Gun types

In game there are 3 officially recognized gun types: Cyclic, Autoloader, and Auto-reloader.

However within these types there are some guns which differ from the “original definition” of that gun, either with different stats or a different way they are played.

Regular / Cyclic guns

Regular / cyclic guns are the most common guns in the game. These are guns which reload each shot one-by-one and have no magazine or special feature.

Example: T-22 medium
This tank shoots in a regular cycle:
5.3s reload, shoot, 5.3s reload, shoot, 5.3s reload, shoot, etc.

Autoloader

Autoloader guns are guns with a magazine. This means that the tank has a long reload, but is able to save up its damage and shoot out its shells in quick succession.

To start reloading in an autoloader, you have to either:
1 – Empty the magazine by shooting all shells at an enemy. Don’t shoot shells to reload if there are no enemies, use the manual reload to save your ammo.
2 – Manually reload. On PC the default key is “C”, on mobile devices, you have to double tap the ammunition type you currently have loaded (so if you have 1 AP shell left in your magazine, double tap the AP shell in the ammo selection on the right side of the screen).

Example: T57 Heavy
Magazine reload: 18.6s
Intra-clip reload: 2.5s
Time for a full cycle: 23.6s

-A full cycle is how autoloader DPM is calculated. It is the magazine reload added onto the unload time for the magazine. In this case, 18.6 + 2.5 + 2.5 = 23.6.
-Even though the T57 has 3 shells, you only calculate 2 intra clips, this is because you do not have an intra-clip reload before you shoot the first shell. It is intra-clip, so its the within the clip.

Regular autoloaders play by unloading their full clip (usually into just 1 enemy), then hiding and reloading till they have a full clip again.

Burst-fire autoloaders

Burst-fire autoloaders are tanks which have a gun where you click once, and the gun fires multiple shots automatically. The burst cannot be interrupted or stopped, tanks with multiple bursts can manually reload just like autoloaders, some tanks only have 1 burst (like Helsing or Annihilator).

Burst fire autoloaders have a limited range, their shells cannot travel past 400 meters. If you shoot at an enemy that’s 401m away, the shells will disappear just before hitting the target.

Example: Covenanter
Total magazine capacity is 4 shells of 55 damage, in game this is shown as “shots per magazine: 2, shells per shot: 2”.
Each time you press the button to shoot, the gun fires 2 shells, giving it a total of 2 bursts, each burst doing 110 damage in 2 shots of 55.

Many lower tier tanks have this type of gun, tanks such as the Leopard, MT-25 (stock autoloader), all cruiser tanks, T2 Light, T7 Car, Luchs, all Panzer II tanks, etc.

Example: Helsing & Annihilator
These 2 are different to low tier burst-fire autoloaders, as these tanks only have 1 burst.

Helsing has a magazine capacity of 2 shells of 200 damage. Its “intra clip reload” is actually the time between each shot within the burst, in this case 0.25s.
Each time you “shoot”, the gun will fire 2 shells automatically, giving it one burst of 400.

Annihilator has a magazine capacity of 3 shells of 210 damage. Its “intra clip reload” is 0.33s.
Each time you “shoot”, the gun will fire 3 shells automatically, giving it one burst of 630.

Increased DPM Autoloaders

Generally autoloaders are not calculated based on their DPM-while-unloading (which is the damage per minute of the intra clip reload, not accounting for the magazine reload), however, due to the nature of this type of autoloading gun, calculating it by its intra-clip DPM is actually justified.

Increased DPM autoloaders use the same gun system as autoloaders, but instead of a long magazine reload and short intra-clip reload, increased DPM autoloaders have a long intra-clip reload, hence why their intra-clip DPM matters more than on other autoloaders.

Examples of this tank are tanks like the T28 Defender and IS-3 Defender, both have an intra-clip reload of over 6.5s, but both also have a magazine reload of over 20s.

The long magazine reload is what sets these tanks apart from the M-IV-Y, which is an “adrenaline autoloader”.

Increased DPM autoloaders usually can’t unload their full clip into just one enemy, as they have such a long unload time (15s for the IS-3 Defender, 13s for the T28 Defender), often these tanks play like tanks with cyclic guns, but increased DPM.
These tanks keep the same trait of needing to hide while they reload.

Adrenaline Autoloader

The adrenaline autoloader a sub-type to the increased DPM autoloader.

The main difference that is its magazine reload is extremely short, allowing the tank to be extremely flexible. This flexible magazine reload allows the tank to basically have a rechargeable adrenaline consumable built into the gun.
Given that the player reloads the magazine in the right situations, you can always have increased DPM over your enemies, just like the DPM boost that the adrenaline consumable gives.

There is only one “adrenaline autoloader” currently in game, and that is the M-IV-Y.

The adrenaline autoloader is one of the most versatile gun types in game, due to its ability to basically always have increased DPM (just like the adrenaline consumable gives), given that the player times its reload well. This is explained in-depth in the M-IV-Y review.

Adrenaline autoloaders play completely differently to other autoloaders. Its hard to explain quickly and simply, so check out how to use this gun system in the M-IV-Y review.

Auto-reloader

Auto-reloader guns take the best of both cyclic guns and autoloader guns, and combine it into one gun system.

Auto-reloaders have a magazine, but they reload each shell one-by-one. The benefits of this are that you can shoot even when the magazine is not fully loaded, and you can start to reload without having to empty the magazine fully.

Auto-reloader shells take longer and longer to reload, the more you shoot the magazine.

Example: Kranvagn
1st shell reloaded into magazine: 12.2s (no intra clip)
2nd shell reloaded into magazine: 11.6s (8.6s + 3s intra clip)
3rd shell reloaded into magazine: 10.7 (7.7s +3s intra clip)

1st shell loaded into magazine is the first shell that your tank will reload when the battle starts. 3rd shell into magazine is the first shell you shoot when the magazine is fully reloaded.

In “regular” auto-reloader, you want to try and keep shooting only that 3rd shell, as the 3rd shell has the quickest reload, thus the highest DPM.

Maximizing the gun system:
The best way to use the DPM is to shoot only the 3rd shell with the highest DPM, then when the enemies is within your full clip potential, you unload the whole magazine. This is the quickest way to take out an enemy, and is most effective when in a 1v1.

Example: Kranvagn facing against a T110E5.
For convenience of the example, the E5 has only 2300 HP.

The Kranvagn should shoot only the 3rd shell, the one with a 10.7s reload. The Kranvagn would need to shoot this 3rd shell 3 times and then it could burst out its magazine to kill the E5.

The T110E5 would start with 2300 HP, its maximum health when unequipped (just for example).
After the 1st shot, E5 HP is down to 1900.
After a 10.7s reload, Kranvagn shoots again, E5 down is to 1500 HP
After another 10.7s reload, the E5 would be down to 1100 HP
After another 10.7s* reload, the Kranvagn shoots its whole magazine, killing the E5.

*At this reload, the Kranvagn would again be back to its full magazine. The magazine does 1200 damage in 3 x 400 damage, enough to kill the E5 in a single 6s burst.

Though it may seem like a long time and a slow engagement for a tank with an automatically loading gun, this is the way to utilize the DPM to its maximum capacity. Also note that the Kranvagn is the lowest DPM tier 10 heavy.
In this situation it was able to do a potential of 2400 damage in 38.1s, just for holding its shells and not unloading the whole magazine at first.
If the Kranvagn unloaded the magazine first, and then just fired the 1st shell upon reload, it would have taken 42.6s to deal the same damage. (When your DPM is as low as the Kranvagn, that’s a significant difference)

Of course, you can’t always have this perfect situation, sometimes you may not have the chance to do this, and it may just be better to unload and run like an autoloader (though, do consider how much time it would take to fully reload), and sometimes you won’t get to unload the full magazine; every situation is different.

Inverse Auto-reloader

Inverse auto-reloaders keep the same gun system of regular auto-reloaders, the difference is that inverse auto-reloaders have shorter and shorter reloads the more that they unload.

The inverse auto-reloader is the most flexible gun type in the game, due to it being able to fully unload the magazine with no penalty. Unlike regular auto-reloaders, inverse ones have the best DPM when their magazine is empty.

Inverse auto-reloader shells take less and less time to reload, the more you shoot the magazine.

Example: Progetto 46
1st shell reloaded into magazine: 6.2s
2nd shell reloaded into magazine: 7.4s (4.9s + 2.5s intra clip)
3rd shell reloaded into magazine: 7.4s (4.9s + 2.5s intra clip)

1st shell loaded into magazine is the first shell that your tank will reload when the battle starts. 3rd shell into magazine is the first shell you shoot when the magazine is fully reloaded.

With inverse auto-reloaders, you can just shoot the gun whenever and at whichever target. These guns have no penalty for using their magazine, as their best DPM is actually when the magazine is already empty.

Reserve Shell “mechanic”

The reserve shell is not really a game mechanic, its really just a regular auto-reloader, but with an increased reload on its 1st shell in the magazine.
The first few shells in the magazine have a reasonable reload time, but the last shell has a very long reload (generally over 20s). This long reload is why WG calls it a “reserve”, as you are not meant to fire the shell in most usual circumstances.

So far the only tanks with this “mechanic” are regular auto-reloaders, so their reload gradually gets longer and longer the more shells they shoot, and then the final shell has a significantly longer reload. There are no inverse auto-reloaders with a “reserve shell”.

Example: Carro 45t
1st shell reloaded into magazine: 20.4s (this is the reserve shell)
2nd shell reloaded into magazine: 10.6s (7.1s + 3.5s intra clip)
3rd shell reloaded into magazine: 9.2s (5.7s + 3.5s intra clip)
4th shell reloaded into magazine: 8.0s (4.5s + 3.5s intra clip)

Tanks with the reserve shell “mechanic” just play as regular autoloaders, firing only 1 shot to maintain the best DPM, but unloading on the enemy when they are low enough HP, or its safe to do so.

Tanks with this mechanic have an added caveat with that reserve shell due to how much longer it takes to reload.
You have to really question, is it worth spending 20-30s just to have 2 shells in the magazine again? (Reloading for 20s just to shoot that 1 reserve shell is illogical, never do this).
Also consider that for the magazine to go from empty to full can take up to 48s (depending which tank you use).

Some tanks with this mechanic are: Bisonte C45, tier 7-10 tanks of the Minotauro tree, and Carro 45t.

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