Returning the role of armor and increasing the importance of heavy tanks on the battlefield, which can now fully fulfill their role.
Greetings tankers! With you Wotpack, and following the results of the rebalance of land mines, there is good news for fans of strong armor. Against the background of a complete failure with Crew 2.0, most of the players rated such changes positively.
Heavy problems
Currently, many players have difficulty completing personal combat missions for TT. And if the first stages of the tasks are quite simple to do, then the closer the tanker gets to the Object 260, the more difficult the LBZ becomes. For example, the twelfth task for the heavy weights in the third and fourth stages requires slightly more blocked damage than the durability of the player’s car.
It is quite difficult to accomplish such a task in the current realities. The reason is simple. No matter how armored a heavy tank is, due to its large dimensions and low speed, it becomes an easy target for vehicles using high-explosive fragmentation shells.
With the advent of an increasing number of large-caliber vehicles, it becomes more and more difficult for heavy armor to play with armor. No matter how well the TT is protected from armor-piercing or cumulative shells, the landmines still inflict significant damage on it. And in the case when several opponents shoot at a heavy tank with similar shells, the chances of survival are practically zero.
This situation in the game has long been causing discontent among players who are forced to switch from large and heavily armored vehicles to tanks with smaller dimensions and greater mobility. KV-4, KV-5, Mouse, Type Heavy and many similar machines are less and less common in battles, they are in the position of dinosaurs, dying out in the rain of high-explosive shells.
However, there is hope that this situation will change soon. Wargaming is preparing a big update to WoT that will affect all types of tanks in the game.
For players who prefer to play on TT, the most interesting aspect of the upcoming changes in the world of tanks is complete overhaul of the penetration mechanics of high-explosive fragmentation shells… Let’s try to figure out what the developers are preparing for us and how this will affect the game on heavy weights.
Old mechanics of calculating damage
At the moment, the results of hitting a high-explosive fragmentation projectile are calculated by volumetric damage. Each land mine in the game has a splash radius depending on the caliber of the gun. When such a projectile hits a tank, it produces a spherical explosion. Within this sphere, the mechanics of the game find a place with the smallest armor thickness and damage is done through this place with an absolutely unpredictable result.
As you can see in the video, the projectile hit a place with good armor, but the damage will be calculated based on thin armor within the splash range.
In the event that a high-explosive projectile penetrates the armor, it flies into the tank and explodes there with the same radius of dispersion of the fragments, incapacitating the crew members or internal modules.
Let’s conduct a comparative experiment. Below is the result of high-explosive shells fired at a heavy tank currently in the game.
Such high damage rates are due to the fact that the calculation is made not at the point of impact, but along the radius of the explosion.
New mechanics for calculating damage
With the new mechanics, the calculation of the damage of high-explosive fragmentation shells is made depending on the thickness of the armor at the point of impact.
If the land mine manages to penetrate the tank, then everything will happen as with the standard mechanics for armor-piercing or sub-caliber shells. If the projectile does not have enough armor penetration, it will explode at the point of impact, and pieces of armor will break off from the inside of the tank, which will cause damage.
Now let’s fire shots at heavy tanks again and compare the performance with the new and old mechanics:
As you can see in the screenshot, the actual damage from a high-explosive fragmentation projectile has decreased by approximately 2-2.5 times.
Let’s also see the amount of damage depending on the thickness of the armor:
As we can see, the damage increases in proportion to the decrease in armor at the point of impact.
New properties
With the new mechanics, the land mine will acquire the characteristics of an armor-piercing projectile. He will be able to punch through obstacles, tracks and wheels. And if it hits a shielded vehicle, if the screen is not broken, it will not receive damage, since the projectile detonates outside the tank.
If there is a penetration, then the projectile reaches the tank’s armor, and the damage is calculated based on the point of impact.
Art light bulb
Another interesting innovation from the developers will be the appearance art light bulbs…
Currently, the player, upon gaining the “sixth sense” skill, has the opportunity to see that he is exposed to enemy vehicles. However, it is impossible to understand that the artillery has no way of targeting a tank. The developers decided to fix this.
In the screenshot you can see how the warning about a projectile flying from an SPG will look like:
The artillery light will turn on at the moment when the projectile fired by the self-propelled guns is already in flight. This gives the player up to 3.5 seconds to maneuver and dodge.
Conclusion
In the long run, everything looks great. The new mechanics will not only reduce the damage received from high-explosive fragmentation shells, but also allow them to be taken without damage when they hit the tank’s mask or screens. Also, players will be able to actively use the benefits of armor without the risks associated with receiving disproportionately large damage from high-explosive vehicles.
And the introduction of the art light bulb will allow the heavy weights to periodically dodge artillery shells, taking less damage. Such changes should facilitate the passage of the LBZ, and, in principle, make the game on TT more comfortable, and at the same time. As it should be on a heavy tank, created to break through the enemy’s defenses.