11 replies to this topic

[Burning Chrome]

So...what can you tell me about World of Tanks?

I have never played, but viewd some vids the other day and it looks interesting.

Pros?

Cons?

Is it fun?

Edited by Burning Chrome, 08 January 2014 - 07:05 AM.

[Heffay]

Burning Chrome, on 08 January 2014 - 07:05 AM, said:

So...what can you tell me about World of Tanks?

I have never played, but viewd some vids the other day and it looks interesting.

Pros?

Cons?

Is it fun?

Very similar to MWO in game play. It is very fun, but about 10 times the grind. If you like tanks and you like the gameplay of MWO, you'll probably like WoT.

[PanzerMagier]

Tried WoT Since it's so "similar" to MWO, it isn't.

Bunch of {Scrap}. Grind fest. Can't see tanks if they're in view range as in they're 100% invisible if your crew can't see further than 600m.
Tutorial was nice.

Died every game and lost 80% of my first 100 games. sucky game, really not worth the grind or time. P2W factor, always someone with a bigger tank than you which makes a huge difference, the balance system is borked. yea not a great experience, came into it as a new player with no experience, much worse than my first experience with MWO.

[Sybreed]

pros: it's actually a more intelligent shooter than MWO. Where you're placed, where you go matters.
Piloting WW2 tanks is fun

Cons: Pay2Win. The gold ammo is the biggest offender here and there's a reason very few other games (well, in NA at least) dare go that route.
Matchmaker: Being a tier 3 or 4 tank matched against tanks 2 or 3 levels above you sucks. You're just bait to lure the enemy out and get their positions before to your team before you die. Your shots won't even damage them. It gets better at tier 6-7, but it's still an issue.
Grind: You think there's grind in MWO? WoT is 10x worse
Hitpoints: Meh, never been a fan of hitpoints in "simulations"

If you want to play a tank simulator, wait for War Thunder Ground Forces, it'll do what WoT does but better with more realism and no P2W

[Burning Chrome]

Well, after a few weeks of play I find WoT to be enjoyable for the most part.

A bit more management than I'd like, but overall fun.

For some reason...the Tier 1/2/3 games seem to be much more fun than the Tier 4/5/6 games so far.

Maybe it is more challenging/rewarding to do well in a Pz1?

Lots of maps, interesting music (for the most part) and no game breaking items like "ECM" and other poorly conceived "immersion enhancers".

As MWO continues to "circle the bowl" at least WoT is fun, and I'll have to check out the other game Sybreed mentioned.

[S3dition]

WoT has a major pay wall around tier 7. You can't earn enough silver in a match to repair your tank unless you have premium or a gold tank.

[Grrzoot]

what the others are saying, the first couple tiers are really well balanced, do a really good job of getting yu into the game, getting you comfortable. And then the pain starts. as the old addage f2p players are "content" and it becomes really relevant around tiers 4-6 as you are cannon fodder for the higher tiers. I don't begrudge them, once they have you hooked they know when to set the line.
unfortunately i became really uncomfortable with the whole must have to even try to grind experience and spent more time here, getting new shiny mechs,

[Sybreed]

Grrzoot, on 06 February 2014 - 05:03 PM, said:

what the others are saying, the first couple tiers are really well balanced, do a really good job of getting yu into the game, getting you comfortable. And then the pain starts. as the old addage f2p players are "content" and it becomes really relevant around tiers 4-6 as you are cannon fodder for the higher tiers. I don't begrudge them, once they have you hooked they know when to set the line.
unfortunately i became really uncomfortable with the whole must have to even try to grind experience and spent more time here, getting new shiny mechs,

War Thunder Ground Forces will be the game for you... there's no such thing as being a 1940 tank fighting a Korean War tank in that game...

[Burning Chrome]

Thanks for the "heads-up" and experience based tips guys.

For now, it remains entertaining. I'm thinking about throwing some cash its way to be able to run more tanks at a time.

Probably won't mess with the tier 7 and higher stuff (again, thanks for identifying that concern) if I can avoid it...just play to have fun.

Question, do most of you use the auto-aim or zoom in and make the shots yourselves?

[Heffay]

Burning Chrome, on 07 February 2014 - 10:54 AM, said:

Thanks for the "heads-up" and experience based tips guys. For now, it remains entertaining. I'm thinking about throwing some cash its way to be able to run more tanks at a time. Probably won't mess with the tier 7 and higher stuff (again, thanks for identifying that concern) if I can avoid it...just play to have fun. Question, do most of you use the auto-aim or zoom in and make the shots yourselves?

Zoom in, each and every time. Once you learn where tanks are vulnerable, you can aim for those specific points. Well worth taking the time to line up the shot.

[Anjian]

I find the game brutal. It wasn't meant to be fair. You can die from one shot being fired from god knows where. The camping sniper & artillery meta is much worst than the PPC-Gauss-LRM meta in MWO. But guess what, the registrations keeps coming (75 million over now, exceeding even League of Legends). That's almost the same number of Xbox 360s sold in the product's lifetime.

So why the savage appeal? Its similar to the appeal why over 7,000 players in EVE Online engaged in a 21 hour epic space battle few days ago, with losses that amounts to over $500,000 in terms of manhours. Or why Dark Souls are so popular, or why the dungeons on Final Fantasy 14 ARR are so brutal. People want hard and punishing, because even with frustrations aside, they keep coming at it.

If you find yourself with a K/D ratio of 2 in MWO, you might suddenly find yourself scrapping at .5 in WoT.

That said, WoT forces you to think like no other. What am I doing wrong? What should I do? Which tank should I progress? Maybe this tank fits me or maybe not. For the first time, I am actually doing an analysis in my stats. I thought I am doing alright with tank destroyers, but I find that my Win Loss ratio is actually better with medium tanks. It is my favorite to use German tanks but it turns out I am getting better stats with the British tanks.

WoT also forces you to analyze, learn every map, and there are plenty of maps. Where you are, the position, is going to affect you very much in the game, and that can matter more than the quality of your tank or "skill". Equally important is the quality of camouflage, stealth, and stalk. That is much more emphasized in WoT. Being out in the open, can easily mean sudden death.

As a MWO player now doing WoT, I am forced to unlearn many habits from MWO.

1. In Mechwarrior, we are taught to aim at the center torso on the mech to bring it down quickly. In WoT, the front center of the tank is its most invulnerable; you can watch your shots just simply bounce off. In MWO you can reliably expect every shot that hits should take away some HP, in WoT, a shot can miss do matter how well you aim, and it can bounce off. In fact, in the game, there are going to be tanks that your poor tank is unable to penetrate even sides and rear pretty point blank. What you should do? You pick your enemies, you do not engage what is superior to you. If you can't kill them, you can at least spot, and call in an artillery strike.

2. Because tanks are vulnerable on the sides, not on the front, and because the map center is death, tanks roll out to the flanks and sides of the map, rather than massing in the center.

3. Maps are huge in WoT, like every map is in the scale of MWO's Alpine. So it definitely takes time to move around a map. Having said that, mobbing like in MWO won't work in WoT, Tanks form into small platoons, then head out in different directions, and its important that each direction is covered, less an enemy platoon will be in your base or snuck up to your artillery.

4. Capwarrior tactics don't work here. Rushing fast across the map in your light to quickly camp the enemy base with a smile in your face thinking you're a hero ---- bam, you're dead in one shot, because there is a tank destroyer hiding in the bushes. Even with a platoon that has clear access to the enemy base, they don't rush to the base, they fan out to spot and eradicate ambushers in the bushes. You can cap when it is clear you are no longer going to be opposed.

5. Spotting is so important here. Even in a light, you don't fire a single shot, but you can serve a critical job for your team by hiding in some place where you can illuminate enemy artillery and snipers.

6. Premium tanks. If you are used to buying Hero Mechs in MWO, I find Premium Tanks pretty cheap, except for the high tier ones. The Tier 3 and 4 ones, when on sale, can go as low as $4 and the Tier 5 ones can go under $6 (regular $9 to $10).

7. Bottlenecks. Both MWO and WoT share a common feature having maps that have bottlenecks, and experienced vets suddenly turn idiots at the sight of them and trying to force their way through the valley of death.

8. The minimap is more critical in WoT than I have seen in any other game. Use it.

9. Autoaim is automiss. I do use Auto aim sometimes in close range battles when tanks are not moving so fast, when you can't find the time to zoom in. But I prefer to zoom in since I am mostly a camper-sniper. Against a fast moving target, its better to just manually lead your shots.

10. When you come to some tanks, derping (HE cannons) is the best. No need to use gold ammo here. For example, the Hetzer and the Panzer IV using the 105mm, or the KV-2 with the 122mm. Even if the shell doesn't penetrate, the splash damage will still do all sorts of damage to a highly protected tank, like set it on fire or kill one of the crew members. Derping can kill open house artillery SPGs and tank destroyers with one shot.

To sum this game up, WoT is very easy to learn, but incredibly difficult to master. Its possible you can run up to thousands of games and still don't get it.

[Stone Rhino2]

The whole Sight system is, politely said, very complex. There`s reason why there are a whole bunch of Tutorials about it. Not to mention all the Clans that specialized to introduce / teach new players ( and even experienced ) the ways of the Tank.
http://www.wotinfo.net/en/camouflage
That is a link to a site, where you can do checks on how the camo is for all tanks, when still, moving and firing. and compare them, not to mention when you spot other tanks ( and with what equipment )... very useful.
EDIT: In case you`re german speaking DEPAC as an example would be one of these Training Units.

The armor sadly is pretty much dead now, thanks to Gold ammo. Why bother to do the "Mahlzeit"-positioning on the E75, when any T7 can pen your Frontal armor with gold ( Deathstar 183 anyone? )
EDIT: Gold ammo pretty much made heavily armored Tanks ( like E100, Maus or T95etc ) obsolete. Afterall they can``t simply buy themselves some +50kph for a game or something, but do loose most of their armor vs Gold. But this is a heated discussion on it``s own.

Weakspot knowledge is essential. Equally essential is where what sits in a tank. ( Ammoracked an E100 with first shot recently? ) Knowing where to aim even gives lower TIer tanks chances to hit and damage bigger tier tanks.
http://www.wotdb.info/#country=ussr Click ont he Tank you like to view and click on the leftbottom of the new window "Vulnerability"
http://wotguru.com/weak-spot-guides/
And for a few tanks ( far from all though but very detailed about the armor stats and how angled )

Keep in mind you don`t need a huge Alpha to track a bigger tank. But keeping it from retreating behind a House/Rock can give your team some good chance of taking it out, esp TDs without turrets. And germans with their Frontal Transmission/Engine burn chance is just fundamental to hide. *cough* Tiger/Tiger2/JT
Learning how to sidescrap is a basic technique to know and master. Some heavy tanks like KV1/4 or Tiger 2 can use that to basically shutdown a whole road or path with the enemy having only little choice to counter it.

Generally all non Light tanks above T3 get a +2-2 ( so a T7 can be either TopTier with T6 and 5, or LowTier and face T8 and 9 and of course inbetween ). Light tanks get a +4 :/

I admit i haven`t played MWO for a long time now, so i do not know how complex it became but from the time i still played and comparing it to WoT: WoT is vastly more complex and to become very good in it will take lots of time not only playing but also studiing your tank(s), all other tanks, the mechanics etc.
You could write a alot more about it, but this should be just a brief intro.

And of course Anjian is right in what he says.

EDIT:
WoT was designed to give the most money f2p at T5. Below you do not enough damage ( the OpFor has not enough HP to do so ) and above the Gain is also getting smaller and smaller due to much higher Ammo costs and repair bills. Most can still get an ok Balance on T8, and do +-0 on T9. With prem you should have no problems to still gain money in T9 and be +-0 on T10. ( though i currently do +-0 on T10 without prem yet do - on T9 , damn you JT! )

http://www.noobmeter.com/
There you can check your stats and compare them to other players.

Edited by Stone Rhino2, 13 February 2014 - 10:10 AM.