I never had problems against the KV 8, it was a fairly used unit and in line with the soviet faction design of being a hard counter unit.
However you could see it coming and any mine / suicide mine + 2 paks would kill it off.
Now it's rather meh.
I also disagree that it should be seen as a Ostwind.
A Ostwind is very versatile, it can shoot down planes, hard counters infantry and destroys light tanks + vehicles.
The KV8 cant do that all the time. You need to switch the ammo in order to damage vehicles and even that you can usually save vehicles from being destroyed by it.
It should been a feared unit that punishes infantry only builds hard.
Now it is more like a lighter.
