IS-2 Shielded

IS-2 Shielded is a tier 7 USSR heavy tank. It similar to other tier 7 IS tanks, but has much higher DPM with better accuracy, handling, and aim time on its 122mm gun. It has good mobility but fairly low speed, and fairly average armour.

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

Armour

(The IS-2 Shielded in the images is using Improved Assembly)

Drag slider right -> to view 180mm AP
Drag slider <- left to view 235mm APCR

When flat and facing head-on:
Upper plate 239-247mm
Mid & lower plate 130-135mm
Turret 140-200mm (360mm+ on edges)
Cupola 125mm

Spaced armour:
-Through extensive testing, the spaced armour of the upper plate was found to be able to withstand up to 237mm APCR penetration, but not 241mm APCR penetration.
-This essentially means that other than very few tier 7 HT and TD, the upper plate of the IS-2 Shielded cannot be penetrated by tier 7s, even when using premium ammo.
-Its also able to stand up to tier 8 tanks, however only to standard ammuntition. 

-Note that due to angling, the closer enemies are to your tank, the less angled it is, and the more likely they are to penetrate.

-As the spaced armour has a good distance from the base armour, enemy shells lose more penetration, making it more effective (even though its a very thin 5mm). See more about this here.

Note that even though the tank is covered in spaced armour, the only plate that is really actually useful is on the upper plate.
The other spaced armour sections are in rather irrelevant parts of the tank, especially as the IS-2 cannot sidescrape or angle.

Armour vs tier 6 tanks:
When facing lower tier enemies, the upper plate will bounce all ammo, and even most premium ammo. Very few tier 6 tanks have more than 237mm of premium penetration (which is what’s needed to penetrate the upper plate semi-reliably).

The turret weakpoint on the left side of the gun mantlet will be penetrable to most tanks, but some low penetration MT and LT will struggle to penetrate.

The cupola and lower plate are easily penetrable to all tanks.

VS tier 7:
Against tier 7 tanks, the upper plate again is very hard for most enemies to penetrate. Unless they have over roughly 237mm APCR, they won’t be able to reliably go through.

Due to the distance and the angle of the spaced armour, HEAT shells are quite unreliable against this, however they can work against the flatter screens on the sides.

All tier 7 tanks will be able to penetrate the left side turret weakpoint of the IS-2 Shielded, but lower penetration tanks will see a larger portion of red on the turret.

The hatch and lower plate are both easily penetrated by tier 7 standard ammunition.

VS tier 8:
Higher tier enemies will be able to penetrate the turret cheeks fairly easily due to high penetration, however if you keep the tank moving then enemies may miss and bounce off the angled edges.

Tier 8 tanks will still struggle against the upper plate of the IS-2 Shielded if only using standard ammo. Most enemies will need to shoot premium APCR to go through it, but there are a few high-penetration exceptions (such as French heavy tanks).

The weakpoints remain the same as with tier 6 and 7 tanks.

Gun

The IS-2 Shielded mounts a 122mm gun

-Alpha damage is 400 on AP, 340 on APCR, and 500 on HE
-It has a 11.4s reload, giving it 2111 DPM
-Penetration on AP is 170mm, APCR is 212mm, and HE is 61mm.
–Estimated aim time is 5.1/5.5s
–Base aim time is 3s, but it can get down to 2.44s.
-Dispersion is 0.380/0.342
–Gun handling is 0.2/0.2/0.16, or 0.17/0.17/0.14 with Vertical Stabilizer.
-Gun depression is -6 degrees

Overall this gun feels very nice when compared to the other 400 alpha guns in this tier. It has very good DPM, quite good accuracy, and much better aim time and gun handling than the competing tanks. Its only real downside is 5mm less penetration on AP and APCR, but this hardly noticeable in battle.

Compared to all heavy guns at this tier, this gun is ok. For its alpha its got quite a nice reload (making it great for damage trading), and when given the time to aim its fairly accurate. Overall its a good gun, not too amazing.

Mobility

-Top speed is 32km/h forwards, and -12km/h in reverse
-Traverse speed is 37.3 deg/s on hard terrain, and 31.1 deg/s on medium terrain.
-In game acceleration rate is shown as 15.9 hp/t, it has a very strong 737 horsepower engine for its 46 ton weight.
-Actual acceleration rate is 15.9 hp/t on hard terrain, and 13.2 hp/t on medium terrain.
–Terrain resistances are 1/1.2/1.5

The IS-2 Shielded is a very mobile heavy, however its limited by its speed. The top speed is fairly low, but the acceleration and traverse speed are both very good. This means the tank can very easily maintain its top speed on all terrain types and in all kinds of maneuvers, but it just can’t get long distances very quickly.

Equipment, provisions, & consumables

The IS-2 Shielded does not have any special provisions or consumables.

Gun Rammer:
Though the IS-2 Shielded has slightly below average penetration, its not so bad to an unusable level. The penetration is perfectly adequate for a tier 7 tank.

First play the tank with gun rammer, after maybe 5 to 10 battles, if you really feel like the penetration is holding you back from winning battles or dealing damage, then change to calibrated shells.

Gun rammer is what makes the IS-2 Shielded quite special, as its able to even out-reload and out-DPM tanks with the same kind of 400 alpha gun both in all tiers it faces, tier 6, 7, and 8.

Enhanced Gun Laying Drive:
Gun laying drive is essential on this tank due to its fairly poor base aim time. Though it is better than competing tanks in tier 7, its still not that good, and does really benefit from using the GLD. Supercharger won’t help this tank at all, since its usually fighting in close ranges (what’s the point of using supercharger if your aim time will be so long that you can’t hit anything at distance anyway?)

Improved Assembly:
Due to having such a strong upper plate, but weak lower plate and turret cheeks, the IS-2 Shielded doesn’t gain a noticeable advantage by using enhanced armour. Its better to use improved assembly to allow the tank to take more hits, due to its many weakpoints this is a lot more useful.

Improved assembly would take this tank’s great base HP of 1450 up to 1537, which is very good for a tier 7 heavy tank.

Vertical Stabilizer:
Due to the actually decent 0.380 dispersion of the IS-2 Shielded, and due to it being a frontline brawling heavy, refined gun would not benefit the tank’s playstyle.

Its far better to use vertical stabilizer, as the tank won’t often have the time to fully aim in, and when your tank can’t fully aim in, refined gun doesn’t benefit the tank. The stabilizer will help by reducing the amount of dispersion bloom when your tank moves, which is always helpful on an active and frontline heavy tank.

Gameplay advice

The IS-2 Shielded doesn’t really have any special playstyle, its very typical USSR heavy kind of gameplay. Its basically the same gameplay as any other tier 7 IS-type tank, just with a bit more emphasis on its DPM and damage trading.

General gameplay:
Basically you just need to take this tank to the heavy tank frontline, hide the lower plate, and let the gun deal damage.

Its armour should never be angled, and you need to stay with allies due to the fairly long reload of 11.4s. Despite this reload being 1.2s faster than any other tier 7 with 400 alpha, and 0.8s faster than any tier 8 heavy with 400 alpha, 11.4s is still a fairly long reload overall.

Try to avoid going to the medium flank, since even though your DPM is good for your alpha, mediums reload very quickly and will quite easily out-trade you if they play right. The limited top speed also means you reach the medium side quite late to the battle, which can make positioning hard if enemies have taken better positions.

Also note, the MT flank generally features more uneven terrain, which is unfavourable for your tank’s fairly limited -6 gun depression. Just keep to the heavy tank side of the map, the great DPM/alpha combination really shine when pitted against tanks with similar guns (heavies).

Hide the lower plate:
The front of the IS-2 Shielded has 3 weakpoints, the biggest of which is the lower plate. You should always look for positions where you can hide this behind cover, so that only the strong upper plate is showing.

Even though enemies can still aim for the hatch or the turret cheeks, both of these weakpoints require enemies to aim carefully to make sure they don’t miss or bounce. 
You can also throw enemies off by continually moving the tank sot hat these weakpoints are slightly harder to hit, but if the lower plate is exposed then its quite pointless, as the lower plate is such an easy weakpoint to hit.

Take time to aim:
The IS-2 Shielded has both very good base aim time and estimated aim time among the tier 7 heavies with 400 alpha, so you won’t have to aim for nearly as long as the most of the other tanks.
Since your tank does a fairly large hit of 400 alpha, it is better to take time and carefully aim rather than rush your shot and miss. The IS-2 Shielded’s DPM is based in its alpha, not rate of fire, make that alpha count by aiming and hitting.

Even though it has higher DPM than other 400 alpha guns, an 11.4s reload is still very significant for every missed shot.

Don’t go alone:
As with any IS series tank, the reload time is long, and the armour doesn’t hold up at all  when you’re surrounded by multiple enemies. Always stay with your team, or at least a few other allies, even if you think that the play they are making is wrong, or the side of the map they are going to is wrong.

Its always better to be on the wrong side of the map, but still alive and with a chance to win; rather than to be on the “correct side”, but dead to the enemy team. You are the only one who can actively influence whether you win the battle, if you die early, you’re fully entrusting the battle outcome to the rest of the team.

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Play the IS-2 Shielded as just a regular heavy tank, but account for its lesser gun depression, and the fact that you can’t angle the tank in any way.

Try to always take advantage of your tank’s high alpha damage and quicker reload to out-trade enemies, and use hulldown positions whenever possible.

Tank gameplay:

Overall

Armour – 7/10
Gun – 7/10
Mobility – 7.5/10
Speed – 3.5/10

IS-2 Shielded is overall a good tank.

Armour is very good on the upper plate, and the turret is strong but has multiple weakpoints. Amour not angle/sidescrape usable, HE/HESH protection is extremely high.
Gun has decent accuracy, handling, and penetration. Aim time is mediocre, gun depression is usable at -6 degrees. DPM & alpha damage are both very good.
Mobility is good, with a strong engine, good acceleration, and good traverse speed on both terrain types. Reverse speed is mediocre.
Speed is below average, 32km/h.

Is it worth getting?

The IS-2 Shielded is by far the most unique of the tier 7 IS tanks, and its also one of the strongest. This tank type itself isn’t the most exciting, but the IS-2 Shielded is different enough to make it worth considering over the others.

It just has a far better gun in all aspects of aim time, accuracy, gun handling, and DPM, and it only loses 5mm of penetration compared to the other IS tanks. On top of this its upper plate is also around 15mm more effective. It does have downsides, those being 2km worse speed in both directions, and a larger weakpoint on the left of the turret.

Considering all this, the IS-2 Shielded has some very nice advantages, comparatively losing quite little to compensate for them. Its much more interesting to play due to this, and just more enjoyable due to a more consistent and fast firing gun.

This tank of course won’t suit everyone, especially players who hate tanks with low speed, which the IS-2 Shielded does have. However overall its a fairly interesting and enjoyable tank with most players should be able to enjoy.

The IS-2 Shielded is worth 5,500 gold. Its a good tank, with a bit of a unique trait in its high DPM, high alpha combination.
It shouldn’t be understated, the IS-2 Shielded out-DPMs every single tier 6, 7, and 8 heavy tank with 400 alpha damage. That’s definitely not something to scoff at or overlook. Its armour is also good but nothing insane or OP, and its mobility is very good, though limited by top speed.

Most recently sold for:

Release in Mystery Certificates – November 2023
Free subscription – December 2023

Camo cost:

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