10.2.2014

As I wrote on the Facebook, I am currently ill, so I apologize if the translation is worse than usual, did my best.

Check out Listy’s article about Chieftain development – part 1

- SerB doesn’t often use the Soviet branch as a comparison for other branches (SS: earlier, it was posted somewhere that some Soviet vehicles serve as some sort of “base” for other vehicle comparison)
- whenever a tank moves, it is instantly considered to be moving (for camo purposes)
- the rule above applies for all types of vehicles
- a player asked, whether WoWs is being developed, or priority lies elsewhere. SerB answers that WoWs development is made by a separate independent studio and it is influenced very little by other WG projects
- shell velocities in WoT are lower than in real life in order to emphasize the skill factor (pre-aiming)


- all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players
- SerB, when asked whether MM is taking into account situations, where elite clans make platoons of OP tanks in high tier battles: “You got skilled – you have the right to pwn. If you made a platoon from skilled players – you have to pwn.”
- apparently the rumor that if you are getting nasty fights, it’s enough to just switch a server to “reset” MM is just a rumor
- ground resistance is not tied to the tank weight – weight is taken into account in power-to-weight ratio, not in the resistance
- the ingame report system will be improved (it is being developed), it’s possible the “justifiability” of each player will be taken into account (SS: as in, a complaint by a player, who submits bullshit reports might have smaller weight than the one by a player, who reports correctly, at least that’s how I understood it)
- SerB doesn’t see a general problem with the “old” tanks (SS: as in earlier introduced): “If Veider’s team notices problems in statistics, we will buff them”
- SerB states that the appearance of alternative hulls does NOT mean the current issues with load capacity will be completely negated, he adds that there shouldn’t be that much of a problem in it, because later (more advanced) hulls will simply have access to later modules (SS: as in, early hull variant will have access to stock gun like it is now, the late one will have access to upgraded guns)
- for now, the hulls are planned as tied to the suspensions
- Havok will have no influence on shell behavior, it will work client-wise (SS: shells will not have mass)
- 0 damage hits being removed from the game (SS: as in, damaging tracks would damage the tank HP as well)? “It’s not decided yet, we are discussing”
- Object 140 model will be reworked – when it is reworked to the HD quality
- about shooting HE shells into enemy gun barrel: the “explosion” happens not always at the end of the barrel, but at the point it met the barrel. Shooting the end of the barrel however will produce 0 damage hit.
- it’s possible, that alternative hulls will have their modules somehow “locked”, for example the T-54 (with two equally valuable hulls – either more armor, or more speed), the older (more armored) hull might be able to use only the stock turret with LB-1 as its gun
- vehicle viewrange will not be buffed (“it’s big as it is now”)
- missing US premium TD? “We do not guarantee the symmetry of all types of premium vehicles for all nations”
- Q: “Should we wait for new maps with western, African, Eastern and Asian thematics, CW innovations and premium French vehicles?” A: “Noone can forbid you to wait”
- apparently, on supertest an option was tried where bunker guns on maps suddenly came alive and started shooting at the tanks passing by

Earlier today, Storm posted a “fan mail” he recieved from some Russian player (pretty funny whine). In comments, Veider wrote he gets over a dozen of such stuff per day.

- developers decided not to implement a winrate per session statistics, because people would only get butthurt about 30 percent per session and those, who really want this stuff (unicums) can get it via mods

117 thoughts on “10.2.2014

  1. I’m just thankfull that you even bother with trying to do a translation when ill, hope you get better soon.

  2. - SerB doesn’t see a general problem with the “old” tanks (SS: as in earlier introduced): “If Veider’s team notices problems in statistics, we will buff them”

    Maus …. hello…. anybody there in its “team”?

    • I don’t know much about the Maus
      but I will say Panther/M10 really need a buff
      it a tier higher than the 30.02 (m) yet the 02 (m) has better rof and viewrange

        • yeah, I dont know.. I was kinda disappointed when I finally unlocked maus.
          Just because of this.. gold shells. I mean, i dont have any problem with gold ammo (using a few shells when I’m on the bottom of rooster, just to make at least some dmg and get xp)

          But on tier X, its just too powerful. .. excuse me but 360-400pene ? Completely diminishing THE ONLY thing Maus is about.. armor.
          Rendering it just slow moving support tank, since everything goes through as hot knife into butter.

          Just my thoughts… but it’s kinda same with every tank in game, they are way too fragile.
          Throw a rock on panther and it will catch on fire. I’d rather see much more ricochets and having the shell cost reduced than this… I just don’t feel like Im driving A TANK! It’s more like a car with gun.

          • *shrug* Mere steel plate is ultimately pretty limited in terms of stopping power. And Tier Tens are mostly designs from a period when designers had by and large learned the wartime lessons and tended to go to some pains to ensure their creations had “enuff gun” to kill whatever the opposition might field.

              • *another shrug* They also were IRL so long the opponent wasn’t severely undergunned. And even then aside from truly egregious mismatches (which aren’t *that* common in WoT thanks to the tier distribution) tactics and specific circumstances tended to be at least as important in deciding who was left a smoking wreck as raw hardware.

                • Well IRL 1 penetrating shot = wrecked tank. Not necessarily the tank, but the crew was all over the place…
                  but yeah, you are right… it would be just campfest in that case….
                  Please no more shrugging :D I got your point ;)

                • Realistically speaking, the Maus was a butt-stupid idea already at the conceptual level – the E-100 only came into being through the horrified military brass wanting a marginally industrially and logistically saner alternative should Der Führer’s infatuation with retarded superheavies prove lasting. (It didn’t, doubtless to the great relief of many.)
                  Could use a firepower boost in-game though.

          • I think you should learn to angle your Maus, that dinosaur is immune even with gold rounds. My friend’s Maus received 16700 dmg but he still alive at the end of battle. Maus only vulnerable by HE, which can be troll with super spall liner :D

            • lol man… I don’t disagree that angling is a must, but it doesn’t save the maus unless it is getting fired at from a single direction/tank. And 1 or 2 good games out of dozens doesn’t mean that the maus is doing fine.

              I never get such arguments where people quote a single game as proof that the others are talking out of their asses.

      • panther/m10 is much better than regular panther. its mobility and traverse is very nice. but yes, both panthers should get better rof – now their dpm is mediocre at best, alpha ridiculous and armour is shit. cromwell has better rof and dmp at tier 6. 2000-2100 dpm would be okay.

    • That is literally the worst troll comment Serb has ever made. ALL of the older tanks are worse and its due to the HUGE amount of power creep going on in the game. Someone explain to me how the M48 compares in any way to the STB-1. That’s only one example but i’m not wasting my time on more because Serb will just never care.

      Maybe this year with only introducing 2 new branches we will finally get some proper re-balancing but I’m not expecting anything. Another problem is the fact they when they buff something they generally either extremely overbuff it or buff something that is completely useless to the tanks playstyle

    • I tried the Maus in the test server and I loved it. Maybe because there, the tier X fucktards only load HEAT and shoot my tracks or angled turret when sidescraping.

    • Woras bro’, i see your Maus and raise you a T95…..
      but “it’s speed will not be buffed”, even though the gun is so inaccurate that you ned to shoot well inside enemy viewrange, and they can pinpoint parts of your armor that shouldn’t be able to get penned(i got penned on the left frontal armor by a cheating E5 with AP repeatedly, not one of the big cuppolas, but the FLAT ARMOR)

      • But T95′s “speed” completely historical in the game. 13km/h.
        And if I remember correctly, they already refused a historical speed buff.

        • Hellcat isn’t going to get a speed buff because it was not historical to have M36 turret + 90mm gun.

          Want speed buff? Go back to 76mm.

          • Both German lines imho need to be redesigned but I doubt it will ever happen…
            Too bad though as Maus II with L/66 would have been a lot of fun.

          • If unlockable hulls bring a 90kph top speed to my Hellcat, I’ll happily get back to the high dpm 76mm and play it like a T-49. :D

      • didn’t SS post a rather large spreadsheet around 1 month ago showing the speeds for every shell ingame?, and that one clearly showed that for the same gun, APCR/subcaliber/”gold” had MUCH higher velocity…

        what’s going on?

  3. “Apparently, on supertest an option was tried where bunker guns on maps suddenly came alive and started shooting at the tanks passing by”

    This would probably startle me pretty bad the first dozen times or so, if this was implemented.. I am used to them just laying silent.

    • Scare you the first dozen times and piss you off every single time. Not gonna be fun when your tank gets shot by a random gun in the map controlled by no one in particular.

      • Ooooh, but the opposite of what you said could be very interesting.

        Instead of just having the guns shoot anything that gets close, give them a cap circle like what the flags have. The guns would only fire as long as a tank is sitting in the circle, and would stop firing when tanks of both teams are in the circle, similar to how flags on encounter maps work. And they would only fire at tanks on the other team too.

        There are areas on certain maps where combat kind of stagnates, putting in other objectives, especially ones that shoot, could be used to get the ball rolling in places like that.

    • It’s all rumours, but Chieftain prototype is meant to be tier 10 of the second British HT line. I think SerB implied somewhere FV 215b may not be remodelled into HD and will be replaced instead IIRC.

      • Well you can check them in the abovementioned programs (WoT Database can be downloaded for androind, and about Tank Inspector – you can find info here on the blog – try searching for it)

        The numbers aren’t very different but still I’ll let you know about some tanks

        T34 — 816 vs 1020 m/s (norm/prem)
        KV-1S — 780 vs 975 m/s
        IS-3 — 1007 vs 1259 m/s
        ISU 152 — 880 vs 1100 m/s
        And so on…not big difference but sometimes you think you can feel it =)
        P.S HEAT are the only prem shells with a bit less velocity rather than a bit more.

          • That’s sort of the whole point of the concept. The discarding “carrier” around the penetrator is above all to give the propellant gas more surface area to work on which is AFAIK why this gets you more poke than an otherwise similar full-caliber smaller shell (and for that matter a wider barrel gives the propellant more volume to combust in before running out of pipe I guess).

      • According to the game files, HE goes the same speed as AP, and only on some guns is HEAT slower than HE.

  4. So could the T54 optional hull thing be considered a nerf? For example you have to choose speed or armor but currently there are voth ?
    Also, will optional hulls add hit points?

  5. - all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players

    Total bullshit!
    You can easily see, that there is a huge difference in the velocity of HE and APCR for a lot of tanks.

    Or was that changed with 0.8.11?!

  6. “0 damage hits being removed from the game (SS: as in, damaging tracks would damage the tank HP as well)? “It’s not decided yet, we are discussing”

    Is he trolling?!

    How could they implement such a feature? That would be a huge nerf to all tanks that rely on armor.

    Maybe I just misunderstand but this sounds like a terrible idea to me.

    • Armour is for the shells to bounce/ricochette. What he means is that penetrating shots would always do some damage. Today you can pen a ELC with the largest caliber gun and do 0 dmg… Insanely annoying.

      • Yeah but it’s stupid to do dmg by hitting only the tracks.Now you can hit and ELC and do no dmg because your shell doesn’t hit the tank itself,just the tracks,if you could dmg the tracks armor would become completely useless.

    • “Maybe I just misunderstand but this sounds like a terrible idea to me.”

      It was mentioned in the past. It’s not about doing full damage, just transferring some of the damage, presumably much below nominal value.

      http://ftr.wot-news.com/2014/02/05/storm-asks-for-player-opinions-on-wot/

      “[D]evelopers are considering an option, where damaging the tracks or the gun (external modules) with high power shells would transfer some of the damage to the tank HP itself, if it came, it would be tied with additional text and sound info”

      I think that in this context describing such mechanism it as “removing 0 damage shots from the game” might be misleading (since it’s quite clear it would not be “guaranteed damage no matter what shell you use”).

      • As much as 0 dmg hits are annoying i still think they shouldn’t switch to this partial damage system. It would change gameplay significantly and not in a good way imo.

        • I’m not saying it’s the besterest idea ever (it would be very easy to screw it up), just pointing out it’s a far cry from “shoot tracks for full damage”. It really depends on implementation – getting damage within the ballpark of 50-100 HP for each time you hit tracks would still mean you need to continuously hit Maus, time after time for half of battle time to kill him.

  7. - it’s possible, that alternative hulls will have their modules somehow “locked”, for example the T-54 (with two equally valuable hulls – either more armor, or more speed), the older (more armored) hull might be able to use only the stock turret with LB-1 as its gun

    This is stupid. First they want to add the option to customize your tank ( more armor or speed etc.), and then take that customization away by making one option clearly better.
    If this really happens, they should stop the work on alternate hulls right now, because it is only going to be another crap to spend XP and make grinding even harder.

    • Are you honestly surprised? WG making more ppl rage by making a harder grind so they use more free XP.

      This will literally mean that any tank that had a reasonable stock grind because of its good hull armour will have the potential to become painful. Not to mention that WG being WG will probably mess up many existing tanks good hulls.

      • If it is tied to Tracks so why would they need to spend more exp? On more than 50% tanks you still need the tracks so…

      • Yup. If we’ll be only able to use the top guns (the only adequate ones for the tier) of it with the less armoured (100mm) hull, there’ll be no point in keeping the T-54 if we have the T-62a too.

        And one of the most fun tanks will be ruined.

  8. “- Havok will have no influence on shell behavior, it will work client-wise (SS: shells will not have mass)”

    Bummer, I was looking forward to flipping an ELC AMX over when his tracks eat my BL-10 shot with ZERO damage.

      • Um, no.

        IRL the track would not “eat” the shell with ZERO damage either.

        However, this is not IRL.

        If WG is going to make it so that a track can “eat” a shell with ZERO damage, then they need to deal with the realities of a little term called “conservation of momentum”. Think of it this way, what would happen if you mounted a BL-10 on an ELC AMX and fired it broadside? It would flip it. That is the same energy that the shell has at impact.

        • Not into physics?

          If you hit only track ( no hull behind it ), the shell would simply tore of a roadwheel and NOTHING more. The energy is absorbed by the torn of wheel and possible ( there is random saves, even for tracks ) detrack when hit the front/back wheel.

          Where do these spinning tanks come from… hitting only a track will most likely ricochet for not even delivering a proper mass relay. When the shell would hit ELC straight into the side hull ( not only to track ) it would get quite smashed ( well it already does… it dies straight off ).

          Think ISU shot BL-10 broadside… it would not quite survive it itself… So argument mounting it on ELC is quite silly. Also the shooting blast is more powerful than the shell exiting, because not every ounce of it is transfered to the shell. Thus We need recoil dampening.

          • Newton’s Third Law of Motion states “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

            The amount of energy that the gun recoils with is EXACTLY the same as the energy imparted on the shell. The purpose of recoil dampening is to impart the gun’s half of the energy equation to the shooting tank over time instead of all-at-once, which would be the case with the shell when it hits the target.

            When the shell hits the ELC’s track (and in game terms stops), the amount of absorbed energy is massive and will have to be redirected. If the shell is indeed stopped (not IRL), the ELC would be shoved violently (likely flipped) as it would react just like the gun dampener. IRL the shell would go through the track, through the hull, through the other track, and keep going.

            I saw a test where three M60 hulls were lined up front-to-back and shot with a 105mm APFSDSDU round through the upper hull plate. The round went through all three tanks and kept going. I want to know when WG will implement this real life aspect of tank-on-tank combat.

            Yes, IRL I am a tanker.

            • …and if the shell only hits a roadwheel at a trajectory where it won’t meet the hull after totaling that, about the most that’s gonna happen to the target tank is a snapped roadwheel lever arm (or whatever those are called) and maybe some damage to a torsion bar or whatever. Not like the kinetic energy is going to get somehow magically transferred into the hull beyond the material breaking point of whatever connects the ‘wheel to it after all.

              Which is what Elfy was talking about.

              • What you are describing is akin to being hit while side-scraping. This is not what I am talking about.

                What I am talking about is a side shot into an ELC AMX that does ZERO dmg and only tracks, or worse yet, only does a “critical hit”.

                • Considering the tracks count as like 15mm’s of spaced armour, that basically means the scenario I described. Also no relation to sidescraping which is about improving the effective thickness of the side plate through angling.

                • I have seen it many times hit the upper track or a return/power/idler wheel and simply “track” the tank.

              • If there is no hull behind a track when it is hit (such as at a steep angle, ala sidescraping), then yes, it would pass through and keep going without further damage to the tank (interesting mechanics there for double hits).

                However and again, that is not what I am talking about. I am talking about a side shot that is nearly perpendicular to the ELC AMX. I don’t care if the tracks count as 15mm of spaced armor or not as a BL-10 shell would go straight through and completely wreck the tank, every time. Heat rounds are another issue all together but spaced armor of this thickness has little affect on a 152mm AP shell hitting it flat on.

                • You DO realise that unless you’re shooting from quite close up it’s perfectly possible for the shot to disperse low enough to only hit the lower track and merrily carry on to the ground, right?

            • If you know your physics, you’d also know the energy imparted by an impact wouldn’t be the same as the recoil, as the velocity of the shell drops over distance, the shell is also penetrating the armour and the energy imparted upon the tank is being absorbed by crumpling armour. Not to mention the shell going through it and out the other side, or the shell exploding inside the tank.

              You mentioned firing a BL10 from an ELC would flip it, well take a cardboard box and strap a rifle to it. Once fired the box will probably flip on its side. However shoot a cardboard box with the same rifle and it will barely move, that’s because the energy of the bullet isn’t fully imparted onto the box, only enough to penetrate.

              If the shell hit the ELC and stopped dead by it, transferring all energy to the ELC, yes it’d flip, but that isn’t what is currently modelled in the game. If the shell hits with no damage, it’s because it went through the tracks and landed on the ground, once again imparting only enough force to penetrate.

              IRL the shell would explode under the ELC destroying it anyway, but APHE explosions aren’t modelled outside the vehicle to give a consistent playing experience. It’s hard enough to understand 0 damage pens, imagine 300 damage bounces.

  9. - all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players
    ____________
    Yo dawg. We heard you like getting confused so we confused you with this statement about confused players by stating this nonsense eventhough we as developers should have known that APCR shells have higher velocity than AP and HEAT/HE have slower velocity than AP.

    - SerB doesn’t see a general problem with the “old” tanks (SS: as in earlier introduced): “If Veider’s team notices problems in statistics, we will buff them”
    ____________
    Please nerf Veider’s team by firing him and buff it by bringing Zlobny back. This fuckwit has no goddamn clue about the game he is “balancing”/working on. He proved it many times so far.

  10. - all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players

    dew have no idea about their own game -.-”

  11. “”0 damage hits being removed from the game (SS: as in, damaging tracks would damage the tank HP as well)? “It’s not decided yet, we are discussing””

    That’d be a GG for the KV-4. No more sidescraping ISU-152′s…
    … I mean, sometimes I get bothered by the 0 damage track shots, but it’s an anti click-and-win mechanic for good players in certain tanks, that can make it happen. The monster guns like those in Tier X TD’s like the ISU-152, Foch 155 or JE-100 would have even more power against everything, if this was introduced… And sometimes the only chance a lower tier has to bounce them is exactly a lucky sidescrape…

  12. ” – all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players”

    Biggest bullshit I’ve ever heard.
    Each type of shell has it’s characteristic velocity in game.
    APCRs will always be faster than APs, AP will always be faster/close to equal to HEATs and HEATs will always be faster/close to equal to HEs/HESHes.
    You can see that in any database that has the velocities posted and you can even test in game, easiest example being the WT E-100 128mm gun.APs are pretty fast, APCRs are lasers, you don’t even nees to preaim with those.

  13. WG staff must see the differences of Mosin rifle variants.

    (Talking about difference of shell velocities here)

  14. - 0 damage hits being removed from the game

    oh cmon :( The tanks are so fragile even now… I dont think this is good idea… there are even tanks that are completely built around this – churchils – absorbing dmg with tracks.

    - it’s possible, that alternative hulls will have their modules somehow “locked”,

    So much for “alternative” — they will be just stock and top. And nobody will use stock hulls since better modules are locked to the other hull… oh well..

  15. - SerB, when asked whether MM is taking into account situations, where elite clans make platoons of OP tanks in high tier battles: “You got skilled – you have the right to pwn. If you made a platoon from skilled players – you have to pwn.”

    Seems obvious to me.

  16. - SerB doesn’t see a general problem with the “old” tanks (SS: as in earlier introduced): “If Veider’s team notices problems in statistics, we will buff them”

    Yea

    If they finish snorting the cocaine bucket empty….

  17. “- all types of shells for the same gun have the same velocity in order not to confuse players”
    Bullshit.

    APCR is way faster than AP.

    • Didn’t saw your reply : exact, shell velocity is NOT the same depending on shell type for the same gun. Clearly not.

  18. somebody knows when, or if the feature comes where you are able to hide your statistics towards xvm server or such? i mean i am not interested anybody to see my stats

    i hate it when xvm starts to shoots players just cos they are blue or violet – prioritize you trying to raise their winchance or whatever – these xvm-arty-shooters are a pain in the ass tbh

    • with your stats you can be called noob, cause you’re not purple, without your stats you’ll be called a noob because you hide them = you’re embarassed of showing them = you suck. People who call others names will do it no matter what you do.

      • true, but he was reffering to the situation where good players are singled out with the use of XVM.
        i have had situation where me driving my VK36.01h was singled out in a T8 match, by everyone and their dog while not even being in the front line.

        but people will always be name calling or placing the blame on people who stand out by either high or low stats. and my least favorate is the rage quiting of people who use the XVM chance to win.

        teams have won or lost matches completely the oposite of what XVM predicted so i have selected to turn it off, and remain blissfully unaware ;)

        • Well, being shot at by half the enemy team just because your stats are good can be quite frustrating. How often does it happen? I don’t think there’s that much teamplay (or brains) in solo pubs.

          I haven’t turned chances off because it helps me to choose tactics right before the battle (if chances are way off that is) but I’d never consider a battle lost at the beginning no matter what xvm says. I had the highest kill roll (12) in a 29% chance to win battle and we won. Even if we are loosing I try to take as many reds with me as possible. Rage quitting is plain silly.

  19. yes, that the biggest rubbish i have read so far in here…

    if you shoot APCR or AP or even HEAT/HE is a big difference

    wait, do we are on 1st April yet.. no… hmmm

  20. Shell velocity and talking about skill factor? Lol, skill is hardly determined by such features in wota. If we want ultimate skill as in reflexes and leading targets etc, then rng and accuracy has to go.

    Also the optional hulls are bullshit, this will make some either better armored making it harder to pen, or lighter easier to pen. Why the fuck cant thay leave the hulls alone instead of messign with them. I just wonder how they will screw up the tiger II hull…

  21. I think what he means is shell velocity is the same for each type of ammo on same gun …on different platforms tanks (that would make sense).