Source: http://world-of-kwg.livejournal.com/204817.html
Author: Slavamakarov
Slavamakarov is one of the developers (or producers, I still don’t understand the top structure of Wargaming, but whatever, he’s one of the important people) and in this article, he discuss the problems with garage battles implementation. For those who do not know: garage battles are battles where you send one tank after another from your garage to the battle, eg. you start with E-100, you get killed, you take T110 from your garage and get back into the same battle. This article is especially difficult to translate, because it somehow presumes the reader to have the knowledge about the garage battle mechanism they want to implement, which I don’t have.
Furthermore, what I THINK the developer has in mind is this: start at lower tier, make your way up to higher tiers as you go thru your tanks and airplanes: yes, this mode will apparently appear in WoWp too.
I’ll basically write just a summary (the way I understood it)
Slavamakarov sees three problems:
- the battles are too long, which will make noobs cry
- if you enter the battle with a team of noobs, you are stuck there until the battle is over. If you think you are stuck there, you throw the game (leave the battle) and the other players get punished by your absence.
- it’s pure hell for the MM (when someone with two tier 1′s and one tier 10 joins) and people get confused, what they have to do to win
As possible solutions, he suggests
- the first point can be solved by more complex structure of victory – for example partial victory goals (as you progress thru the tiers) within the battle and a huge reward for winning altogether. (SS: the way I understand it, it’s a bit like raiding in Warcraft – partial goals are the various lower dungeon bosses, for which you get lesser reward – and the last boss is the main goal, for which you get the biggest “loot”) And – also generally not let noobs advance past tier 5. – at second point S.Makarov states that there is no clear solution here, it would be possible ti economically punish the players for leaving, but that’s just treating the symptoms, not the cause. It is also possible to limit the garage battles to company mode only, but the question is, whether company battles actually need such a mode. As for the leavers, in connection with the “you leave – you get nothing” principle, it’s possible to implement some sort of reward accumulation. In order not to draw the battle for too long, it’s possible to implement some victory condition based on performance.
- third point: here, Slava Makarov has an idea, he will tell separately:
Garage battle, in order not to drive the matchmaker crazy and to make battle outcome predictable, takes place strictly on one level. The rewards grow rapidly with tiers. The deck size (SS: the amount of vehicles one player throws into the battle) is fixed – additional vehicle slots are never awarded. One player cannot also mix arty/anti-ground airplanes and tanks/tank destroyers in one deck. If your team kills 45 enemies within 3 deck slots, it’s a guaranteed victory, each kills brings the team closer to victory of course.
The tanks and airplanes in the decks should be different from each other – the developers don’t want players to spam KV-1S in one deck. If there are no different suitable tanks, players can put the same tank twice, but they get no reward for that. As for the anti-ground planes, apprently there will be an AA defense respawn.
Comments:
- In comments, Slavamakarov states that the game doesn’t have to be 3-slot deck only, 5 slots are also possibility. Victory condition could be like in WoWp: victory points too.
- the aim is not to bring pubbies from random battle to this mode
- it’s possible tier 8 premium vehicles will somehow be limited in this mode
- the spawnpoints: there will be a set of them, it’s possible the engine will pick the most distant one from the enemy
- prototype garage battle was tested on Karelia, but there is no set of maps already decided
