Rather not unless it gets veterancy in combat.
T-80 is superior because of ROF, damage and firing range. It has 7 Acc at 1925m. Not mentioning better shaped armor.

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No amount of vet will ever substitute the range and frontal armor.

T-80 has Rof 10 AP 9, end of argument.

Regarding the Op's question: I think you need one good line of heavy tanks like Leop 2 or T-80's with all variants unlocked. After that it depends on your playstyle. Usually you should have more than enough heavy tanks with a 2-3 variant line.

Abrams line is Ok but not great. You cannot face the best tanks head on without serious support and Leopards are even faster for flanking purposes. The base Abrahms is a good medium tank hunter though.

Challengers are slow and have no variants, severely limiting your combat flexibility as the only heavy in your deck. They are good for supporting though. Call them in later on frontline call in sectors.

Leaves you With Leopards pretty much, even if they weren't that good. Same goes for T-80's. No other Pact tankline has the ability to compete head on with Nato heavy tanks and no other heavies are really needed.

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The only use for T72 is as damage sponges. Depends on the opponent, but around 60-70% of players I come across n the game are pretty bad and tend to just stand in place with a group of 4 Leo 2A4 and some minor support. Quick Dana/Malka/Buratino/Smerch volley (depends on the map and the deck I go with) to drop the morale and then even a frontal charge is not too bad. Drive up with T72's and shoot from distance with T80U. They have a choice of either shoot at the T80's and let the T72s roll in to such a close distance that even they can't miss or shoot at the T72s and allow T80U to spam 11AP rounds at full vet accuracy. Of course, any decent player would just move back and use the perfect Leo 2A4 stab to kite your units, making the T72's useless and suddenly the engagement is a 2 v 4 when it comes to units that actually shoot at each other. But most people tend to be either bad or over confident when it comes to their belief in invincibility of 10AP/10 armour in a full frontal confrontation. Plus sometimes kiting is not an option due to terrain features (mostly rivers).
I like using T72 and T80U to push from the front while I have some T72A pushing on one of the flanks. T72's usually die a horrible death, but do their job for long enough to overwhelm the enemy and they are cheap anyway. Also bonus of using T72's is that you are very well protected against a VAB/Fuchs spam. If you replaced a bunch of T72's with a couple of vetted BV's you are putting yourself at an disadvantage. Though again, disclaimer, when I come up against good players, I die horribly, but I guess there aren't that many good players around.


TL DR and actually more on topic as well:
In my Pact deck tank section I always have:
T80 using the U every single game as every other Pact tank is 9 AP or less, I'd probably prefer to use different tanks every now and then for variety reasons, but as long as this is the only tank which can damage 10 armour at max range then T80U it is; I use base model fairly often and occasionally the BV as well; I find the A and B version overpriced for what they offer, mainly because the crappy, useless ATGM lifts the price considerably vs T80, but the tanks are still average/poor for the price
T72 only using the basic and A version, B is utterly terrible; for that price it is truly laughably bad; any opponent who deploys them is shooting himself in the foot
T64 mostly use the A, but not very often; B and BM are better thanks to their better stabs, but the terrible fuel efficiency means I only use them on small maps; BV can be a great tank in frontal engagements and the side armour is manageable, but for that price I'd really expect better protection from random arty shells; at the end of the day; if it's a time game on a big map and it's going for a long time I might deploy a bunch, but usually most games don't last long enough
T62, only using the high end ATGM versions
flame tanks

For Nato

Leo2A4, I tend to vet them 2-4 lvl and deploy 2-3 as main source of damage output
Challenger, deploy 2-4, no vet; very basic strategy, but many people tend not to micro and they let their units choose targets, which often end up being Challengers, while the Leo 2A4 can snipe the enemy
Patton; Rise is a good cheap tank and awesome against anyone trying to rush you with Skot's or BTR's but it's made of glass; M60A3 is actually pretty good and a bit harder to kill, but it starts getting into pricey territory
AMX30, I still have them in deck, but I almost never use them these days, they tend to die way too easily and unless you manage to completely outmanoeuvre your opponent they rarely have the opportunity to show their strong side
Sheridan, I've put it as experimentation to see how it fares against inf rushes and mainly to play around with the M8AGS. So far I had little joy using it, but it might be the player rather than the unit; frankly as Nato I don't fear infantry rushes as much because I always have some auto cannons on hand on my Luchs and AMX 10P

KPZ 70 only. Haters going to hate, but i have been very successful with them. The 20mm is golden.

When it comes to pact though i have the T-80, T-64 and T-62. I only use the M1 version of the 62, and typically only the BM version of the 64. When it comes to the 80 i use pretty much the U only.

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While heavies have stolen the meta, its still more about good micro then anything else.
I havent played in a few weeks, but my build was generally 80s, Us and standards. BVs arent bad but not essential. My problem with 72s is for the price of 2 i can get 685s in their place or another 80, both of which are good sponges (2-6 armor returns the same results against 10 AP) and much more effective offensively. 64s i dont value for the same reason as Abrams, more or less a waste of deck space given other options. Support was Zhalos/1Ps/Konkurs jeeps, basically whatever I feel.

Leos obviously, with Challengers and Pattons for a rainy day. VTS1s/Pattons/M151s in support on a map to map basis.

Good micro, good combined arms, good recon and good situation exploitation > whether yoou bought Abrams or Leos.

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It depends on whether you need 2 or 6 heavy tanks deployed. 2 slots is all you should ever need, and you should have some medium and cavalry tanks (maybe including amx-32) in the tanks section as well.

Take the top tier version of the tanks, as they'll hold their own against heavy tanks much better. And you will be facing heavy tanks, most of the time. Challys are superb for survivability, they don't die to little mistakes and can keep the enemy occupied for a while as he tries to kill them. Leo2s if you really need firepower (eg. stand-off against heavy tanks).

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Hahaha that's a good one.



That's a funny way of saying that you'll need Leo2's every game.

Challenger only as core force is very managable, if you dont lose any that is and for that case its better to have Leo2s available for call ins. But you can do with Challengers only just fine. Remember that every other pact tank outside T80U has 9 ap at best.
Leo2A4 is not necessary, its just a bit easier to hunt T-80Us with it.

It's much more easier to hunt down those T-80U's however. Sure, all other tanks have 9 AP (except T-80U), but that doesn't matter when both the challenger and Leo2 have 10 front. And when he tries to retreat his T-80Us, you don't ever stand a chance of catching them with challengers.