World of Tanks

[Merusk]

It's not the repairs that are killing me on the T-29.. it's the fucking rounds.   Blown-up is 8k to repair, but shots are like 1.5k each.   

[apocrypha]

Yeah ammo costs are bad for tier 7+ heavies    Haven't yet come out with a profit from a game with the IS-4!

My love/hate affair with the T-34-85 continues however... some days I suck balls and miss every shot and die instantly. Some days I get this:

Victory!
Battle: El Halluf 23 April 2012 11:03:03
Vehicle: T-34-85
Experience received: 3,294 (x2 for the first victory each day)
Credits received: 36,613
Battle Achievements: Mastery Badge: Ace Tanker, Master Gunner, Sniper

[kildorn]

Russian guns 

Finally got the top gun for my 28p. Had one hilarious game with it as the top tank against a mess of IS-3s. Came out with a mess of IS-3 kills. Didn't even have to aim to pen them. <3

[Merusk]

I started playing Russian TDs for that exact reason.  I love sniping and making things go pop.  There's been a few games on the SU-85B where I seriously said "Wait, I killed that in one shot?"

[Nebu]

Am I making a mistake by playing the German TD and medium trees?  I have tier 6 in both and enjoy the gameplay, but am getting stuck in matches with 8's and 9's all the time.

[apocrypha]

The matchmaker doesn't take tank nationality into account at all does it? So you'd get the same tier 8 & 9 matches whatever TDs/meds you were playing.

Or did I misunderstand your question and you're asking about TDs & meds in general? If so, then, yeah, that's how it goes. I have learned to not just see the top tier tanks in a match but consider the tanks my tier and below as my primary targets and the higher tier ones as things I will support the heavies on if I can but try not to directly engage myself unless I think the advantage is mine.

Often during the pre-match timer some tier 5 in a tier 9 match says "thanks MM!", clearly not even seeing the 4-5 tier 5 enemy tanks that they can go toe-to-toe with, but only seeing the IS-4's and T34's and considering themselves useless.

[Nebu]

Or did I misunderstand your question and you're asking about TDs & meds in general? If so, then, yeah, that's how it goes. I have learned to not just see the top tier tanks in a match but consider the tanks my tier and below as my primary targets and the higher tier ones as things I will support the heavies on if I can but try not to directly engage myself unless I think the advantage is mine.

I meant more in the fact that I see more American and Russian Tier 6-10's than anything.  I was attracted to the German tanks as they had lower caliber guns but seemed to have higher average accuracy and penetration.  Now that I'm playing again, everything I shoot seems to bounce off the enemy. 

What are the strengths and weaknesses of the nationalities... in general?  Can you even generalize?  I'll check the WoT forums for some insight.

[Tmon]

The matchmaker doesn't take tank nationality into account at all does it? So you'd get the same tier 8 & 9 matches whatever TDs/meds you were playing.

Or did I misunderstand your question and you're asking about TDs & meds in general? If so, then, yeah, that's how it goes. I have learned to not just see the top tier tanks in a match but consider the tanks my tier and below as my primary targets and the higher tier ones as things I will support the heavies on if I can but try not to directly engage myself unless I think the advantage is mine.

Often during the pre-match timer some tier 5 in a tier 9 match says "thanks MM!", clearly not even seeing the 4-5 tier 5 enemy tanks that they can go toe-to-toe with, but only seeing the IS-4's and T34's and considering themselves useless.

It's fairly rare for the match maker to throw any vehicle, excepting some of the more gimped tier 4 lights, into a match where they can't do anything useful.  Too many people focus on the top of the list and forget to see what's in the middle and the bottom, with a few exceptions they will have weaknesses that can be exploited if you understand your tank.  I think one of the worst things people do is to rush through low tier tanks to get to the 'good' tanks.  One result is that people show up with under equipped tanks and under trained crews due to not taking time to unlock guns and engines that can be used at the next tier.  A second and probably even harsher effect is that they have a very limited understanding of the mechanics of the game and so take a beating after beating because they just don't know how to play effectively.  Although some people never seem to learn, saw a guy today who was so bad in his IS4 I asked him if he was playing his brother's account or something.  I looked him up after the match and he had 10k+ games and a 45% win rate.

[Engels]

Nebu,

Although there are exceptions in every tree, especially with regards to artillery, the general rubric is as follows:

German : High accuracy, low damage
Russian : Low accuracy, high damage
US : A balance of the two.

This applies to both mediums, heavies and TDs across the board. There are many other factors to consider, however, such as mobility, armor slopes, etc. By and large the german line is blessed with very tough frontal armor, but very weak side armor, as are the US lines. By contrast, the Russian meds and heavies are more sloped and have better all around armor 'rating'. Again, on this one can't generalize too much, as the slopes on a T110 and M103 are amazing from the front.

I think that the German line is a fine line to go down, and in fact may make you a better tanker in the end, since you do have to be quite aware of postional protection. The US and Russian lines are far more forgiving in this regard. Put someone who's played nothing but a T-54 into an E50 and he's going to whine and minge on about how crappy it is because he has no sense of angling, etc. That said, I'd take a good player in an E50 over a good player in an T-54 any day of the week.

[kildorn]

The MM does some pretty stupid shit with some tanks. KVs for example seem to have horrible weighting that puts them up against things they're just very slow and easy targets for. There's a pretty bullshit issue right now with tier 5/6 due to the overabundance of tier 8's (due to being pretty obtainable/profitable, and all the fucking tier 8 premiums).

As for German tanks: a few of them are bullshit good (The E-# series seems pretty awesome, the Tiger 2 is really freaking good), but I really hated the middle tiers. The 3601 is meaner than it looks, but the 3002 for example is pretty mediocre. The TDs are all pretty bouncy comparatively, but none of them are really terrifying imo. The entire german line suffers from the easiest fucking weak spot on the planet to hit that turns most of their armor advantages into paper advantages only, imo.

[Merusk]

Yeah I can admit I'm guilty of that mindset at times before looking at the rest of the list.  You see you're bottom or bottom 1/3 of the list and think "Fuck me" before realizing there's also a few M3Lees on the other team.

That's not saying that MM can't fuck-up.  The worst MM match-up I've had was the 2nd or 3rd match in my stock T-20.  Since I was a T7 it figured I was a good match for an IS. The highest-tier heavy on my team was a KV who I think had the long gun.

We lost.

[kildorn]

The worst MM setups I've seen are when it throws an extra 2-3 high tiers on one side(not counting oddly matched tanks like 13-90s). It's rare, but occasionally the thing just messes the hell up, you laugh and move on. Mocking the matchmaker is a form of community bonding.

[Tmon]

The KV will be happier once 7.3 comes out since it will be 2 tanks.  Right now MM doesn't care about equipment, mods or crew level so my KV with a maxed crew, 107mm, rammer, spall liner and vent gets matched just like the stock kv with 50% crew and 76mm gun.  I got 2500 undoubled xp in my KV one glorious battle on lakeville.  I was the bottom guy and managed to kill most of an IS4 (thanks to a really well timed engine fire) and four tier 8s that for whatever reason decided I wasn't really a threat.  I not only survived but even got the coveted "Hacker" accolade from a Lowe I killed just before the battle ended.

[kildorn]

But that's terrible opponents, not that the MM should have put the KV in there. It takes two shots to kill a KV from any random t8, and the MM really likes to put fleets of them up against things that if played with two functional brain cells won't even take damage from the KVs.

I had one match last night with an IS-3 on my team that thought he was a battleship. Every engagement he would stop, turn his side towards the enemy, and proceed to fire from a stationary position. He was murdered by low tier tanks not because they were awesome, but because he was Terrible.

edit: basically, I think 4 tier ranges are entirely too wide for viable matches. A tier 4 in a tier 8 fight is probably just going to have a shitty gameplay experience unless he's a specialist. Scouts can function as low tiers. Arty at around tier 5/6 can function in high tier matches (before that, no. A tier 4 arty shelling a tier 8 tank deals like, 5 damage per direct hit). TDs shouldn't be weighted the way they are, since a lot of them don't get massively better guns than their same tier counterparts (or, fix the tanks that have shit gun selection for their tier)

It's just a bit silly to have such a wide range of tiers in a match when the bottom third is either scouts (will have fun) or food (will try and kill the other bottom tier and hope to god they don't run into anything big), but you can usually actually engage a target 2 tiers above you with some tactics.

[Furiously]

Or did I misunderstand your question and you're asking about TDs & meds in general? If so, then, yeah, that's how it goes. I have learned to not just see the top tier tanks in a match but consider the tanks my tier and below as my primary targets and the higher tier ones as things I will support the heavies on if I can but try not to directly engage myself unless I think the advantage is mine.

I meant more in the fact that I see more American and Russian Tier 6-10's than anything.  I was attracted to the German tanks as they had lower caliber guns but seemed to have higher average accuracy and penetration.  Now that I'm playing again, everything I shoot seems to bounce off the enemy. 

What are the strengths and weaknesses of the nationalities... in general?  Can you even generalize?  I'll check the WoT forums for some insight.

Tier 4 thought 6 are worst tiers to "play". You will get into tier 10 matches occasionally and be unable to do anything. Once you hit seven it will still happen but you should be able to do something to most of the higher tier tanks. Eight is where it all evens out. Able to pen anything on the map and contribute.

[Nebu]

Tier 4 thought 6 are worst tiers to "play". You will get into tier 10 matches occasionally and be unable to do anything. Once you hit seven it will still happen but you should be able to do something to most of the higher tier tanks. Eight is where it all evens out. Able to pen anything on the map and contribute.

Thanks to everyone for their input.  Looks like I have some matches to grind.  I blew $30 on gold for at least 2 months worth of premium play, so this should keep me busy until GW2 comes out.

[UnsGub]

Am I making a mistake by playing the German TD and medium trees?

If you like the play style which demands you know what you are doing to be effective.

The higher tier you go the more it is all about heavies.  Arty and medium tanks are a specialty in clan wars now.  Fifteen heavy tanks on some maps is a standard lineup.

The days of tier nine medium wolf packs in public battles are over.  A platoon of tier nine TDs can do stuff also but solo it is about defending base and waiting for people to drive in front of your gun.

[Nebu]

The days of tier nine medium wolf packs in public battles are over.  A platoon of tier nine TDs can do stuff also but solo it is about defending base and waiting for people to drive in front of your gun.

Good to know.  Thanks for the heads-up.

[apocrypha]

Just going back to the KV, it's great strength is that it's so often dismissed as no threat by tanks 2-3 tiers higher than it. They're wrong - if you play the KV cautiously, well aware that you can be 1/2-shotted by tier 7's, and manage to sneak in some shots on weak spots you can put a serious hurt on some big tanks.

I used to use the derp gun exclusinvely but since the HE nerf I've swapped to the 107mm and it's a fantastic gun for a tier 5 tank. You can ammo rack tier 7 heavies, set their engines on fire, take off 1/3 of their armour in 1 well-placed hit because they just assume some lower tier tank on their team is going to deal with you while they tackle the IS-3 or whatever.

I love KV long time! I really hope that one of the replacements in 0.7.3 is as awesome.

[Furiously]

Yea the 107 on the KV is amazing for it's tier. I run a double in mine every day; eventually I hope to get the S51.

[Tmon]

In 7.3 derp and the 107 armed kv will become the kv2 and move to tier 6.  I played a few games with the tier 6 version on the test server and it wasn't bad, but since most games are full of people test driving the new tier 8 heavies it's really hard to tell whether it will hold up in live.  Speaking of 7.3, the KV4 unless it gets a good solid hit from the nerf bat will be a very nice addition to tier 8.

[veredus]

Am I making a mistake by playing the German TD and medium trees?  I have tier 6 in both and enjoy the gameplay, but am getting stuck in matches with 8's and 9's all the time.

For Tier 9 TDs Object 704 and T30 are far and away better TDs imo then the JTtger. They do what a TD is meant to do. They scare the shit out of heavy tanks. Also both are really fun to play, popping tanks for 600-900 dmg a shot is very satisfying. If I had to pick one I'd go with the T30 but that may be because I've already played a 704 a lot between beta and now.

For mediums, I love my E50. Other T9 mediums do not scare me at all in that tank. It is very much a German tank though. Great gun, good frontal armor, neutral steering but protect your sides and rear at all costs.
I do not have anything to do with clan wars anymore though, so this is all pub and platoon stuff.

[Furiously]

I've got all these tier 9 and tier 10 American tanks and suddenly they are viable tanks its sooo odd.

[Abagadro]

I can't stand the T30 and am loving the jagtiger despite not even having the top gun on it yet.  You just need to know how to play it.

[UnsGub]

I've got all these tier 9 and tier 10 American tanks and suddenly they are viable tanks its sooo odd.

They have always been great tanks if played within their limitation.

The new tier 10 is amazing and showing up in clan war lineups in numbers (2-6).  It does not even need gold rounds.

[Tmon]

I enjoy just pointing and shooting with that gun, right after the patch their were some very surprised IS7s, E100s and 75s.  Not only did it punch nice shiny holes pretty much anywhere it hit but I could get of shots much faster than they expected.

[Ginaz]

I just got the top gun for the T-30 last night.  Wow.  What a game changer.  I played a few matches with the gun just below it and did so so.  After putting in the new gun, it was like a whole new tank.  My first match I got 7 kills, two shotting a ferdi in the process and having every other enemy tank that saw me turn around and try to run away.  I like this much better than the Jadgtiger already.

[Mortriden]

I just got the top gun for the T-30 last night.  Wow.  What a game changer.  I played a few matches with the gun just below it and did so so.  After putting in the new gun, it was like a whole new tank.  My first match I got 7 kills, two shotting a ferdi in the process and having every other enemy tank that saw me turn around and try to run away.  I like this much better than the Jadgtiger already.

Yeah, the 155mm on the T30 and the T95 are fear inducing.  I'm still grinding the 60k to get the 155 on my T95, but I love that just the sight of my tank will break formations up as they scurry for cover.  Arty turns me into goo though... apparently I'm a high priority target now...

[angry.bob]

Okay...  so...

Credits earned on tier 9 and 10 need some adjusting up. Any match that I don't kill at least 4 people costs me money. If I die, forget about it. And this is with a premium account.

[Tmon]

That's by design, depending on the tank it is possible to turn a profit at tier 8/9 but generally they lose money.  It's to encourage people to keep playing lower tier tanks.

[Merusk]

Tier 7 Premium tanks seem to be the sweet spot for money earning.. but I also don't own a Tier8 tank.   I hear the T34 makes buckets of cash.. as it should for $50.

[Nebu]

Any chance I could run a match or two with one of you 'experienced' guys?  I'm starting to think that I just suck at this game.  I'm not confident that I understand the tactics of each map well and find that I'm either too passive and die late having not shot anyone or too aggressive and get killed early for pressing too hard. 

[Amarr HM]

Credits earned on tier 9 and 10 need some adjusting up. Any match that I don't kill at least 4 people costs me money. If I die, forget about it. And this is with a premium account.

Killing people doesn't earn credits, it's damage and spotting for damage.
If you find you are bouncing a lot and getting no hit pens then you may need a better gun or to stop shooting at Maus from 550m+.

I mainly run tier 9 tanks and I always make a profit (15-20k on average I'd say), I could make a lot more if I cared more about surviving.

[Amarr HM]

Any chance I could run a match or two with one of you 'experienced' guys?  I'm starting to think that I just suck at this game.  I'm not confident that I understand the tactics of each map well and find that I'm either too passive and die late having not shot anyone or too aggressive and get killed early for pressing too hard. 

Hook me up tonight/over the weekend I'll gladly get in on a game with you. My in game name is 'BlindSide'.

[Nebu]

It's finals week next week, so I may not be on much this weekend. 

Also, tier 6 is as high as I have.  Perhaps this is part of my problem.  I'm constantly up against 8's and 9's and I feel completely ineffective.