M5A1 Stuart Guide

General info:

M5A1 Stuart is unlocked from Type 2597 Chi-Ha, costs 3200 experience to research and 143000 credits to purchase.

Crew:

M5A1 has 4 crew members:
-Commander (working as a second loader)
-Gunner (working as a main loader)
-Driver
-Radio Operator

It is important to note that secondary qualification of both commander and gunner is loader. This means that if either of them is injured the reload speed will suffer as the tank needs them both to maintain it's stated rate of fire.

The tank is considered to be a "scout" and thus has a special match maker chart. It will see tanks from tier 3 all they way to tier 8. Ending up in high tier battle is a challenge on its own, even with elite crew with few secondary skills and it is certainly a very hostile place for any player using stock (50% skill) crew. Because of that it is a good idea to invest some silver and train your crew to 75%. If you can't train them all then at least train the gunner and driver as this at least will give you better fighting chance in lower tier battles.

If you happen to have some experienced crew ready for transfer or you have played the tank long enough to unlock secondary skills and you're wondering what to choose then here's my recommendation:

Basic skills:
Commander: sixth sense, camouflage
Gunner: camouflage, snap shot
Driver: camouflage, off-road driving
Radio operator: camouflage, situational awareness

I have called them "basic skills" as it is relatively easy to train the first secondary skill and start another. Camouflage is very important for all crew members. It helps you to stay unseen. At lower tiers, where tanks don't have too good view range and many players drive tanks without extra modules and with inexperienced crews it is easy to outmanoeuvre enemy while remaining hidden or even hide in a bush and snipe without being spotted. At higher tier battles the speed and camouflage are your only defences and the less you expose your tank to the enemy the better.

Sixth sense for commander helps a lot and often makes a difference between life and death. In low tier engagements it will help you to estimate how boldly can you act based on the knowledge whether you've been spotted or not. On the other hand in high tier encounters, especially if you're "ninja scouting" (standing still in a bush without firing weapons and only detecting enemies for your team to shoot at) it will be a clear sign to "get the hell out of here".
A note about sixth sense: It's a perk, meaning you will need 100% (fully trained) for this perk to start working. It is not very efficient to drive your tank with a partially trained sixth sense and you can use a workaround. Take camouflage as the first secondary skill and train it all the way up. When you get to your second secondary skill choose another one (mentor or recon are good picks) and train it up to around 40%. Then you can drop skills for credits. You will lose some experience but you should have enough for one 100% skill. Chose sixth sense (it will be fully trained by then) and then chose camouflage again to start training it from scratch.

Gunners snap shot will help you aim quicker in the situations where you need to fight and since M5A1 is a decent damage dealer it may mean often.

Off-road driving for driver will generally increase tank's mobility and it's the mobility you will rely on to get where you're needed or run away from the trouble. Most noticeable will be increase in acceleration but turning at high speeds will improve as well.

Since radio operator doesn't have all that useful skills the situational awareness is the best pick. It will give you slight view range boost which may come in handy if you manage to spot enemy before he spots you.

Advanced skills:
If you really like M5A1 and you play with it a lot you will eventually get enough experience for 3rd secondary skill. After unlocking your 3rd one I would recommend resetting skills for silver (just as with camouflage and sixth sense for commander) and assigning Brothers in Arms for ALL crew members as the first skill and then reassign remaining skills just like the basic ones. Brothers in Arms perk will slightly improve all aspects of the tank but it will work only if all your crew members have it trained to 100%.
Getting to the 4th secondary skill takes a lot of time, effort and battles played. By that time you will most likely be able to write tutorials on your own! You will know exactly what other skills you need by then

Mobility:

M5A1 is starts out with 296 horse power engine which is enough to move around but it doesn't give the tank the agility it needs. Second engine is a massive improvement as it gives 400 horse power. It is also few kg lighter.
Since you will need to upgrade suspension to be able to mount all modules you should do it regardless of other benefits. However the upgrade gives you a bit better hull traverse and terrain passability (determining how well the tank moves over difficult, boggy terrain).
With both engine and tracks upgraded the tank gains decent mobility and it's rather easy to get near to it's impressive maximum speed of 64.4 km/h. It is also easy to make sharp turns and the tank doesn't lose too much speed when manoeuvring.
Taking both speed and agility the M5A1 is one of the most mobile tier 4 scouts, beaten only by T-50.

Armour:

The armour is nearly non existent on this tank. The hull has up to 28mm and while the front is somewhat sloped it will struggle to stop any shells, even from low tier low penetration guns. The upgraded turret is somewhat better with 44mm in the front and 31mm on sides but it won't be enough to stop shells reliably either.
In low tier battles you should be avoiding any brawling with tanks that use auto-cannons as they will damage you badly or shred you to pieces straight away. Also tanks with larger calibre guns will have a good chance to penetrate your armour with High Explosive shells dealing great amount of damage and causing multiple critical damages.
With that in mind, as stated before, your best armour is your mobility and staying out of sight.

The tank has 310 hit points with stock turret and 340 with the upgraded one. It's roughly on par with it's competitors from other nations.

Armament:

The selection is very narrow as the tank can use only two guns.
The 37 mm M6 offers rather good accuracy (0.42), good rate of fire (26 rpm) and quick aim time (1.7s) but the damage (40) and penetration, even with gold ammo (56/78), are really on the weaker side.
The second gun, 47 mm Gun Type 1, is a huge improvement. It is also researchable from Chi-Ha tank so if you unlocked it there you can mount it straight away. While it reloads and aims longer than the stock gun it offers better damage and monstrous penetration for it's tier. The 47 mm Gun Type 1 is rather accurate for it's tier with 0.42 accuracy, can fire 24 rounds per minute, aims in 2.3 seconds, deals 70 damage and has amazing 81mm penetration with standard Armour Piercing ammo and whooping 130mm penetration with APCR ammo.
Neither of the guns have calibre large enough to make the use of High Explosive shells worthwhile. I would recommend not to use them at all and rely on AP or APCR shells instead.

Both guns have great -10 degrees gun depression. Only American M5 Stuart have better depression of -20 with it's 75mm howitzer and Leopard sports the same -10 degrees on two of it's weakest guns. The rest of the comparable tanks are far behind.

Armament wise the M5A1 is hands down the best tier 4 scout. It's nearest competitor is the Leopard (8.3 patch) with a very similar gun that is a bit more accurate but has a lot less penetration with AP shells.
It is also worth noting that APCR shells for the 47 mm Gun Type 1 cost only 2 gold (800 credits) compared to 5 gold (2000 credits) for the 5 cm KwK 39 L/60 used on Leopard.
That means it is possible to use premium ammunition in higher tier battles to damage/kill even tier 8 tanks and still make profit.

Turret traverse (48) is on par with other tier 4 scouts and is enough to keep up with fast moving targets or keep the gun pointed at the target when you drive around it.

Misc.

Top view range is 350 meters. It's average compared to other tanks of the same class.
Top radio range is 615 meters. It's on par with others. Unless your radio is damaged you shouldn't get in a situation where you're out of radio range.
Same as American M5 Stuart M5A1's top engine costs only 550 exp to research making it the cheapest among the tier 4 scouts giving you the enhanced mobility early on.

Personal thoughts:

I find the M5A1 Stuart to be the best tier 4 scout tank out there. It has both great mobility and amazing firepower that is not found together on the other tanks of it's class.

Armour wise it may seem weak but while heavier armoured competition may shrug few shells in the lowest tier battles the protection becomes irrelevant for either of them against tier 5-8 tanks.

I would say the tank's top gun is THE selling point. It has great penetration with standard AP and amazing penetration with gold ammo (which is very cheap compared to comparable ammo from other nations). If you use a mix of both in your loadout you will be able to penetrate most tanks you face (tier 3-6) head on! A rare luxury for a scout. Using the great mobility you will often be able to flank the enemy and if you have some APCR shells with you then you will be a threat to absolutely any tank you may encounter. The damage the top gun deals, 70, really does hurt in tier 3-5 games. In higher tier battles it may seem low compared to, say 390 dmg IS tank has. But if you play your tank smart, attack from flanks or rear the enemy will need to decide if he wants to ignore you, letting you hit him for 70 again and again (and after a while it adds up to some substantial damage) or try to turn around to deal with you and expose his rear to your team mates in heavier tanks. It's a win-win either way. Also the gun is accurate enough to let you keep your distance and even stay hidden and shoot from the second line.

M5A1 has great gun depression allowing it to shoot from over the hill positions, revealing very little of it's turret and hull in the process and making it low profile target.

While 350 meters view range is not the top of it's class it is not that far behind the leaders (M5 Stuart and PzKpfw 38 nA having 370 meters). Combined with natural camouflage all light tanks have, proper skill selection and using the vegetation cover to your advantage you should see most enemies way before they see you. By using the sixth sense you may even guess where are the enemies you can't see and withdraw from danger using your mobility. When played well the M5A1 is an asset even in tier 8 battles and can actually contribute both scouting for the team and some damage on it's own to the game.

Advantages:

-Good firepower against low tiers and good penetration against mid-high tiers
-Good speed and mobility
-Great gun depression

Disadvantages:

-Match making puts M5A1 in higher tier battles than "regular" tier 4 tanks making it difficult to play for players not used to play scouts.
-Thin armour
-Misguided general player base usually assume that since it's a light tank it has to go ahead and kamikaze scout (expect some verbal abuse ... as all light tank players get)

Equipment recommendation:

For the modules it's pretty straightforward:
Improved ventilation - helps with everything a little and "every little helps"
Binoculars - it is recommended to scout from concealed position and not while on the move. This way you remain in cover and have better view range than with coated optics.
Camo net - the less visible you are the better. Sometimes bush/tree/camouflage skill cover alone won't be enough. The net gives you a bit extra. Also it may help when firing not to reveal your position (your camo value will go down when you fire your gun by A LOT but it may be just that little bit you needed to stay unseen).

You could try to use ventilation, gun laying drive and coated optics if you absolutely MUST go forward and drive in between and around enemies. Don't expect to survive long though.

I'd recommend a "standard" consumables loadout: manual fire extinguisher, small repair kit and small medic kit. I would also advice against removed speed governor. You cannot afford to get your engine damaged.


Originally written by ClassicFrog