knutliott

I actually like all of the skins and all of the camos, except - ironically - the ultimate prize which is now easier to obtain. I'm cautiously optimistic about the improvements, but we'll just have to wait and see. I've yet to participate in a Raid because you basically have to rig them to have any chance of completing them, and also because past Raids have forced you to play PvP. So... we'll see.

It really looks like 0.33 and 0.37 were designed and implemented by completely different teams that didn't talk to each other. In the abstract I don't really mind 0.37. I can kind of see what I think they might have been trying to do, and in some ways it's actually good. It doesn't look like the plan was fully implemented across all vehicles, but some of the higher-level concepts appear to have some merit. (Assuming I'm reading the tea leaves correctly.) But when compared to 0.33? It's insane. It makes no sense. Had they extended 0.33 down to tiers 1-6 things would have been fine. Had they re-rebalanced tiers 7-10 with the launch of 0.37 things (probably) would have been fine. But 0.33 and 0.37 are entirely different games and make no sense as opposite ends of a single tier structure.

We're also getting a benefit for "night" missions because our vehicles are black, but there are only a couple of night maps in PvE (which aren't being used for this Episode) and IIRC none in GLOPS, PvP, AN or MC. It's lore. It isn't intended to actually reflect what you see in-game.

The *did* fix Reinforcements, though, which in my case will now allow me to fully complete it. I was going to miss the last reward because the event started while I was on vacation, but the extra days will now let me get it. If they do get Riders of the Storm patched then that's even better.

I like that skin and would totally use it, but I detest the Raid mechanic and won't support it. Anything that tries to force me to play PvP or GLOPS is a non-starter.

I managed to finish Reinforcements this weekend! Thanks to everyone who joined me in platoons. It was quite a grind, but as Haswell has pointed out above you can do speed runs kind of comically quickly. My groups never got quite that fast, but 40 min for a full run wasn't difficult at all. It took me right about 8 hours to do 50 missions, split up into 3 playing sessions. I plan to play Moscow Calling next weekend to help others complete Reinforcements, and also to generate some padding since I played some missions in the T-72B3 Green which was accidentally not counted in earlier missions. I won't be playing on Friday like I did this past weekend, but I'll be online on Saturday to help out. (And possibly Friday night... that'll depend on external factors.)

I mean... the York's hull armor is kinda irrelevant because it has a manned turret that has basically no armor. So giving it 1m thick hull armor is kind of an intelligence test for players it faces. Bots don't care one bit. They shoot the turret anyway, and IIRC always have.

That's your config. The default is a 2-second reload between clips. My config has a 1.68-second reload between clips. I've also heard that its ROF was increased (it's now 400 RPM), but my vague memory says that 400 sounds about right. So I'm not sure whether or not that is true.

The times for War Games are skewed here on the West coast of the US, so the runs start while I'm at work, but I'll join up as soon as I can this evening after I get off work! 15:00 UTC is ... now (8:00 am Pacific time). I work until 5:00 pm, but will probably take off a bit early to get started on speed runs. I'll have to take a break for dinner also, but can then play as long as we have people!

Those are the vehicles that we, the players, chose. So of course they're part of the event - we asked for them. Note that the second one is the Tier 9 Termi 2, not the Tier 8 Ramka. The Termi 2 is still OP, but significantly less so than the 2017 is at Tier 8. Looks like I need to get in 42 battles before I leave on vacation. Then hopefully I'll have time to catch up with whatever other missions are available once I get back. Bad timing to take a 10-day vacation!

7105 DPM with the upgraded AP is at least competitive. Your comparison is using your current builds, so I assume you have retrofits on those tanks? If so, then once retrofitted the TAM should be around 7800 DPM which will at least beat the TML. Stingray 2 is borderline OP for what it is, so I'm not sure it's a valid comparison. The TML and Centauro 105 are more legit targets to me, and it looks like it's going to be similar to them.

My bonus is currently 37.58% so it really adds up! I do currently have every progression vehicle and quite a few premiums, but it adds up rather quickly until it gets to 20%. Yet another reason to advance all of your vehicles at the same time - and then keep them - so that your progress will be faster overall.

SS said that the current BC sale is the last one of this BP. Buy now or miss out. There might still be a BC bonus event... or there might not. If you're close to some goal, I wouldn't risk waiting for an event. I'd spend the boosters and get it done while you still have time. Turns out they've explicitly stated that you will get a 2999 gold refund. Yay!

Welcome! I'll disagree with Haswell and recommend the Sol Schreiber tanks. They were specifically designed with new players in mind and they advance more quickly. That said, they're a different play style. The T-series that Haswell recommended are good all-around tanks, but in the upper tiers they're dependent on their mobility because their armor isn't generally as good. If you prefer a more heavily armored style (at the expense of firepower and maneuverability), then the Merkavas and Challengers are very good. I never played WoT so can't say what the difference might be. But one difference (or so I've heard) is as Haswell said - there are no costs for ammo in AW. There are premium vehicles, but they are (allegedly) specifically tuned to be slightly less powerful than a fully unlocked and kitted-out progression tank. That isn't always the case - sometimes the devs missed the mark and made a premium vehicle OP in one mode or the other - but it's generally true. You play premium tanks to earn credits faster, not because they're more powerful. Also, AW is balanced for PvP only. The devs do not consider PvE when they're tuning the vehicles, so there are some that are just plain bad in PvE. There are also some that are incredibly overpowered and cause much angst, especially at lower tiers. (Tier 4 Shilka and Tier 5 XM247 Sgt. York, I'm looking at you.) The progression Tier 5 AMX-13 DCA is also incredibly powerful in PvE, but it's not quite on the level of the Shilka or York. In general, it is a good idea to progress in all vehicles at the same time. This will seem slower at first, but since there is a daily x2 multiplier that you can use once on each vehicle, progressing all of your vehicles at the same time actually doubles the speed at which you progress overall. This, of course, assumes you can find low-tier battles easily so that you can play each of your vehicles once per day. You should find that advancing a vehicle to 100% earns you just enough credits to buy the next vehicle in the line, but for that to work you cannot buy retrofits. At low tiers this is not a problem at all - retrofits are basically wasted on low-tier vehicles so it's best to skip them anyway. Somewhere around Tier 6 or Tier 7 you'll probably start finding yourself strapped for cash, so at that point it's reasonable to purchase a premium vehicles and use it to grind for credits. It generally isn't worth buying lower-tier premiums as you advance through those tiers too quickly for them to be useful. My first premium was a VFM Mk.5 at Tier 6 and it helped me get to Tier 8. At that point I bought the AMX-10 RCR and that was my credit printing machine for several months. (Those probably aren't the best options anymore... for me that was in 2016 and 2017.) If you're going to be playing PvE to earn credits, then at Tier 8 I'd get the BMPT Terminator 2000. It isn't quite as good as the progression Ramka-99, but the Ramka-99 is OPAF and the Termi-2k is still extremely OP against the bots in PvE. Have fun!

I can't speak for PvP, but off the top of my head the problems in PvE are: 1. 15 second reload is beyond crap. The XM1A3's 140 has a 9.8 second reload. It should probably be 12 seconds. 2. Ammo is worse than the XM1A3's despite being the same ammo. 3. OMGWTF bloom after firing is insane, and lingers for a second or two before aim time kicks in. Thus the infamous "double-tap" that's allegedly what makes this tank good is crap. The second shot could land anywhere, and by "anywhere" I mean anywhere on the map, not on the target vehicle. You have to experience it to understand. The aim circle becomes as big as the HUD. So to effectively use the double-tap feature, you either have to be within about 25-50m of your target (and pray to RNGesus), or you have to wait several seconds (4-ish, I would guess) to re-aim after the first shot which kinda defeats the purpose of a double-tap feature. 4. A long time ago during one of the 5-6 nerfs (I'm not exaggerating, it was nerfed twice during its BP, and then again immediately after), its armor vs HEAT was reduced and its armor vs AP was allegedly made more uniformly strong in order to give it a distinct feel. I.e. you were supposed to need HEAT or ATGMs to defeat it, which presumably gave it character in PvP where most people only carry AP ammo. But that made it beyond bad in PvE where ATGM-spamming AFVs and TDs are the majority of the vehicles that you face. This problem has better and worse during various patches as they've balanced armor and ammo in general, but mostly worse. It seems like every adjustment to any kind of ammo somehow manages to hurt the CATTB. Right now, IIRC, it's armor vs HEAT is somewhat functional but not great and vs AP it's just bad (for a Tier 10). The 0.33 armor rebalance seems to have hurt the CATTB yet again.

You aren't supposed to buy access twice, though they don't prevent you from doing so, so I don't know for sure what would happen. My guess would be that you'd get the 50k Battle Coins but would not get a refund on your original 2999 Gold purchase.

I don't think that improved side armor and the Burlak's ready rack system counts as "true and satisfactory" since it's still going to have a 15-second reload and that god-awful bloom every time it fires.

Yeah the laser targeting sounds pretty meh. I have to assume that AW will not faithfully replicate the lower gun mantlet and lower glacis weakspots. Those are freakin' huge and will be impossible for bots to miss, thus relegating the TAM 2IP to a sniping/support role. At least the Stingray 2 has fairly uniform armor. It will be interesting to see how bots react to the laser targeting, if at all. Lastly, am I the only one who keeps reading the name of the vehicle as TAM ZIP?

I'm very wary about the split spawns. The matchmaker already does a poor job of simply putting together platoons... is it going to be good enough to ensure that both splits are capable of completing their half of the mission? Somehow I doubt it. And what happens if one side of the split gets eliminated completely because the players are idiots, do something stupid and get destroyed, and then refuse to respawn?

There are a number of "regulars" who play every week when things reset - Wednesdays at 5:00 pm Pacific. We'll often start early (around 4:30) because you only need to start the last mission after the reset at 5:00 in order to get the battalion x10 multiplier, and the credits x10 multiplier resets at 4:00 pm Pacific. That said, ask before you use a vehicle in Heroics just to level it up. Heroics is difficult enough that you can't always count on being carried in a sub-par vehicle.

There is a lot of wonkiness in the back end when it comes to players being destroyed, and whether or not that counts for various things. For example, for a long time you only registered a "death" in a game if you were dead at the end of the match - if you died and respawned using the FRBK your death wasn't recorded in your stats. (This was fixed before they introduced the pay-to-respawn mechanic.) There have also been achievements in the past that require you to "survive" which are completed as long as your tank is still alive at the end of the match. It doesn't matter if that's your 3rd spawn or not - as long as your tank is alive at the end, you count as surviving. Sadly, that wonkiness doesn't apply to the Teamwork medal. If it did, that would make that contract significantly easier to complete.

That first line is worrisome. It's troll/griefing bait.

Ophelia just saved my York on Desert Saber. Got surprised by a final spawn that I thought we'd already killed, and took over half health in damage before I could even pop smoke. Unfortunately the smoke didn't blind all of the bots, so they depleted my health before I could kill the one that could still see. Ophelia's shield kept me alive, and I was able to retreat out of spotting range and get 2 more kills. Kind of a perfect example of both the type of vehicle I use her in, and the situation she's there for. The York is amazingly powerful, but has very little armor and so goes down fast if it gets focused by bots. (Especially bots with missiles.) One at a time I wouldn't have needed Ophelia, but 4 unexpected bots suddenly appearing out of nowhere was one of those "oh shit!" moments that Ophelia helps mitigate.

The Tier 9 Ghost is good (keep the base gun, the "upgrade" isn't worth it because it nerfs the ammo). It's comparable to a ZTQ, though, so since you already have that you don't really need the Ghost. It's pretty easy to get, though - it should only cost around 22.5k to 25k BC if you only buy "rare" or better offers - so you might as well get it unless doing so would prevent you from getting to level 30. Because... The Tier 8 Mk.IV is very good. If Terminators didn't exist, it might be the most OP vehicle at Tier 8. It's a least on par with the Marder 2 overall, but plays differently because it has missiles but no PELE. I haven't played my STRV much yet, but I've played it enough to think that the Mk.IV is the overall best vehicle from this BP. It has excellent vision and good camo, excellent firepower, and excellent maneuverability. The only thing it doesn't have is armor, which makes sense because it's an AFV. It's one of those vehicles that seems purpose-built for Juan Carlos... he gives it another 5% camo and a huge VR boost. Erin is overkill on the camo. The Tier 7 TML is good, but suffers from being Tier 7 (matchmaker hates you in PvE) and being very close capability-wise with the Stingray 2. If you have a Premium Stingray 2 (such as the Black Eagle), then you have very little need for the TML. But if you only have the progression Stingray 2, then the TML is essentially a premium version of it and is probably worth having. The reality, though, is that the TML is just a bonus on your way to the Mk.IV which is what you really want. It's not a CV90, but the STRV is pretty comparable to the Object 195, maybe a little better. I feel like its armor is better, and while I don't like its 40mm as much as the Griffin's 50mm, the triple-shot is very useful while waiting for the main gun to reload. And since there's no reload on the 40mm, it's more consistent than the Object 195's 30mm AC clip.

I don't use her in MBTs - Douglas and Cortez are both better for MBTs depending on the gun. I use Ophelia in vehicles that you might normally want to play stealthily, but can't because of their particular armaments and/or camo, so are constantly at risk of being spotted and insta-gibbed. So basically any AC vehicle and some missile vehicles. I also use her in Terminators. For me, her shield is insurance because you can't really rely on it completely in PvE. I still use its kits normally. The problem with her shield in PvE is that it's only 15% of your max health, and that's not a lot when there may be multiple bots firing on you at the same time. On a 3300 health Tier 10 MBT, for example, her shield is a whopping 495 health. That's not even one hit, and it feels like about .003 seconds of incoming AC fire from a T-15. Note: her shield does always absorb 1 hit, so the fact that it's only 495 health will still completely absorb a 1300 damage HEAT round from an XM1A3 140mm. But then a single AC round from basically anything will kill you. She's OPAF in PvP, but merely good in PvE. I use her, Douglas, Cortez, Erin, JC, and Freja (SPG build) regularly. I also use Vincent in certain tanks, and either Sabrina or Andrey if I want to kill components or crew respectively. And I use Fyodor on those rare occasions these days when I need to train crew.