The Most American Tank Ever Made

Decal affiliate link: tinyurl.com/42thwzv3
The American M4 Sherman medium tank is a fearsome machine in its base configuration, so slapping a rack of sixty M8 high explosive rockets onto one is only bound to make it a menace. The Calliope was very overpowered when Gaijin released it so many years ago, but it's much more balanced nowadays. Playing it has been some of the most fun I've had in War Thunder.
Check the channel "About" section for the link to the creator of my profile picture.
Songs used (in order from first to last):
Command and Conquer: Generals - Search and Destroy, Makin' A Sweep, Fire For Peace, Comanche Down
Halo 3: ODST - Rain (Deference for Darkness)
Sound mods:
Epic Thunder (Pre-release)
Gunner HEAT PC Crew Voices Mod (Personal, go play the game: gunnerheatpc.com/ )
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Second channel: / @spookstoon
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#warthunder​​​​​​​​​​​​ #tanks​​​​​​​​​​​​ #tankhistory
The Most American Tank Ever Made

[@csabacsaki4169]

Dont get me wrong, I always loved your content, but the recent videos with the little edits and live commentary are awesome, I could watch you all day.

[@PrinzAquatic]

It's his depressing tone that sell it for me

[@dantem4119]

Fr they’ve been absolute bangers with the little meme intros and fun edits.

[@clunk_fest5326]

I completely agree

[@globalvirtualmilitary2051]

Ngl, he got us in the first half

[@boogalowo7022]

TFK

[@luckypolack]

Another added benefit to having rockets is the ability to blind whatever you are shooting at

[@grievetan]

Unless your opponent has ULQ enabled

[@SilvaDreams]

@@grievetan Which is still a surprising amount

[@toki_tsu_kaze5511]

@@grievetan in that case they not only get blinded, but fps goes down to single digit count

[@urip_zukoharjo]

@@toki_tsu_kaze5511 the ultimate fps attack

[@BoarhideGaming]

That's why the Marder is so incredibly annoying. Like yeah, you missed your ATGM and I have an easy opening to shoot you back IF I COULD SEE A THING

[@PitFriend1]

The reason they moved the radio antenna on the Calliope is that the backblast of the rockets (which they don’t seem to have in the game) would melt it off if it was still in its regular place right behind the launcher.

[@Alloy682]

That's actually pretty cool lol, the back blast MELTING it off lol

[@falfill2096]

Ah yes, the ultimate sentry upgrade

[@Kevinuncletf2]

Don't give de engineer ideas

[@DarkelsDumpster]

@@Kevinuncletf2 remember Medic he has never gone to his Nuremberg trial.

[@MK-th4sp]

8:20 Weird that in my gameplay encountering enemy Calliope. 99% of my allies who encounter it doesn’t target the rockets. Above. Ever.

[@95keat]

I mean If I saw that my first reaction would be "oh the missiles are too far away to kill it, that makes sense why they put it so high up. Better kill the tank before it sho-"

[@OptiPopulus]

Back when I was stuck at the BR that would encounter them, shooting the rockets was an extremely unreliable kill. Gaijin might have fixed it but I'm not taking my chances

[@jesusofbullets]

@@OptiPopulus Literally same.

[@commandoepsilon4664]

@@OptiPopulus Exactly, you can shoot the rockets and maybe get lucky, or you can just shoot the tank, its just a Sherman after all.

[@awacsrazgriz967]

Why shoot the rockets for a hit or miss kill when you could get a safe kill by just shooting the hull? I mean its a standard sherman with a rocket launcher, its not like its a jumbo

[@roys.1889]

I think the first time I encountered this thing was in CoH1. Even when they nerfed it by disabling its main gun, it was still one of the most broken units in the game. Good times.

[@mimisansan3333]

I always loved using the Calliope before it was nerfed. Instant Sherman without needing the building used to make tanks

[@scout4996]

Rocket barrage from across the map

[@tianhaoju4634]

My USF main is urban assault(and rifles), can I be educated with how do I calliope in COH2? Thanks

[@diobrando2575]

@@tianhaoju4634 I mean just google it.

[@grapegod6646]

@@tianhaoju4634 Its good in 3v3 4v4 but If you dont have a close match or good unit comp by the time you get it, it will get dove

[@JerichoTheBeagle]

I picked up the Calliope recently and I'm not very good with it yet, but it is hilarious when you're bombarding someone with rockets and they visibly panic and blindly try to fire back

[@WarFoxThunder]

He'll yeah, a fellow calliope owner!

[@literallycheese6130]

the reason you killed the churchill 7's so easily is probably because the roof of the turret is only 20mm so you could overpressure it with the rockets explosion.

[@OptiPopulus]

@@Green-ader yes, thats how bombs get your crew without the tank getting damaged

[@Apache1990]

As someone who plays the Churchill VII in World of Tanks, I instantly knew this was what killed them. I'm acutely aware of the 20mm turret roof, as overmatching in that game means all guns bigger than 60mm (3*20mm) automatically pen you there.

[@OptiPopulus]

@@Green-ader If there is shrapnel then the game models that with red/orange streaks. Grey streaks are your own armor being used against you if your vehicle is penetrated IIRC

[@Eonymia]

@@Green-ader A lot of that stuff is in the game, like the missiles and shots leaving holes where they pen, and you can even get shells stuck in tank armor if it has enough pen to embed itself in the plate, but not enough to go through, the shell holes are also different based on what kind of shell you shoot them with, like hesh just leaves a massive crack in the plate. Overpresure, I think, just works as if you killed all the crew without damaging anything else inside, and the model just gets swapped to a more generic "dead tank version", instead of having the turret get blown off from the ammo cooking off or something like that (which is a thing as well). I'm not sure how well all the scuff marks transfer to the dead tank models though, I haven't looked that closely at stuff that's already dead. They just don't model every piece of equipment inside a tank, just the big ones, like gun breeches and so on, to keep the modeling simpler, I imagine.

[@OddBawZ]

This is hands down pound for pound the most laughs per match tank I have!

[@professionalnoob5474]

7:44 if you're having problems killing Churchills, try to shoot at the little boxes on the sides of the engine, they have 5mm of armor so you can pen them with the MG or rockets

[@ham5366]

the roof armour on the churchill hull and turret are pathetically weak and can be overmatched easily with a 75mm, works wonders with aphe

[@cmanmaxwell]

They also are the only models I've found to have their hull located inside the track. So shooting tracks sometimes have the surprise bonus of killing a crew member or two.

[@albundy8139]

This and the Pershing with rockets are two of my favorites, even if the Pershing is super slow.

[@WarFoxThunder]

Agreed

[@Jont12gte]

That roof on the churchill VII has been bugged for a while. Its 20mm but at an extreme angle. However it seems alot of shells ignore that angle and go through anyway

[@YurinovichDornburg]

HE doesnt care about angles, same with those rockets so that's how it got through I think

[@DewaKrishna_]

@@YurinovichDornburg aren't they HEAT rockets?

[@ham5366]

not a bug, a feature. overmatch is a mechanic that exists in war thunder

[@Jont12gte]

@@YurinovichDornburg I mean more of APHE or AP shells penning past their critical richochet angle.

[@WarmPillow-hs6kj]

You are evil for playing it anyways.

[@PanzerYeena]

I love how they clearly made this thing, then decided that one rocket rack wasn't enough and slapped two smaller ones on the underside.

[@SpardaSon21]

We also made the T40 Whizbang variant with 20 7.2" demolition rockets, each containing 33 pounds of Composition C-2. If you don't know what those rockets were, think Hedgehog, but with a rocket booster instead of mortar launch. And yes, unlike the Matilda they were mounted on top of the turret, same as the Calliope.

[@eriktheos6022]

I like how this thing kinda supposed to be an artilley piece, just with a sherman underneath it, in warthunder its a shwrman with a shotgun

[@rasmusjonsson1348]

I love how calm you are all the time and when you say "what" to some strange Gaijin magic trick. I had one of those moments too when I shot a DF105 (~30mm armor) with my Centurion Mk10 (~300mm penetration), I hit the DF in the front left track and some how the only damage I did was making the optics orange.

[@desertfalcon1539]

I gotta say, the way you make your videos now is extremely good and a lot of fun to watch

[@CheezeSpartan]

0:47 Absolutely Genius. If I get a Calliope: I’ll be sure to make a giant X with the “1” decals. Then just to be safe I’ll put the STOP sign decoration in the middle.

[@lnawesome]

I've gotten a decent handful of the premium vehicles just for how quirky they are in play style. The calliope was one of the ones that I would never get specifically because it was too much money, but after rolling the two week box more times than I know I got it. Now it is literally my most used vehicle. You learn to live by the RNG of if the rockets will explode from a random hit. 90% of the time it doesn't make sense because they'll blow up because of an aphe shell exploding on your armor that doesn't even penetrate. The stupidest one is probably when it goes through the track or the side skirt without even entering the tank but because it's enough armor to detonate the aphe it will blow up and there is one single piece of fragment will blow up the entire rocket rack. The other strange thing is when it hits the top of the turret and it doesn't penetrate enough to hurt the crew but that shrapnel blows up the rocket rack. I think it's coded in a way so that it believes the rocket racks tubing is outside armor, so if any part of the shell penetrates in terms of the game's logic now there's no armor on the tubing of the rockets so it has a complete straight line to the ammo. So from the outside there's two separate armor parts, but in terms of inside it thinks that everything inside the tank and the rockets are in the same space which essentially means fragmentation can warp up to that.

[@aldousfoxly]

Love these recent gameplay videos like this, good fun and a great watch. Funny but tasteful

[@Seannarutods]

Ive Been watching your videos for a few weeks now, and i love the content. Your videos have made me enjoy getting back into the game more and trying out different tanks. That decal has been secured. If i buy things in the future youll be who im supporting.

[@commandoepsilon4664]

You see Spookston the Avenger is highly resistant to HE because the Churchill tanks took all their HE vulnerabilities on themselves. I am not even kidding, the majority of time my Churchhills die is because of HE. I think every optic on the tank is counted as an internal component so any HE shrapnel that hits them applies over pressure damage to the crew through the armour. Also it will almost always die to bombs that land in front of it but if they land behind it the tank may survive.

[@theoneandonlyartyom]

Related to this, i once overpressured a m24 with my ikv, i shot aphe at the gun shield, pierced the shield but not the turret itself, exploded and overpressured, that space maybe is considered internal too?

[@1967_Chevy_Impala_Sexy]

Bought the decal as soon as you showed it, love you spookston! Keep making these great videos.

[@bigfish821]

My experience with the Calliope is that players would usually always shoot the launcher without ammoracking me, making this thing much more survivable than a normal Sherman. Though since the launcher overlaps the turret on the small hud top down image, I killed myself a few times by shooting an oranged gun that blew up because all I saw was the launcher above it intact

[@djraythefurry0420]

Also spookston you can actually use those rockets to shatter armor I don't know if it's actually coated into the game or not but I noticed that if I shoot an Abrams with those rockets in the front of it if I keep nailing it I might actually overpressure it due to the amount of explosions happening all at once it's kind of interesting actually hard to do and pull off but seeing and being the one doing it is kind of interesting

[@OptiPopulus]

Armor cracking is not modelled, but Gaijin in their infinite wisdom decided you could stack overpressure. So if you spam HE from a modern SPAA it can overpressure a good amount of MBTs after a few seconds of repeated firing in roughly the same spot

[@djraythefurry0420]

@@OptiPopulus that honestly kind of makes sense it's the overpressure mechanic that's broken basically obviously there's a lot more than that but that's one of the main effects for why I'm assuming saphei and he are op for anti air vehicles lol 😂 (but then again we got to take into consideration that most modern tanks have kind of terrible armor in the sense that they basically have zero armor it's just spaced enough to stop high explosive anti-tank rounds of any kind but it is not enough to stop sabots and over pressure from high explosives due to how thin every plate of the composite screening are) thank you for sharing that with me though I don't think I would have looked it up until you said something mostly cuz I would keep forgetting about it lol 😂 but anyway hope you have a good day thanks for reading and good luck to you :3 same to anybody else reading our comments :3

[@Midnight_Azur]

I'm just so entertained by your content! I love it!! And how the heck are you having such good runs, I wish I was at your level

[@RobertLiesenfeld]

Love your videos. Entertaining to watch without any stress when you get knocked out. Keep 'em coming.

[@DaddysBelt92]

I'm really enjoy these types of videos. Great job as always

[@colonelace2901]

The way you're doing your new videos are very good, i legit am hooked to ur content.

[@JLS-ti3lb]

I love the edits so much makes the videos a lot more funny and entertaining please keep this up

[@Hi_Buddy-cw6pl]

All of those little edits are so good, keep going

[@kirishima638]

I love your gameplay videos. They're laid back.

[@adendaloia769]

I’m loving the live commentary videos !

[@TTVCoreality]

i love the engineer reference that spookston does, after watching a lot of spookston, please dont stop with content creation its too good thanks spookston

[@connordalton4553]

The audio and meme edits are what make these videos so fun to watch.

[@Patrick-nd8wn]

Im loving these new short commentary videos

[@illsustrious]

i love this form of wt gameplay, a little bit of meme with a little bit of commentary go a long way

[@legoeasycompany]

Hey I love seeing the shout out to the The Gregson Street Guillotine. Really unexpected but I appreciate that she be fondly remember for all the trucks she ate.

[@landonroberson1417]

I love the new style of your videos!

[@ZZZZZZ-ek2pq]

As always love the edits on these gameplay videos, genuinely make me cackle sometimes. Since you did the Calliope, do the T99 M26 next!!

[@ab123110]

Great intro, good choice on the M8 position.

[@DoingTheBestICan]

That Halo Reach dialogue at 2:07 makes me want to go back and play it again. Damn you, Spookston

[@Argentum_Rex]

That bit with the Witch from L4D2 with the KV-2 was genius editing!

[@booze5376]

Loving the videos! Heres hoping we could see some Churchill VII gameplay

[@johneisenberg7329]

I remember when I was fairly new to the game, I was playing with a panther on the Sweden map when I turned a corner and got immediately greeted by a Caliope who started firing all of its rockets point blank. Has to be the scariest moment I've had in this game.

[@WildBillCox13]

About the weight, Spook. The "tubes" were plywood. The T40 (and others) added armored tubes/box launchers. The entire battery going off over your head should not have necessarily destroyed the tank. They (114mm Holy Moses rockets) weren't top attack missiles and the TC's hatch is sealed when rockets are carried. Support three companies of these with a couple platoons of Skinkdozers and you've got an awesome shock artillery battalion. 700 rockets in about twenty seconds. Sure, they're not 15cm rockets, but German rocket AFVs (Stuka zu fuss, like the Maultier based panzerwerfer42) don't have 75mm cannon and 51mm of sloped front plate.

[@jeffreywenum9699]

Bro you got me with that ASU I was laughing so hard

[@Captainkeysballs69]

Love the halo 3 odst music at the end of your videos

[@brain8690]

"Most American tank" M46 T99:

[@dr.brownie7865]

Thanks for making a video about the calliOPe! keep making this funny videos

[@TreXoniKs]

The enthusiasm, the cutscenes, the cute dog reaction, nice vid.

[@gorgeousfreeman-]

I like these kinda videos Keep making em

[@iain-duncan]

Loving the new format

[@cadet5126]

love that stuH is spitting flames like WRC car.

[@ALFIEmr]

Love the content it’s always good watching you thanks 🙏 for the vids ❤

[@ponycentaur1456]

8:50 sPONGEbob guiding the ghost ship in the narrow ravene : "your good, your good, your goood, your goood"

[@elexx1568]

I love this type of videos! They’re amazing. Please can you play with the Katyusha?

[@apersondoingthings5689]

Designers: how much weapons do you want USA: YES

[@peterni2234]

This video is top shelf!

[@richardwylie1785]

Your videos keep getting better and better. 😂😂

[@summer8746]

Nice video as always, can you perhaps take a look at the Ab 43? It's a pretty fun vehicle

[@tractordawg]

We need more of this tank in our lives

[@slaaneshgod]

This looks soo fun! I need to get this tank!

[@debruynvince]

one of my favorite fights was with a calliope. they were hiding from me behind a rock, and for like 4-5 repair cycles, I just kept shooting their rocket rack. it took one of their teammates finally coming over and helping before they got me, I was just laughing and shooting his rockets every time he tried to move

[@altonlovell8490]

I saw a ton of these tanks this weekend playing as Germany with a friend that’s new to the game. Brings a tear to my eye to still see the 60 rockets of freedom in a match.

[@theoneandonlyartyom]

you are a monster for introducing your friend to this hellhole of a game

[@garrettlittle1279]

Your description of the Calliope at the beginning of the video perfectly describes it's effectiveness in the Endless War series.

[@solluxcaptor2499]

i never thought i'd see the 11foot8 bridge in a spookston video but here we are

[@PerryCaulkins]

How tf did I not realize you had 200k subs…. I think I subbed at like 20 or 30k? Really proud of you spooky ;)

[@Ksportin]

8:53 Spookston knows about the Canopener!!

[@jm10srb]

That's a smooth advertisement of a decal lol

[@justcast1429]

I love the edits

[@dario9793]

9:20 witch sound when you spot the KV-2 got me 🤣🤣🤣

[@Randomcanadian20]

Crying lady ahead

[@papieznik21]

my man's got all the right memes, I hope he uses them more often

[@ethanjordan8562]

Once the holiday sale hits I’m immediately getting your decal

[@myhreeng2709]

It's been a while since I played the Sherman Calliope but they used to go on top of the rockets and it was so hard to aim your gun, especially in simulator battles. It would still put you on top of the rockets.

[@bobman36]

On the m26 you can maneuver the turret in such a way where the rocket pods will move independently from the gun, the rockets are directly mechanically tied to the gun.

[@daemonfifield1242]

i watched one of these smack a doorway on stalingrad back in like 2015 and blow up

[@jimmyjazz4605]

Love that Halo Reach artillery voice over 😂

[@lowkey724]

8:54 lmao my bus goes underneath that, I'm waiting for the day.

[@DJB1ack0u7]

Man i love that they took the larger rocket rack and then presumably went "well why SHOULDNT we weld two smaller racks under it?"

[@ruknot4648]

I decided to play arcade for the tasks yesterday. And I ran into a party of them. I still have PTSD from the full volume gameplay

[@Thunderbolt_1000_Siren]

I own this thing and yea those rocket kills are so satisfying. Gotta say that IL-2 kill nearly made me die of laughter XD Try the Katyusha truck next, get a silly theme going XD

[@callumcooper5652]

Since when did you play war thunder?

[@Thunderbolt_1000_Siren]

@@callumcooper5652 Been playing since 2015.

[@Rafael_Fuchs]

The 11'8" bridge reference was perfection.

[@Klumzy05]

When I got my M4, I saw this in a game and got spooked

[@nickclark1026]

Love the badger ref

[@dragoneye0979]

Cali is a lot of fun. I very rarely die to getting my rockets ammo racked, they probably get me killed more often by giving away my position. The big thing they help with is armored targets like KV's, churchills, and ARL's. Plus they kick up a ton of dust so I have more than once used them to lay down a psudo-smoke screen

[@dixieduffy7]

I think this is the best time we have seen spookston have in a long time. Have you tried spamming between the enemy spawn and objective right after a match starts? One of my favorite ways to get kills.

[@TackleTheDog]

The decal on top caught me off guard 🤣🤣🤣

[@matthederplawman3327]

Man the calliope really does highlight just how weak the churchill's roof is to overpressure. I thought it was descent at first since I was using soviet 152mm soviet cannons with HE but now I figured it even dies to the sherman 105 hitting the roof. Big cannons in close quarters tends to be a big no no for the Churchill. That and CAS with pretty much any kind of secondary weapon or cannon can just ruin its day.

[@spiffywolf2850]

I think im just dense but when I clcik of the Decal affiliate link it brings me to the snail store and I dont know where to go from there. Enjoyed the video, love the live commentary. Whish that tank wasn't so pricey

[@SexPun48]

Such a fun video

[@johnvga6239]

The meme edits like the 500kg bomb one are choice

[@bensonfitch6697]

I love rocket kills. The HVARs are also great. I love their accuracy.

[@smh9902]

I can see the rockets being super useful to shoot at the enemy as your gunner reloads your main gun.

[@LarySeeAircraft]

When I first started playing warthunder I got a test drive for it on about week 2

[@95keat]

Everytime spookston zooms in on something and plays menacing music I never see the tank and I always feel like I'm playing where's waldo

[@kungusmacbungus1021]

The SU-122 might be worth making a video on, it's a little broken right now at 2.3 even if it's not the best on paper. Long reload aside, the HE one shots 19/20 tanks you see any the 45mm armor on all sides can bounce most 37s, some 50s and the earlier 75mm guns. Plus, it's a t-34 chassis so it's fast as all hell...

[@tux8000]

I would love having a Sherman or Staghound Tulip in addition to the Cromwell Tulip - especially since their rockets aren't stacked but side-by-side.

[@FlapJacks7]

Gotta say rockets vs airplanes is great stuff. Your a pro

[@MKfoxbat]

7:19 "Where's the fire buddy?" My brother in Christ you set him on fire

[@seanhunt1171]

been looking at this for my 4.7 line, its such a pricey premium though. you should try the C2A1 its just the leopard 1A5 but you get mexas which makes stock heat-fs much worse for your opponents though