MM values for specific balance (Part 1)

Introduction

In my previous post i already pointed out some values which you can use as a MM balance. Therefore there are a lot more values who can have a different effect to the game. 
Basically you can go several ways when you start with a MatchMaker:

• Random with just a tier/class adjustment
• Basic values, like winrate or ratings
• Detailed values
• Conclusion TL;DR at the end of Part 2

Each of those attempts have positive and negative aspects like, increased queue time, worse matchups in a bad tier and vehicle balance situation or short queues and so on.

Random MM

This is basically the easiest out of all 3 MM based codes, as you decide only on to 1-3 values who are creating the matchup. The lower the amount of values the faster should be the MatchMaking. You might ask on what values you usually pick for this:

• Tier balance

Tier balance would be, that every team has the same amount of tiers per side, as for example 5x T9, 5x T8 and 5x T7 per side. This value ignores the type of vehicle and playerskill, but makes sure that each side has the same amount of different tiers spread over both teams.

• Class balance

If i stick with my above example of tiers, this value checks on the classes that are spread over each side. This does make sense, as a class imbalance already makes it harder for one side to fight the other team, as they could not benefit from for example map advantages or key points.
This leads typical to imbalanced matchups, where for example 1 side gets all the vehicles with a high vision range or only heavy armored vehicles and so on.

• Platoon balance

Since platoons can enter the solo queue, they need to have a balance here, since platoons add something indirect to the players that are in it. Usually platooned players are communicating with a VOIP program, which is leading to an advantage over solo players who usually talk or write with each other in a random matchup.
Platoons in general are a hard value of balance, as in a perfect matchup you have both sides with a equal amount of platoons, within the same tier, the same vehicle and most likely within the same skilllevel. This means platoon balance has a lot of influence from the above mentioned values.

Conclusion

If you pick a random MM, you want to use either all 3 values to have a decent balance or you focus on just 1 or 2, while 2 values would make more sense, due the specific types of each code. What you can do is, that you don't use tier balance, due the fact if you have a good balance between the different tiers and a small tierspread, the negative aspect of not having it, would be lower, since the vehicle balance kicks in.

Regarding high tier balance in AW, this is not the case, so you need this one actually. Same goes for Class balance, which is needed due the circumstances of high tier balance, which leads me to platoon balance and their overall influence in a battle.

Basic values

Basic values use a set of different values that determine the skill of each player to get a fair matchup. While this sounds reasonable, it highly depends on how your very own rating works and on how much this rating is representing the actual playerskill in a short amount of time or in the long run.

 

• Playerrating

This is most likely the key factor for having a good or bad code. We all know the ratings which are used in WoT to determine playerskill or give a certain direction on how you can manipulate the rating in your favour. Everyone knows it and everyone done it to a certain point.
Though i know the pro's and con's for it, having a rating is a natural approach to make a difference between players. Chess for example has a ELO system or even football aka the FIFA has a system to represent somewhat a countries strength due recent results.

Even regular sports have to a certain point a rating, which is the time. If you run the 100m in 11 seconds as a male from the USA for example, you are quite good, but not world class. If we stick the the USA and a world class runner, which runs the 100m in 9.7seconds, he would be considered to be world class, just because reaching those times, require a certain amount of training and "skill".


Those are of course different examples on why having a rating is nothing exclusive, but needed if you want to have the difference shown between actual playerskill. The question is on how detailed this rating works out, and if it takes into count that the vehicle/class balance can be really impactful, like for example using illegal drugs to get more physical power, if you are a athlete.
Essential for this kind of MM, is the playerrating and what it does take into count. If this rating doesn't pick up the right data for a player, it can be seen as a flawed rating, due the false displaying of the actual skill of a player.

• Winrate

This is more a simple approach of a value, since it doesn't reflect a lot with a small sample size of games. The reason why it can be seen as a flawed value, is the amount of games you play in a vehicle, next to the fact, that you can be lucky with your teammates more or less, without contributing anything to each of your games.
Another important factor is the amount of wins versus the same tier, higher or lower tier, tierdifference (power creeps) or even classdifference. You can have for example a 60% winrate vs lower tiers, while using a power creeped vehicle, but just a 30% winrate vs same tier.

We could go even further down the road, and say that you have been incredibly lucky with your teammates and you got carried in 40 out of your 70 games for example. This would give you a high winrate, while the actual "winrate" is a lot worse than you are actually.
That is a main reason on why winrate balance doesn't reflect a lot by itself in a small sample size, and even in a larger sample size the chance of getting carried might be rng based high.

• Vehiclerating

You could start using a vehiclerating, next to your playerrating to determine differences in skill. While the playerrating reflects the overall outcome of a player from all his statistics, a vehiclerating is specific and bound to each vehicle you are using.
The advantage of having such a specific rating in your formula is, that it reflects your very own performance at its best. Questionable is, on what values you define this rating.
Reasonable values :

1. Battles in a vehicle up to a max, so you can't stack it endlessly
2. Average spotting damage compared to its role
3. Average damage compared to its role
4. Average reputation earned on win / lose / draw
5. Average damage blocked compared to its role
6. Average assist damage compared to its role

I think there could be some more values, but i think those are a good start for a basic rating. Within the next point (detailed values) i will most likely list up more values which you could even add to a vehiclerating, but those are really specific and might be too much for a basic rating to start off.

Conclusion

Ratings are needed as a part of what determines actual skill between players in any sports. The big question is, if you can identify the right values to clarify "skill" while having enough knowledge on where to cap skill. The latter one means, what i wrote before when mentioning " Battles in a vehicle up to a max ", as you need to set a maximal amount of battles who are influencing the rating for a vehicle in this specific case. 

Overall Obsidian needs to identify, if they are using the right values for their rating and they should get immediately away from a winrate focused MatchMaking, as the value itself displays not the actual playerskill up to a certain point.

MM 2.0 a failure ?

Introduction

As i mentioned before in the Patch 0.13 notes, that i will try and look on how much improvement they made regarding their "new MM 2.0" and if that progress is going into the right direction. A lot of players in the official forum are saying that they dropped a lot of Winrate within the new MM, and that the overall match outcomes are no where near of being good.

For myself nothing has changed regarding on what i need to do to win, well maybe it changed towards doing it all alone now for the most part. Questions that might come up during this post, are if they changed anything ? Would i recommend the game to anyone ? Should you or me invest money into this ? Is the Open Beta a solid and fair excuse for the Devs ? Is the MM 2.0 a success or does it show that it has no practical use, besides their theory aspect ?

MM 2.0 official Patch notes

We've updated our matchmaking system to provide an overall better experience to players looking for more balanced matches. Previously, players would often find themselves placed against full platoons in higher-tiered vehicles without an equal number of equivalently tiered vehicles on their team.

Platoons will now be matched against equally tiered platoons or players who match the top tier in the platoon. For example, a platoon of 3 tier 8s can only get into a match if the match has three other tier 8s (platooned or not). Artillery is also more strictly matched so their tiers are balanced between the teams. While this means platoons will sometimes have to wait longer for a match, solo-queue players should now find themselves in matches with other similarly-tiered players and a balanced number of platoons.Additionally, solo-queue players should also find it easier to get into a match, even at higher tiers.

Finally, the introduction of Matchmaker 2.0 also brings with it new server-side controls which allow us to more easily tweak the matchmaking settings based on individual region needs.

They call something 2.0 while the obviously only new program line, is that they changed something regarding platoons and the overall queue time. I don't even see on why they call it new or a complete new version as within the next screenshots it will show that they improved literally nothing which is worth mentioning a new version of the Match Maker.
The Devs still have no clue about what they are doing or let me put it this way, they still don't play their own game on a decent level to see the downsides of their "theoretical" aspect of their own MM 2.0 and that it is not working.

This screenshot was taken on a Saturday at 16:57 in the afternoon on the EU server. 

Sure every side has an equal amount of platoons and tanks, but i might miss tier 6 in here, or rather why are tier 5 tanks in this matchup ?
According to their MM formula i would matched as a 55%+ player, which means my team will have for sure a 45% player, which can be a T5 but also within a very high chance of  being a T7.

Since we already know that power creeps are strong in this game regarding high tier, what can i do as a high skilled player in the lowest tier against 1000% power creeped vehicles ?
Yes i can try and i did, but we lost , because i have T7 players who can't carry their own weight in this matchup. You might say, losing is part of the game, which is true, but it depends on how you lose.

• Do I enjoy stomping enemies ? No i don't since it is like stealing candy from the kids
• Do I enjoy being stomped without a chance of winning ? No i don't since it is a waste of my own time, as the MM is rigged towards that ?

Regarding the assumption of having a rigged MM or rigged RNG, which we all fairly know from WoT. They said that they match each player to have a relatively equal chance for both teams, which means each side has 50% chance of winning, according to their theory for their MM 2.0 formula.

As you can see it , this screenshot was taken yesterday night, which ain't an excuse for the result. Where do i have here a 50-50 chance of winning the game ?
More than 50% of my team are players who get rewarded for doing nothing, while i was not sitting back and being a sniper, no i played to the task of my tank, but you can't do anything if more than 50% of your team does nothing.

Yet again, does your MM 2.0 or MM in general work ? No it doesn't and all you are doing in your office at the Obsidian Entertainment HQ is jerking off to theory and how it can work, while it doesn't.


How does such issues come around ? For some time they said it is all about the game being really snowball like , but this is just an excuse for like 5% of the games maybe. If you play it smart you can work around a snowball, by snowballing yourself or simply stop the snowball by intelligent play.
Yes i said smart and intelligent, which sadly is not the case for 80% of the players in AW . But to give you an example on how their system doesn't work out.

1. Player A has a average of 50% winrate, on tier 6 with 500 damage per game.
2. Player B has a average of 50% winrate, on tier 6 with 1500 damage per game.

Both players are getting matched towards both teams. Player B will do a decent amount of damage while Player A will provide nothing , but both players can be seen as 50% WR players and so does the MM . Their system takes winrate into count to provide a equal chance for both sides, but as you can see in my short example, the system doesn't work, as they are missing values, which are important and which i recommend to use countless times.



MM is a complex thing and if they want to pull it of, listen to players that have game knowledge which 80% of the playerbase is lacking hard. Sounds rude, but it is like that. You have shown that either your very own testers are clueless and that the own Devs have no skill as well or just don't know on the importance of some values.

Important values: (easy ones | only some from the player)

• average damage for the vehicle
• average spotting damage for the vehicle
• average damage / damage taken ratio for the vehicle
• average kill / death ratio
• average damage for the tier
• average spotting damage for the tier
• average damage / damage taken ratio for the tier
• average damage overall
• average spotting damage overall
• average damage / damage taken ratio
• average performance for the map and spawn
• average damage against higher tiers ( more specific against what vehicles )
• average winrate against higher tiers
• average winrate against same tier
• average winrate against lower tiers

and so on. (will do a detailed post about this)

The MM needs the right values to work as accurate as it should, and winrate itself just doesn't cut it or do you think that me as a good player wants to "work" off every game and feed your flawed system with players who actually doesn't deserve the win, but due your very own MM fail 2.0, i need to carry every fucking
game.

Do you really think that it is fun to carry every game with 5-10 kills and 7-10k combined damage, just because you get punished with a truckload of your "50% winrate plebs" who even get rewarded for doing nothing.

Final Words

Would i recommend the game to anyone ?

No, this game is pure pain to play, while the Devs still have no focus on WHAT they NEED to DO.

Should you or me invest money into this ?

No, since they don't learn out of their mistakes for almost a complete year and like above, they don't focus on the right stuff.

Is the Open Beta a solid and fair excuse for the Devs ?

This "argument" has no value, since they can charge money for their game already and the speed on fixes and real issues is so slow, a 100 year old grandma looks lightning fast.

Is the MM 2.0 a success or does it show that it has no practical use, besides their theory aspect ?

MM 2.0 is a huge failure, and doesn't provide any practical use.

Maybe some people don't know it, but either their Dev team has just a handful people in it, which would a explanation of their slow speed or they still have no dude in charge who sets the right goals, aka focus on the important stuff.

You might ask on what i mean exactly, well they are happy developing tier 10 (which we don't need), pulling out a new Dealer with questionable vehicle tiering (yet again), released a questionable OP T5 Premium tank (it is OP as fuck), release a new map who is designed for MBTs for the most part (they still have a shitty map design) and last but not least the so called MM 2.0, which might work out in theory but has no practical use (they still don't get on what they need to do).

Overall, patch 0.13 has little to no improvement, as the big statements are more incomplete than complete. The new Dealer has a lot of wrong tiered vehicles, the MM 2.0 is a failue, the new map is stupid to play and the PvE SPGs still focus 1 player.

Shishkin reworked Tech Tree up to tier 8.5

Here comes the second part of my reworked dealers.

Sidenotes :

• T-64A added to T5.5
• T-64BV added as i think it could fit (not entirely sure, as i have low intel on T-series)
• T-64BM added as i think it could fit (not entirely sure, as i have low intel on T-series)
• T-84 Oplot added
• T-80 has become the T-80B
• T-80U added
• Olifant MK2 added (may fit better as a tier 5)
• Falcon Turret Challenger added
• XM8 and M8 merged again, as they should have both guns as a option for different gameplays
• CV90-120T replaced the fiction PL-01

Reasoning :
All vehicles that moved up or down a tier, need to be toned up or down, to fit the tier. 

• I split the T-series as they will do in future between the 2 tankplants. Added different versions of the T-64 and T-80, but like i said above , not entirely sure about the possible upgrades and basic strength of those. Someone with more knowledge regarding T-series, might have changed some of them.
• The Olifant MK2 might be aimed a little to high, as it could fit tier 5 better, but for now i think tier 5.5 could be close to its probably estimated performance.
• Falcon Turret should be a nice addition to the series, despite i would rather see it as an ugprade option for the Challenger 1 itself. I think My.com and OBE would have done it as a unique tank and not an upgrade.
• Yes the Ariete is Italian, but the main part is british origin and we need to place the Ariete somewhere.
• Ramka, Terminator(premium) and BMPT 72 are now in the MBT Support role. My reasons are that those are based on MBT hulls, which makes them already stronger than most AFV hulls, and their main purpose is to assist MBTs and Infantry in Urban Warfare.
• Warrior is placed where it should be on tier 6. It is old and has a bad weapon system, and with its armor and armor kits it should be able to survive better on tier 6 against other AFVs, like the Bradley already does.
• BMD-4 is for now tier 6.5, although it could be tier 7 again, but only with the 4M upgrade.
• Stingray in its current state could be at best tier 5.5, but i removed it with the Stingray 2, to give the player a good tracked variant with good survivability options.
• XM8 / M8 will be 1 vehicle again, as they had it before, but with 2 gun options. This should be done parallel and not following, as i think that both gun options could suit different play styles regarding alpha damage or dpm.
• PL-01 got removed as this vehicle is pure fiction with nothing but a mockup and it will be replaced by the original CV90-120T

Conclusion

The main reason why iam not entirely sure about the T-series, is the possible upgrades per vehicle and the possible basic stats from real life, as they need to fit the overall tier , before a buff or nerf. Personally i don't like to research the same upgrades on the same vehicle, just on a different tier then, as it doesn't feel well thought , nor is it fun to research the same ammunition for the 3rd time on the 3rd vehicle. (Leopard series, iam looking at you)

I didn't add another tier 8.5 vehicle ( regarding the Challenger 2 LEP ), because it is yet unknown on who will win the competition for it, nor do i want to drag out the same vehicle just on a different tier then.

Overall i wanted to not add vehicles that are not ingame yet (T-64A for example is, but not enabled), but in the end, i tried to minimize it and just show on how it could be to a certain point. 

There are more vehicles which you could add, but high tier vehicles need a well though moment, as i see only the latest and best variants for that. This means a basic armament which could suit the possible tier and the survivability must be given. (armor and technology)

If you have thoughts on improving both reworked tech tree, just post it in the comments with a small description on why you would do it.

Wölfli's reworked Tech Tree up to tier 8.5

Introduction

I was thinking quite a while, if i do a tech tree or not, and how i would design it within the current available vehicles. Personally I'm against 10 tiers as i don't think that this is necessary and the idea of having half tiers like you have in WTGF seems to be a good solution regarding match making and "power creeps".

My main reason is, that you will effectively boost vehicles to fill up the tech tree, due the nature of the current development of combat vehicles.

If you look closely to the current situation and do some research by yourself, you will notice that almost every AFV in the high tier area, is boosted with no regrets to fill up the tech tree and add some variety besides MBTs.

MBTs are the main engage of every Army, therefore are those the most advanced and used vehicles out there, and that is why it will be hard to find other vehicles that suit the tier.

Wölfi reworked

Sidenotes :

• Leopard C2 Mexas on T5.5
• Leopard 2A4M Can on T7
• M1A2 Tusk on T7.5 (this is mostly a placeholder to something that would fit better)
• M1A2 Sep V3 on T8.5 
• Swingfire removed as i don't know where to put this
• SPGs and Premiums not included due obvious reasons

Reasoning :
All vehicles that moved up or down a tier, need to be toned up or down, to fit the tier. 

• Leopard C2 Mexas follows the Leopard 1A5 as one of the most recent upgrades to the Leopard 1.
• Leopard 2 moved to tier 6.5, because without an armor package (Evo kit which is T8 material) and the current balance situation it is just not worth to be on tier 7.
• M1 Abrams moved to tier 6.5, because it just has a 105mm gun and shouldn't be on tier 7, as that tier should be represented by 120mm and 125mm MBTs.
• BMP-1P replaced the BMP-1, as i think the upgrades are not worth to be a tier 4.
• BMP-3 and BMP-3M are placed on tier 6, because the upgrade is not worth to be on tier 7. I split them into both , to keep both vehicles ingame, but overall i would just add the 3M as an upgrade option.
• Wiesel moved to a new role, which is not primarily spotting like VBL or Crab (viewrange and viewrangeeffectiveness), but to more a combat role. Therefore it should receive a weaker recon package compared to previous mentioned pure recons.
• Draco moved to tier 8 and right after the Wiesel to represent the combat role better. Overall i would say it should be placed into a SPAAG role in the AFV class, but we need more SPAAGs in first place.
• Crab is the successor of the VBL, therefore it should represent the increased firepower, as that tier would suit the maximum capabilities of the 30x113mm autocannon. The Crab represents the current highest tiered recon.
• LAV-600 and M1128 are down tiered , because logic and limits in their weaponry ( 105mm ). Even then the M1128 is boosted to fit tier 7, but not as much as on tier 8.
• You might noticed as well that i put the "TD's" as a role in the AFV class, due i think we just need 3 classes in general with different roles inside that class. MBTs ( Heavy Combat, Light Combat and Support ), AFV's ( Recon, IFV's, High Caliber tracked [LT], High Caliber wheeled [TD], Combat ) and SPG's ( Wheeled, Tracked, Mortar ) 

Conclusion

I think that this is a better approach to high tier and to lower the amount of possible power creeps, just due the technology jump. Using half tiers, might be a good approach for vehicles that are too strong to downtier them for a full tier, but to weak for the current tier. It also allows a better transition to different vehicles without overbuffing them.

Top tier AFV's are reserved for the latest upgrades of  fairly new vehicles. Also i would not put any AFV on tier 8.5, as i think that MBT's are the alpha animals on the battlefield and other classes are not meant to be that in first place, despite the "balance" .

Patch Notes 0.13 *dis vehicle balancing FailFish*

 Introduction

So finally they released some patchnotes for the first big patch this year. Let us have a look on what they did change and if they finally step up their balancing regarding vehicles. Below here is the overall summary out of the patch notes, also i deleted some of the PvE stuff, since i don't care about the fixed maps, unless i have played them again. (Theory vs Practical use)

Basically this update is about the new dealer which adds Chinese Tanks and the new MM 2.0, whom i waited long enough . I just hope that the MM 2.0 delivers , otherwise i don't see me playing this game in future. As for the dealer, well i will try them, but from what i have read, those tanks are most likely boosted to fit tiers again, which make them rather bad, but we'll see.

Update 0.13 does bring several major features that include:

• Third Dealer Zhang Feng with 7 new Chinese MBTs
• New Coastal Threat PvP map
• PvE and PvP Reward System overhaul
• PvE Consumable Cost Changes
• PvE Artillery Changes
• Matchmaker 2.0

New Features


Third Dealer Zhang Feng with 7 new Chinese MBTs

• Type 59 (Tier 3)
• Type 69-II (Tier 4)
• Type 80-II (Tier 5)
• Type 85-IIM (Tier 6)
• Type 90-II (Tier 7)
• Type 98 (Tier 8)
• WZ-1224 (Tier 5 Premium)

Coastal Threat Map

Coastal Threat spans 1200 x 1200 meters in size and is roughly comprised of one third urban areas intermixed with rolling terrain. While designed to offer players several different sections for head on engagements, Coastal Threat primarily focuses on mixed movement - enabling players to find plenty of routes to flank enemies or set up ambushes. More details can be found in our preview.


Conclusion


I played this map during the Alpha and by the looks of it right now, they replaced an accessable area with a great lake in the middle. Although i didn't played this map ever since, but replacing an area which was part of the map, with an area which you can't enter, aka "deadspace" is not that good actually. The bad performance was mostly due the countless objects you put on load for the GPU and replacing it with a lake or an area which you can't access ain't the way to do it, but we'll on how the map will be played now.
I just think that this is another MBT map, just from the looks, and this is what we don't need at the moment.

PvE and PvP Reward System Overhaul



In the previous rewards system, PvE had lower Gross credit earnings than PvP, but had virtually no costs (aside from consumables). While the net results for average matches were similar for players with average performance and no boosts, high performers and players with Premium Accounts or other multipliers didn't have an opportunity to shine.


We considered several options for addressing this, but ultimately, we decided that PvE needed to function more similarly to PvP in order for the systems to be equitable. We considered reintroducing ammo and repair costs, but those didn't scale properly for PvE maps. Instead, we've introduced a new cost - "Logistics Costs" - for PvE missions on Medium or higher difficulty, and vastly increased Gross rewards. This will make Medium or higher rewards more performance dependent, as well as benefit more from any kind of multipliers (such as Premium Accounts and Premium Tanks).


Conclusion

While i agree that PvE needs to be a valid choice, i don't think that raising the income to pvp levels is the way to go. As for example you can farm missions in EVE Online in a 0.9 sec, fairly safe but on a low income base, while doing missions in the deadspace in a -0.5 space rewards you with more income, due the higher risks.
Although this is different than AW PVE, i think that PvE needs either a really high chance to not have success in the higher levels and difficulties than you have in lower difficulty. If we start to give them a similar amount of money for a guaranteed win, this ain't the way to go. This doesn't mean that PvE is worse, but it is by far easier to have a high winrate or successrate than PvP, and therefore it shouldn't have a similar reward at all.


PvE Artillery Changes


AI-controlled artillery was changed to reduce the focus on a single player. More details are available in detailed patchnotes below.

Wow, that they even used this as a valid tactic for the AI is kinda bad. It is one of the worst mechanics you could add in that mode, especially when you are not playing a Brickwall vehicle .


Matchmaker 2.0


We've updated our matchmaking system to provide an overall better experience to players looking for more balanced matches. Previously, players would often find themselves placed against full platoons in higher-tiered vehicles without an equal number of equivalently tiered vehicles on their team.


Platoons will now be matched against equally tiered platoons or players who match the top tier in the platoon. For example, a platoon of 3 tier 8s can only get into a match if the match has three other tier 8s (platooned or not). Artillery is also more strictly matched so their tiers are balanced between the teams. While this means platoons will sometimes have to wait longer for a match, solo-queue players should now find themselves in matches with other similarly-tiered players and a balanced number of platoons.Additionally, solo-queue players should also find it easier to get into a match, even at higher tiers.


Finally, the introduction of Matchmaker 2.0 also brings with it new server-side controls which allow us to more easily tweak the matchmaking settings based on individual region needs.


Conclusion


So i hope for them that these changes are not all changes regarding the MM, otherwise they really need to hire some guys that have some skills in their own game and some sense for solo queue players. I agree that the platoon stuff needs to be done and hopefully this is working out, but if this MM 2.0 is as punishing as the previous MM to higher skilled solo queue players, than this game won't attract solo players, since your game punishes them for being good.
Just saying that i have no problem with a challenge, but having always the worse out of the worst players isn't entertaining, nor can i play vehicles that don't have high carry capabilities, because i would lose in those more often due your MM. However i will check closely if they done their job or not, otherwise i will drop the game most likely.

List of 0.13.1881 Changes


Gameplay Mechanisms

Retrofit and Commander Changes

The commander Freya Højbjerg can now also be unlocked on the BMD-1 and the commander Juan Carlos Miramon can now also be unlocked on the Swingfire. We've added a new retrofit called 'Reinforced Wheels'. As its name suggests, Reinforced Wheels improves the durability of your vehicle's wheels and treads by adding additional hit points to the module. The Reinforced Wheels Retrofits are unlocked on the following vehicles:

• Mk.1 is given out automatically to all players
• Type 69-II (Mk.2)
• Type 90-II (Mk.3) 

Conclusion

It would make sense to have this retrofit, if you feel the difference with a "red" wheel and a "yellow" wheel or a non damaged wheel, but currently you barely feel any difference i would say. And even then, you just stop and repair them to "yellow" and have no drawbacks. You might need to check your balance department here


Component & Crew Damage Adjustments

• Reducing saved component damage percentage from 50% to 30%. However, components will now take less damage if their saving throws succeed
• Saving throws have gone up for all components. All components got a 5% increase except for crew and gas tanks, which got a 10% increase. It will be harder to deal maximum damage to these components
• Hit points have been slightly increased for all components, except for treads, which now take 2 critical hit shots to destroy
• Repair speed has been increased for tracks and engines. Tracks now repair in 6 seconds, engines in 7 seconds
• Destroying an external gas tank now has a 35% chance to start a fire on the vehicle
• Destroying an external gas tank now also causes a 5% penalty to vehicle traverse speed
• While the external gas tank is in the destroyed state, there is a 15% greater chance the engine could catch fire if it is shot
• Fire damage to internal components has been slightly decreased. Fewer components should now enter the damaged state after a fire starts

Conclusion



So in short you get less module damage, but can easier track people, while catching a fire lowers your mobility, but you have an increased repair speed. I think those are important changes and we'll see on how these develop and change the gameplay for some tanks. Low mobility tanks will suffer most from this i would say, especially if you can set them on fire fairly easy.

Vehicles

Armor Rebalance


In order to improve the reward for successfully flanking enemy main battle tanks from behind, a global armor adjustment has been done on all MBTs from Tier 2 to Tier 9. This results in an effective reduction of roughly 20% armor protection on the rear portion of the hull from Tiers 2 through 6 and 40% for Tiers 7 to 9. The nominal values for tank armor will not be changing, only the composition of the steel.
This change is primarily benefits automatic cannons; there should no longer be cases of MBTs being completely impervious to damage regardless of where they are shot - attacking from directly behind should always result in penetration. Behavior amongst TDs, MBTS and LTs should be unaffected. This is the beginning of a broader iteration to normalize MBT weak points, with MBT side armor being the next portion to be evaluated on a vehicle by vehicle basis.




Conclusion


Okay, i think that reducing the rear- and sidearmor of MBT's is a good step forward, but i think it would make more sense to introduce MBT's with their estimated real life armor values for the side and the rear. This would mean that either most MBT's have to be nerfed to do so or some are even below their real life values, which shouldn't be the case i would assume.
Regarding the nerf itself, i think this will hit mostly the MBTs that had great side armor anyways, while the MBT's with a low amount of sidearmors won't get hit by the nerfbat as hard as previous mentioned tanks. My concern would be, if the tanks that lost a lot with this nerf, get something else in return or on how much they will drop in performance.

BMP-1P


The BMP-1P wasn't as clear of an upgrade over the original BMP-1. As such, we've given it several firepower improvements:

• HE damage increased by 10%
• Rate of Fire with all standard rounds increased by 10%
• Rate of Fire with ATGMs increased by 20%
• Aim-time decreased from 2.8 seconds to 2.6 

How is it with just replacing the BMP-1 on tier 3 with this one ? It would make sense and has a lot of potentitial upgrades then, with some different paths as well, but instead they are buffing the firepower even more. Firepower is not the only stat which you can balance, sometimes a vehicle just doesn't fit the tier.

BMP-2


While the BMP-2 isn't suffering quite as much as the BMP-3 and BMP-3M (see below), it's still performing somewhat below standards, and we're giving it some minor improvements that are appropriate for the theme of the line.

• Autocannon clip reload time decreased from 7.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds
• ATGM reload time decreased from 16 seconds to 14.29 seconds

It is basically not easy to play, because the lack of gundepression and the restriction with the ATGM launcher. Though i don't know exactly on how the external launcher works, but iam pretty sure that you can move it up and down a bit, and this should be introduced as well, since your own positioning restricts the usage of ATGMs right now.

BMP-3


The BMP-3 has always been more of a brawler/skirmisher than most AFVs, but it's lacked the efficiency to make that style as viable as it should be. We've made a broad range of improvements focused on increasing its close combat effectiveness.

• 100mm gun damage increased from 314 to 329
• 30mm stock AP damage increased from 68 to 75
• 30mm upgraded AP damage increased from 72 to 78
• 30mm stock HE damage increased from 51 to 56
• 30mm upgraded HE damage increased from 54 to 59
• Stock ATGM damage increased from 597 to 653
• Upgraded ATGM damage increased from 656 to 686
• Autocannon clip reload time decreased from 7.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds
• 100mm gun peak accuracy improved from 0.136 to 0.125
• 30mm gun peak accuracy improved from 0.1466 to 0.125
• ATGM reload time decreased from 13.33 seconds to 11.25 seconds

If you want a "brawler or skirmisher" you need to be able to succesful kite your way in and out, and now tell me if buffing the firepower helps you with brawl or skirmish better ? Whatever those guys are smoking, smoke less please. If you want the BMP-3 to be a brawler you need to buff its survivability, which means hitpoints, a good mobility and the right options for armor kits to survive autocannons of the same tier up front. 
That is how a brawler should be and you describe in your patchnotes something which the BMP-3 will never be unless you make said changes and not just buff its firepower. This just shows that you don't know anything about giving vehicles or a class a identity while buffing something completely different.

BMP-3M


Similar to the BMP-3, we've made some improvements to the BMP-3M to increase its brawling prowess.

• 100mm gun damage increased from 378 to 401
• 30mm stock AP damage increased from 88 to 90
• 30mm upgraded AP damage increased from 92 to 95
• 30mm stock HE damage increased from 66 to 68
• 30mm first upgrade damage increased from 69 to 71
• 30mm second upgrade damage increased from 71 to 73
• Stock ATGM damage increased from 686 to 751
• Autocannon clip reload time decreased from 7.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds
• Upgraded ATGM damage increased from 755 to 789
• Autocannon clip reload time decreased from 7.5 seconds to 6.5 seconds
• 100mm gun peak accuracy improved from 0.129 to 0.12
• 30mm gun peak accuracy improved from 0.139 to 0.12
• ATGM reload time decreased from 11.76 seconds to 11.11 seconds

Same as above, but the BMP-3M should be more another version on tier 6 or an upgrade for the BMP-3. Increasing the firepower for every AFV that "underperforms" will snowball into something really bad. Tiering is important and while we are on this again, YOU need to step this up, unless you want to buff every AFV after some time with some more firepower to make it on par with same tiered vehicles.

This just doesn't cut it.

LAV-300


The LAV-300 is in a pretty good place, but it needs some minor improvements to increase its reliability and ease of use. We've increased its camo factor slightly to make it easier to stay concealed and provide synergy with the Tank Destroyer class ability, as well as given it some minor improvements to gun performance.

• Camo factor improved from 0.25 to 0.28
• Targeting Time decreased from 3.3 seconds to 3 seconds
• Peak accuracy improved from 0.136 to 0.12
• Hit Points increased from 1095 to 1205

A minor improvement would be a buff to gundepression, as this would help the vehicle more than anything else, next to a better upgradetree , regarding the AP shell at the end.

LAV-600


Similar to the LAV-300, the LAV-600 is performing just below average on most statistics. We're giving it a number of minor improvements similar to the ones we're giving the LAV-300, which we feel will help make it easier to use and more fun to play.

• Camo factor improved from 0.25 to 0.28
• Targeting Time decreased from 3 seconds to 2.7 seconds
• Peak accuracy improved from 0.099 to 0.09
• Hit Points increased from 1660 to 1830

Exactly what we need. A tiny bit of camo bonus and hitpoints, since we want to give the enemy the chance to farm more juicy free HP. In all seriousness , buffing the HP and the already worse Camo won't make it better when people have problem to point their gun down, due the lack of gundepression. The Peakaccuracy and aimtime might be a good change, but lets check on my current stats with it. I have like 2.2 seconds of aimtime with a lvl 3 or 4 crew, a booster and crew intercoms. Will the aimtime reduction help me ? Well i still have shitty gundepression, penetration and mediocre camo.

For real OE, people ask for GUNDEPRESSION and penetration or if you don't want to change the latter one, CHANGE THE RETROFITSLOTS. Why do i have to use a armor retrofit on a TD ?

T-64


We've improved the accuracy of the T-64 to be closer to the accuracy of an upgraded T-62

• Peak accuracy improved from 0.164 to 0.148

Uhm why ?


Player versus Player

• Designers have done a pass on the following maps to fix minor audio, terrain, camera, and map asset issues: Pipelines, Reactor, River Point, Lost Island
• Designers have done a global shadow & vegetation pass for consistency and optimization
• Platoon members will now spawn near each other on all PvP maps

Lost Island

• Designers have completed an optimization pass to reduce the performance impact of Lost Island's vegetation when set to low

Just remove this crap map finally

Narrows

• Fixed an issue where capture circles and flares would be the incorrect color after reconnecting to the match

Just remove this crap map finally (it does look fine, but mapdesign is so limited)

River Point

• Fixed an issue where the vehicle range finder was intermittently disappearing
• Fixed an issue at G5 where players were unable to shoot between the building and destroyed airplane wing

Just remove this crap map finally (map rewards base camping, is never a good design)

Pipelines

• Added cover for the North team in order for them to counter the F0/G0 spots
• Adjusted the potential spotting areas on the hill at C6/C7 that allowed players from the north to quickly spot players exiting their spawn from the south
• Added spots of cover to prevent the North team from spotting the South team as they head from the spawn area to the refinery area
• Reduced the amount of cover available to the South team at H8/H9 in order to make it on-par with the North team's equivalent cover

Lets see on how these changes are working out, as i doubt it will help, but i need to play it first


PvE Artillery Adjustments

Reduced the desire for AI Artillery to fixate on just one target during a match. Previously, up to three Artillery were allowed to target a single player. This has been changed to two on hard. On easy/medium, only 1 arty should target a player at once. The only exception to this is if a player gets within 150m of an AI Artillery. Doing so will cause it to "panic" and have an increased chance to fire at the nearby player. Artillery that are panicked do not count towards the maximum number of Artillery allowed to fire at one target. AI Artillery will also still favor player Artillery greatly, but they will not fixate on it to the exclusion of other players. Further Artillery PvE changes:

• Changed the priority weights on SPG AI to encourage it to change targets if it can't see a particular enemy
• Moved Artillery Line-of-Sight checks to the LoS manager and added the current LoS to the SPG targeting logic
• AI will now attempt to target weak points starting with only MBTs on medium
• Added Commander Sight and Gunner Sight as weak points for AI Artillery to target
• Fixed an issue where visibility wasn't being tracked properly for counter-battery targets
• Modified how turret yaw and pitch affected enemy AI spread values to make the AI less accurate while aiming at a moving target
• Fixed an issue with AI Artillery not waiting until it was properly aimed at a target before firing
• Fixed an issue where AI would fire when their target was directly behind the AI's turret
• Fixed an issue where AI would potentially shoot before they were aimed directly at a target
• Fixed an issue that would sometimes cause AI not to fire if it was attempting to target weak points too far away from the center of its target vehicle
• Cleaned up AI weak point targeting code

Sounds like a spaghetti code.


Overall Conclusion

While they fixed a lot and introduced some new stuff, which is absolutely okay and good, i don't think that they understand on what balancing means regarding the vehicles in this game. I will repeat myself again, as this seem to be the biggest struggle for them, tiering is very important and balancing in the right areas of a vehicle is the major part to have a successful techtree. 
Having statistics and understanding those are two different things, and going full fiction mode or balance the game for the worst players won't do it.

How to not launch an Event and how to do it better

The recent Mercenary Showdown event is a good idea and probably a reason on why more players are playing the game, due the rewards you can get. Whoever side you have picked you will get some Premium Days and if you are in the top 100 ranking you will get some gold as well.


There are 3 major flaws on how they launched this event.

1. even if this is fiction the background of the faction is quite badly chosen
2. showing the current reputation earned for each side
3. Top 100 can be easy achieved by just playing T9 or high tier in general (basic rep gain)

Point 1 

What we got here is the typical good vs evil with a history background from ~ 70 years ago. Bad germans all the way, this could have been some propaganda from the 2nd WW actually. As for the other side we have the white knights that are fighting for the good and probably against the evil.
 This is some of the worst cliché I've seen lately and i need to say, that i never would have expected something like this as a "fictional background story". If you play titles like RTCW , you can expect it, and you won't wonder about it, but here... ? I mean really .... ?

What they need to change !

They need to change the background to be not biased to past historical events, or in other words, Mercenary Corp A has its origin in Germany and has base out of german speakers, as well as they use german manufactured vehicles for the most part. Their Commander likes to use their large numbers of MBT'S to  force a quick win or flanking maneuver and also has no problem in losing material on the field, but that counts only for the Tanks not the Crew as he sees them as part of the family.
Mercenary Corp B has  their origin in the former eastern europe and consists mostly out of polish or cze/sk speaking members. They do like to use fast and lightly armored vehicles and have a small number of MBTs as well, next to their Commander who is a calm and smart regarding the best tactic to lower the amount of casualties.

This is just an example on how you can do it, but this way no one is the straight up bad  or good one, but they use different tactics to achieve their goal as well as they have a different opinion regarding material overall.

My.com really needs to step up and go away from historical actions and overall bad prejudgement.


Point 2

If you start an event where 2 factions compete with each other for the win and the better bonus you want to not show on who is the winning side. The result is if you let people know on who is winning or losing, people will pick the faction who is winning and not losing.
If people would not know on who is winning currently, until the results are posted at the end of the event, they will pick the faction which either fits their mindset or point of view regarding good vs evil, or if they like specific types of vehicles which has been given out as background or if they just like the symbol or colours.

Those thoughts come directly to my mind, and therefore this should be prevented in the next event as this is just a bad choice overall for all players.

What they need to change !  

Just not show the earned reputation for the whole faction until the event has ended. This basically denies win team joiners and every player can the pick faction which he likes most. What you need to have in mind here, is that even showing your current amount of earned reputation for the player can be somewhat bad, as players might show on how much they earned right now and sum it up to give a direction, maybe.

Another way could be, that the reward itself is the same for both the winning and losing team. Therefore this shouldn't be your choice when you can prevent easy, this situation with the previous mentioned idea.

Point 3

If you are in the Top 100 for either side you will get rewarded with some extra gold. This is how they advertise it, and actually this sounds reasonable to try to go for it. What they didn't had in mind is their "reward" system for each tier, which clearly favours those who are playing only high tier.
You might ask on why this is bad ?
Well if they considered to push high tier battles or numbers of players, i guess this is the way to do it, but what is with those players that don't have high tier vehicles ?
The basic reputation in high tier battles is way higher than you have in low or mid tier, due their tiering and tech tree system which requires more reputation the higher you go. To maintain a decent speed of progress the basic reward is higher than it is on lower tiers. This means simply, you just need to play T8/9 and gain even in a bad game more reputation than a player in the mid tier area who had a good game.

The result is, the Top 100 will be most likely only players that played high tier during the event. There might be players in the mid tier bracket, due the sheer amount of games, most likely, but overall i see 90% only high tier players in that.

What they need to change !

The top 20 players for a dual tier bracket (tier 1+2 , 3+4, 5+6, 7+8) and the top 10 players for the single bracket (tier 9) will get the extra reward for contributing a lot for the faction.
What you can do as well is making a difference between PvP and PvE, so the top 10 players for a dual bracket and the top 5 players for the single bracket for each gametype (pvp | pve) will get the extra rewards etc. .
This is one way to do it, and already better than just saying the Top 100 player for each faction will get something extra. Your current system will punish all none high tier players the most.


Conclusion

I just hope that they learn out of their mistakes this time :^)

My.com fails and OE's attempt for balance

 My.com and events

Since the playerbase seems to be stagnating to a certain point, my.com had the feeling that they need to roll out some events which attract some players for a certain timeframe, and probably hope that they stick to the game a bit longer. The event(s) itself are quite good, as you can grind relatively fast during the given timeframe, but as it is, there is already a drawback.

Suiciders in PvP and stupidness in PvE, to get as much "doubles" or vehicles with reputation and money out of the event. Well you can't do anything against that, except making these kind of tactics inefficient, but as we know within the current system, this won't happen in future.

This is just an example, and maybe they got a bit spotting damage, but overall you get a lot for doing nothing. I could post another one, where a player done some intentional teamdamage / teamkills and still gone out with more EP than someone who done 1 shot with damage.

However to get to my point which i find pretty amusing and awful at the same time is their planning of events and how they perform those. I can understand if you launch your first event for a game, you will get experience from that and hopefully learn out of your mistakes. Obviously this is not the case for My.com employees or the overall staff that is involved in that.

First they have problems with the timezones, as they obviously were confused on what they said and what setting they used to launch the events.
Second part which is funny, is that they have problems with the right event gifts, as for some they are shown and for some other they are not.
Third is interesting as well, which affects the my.com launcher. You can claim a daily bonus, but that seems to be bugged without a doubt. Sometimes you can claim, sometimes you can not, or you get an error message and so on .

I don't know if they are learning out of their mistakes, but iam honest here, as it does not seem that they have the right persons in charge of those events or they are simply not capable of learning out of their fails and mistakes. I'm not picky when it comes down to customer service, but for sure these constant fails are a bit embarrassing to be honest.

OE's attempt to balance high tier

Lately they posted some pictures of their shiny tier 10 tanks, who are a combination of various upgrades from different periods of time with a cool new name.

There are two things we need to bear in mind when considering a vehicle for Armored Warfare:

• Its role in the game and any possible issues connected to it
• Historical accuracy

Inventing a new Version of a Tank seems really historical accurate, but as SilentStalker already said, those are not fantasy tanks, as in the past some of the upgrades were tested, but never reached the final production stage, so it is valid and historical accurate. I think WGN had the same argumentation when they introduced some of their tanks.
Guess we have some

here. :)

A nice coincidence i would say.

However most of them will have a high caliber , like 140mm or 152mm most likely. I find it really interesting when i have read their FAQ about the game and the their intention of balance.

We try to avoid vehicles that potentially represent a balance risk. Perhaps the most obvious of these would be the various tank destroyers or self-propelled guns of extreme calibers such as the British FV215b with its 183mm gun.

Yes there is still a difference between 140mm, 152mm and 183mm or 170mm, but overall the result will be the same. I would think of the lovely ISU with the BL-10 in WoT, where you can cripple almost every tank of the same tier for the whole match with just 1 penetrating shot.

we want to specifically avoid having such unbalanced weapons with potentially too high single shot damage (damage generally increases with gun caliber).

Interesting isn't it ?

Well Obsidian is probably aware of the tier 10 situation with the assembly kit vehicles, and they choose to try to balance them to the previous tier. I would have quoted that part, but i can't find it in the forum and i'm not that much willing to search for it . From what i have in mind, they don't want to have a power creep again, or maybe not an obvious one, therefore i don't see tier 10 anyway in the close / near future nor is it good anyway.

I don't know if they or even most of the community that can't even wait for another tier of imbalance, are aware that spreading a small playerbase even further is a good thing, but they should think about it. Another big item is the tier imbalance overall , which needs to be solved before adding a new tier. I know this is a logical move and i fully understand that Obsidian and My.com are not thinking logical when it comes down to map design, tiering and tier balance, but we can not give up here.

In short on why tier 10 and tier 9 are bad :

• small playerbase -> spreading the players even further, resulting in less players (EU and NA, RU maybe not so much )
• no balance to the next higher tier, starting at tier 6 and up
• balance starts at the bottom, not the top of the table (T7 needs balance, T8 needs balance)
• Introduce T9 and T10 when all western servers have enough players
• T10 is pure prototypes and fiction, based on "future" projects (your game won't last long enough to see actual T10 tanks for all other nations)

Conclusion

My.com does not learn out of mistakes when running events and OE tries to balance from the top to the bottom. The only reason why i "play" AW are those events, otherwise this is the first game for me, where you get punished for being interested in it. I really wonder on how long OE can resist the pressure from Mail.ru in releasing T10. (SS and his spaming mod Crew, said that this part is not true, but we know that already when they introduced T9)