Friday, March 30, 2012

0.7.2 patch today


Much sooner than expected, WarGaming.Net announced the release of update 0.7.2 for today, between the hours 05:00-13:00 GMT.

Due to the maintenance, Global Map and Clan Wars will be unavailable from March 30th 03:15 GMT untill March 31th 03:15 GMT.


Summarized features of the 0.7.2 patch:

  • new maps - Province and Live Oaks;
  • US tank destroyers with turning turrets line: M8A1, T49 , M18 (Hellcat), T25-2, and T28 prototype;
  • changes in the US heavy tanks line;
  • 22 new crew skills and perks;
  • new camouflages for all nations.


The full list of implementations with 0.7.2 update can be found here.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Interview with Sergey Burkatovskiy Lead Game Designer


Source: Outpostgamez.com


1. We understand that you have plenty more premium tanks to dish out, is it possible to have 2 different battles such as premium battle and random battle and keeping premium tanks strictly to premium maps unless they are in platoon to improve the overall game quality.


We’re actually creating a single game space in World of Tanks. Whatever Class/Tier a tank belongs to, we’ll stick to a classic rock-paper-scissors approach that counterbalances the pros and cons of all the “classmates”. One vehicle’s firepower is balanced with lower accuracy, while a slow-paced machine will excel in armor and durability, and premium tanks fit in this formula perfectly.

Every game balance change we implement is based on the statistics we gather and process daily. The only advantage to a premium tank is the economic benefits players get from them, and this is where we come back to the core basics of our free2play model — premium stuff accelerates your progress through the game.



2. In previous interviews, wargaming.net stated that the prices of premium tanks such as Lowe, Type 59, etc are based on their capabilities as well as demand. You have raised the price of Lowe due to high demand, why was Type 59 not monitored more carefully that you had to remove it from Game Shop in short notice.

Although it wasn’t the most effective tank, the Type 59 definitely gave players more confidence, which made it the most popular premium tank in the game. It, thus, had a far bigger and, unfortunately, negative impact on the in-game balance than the Loewe, for instance. The mediums are one of the most popular vehicle classes, and having a chance to go and kick some butt in a tier-8 med was a golden opportunity for players.

We’ve been monitoring the statistics of the Chinese medium and hoped that the issue will improve, but, obviously, the further rise of the Type 59 population would have crushed the balance between the free and premium content in the game, so we opted for its overall removal.



3. In upcoming garage battle, what prevents arty or massive number of tanks from camping the spawn area for easier kills/victory? Aka: Spawn camping.

This could be an issue, but garage battles will have several spawn points making it highly difficult and absolutely useless to try massive area camping. Only outnumbering of, let’s say, 7 by 1 grants victory. Moreover, garage battles will be more chaotic and exciting than the regular base-on-base clashes; every battle will become a “seek-and-destroy” mission eventually evolving into “seek-and-destroy-the-bastard-that-just-killed-you” mode.



4. Any word on when Physics will be introduced, and what challenges have you had to overcome to release Physics.

The major challenge with the new physics lies in keeping your vehicle from becoming considerably more complex. As of now, players are unable to fall off cliffs or bridges even if they want to, which has guaranteed one of the key World of Tanks game design elements — accessibility. We’ve been repeating this mantra to ourselves and to everybody since the very first day we began developing the Tanks: players should fight against enemies, not struggle with their vehicles, which meant giving them simple controls with arcade elements of tank behavior.

And several elements of Physics turned your tank into an enemy (especially true for hillsides and cliffs). Now that we have the updated Physics on our inner testing, we still have to think of the optimal control system that would leave the game at the same level of simplicity.



5. French tanks have been released in 7.1, any word on the British tanks other than the lend-lease premium Russian tanks.

The Brits will, most likely, appear in the third quarter of 2012. They are at full tilt in development right now. However, while work on them is being done, we are going to continue introducing new vehicles of all four nations to the game.



6. We were teased with Adaptive camo. Then it never came with the 7.0 update. Any idea on when we will see this?

It’s planned to be implemented in update 7.4 if nothing intervenes



7. There has been talk of Matchmaking modifying. Yet the spreadsheet you posts lists tiers up through 13. Is this precluding to future tanks? Any idea what these tanks might be.

There must have been a bit of confusion, because we have been referring to battle tiers, which differ from vehicle.  In essence, 13 tiers doesn’t mean there will be 13 levels.

 As far as artillery, heavy tanks, SPGs and TGs differ in respect to the number of vehicles present; we have several tiers to compensate for this difference. For example, if we had initially set out for 8 levels per tier, WoT would have only featured 9 tiers. We’re going to introduce extra tiers to level the odds.



8. In a recent video release by Wargaming.net, there was mention of an IS-6 and IS-8. Any word on when these will be release, what tier they will be, and how they will affect the tech tree.

The upcoming Update 7.2 will feature American tank destroyers and two new top heavies (and the first American map as well!), and will be followed by the purely Soviet Update 7.3 to include the IS-6 and the IS-8, among others. An experimental vehicle created at the end of WWII, the IS-6 will be a premium tank. The IS-8 is the prototype of the legendary Soviet monsters, T-10 and T-10m from the 1950s. The tank will take the tier-9 slot of the IS-4, which will become the second tier-10 heavy tank. Thus, the IS-6 will, most likely, become a tier-8 premium, and the IS-8 will be a researchable tier-9 vehicle.



9. As of patch 7.1 there has been heated debate in regards to matchmaker system. Will the dedicated Matchmaker development team re-evaluate how the matchmaking system and add additional variables such as "light, heavy, medium" etc to balance the a bit more instead of strictly Tier's and weights?

There are views of the game balancer. We don’t want it to create totally mirrored teams and we also won’t balance battles with opposing types of teams in their backbones (one team rich in arty; the other oversaturated with tank destroyers). The only group of tanks to be rebalanced is scouts, and by these I mean both light and medium tanks. As battles show, the definition of a scout cannot be limited to light tanks only; mediums can fit perfectly for this role as well. Personally, I reckon M46 Patton is the best scout, thanks to its nearly huge view range, coupled with its damage and accuracy. We will set a list of tanks suitable for scouting and will distribute them evenly between teams, not forgetting to balance them up against each other, as well.

As for a more detailed “tougher” matchmaking, the current balancer is tuned up for bigger online numbers and won’t act perfectly with low PCCU, and it’s impractical to have two different matchmakers, because they would fail at “borderline” online numbers.



10. When will the American tech tree revision take place, along with the Russian tech tree revision take place?

National tech trees are revised non-stop. During the ongoing revision stage, we’ll add American TDs as a part of Update 7.2 and introduce several Soviet heavies in Update 7.3; the French tech tree will get TDs and arty in Update 7.4. It’s a little early to unveil any further plans, but I can say that we’ll certainly continue adding Soviet and American machines.



11. When will premium SPG's and TD become available and, any word on what they will be?

We’re working on them right now, so it’s pretty difficult to name an exact date at the moment.  All in all, they’re scheduled to be introduced in one of the upcoming updates, and will be tier 5 vehicles, with the 88 mm JagdTiger being the only exception; most likely, it’ll become a tier 8 tank destroyer. We decided to focus tightly on the main branches — they are the top priority, while premium vehicles will be added as soon as they are ready.



12. Do the development team actually play the game to determine from game if certain things needs to be changed or do they rely on consumers/players input? If yes, how much of their work time is dedicated to playing the game?

You develop a core understanding of the game by playing it. Take the QA Dept as an example — they play WoT all day long, simply because they need to test it. As for me, unfortunately, I only have time to play 4 vehicles a day: the French branch that I’m researching right now, plus, 3 premium vehicles. I hate to admit I haven’t bought the IS-7 yet, as opposed to the T-30, for instance. That’s why I’m focusing on the French tanks (I’ve researched them up to AMX 12t by now). Plus, I play premium tanks to earn credits and finally afford myself an IS-7.



13. Are there any plans in the works to increase the credit earnings of tier 8 artillery, tier 9 and 10 heavy’s? As it stands right now, many players cannot gain credits when playing these tanks. Even with a win, the loose credits due to ammo cost and high cost of repair.

I would say no. The point is the vehicle profitability scheme in World of Tanks presumes that if you fancy playing top tiers you’ll have to spend some gaming time on mid-tier tanks. It’s done with purpose: most of these vehicles — the Sherman, the Tiger, the Panther, and the T-34 — are tank-building legends and we encourage players to choose them. That’s why they get the most credits. We are pretty adamant about it, and won’t change our policy. The same principle holds true for the arty. Players with top tier SPGs have to play medium tiers, thus, providing support for the medium tanks that prevail in the game.



14. We have seen some of the new Camo. However when will the adaptive camo be released which supposedly changes the color of the camo based on which map you are on? Will other Premium Tanks be available in the Gift Shop? For example: Churchill, T-14, Type 59, ect.

Soon. Players will buy masks for coloring, and the coloring will automatically adjust to the battlefield a player is fighting in. Each map will get a range of coloring schemes to choose from (grey, brown and black for Himmelsdorf; grey, sand-coloured and green for Ruinberg; and green, white and grey for Erlenberg). In a nutshell, Adaptive camo will allow you adjust your tanks in accordance with a respective map.


15. With the new auto, loading system introduced with the French tanks. Will we have the option in the future to change the round sequence? For example: currently it is AP-AP-AP-AP-AP-AP (6 round same shell) could we have the option to make it AP-APCR-AP-APCR-AP-APCR. Alternatively, any other combination of available rounds?

We were considering the feature and decided against it. The reason is that we’ve got premium shells in the game, and we wanted to be sure players control the way they are used. In case of a mixed loading system, you might fire several premium shells accidently, which would be really frustrating. That’s why we’ve opted for a single-type loading. You’ll have to switch to the other barrel if you’d like to fire with other types of shells.


16. How much of the shell velocity with A.P. rounds have an effect on penetrating armor?

To simplify calculations we didn’t tie together shells’ velocity and penetrating power. We’ve got a penetration/distance ratio table that, despite being simplified, provides plausible data. We are quite happy with it, and don’t plan any significant changes at least in the nearest future.


17. French tanks with semi-automatic guns don't have the option to buy Rammers. Will there be something equivalent to Rammer Module for those type of guns?

French tanks that have automatic loading gear with oscillating turrets. They’re trickier to stabilize than a usual gun and that’s why we aren’t planning to introduce Rammer Modules for it.


18. Any plans to improve the collision penalty since many players still get fined even if friendly ram from behind and do damage to lighter tanks.

We are taking a look at the collision penalty and will change the system a bit, making it less harsh for players.


19. What are the chances to have 4man or 5man platoon?

We went back to the idea and tried introducing 5-man platoons once again. It turned out that, in the frame of random battles, a well-organized group of five becomes virtually invincible. If we try offsetting it with a similar 5-man platoon for the other team, the rest of the players are left with no change at all to influence the battle outcome. It causes a devastating game imbalance. Thus, 5-man platoons are only in short battles with two platoons combating each other. As for random battles, it definitely won’t do.


20. I understand that wargaming.net stated they have a separate team to focus on matchmaking system. Why has matchmaking system not improve in 7.1?

Yes, we indeed have a separate team working solely on the matchmaking system. Unfortunately, the team hadn’t managed to tackle all the issues with the new system before version 7.1 was released.


21. Why is there a 5min max queue time in effect forcing the matchmaker creates corrupt matches?

A 30 min max queue is pointless and unreasonable. Most players would get tired of waiting and would quit before a battle starts. A 5-min queue is the longest reasonable time. We hope World of Tanks draws more players, because an increase of players online will solve the problem of corrupt matches.


22. Are you at any point looking at the possibility of a World of Infantry?

Infantry and tanks fought in tight cooperation during WWII. However, we aren’t planning to either introduce the infantry in WoT or create World of Infantry in the nearest future. For starters, we’ve never ever regretted choosing tanks as our “main” characters and don’t see any plausible reason to change the initial mindset. Tanks provide for an immensely diverse gameplay, and introducing infantry into the game would mean rethinking gameplay essentials from scratch.


Sergey Burkatovskiy - lead game designer for World of Tanks

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

CW - battle with owner - draw is considered a victory for the attacker [UPDATE]


Yesterday, when WG added the Western Africa provinces to the CW map, they also modified a very important CW battle rule for landings:

  • in battle with owner, a draw is considered a victory for the attacker


Fact is that WG did not bother to publish this change on the main WoT portal and only did so in the Special Battle window:

Because of this, a few clans that did not took notice of the change or totally ignored it and used the same tactic (totally defensive) and doing so, they lost the landing to the attackers.

After all, who's fault is it? Well ... both, WarGaming's for not properly advertising the change but also the clans fault for not taking notice of the Special Battle window descriptions.
Fact is that some took notice and that's why, yesterday, not all landing provinces were lost to the attackers

Will WG do a roll-back? I don't see why, as far as they're concerned they've informed everyone thru the Special Battle window. If clans did not bother to read it, it's not WG's fault, is it?!


[UPDATE]

Yesterday, after 3 days, WG acknowledged the issue and posted a statement on the portal:
On 19-20 March, 2012, clans, partaking in Clan Wars, fought for provinces according to the Global Map conquest rules. One of them states that a province is taken by the enemy forces if a battle with its owner ended in draw.


Based on clans reports, developers have detected an issue with the Global Map battles which ended incorrectly: after the conquest, a province was still taken by the enemy forces if a battle with its owner ended in draw. At the present moment, the development team is working on fixing the specified flaw.


Thank you all for your feedback. We will keep you updated on the progress. We apologize for this inconvenience.


Please note that the results of the current battles are counted as successful and their outcomes will not  be revised.

A few notes:
  • will they revert landing to original owners - nope
  • did they admit it was a mistake on their part - nope
  • "battles which ended incorrectly" - but they did end correctly according to Special Battle window
  • to my knowledge, the draw landing rule is still not reverted to original

And after all this, there are still players who believe in their lies ...

Monday, March 19, 2012

Upcoming 0.7.2 patch game economy changes [UPDATE - 2]


Today, with the release of 0.7.2 public testing, WG also released a note on the upcoming game economy changes included in this patch.
The long blah blah version here.
The short version, below:



Income Adjustments


  • Early Tiers

In the early game – tiers one through four – all vehicles, regardless of type, will see an increase in credit income. This includes most premium vehicles in that tier range.


  • Light Tanks

Along with the implementation of  the economic improvement, income of all light tanks will be increased. For tier one it will be an increase from 82% to 95%. Tier 2-5 Scouts will receive an increase within the frame from 14% to 58%. While AMX 13 75 and AMX 13 90 will see a 10% increase.


  • Medium Tanks

The changes to medium tanks will see a reduction in credit income for tiers six (reduced on 8 %), seven and eight (from 10% to 5% ). Meanwhile Tier 2-4 will receive an increase from 10% to 40% depending on the vehicle. Tier 5 vehicles will in some cases see a bonus of up to 7%, while others are nerfed, but not by more than 12%. A purely good change awaits owners of top tier vehicles – Tier 9 will receive an increase from 5% to 11%. This will allow to maintain such beasts as ‘M46 Patton’, ‘T-54’ or ‘E-50’ much easier.


  • Heavy Tanks

On Tier 5 it will be increased from 6% to 18%, while Tier 6 will lose some credits – their credit earnings will be reduced 5%-8%.  For tiers seven and eight we will both reduce up to 5% or increase up to 5% the income potential of heavy tanks depending on the particular vehicle.  Pleasant news for Top Tier drivers – their vehicles will receive a boost in the range from 5% to 10%


  • Self-propelled Guns

Many self-propelled guns will see a boost in credit income, including tier eight. On Tiers 2-3 it will be an increase in the diapason from 40% to 60%, on Tier 4-5 it will a 4%-14% bonus, while Tier 8 will receive a boost in the range from 7% to 13%. The only cases where credit income will remain the same are tiers six and seven.


  • Tank Destroyers

Due to the rebalancing of tank destroyer progression, we will be reducing the income of all tank destroyers by somewhere between 3% - 8%, depending on the vehicle. This of course excludes tiers two through four, which will see credit income increases.


Profitability of premium vehicles of tier 5 and above will not change.



[UPDATE]


Explaining tables

Here you can find the tables explaining these income adjustements for each tank nation. The tanks not mentioned will not see an income change. Info in brackets marked with a star ( * ) refers to repair cost change.

All values in green represent income increase and reduction in repair costs.

All values in red represent income reductions and increase in repair costs.



  • France

  •  Germany

  • Soviet Union

  • US

Friday, March 16, 2012

0.7.2 tank qualification badges



The upcoming update 7.2 will implement special qualification badges, which will be granted to a player in case he/she earns a certain amount of experience in battle.

Qualification badges resemble real qualification badges, which were given to tankees for professionalism and combat skills.

Historically, tank or SPG driver’s qualification badge was awarded to generals, officers, sergeants, or soldiers of armored troops; they were established by the USSR Defense Minister’s order on April 6, 1954. Four degrees of badges were introduced then: Master Driver and Class I, Class II, and Class III Driver. Along with badges, a person received a certificate, confirming specialist’s class. Officers purchased badges with real money, whereas military conscripts gained them for free.

In July 1954, qualification badges were established for non-commissioned and private corps of all branches of troops. Since then, classified driver badges were credited only to officers.

In 1961, due to the fact that qualification badges were established for officers of all branches of troops, qualification badges for SPG and tank drivers were discontinued.

In game, you will receive a qualification badge for earning a certain amount of experience. Thus, it’s a kind of a record, which can be reached in a random battle. A qualification badge will be granted after earning more experience than other players in battle. The reward will be granted right after the battle end. A vehicle’s 7-day battle statistics will be used for qualification tracking.

Please note that the name and features may be subject to change during the development process of the 7.2. release.

If your amount of experience received in battle overcomes an average result of 50% of top players riding this tank within last seven days, then you gain the Class III badge.
If you remount of experience overcomes average result of 20% of top players riding same vehicle within 7 days, then you get the Class II badge.


If your amount of experience earned in battle overcomes average result of 5% of top players riding same vehicle within 7 days, you get the Class I badge.

If you get into 1% of top players (i.e. you established the best result of experience within 7 days), then you will achieve the Master Driver badge.

Experience will be counted without premium account or multiplied coefficient effect (x2, x3 or x5).

Qualification badges will not be taken back or decreased. If next time you play worse, the qualification badges will not be affected. If you receive Master Driver badge, then no other badges will be given to the specified vehicle. A vehicle only have the higher badge it obtained. Qualification badges will not be credited for experience received prior to 7.2 update release.


Example: Within the last 7 days, average experience received by 5% of top players riding BT-7 comprised 600 experience points. If you receive 610 exp. points on BT-7 in battle, you will be given Class I qualification badge. If you receive 750 experience points, having premium account which adds 50% experience more, then your actual amount of experience comprises 500 exp. points, and you will not achieve Class I badge.

In game example

Source: WoT EU portal

Thursday, March 15, 2012

3 days strategy to kick someone from a landing


Now with tank freezing in Clan Wars I thought of a strategy to kick a clan from a landing province withing 3 days.
How? simple:

  • 1st day - apply for landing, battle your way through the qualifications with your top tier tanks and in the battle with owner, jump to tier9 heavies, tier 7 arty and T-50-2s with the sole objective to knock out as many of their top tier tanks as you can
  • day 2 - apply for landing and fight your way to the last qualification round (before battle with owner), where you forfeit to the other clan; the objective is to force the province owning clan to lose more top tier tanks and none to you
  • day 3 - again, apply for landing and fight your way through; in battle with owner use your top tier tanks, the idea is that in those 2 first days, the clan owning the province would have lost enough top tier tanks so they won't be able to fill the entire roster.
owner kicked
  • in day 4, you have your own NAP and forfeit the province to a friendly clan with fresh top tiers
  • day 5-7 you play top tiers in qualifying rounds and have to win final so owner won't have to lose top tiers in landing battle; meantime, NAP clan secures a province or two
  • day 8, NAP clan forfeits the landing province to your clan

Thoughts?

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Tank freeze for EU Clan Wars


The long awaited feature called "tank freezing" for Clan Wars is here. Praised by some, hated by many, this feature will freeze a tank destroyed in a CW battle for a specified amount of time depending on it's tier and type.
The duration of the suspension depends on the vehicle’s tier: the higher the tier that the vehicle belongs to, the longer it’s suspension will last. Vehicles of Tier 1 will not get locked out at all. Furthermore there’ll also be no lockout in the starting tournaments at landing, regardless of tier or combat result. In addition to that, previously suspended vehicles also will be able to participate in these tournaments as well. However this exception does not apply in final battles with the province owner, where the lockout feature will come into effect again.

The chart shows you how long (in hours) the tanks get locked out depending on their tier

This feature will be implemented starting with 15th of March at 10:00 CET (GMT+1)

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

0.7.1.1 patch on RU server, tomorrow


Tomorrow, during the interval 3-5 AM Moscow time, RU server will get the 0.7.1.1 patch. 0.7.1.1 is an transition update necessary for the upcoming 0.7.2 patch.

An important aspect when installing 0.7.1.1:
If a player has replaced files in the game folder (custom modifications), then, to avoid downloading files totaling up to 5 GB, it's recommended that you delete the game folder entirely and install World of Tanks again by downloading the full installer version 0.7.1.1 (2,44 Gb).
If there were no modifications to game files, the launcher will only download 10Mb of data required for 0.7.1.1 update.

Features:
  1. Packaging resources:
      • a new file format for storing files is introduced, aimed at optimizing loading of game's maps
  2. A separate folder for mods:
      • every time a patch will be released, a new folder will be created for storing the mods; giving the player the ability to chose witch mods he wishes to move from the old folder to the current version

Note: the global testing of 0.7.2 patch is planned for the coming days.

Source: WoT RU portal

Friday, March 2, 2012

Some new info about 0.7.2 from "Storm"

In a recent interview with wotbase.ru, developer called "Storm" had some info to share.

Note: original text is in russian, some translation errors might occur or make no sense at all.



  • Rescale models of tanks: IS-3 IS-4 IS-7, ISU-152, Object 704, S-51 (according to Overlod, some russian tanks are overscaled)
  • Reworked balancing algorithm for teams of tanks in random battles. Posted interrupt the long series of hits in the high-level battles. (according to Overlord, if you get in a long streak of matches against hi tiers, you'll be then put in lower tiers)
  • Rebalanced settings for the French branch of tanks, introduced in version 0.7.1. (A complete description of the changes will be ready to release a patch.) 
  • Changed the angles of declination for the following tank guns: AMX 12t, AMX 13 75, AMX 13 90, D2, B1, AMX M4 1945, AMX 50 100
  • Now reduces the damage of the screens mines taking into account its thickness and location. 
  • Absorption (blocking) armor explosive damage reduced by 20%. 
  • Fixed frequent non-penetration of the tank in contact with a weapon after breaking through the screen (mask tools or instruments of reservation.) 
  • The sight added to the indicator remaining in the drum (or in the cassette / tape) shells. (french revolver type tanks)
  • For a wide list of commands added to the state of the markers and tags platoons clans. 
  • The substrate is made ​​of lists of commands more transparent. 
  • The width of the lists of commands in the "wide" mode is now adjusted to the most comprehensive player nickname in the list (before the width of the list has always been the maximum.) 
  • When you press "TAB" now instead of a table with a list of commands displayed "wide" mode list of commands. 
  • Reworked the color and geometry of some German camouflage to better fit the real historical camouflage. 
  • Now, if a module is broken or bruised Only one crew member, the repair module or crew member is treated with a single click without having to select the module or crew member. 
  • Added display of the input language on login screen. 
  • Added an extended set of markers on the tanks in the normal and expanded (when you press Alt) mode. 

  • Added advanced configuration of sight in the sniper mode.
  • Added additional messages to detect the enemy, damage to the enemy "lit up" the player to destroy the enemy "lit up" player.
  • Changed the format of the record fights. Records from version 7.1 will not play in version 7.2 and vice versa. 
  • Fixed "twitching" when viewing the tank battle.
  • In the shutdown mode interface (by pressing "V") removed unnecessary display of messages and tokens of tanks.
  • The howitzer sight is now permanently displays the distance to the marker gun.
  • Changed the color of the flags on the bases. Now the color of the flag of its base is always green, and the enemy - always red.
  • Fixed "sticky" marker on the minimap view.