It is pure bullshit, for example, destroy an entire tank by repeatedly shooting commander’s cupola (that in reality would be gone in 1 or 2 shots, with some possible fragmentation damage to the turret interior) or open top tank destroyer’s gun shield (that at the point of penetration at best would have 1 crew member behind it, if anything at all).

To put it in other words, if you were shooting a car with a gun then you could damage it only so much by shooting one of it’s tyres over and over again. When it pops, it’s gone. You’d need to try shooting something else then. Another tyre, engine or fuel tank. But using wot logic you could blow up the whole car just by shooting it’s one wheel exclusively.

It has been proposed then to reduce damage from hitting such places to make it more realistic. But it was rejected as it would confuse players.

But can you always do that? I can’t. I do tend to miss the shell hit sound quite often … even to a point when I realise I got hit only going by visual display and hit point counter. I am simply focused on other things going around, and at certain intense moments there’s a lot of sounds piled up together, with tanks around shooting, getting hit, exploding, you-name-it …. teamspeak communication doesn’t help either.