Tanks as they stand right now (anti-infantry, operable by a single merc) can never, ever be balanced in a pure TDM game mode. They fill the exact same role as an assault suit: roll around the map, gunning people down one at a time with an oversized AR. In a game mode with objectives inaccessible to tanks, their near-invincibility and 900 DPS AR turret can maybe be considered to be balanced and exist in a real separate role. But when the only goal is to kill X clones, the current style of tanks is always going to either be massively OP or paper-thin UP. As it stands right now, they're just a big suit I put on over my little suit with 10x the HP, 2x the damage, and 90% resist to most weapons on the field.

As an example: I just got out of an ambush where I spent a solid minute or two playing cat and mouse against a Soma, running in circles around pillars, etc. The fact that he was in a tank made it impossible for me to kill him. He simply chased me around and around searching for the kill, just like an assault player, because that's all tanks are good for.

Change their role or get them the hell out of ambush.

I don't know why tankers can't understand that when it takes more than one AV person to kill you, in a game mode that offers very little cover, when the enemy switches to AV, your infantry in effect multiplies.

Basically, whoever deploys the most tanks in Ambush first can only loose through extremely bad skill on their part because their force is exponentially larger than the enemies, despite having the same amount of players on both sides.

Solution?

Offer an infantry only Ambush option.

By your logic, TANKS are forcing CCP to do another vehicle/AV balance at this very moment.