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Since up-to-date guides for Armored Warfare are few and far between, I’ve decided to contribute a comprehensive crew overview/guide (in spite of how much of the crew system is already common knowledge). Since I will be writing it, the content presented may come off as long-winded and/or excessive. A side effect of university papers perhaps… Apologies in advance if this is the case. On the other hand, if the community here enjoys my transcribed thoughts and opinions, I may decide to create more of these posts/topics. I think the ArmoredLabs forum is an excellent platform and initiative, where perspectives, information, and discussion pertaining to AW can be shared between and archived for players, experienced or not. Note that some elements of my writing will be influenced by personal opinion, so please do not take everything here as gospel. Much of it can be classified as suggestion instead of fact. Any suggestions and/or constructive feedback would be greatly appreciated. Please notify me of any errors and/or discrepancies, edits will be made if necessary. I will strive to keep my posts up-to-date. With that out of the way, here is my AW crew guide: Crew Vehicles in AW (all currently manned) require a [healthy] crew complement to support and sustain combat capability during battle(s). The bulk of the material within this overview is not applicable to commanders. Although commanders are also technically crew members, they employ a skill and leveling system far more complex while also boasting significant/substantial distinct abilities and mechanics; therefore requiring a dedicated guide of their own. When a new vehicle is purchased/acquired, it is assigned crew members automatically, each with specific roles/duties to fulfill in their respective vehicles. Crews will also have skills and attributes related to their position. Skills: Crew skills are selectable performance improvements available to individual crew members. Different crew roles will each have their own respective sets of [unique] skills relevant to their position. Two skills can be chosen for each crew member, with the first skill slot unlocked upon reaching level 2 and the second slot upon reaching level 4. Attributes: Predetermined set of intrinsic competencies relevant to the specific crew member’s function within the vehicle. Designed to reflect a crew’s mastery of the vehicle, its percentage/potency increases alongside a crew’s level of proficiency. Attributes are maxed once a crew attains level 5. Crew Progression: Unlike commanders, which can be moved and/or shared between different vehicles, the other crew members of a vehicle must remain with their respective vehicle. Crew members gain crew experience tied to the amount of base experience (based on performance) gained from battle(s). Consequently, crew experience can be augmented by winning (in PvP), completing [primary and secondary] objectives (in PvE), first win of the day multipliers, and premium account. However, crew experience income can be further increased with certain boosts, applicable insignias, and special event bonuses as well. As a vehicle’s crew accrues experience, their proficiency level will gradually increase. Higher levels will progressively increase their [passive] attributes while reaching levels 2 and 4 will unlock a skill slot respectively. Proficiency is maxed upon reaching level 5. Crew experience required for level up: Level 1 → Level 2: 3,000 Level 2 → Level 3: 17,000 Level 3 → Level 4: 70,000 Level 4 → Level 5: 110,000 Players are also presented with an option to immediately “promote” the crew to level 3 (with credits) or to level 5 (with gold). But this is generally unadvised, as the crew grind is rather seamless and quick, occurring in parallel to the corresponding vehicle grind. Some premium vehicles come with a level 5 crew as standard: Crew in Combat: Similar to internal vehicle modules/components, crew members are modeled with a hitpoint pool and located at their respective positions within their vehicle. A penetrating shot in or around these particular area(s) may injure crew member(s). Whereas modules are [eventually] repaired automatically, injured crew cannot recover without the use of a medical kit or first aid cabinet. Crew Consumables: The three consumables relevant to crew are: Medical Kit: Heals all injured crew members in your vehicle (single use) First Aid Cabinet: Heals all injured crew members in your vehicle (3 uses, 90 second cooldown) Both medpacks feature a passive 15% bonus to crew resilience (crew “durability”). There is no reason not to equip the first aid cabinet over the medical kit (especially if you play GlOps), unless you are particularly low on credits. Energy Drink: Increases crew stats (attributes) by an additional 5% for a single battle Energy drink (and some commander skills) buff crew stats, but this only improves crew attributes, not crew skills. Therefore, vehicles with a manual loader should be equipped with energy drink. A vehicle with a level 5 loader trained with Rapid Fire combined with energy drink would see a considerable 10% increase to its rate of fire (without factoring in any additional crew stat buffs) Crew Configuration: The number of crew a vehicle seats may vary from vehicle to vehicle, from a minimum of 2 (Wiesel) to a maximum of 5 (Some SPGs, AFT-10, etc.). All vehicles require two crew members minimum, specifically: Commander Leader of the vehicle. Guides, instructs and directs crewmen during operation of the vehicle under his/her control. Responsibilities encompass communications, navigation, target acquisition, operating weaponry, etc. A commander injury disables any commander abilities and results in a sweeping debuff to vehicle characteristics, such as mobility, targeting, and firepower, even if the crew member corresponding to that function is still alive/unharmed. Driver Drivers are responsible for mobility; specifically driving and/or manoeuvring a vehicle. They steer and control the hull movement of vehicles, namely forward/reverse movement and turning/rotation. An injured driver will have significant negative effects to speed, acceleration, hull traverse, etc. Attributes: Traverse Speed (+5% max, +1% per level) Self explanatory, the rate at which a vehicle rotates its hull. Expressed in degrees (°) per second. Terrain Resistance (+10% max, +2% each level) How evenly a vehicle distributes its weight to the ground. Better terrain resistance effectively improves vehicle acceleration off-road. Skills: Smooth Ride: Overall accuracy while moving is improved by 10% Use/Function: Better accuracy while firing on-the-move Classes: MBT, LT, AFV (particularly LTs and AFVs) Vehicles: Most LTs, AFVs which are able to fire on-the-move (eg: SPHINX) Battering Ram: Ramming damage increased by 50% Use/Function: Increased outgoing ramming damage Classes: MBT Vehicles: M1A1 Storm, T-80U, Obj 640 Off-Road Driving: Acceleration on off-road terrain increased by 20% Use/Function: Better off-road mobility Classes: All Vehicles: Any vehicle which feels sluggish off-road (eg: Challengers) Spin to Win: Hull traverse speed improved by 5% Use/Function: Improving turn rate Classes: All Vehicles: Vehicles with poor hull traverse/large turning circles (eg: Merkavas) Field Repair: Track and wheel repair rate improved by 25% Use/Function: Decreasing track/wheel repair times Classes: MBT Vehicles: Brawlers and/or vehicles frequently receiving fire The vast majority of vehicles will also feature a gunner. Gunner Gunners operate vehicle weapon systems and it is their task to aim and fire upon targets. Vehicle turrets and/or weapons are manipulated by the gunner. When the gunner is injured, a vehicle’s accuracy and turret traverse speed will decrease drastically, while aim time will increase considerably as well. Attributes: Aim Speed (+10% max, +2% per level) Self explanatory, the time required for a vehicle to minimize its aim circle. Turret Traverse Speed (+5% max, +1% per level) Self explanatory, the rate at which a vehicle rotates its turret. Expressed in degrees (°) per second. ATGM Accuracy (+10% max, +2% per level) The missile guidance stability of a vehicle. Skills: Do the Twist: Turret traverse speed improved by 8% Use/Function: Improving turret rotation rate and target engagement Classes: All Vehicles: 490, MGM, ADTU, etc. Quick Draw: Aim speed improved by 5% Use/Function: Improved gun handling/targeting Classes: All Vehicles: Any vehicle with longer than desired aim time Sharpshooter: Max spread is improved by 5% Use/Function: Improves maximum (best) accuracy. Classes: All Vehicles: Any vehicle which has less accuracy than desired Preventative Maintenance: Cannon hitpoints are increased by 50% Use/Function: Making disabling weapon(s) more difficult Classes: MBT Vehicles: MBTs with easily disabled guns (XM1A3, 490, etc.) Accuracy: Accuracy decay rate while firing is improved by 25% Use/Function: Decreasing weapon bloom after firing Classes: Some MBTs, LTs, and TDs Vehicles: CATTB Some vehicles will also retain a loader, until higher tiers (especially tier 10) where they are largely replaced by autoloaders. Loader Loaders are mostly self-explanatory. Vehicles without an autoloader must rely on a human loader to manually replenish (reload) their armament. When loaders sustain an injury, both vehicle reload speed and weapon/ammunition swap time increases substantially. Hence, loaders are both potential liabilities and/or beneficial assets. An injured loader can effectively disable a vehicle’s weaponry, although (or conversely) loader effectiveness can be buffed with energy drink. Attributes: Rate of Fire (2.5% max, 0.5% per level) Self explanatory, the rate at which a vehicle is able to fire its weapons. Applies to reload times on single fire weapons, both reload and intra-clip reload times on weapons with ready-rack/magazine and the RPM of autocannons. Skills: Rapid Fire: Rate of fire increased by 2.5% Use/Function: Increasing DPM Classes: All Vehicles: All Preparation: Ammo swap speed improved by 50% (Bonus is higher on clip-style autoloaders and large magazine autocannons. Activates only if the number of shells are full.) Use/Function: Improved weapons and ammunition flexibility Classes: MBT, LT Vehicles: Vehicles with longer reloads but decent gun/ammunition Explosive Shells: Module damage increased by 10% Use/Function: Greater module damage Classes: All Vehicles: Any vehicle set up for module damage (eg: Cent 120 w/ Sabrina) Secured Ammunition: Reload speed not reduced when ammo rack and/or breech are hit Use/Function: Eliminating reload penalties for damaged/disabled ammo rack/cannon breech Classes: MBT Vehicles: Any MBT with easily damaged/disabled ammo rack and/or cannon breech (eg: Leopards) Vehicle Expertise: Repair speed increased by 10% Use/Function: Improved module repair speed Classes: MBT, some LTs Vehicles: Vehicles with modules that are consistently/routinely destroyed Safety: Chance of explosion during a fire reduced 22.6% Use/Function: Chance to preventing additional damage from ammo rack explosion Classes: MBT Vehicles: MBTs with vulnerable ammo racks (Leopards, Ariete, etc.) Notable vehicles/lines without a loader: [Most] Russian MBTs [Most] Chinese MBTs AFVs Autocannon [exclusive] vehicles [Most] Missile [exclusive] vehicles Note: Some vehicles may have a crew member assigned as both a gunner and a loader. In this case, the crew member will serve as both roles simultaneously and will have attributes and skills available from both positions. Accordingly, dual-role crew members should benefit from loader skills (trained in Rapid Fire) while their vehicles should also be equipped with energy drink. Interesting fact: Crew members can be customized in AW. First and last names can be chosen from an extensive list of different names originating from various languages and/or nationalities. Crew portraits can also be changed; another likeness can be selected from yet another expansive list of appearances of varying race, ethnicity, gender, and attire. Fin

Hello everyone. It's again time for a new guide translation from AWtactics. The original guide in german can be found here Keep in mind that english is not my native language, I try my best to write correct sentences. Aswell I use google translate on my original text to keep the effort a bit lower. So there might be some errors I'm missing. In this case feel free to correct me. Blindshots, i.e. shooting at the enemy without seeing them, can be seen as a legitimate and effective tactic in Armored Warfare. Used correctly, you can use it to increase your damage output and increase your chances of winning the game. As always the Guide is a bit more focused on the PVP side of things. However, there is not really much of a difference to PVE concerning this topic. Content: I'll cover the following things in this guide: What are blindshots How to use blindshots as a tactic How can you prevent being blindshotted 1. What are Blindshots In general, you can say that a blindshot is a shot at an opponent who is not visible (ie not spotted). There are a few tactics that can be used to increase the damage output from blindshots. These are detailed below. It is important to know that a hit with damage to an unspotted opponent is not displayed in the UI and is not reported by the crew. So you only know at the end of the battle in the winscreen with 100% certainty whether you hit the blind shot or not. The only exception is if your shot was defeated by a hard-kill APS. In battle, one can guess the successful effect of the blind shots by one of the following aspects: The opponent sets a smoke screen after the blind shot, although he is actually not spotted at all. The opponent moves after the blind shot (which is visible if he hits some trees or even gets spotted by his movement) The enemy has lost the estimated number of HP compared to the damage which your projectile deals. (Of course you only see this when the opponent is spotted again) Your shot almost disappears in the air, where the opponent is. (This is not always the case, but you can observe it from time to time) The opponent's APS triggers (a message appears on your reticle) The opponent complains about cheaters in chat (rare but possible ) 2. How to use blindshots as a tactic In general, blind shots can be divided into 5 categories, whereby these situations can of course also occur in combination in combat (e.g. blind shot at tracked opponents behind a smoke screen). Of course, you can combine these tactics in any form and adapt them to the battle situation. Blindshots at frequently occupied enemy positions: Blindshots at frequently occupied enemy positions are rarely used. The benefit of this is that you can scare away the potential opponent from there by blindshooting his position, on the other hand it is a very random method and of course due to that not always successful. You need a lot of luck and of course also appropriate map knowledge to guess where the opponent might be positioned. In general,while using this tactic you should be aware that the enemy is usually hiding behind bushes, trees, rocks or house corners rather than standing in a completely open field. Accordingly, you should prefer such positions as targets for this type of blindshots. The general advantage of this tactic can be that you can chase away enemy spotters who make life difficult for you, or at least force them to reposition their vehicle. Blindshot at enemies who were previously spotted: These blindshots can be made very often and mostly with a very high level of certainty. If an opponent is no longer spotted, but you are already aimed at his position and can shoot within a short time, it is mostly worth firing the shot. The opponent cannot change position very quickly in such a short period of time, so the chances of a hit are good. Blindshot at tracers: Blind shots to bullet tracers can be used very often. Here it is especially important that you know roughly where your opponent is. Especially if you are shot at by invisible opponents, you can successfully defend yourself by using this tactic. The easiest are bullet tracers from machine guns and autocannons, which form a direct line to the target. The only thing you have to do is shoot directly at the origin of this tracer. Keep in mind that you might want to aim lower to not hit the gun of a potentially unmanned turret. Single-shot cannons are also not a problem with a little practice. The following checklist for a blindshot at a tracer is helpful: Estimate where the opponent could be (from which direction am I / my teammates being shot at?) Watch this spot, preferably in the sniper view Wait until the enemy shoots Recognize the tracer and shoot at the place of origin. Blindshot at tracked enemies: Blind shots at tracked opponents can be very effective. It is important that you shoot continuously at the position of the drive wheel or the idle wheel in order to keep the enemy tracked. Try to evaluate how much shots you need to kill the opponent, so as not to shoot 20 shots at a position where the opponent is no longer standing (for example, the opponent has repaired his tracks). In the video example you can see that after the first shot with the RDF-LT, which tracks the opponent, I no longer shoot the idle wheel, but in the middle of the hull. This is due to the fact that I shoot HEP ammo. Due to the HEP mechanics, I would not do any damage if I hit the enemy tracks, but would only continue to track the enemy. Therefore in this situation it is better to deal actual damage by hitting the hull. Blindshot at enemies behind a smoke screen: This is also a situation that occurs relatively frequently: The opponent is spotted, takes a few hits and deploys a smoke screen to cover himself. If you are already aiming at the opponent and are almost reloaded, it is a good idea to fire once again at the last position of the opponent (the opponent does not have enough time to move away from his old position). This action is all the more effective if the opponent is poorly armored, since it doesn't matter where you hit. If you have not previously aimed at the opponent, but can see the smoke screen, it can work quite well to shoot in the middle of the smoke screen shortly after the smoke appears. Blindshot at moving targets: Definitely the supreme discipline in this regard. If a moving enemy was previously spotted and then disappears again, it can be quite efficient to shoot at the enemy again. But, of course, you have to take the speed and movement direction of the enemy into account. This is a skill that can be aquired by playing the game and gaining lots experience. Self-protection and priorities when using blindshots: I would like to emphasize again that blindshots can be effective, but due to the uncertainty whether you deal damage or even hit the target at all, it is also a tactic that should be used with caution. Before firing the blindshot, you should always consider whether it is worth firing it. The following factors should be considered: Is it possible that the enemy could spot me because of the blindshot? (Is it better if I remain undetected? Do I have cover in the event of being spotted (rocks, smoke, ...)) Do I have enough ammunition left to fire such a risky shot? (Or should I better save the grenade / missile for later) What is the likelihood of a penetration if I hit? (Is the target well or poorly armored) Are there better targets / targets with higher priority, which are spotted and which I could shoot at immediately? (If so, this would be the better option) 3. How can you avoid being blindshotted Basically, you can always be hit by blind shots. Nevertheless, you can try to keep the probability as low as possible. Especially when you play TDs and stand in one place for a long time, you should constantly watch whether you are being blindshotted. You can recognize this by the fact that shots from the enemy side fly past near your own tank. The most effective way against such shots is to vary the position by a few meters after each shot. If you are heavily blindshot at, which is rare, but can happen, it helps if you have cover and only expose yourself if you really want to shoot. Blind shots are often a considerable problem when using smoke screens. As soon as you deploy one and assume that you will possibly be blindshotted (if, for example, opponents have previously aimed / shot at you), it can help if you do not reverse straight backwards after deploying, but steer the tank to one side (left or right) of the screen. This increases the chance that you will not be hit, since most opponents assume that you are reversing straight backwards.