SnapShot: Pub play in World of Tanks

Just wanted to say a few things about pub play - i.e. "Random battles" - in World of Tanks. Too often people, sometimes myself included, get agitated about the lack of teamwork in randoms. But here's the thing, unless you're in a platoon with people you have comms with, there is almost never any real collaboration going on in randoms.

OCCASIONALLY at the end of a battle, you'll see a couple of players start to communicate a bit and coordinate their actions. But usually 15 people sit there in relative silence. Other than the occasional map ping, joke, or gripe, there is very little actual communication happening.

And that means if you push in somewhere aggressively, especially if you didn't communicate that intention to your team first, you really don't have much to complain about if some of those other people didn't read your mind and just KNOW that you were going to hold W and YOLO over the hill and that they should come with you.

During the countdown I'll often ping where I intend to go on the map...and I'm usually the only one who does. SOMETIMES somebody else does, usually not. Wargaming added this cool communication system that lets you specify what area you're going to fight in, indicate where you intend to drive, even select a teammate and ask them to follow you, or fall back. Very few people actually use it in battle though.

So...if you didn't tell your team what you intended to do, don't bitch at them if they don't back the play you never told them you were going to make. And if you do tell them what you want to do, get confirmation before you just assume they're going to back you. Some people have chat turned off. Some don't speak your language. Some just aren't watching every chat message that rolls by. 

And the corollary to that...if you're about to do something stupid, don't blame them if they decide not to participate. Just because you want to push into a 2 v 5, doesn't mean they can't sit back and let it be a 1 v 5.

Finally...if you do try to coordinate with strangers, be nice about it. I'm much more likely to tap "Affirmative!" and come with you if you're polite. "Hey, E 50, I'm going to push up to G6. Can you watch the south?" will probably get an "Affirmative!" from me. As opposed to, "E 50, get off your fat ass and go to F5 right now!" which will probably get a "Negative!" and a smile as I watch you push into that 1 v 5.

GLHF!

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