I'm going to try and post some thoughts on World of Tanks each Monday inspired by the weekend's gaming. Hopefully this happens more than once. :)
It's a game. It's supposed to be fun. It's important to recognize when you're tired, you've had enough for the day and it's better to just sign off and come back to it fresh another time. Otherwise it starts to feel like a chore.
I'll almost certainly get the last 20K tomorrow.
Experience Matters
This weekend Wargaming ran an x2 Crew Experience bonus. The way it worked was that if you finished in the top 10 of your team in a particular battle, win or lose, you would get double crew experience for that battle. And not just for your first battle of the day in that tank but for EVERY battle. As a result I spent several hours this weekend grinding my most important crews trying to get that extra experience bonus.
As it turned out it wasn't that hard to be in the top 10 and I was probably 90% of the time. In public games, especially in the middle tiers, there are always a handful of campers who do nothing and YOLO maniacs who just rush out to get killed in the first 30 seconds. If you play smart, play actively and last more than a few minutes you'll almost certain rack up enough stats to make the top 10.
As it turned out it wasn't that hard to be in the top 10 and I was probably 90% of the time. In public games, especially in the middle tiers, there are always a handful of campers who do nothing and YOLO maniacs who just rush out to get killed in the first 30 seconds. If you play smart, play actively and last more than a few minutes you'll almost certain rack up enough stats to make the top 10.
New players often don't realize just how important crew experience is to the performance of your tank on the battlefield. Everything from spotting to camo to reload times and more can be affected just by your crews base training. And that's before we even talk about skills and perks.
One of the bigger mistakes I see relatively new players make is charging up the tech tree buying the next tier tank just as fast as they can, but not paying much attention to getting their crew ready for that next level. Getting into a Tier VIII tank is great...but if you have a 70% crew with no skills or perks you're going to be at a massive disadvantage in those battles. You can see this in the replays and videos you see on YouTube - pretty much everybody you see playing in those top tier (VIII, IX, X) games has Sixth Sense activated which means they not only have a 100% crew but they also have at LEAST one 100% perk/skill on every crewmember. If you don't you might as well fight them on one track. You're going to get sent back to the garage in a big hurry.
Skills and Perks
There are plenty of guides out there that explain skills and perks. Here's the official guide from Wargaming, for example. Let me take a moment to share how I approach my crews.
Light Tanks
For my light tanks the most important skill for my crew to have is Camo. It's amazing when you've really optimized your camo and you can sit in a bush, just a couple of hundred meters away from enemy tanks driving by, and they can't see you at all. As soon as I get my LT crews trained to 100% I add "concealment" to all of the crewmembers as their first skill.
Once I get my commander to 100% on Conealment I'll actually do a "reset" (which drops his skill and lets me choose another one) and change his skill to the Sixth Sense perk. If you do that reset without paying any credits or gold the new perk starts off at 80% and you have to earn the last 20% again. If you pay some gold, however, you can switch to the new perk and not lose any value. Then you can re-start concealment as the second skill for that commander.
Once I have the rest of the crew trained up on camo I usually look for Situational Awareness to increase my view range, or repair.
Tank Destroyers
For TDs the most important qualities, in my opinion, is to be able to see without being seen. So like Light Tanks I tend to prioritize camo but I also give some weight to view range. So Recon and Situational Awareness. Just as with the LTs I'll reset my commander to Sixth Sense as quickly as possible.
Medium Tanks
For my medium tanks I have a little less formal strategy. I'm experimenting with a larger mix that includes concealment, recon, situational awareness and repairs. As with the other two Sixth Sense is a priority once that's available.
If I have a medium that is prone to more fires I'll add the firefighting skill as well.
Artillery/SPG
Artys are a little different beast because of the nature of their play. I tend to prioritize concealment and Brothers in Arms for these. Repair and Firefighting, for example, aren't really that important. The reality is that if you're getting hit by tanks you're probably about to die anyhow - repairing 1 second faster isn't likely to save your arty.
If I can pick a new perk for ALL of the crew I'll eventually opt for Brothers in Arms which boosts crew performance across the entire vehicle - but it requires the entire crew to have it at 100%.
I don't prioritize Sixth Sense as much for artillery. It may be handy, but honestly if I'm spotted in an arty I'm probably running for my life at that point anyhow.
I don't prioritize Sixth Sense as much for artillery. It may be handy, but honestly if I'm spotted in an arty I'm probably running for my life at that point anyhow.
Heavy Tanks
I don't have a solid strategy for heavy tanks yet since I don't drive very many of them at this point. I'll do a future post on that when I've got something useful to say about it!
Know when to "retreat"
Tonight after work I had a little time to play so I got on to fight a few battles in my favorite tanks. I'm grinding credits towards a new German heavy tank and I'm getting fairly close so I figured that MAYBE if the battles went well I'd get the amount I needed to finally buy it. I fought about 10 battles and won 6 or 7 of them - I was pretty pleased with that. But I was getting tired and I realized I wasn't really going to be at my best if I continued on. I was about 20K short of the credits needed for that German tank...but I decided to pack it in. I probably could have slogged on for a few more battles and gotten to the 20K but I was pleased with how I'd been playing and decided to quit while I was ahead.
It's a game. It's supposed to be fun. It's important to recognize when you're tired, you've had enough for the day and it's better to just sign off and come back to it fresh another time. Otherwise it starts to feel like a chore.
I'll almost certainly get the last 20K tomorrow.
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