Saturday 4 April 2015

04.04.2015 Q&A

Dietolog (former Wargaming community manager) posted yet another part of his exposition. It's more Russian-centered and translating it makes no sense, but basically he confirms the existence of a WG community manager team that calls itself STF ("Special Troll Forces"), who frequent notable Russian sites (at least they used to). In the second part, Dietolog lists a number of "coincidences" where for example anti-Gaijin hate blogs appeared at the same time, use the same hosting etc. - worth reading if you know the RU community background.

http://dietolog.livejournal.com/78560.html

The Wargaming part of the story is that Dietolog was indeed a community manager and fired for incompetence.

- T95 icon size will be fixed;
- There is a list of unpopular maps that might be removed from the game, but it's still in flux and is changing all the time. Prokhorovka and Malinovka are not on it;
- "There are plans" to do "something" with artillery;
- WG is aware of hateful idiots who teamkill artillery players. It is not clear for now what will be done about them;
- Developers will not introduce the "armor quality" as a balance parameter to balance the game better (for example giving "better quality" armor to light tanks so they survive more), it would be too unrealistic
- Q: "Will the Polish tanks appear until the introduction of the EU branch?" A: "No";
- Rudy tank crew nationality will be Polish (the crew however will have names from the TV series and yes, there might be a dog);
- Chinese HD models have low priority because: "we have other priorities";
- HD King Tiger will not be made using photogrammetry, but via the "usual" methods;
- Artillery will not be removed from the game;
- Being a WG developer does not mean you have access to press accounts;
- Q: "About the new acuraccy, my butt hurts so much it spits flames and burns the chair beneath me, can you advise me what to do?" A: "You can play while sitting on a block of concrete" (RG: Or... search for a doctor?)
- This year will bring "many various changes in balance";
- Maus is by far not the worst tier 10;
- The decision to replace FV215b with Chieftain is final;
- No current plans to introduce tank biathlon fun mode;
- Developers will not be adding track links hanging on the hull and turret to every tank, especially not the HD E-100 and Maus;
- The fate (rework) of HE shells is not decided yet;
- Statistically, the accuracy nerf in 9.6 turned out okay and currently accuracy is fine;
- Alternative hulls will come, but not soon and most likely only for real tanks (not prototypes and paper projects);
- US server tested in 2014 the automatic premium tank recovery feature. There was apparently some issue with it - Storm states that he wants to have it on RU as well but it is not sure when.
- There are no plans to display the penetration value of every shell impact;
- No plans to buff Type 59 gun (RG: It's fine with me).

57 comments:

  1. "Dietolog was indeed a community manager and fired for incompetence."

    That's the basic difference between WG RU and WG EU right here:
    RU fires for incompetence, EU hires for incompetence.

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    1. Even thought I know some very competent staff at EU, that one made me giggle.

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    2. Yeah, I didn't mean it personally, I just couldn't resist the joke - I don't automatically assume that everyone working in Paris office is incompetent, I prefer to judge it on a case-by-case basis ;)

      Besides (on a more serious note), if someone applied for a WG EU position, is hired and is not exactly the best person for the job, in my eyes the underlying fault is with the person who hires (and later evaluates the quality of the job done), not the one who was hired, so if Paris HQ is fine with employing people who have no interest whatsoever in the game (like a certain English community manager having 150 battles on his main account) then, well, what can we do.

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    3. Ohh I know, I took it in a light manner. :)

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  2. Give the Alternative hull to M46 Patton! I want to see real M47 Patton which have its own turret and hull!

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  3. "hateful idiots who teamkill artillery"

    I'm sure you meant "heroes".

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    1. In Korean server They call their action is "Justice Realization!"

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    2. Idiots is the correct title. They are not "heroes" except in their convoluted minds.

      Do I get angry when arty one shots me specially in the first 30 seconds of the battle? Hell, yes I do. Do I start a rant detailing what is wrong with the game because now my rating is suffering? No, I don't. It is stupid and it is something that happens.

      Also, the best most satisfying thing in this game is when you start the "Great SPG hunt" and see them trying to escape/hide from the vengeful horde.

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    3. @Zeus67

      and the most annoying thing is one of those arty shot guns you in the arty hunt

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    4. Actually, it annoys me much more when an FV 215b 183 aka Death Star oneshots me. That thing is much more precise than an SPG, its bullets are faster, and you won't see it coming half the time anyway. Same goes for the WT E100 (although that one's getting replaced) or the SU-152 in tier 7 batles, and you'll be seeing those in EVERY battle including their tiers.

      I have an arty, so I know perfectly well how inaccurate it is and how rare are the occasions in which you can oneshot someone. Hell, sometimes you can't even manage to get one bullet out of ten in place during an entire battle.

      I don't know... it can get really annoying when an arty focuses on you, but that's it. Don't stand still when you're spotted un a battle with arties or get behind cover and you'll be fine.

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    5. "Just camp and you'll be fine."

      Yeah...

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  4. - HD King Tiger will not be made using photogrammetry, but via the "usual" methods;

    ...what? There are plenty of KingTigers IRL they could use photogrammetry for...

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    1. I think that thanks to "The Challenger" actions in destroying the working relations with several tank museums, those tanks are not unavailable for the time being.

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    2. I know what did you feel ...
      IS-3 *Ehm Soviet Tank got HD Model with 3D Photogrammetry
      King Tiger *Ehm Nazi Tank got HD Model with Standard Method
      I feel something unfair here ... or perhaps incompetent from what WG Devs did ...

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    3. is there not only like 12 tiiger 2s left? and just one is in full working order in france (i think this is where the challenger came in to play because the only working one is in france as far as i remember). i do think its odd though that they are going to bovington to i think use the 3d thing to make a hd jagdtiger but they have a tiger 2 porsche turret and the henschel turret why not just do those at the same time?

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    4. The restored Tiger II is at the Musée des Blindés in Saumur yeah. Apparently they drive it around a few times every year, would love to see that :)

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    5. There are other methods such as 3d laser scanning (that WG have used, they use multiple methods) that are better than Phorogrammetry, which is basically stitching together 2d photos into a 3d shape, there are problems with shadow and perspective for example that laser scanning just doesn't have

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    6. What when on with "The Challenger"????
      I haven't heard anything about the incident

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    7. Okay so they will just make the tigar II using regular photographs and no actuall scanning? I bet it will be nerfed then even more (in terms of visuals as well as armor angles).

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    8. Yeah what's this about Challenger and relations? Must have missed that one.

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  5. About Dietolog: So what? Every single company in this planet does the same to their competition so that is nothing new. I also believe that Gaijin and co. do the same to WoT.

    I liked the automatic premium tank recovery system. I got back two tanks that I sold at the time without too much problem. What were the problems that caused the system to be disabled?

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    1. It's not just that fact that they did it, it's the fact that it was a big waste of money that and time that is clearly needed on other projects. Simple fact is that they didn't need to slander warthunder because lets face it, the game had it's own problems payed trolls or not.

      What really bugs me is that they spent money to do it that could have went toward development, they spent time doing it that could have went to getting other things fixed (*cough* EU server support *cough*) and worst of all it backfired right in their face. Even if a game now has a legit criticism people can now go "not real criticism, payed wargaming forum troll" (which to be honest i do believe exists but that is another story). It's not just the fact that it was sleazy and underhanded it's that it was also a bad business move.

      A lot of companies slander others but a lot of people also commit murder, i guess that is ok too since enough people do it. Just because people do it doesn't mean that it's ok to do it.

      I also stated this before, if it was any other game company that got caught doing this they would be crucified. If EA for example caught doing something like this it would be on the front of every game site as "worst company ever" and no one would be surprised either.

      Only reason Wargaming doesn't get more flank for this, the EU server staff messing up constantly and being lax on cheating is because they are the only tank game in town....for now.

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  6. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  7. Replies
    1. Some time in the 21th century.

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    2. Christmas - not necesarily the next christmas...

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  8. "There might be a dog" - I am curious about his special skills like smelling hidden enemies or demobilizing them by peeing at their tracks.

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  9. - WG is aware of hateful idiots who teamkill artillery players. It is not clear for now what will be done about them;

    hi!

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  10. - WG is aware of hateful idiots who teamkill artillery players. It is not clear for now what will be done about them;

    hi!

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    1. Thats easy, up the TK penalty for shooting friendly arty. Say 1 day ban for doing it in the first 2 minutes, that kind of thing, double or triple normal points any other time.

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    2. nooo! teamkilling is a feature of the game. if teamkilling is allowed, its a feature of the game! you shouldnt ban people for making use of a feature of a game, thats like giving candy to a child an then saying she cant eat it, thats just rude and unfair. if teamkilling really is such a problem, why dont they simply remove it?

      they already admitted it, they dont care about historical accuracy anymore, they nerf and buff tanks beyond their technicalities to balance them for the game. so who cares of 'historical accurate team damage' is still in the game? just remove it, and you will solve half of the problems of this game

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    3. Baffles me why team damage is still in the game yeah. I mean, having it enabled in organised games is fine, but randoms are very, very random. Had plenty of times where I'll be scoped and aiming at a target, only to have some idiot teammate drive in front the second I press fire. Or angry kiddies firing into you because they're not getting what they want (i.e. a kill, or you suicide scouting for their personal pleasure). It should either be disabled, or the financial penalty be ten times as much as it is right now, so they actually feel the consequences.

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  11. RNG factor in WoT is so wild that a few nerfs or buffs wont influence it drastically.

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  12. last time there was a dog in wot it was possible to kill it by driving over his little house in some maps, closed beta players might remember.
    Creepy I know xD

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  13. I dont care what method they use to make King Tiger but whenever they do, it should be the best HD tank made till that point.

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  14. - Maus is by far not the worst tier 10;

    Would be extremely curious to know what "they" WOULD say is...

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    1. am i the only one who enjoys the maus?
      plus my bet on the worst tier 10 tank would have to be either the m48 patton or the chinese (theres likely a good reason why you never see 121s around and why 113s are so rare) either those or the fv4005 or the foch 155. i havent heard good things about the foch 155 since it got the armour nerf and lost the 1200hp engine.

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  15. - Q: "About the new acuraccy, my butt hurts so much it spits flames and burns the chair beneath me, can you advise me what to do?" Is Rita making these questions or is there a way for people to send questions to Rita in order to ask them to Storm ?

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    1. People running blogs don't automatically get a hotline to the developers... These Q&As are just what's published in russia and then translated.

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  16. So WG wants to punish more those who TK artyfags, but they won't do anything about arty morons splashing their own teammates for half of their HP because they are chasing a 100 HP kill and TK system doesn't even count it as fucking team damage because reasons. Next time your own arty monkey damages you for 600 dmg and doesn't even turn blue think about it.

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    1. You have to remember that shell travel time was one of the nerfed properties. It is quite significant now and could be as much as 5-6 secs, so the decision to fire is based on the battlefield situation then.

      And apart from the few arty players really being careless, I've seen the opposite happen as well, where players who were previously engaging an enemy at a distance drove *into* the shot, even after the target was marked by arty...

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  17. "There are plans" to do "something" with artillery;"
    Those plans will manifest after they see how AW deals with the issue I do not doubt... :D

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  18. the massive rebalancing their talking about i hope considering i think they said historical gun penetration was going to be less of a priority that they buff the pen on the vk3601hs l56 88mm because it has been boned for so long with terrible gun pen i hope they either buff it or make the difference between the germans and the russians a little smaller.

    plus some pershing buffs woulld be nice to see considering the centurion can do everything the pershing can but better with the better gun pen and just a little worse rate of fire because i really want to like the pershing but they make it hard to do. plus a buff to pen would make the m46 patton grind a little less suicidal.

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  19. " - WG is aware of hateful idiots who teamkill artillery players. It is not clear for now what will be done about them;"

    Key word: "idiots"

    Truly, the best way to vent your frustration with enemy artillery is to kill the only vehicles on your team who can immediately counter them.

    Scrub logic is best logic.

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  20. Not sure if this was mentioned earlier and I just missed it, but did WG ever give any indication of when(9.8 or 9.9 etc) we should expect the Chieftan to replace the FV215b?

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  21. HE shell rework being looked at? Hallelujah.

    Honestly HE on many, many main tank guns that aren't derps is nigh useless, whilst the current HE mechanics are the core of the Arty issue, (aside from their awful accuracy but that's an awful attempt by WG to counterbalance their HE issues).

    Fior those scratching their heads wondering what i mean think of it this way. How would you feel about an FV304 that did a fixed 80 damage per direct hit? He only gets 10 rounds a minute, so at best he's achieving a third the damage of an equivalent tier medium. He needs a full minute to kill an equivalent tier heavy and a full minute and a half to kill an IS.

    The number one problem with arty right now is that if they hit a weakly armoured tank or get a lucky hit of weak armour they'll out DPM for the cycle time of a shot any tank in the game.

    For a hypothetical example. Take a Platoon of Hellcats and put them up against an FV304 and the 304 will kill them faster with just 100% crew, and no equipment than a 00% crew + BiA + Vents + Rammer Tortoise will. But swap those for say Black Prince's, (or something else the 304 can't pen), and a Valentine T4 with the 6 Pounder, (presumably shooting them in the rear for easy pens), would kill them faster than the 304. That's just how extreme the difference between arty dealing with something it can't pen and arty dealing with something it can pen IS.

    Anyway sorry for the rant but the HE mechanics of this game are my number 1 hate TBH. They're so screwed up all round.

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    1. HE shells are quite useful for knocking out modules and crew members tbh, and of course resetting the cap. If I'm pelting someone who's harder to pen I'll throw in a few HE rounds so he'll lose his commander, gunner and loader, and if there are external fuel tanks I'll try to start a fire. And if you happen to encounter something softly armoured, like, oh I don't know, a WT auf E 100, you can badly hurt them with those cheap shells :)

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    2. I didn't say HE doesn't have a use. But those are rare circumstances barring that German paper TD line. It's not remotely a genuinely useful option 90% of the time, particularly on a huge range of low to mid calibre guns where if your not shooting tracks it bounces a lot. The Russians are the only one's really able to get away with it as they're the only ones through most of the tiers who get big enough guns to have enough raw HE damage to get through thick armour with a useful amount of damage.

      The vast majority of guns, HE is just a gimmick ammo type that serves no purpose because the rare circumstances of shooting a really badly armoured tank aside it's never going to do any useful amount of damage. And those are rare enough it's not worth carrying more than a couple of rounds.

      But the same mechanics that produce that outcome also result in Arty that if it ends up getting lucky hits on weak armour or is shooting at a badly armoured target in the first place result in it having unacceptably high real world DPM. And the effects on arty are the much bigger concern.

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    3. As mentioned, don't consider the main role of HE to be doing damage. You can use it to severely reduce your opponent's crew and module effectiveness, for example doubling their reload time or aim circle. In a 1 on 1 situation that means a few HE shots early on will give you a huge advantage in dpm, and if you manage to set their external fuel tanks on fire they'll be losing even more health. And if you throw a HE round at one of the track weak spots (front and back wheels), your opponent will be locked in place for your team to damage at will.

      In short, don't think of HE as a damage dealer (except with certain targets), think of it as special ammo that when used right can give you an advantage over your opponent :)

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  22. Prokorovka is like the current Campinovka now. You think Malinovka is full of campers, at least they move more than in Prokorovka. That map, even I don't want to go over the mid. it's a TD map to the core

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    1. Prokhorovka is all about cooperation. After knocking out the initial yolos, a good scout can light up enemies and present juicy targets to its campy TD teammates. Had an 11k spotting game on that map once, didn't even get noticed until they had just two left :)

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  23. It is not "Q&A". It is Q&B. Questions and BULLSHIT.

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  24. The Wargaming part of the story is that Dietolog was indeed a community manager and fired for incompetence.

    WOW how he did that? So you have to insult MORE THAN 770k ppl to get fired?
    EXPLAINS A LOT :D

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  25. - WG is aware of hateful idiots who teamkill artillery players. It is not clear for now what will be done about them;

    WG can send them my regards.

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