Ponyri: A First Glimpse That Could Change Tank Squad

It’s been a long drought since Steel Fury and T-34 vs Tiger. No sim has really captured the feel of the open Russian steppe since those two.

This week we saw the first in-game glimpse of Ponyri on the Tank Squad Discord. Ponyri isn’t out yet — this was an early test shot — but it already shows where Tank Squad needs to grow if it’s going to handle the steppe.

The Steppe in Reality

German Panzer III on the open steppe, September 1942 (Bundesarchiv). Endless horizon, no cover — this was the reality Tank Squad is trying to capture.

The Steppe in Tank Squad

 

First in-game glimpse of Ponyri in Tank Squad. At 1.8 km, the steppe demands more than short-range AI and corridor combat.

What the Dev Said

Robert [HQ] didn’t sugar-coat what Ponyri revealed in testing:

“we’re playing with Ponyri distances and we have to uplift the rest of the game for it, on such distances enemy AI is still pinpoint accurate after 1 shot”

“most of the time some of these hits just bounced off or did not penetrate but on this distance I was happy that I hit the tank, when AI is pinpoint accurate lot of systems do not work correctly, AI dispersion for their shots is mostly 100% accurate.”

“I can't hear any shots or Stuka dive at distances longer than 1.4 km… so there is lot to do”

“it might be that I'm just not used to what should or should not penetrate on these distances, for few years now I've been playing on much smaller distances where Tiger got through everything”

And on the camera:

“The third-person perspective (TPP) camera is not useful at all for this campaign. You can’t see without binoculars and good luck without unit markers.”

What Ponyri Is Exposing

Large, open 1.7–1.8 km sightlines are a stress test. They reveal things that corridor-style missions can hide:

  • AI accuracy → too perfect after the first shot.

  • Damage/penetration → hits land, but kill logic can be inconsistent at range.

  • Spotting/awareness → players struggle at distance, AI sees too well.

  • Audio range → gunfire and aircraft sounds cut off beyond ~1.4 km.

  • Camera/UX → TPP struggles; optics and teamwork are essential.

These aren’t flaws of Ponyri itself. They’re flaws Ponyri has exposed.

Where This Points

If the team really does “uplift the rest of the game” to meet Ponyri, Tank Squad shifts toward the sim many of us have been waiting for:

  • AI with human limits (dispersion, imperfect vision, reaction times).

  • Ballistics and damage that feel right in long-range duels.

  • Audio that carries across the steppe the way it should.

  • Gameplay centred on optics and unit cohesion rather than lone-wolf brawls.

End Game

If Ponyri forces these changes, Tank Squad could land in a very sweet spot:

Ponyri is just a glimpse, but it matters. You can’t fake the steppe. If Tank Squad rises to it, this could be the first step back to the kind of long-range, optics-driven, armour-feels-like-armour battlefield we’ve been missing since Steel Fury and T-34 vs Tiger.

If you’ve been waiting years for a true WW2 tank sim, Ponyri might be the first step in that direction. 


 

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