STG

The STG is a tier 8 USSR medium. It has a strong rear mounted turret, weak hull armour, and great mobility. Its 122mm gun aims quick and has good alpha damage, and the tank has a high camo rating.

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

Armour

Drag slider right -> to view 225mm AP
Drag slider <- left to view 265mm APCR

Armour when flat and facing head-on:
Upper plate 140mm
Lower plate 160mm
Turret 245-370mm
Cupola 135mm

The side armour is shown here, but is not impressive. 45mm is not very useful even with the rear turret of the STG. The hull is very wide so sidescraping is not easy, and the side armour is just quite thin.

The best way to use the rear turret is to reverse around corners to shoot enemies, as it exposes less of the long hull compared to if you drove out in the forward direction (shown below).

Armour vs all tier 7-9 tanks: 
Against any tank that the STG can face, its hull armour is weak, and its turret armour is strong.

Other than high penetration TDs (like the ISU-152 or WZ-111G FT), all tanks in tier 7-9 will be unable to penetrate the turret with standard ammo. The tanks with the best chances to penetrate are tier 9 mediums and heavies that have 300mm+ penetration on APCR or HEAT.

Even though the turret is very strong, note that there is a fairly large hatch weakspot, easily penetrated by any tank.
(One more thing to note is that all the crew are in the turret. Shooting an STG in the front of the hull has no chance of injuring any crew.)

Gun

Mobility

The STG mounts a 122mm gun

-Alpha damage is 400 on AP, 340 on APCR, and 500 on HE.
-The reload time is 12.6s, giving the tank 1900 DPM.
-Penetration is 180mm on AP, 225mm on APCR, and 61mm on HE.
–Estimated aim time is 2.3/2.4s
–Base aim time is 1.1s, but it can get down to 0.90s.
-Dispersion is 0.362/0.326
–Gun Handling is 0.12/0.12/0.06, or 0.1/0.1/0.05 with Vertical Stabilizer.
-Gun depression is -5 degrees.

The STG’s gun is a strange mix of stats, DPM and penetration are very low, in fact the penetration is the lowest in tier 8. Gun handling is decent for its alpha, accuracy is quite good, and aim time is extremely good.

Overall the gun is quite accurate if using refined gun, as it aims fast with great dispersion. The alpha is good for making trades and hitting hard, but the penetration is very poor and you need to use the quick aim time to aim at weakpoints on enemy armour.

-Top speed is 50km/h forwards, and -20km/h in reverse
-Traverse speed is 68 deg/s on hard terrain, and 54.4 deg/s on medium terrain.
-In game acceleration rate is shown as 20.4 hp/t, it has strong 690hp engine for its 34 ton weight.
-Actual acceleration rate is 25.4 hp/t on hard terrain, and 20.4 hp/t on medium terrain.
–Terrain resistances are 0.8/1/1.6

While the STG doesn’t have the most impressive top speeds, it does have above average acceleration rate and good traverse speed, which make the STG quite mobile and able to easily move around the battlefield.

Equipment, provisions, & consumables

STG has no special consumables or provisions.

Gun Rammer:
The penetration of the STG is the worst in tier, however, that’s not to say that it needs calibrated shells. The STG actually has good enough aim time to reliably aim for weakpoints, and its quite rare for weakpoints to have more than 225mm of effective thickness. So if the tank can’t pen with premium ammo, it can still easily aim for weakpoints.

Calibrated shells is a bad option on the STG, as the STG has the lowest DPM of any cyclic-gun medium tank. With a gun rammer the DPM is 1900, for a 12.6s reload, you really can’t afford to make it any worse, so the gun rammer is an essential equipment piece on the STG.

Improved Assembly:
The hull is weak, weak enough that using enhanced armour would not make any difference to the armour. The turret is strong, strong enough that using enhanced armour to make it stronger would be overkill, as it can already bounce most premium ammo that shoots at it.
Use improved assembly, increasing the STG’s hitpoints from 1400 to 1484.

Refined Gun:
Refined gun is much more useful than vertical stabilizer on the STG, for the same reasons that it is on the T-34-3. The STG is a support medium, so sometimes it will play a role where it shoots across the map to support allies; it also has very very quick aim time, so fast that as soon as you stop moving, it only takes a second or two to be fully aimed; so for these 2 reasons, having a smaller aiming circle (refined gun) is much better than having better dispersion-on-move (vertical stabilizer).

Refined gun makes the STG more accurate in all situations where it stops to shoot, which it should always do, due to its terrible gun handling and long reload. If you don’t stop to shoot, you will miss.

Gameplay advice

The STG has a very similar gameplay to the T-34-3, and is also a is a support medium tank.

General gameplay:
STG is a support medium tank with a big gun, hence it plays almost like an active tank destroyer.

You should try to keep to the 2nd line, this is the next area of cover behind the frontline, and is great for the STG.
The STG’s long reload means the 2nd line provides the cover and distance it needs to safely reload, but the 2nd line position also isn’t too far from the frontline, so you can easily push forward to support allies if needed.

Due to this playstyle the STG can work on either flank, though the MT flank is still the best suited for it. STG struggles with low penetration, so in some cases it just can’t work well on the HT side, and even though it can trade damage, it has much less HP than heavies.

Try to use hulldown positions whenever possible, since the STG’s only armour is on its turret. If you want to use gun depression positions, reverse into position. Since the STG’s turret is rear mounted, driving forward into position only props your hull upwards (and thus props your gun upwards). Reversing up the hill/ridge means there’s less hull in front of your gun, allowing you to have more flexibility.
Doing this also means you can just run away faster if you have to.

Utilize camo rating:
The STG has one of the highest camo ratings of any medium tank in the game.

This can allow you to pull off some sneaky plays, such as using bushes to get spotting on enemies, taking ambush shots, or just relocating around the map.

This is a notable gameplay difference to the T-34-3, which has just terrible camo rating for a medium tank.

The lower penetration means that if it faces a very well armoured enemy like an E75, it has to rely on allies much more, or it needs to flank the enemy. While the T-34-3 can shoot high penetration HEAT, the STG only has low penetration APCR. 
Sometimes the best option is to shoot HE, get some splash damage, then run away.

Reverse around cover:
As stated in the armour section of this review, the STG cannot sidescrape effectively, as its sides are a very thin 45mm.

The best way to use the tank’s rear mounted turret is for exposing your armour. Due to the tank’s front being so long in front of the gun, driving out to take a shot exposes much more of your tank which enemies can shoot. This also means enemies can shoot you before you can even see them.

Reverse out backwards to take shots. Enemies will have to aim for a smaller target, and also won’t be able to get into cover without taking a shot in return.

---

The STG just plays a supporting medium role. Its low DPM and weak armour hold it back from being able to brawl with any other tier 8 tank, and its high alpha with great aim time make it very effective as a support tank to its allies. This tank thrives on being sneaky and flanking enemies to get its big alpha damage out.

Overall

Armour – 4.5/10
Gun – 5.5/10
Mobility – 8.5/10
Speed – 5/10

STG is overall a decent and fun tank.

Armour is strong on the turret, very weak on hull. Sides are easy to HE. Armour isn’t easy to use.
Gun has amazing aim time, high alpha, and decent accuracy; but low DPM, slow reload, & very low penetration. Gun depression is poor.
Mobility is great, with a strong engine, good acceleration rate, and good traverse speed. Reverse speed is average.
Speed is good at 50km/h.

The STG is just a rear-turreted, Soviet version of the Chinese MT line. There are a few differences here and there, but overall it plays just similarly to those tanks.
Its not really anything too special, but the tank can be quite fun due to its sneaky camo rating, low profile, good mobility, and high damage.

Is it worth getting?

The STG is worth getting for players who want a bit of a unique tank. It offers gameplay which isn’t really similar to many other tanks, and its quite a fun tank in that style of gameplay.

Its best to avoid this tank if you like playing brawling tanks or frontline tanks, as the STG is neither of those.

The STG is worth 6,000 gold. Its more fun to play than its premium competitor the T-34-3 due to its better mobility, HP, and gun handling, but its low penetration holds it back slightly in terms of being an effective tank.

Most recently sold for:

7,000 gold (full bundle) – October 2022
6,500 gold (Starting price), 5,000 gold (Final price) in Auction – August 2023
Luxury lounge reward – November 2023

Back to homepage