Hello everyone,

I am sure that the Polish FTR readers known about Polish Dom1n’s blog – personally, I consider it one of two best non-Russian WoT blogs there are (the second would be Eikarramba’s http://wot-com.de/ in German).

Recently, Dom1n was successful in acquiring some QA answers from Obirian and Quasars, WG EU producers. Now… the latter name might be familiar to some of the older FTR readers. This guy did QA earlier on EU server (once per blue moon) and… it was not successful, to put it mildly. So, take any answers here with a grain of salt. Also, if I mistranslated something from Polish, please let me know, the original Polish source is here.

- in 9.3 ricochet system, you will not be punished for having your shell ricochet and damaging an ally
- ricocheting your shell into an enemy tank will count as your damage
- shells will not ricochet from house walls

(followed by explaining the ricochet mechanics, can be found here)

- new LT8 models have each over 40 thousand polygons
- water does not provide camouflage bonus
- shooting a tank that is under water does not make the shell lose penetration
- there are plans to rebalance LT’s further, the Chaffee rebalance and introducing new LT8′s are the first steps

Continue reading →

Hello everyone,

while we are waiting for the 9.3 patch (not today), Russians already have it (be grateful, that also means the worst bugs that sometimes appear get to be fixed before the patch comes out). From the discussion:

- some mods again stopped working with 9.3, but other players reports their mods to be working
- the shots sound more muted when in sniper mode, Storm states this is intentional: “The price of realism” (later, he adds “try hitting a tank with a hammer with someone inside – he will barely hear it”, although he adds that he forgot the physics he learned, so there is no need to bash him on that if it’s not true)
- XP for “tanking” will definitely not come via a micropatch, Storm states that currently, they will fix the formula, then they will upload it to the server, they will collect statistics and only after that it will be applied – “when it’s done it’s done”
- Storm on new easy-to-obtain medals: “And I, as a noob, really like them”
- one of the T-54 turrets has its weight incorrectly displayed, this will be checked
- Storm states that there were various optimizations and fixes when it comes to graphics in 9.3, for some players, FPS grew

Continue reading →

As you probably know, 9.3 is currently active on RU server (EU should get it tomorrow IIRC). The patch seems to have some bugs, but overall it’s normal. The biggest change is the split of HD textures – please make sure you know about it if you use maximum quality texture setting (so you aren’t in for a rude surprise). Some Russian players claim that WG fucked the patch up and included the HD textures in the “non-HD” patch anyway, Storm replied that he would investigate this.

- why does LTTB have bad depression? “Because it was like that in real life” (SS: funny, because LTTB turret was NEVER designed in real life, it’s a Wargaming invention – Yurko2F stronk!)
- when balancing vehicles, DPM is calculated based on (rate of fire * average damage) with the “specific situation of high alpha guns” in mind. In any case, it depends on balancing.
- it’s “possible” that company mode will be completely removed
- T-54 Light being better than tier 8 medium tanks? “Don’t forget the scout MM spread”
- the percentage of hitpoints you lose during an engine/fuel fire, unless you extinguished, is not constant for all tanks – for each tank, it depends on the nation, class and individual characteristics
- apparently, the “realistic tracks movement” made it into 9.3 – these will work with HD models and will be present even if you do not download the HD texture pack
- there is apparently also a bug in 9.3 where the clan logo does not display correctly in the hangar
- according to Storm, T-34-3 will not be seriously buffed
- special SD client? “Enable low graphic quality settings”
- special low quality low-polygon-count models will not be made: “there is no advantage in that”
- for the remaining vehicles, the engine/transmission split will happen “in upcoming patches”
- the 9.2 KV-1S crew will be retrained automatically to KV-85 (apart from the radioman)

Nothing much today (don’t forget to change your password on EU and US server for free 300 gold). If you are however interested, there are two things I wanted to link.

First is yet another Chieftain’s Hatch article, this time about the Sherman PR from 1942. Some interesting read.

Second is an article by Listy on Overlord’s blog about the British WB1 tank. Never heard of it before? No worries, noone has. I kept teasing Listy about this project for months because it’s his “white whale” – there are scraps of information, but noone knows what it really looked like. Good luck finding more though :)

In two days, Storm is planning a big stream, where he will allegedly (according to RU staff) talk about future features. In Russian of course, but that’s what FTR is here for. Should be interesting (topics will cover for example Havok, gold ammo etc.). He will also be playing WoT on Ru server, of course. Damn, he should come to EU using roaming. That should be fun!

- no plans to unify gold and premium account in WoT and WoT Blitz
- T110E5 will apparenty not be nerfed
- Q: “What will there be in WoT 2?” A: “WoT 2.0? What is that? :)”
- during ammorack explosions, remaining shells are not “used up” – you don’t have to buy them all back even though they all explode. This is so the players don’t suffer.
- it’s completely possible that new premium tanks will come soon
- it’s completely possible some of the removed maps (Port, Dragon Ridge) will return to the game after they are reworked
- there will be no “zombie mode” in WoT, it was only mentioned as April 1st joke
- crew visual models are not planned
- M6A2E1 buff confirmed (it loses its top battletier, thus getting limited MM)
- larger platoons are not planned
- the AFK and leaver punishment system will come in 9.3 – the only thing that was removed was the suicider punishment system, which needs to breworked
- there will be new tier 8 premium tanks
- “many new and nice, interesting things” will come in stronghold mode
- the XP bonus for “tanking” will not appear in 9.3, it will be reworked and it will come later
- Q: “Storm, what is the fate of 7/68 mode? What about team battles for tier 10?” A: “7/52″ (SS: take it how you will)
- apparently, according to Storm, the XVM minimap with tank names option mod is very resource-requiring
- on very weak computers (“calculators”), XVM can cause up to 30 percent FPS drop
- about half of WoT players have very weak computers

Source: VK Wotleaks community

Hello everyone,

as you might or might not remember, Yuri Pasholok (Wargaming’s chief historian) is working on a long term project, renovating some tanks at the Central Museum of Armored Forces in Moscow. This includes scraping off the rust, sandblasting, re-painting them and such stuff. He’s not however doing it alone, the “crew” consists also of volunteers and one of them, Ivan Karetnikov, helped out with the work, asking some things in the process.

Here’s what he learned.

- FV4202 switch will most likely not come this year. The reason for that is that the developers have to physically go to the Bovington Museum to 3D scan the Action X turret. If the turret doesn’t get scanned, the model will simply not be made.
- VK4502 Ausf.B could become a tier 7-8 premium vehicle with mediocre mobility and its historical gun and armor (SS: 88mm L/71, 80 or 100mm of armor IIRC). This would happen after the tank gets switched for Maus prototype
- Swedish tanks will be in the EU tree
- tier 1 of EU tree will be Fiat 3000B with 47mm armor and tier 2-3 gun, but poor mobility (SS: this is some weird shit, this tank has absolutely nothing to do with other branches of the tree)
- Italian EU branch (SS: note that there will not be a separate Italian tree apparently) hightier tanks will be M47 Patton and Leopard 1 clones
- Stanislaw Lem’s “Czolg Pancernik” could (seriously) become a tier 10 Polish tank. It’s apparently mediocre, but Slava Makarov (one of the main producers and such) did not say “no” to the idea of this tank in the game.

A few answers from Tuccy, Czech community manager or whatever his rank is these days, as collected during NATO days in Ostrava by Svitman (thank you!).

- there will be new extended tutorial (how consumables, equipment work etc.) – allegedly soon, as the developers were waiting for new hangar UI, that comes in 9.3
- WoT Wiki will be promoted more “when it’s finished”
- it is currently not known, whether there will be more “cheap” tier 8 premiums (like Super Pershing is)
- no further info on how how to get the gun barrel marks will be disclosed (SS: as in, battles remaining, exact XP threshold etc.)
- T71 gold ammo price will not be changed
- it’s possible that the company mode will be cancelled altogether
- it’s possible there will be special CW missions
- there will not be more Stronghold missions for now
- T-34-3 will likely not be buffed (SS: oooops, but then Tuccy was never the most reliable of sources)
- T-34-2, 113, SU-101 and Afk Panther “will be buffed if needed based on long term statistics”
- mercenaries might come to CW, if the feature is successful in Stronghold
- WZ-132 advantage compared to RU251: “Better camo”
- the fact that a tank loses armor when the model is remade to HD does not mean the tank will always be buffed to compensate

Not much going on. Russian Supertest had a little affair, where one guy with the nickname Kostik_11 ranted against Ukraine (allegedly very rudely) and as a reward, he got kicked from supertest and recieved a 2,5 month ban. He “appealed” using support ticket and RU support changed his punishment to permanent ban, which caused much butthurt and many bricks were shat. The rage on RU forums was quite funny, pointless to translate though.

Q: “Developers, you said earlier that the vehicles, which can be lit up by firing into frontal transmission have this handicap compensated by other characteristics. Does that mean you will nerf the frontal transmission vehicles, now that they can’t be lit up from the front?” A: “If necessary”

A quick announcement – I had several events planned for this week, specifically a nice historical competition, the Hall of Shame mod, some streams and such. Unfortunately, everything got delayed by a week or two by the fact that my PC is undergoing repairs, so please, be patient (especially the mod seems to be a requested featured judging by mail).

- the equipment is tied to a vehicle, not its modules. FV207 British artillery for example uses medium caliber rammer, while the vehicle tier higher uses large caliber rammer, even though it can use the same gun. That is due to the presence of the 7.2in howitzer on the latter vehicle
- Swedish tanks in the game? “If Swedish tanks were to be added to the game they would more likely be part of a European tree.”
- regarding WoT monetization: “The game model is such that you use your tier 6 and tier 5 to generate credits to fund your higher tiers. If you could play tier 10 without ever having to really worry about losing credits, why would anyone ever use the premium account option, purchase premium tanks, or play any other tier than tier 10 where they don’t have to worry about facing tanks of a higher tier?”
- T95E2 Medium Tank in WoT? “We can’t comment on future content because it’s always subject to change. The future of this tank hasn’t been confirmed, once we’re sure of what is happening with it, we’ll let players know at a time where we’re also able to answer any questions players have about it.”

Hello everyone,

there was currently a Q&A session with EU staff (Ectar, Obiron and some guy I never heard about, Tugali or something) on Reddit. As you can imagine, it wasn’t exactly groundbreaking, but nevertheless, here’s the sum of it (minus the pointless stuff):

- ricochets in 9.3: “Ricochet can occur only on the first tank, if ricochet occurs on the second tank, the shell disappears. But ricochet on the second tank will be processed the same way as for the first one.”
- a new CW campaign is still coming this year (tier 10 stuff)
- “team battles are not so popular with introduction of StrongHolds”
- the new LT’s were something that was planned for quite some time (SS: the T49/XM551 hybrid was planned ever since late 2013 as tier 8, RU251 was planned since early 2013, that LTTB thing was however quite new)

Continue reading →

- Ruineberg on Fire will be completely removed. It will be replaced by a winter Ruinberg version.
- developers are still working on bigger maps
- new motion physics will not come in 9.4, but later
- Storm states that it is necessery to find a balance in the amount of bushes on maps. Too few are bad, but there are sometimes too many “shooting bushes” out there.
- once upon a time, long time ago, there was a map called “Savannah”. Developers decided not to implement it, because arty was dominating on it and there was nowhere to hide.
- the Chaffee Race mode is also temporary, just like the soccer and Karl modes were, there will be a medal and the Chaffee will be handed out for free
- Storm states that some FPS loss reports reported lately could not be proven on computers of the same configuration