Haswell

Getting Blue Stars for me is essentially a combination of me knowing what to do, and my teammates not knowing what to do. There's a modicum of luck involved since there's always a chance of you running into a better player (or someone playing a better vehicle), but most of the time if you know what you're doing, you'll get top XP. That's why I don't explicitly recommend any particular vehicle, but obviously the better the vehicle the better you'll perform.

Granted, you also have 7 days to rack up only a handful of Blue Stars, so that mission is definitely on the easier side compared to others. There's also no shame in dropping down to lower tiers for the sake of being matched up with more inexperienced players, if you really want those Blue Stars.

Some examples of how lack of DPM isn't too much of an issue:

Update: edited Marksman. Added Expert Tanker, Headhunter, Semper Fi, Bullseye.

Small update, I somehow thought tier 8 AT infantry uses HEAT-MP instead of normal HEAT. Fixed.

Ah, I never touch PvP. I guess not having to deal with the constant ATGM aimbot spam makes it perform a lot better?

Tier 7 in PvE is just horrid in general, due to the way the tier brackets are set up and the gaping power difference between tiers 7 and 8.

https://aw.my.games/en/news/general/spirithaven-contest-damage-round-2

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In the second contest, we’ll be asking you to deal as much damage as you can while driving the Type 16 Tier 7 TD and post the screenshot of your result in the dedicated contest channel on Discord. You can compete in three categories, separated by mode:

• PvP (Random Battles)
• Global Operations
• Spirithaven Special Operations

However, please note that you can only win in one of the categories. The best result for each mode will be rewarded with the Japanese Type 90 Tier 7 Premium MBT!

Make sure that your submission includes the following information along with the screenshot: Your in-game nickname, mode and your result.

Please note:

• The contest ends on March 23, 16:00 CET
• One player can only submit one result per category (so make sure you submit your best one)
• One player can only win in one category
• All submitted results must be from the battles that take place during this event (March 16, 13:00 CET to March 23, 16:00 CET)
• Platoons are not allowed
• If you own the Type 90 already, you will receive its price in Gold instead

Meh... I think I'll pass. Type 90 is really mediocre, not worth my effort right now.

Tried that out yesterday, didn't work so well. The bots basically spawned way out of bounds so I couldn't get behind them as they popped up. There's also very little cover around the C3 C4 area, making it difficult for anything without armor to survive.

That spot where the Harimau is might work, but that area don't have good sight lines into the cap as far as I could tell. I need to spend more time exploring.

In other news, everything got delayed because of the Wuhan virus.

https://aw.my.games/en/news/general/update-spirithaven-schedule

Shhhh, don't tell them that.

It's not like the Vickers is a good performer to begin with, having HEAT is probably the biggest thing making it bearable.

Something something #REMOVE_ARTY_FROM_GAME

https://aw.my.games/en/news/general/development-artillery-global-operations

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As we announced during the Spirithaven season launch, artillery would be making a comeback to Global Operations along with the re-implementation of its special shells (smoke and illumination rounds). This is a significant change to this mode’s gameplay, so, as you can imagine, the decision wasn’t taken lightly or out of the blue.

Over the last couple of months, we’ve carefully analyzed both your feedback and our data regarding the balance of the Global Operations mode. It’s no secret that with the introduction of several vehicles and features (such as the LOSAT kinetic ATGMs), the gameplay balance of – especially high-Tier – Global Operations was somewhat disrupted, leading to teams full of one type of vehicles (such as the Wilk XC-8 situation before American Dream season).

This was, of course, not the intended state of things. The thing about Global Operations is, not only does this mode sort-of magnify specific vehicle traits and, subsequently, the impact of said vehicles on gameplay; it also favors long-range encounters to close combat in an effort to emulate the feeling of a real, open battlefield. This is, on the other hand, is intended, but one has to find the right counter to the vehicles that tend to outperform the most (and are therefore the most popular) such as various long-range Tank Destroyers that have:

• A lot of firepower
• Good camouflage (very useful at long distances)

Very simply put, the best counter to such vehicles is artillery. But not the way it is right now, since just dumping a PvE class in a PvP mode wouldn’t be very useful or fun for either side. That is why we will be making the following changes to the Self-Propelled Guns as a whole:

• Accuracy changes – we’ll be taking a look at the entire class to make sure it’s not overpowered but, generally speaking, we’ll be increasing the accuracy to make the class useful in Global Operations
• Aim changes – SPGs will take aim somewhat faster than the way it is now
• Special shells – smoke shells are making a comeback
• New shell type – white phosphorus shells (overhauled illumination shells)
• Switching between ammo types will be practically instant

Special shells existed in the game in the past, before they were removed during the overhaul of the entire class. Simply put, the smoke shells allow the artillery to deploy smoke to a certain position, blocking enemy lines of sight or covering your friendlies when they get exposed too much. It’s worth noting that artillery shell smoke will stay around for far longer than standard tank smoke and also fly a lot faster than before, so the deployment is nearly instant.

The white phosphorus shells, on the other hand, are new and represent a significant change to the previous illumination mechanics. Before, the artillery would just fire a flare over a certain area and would spot everything there instantly. This wasn’t really all that great for gameplay because there was no defense available against this kind of mechanic and even if you did everything “right”, you could still get spotted this way, often resulting in your vehicle’s destruction (in PvP, at least).

The way the WP shells will work instead is they will deploy white phosphorus to a certain (rather wide) area. This area will, of course, be visible to everyone (burning ground is hard to miss). Anything in that area will get covered in burning phosphorus, suffering from the following effects:

• Camouflage factor reduced to zero for the duration of the burn
• The vehicle will start taking damage for as long as it is in the affected area
• Engine starts overheating and will start to burn if you in the area for too long

Additionally, any infantry caught in the zone is not going to have a good day, to put it mildly. However, the phosphorus disappears as soon as you leave the affected area.

They will also have reload times independent on the standard ammunition (will therefore act more as an ability than an actual shell).

Basic shells will also be available, but these will not do a whole lot of damage and will serve either to suppress the enemy or to finish off almost destroyed vehicles.

In other words, the artillery in Global Operations will serve mostly as a support class that will aid your team in victory by providing cover and additional spotting abilities. With that being said, we do not want the class to have too big of an impact, which is why we will be introducing the following restrictions:

• No more than four artillery vehicles per match (two per team at most)
• No artillery platoons

Last but not least, given the special nature and abilities of this class that would become too overpowered in regular PvP without respawns, we do not intend to return this class to Random Battles.

Currently, the plan is as follows – much like the Mechanized Infantry feature, we will release this feature for one week in the near future to gather your feedback. If the feedback turns out to be positive, the feature will be launched permanently or, possibly, removed for further work.

The buffs will definitely make it less unbearable in PvE, but I shudder at the thought of poor PvP players being punished by something they can't fight back against.

WP shells in PvE might be hilarious, considering how bots tend to clump up in certain areas and don't attempt to avoid damage.

The locations look correct, yep. The one on the top should be the airship, bottom should be cannons.

Can't say I noticed anything different, nope.

I only got the CATTB one day before it got nerfed, never got the chance to experience how OP it was.

It's still fairly viable in PvE though I think. From the games I've had so far, a slight bit of angling makes all the difference between getting rekt by T-15s and not taking any damage at all. Zero In is a pretty use ability for it though.

Moved to metagame because satire became srs bns.

I just realized there's no thread for discussing SH yet, welp.

Anyone got any tips for killing 20 infantry in ch1? Other than using mortar guy and waiting it out of course.

For ch3, anyone figured out good spots to get behind the bot spawns yet? From the look of things, it's similar to ch2 where the best defense is to cull the bots as soon as they spawn.

And just how do you kill 35 bots on ch3 without being spotted at all? I'm getting Retribution vibes here.

Go right ahead! Everyone will benefit from knowing more about the game, hopefully it will also help people become better players!

That ram on the Stingray 2

31 minutes ago, di_duncan said:

Ah shit, have we been infiltrated by Beavis and Butthead? ;)

It's hardly an infiltration when I invited them here. :P Everything in good jest, we're here to make efrenz after all.

Note: this is only my own interpretation of how assist damage works. I could very well be wrong, and I would appreciate corrections.

Assist damage is possibly the most annoying statistic to farm IMO, not only because you are at the mercy of your teammates to actually shoot at targets that you want to be shot at, but because of the convoluted mechanics that will force you to intentionally go out of your way in order to get credit.

There are 3 types of assist damage: designated damage, de-tracking damage, and spotting damage. They are not all weighed equally however, each of these 3 types follow a hierarchy for the purpose of calculating assist damage. The hierarchy goes like this: designated damage > de-tracking damage > spotting damage. It is impossible to get credit for more than one type of assist damage at the same time. Fortunately, knowing the mechanics mean you can somewhat easily manipulate it into your favor.

As assist damage follows the strict hierarchy, it also means only 1 player can be credited with assist damage for any target. If a target is de-tracked by someone else after you have spotted it, then the assist damage will not be credited to you, but instead whoever de-tracked the target. Likewise, if you designate an already de-tracked target, you will be credited with all the assist damage until the designation wears off.

It's probably easier to explain this in point form:

• Player A spots a target. Nothing else happens. Player A gets credit.
• Player A spots a target. Player B de-tracks the same target. Player B gets credit.
• Player A spots a target. Player B designates the same target. Player B gets credit.
• Player A designates a target. Player B de-tracks the same target. Player A gets credit.

Regarding spotting damage, the game only considers EXCLUSIVE spotting damage to count towards your assist damage. That is, a target must be only spotted by you and nobody else (including infantry) in order for you to get credit. I shall summon the power of MS Paint to illustrate how this works.

In this horribly drawn diagram, you are the only one close enough to spot the target. Your ally can also see the target thanks to you, but he's not close enough to spot the target. All damage inflicted on the target by your allies will be credited to you as assist damage, as long the target isn't de-tracked or designated by someone else.

-----------------------------------------------

In this equally horribly drawn diagram, both you and your ally are able to directly spot the target. Nobody will get any spotting damage, neither you nor your ally.

----------------------------------------

Note that the "eye" icon is irrelevant in all of this, it is simply an indicator of whether you are the first to spot (or re-spot) a target. If an ally starts spotting the same target as you do, nobody will get any spotting damage. Similarly, the assist stat is also irrelevant because it has nothing to do with assist damage.

From understanding these mechanics, assist damage can be farmed using several methods: a) making sure you're the only one spotting targets; b) de-tracking everything that your allies are or will be shooting at; c) designating everything your allies are or will be shooting at.

If you want to be extra cheeky, popping smoke in front of your allies (but behind you so you don't get blinded) will also allow you to rack up spotting damage as long as the smoke lasts, since your allies can still see the target thanks to you but they won't be able to spot it themselves through the smoke.

Now go be a cheeky sod and pad your assist damage stat.

Welcome!

https://aw.my.games/en/news/general/maintenance-march-12-0

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On the 12th of March 2020, starting from 8:00 CET (midnight PDT), the server will not be available for 5 hours due to the application of Update 0.31.6003

List of Update 0.31.6003 Changes

 

New Features

• Added the third Spirithaven Special Operation along with its respective achievements
• The Last Patriot Battle Path ends with this update (please make sure to spend all your Battle Coins before the maintenance)
• Added a Battle Coin reward for the upcoming Battle Path to the list of War Games Loot Crate drops

Please note that there is a known issue, where, if you destroy the EMP guns before the appearance of the objective for their destruction, the objective will sometimes appear as impossible to complete.

Kinetic ATGM Changes

We are changing the way the kinetic ATGMs work on the Bradley AAWS-H and M8 MGM-166 vehicles as such:

• Removed the damage randomization, making the shell damage more predictable
• Distance now again influences damage, but not by much. At the same time, improved the damage value for both kinetic missiles. Depending on the distance, the KEM ATGM will now deal 700 to 840 damage and the CKEM ATGM will now deal 800 to 1000 damage
• Removed the penetration randomization altogether

General Changes

• Fixed an issue where the GPU would heat up a lot during the loading screen phase
• Fixed an issue where vehicle’s ammunition would disappear after a respawn
• The old Battle Coin Coupons for the Last Patriot Battle Path can now be sold for 10.000 Credits
• New Battle UI: Added new tooltips to the vehicle status interface, which depend on each module and crew-member’s status
• New Battle UI: Added new tooltips for the active Commander abilities
• New Battle UI: Improved the appearance of the shell reload element in the UI
• New Battle UI: Fixed an issue where respawning could cause some elements to move around to incorrect places
• Harimau: Fixed and simplified the armor geometry to remove some of its stranger elements (the actual protection levels have not changed)
• K21: ATGMs can now be launched if the target is lower than before (maximum ATGM camera depression improved from -8 to -20 degrees)
• K21: Fixed an issue where firing 40mm AP shells imposed too small a camouflage penalty while the penalty for firing 40mm HE shells was in turn too big
• M8 MGM-166: Fixed an issue where two missiles from its magazine would not fly using the correct trajectory
• Object 640: Improved the tank’s upper frontal plate armor by reverting it to the pre-0.31 value
• QN-506: Fixed an issue where the mud on the hull looked different than the mud on its ERA
• T-90MS: Fixed the Supercharged soft-kill APS ability for this vehicle
• Type 89: Fixed the incorrect 35mm shell caliber UI value (was listed as 30mm)
• Type 89: Fixed the incorrect Improved Turbocharger module description
• VT-4: Improved the visual model of this vehicle
• Fixed an issue where the Team and General chat settings were inverted
• Enabling v-sync no longer automatically forces the Normal render mode
• Improved the lighting in the Spirithaven Garage
• Changed the icon of the game

I would advise anyone who haven't completed their 20 extreme spec ops wins to get it done before the update, just in case ch3 proves to be as ridiculous as Moscow ch4.

This is a thread for giving cake to players performing extraordinary feats, or otherwise doing something amazing that you don't see every day. Funny enough, I thought a name and shame thread would come way before a name and praise thread.

I'll start by praising Az for being a great platoon mate and carrying 3 clueless pubbies (and me) kicking and screaming to the end.

The match started with both of us going groaning at the sight of a Crab. Seeing that the path we rolled was the harbor > dam path, we quickly cleared whatever bots spawned in the harbor and took the usual positions at the (closed) central gate. All went normally until time came to push the dam, that's when things got weird.

Pubbies being pubbies, they refused to move up to the dam area. Az butted her head in and lit up a T-14-152 and various infantry on the hills. I tracked the bot, she violated its butt. Infantry got mowed down and a LT XM1A3 got spotted. A few missiles into its upper front plate removed it from existence, and we practically pushed up the dam with only the two of us. At this point we both had over 40k damage, while the pubbies didn't even break 5k. The Crab in particular derped around uselessly.

Once we had to push into the base, we mowed down the two bots that came to greet us and the first two pillboxes. I was low on ammo so I derped into the bot horde for a respawn, Az did the same (I think). While we both slowly cleared out the base, the Leo 2A6 and Merk 4M decided it would be best to sit uselessly on top of the platform instead of helping us. There was a LT Merk 4M waiting for us, I distracted it while Az made it regret its existence from behind. Once everything got cleared out, the pubbies finally decided to come down and cap, triggering yet another wave of T-15 bots. We cleared those out as well.

Defense phase, oh god. Since we pushed up from the hill side the first waves would spawn at the coastal side, so Az and I both took positions there to apply merciless spankings. Note that all the pubbies at this point were still huddled around the cap and on the platform, they did nothing to help cull the bot swarm. Once the first waves were dealt with, we swung over the hill side to repeat the process.

T-15s are inherently slow, so we barely got over to the hill side before bots started spawning. Bot removal procedures continued, pubbies took potshots here and there but didn't do much overall. This is when we started to get overwhelmed, since even the combined DPM of two T-15s wasn't enough to stem the tide of ATDUs and T-15s from rolling up the hill. With around 45s left on the clock, I pulled back up the platform while Az continued to apply pain to the bots from behind. The door couldn't open fast enough.

It almost didn't open fast enough, by this point we were both on our last lives and low on hitpoints. Luckily there were only a K21 and Termi 2 waiting behind the door. Az got stuck below the platform because there were still a few bots in her way, and of course the pubbies did nothing to help. With time running short, I nuked the K21 and Termi 2 and sprinted into the exit cap.

End result: both Az and I broke 80k damage, carried 3 useless pubbies kicking and screaming to victory. It was ridiculous to say the least.

Az gets a cake for spotting 46 bots.

10 hours ago, TeyKey1 said:

Again over the years there were several modifications on all mechanics which were never reflected in those articles.

This annoys me greatly. At least with a forum now we'd have a place to compile all the existing info without being drowned out in Discord.

Thanks for the link, I didn't know that before!

This makes it what, the 6th change since release? The game will probably die before they stop touching it.

I actually prefer camo skills in commanders over raw view range, reason being camo is far harder to increase compared to stacking optics + binocs for view range. But that's a topic for my vision control wall of text which will come soon(tm).

22 hours ago, Nihtwaco said:

I hate when I light the CAP up and the rest are 800 meters back hiding.

This is one big reason why I prefer camo over view range. Being able to spot stuff myself is nice, but being able to spot AND shoot stuff while not being spotted is even better. This all depends on positioning of course.

I too opted to use Rapid Fire instead of Override for refilling the ready rack faster, since it cuts almost a full second off my per-round reload and up to 4 seconds of total reload time. It's not much, but it's definitely useful for quick repositioning or waiting for bots to spawn.

20 seconds of speed boost is nice, but I tend to spend more time shooting than having to run long distances.

No HEAT makes me sad.

40 minutes ago, Silentstalker said:

....yet ;)

No idea, but my guess is probably not intended.

My bet is that it will take a month or two before they notice it.