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Mar 13, 2013

Arty suggestion: Barrage mode

Okay, this is something I've thought about for a while. I was thinking about what would I suggest to actually improve the artillery gameplay. Based on a post I made under the latest entry in Overlord's blog, here's the idea:

How about this: special cooldown mode "barrage"

Each arty vehicle can activate barrage mode once per 7 minutes. It is aimed just as regular arty (thru the arty scope). When it is activated, the artillery vehicle starts a barrage of shells on its target.

This mode would be special: the shells wouldn't count as "ammo fired" (thus they'd be "for free"). They would have double their normal splash, but cause only 1/2 to 1/4 (depending on their caliber) of their normal damage. Their aiming spread would resemble the maximum aim circle of that respective arty - as if it just moved (thus, the shells would cover most of the maximum zoomed-out view in artymode)

Rate of fire would be roughly one shell each 1-3 seconds, the barrage would take 30 or so seconds. When using barrage, the artillery vehicle can't move or stop the barrage and its camo factor is reduced to 0 (eg. it is instantly spotted whenever someone even looks its general direction). Furthermore, barrage shells have distinctive tracers (which would activate when the shell is in mid flight in order not to make the countearty too easy) and sound effects ("hweeeeeee.... boooom") so the vehicles in the target zone know they are under barrage fire and have a chance to clear out.

Basically, the aim would be to create a suppression zone, which no enemy (or friendly!) tank  would want to enter. While the damage from entering the zone would be lower, it would be also more certain, given the bigger splash of the barrage shells. It could create an interesting tactical element, when an artillery stops the enemy assault dead in its tracks by covering a chokepoint with barrage fire, or it could possibly break a stalemate (think El Halluf or early Malinovka camping) by covering enemy positions with barrage fire, forcing them out of their hiding spots into the open.

54 comments:

  1. No thanks.
    I wouldnt even want to think what would happen, if for example 3 platooned arties barrage a given area at the same time, it would be simly too OP.

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    Replies
    1. Hmmmm well, there could be a mechanism implemented allowing only one friendly barrage at one time... that's probably not so difficult.

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    2. how about allowing barrages ONLY to platoons, or at least have those barrages fired by several arties after choosing a common target. a barrage by a single vehicle seems... lets say unusual.

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    3. this way WoT would demand a whole new level of cooperation and coordination from the players.

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    4. Why not just make a one arty barrage worthless? So that atleast 3 vehicles are required for any decent effect

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    5. No thanks, too complicated and it just wouldn't fit into the game.

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  2. Gonna eat a Maus with a spoon if you gotta hit smth

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  3. There are only two relevant questions when reviewing this suggestion: 1. What resources will it cost WG to implement. 2. How much extra profit will it bring to WG. Answers: Quite a lot & very little. Therefore there is no chance of it happening.

    Oh, and my personal opinion: on balance, no thanks.

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  4. I dont like the idea but thank the effort towards new thing.

    And I dont like because if dmg is like....1/10 at best, and barrage time....15s (thats a lot) and....bigger spread and still arty cover nullified it; and still I see it Balance breaking.


    With your numbers I see it unbereable, just imagine this, 3x S-51 in tier8 battle, and firing that barrage at once, with your 1/2-1/4 it takes about, let's say 6 shoots to make an IS3 explode, meds sooner, and...TigerII (with the uber KT mobility) doomed. With higher splash is just unfair. The 0 camo is not a balance factor, the elimination of tracers I dont see why, the only way to make a barrage to stop is precisely a counter barrage, if not is just like satelite bombing.

    Me do not want. =)

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    Replies
    1. I understand, but consider the fact that the shells fly all over the maximum-zoomed screen with no aim... any hit would be a pure coincidence.

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    2. So, a lot like arty currently works, considering all the accuracy nerfs. Now that you mention it, they're already doing in the 1/2 to 1/4 damage range...

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    3. nah its take one shot to kill my IS-3 (pro driving S-51)

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  5. How about that, but just for Rocket arty, if god/WG will implement it at some point.

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  6. instead of a barrage it could be something more like an air strike, you mark one square of the map and one direction and they have 30 secs to move from there.

    that would prevent the camping on forests or bases like in south coast.

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    Replies
    1. Like that idea. A team could have maybe 2 air strikes a battle.
      Or the air strikes appear randomly or not player-generated.

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    2. There was rumors about Command tanks, maybe "Air strike" can become alternative attack.

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  7. To be honest with u , a little retarded idea ;(

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  8. Consider that there are not much vehicles capable of such actions. Sure germans could use Panzerwerfer 42, american could use Calliope Sherman, ruskies could activate their Katyusha, but what about brits, chinese, french and other upcoming nations?
    I can say that rocket artillery is perfect for the task given, but not much nations had them.

    Kind regards, PijacMali.

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    Replies
    1. Of course it's completely unhistorical - then again, so is the ROF of most arty vehicles...

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    2. dont like the idea... the game itself has big problems with offensive gameplay in general and i think this would promote defensive gameplay even more...

      NebukadnezarII

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  9. u are not playing CWs, arent u...

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  10. I think this idea woud be great for cw/tc. But for randoms,... imagine some player who has less tactical insight then others, aiming at a spot your team just wants to/going to storm. Also, area where this can be used should be limited, since if you dont, this willbe used for decapping just the easy way. Thus eliminating the main idea behind the game as it wil turn into ordinary team deathmatch

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  11. I quite like it, but it would need heavy balancing, and WG probably wouldn't implement it either.

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  12. I hate arty, so it would be better for me if all arty gets removed from game:)

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  13. It would be fine if they would implement Panzerbefehlswagen / Beobachtungspanzer and other command/observer vehicle. Those would not have proper guns compared to their tier, but they would use arty-sniper mode and could make area-marking (with colored smoke shells) and ask outside-of-the-map arty-barrage or air-strike

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    Replies
    1. this & all arty would be "of map"
      you would not just research the FO vehicle but also 2-6 gun Battery of "off map" arty. where you would could research extra ammo, gun pits, bette communication...

      and then limit it to one slot for each battle.

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  14. This would change cb for sure...imagine those arties XD

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  15. It's impossible in real world. you can't implement somethnig in a game with realistic physics something that's real impossibility. It's impossible to reload a 250mm shell within 30 sec. Even THREE loaders would have huge diddiculty doing so and also you must count in firing itself, ejecting the shell casing and inserting a new one. There is also aiming question. Each shot from such huge gun requires aiming anew, it adds to impossibility of your idea.

    I mean your idea is too imaginary and wouldn't fit WoT.

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  16. Proposed Indirect Arty Changes
    -Arty maintain the same flight characteristics, accuracy and precision
    -Arty fires 5 pellets which use the initial reticule settings at the time the trigger is pulled, but will have a randomized result as if all the shots were independent
    -Each “pellet” has its splash radius reduced by a set percentage, say 25-40%
    -Each “pellet” has its damage reduced by 1/5th of the current shell damage range.
    -Possibly make arty immobile for .1-.2 seconds to represent the salvo going out.
    -Damage is dispersed over a greater area with fewer opportunities for a one shot.
    -The odds of causing some damage is increased

    TD Mode
    -Definitely need something better than what you have now that causes your reticule to bounce all over the place at times when aiming at an enemy. If you are lazy hijack the max zoom out in sniper mode.

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  17. Righto, wait until the last five minutes of the match, aim for my own cap, suppression fire, reset everyone and anyone who tries to cap for the rest of the match.

    Sorry, it's too broken.

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  18. Like your ideea, but with so many arty 'lovers' and wg supporting them it won't happen with a 95% chance.

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  19. I think its a cool idea, but It would bring another reason to hate arty.

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  20. with one arty its a bit unrealistic.
    Personally I like the idea of making arty counter-camping vehicles.
    It would require to make objects like big houses or rocks destructable for artillery.
    I also like the idea of lowering the alpha dmg, and increasing splash, but lowering the accuracy, so that artys would provide stable dmg not that kind of one-shot-half-hp-less as now.

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  21. I think it would be unusable. By the end of the game when there are only a few tanks, barrage would be op because there would be nobody to attack the arty that is doing the barrage and it would be way too useful for de-caping. At early-mid game it would be completely unusable since enemy arty will just counter battery the barraging vehicle instantly, not to mention the size of the aimig reticle you are talking about. If there is a single ally anywhere near your target, chances are they are gonna be hit as well and you need allies in the area for spotting in the first place. Also consider the effect it could have in arty vs arty fights. You know what the best spot for arty is, so you just barrage it and wipe most enemy arty instantly. It would just be a race of who gets to barrage first. Way too many problems for this to be implemented.

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  22. I think that they ought to do the following.
    Instead of having it fire 1 shot a time, why not make artillery players choose 3 shots before they fire.

    Imagine the current artillery system.
    Now instead of firing once you click, you set where your 1st shot will land, then the second and after the third has been chosen, arty will start firing.

    This will mean artillery will no longer just take snapshots on light tanks and it will mean that artillery will be more active role.

    Instead of having to wait for artillery to load, you'll have to wait for it to finish shooting.
    Of course this would mean that lot of the alpha damage needs to go out of the window so the game could accomodate reasonable rates of fire.

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    Replies
    1. Seriously, have you ever played with arty? Sometimes you only have 1 sec to shot on a peek-a-boo tank with 2.5 sec shell travel. If you missed it then wait another 35 sec doing nothing. Most of the people who hates the arties never notice how many shells missing them and how many actually hit them. Try arties artyhaters (especially who thinks is just a click and kill game).

      The_Pho

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    2. Maybe arty isn't designed to fight peek-a-boo tankers, but just tanks in hulldown position (American heavys), other thick armored campers and stuff like the Jagdpanzer E-100?

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    3. When u fight against good players u really dont have to many opportunities to have a clear shot. Good arty players are priceless since most are just dumb wanna-click-n-kill guys.

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  23. I like the idea but I can see it being strategically abused in clan wars or company battles.

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  24. I don't like two things, 1: "double their normal splash" and 2 that they shouldn't pay for it.
    The best way to make it "fair" is to transform their sattelite view into a map mode where tanks would be dots, they wouldn't know which way they are facing, what tanks are exactly (same as on minimap but bigger) this way, they must know the map, if they can shoot there or not, AND, couldn't shoot moving targets (it would be extremly hard) so this way arty would work against camping, not making campfests!

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  25. even if the idea is good , barrage would totaly kill the servers , they already said pz I C with it's machine gun use alot of server resources

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  26. I wrote a post describing a very similar (though still different in the particulars) barrage concept awhile back; http://petukocasual.tumblr.com/post/32597154075/world-of-artillery-a-fundamental-change

    Honestly would love to see this implemented, and encouraged as the primary use of artillery. I'm getting pretty sick of the laser-guided-bomb SPGs in this game.

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    Replies
    1. Though I do think the "barrage shells cost nothing" in your idea is a bit extreme.

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  27. I can only imagine the rage threads that people would create when they get hit by noobs on their teams. xD

    Unsure about the idea as this means arty + arty mechanic.

    Note: I'm a arty AND Slow Heavy Tank driver.

    MTWEmperor

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  28. I strongly oppose this. This is World of Tanks, not World of Artilleries. SPGs only spoil the game by stealing kills and cowardly sniping from beyond range. Are SPGs even really tanks I wonder?

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  29. "It could create an interesting tactical element"

    And this is where the idea leaves the WoT universe...
    ;-)

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  30. Can't troll the forums so trolling your own blog now?

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  31. Hell no, they would just do a counter arty first and the team with idiot arties who won't do that will have a big disadvantage.

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  32. OP, you've put a great many interesting and intelligent ideas onto your blog.

    This 'arty barrage' mode however, is not among them.

    There is no place for arty in WoT.

    The end.

    ReplyDelete
  33. Interesting idea, but not on current maps. Way larger maps would be needed + more players.

    Using that mode right now on the current size of map would just even more enforce the camping style and hidding behind a house/rock gameplay.

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  34. I'm thinking about three main changes:
    1. Longer shell flight time
    2. Slightly longer aim OR slightly less accuracy
    2. Reworked spotting for arty's "satellite view"

    The increased flight time encourages people to keep moving. The aim time AND/OR accuracy change also encourages movement. Stay still too long and you get pummeled. That's fine.

    The main change though, which I think would encourage better scout play also, is to implement a system whereby when a tank is first spotted, it show up in arty satellite view as a very blurry or large outline of a tank. The idea being that you know a tank is in that 15 or 20 meter area, but not exactly his heading, speed, cover, etc. The longer the tank is spotted, the more he comes into focus for arty. This would make it much less rewarding for suiscouts, as a 1 second spot doesn't mean much to arty. A five second spot means arty can home in and drop his LGB right onto the target. I thinks this helps emulate the radio conversation that would be going on between the scout and the arty.

    IDK, I just think the main issue is that arty can see over the horizon as clear as if he was 20m away. There needs to be a little fog of war.

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  35. Well I play the M7 Priest so I come a bit closer to this and have a nice replay from El-haluf there I managed to get off 65 shells.

    I did wonder what the effect of a well organised three Priest platoon would be on some maps. You'd be putting down 20 rounds per minute in the rough vicinity of the problem area. Might have an interesting psycological effect.........

    VR

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  36. I'm of the opinion that artillery and TDs should play fairly similar. Perhaps mesh TD and Arty into "SPG" (Americans have special "GMC"s maybe). All tanks in reality can fire indirectly, they are just limited by gun arc and shell velocity.

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  37. Problem: arty is too strong and promotes camping
    Solution: make arty more powerful

    ReplyDelete

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