldown, due to the aforementioned upper plates, and its large and strong gun mantlet.

However all ammo will easily penetrate the turret cheeks and the hatch on top, so always try to move back and fourth on a ridgeline so that its harder for enemies to hit the hatch or cheeks.

Due to the size of the gun mantlet, its much harder to hit weakpoints if the AMX 30B is further away.

Playing against an AMX 30 B

Commander cupola size:
Don’t be baited by the commander hatch, its smaller than it looks visually.

The very top part of this cupola is a visual element, so there is no hitbox there. The armour images above have this visual element cropped out so its not misleading for the actual cupola’s hitbox.

Note the image below:
The first image shows the visual model, with the full cupola.
The next image shows the AMX 30’s actual hitbox, with the spaced armour in pink/purple.
The final image shows the hitbox without spaced armour. The black areas on the cupola are where your shot can hit, penetrate, and come out the other side, dealing no damage.

Viewport spaced armour:
The viewports on the cupola are spaced armour, not actual armour. Its fully possible for you to hit the viewport spaced armour, with your shot going all the way through the cupola and out the other side, dealing 0 damage. Its best to try shoot under the viewports so that there is no chance of this happening.

If the AMX 30 B is using gun depression, then there’s little chance of this happening due to the angle change, and you can shoot the viewports and deal damage.

Utilize ammo types and gun caliber for the AMX 30’s upper plates:
Though its upper plates can bounce AP quite easily if they are angled or in hulldown, HEAT goes through with no problem, even if the tank is using its full 10 degrees of gun depression.

If the shot on the enemy AMX 30B is going to be a kill shot, or it may change the game if you miss/bounce, don’t hesitate to shoot HEAT through the upper plate of an AMX 30B. You would be very frustrated if the tank suddenly turns its hull and you bounce your AP or APCR shot and lose the game because of it.

If you aren’t in such a desperate situation though, just aim for the side of the tank or the lower plate. The upper plate may sometimes troll, but the 30B wasn’t designed to be very durable. The AMX 30 B also has very weak side armour, as long as you don’t hit the tracks, any tank can penetrate with HE.

Use HE:
AMX 30 B has no spaced armour on its hull sides, unlike the tier 9 AMX 30 1er Prot.

The side armour is fairly flat, and is penetrable with 45-56mm of HE penetration.

Gun

AMX 30 B mounts a 105mm gun

-Alpha damage is 350 on AP, 300 on HEAT, and 400 on HE
-It has a 5.9s reload, giving it 3563 DPM
-Penetration on AP is 250mm, HEAT is 295mm, and HE is 53mm.
–Estimated aim time is 2.8/3.1s
–Base aim time is 1.9s, but it can get down to 1.55s.
-Dispersion is 0.290/0.261
–Gun handling is 0.11/0.11/0.06, or 0.09/0.09/0.05 with Vertical Stabilizer.

This is an amazing gun, it lacks nothing. Penetration is good, alpha damage is good, DPM is very high for 350 alpha, and gun depression is great. The aim time, gun handling, and dispersion make this gun one of the most accurate and consistent tier 10 guns, only beaten by the Leopard 1 in its consistency and DPM.

Mobility

-Top speed is 62km/h forwards, and 23km/h in reverse
-Traverse speed is with 72 deg/s on hard terrain and 61.7 deg/s on medium.
-In game acceleration rate is shown as 23.8 hp/t, it has very strong 828hp engine for its 35 ton weight.
-Actual acceleration rate is 39.6 hp/t on hard terrain, and 33.9 hp/t on medium terrain.
-Ground resistances are 0.6/0.7/1

The AMX 30B is tied with the Leopard 1 for general mobility. Its acceleration and traverse are just as good, though it has less top speed to compensate for its increased armour. It makes the AMX 30 B aiming the most mobile and quickest of tier 10 mediums.

The 30B can easily accelerate to its top speed and stay there thanks to its very strong engine and traverse speed. While other MT (such as the Obj.140 or T-62A) may have slightly better acceleration or traverse, they can’t beat the 30B in an overall mobility profile.

Equipment, provisions, & consumables

AMX 30 B has no special provisions/consumables.

Gun Rammer/Calibrated Shells:
Either equipment choice can work on this tank. The tank has good enough reload time and DPM to easily support calibrated shells; and good enough accuracy/aim time to use a gun rammer and not struggle.

Calibrated shells increases penetration on AP from 250mm to 263mm, HEAT from 295mm to 325mm, and HE from 53mm to 58mm

Gun rammer increases the DPM from 3313 to 3563, and reload time from 6.3s down to 5.9s.

Improved Optics:
This will bring your view range up to a very healthy 307.8m. This will be much more useful to the AMX 30 B in comparison to using a camo net. This isn’t a tank that needs to have a high camo rating, and its base view range isn’t enough to drop out the improved optics.

Improved Assembly:
Though enhanced armour may stop 122mm guns from overmatching the upper-upper plate, using that piece of equipment would be quite pointless.
That upper-upper plate becomes almost hidden when using gun depression, so it will hardly be a weakness in that situation. Its a very small plate, so will be very hard to hit, and only become exposed if you actually show the hull (which isn’t something you always have to do when using gun depression or being hulldown.)
If on flat ground, an enemy with a 122mm gun can still shoot your “lower-upper plate”, or the lower plate/side armour. So enhancing armour to make the upper-upper plate stronger to 122mm guns isn’t the best choice.

The AMX 30B is not a tank with gameplay that relies on armour, so there isn’t any need to improve it. The better equipment choice here is definitely improved assembly, which improves the HP of this tank from 1800 to 1908.

Vertical Stabilizer/Refined Gun:
Both equipment choices work on this tank, so this choice is fully up to you. Which piece you take depends on the playstyle you want to use when playing this tank.

-Since the tank has great gun handling, you can get away with using refined gun; this would be if you want to play the tank quite laid back, and may need to snipe at enemies when you flank them or support your team from a distance.

-The tank also has incredible dispersion, so it will still be accurate at long distance if you decide use vertical stabilizer instead. The stabilizer supports a more active style of gameplay where you are sniping less often, and getting closer to enemies, brawling more, and constantly moving and repositioning. 

Gameplay advice

AMX 30 B’s gameplay is a bit of a unique mix between a Leopard 1 and an STB-1.
Its got some of the armour of the STB and most of the mobility of the Leopard, so it can use some of the tactics of each tank in its playstyle.

General gameplay:
You basically have 2 choices for gameplay, you can play either as a faster STB on the frontlines, or you can play more as a support tank on the flanks like the Leopard does. What’s really nice about the AMX 30B is that it can do both of these in a battle, whereas these other tanks are more limited in terms of their gameplay actions.

As a more frontline tank-
You should always be looking to use hulldown positions and take advantage of the great gun depression the AMX 30 has. Use peek-a-boo gameplay, so always stay hidden when you are reloading, or there are multiple guns aimed at you; but briefly expose your tank to shoot when enemies are distracted, or when you can trade effectively.

Unlike an STB, you can’t fully rely on the turret armour, so never sit still and try to avoid exposing the armour if you don’t have shots.

In a more supporting role-
Constantly be checking the map and enemy positions, check where can you take your tank to utilize the great gun. Look for an open flank, or an enemy you can isolate and take down. Use unexpected positions to get shots into the sides and rears of enemy tanks.

Still try to use hulldown positions whenever enemies aim at you, since outside of hulldown, you don’t have much armour at all. When playing as a support to other tanks on your team, always be using the mobility to get into good positions, never just stay in one location for too long if you don’t have shots.

Also as a support tank, you can use the great speed and view range (307.8m) to spot enemy tanks for your allies. This is also useful intel for you, as it tells you where which enemies are or are not, letting you position your tank more advantageously.

Utilize gun depression:
When using gun depression, you will bounce all AP and APCR ammo shots off the upper plate (unless its a Jg.E100 or FV183 shooting you). This is due to the great angle of the upper plates.
HEAT ammo types can easily penetrate the upper plate, as HEAT can ignore the auto-ricochet angle.

Note that while premium ammo can penetrate the gun mantlet area (as its 275mm thick), its not reliable. The mantlet is comprised of 2 fairly thick armour plates, and will still often be able to stop shots that hit there. Enemies also have to avoid hitting the mantlet edges, where its thicker.

Using the hull armour:
Shown in the armour images above, you can see the AMX 30B has some hull armour. Despite it looking red, its very hard to actually make use of this armour on flat ground.

The best way you can use this armour is to bait enemies when you poke around a corner, as often enemies would expect that on a tank with thin armour plates like the AMX 30 B, its not possible to bounce off. Enemies may just aim for the upper plate and shoot without realizing that its an auto-ricochet angle.

You can also turn the hull when driving the tank, as a moving target is harder to aim at weakpoints on; however note that it exposes the side armour. To get that armour to work on the upper plate, you have to severely over-angle the hull side.

Never sit still:
When you’re hulldown or using gun depression, always keep making small unpredictable movements, even when you’re reversing into cover. This makes it harder for enemies to aim for the weak turret cheeks or cupola, and there’s a higher chance of getting bounces. Even though it seems pointless when the cupola is that big, if you just sit still, enemies can hit your turret cheek weakpoints so much easier, and it takes no effort to aim.

You should also just never sit still on the map, always be looking for where you can relocate to if you’re currently in a stalemate, or look out for flanking oppurtunities.

Once you win a flank, or if you lose a flank and have to run away, you can use the great accuracy of the AMX 30B to snipe shots from a distance.
The AMX 30B has great accuracy and shell velocity, so you easily take shots from a flaking play or from a supporting position. If you can’t see any enemies, relocate and look for how you can support the team, either with cover fire from a flanking play, or scouting enemies.

Overall

Armour – 4.5/10
Gun – 9.5/10
Mobility – 10/10
Speed – 9.5/10

AMX 30 B is overall a great tank.

Armour is decent for this tank’s speed. Turret cheeks are weak, but gun mantlet and roof are strong. Upper plate has some armour. Very usable in hulldown, cannot sidescrape. HE/HESH protection is poor.
Gun has great alpha damage, reload time, DPM, and -10 gun depression. It has incredible accuracy, aim time, and gun handling.
Mobility is incredible, with high engine power, great acceleration, and great traverse speeds. Reverse speed is also great.
Speed is high, 62km/h.

Is it worth getting?

The AMX 30 B is absolutely worth getting. Its essentially the perfect combination of stats in a fast/mobile tank package. It has some armour, its got an incredible gun, and its speed and mobility are high.

This tank is worth getting for any player who likes faster tanks with a great gun, and still fairly decent armour in hulldown. Alternatively if you ever wished that the Leopard 1 had more armour, or the STB 1 had a more accurate/higher DPM gun with better speed, the AMX 30 B is exactly that. 

The AMX 30 B is worth 21,000 gold. Its an incredible tank with great capabilities. It essentially lacks nothing, as it has all 3 major aspects of a tank, usable armour, great gun, and great mobility. Its definitely not a tank for everyone, and not the easiest to play, as it has reliance on good positioning in gameplay.

Most recently sold for:

17,500 gold (Full bundle w/camo & attachment) – January 2022
12,500 gold (tank & equipment) – Black Friday November 2022
Blitzfair auction – December 2022
17,500 gold (Full bundle w/camo & attachment) – June 2023

Camo cost:

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