3821

Yeah, part of the problem with both my Ram II and the KV-13 is that every frickin’ battle features at least a trio of Lowes on the other side, often more.

EDIT: …and part of the problem is I forgot to actually mount the upgraded engine. With that in place, it’s a lot speedier, and I managed to get Steel Wall and solo a M1 Heavy and a PzKw IV at the same time, and survive after killing them, with 19 health. Much better.

3822

Today only, premium is discounted - 1800 gold for a month. Also crew training/buying to 100% is halved in cost and a handful of tanks are halved in cost as well.

3823

I finally ground my way up to the Tier VI M12 US arty. Until I get the upgraded howitzer I’m resigned to it being underwhelming. For one thing, that jump in tier from V to VI means you face a lot more matches full of Maus and IS-7s, and given that your shells already can actually bounce off of even Lowes, that doesn’t help. And I swear they hate the US equipment, because the dispersion on the M41 and M12 weapons is pretty frustrating. I got a friendly fire kill yesterday when I had the aiming circle fully zoomed in on an enemy tank…and the shell fell well outside or even close to the circle, right on a damaged friendly. Ugh.

I have the experience to get my T20 or my IS, but not enough credits. I like the KV-13 ok so I’ll probably ditch the Easy 8 for the T20, but what I really want to do is get rid of the VK3601H and get the Tiger, as limited as it is. But that’s 20k more exp. And I’m still, oh, 60k shy of the Panther or the BL10 for my ISU.

3824

Wow, the only thing I’ve ever bounced a shell off with my SU-8 is the new US top TD. I have shells fall way outside the circle all the time though. I almost have my SU-14 again.

3825

Admittedly, it only happened once, but it was annoying.

And in other news, the T32 sucks. Ok, it isn’t bad per se, but it’s pretty much the T29 moved up a tier, where everyone is meaner. I haven’t gotten the upgraded turret yet, though, which seems good, but that 105 that seemed so cool on the T29 doesn’t seem so hot now. And it’s 185k to the next tank, oy vey.

3826

Game peaks at T5. ahem

3827

T5-7 is where it peaks for me.

oh look its me 1337th post! the l33t one!

3828

Agree at T5. It’s mostly that all the experience costs go up to exponential levels, and the increase in value of the tanks seems to be a bit more flat. The VK3001DB for example, isn’t remarkably better than the PzIV, other than the hit points, which are just arbitrarily assigned to be higher due to its tier. Things feel a bit more grindy.

Also I’ve bounced the AP shot on my S-51’s upgraded gun, even at fairly close range with directfire shots on things that have no business bouncing that round. I’ve pretty much given up trying to fire it and just sticking to HE.

3829

My gaming psychology is that I tend to respond to carrot and treadmill approaches, up to a point. For instance, while I find individual matches interesting and fun in WoT, I find them much more fun if I feel I’m making progress towards, well, something–a new module, a new tank, something. When you get those 100k+ grinds between tanks, each match feels less like fun and more like a grind, even if some matches will be really great fights. Too many are not, and without the nearness of a reward, it gets depressing.

I’ve always thought they had too many tanks, which were too similar; I’d have preferred a system of fewer tanks with far more upgrades per tank. I agree that some of the tank lines have a lot of filler in them–the German medium/heavy line is a great example–with little to differentiate tanks. And it’s kind of silly to have you move up a tier at great cost only to find that, even fully upgraded, a tank in that tier is not noticeably more capable than the one the tier below it.

Arty is particularly tricky, because there are fewer tiers of arty available and you ramp up the matchmaking issues particularly when you leave Tier V. The model they use makes it hard to keep arty getting better and thus justifying the grind, as they really can’t increase the damage proportionally without making it overpowering, without compensating by making it horribly slow and inaccurate. Neither of those two things make for fun play. It seems arty is best around Tier V, and that may well be one reason along with the horrible experience costs that you see primarily Hummels, Su-8s, and M41s now.

And I really am baffled by the idea of going to the French next, which I think is their intention. That should be…interesting.

3830

I like this as it reflects my recent (1 week ago today) exit from WoT. I finally ground to the Ferdinand, and the chasm to the good gun was 63,000K. The battles are so painful where I simply do so little damage, I looked at it and said to myself “this is going to take 200 battles, at 10 min per battle, that’s 2000 minutes, or roughly 33 hours”.

I looked at my backlog containing all my steam sales and am now enjoying Fallout 3. I’ve tried to play a few WoT games every few days, but it never lasts long before I get pissed and close the program. I doubt I’ll ever get to that new gun.

3831

I was doing a good job avoiding this feeling, until I decided that I really wanted to play in some organized team-vs.-team battles instead of disorganized public battles. That means I need to eventually grind up a top-tier tank for Clan Wars.

I’ve had some great games (including an amazing 11-kill battle which I will likely never again experience) but there have also been games where I have been double-tracked by an artillery strike and then destroyed by enemies I couldn’t see. And when you’re grinding, the bad matches hurt. Having your tank locked up for the full 15 minutes of a draw on Maliknova is annoying, even if I’m doing other things during the downtime.

I’ve also noticed myself playing “poorly” because of the terrible incentives. When my team starts winning in my first match of the day, and I haven’t gotten much experience yet, I charge to the front knowing that it’s better to get some hits in and die than to play smart and get less XP.

3832

With the upgraded turret its quite good. Solid all around, basically a T29 with better armor and no weak spots.

The T34 seems to be a giant pile of festering shit though.

A T29 with a bigger gun (for 40k xp) in Tier9?
Yeah. Its shit. When your T9 is easily beaten by T5s at range, its not good.

3833

I think tier 6 is the worst tier, because you start getting matched a lot with tier 9-10. That keeps happening as you move up, but you get better at dealing with it as you move up. I like staying back and knocking like 12% per hit off a Maus with my SU-152, since they’re big enough that even my inaccurate 152 can hit them reliably.

3834

This was quite a good event, extended my premium subscription and moved the Ram II crew to my new M7 and also unlocked and purchased the Wolverine (with gold crew)

I am pretty solidly into Tier 5 now, have about 6 tanks unlocked and pruchased. No Tier 6 unlocked yet, but if I sat and did some grinding on Stug III or Pz IV it wouldn’t take long.

The T-28 was indeed great fun with the top 85mm gun, and probably one of my favourite tanks in Tier IV, alongside the Stuart M5 (with howitzer). The T40 tank destroyer actually turned out to be my highest average XP per battle tank so far as well.

In tier V -

KV: I find this one of the most frustrating in Tier 5, as I have no clue how to drive it properly yet. Its too slow to manevoure like a medium and the gun is not strong enough to be a TD. I think I need to commit to an avenue early, and remember to use cover more, instead of waltzing out and trying to rely on the armour. The 152mm DERP gun is just too annoying to use, way too long to reload. The 122mm mini derp is an OK comprimise. I might switch back to undergunned 75mm though. Dont have the 107mm zis-6 yet, which I am slowly grinding towards. That should make a difference.

Pz IV - one of the funnest in Tier V. Basically a mobile pillbox with a decent gun once upgraded, front armour can shrug a few hits. I can see how this will evolve into the german heavy line. Only problem is once upgraded, it no longer looks like the classic Pz IV.

Stug III - still a mean little bastard. Great fun with the top gun, which is suprisingly easy to get to and unlock.

Su- 85 - This is OK, but not as much fun as the Stug III. Top gun not unlocked yet, takes a lot of XP which is annoying. Suspect it might get pwn rofl awesome with the top gun. (Current gun is still more than useful though, just not a 1 shot boom stick)

M10 Wolverine - Only just bought this, but fun in the 5 or so matches so far. Have the slightly upgraded 75mm which is a great gun for tier. (and rocked on the earlier t40, which had my best average XP ber battle so far at ~ 430xp)

T-34 - Light tank on steroids. Would like a slightly stronger gun, but the 54mm suits my style - accurate, fast firing, good penetration (but low damage)

Ram II - good when I got it, but now surpased by upgraded Tier 5. I moved the crew to the M7. Has a suprisingly hardy amount of hit points for the tier, verges on being a heavy tanks.

M7 - hmm, might wish I had gone the M3 Lee -> M4 sherman part of the tree here. Utterly horrible stock. Getting better with an upgrade to the fast firing decent damage 6 pdr (same gun as Ram II). Will hopefully be funner once I get the cool looking turret upgrade and not the hurrid sloped funny looking trash can it starts out with. Light tank on steroids again, so really needs a radio and engine upgrade too.

3835

The 122 mini derp on the kv is your best bet until you get the 107, in my opinion. That same 122 mini derp is considered a prime weapon on the KV-13 at tier 7. Granted it comes with a lot more mobility in that package.

If you unlock the 107mm for the SU-85 you’ll probably prefer it to the stug. Take the KV version and put it on a more mobile platform with a low profile and a higher rate of fire. I think the SU-85 with a 107 is probably the most destructive tier 5 vehicle. I have not tried US TD’s however.

3836

These past two events–Kursk and Husky–haven’t done much for me as I don’t have any of the tanks they featured, having passed them by on my way up the tiers. I’m not a completest, so I sell tanks as I upgrade out of them usually. I guess I could buy one of the featured tanks during one of these events, at half price, run the hell out of it making double credits, then sell it at the end. But I’d rather work on upgrading one of my Tier VII or VIII tanks I think.

3837

I was getting bored with the Su-85 until I got the 107, then it became awesome. The last battle I fought I had 7 kills and set a new Reaper record of 4 (one less than my T-28 beta record of 5, curses), and that’s not significantly better than usual for me performance-wise. Supposing I play smart and stay behind some other things, I usually end up with 3-4 kills.

Seriously. I’m going to buy equipment for it and not care if I ever get to the Su-100; the -85 isn’t boring and invincible, but it’s highly competitive and a lot of fun.

3838

the su-100 is a beast also but yea, the 107mm su85 rawks :D

3839

SU-85 and SU-100, when upgraded, are both really fun TDs. As much as I like the guns on the higher tier SUs, their lack of mobility makes them less sheer fun to play I’m afraid.

I’m not feeling the love in the US TD line, though I’m only at the Slugger. It’s…ok, I guess. I hope the T25 AT and subsequent vehicles are more interesting. The US heavy line is also frustrating, but I never did it in beta so it’s interesting enough I suppose. I hope they tweak it to make the post-T29 tanks more differentiated though.

3840

I’m staying away from the US heavy line for that exact reason. it seems boring.
I’m really looking forward to the slugger, having a ball with the wolverine. The fast gun rocks its tier and its nicely accurate as well. From what I’ve seen, the T25 should eat 'em up nicely.
The su152 is far less fun than its predecessors. Odd how that works. The derp gun was such fun on the KV, but on a tier 7 TD it just… sucks.