If I had to name the absolute worst thing about World of Tanks, it wouldn’t be the glitches, or the occasionally horrific coding that causes insta-crashes, or imbalances in tanks or matchmaker…it would be the players themselves.
Rarely does a match go by without someone whining, complaining, trolling, or just generally angsting over the gameplay of their teamates. I used to chart some of that stuff – by my meager research, if your team can’t make it out of the starting circle without a collision, your changes of winning drop significantly, for example. And I am by no means exempt. I’m just as bad as everyone else about calling people at, yelling at perceived failures in tactics and strategy. And there are two sides to every story, but a lot of the chatter is over the top, Barrens-style CAPS LOCK madness.
On the one hand, much of what is said in anger is gospel truth. Lots of times a team loses because players don’t know the map, don’t look at the map, don’t support their teammates, don’t have a damn clue how to play their tank, or are apparently controlled by small children sitting in their parents laps. (Seriously, I had a match last night with a tank on our team that had done damage, and moved, but then halfway through the match just drove in circles bumping into things…I have no explanation for that other than daddy let little Timmy drive for a bit).
I could list a ton of examples. I get frustrated when I see players with “derp guns” (howitzers) try to snipe from long range – those guns are so inaccurate that they wont hit anything beyond 100m except with a liberal dose of luck. I feel the need to bang my head on my desk when lemmings mode kicks in and fifteen tanks recreated the classic football play “student body right.” And I would like to make it through at least one match without somebody in a tier 4 light tank whining about matchmaker. Or a tier four medium tank paired with a tier four artillery baffled at why they are surrounded by tier 8 tanks in their match. And I yell, and kick, and scream, and call names, and report people, and (probably) get reported myself on a semi-regular basis. Most of these are self inflicted wounds by players who refuse to learn the game or listen to experienced teammates, and they cost me time and money. So…yeah, I get angsty.
Much of that angst is due to the mechanics around credit income – end game players rarely make money on their matches. The most profitable tier vehicles to run are actually 4-6. I had one match recently in my T-30 (tier 9 tank destroyer) where I lost nearly 30,000 credits. As a result, I dip back down into lower tiers to replenish my cash fund and continue my grind up. This is great in that it keeps the battles flowing and makes sure that new players always have matches to play. But the unspoken downside is that you can have a player with 20,000 matches under their belt on a team where the average number of battles played could be as little as 750. And let me tell you, at nearly 5,000 matches, those are painful for me…I can’t imagine what they are like to someone who has seen that map battle unfold four times as much as me.
More than general experience, there is also the problem of experience with the vehicles themselves. I am firmly of the belief that you need at least 100 battles in a given vehicle before you know how best to play it. For one thing, there is upgrading modules, and for another, ever tank – even moving within the same line and nation, will play differently. For example, if you’ve spent the last 100 battles in the T-28, you were playing with the 57mm Zis-4 gun. Its one of the most accurate in the game, with a rating of .34 (this is related to the size of the targeting circle – so smaller is better), and with a full crew, you are getting off 26 shots a minute! And then you move to the KV – congrats, now you are using the 76mm Zis-5. It should be a better gun right? No, actually, it shoots slower, penetrates less, and is one of the worst guns in the game for accuracy at .46. Meaning your targeting circle is now 35% larger than you are used to, and your gun takes 72% longer to reload. That takes some adjusting.
BUT
That doesn’t mean that people yelling at you, even me, are right. And in fact, they are often just as bad as you. The thing that helped me curb my instinct to yell, and that has given me a great deal of insight into this is actually the controversial XVM mod. At its basic level XVM will show you how many battles each player has had, their win %, and their efficiency score – a player generated algorithm that gives a pretty good picture of a players general skill level. Its not perfect – the parameters slight arty players for example, but its a generally agreed upon standard at this point. (If you’re curious, you can check your own score here.) The controversial part is really a specific add on that purports to calculate your teams odds of winning the battle, based on the skill levels and experience of the players present. I don’t use that part, because my college psych prof did her doctoral work in self-fulfilling prophecies. I recommend that you shouldn’t use that add on either.
Worst > red > orange > yellow > green > blue > purple > Best
The basic XVM mod itself though is what has made me a better teammate – and not through gameplay. Often times I go to yell at a player and realize they have less than a thousand battles under their belt. They are still learning maps and trying to figure out what playstyles fit and don’t fit. They may even still be learning basic mechanics and tactics, and not know how some things work. And I bite my tongue. Even players with several thousand battles are still learning – like myself. I was in a match with a player in a tier 9 tank destroyer – you would assume that he was a good, veteran player. But he used premium and it was his first and only line of tanks – he had only two thousand battles. And when I chatted gently with him, he admitted he had less than ten matches in his newest tank. How can I yell at that person? He probably knows very little of how arty works, and is probably getting used to being the big dog at the top of the match list.
Its also made me realize that there are some games that are forgone conclusions. It is entirely possible to have a half dozen new players or bad players on your team, and a half dozen players in the top 0.2% (yes, zero point two percent) of the efficiency ratings on the other team. So I don’t whine about bad tactics or chide my team mates at all – we will probably lose no matter what they do!
Note the number of purple players (top 0.2%) they have and also note the poor players with 0k and 1k battles on our team…
That doesn’t mean I don’t still lose my temper. There are players with those 20k battles whose efficiency score is lower than that of some of the very newest players. And players that goof off – I had a match with a platoon of three that were playing bumper cars in the starting area and shooting each other – meaning the match was really a 15 vs 12 proposition. But for the most part, my patience has been extended, my diatribes shortened, my yelling toned way down. I do love the game and I love when new players come in and get to experience it. If I’m one less guy yelling at them, maybe that helps them stick around a little longer to learn a little more, and that will be good for the whole playerbase.
I still bang my head on my desk sometimes though. That doesn’t hurt anyone but me, but sometimes it does, paradoxically, make me feel better.
This seems much like WoW’s LFD in terms of the random quality of teammates, though I suspect any match-making algorithm would to some extent. About how long does it take to run a battle?
Yeah, matchmaking takes only the tanks into account, not their modules or the skill of the players. For all that, the server W/L averages are pretty darn close to 50%. I suspect this is because of the large number of battles. Each battle lasts has a 15 minute timer, though few matches make it that long. I would say the average is 7-8 minutes. However…once you are dead, you can leave the match and queue for another one (though the tank you just used is tied up until the match is over) so in practice, you can really roll through matches quite quickly.
Glad to see I rank in the upper half of “average.” About all I have the inclination to aspire to.
I think there is another study to be done in how the individual scoring calculations impact and undermine team play in random battles. I have seen a lot of behavior that emphasizes the immediate goals of the individual to the detriment of the team. I can never get somebody, as an example, to actually pull back some to draw the bad guy out into the open so the rest of us can shoot him up.
It isn’t a huge problem, but I have seen it undermine a side.
I have too, and I agree its limited. Some players that have a lower score seem to be in that place only because they are willing to take on the “dirty jobs” in every match. Being the one guy to plug the open flank, etc. And there are hosts of threads on how to gimmick your rating or why the rating is not sound. For example: Players who hit the upper tiers and stay there (dipping down only to 8 for high end premium creds) tend to have a much higher score because their potential damage output is greater. Another: A good way to inflate your score is the KV-1S with the 122mm on it – you have tier 8 dmg potential while logging a tier 6 match.
For me, I just kinda of eyeball it. How many greens, blues and purples (top 10%) do we each have? Is the guy I’m now one on one with someone with 20k matches and a blue rating? Then I need help, pronto. Is that guy who is not listening a red rated guy with 0k matches? I’m going to encourage him rather than jump on his case. That sort of thing.
But you have hit upon the reason Wargaming has said repeatedly they will never do skill based matchmaking – there is just no good way to measure a players worth to their team – especially for matches that short and that great in number.