World of Tanks Mark 2

[Vendetta]

It's not necessarily making a kill (although that's always nice to have) insomuch as wanting to make it out of a battle more or less in one piece that I'd like to get better at. I've been making use of cover as much as possible, although Vendetta's point about the wooden barricades was a good observation I just noticed in my last battle, particularly as the opposition could start shooting at me before I was able to spot them.

You're mostly not going to survive, because there's no way to restore health even if you come out on top in an encounter unless you can do so with no damage at all (like enemies are shooting someone else) you're still going to be damaged, and that means eventually you will die.

Just make sure you do enough damage before you die to make it worthwhile. (You are rewarded far more for damage than kills in WoT, if you do damage to someone you still get that as XP, even if they survive the battle as a whole)

[Advocate]

Is the SDNet clan still active and if so, how do I apply to get in? I just came back to WoT and would like a clan to play with. WoT username is Grammaticus.

[The Vortex Empire]

There's never been an SDN clan as far as I know, we just have a chat channel. Go to the channel tab on the bottom left and search for SDN.

[Skywalker_T-65]

It would be nice to have a clan, but I don't think (two threads to the contrary) we have enough real interest in it.

[Advocate]

Got it, thanks.

[xthetenth]

We don't have the tier tens, leadership or depth to make a CW clan work and I don't see much other reason to make one.

[Darth Wong]

Yeah, I get the impression that you have to be hardcore, although I've seen some clan players out there in the pub matches who seemed to be quite incompetent.

[Hawkwings]

Any group of people can start a clan. To have your clan tag strike fear into the heart of the enemy takes a lot of time and effort.

[AniThyng]

Is the SDNet clan still active and if so, how do I apply to get in? I just came back to WoT and would like a clan to play with. WoT username is Grammaticus.

You're playing on the US server and not SEA?

[applejack]

Yeah, I get the impression that you have to be hardcore, although I've seen some clan players out there in the pub matches who seemed to be quite incompetent.

I guess even bad players benefit immensely from decent leadership and teamspeak-based communication. I'm not part of a clan, but I did play company battles with a clan once and the difference between clan-led CB and public matches is the difference between night and day. With a 53% overall win rate, I'm strictly mediocre on my own. But when playing clan-led CB, the team's win rate jumped to well over 80%. Without the leadership and support from clanmates, I can totally see how someone who could be useful in clan wars or CB be hapless on their own in pub matches.

[The Vortex Empire]

With a 53% overall win rate, I'm strictly mediocre on my own.

53% is hardly mediocre, the average winrate is a bit over 48%.

[Nephtys]

53 percent is better than 90+ percent of the playerbase.

[Vendetta]

Fuck me, much more of this and I might start respecting the Crusader.
me and a Sherman Jumbo managed to hold off five tanks in the pass south of Karelia, two Churchill 1s, a Leopard, a Pz3/4 and a KV-2.

Admittedly, the Sherman did a good deal of the work, and took most of the fire, whilst I peeked over ridge lines and machinegunned things with my 6pdr for not much damage a time, and scuttled away whenever anyone looked at me, but still, managed to be top 3 in the team, which is a first. Usually things do not go well for me in this tank.

[xthetenth]

Yeah, I get the impression that you have to be hardcore, although I've seen some clan players out there in the pub matches who seemed to be quite incompetent.

The vast majority of clan players are people who joined for platoons and stuff, and they may be good players, but their clans aren't an actively weeded out organization with battles all the time. Being a Europe clan (by this I mean a clan that can take and hold land in Europe) takes multiple teams every night with 14 good tankers and a good leader. Being a Europe clan is hard. For reference, I'm running a 58% win rate with 10 tier tens (and I can drive them all pretty well and they all have good crews except the batchat), and I'm good by ANVIL's standards but by no means exceptional, and ANVIL's the second division of FORGE, which is better. I'd probably only be average there. FORGE can usually put up three teams of that standard on in a night. That's a lot of depth

Yeah, I get the impression that you have to be hardcore, although I've seen some clan players out there in the pub matches who seemed to be quite incompetent.

I guess even bad players benefit immensely from decent leadership and teamspeak-based communication. I'm not part of a clan, but I did play company battles with a clan once and the difference between clan-led CB and public matches is the difference between night and day. With a 53% overall win rate, I'm strictly mediocre on my own. But when playing clan-led CB, the team's win rate jumped to well over 80%. Without the leadership and support from clanmates, I can totally see how someone who could be useful in clan wars or CB be hapless on their own in pub matches.

The coordination is key. Go from there to pre-planning, choosing all the tanks, setting up a plan so everyone knows where they're going and the general plan and has clear command and the difference is night and day. CW is a step above companies in coordination, and you desperately need a good leader. I tried, I'm mediocre but would need a lot of work to be much good. Running a CW capable clan takes a lot.

[Mr Bean]

Watching the old World at War guys in platoon in pubbes is night and day because...
A. Every tank is going to have 100% crew likely with at least one fully trained qualification
B. Every platoon is using Voice-chat and exploiting behavior to rack up kills
C. Likely they have trick combos that only work in certain situations but are devastating in them.
Like the exact right tanks in a Tier 3-4-5 match so one KV1 acts as a literal mobile pillbox for two T49's backing him up.

That's not something you can do in a Clan match but on a map like Himmelsdorf or Abey trying to stop that combo is ni impossible with artillery and they can keep moving to fast to let much arty concentrate. With the KV using the 122 HE to detrack and the T-49s firing 76mm shells just tall enough to shoot over it's sides it's a bastard of a combo to fight, but it's not something they would use in a clan match but something that dominates on pubby matches.

Another example a BT7 backed up by two Su-26's is a bastard in low tier matches since the BT7 has the sprint speed and tiny size to duck into cover long enough for the arty to smash the enemy then sprint away again.

[Skywalker_T-65]

Yeah, an average (mediocre if you must ) win-rate is mine which is hovering at 49%, and tied with my loss-rate. I blame the fact that instead of murdering people in my VK, I'm playing more matches with stock tanks, which doesn't end well.

[Darth Wong]

Wow. No one told me how much more fun tier-9 would be than tier-8. Now that I finally have the big gun on my ST-I and IS-8, they're awesome. It's so nice to drive a tank around that actually has a turret and also has a gun which is powerful enough to be a threat to anyone and everyone on the battlefield.

[xthetenth]

The big downside I see about tier nine is that getting through it is eternal. Other than that it's really fun because especially for heavies you can uptier well and aren't going to run into anyone you're hopeless against. That's part of why tier ten can suck, the other is that matches usually include good players in coordinated platoons and exemplars of how anyone can get a tier ten so it can be lopsided at times. That's part of why when a friend plays a tier ten I often take a Maus and be a gibbering fool. That actually works a distressing amount of the time because I know how to drive a Maus pretty well and a bucket of hp that can be invincible in plain view is a pain to dig out.

[Nephtys]

Speaking of buckets of HP, the upcoming TOG II is absolutely hilarious. 1400 HP at Tier 6? Bigger than a Maus? Armored like a LolTraktor?

[Mr Bean]

Speaking of buckets of HP, the upcoming TOG II is absolutely hilarious. 1400 HP at Tier 6? Bigger than a Maus? Armored like a LolTraktor?

It's got 75mm armor all around and 80mm turret with a 17pdr or possibly a 75mm gun. God this will be the king of kings in a Tier 6 and below game. Just imagine trying to fight this thing with a Lee, you need 7 shots just to get it to half heath. Sure it's a land battleship with a top speed of 14 km/h but it's going to be such a hilarious tank to play with.

And yes armor is going to be it's downfall but still... this might be the second gold tank that's worth it, but it's worth it only because of insane this thing is.

[Skywalker_T-65]

I'm looking forward to fighting the thing in my VK. Maybe it will be the first T6 tank other than the KV-1S to actually be a challenge

[Imperial528]

Calling it now: TOG 2 will be major arty bait. It's big, slow, and badly armored. My M41 could make very short work of it.

[Nephtys]

A TOG2 actually strikes me as a pinata. It's a premium present for the enemy team to shoot at.

Want to inflate your damage dealt and thus skyrocket in XP and Cash? Congrats. Killing a TOG2 is basically slaying 3 Tier 5s or 2 Tier 6s. And it'd be trivial since it's turret is ludicrously forward mounted and tiny. You could easily track it around a corner and bash in the rear with a fast firing gun like Zis-4 or M1A2 76mm.

[Skywalker_T-65]

Or a slightly slower, but high-damage gun like the L/70 on my 100% crew (with rammer) VK

EDIT: Though the TOG may just be the first same-tier tank I can justify using the 88 on. Its armor is thin enough that the (relative) lack of penetration can be off-set by the extra damage. And the aforementioned 100% crew with a rammer.

[Darth Wong]

Speaking of buckets of HP, the upcoming TOG II is absolutely hilarious. 1400 HP at Tier 6? Bigger than a Maus? Armored like a LolTraktor?

It's got 75mm armor all around and 80mm turret with a 17pdr or possibly a 75mm gun. God this will be the king of kings in a Tier 6 and below game. Just imagine trying to fight this thing with a Lee, you need 7 shots just to get it to half heath. Sure it's a land battleship with a top speed of 14 km/h but it's going to be such a hilarious tank to play with.

And yes armor is going to be it's downfall but still... this might be the second gold tank that's worth it, but it's worth it only because of insane this thing is.

It might be hilarious, but that thing is just begging to get derped by a KV-2. One penetrating hit to its flank would take off 900 hp. It might even give KV-2 drivers a justification to actually keep AP shells on hand. With 110mm penetration and horrible accuracy they're normally not worth the bother, but with a 75mm-armoured target the size of a barn to shoot at, that might change.