Soviet Inscriptions: Part 1

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There are two schools of thought on WoT inscriptions. Many vie for more freedom in the size and location of the inscriptions. Others (including SerB) believe that the current way is the only way: having the inscriptions set in stone is the most historical way to do things. Or is it? Let’s take a look at some inscriptions and their real life inspirations and find out.

For starters, one of the most famous T-34 tanks, Boyevaya Podruga. The game translates it as “Fighting Girlfriend”, but it’s more of a “friend that is a girl” word. In Russian, as in many languages, it does not imply romantic associations. A brief history of the inscription: Mariya Vasilievna Oktyabrskaya, whose husband was killed in battle, donated all of her savings in order to buy a tank for the front (as many did), but then sent a letter to Stalin personally, requesting to be made the tank’s driver, and to give it its name. Stalin granted the request. Mariya fought in the rank of Guards Sergeant in the 2nd Guards Tank Corps. After the first tank was knocked out, three additional vehicles inherited its name. The fourth tank lived to see victory, but, unfortunately, its “mother” did not.

Here is how the tank looks in game:shot_005

And here is how it looks in real life.boyevaya-podruga

Kind of shatters the “historically accurate” theory, eh? The font is much smaller, it’s written in two lines instead of one, and there is no inscription on the hull. Not exactly a precise replica.

Next, a KV tank, “Remorseless”. This tank was paid for by a poet, Nikolai Tikhonov (joined by many other writers), who donated an award that he received for a poem in 1942. The tank fought until 1943, when it was damaged beyond repair in battle. Here’s how it looks in game and in real life.

shot_001 besposchadniy

Well, the doodle of the tank shooting Hitler to pieces is missing, as are the kill marks, but the size of the inscription is mostly right, if not its placement and font. Unfortunately, there is another part of the tank’s decoration we are missing:

besposchadniy-2

A poem by another famous Soviet poet, Marshak, written on the turret. My poetry is awful in any language, but I think you will get the idea of it:

Storm them with your fire
Our heavy tank
Go into the fascists’ rear
Hit them in the flank

Your fearless crew
Without blinking
Carries out Stalin’s
Combat orders

Sadly, all we get is the name. I would have paid double for an exploding Hitler on the side of my tank!

Next, another T-34, Leningradets. The tank belonged to the 1st Red Banner Tank Brigade, and is a part of several tanks named for their achievements in battle. The order awarding the tanks their names can be found here.  shot_030leningradets

Oh boy, lots of things missing. The Order of the Red banner is gone, the inscription is the wrong size and font, but also the wrong colour. The most famous photograph of this tank is in winter camouflage, and yet the WoT version is white, not red. As a result, it is unreadable.

Let’s do a less famous tank, the meek T-70. There were named versions of this tank too. I can’t find much on Avtozavodskoy Shkolnik (Automotive factory school student), but photos show it in a group of similarly marked vehicles.

shot_003 avtozavod

Minor problems with the font, a little too small, and the top line isn’t arched. But congrats, WG, so far this is the least wrong.

36 thoughts on “Soviet Inscriptions: Part 1”

  1. What the fudge? It’s not even close to the real-life counterparts…

    Details like these can make the game so much more appealing.

  3. It would be nice if we could at least change the size of the inscriptions on some tanks…they’re absolutely pathetically tiny on, say, the KV-2. Of course, that goes for all nationalities as well…TOG needs bigger ones as well!

    • WT GF inscriptions?

      You mean those horribly large, overstretched, and completely unreadable(since you only see maybe half of it on one side) crap?
      Because that’s what they usually are.

      You can spend some time to position/size it yourself; that’s the problem.

      • That’s the part that makes it appealing. Not all tanks were the same. People wrote all over them in odd ways, angles, fonts, sizes, Just make it so you can only make it SO large and SO small but you can put it in other spots. That’s why WT is very fun.

      • If you see my tanks in WT you’ll note the historical accuracy of the decals and camm. Then you see the rest….

        • I’ve seen a lot of Rasta coloured tanks… and then they asked how I could shoot them from miles away….

          Cos I iz so skillzed..

          ….having a bright red arse and gold turret was nothing to do with it…….honest..

  5. “Не смыкая глаз” usually refers to “Not falling asleep” (as in, not closing your eyes out of tiredness), so I guess a better translation would be “Without a rest” or something like that.

    Anyway, great article! Now I see the main thing missing in he game – plane tank numbers! It would be much cooler if any tank would get a random number (not all tanks of type X getting the same number, but every player getting a random one) – it would add much more “personality” to every machine.

    • Or to make any number you want (many tanks with the number 69 would then appear ;)

      • Actually, I think it is good that players can’t customize inscriptions to their likeness, at least not the text…
        Imagine the description on EFE tanks…

        • Don’t be like those mindless idiots who blindly follow what the media tells them, yes EFE has idiots, morons, dickheads, insecure new accounts with 3k+ WN8, etc… but then again so do all the top clans and scrub clans alike we just get noticed sooner ‘cuz we’re popular and stuff, don’t forget SilentStalker is in R1SE, and that is ex-EXNOM (ed: sounds fun to say), people who dominated mr. SS’s Halls of Shame a lot! :)

          • You are right.
            I did not actually mean all of EFE. Was talking about people that constantly insult people on racial and national basis.

    • They could always make the number like the last 2 digits from your player number. That way the number would be sort of personal and still not having people do 69 all over the place.

      • Or they could just make it as in WoWP, where your plane will get a number (or letter) depending on which slot you are in on the roster in every battle (so for example you are the top tier in a battle, you get number 1 (or A), when you are the 7th, you get the number 7 (or G), etc.).

        Would be neat.

  8. I thinks it has more to do with limited/fixed space for such inscriptions. Of course, placing each one individually on the model would be cool, but too much work for few hundreds tanks x few dozens inscriptions and probably would need a new system for them.

  10. Will u talk about “rudy” (ginger in polish) inscription? Many polish players have butthurt because of its so wrong place

  11. SS, we would have whole “skins” available for sale, not simple “inscriptions”. And that wouldn’t be bad.

  13. :( SS, because of my timezone, im late for the contest. I really wanted to join. *sob*

  16. It is entirely possible to change the size and placement of the inscriptions if you know how to edit the relevant xml files.

  17. Just mod it.

    The inscriptions in engine are all placed roughly on the same spot, saves resources, but of course, then you can’t have one of them much bigger than some other one.