Friday, May 23, 2014

Storm talks about 9.1

Source: http://world-of-kwg.livejournal.com/293768.html

Hello everyone,
Storm is asking for your feedback on the 9.1 test, specifically:
- game performance and possible loss of FPS
- new map
- new gun sounds
- new turret and shell sounds, new sounds of Hellcat and Jackson
- and of course bugs
Here Storm states that the bug where the screen turns black in battle is known, it will be fixed.
Regarding the gun sounds, Storm writes that many are complaining about them and say that they are bad. Storm emphasizes that the gun sounds are in the test to gather playerbase feedback. The sounds are recorded in real life (some “sound photoshop” was used only for the shells of the largest calibers). The volume of the sounds as it is is on their limit – any louder and they will begin to distort. Storm states that according to player feedback, many don’t like it the way it is in the test and it’s possible it would be more correct to make unrealistic “Hollywood” sounds instead (SS: personally, I actually like the new sounds).
Regarding the optimization, in this round, about ten small fixes and optimizations were implemented, that should affect the performance positively on most computers. This wasn’t in the early patchnotes, as it was unknown how these “fixes” would work for the majority of players. According to first feedback, the majority of players reports very positive influences, which according to Storm means Wargaming is moving in the right direction.
Storm also adds that they found a way, how to without too much digging fix the lags when you switch from arcade to sniper mode. They are working on the fix right now.
From the discussion:
- it’s not yet sure whether the aforementioned arcade/sniper mode lag fix will be there in 9.1 release
- developers are working on more optimization
- crew “not forgetting previous tank training” (SS: as in, would stay trained for tank A even when retrained for tank B) option will not be implemented, it’s not economically profitable for WG
- same goes for buying previously purchased tanks for half (selling) price
- regarding the missing sound echo (you were used to from old sounds): devs added “echo zones” so for example in closed areas the sound will echo
- Storm states that in the “historical realism gun sounds mod”, the quality of samples was not very good and the sounds were collected from all over the place, Wargaming will not cooperate with Gnomefather, Storm personally doesn’t like the sound mod very much apparently (“When it comes to me personally, this mod stresses me sometimes by its ‘forced sound’” SS: as in, too much intensive sounds – Storm adds that atmosphere is good but he can’t play with it for long)
- regarding historical sounds, Storm adds that War Thunder also has historical sounds of guns, yet everyone likes it there
- it’s not an option to have two sound sets (historical one and “Hollywood” one), the work would immediately double by that
- the sound of turret turning is there for all tanks, in sniper mode
- a player was complaining that he can’t now recognize a difference between a sound 300 meters away and 600 meters away, Storm counters that he personally can easily
- Storm states he can’t say exactly which tanks were the gun sounds recorded from, it was some sort of BMP and T-72 and some others
- apparently, Ruinberg on Fire will get some brighter lighting, Kharkov is brighter than Ruinberg on Fire
- stock tanks will not get reduced MM spread (“the team would be very happy to see a stock tank as their top vehicle”)
- the turret turning sound doesn’t activate when you move a turret (in sniper mode) just a little – this is intentional, so that the turret sound doesn’t irritate you, when you are trying to aim precisely. Furthermore, it’s historical – fine turret movement was performed by manual hand cranking and that almost cannot be heard in a tank
- Kharkov does have sound echo in fact

Wednesday, May 21, 2014

T2LT Invite Codes

Source: http://www.mmorpg.com/giveaways.cfm/offer/519/World-of-Tanks-Gift-Key-Giveaway.html

Hello everyone,
on the MMORPG.com site, there is a giveaway of invite codes, that contain:
- Premium T2LT Tank
- 3 Days Premium Time
- 500 Gold
You have to register on the portal to get it. At this moment, cca 4600 codes are remaining.

Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Stronghold Mode Preview

Source: http://world-of-ru.livejournal.com/3291114.html

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What is the Stronghold mode?
New mode for clan players, available within the game and not tied to the Clanwars. A clan has a virtual base with buildings, road leading to it and additional constructs. Can be created by the commander of the clan free of charge, whenever he wishes, but the clan has to have at least 20 players.
The clan can develop its “stronghold”, construct buildings on it in order to access various economical bonuses, that can be activated for limited time. For example, increase of creditmaking of vehicles in the game, or increase the crew training speed – everything depends on stronghold development strategy. In the future, new features will be added to this mode, such as upon reaching a certain level of the stronghold, players will be able to attack enemy strongholds and defend theirs. During such battles, there will be unique features such as air support (bomber raid), artillery fire mission, minefields and others.

Monday, May 19, 2014

19.05.14.



- some players on RU forum started spreading rumors that artillery will be removed from the game – it’s BS, won’t happen
- SerB states that generally speaking, WG always compensates the players for XP, when they make changes in any branches
- according to Overlord, World of Tanks Blitz will be released worldwide “with a substantial update” (as in, during a bigger patch)

- there will be new historical battles and balance changes in HB in 9.1, definitely at least one new historical battle
- current maps are made by the same people like the earlier maps, only the map department leadership changed
- developers are considering nerfing FV304
- Q: “Why do you always nerf the vehicle, that is the favourite one of a lot of players?” A: “‘Favourite’ vehicle always means an imbalanced vehicle. Proven numerous times.”
- the idea to have garage battles and alternative hulls was not scrapped
On the topic of historical battles:
- Q: “Change historical battles not by removing hitpoints, but only stop displaying them” A: “Why, so the player doesn’t know what’s going on?”
- apparently some historical battles will be changed, some will stay
- the removed historical battles might return
- special tank stats for historical battles are supposed to solve HB balance issues
- Storm confirms that each tank will have two sets of stats, one for random, one for HB
- Storm admits that the lack of people playing HB is a real problem
- special maps for HB? Storm: “To make special maps only for several percent of players is not very profitable”

Sunday, May 18, 2014

18.5.2014

- there will be new historical battles and balance changes in HB in 9.1, definitely at least one new historical battle

- current maps are made by the same people like the earlier maps, only the map department leadership changed
- developers are considering nerfing FV304
- Q: “Why do you always nerf the vehicle, that is the favourite one of a lot of players?” A: “‘Favourite’ vehicle always means an imbalanced vehicle. Proven numerous times.”
- the idea to have garage battles and alternative hulls was not scrapped
On the topic of historical battles:
- Q: “Change historical battles not by removing hitpoints, but only stop displaying them” A: “Why, so the player doesn’t know what’s going on?”
- apparently some historical battles will be changed, some will stay
- the removed historical battles might return
- special tank stats for historical battles are supposed to solve HB balance issues
- Storm confirms that each tank will have two sets of stats, one for random, one for HB
- Storm admits that the lack of people playing HB is a real problem
- special maps for HB? Storm: “To make special maps only for several percent of players is not very profitable”

Saturday, May 17, 2014

Straight Outta Supertest: Type 97 Te-Ke


Source: gamemodels3d


A preview of the upcoming tier 2 light tank (probably a reward for something)
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Friday, May 16, 2014

Soviet Light Tank Tier 8 “LTTB”

 It’s pointless to discuss any historical statistics, as it is 99,9 percent sure the vehicle will be unhistorically buffed to be able to handle the LT tier 8 role.
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9.0 Hybrid Blue Damage Panel By Soulza

16.05.14.

- Christie tanks will come, but not anytime soon

- Storm is not worried about the losses of online player numbers (SS: some tried to put a connection between that and War Thunder open beta, that was released yesterday IMHO) – he states that in summer, player statistics by drop a lot
- Storm states that nothing was changed with FPS in the micropatch, observed FPS losses are placebo
- developers are actively working on serious optimization steps
- Q: “To regulate TD’s you need to remove the sixth sense, it wasn’t there before!” A: “Sixth sense is already very old.”

Thursday, May 15, 2014

9.0 MeltyMap'sMathMod


15.5.2014

Storm states that the amount of gold ammo fired per battle is usually 10-15 percent, 20-30 percent are separate cases, which are rare, on low tiers there is a lower amount of gold shells fired
- T-54, FV215b (183), T69 – they don’t belong to the tanks, that use massive amounts of gold ammo (80 percent)
- it’s possible FV304 will be nerfed
- Churchill and IS HD models are not ready yet apparently
- Storm states that he will investigate artillery accuracy, there are no guarantees it won’t be touched (SS: earlier it was confirmed that the developers want to nerf tank accuracy a bit)

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

9.1 Preliminary Patchnotes

- added new map “Kharkov”
- fixes and improvements on maps Arctic, Tundra, Komarin, Windstorm, North-West
- removed the Assault mode on Sand River
- improved performance on the map Hidden Village
- fixed small visual issues with textures and models for a large number of tanks
- fixed small visual issues with textures and models for some map objects
- reworked exhaust smoke effect for all tanks
- reworked tank explosion effect
- added visual damage effect on tank barrels for damage made to them
- added the mechanism where a turret, ripped off by ammo rack explosion “slides off”
- type of surface now influences the behavior of a turret ripped off

- added 5 new medals for artillery: “Monolith”, “For Counterartillery Fire”, “Medal of Horus”?, “Cool-blooded”, “Stark’s Medal”
- added new awards for team battles: “Battle-hardened”, “Sniper Reserve”, “Pyromaniac”, “Promising Warrior”, “Fight to the Last Breath”
- Billote, Bruno and Tarzay medals’ description was reworked for clarification
- “Operation Nostalgia” medal moved to a different medal category
- fixed the “Armored Fist” medal, which wasn’t awarded under certain circumstances
- updated the FMOD sound library
- reworked the gun shooting sounds
- offline/online player status will now display correctly no matter on which server the player is
- maximum amount of symbols for chat increased to 512
- added the clan icon to the Achievements table, where players can see the date he entered the clan
- added some fixes and improvements to the team battles window
- added the time period display for the historical battles
- changed the dialogue window showing up when graphic settings are changed
- companies: removed the possibility to start the battle without the commander
- changed the parameter order in the “summary” window of the “achievements” tab
- setting of “vibro-something Gametrix” moved to another settings tab
- license agreement now displays after you log in to hangar
- added the “dynamic FOV” setting
- changed the start time of tracer display
- removed the limit for skills and perks of a tanker for a damaged tank
- fixed the incorrect enabling of the EnableBalanceCPU parameter for some processors, which could lead to frequent server disconnects and failures to login
- fixed the incorrect display of trees and bushes not turning half-invisible on some configurations
- fixed the memory leaks, appearing with high details of the tanks enabled
- fixed the bug when the currency for buying gold shells switched from credit to gold incorrectly
- fixed some crashes and freezes of the game client
- fixed the track “shaking” when enabling high tank detail in the hangar
- fixed some errors and mistakes in the graphic setting window
- fixed the bug where the game strained the GPU when the client is minimized
- fixed some errors in recording replays
- fixed some errors in mission table interface
- fixed the bug where the ricochet effect appeared even though the armor was penetrated
- increased the number of the national flag emblems
Vehicle changes
- removed the TD camo class bonus when shooting the gun (apart from premium TD’s)
German tanks
Jagdpanzer IV
- stock tracks turnrate changed from 32 to 34, elite tracks turnate from 35 to 38
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 8/14/20 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 9/15/22 percent
Panzer I
- accuracy spread when tank moving improved for both suspensions by 31 percent
- aimtime for 2cm Kwk 30 and 2cm Kwk 38 changed from 1,7 to 1,6 and from 1,6 to 1,5
Tiger I
- reload time for 88mm L/71 increased from 6,7s to 6,8s
- 88mm L/71 accuracy nerfed from 0,34 to 0,35
- 88mm L/71 accuracy spread when moving the turret nerfed by 17 percent
- hitpoints nerfed by 100 for both turrets
Tiger P
- 88mm L/71 reload time for stock turret changed from 9,1s to 9,3s, for elite from 8,6s to 8,8s
- 88mm L/71 accuracy nerfed from 0,34 to 0,35
- hitpoints nerfed by 100 for both turrets
VK2801
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 20/18/10 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 22/20/1 percent
- maximum speed buffed from 60 km/h to 68 km/h
VK3001P
- hitpoints buffed by 140hp (stock turret) and 90hp (710 to 800) for elite
British tanks
Cruiser Mk.I
- reload time of 40 mm Pom-Pom buffed from 8s to 7,8s
Vickers Medium Mk. II
- stock turret: viewrange buffed by 10 to 290, turret traverse from 32 to 35 deg/s
- elite turret: viewrange buffed by 10 to 310, turret traverse from 32 to 35 deg/s
- aimtime of OQF 3-pdr Gun Mk. II and QF 6-pdr 8 cwt Mk. I buffed from 2,3 to 2,2s
Universal Carrier 2-pdr
- maximum reverse speed buffed from 8 km/h to 10 km/h
- aimtime of QF 6-pdr 8 cwt AT Gun Mk. I buffed from 1,7 to 1,6
AT7
- reload time for OQF 20-pdr AT Gun Type A Barrel nerfed from 5,8s to 6,4s
- hitpoints nerfed by 50
US tanks
Hellcat
- stock suspension aim spread from moving and aim spread from turning the hull increased (nerfed) by 60 percent
- elite suspension aim spread from moving and aim spread from turning the hull increased (nerfed) by 57 percent
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 9/14/9 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 10/17/10 percent
- maximum reverse speed nerfed from 20 km/h to 12 km/h
- aim spread of the 76mm M1A2 when moving the turret increased (nerfed) by 12 percent
- aim spread of the 90mm M3 when moving the turret increased (nerfed) by 25 percent
- 90mm M3 reload time nerfed from 8s to 8,5s
M4 Sherman
- aimtime for derp 105mm nerfed from 2,3s to 2,5s
- reload time for derp 105mm nerfed from 8s to 9s
T18
- stock suspension turnrate nerfed from 28 to 18, elite from 30 to 22
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 43/29/7 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 46/40/12 percent
- maximum reverse speed nerfed from 8 km/h to 6 km/h
- 75mm derp reload time nerfed from 4,8s to 5,2s, aim spread from moving gun nerfed by 12 percent
- 2pdr Mk.IX reload time nerfed from 2,1s to 2,5s, aim spread from moving gun nerfed by 17 percent
- hitpoints nerfed by 5 from 125 to 120
T29
- stock suspension aim spread from moving and aim spread from turning the hull increased (nerfed) by 8 percent
- elite suspension aim spread from moving and aim spread from turning the hull increased (nerfed) by 9 percent
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 18/11/8 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) nerfed by 18/20/8 percent
- aim spread of the 105mm T5E1 when moving the turret increased (nerfed) by 11 percent, reload time nerfed from 11,4s to 11,8s
- T136 turret viewrange nerfed by 10
T32
- 105mm T5E1 accuracy buffed from 0,41 to 0,4
T40
- viewrange nerfed from 400 to 370
Soviet tanks
A-32, AT-1
- 76mm (L-10) gun damage changed from 105 to 110
BT-7
- aimtime for 37mm ZIS-19 buffed from 1,7 to 1,6
MT-25
- stock tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 12/11/6 percent
- elite tracks terrain passability (good/medium/bad terrain) improved by 14/12/6 percent
- top engine 600hp changed to another engine 700hp
SU-101
- aim spread for both suspensions when driving and when traversing the vehicle buffed by 5 percent
- D-54S aimtime buffed from 2,1s to 2s
- hitpoints buffed by 10
T-28, T-46
- 76mm L-10 and KT-28 damage buffed from 105 to 110