Yeah, that's just way too generalized to be a useful argument. In reality you have tanks, their crews, the fuel and the resources needed to build them. You can 't just ignore part of that equation. Germany could not possibly win a numbers game. That's a complete nonstarter.
Opting for more "cheaper" tanks wouldn't have done any good at all, it would probably have lead to even worse results. More tanks means you need more fuel, something Germany was already lacking. One Panther may have used more of that than a Panzer IV, but it used less than two Panzer IVs. And that comparison becomes even more tilted when it matches up against something heavier than a Panzer IV. Then there is the issue of crews. One tank needs five men, two tanks need ten. And not only that, they also require twice the amount of training, and training required more fuel. Simply put, going with quality over quantity was the right decision, more lighter tanks wouldn't have worked at all. The end result has nothing to do with the tanks being at fault, and everything to do with facing enemies with far more industrial might and manpower. Tank crews were a specialised group of people, something not easy to replenish with waning manpower. Germany neither had the numbers left to equip far more tanks, nor the fuel to train the crews or operate them. The only choice they had, was to protect their relatively rare tank-crews with tanks that gave them the highest chance of survival.
And since it has been brought up, the T-34 like Panther model had significant issues that were far worse than those of the actual Panther. That's the reason why they went with the Panther. These people weren't stupid. There may have been the odd political interference now and then, but in the case of the Panther and the Tiger, the chosen model was chosen because it was the one that worked better and had less issues.
That doesn't even cover that reliability always depends on the situation and the available materials. At the end of the war, Germany had to rush things and also ran out of good materials. That's two big issues. They neither had the time nor the resources to fix that. They were basically down to opting for the hail mary with everything they attempted. It's not like the Shermans or T-34 were highly reliable from the get go either. The Shermans had quite the issues early on, while the T-34 was a tire-fire of epic proportions that made the Panther's at Kursk look like the pinnacle of engineering, before hard-earned experience and wartime development allowed for significant improvements. Just take a glance at early Soviet lossses during Barbarossa. Most of the T-34s didn't even reach the front, in part because they broke down because of significant design-flaws, in part because units were banned from training with the tanks to prevent said breakdowns, leading to them having little idea how to operate the tanks. And if there is one thing that gets a tank to break down quicker than anything else, it is a crew that has no idea how to handle it. The Panther's reliability somehow gets judged by its earliest performances, yet the T-34's reliability gets judged by the late war versions that had all kinks removed, not in the timeframes that are comparable to the Panther, and msot definately not by its own early stages.
As for the Tiger:
It seems that many people just don't get what it was designed for. It didn't come into existance because German leadership was after ever-larger tanks and Wonderweapons. It was designed for a very specific purpose, never as a tank to replace Panzer III or IVs. The Tiger was meant as a breakthrough tank. It was to engage a defensive line and cause a breakthrough. Once that had been achieved, the Pz IIIs and IVs would exploit the gap, while the Tigers would be called back for maintence. Not only did the Germans know that the Tigers would be maintenance-heavy, they even planned for just that (outside of spare-parts, which Germany somehow forgot about with every piece of equipment) with much higher maintenance intervals. The reason why all this didn't work out, is because by the time the Tiger was actually entereing service in larger numbers, Germany was mostly done with attempting breakthroughs. What happened then, was that these tanks - as by far the most powerful units around - were shifted from one hotspot to another, playing fire-brigade. This was the complete anti-thesis of what they were designed for. They were meant for short, pitched battles followed by a maintenance-period, after which they would be transported to the next spot from which to launch an offensive. Instead they fought prolonged battles, before being rushed to the next point of collapsing defense with little to no maintenance in between. In quite a few cases the tanks weren't even transported but had to be driven there, which was a further burden on reliability.
The Tigers were excellent for their planned role. They still excelled in some parts in a role that went completely against their purpose. They became propaganda-tools thanks to that, not the other way round. The issues didn't lay with the tank-design, but with German leaders having to constantly throw everything they could spare into battles, with no regard for maintenance or usability. Tanks that would break down due to overuse were still better than having no tanks around at all.
I'm surprised it was even 50-50.
