Pros and Cons
Pros:
- Most accurate artillery in its tier.
- High penetration AP rounds are viable option especially on low ranges (< 500 m)
- Artillery is fairly mobile, being only slightly slower than many mediums.
Cons:
- Shells travel on an extremely flat trajectory, making it difficult to hit targets behind cover and making this artillery piece very map-dependent. This also makes most shots hit frontal armor, not top armor, negating most damage.
- Horrible gun traverse
- Horrible gun arc
- Relatively high aim time for poor gun arc
Performance
Experienced players will quickly note that the Object 261 can't hit heavily armored tanks and some TD's. This is not because of the penetration or damage, but because of the angle at which the shells reach their targets. Most SPG's have low penetration, but since shells tend to hit the lightly-armored top of tanks, damage increases. With this SPG, shells will hit the heavily-armored front, or at a near-parallel angle to the top. Therefore, this SPG should be used to attack mediums, and not well-armored tanks.
Counter-battery is a death sentence to this SPG, and since the gun elevation restricts it from countering, relocation is key.