World of Tanks: 7.2 and Learning to Drive the T110!

I think that, if you count WoT as an MMO (and there are good arguments both for and against doing just that), this is the longest I have stuck with (and actively, regularly played) a game of the genre.   At this point, counting beta testing, test server runs, and my regular account, I have close to 5,000 battles under my belt.  Now that is not a grand number in the scheme of things (its not unusual to see veteran players with 8-10k battles played), but its still significant.

 

So let me just say as a regular player that 7.2 (or technically, .72) is probably the best patch to date.  The performance of the game got a noticeable boost, the UI overhaul is excellent, and the new vehicles are fun to roll with.    First on performance, I’m not sure what to say other than the matches load in half the time they used to, and that I have been able to *increase* my graphics detail settings across the board, the first and only time I’ve been able to do that in an MMO (though I have a feeling TOR will be headed in that direction, at least, if they want to stay afloat).  To have an update that makes the game both look better and play smoother is a rare feat in the gaming world, especially the online one.   Part of that is the new UI, which allows more playability and information to the player.  The ability to see exact HP rather than percentages, and to customize the display interface down to names and tiers is a welcome move.

 

And the new tanks are great.  I spent great time and energy grinding my way up the heavy line and then grinding the 6+ million credits to hold onto both my T34 and T30, and I am not disappointed with the investment.  The M103 is a nice upgrade to the T34, doing all that the US heavy line should, but without the glaring weaknesses of the T34.  But the line really shines in the T110E5.

 

 

At first I had no idea what to do with the tank.  I did the usual heavy tank thing, which got me killed a good bit.  The armor is good, but not up to the usual heavy tank levels.  The gun has a high penetration value and solid rate of fire, but doesn’t do an abundance of damage.  The speed and manueverability are, if anything, better than the US heavy line has been to this point.  But that doesn’t help you when squaring off against E-100′s and IS-7′s.   And so in one match on the Cliffs, in frustration, I decided to have fun and race with one of our teams Pershings to the center of the map.  This is usually the dueling ground of the new French tanks and the traditional mediums – get there quick and hold it to help jam up the map and flank the other team.

 

As it turns out the T110 can keep up just fine with the Pershing, and the enemy T-54, Pershing, and T-44 that opposed us clearly were not sure how to handle the sudden appearance of a tier 10 heavy in their usual playground.  And then I got it.   You see, the E-100 and Maus are mobile forts, absorbing huge hits and taking up lanes, as well as drawing the attention of artillary.  The IS-7 is a mobile assault unit, the vanguard of your attacks.   The AMX 50B is a DPS machine.  And the T110 – the T110 is a foil for medium tanks.  Its the perfect counter to the T-54 and the Type-59, with the penetration to handle their sloped armor and the hit points to outlast them, all bundled with the mobility needed to keep base with them and the armor that’s just tough enough to make their tango with you a dicey proposition.

 

And, as it turns out, this makes it the perfect heavy tank for me.  I’m not really all that good with heavies, I’m a natural born medium driver.  And that means that the T110 could become and exceedingly dangerous weapon in my hands.  I’m looking forward to exploring just how much so in the coming weeks.

Catching Up

So I’ve been a busy boy, between stuff at work and a week out of town and the stomach bug.  So lets do a little recap roundup shall we?

 

TOR – I have both my characters in the mid-20′s now.  I grind out about a level a week, which is pretty normal for me.   I just hit Tattoine for the first time last night and it felt…weird.   Landing on Tatooine as an Imperial Agent just felt so *not* Star Wars.  In fact, the whole Empire thing is starting to wear on me a bit.  I may have to let one of those two Imp characters lay idle for a bit so I can scratch the Republic itch.  I will wait until update 1.2 though – the Legacy system means that my Republic alts, all at level 10 on another server are basically useless to me.  And I am not running through Tython for the umpteenth time without Sprint if I can help it.

 

World of Tanks – I’ve spent the last week doing my runs on the Test Server, which has been a breath of fresh air.  The Russian players are actually quite nice, and much more skilled than their American counterparts.  I have wondered lately if I was just bad at WoT or if the teams were so bad it was hard to excel, and its definitely the latter.  In all the matches I’ve played on the test server, I’ve only once seen the team deploy poorly, without watching the map.  As one EU player said after a match, “we didn’t get beat because we made bad choices, we just got beat because they were better than us.”  I don’t get many of those matches on the regular server.   Much as patch 1.2 for TOR will turn it into what it should have been at launch, patch 7.2 will certainly do for WoT.  The new tanks are excellent, and the graphical and game updates are all well done.  The M18 Hellcat is almost all that we wanted it to be (it can’t quite hit 89 kph, and the option of the 105mm howitzer is missing).  Time to learn some Russian and make an account on their server I think.

 

Sandbox Vistas – I’ve shelved this for the time being.  The remaining options just don’t appeal to me all that much, and the announcement that Dawntide was shutting down, while somewhat expected, was ultimately very disheartening.  At this point, unless I get the itch to try Ryzom or Wurm, I’ll probably just keep a keen and interested eye on ArchAge instead.

 

Star Trek Online – Yeah, I know.  But a friend has been begging me to run some missions with him since it went F2P, and I was just a few points shy of my Akira and Nebula.  So I logged in last night and did one mission.  And I have a few things to say:  one is – who killed the graphics?  Its like a whole new engine in there, and it looks like crap, even with all the settings dialed up to max – which, by the way, is something I could not do with the original game.  Balancing that out though – praise the Alpha Quadrant, they actually fixed ground combat to make it manageable, and the skill system to make it less of a headache of WTH, and changed the progression to the point I breathed a sigh of relief.   I did one mission to finish up the jump from 19 to 20.  That same amount of skill points would have required me to do 3-4 missions when I was in the game before.   So now its time to claim that long awaited Akira and learn about that whole “duty officer” thing.  Its like the bizarre crossbreeding of TOR’s companions with your Bridge Officers and a far future version of Pokemon.  I feel like I have to catch them all!

 

And decide if I want to shell out some real bucks for that Nebula.

World of Tanks Introducing Matchmaker Improvements

Two of the things that always seem to vex players of World of  Tanks are the matchmaker (probably everyone’s number 1 gripe!) and trying to earn enough money in the upper tiers.   The new Q&A does a great job of handling questions about both of these, and explaining some of the developers thought process behind them.   First up is the Matchmaker updates that are long overdue, and in the next post we will explore the issues with making enough credits to actually *play* your high tier tanks.

 

The Match maker is a complicated issue that is being addressed.  Players would like to see both more even battles, (less 15-0), balanced artillery with a maximum number in a game, scouts being available in only those battles that artillery are present, platoon balance, not constantly being put in the lowest tiers in a battle, and the spread of the tiers. This all needs to be done without taking a long time to find you a match.

 

This sums up the whole problem in a nutshell.  The reality that the WoT crew doesn’t seem to want to acknowledge though is that people are willing to wait for a match.  Heck, I wait an upwards of 5 minutes for areas to load in TOR, thanks to its crappy optimization, I’m more than willing to wait 60 seconds for a match in WoT.  I say that because its rare to wait more than 15 seconds for a match right now, and often as soon as you hit the battle button, you are dropped immediately into place.

 

While complicated, the first version of this new Match Maker should be available around the 7.2 timeframe. It will take into account many of the above listed issues that players have brought up. The one thing that will be absent is a hard 3 tier spread.

  

While this is on the surface good news, its kind of a silver bullet as well.   A “hard 3 tier spread” means limiting matches to nothing more than three tiers of tanks at a time.  For example, one of the most enjoyable matches in the game now is one of the battles the matchmaker will created that involves only tanks from tiers 3, 4 , and 5.   So Stuarts and Luchs will face Mark IV‘s and Shermans, which is difficult, but not impossible.  As it stands now though, there are matches that commonly occur where those same Mark IV’s and Shermans can end up in battle against Pershings and IS-3‘s.  Now as you can imagine, that kind of stuff happened in real life…and it was about as fun as it ends up being in the game.  However, the reason is that its not *all* about tiers.

 

The Match Maker does not use tiers as a determination, but instead assigns “weights” to each vehicle or vehicle type. It will try to create fun and balanced matches with vehicles that are available at the time. It will no longer immediately assign you to the first available battle you are qualified for, but rather hold your tank and make it available to several matches that are gathering players. This will add the flexibility of generating better matches.

 

Well, to start off, this is something of a lie.  Tiers do form the basis of how matches are made.  Then weights are assigned that modify the tier into the full calculations used (since obviously a tier 5 heavy and a tier 5 light are not the same thing).  Holding the tank will increase time, but as we’ve already said, since the time at this point is negligible its a worthwhile exchange.

 

You may still see some matches with wide tier spreads; however you may also see more matches with lower tier spreads, including some that may only contain one tier. Much of this will depend on server population and the population distribution at the time you enter the queue. The matchmaker will have a better chance to deal with lower populations as it will take a little time to find better matches. If the population is so low, or badly distributed that it can’t find a “perfect” match it will also have the ability to launch with less than 15 players on a side, if it feels it offers a fair match and waiting additional time may not allow for finding the needed players to fill the rosters.

So overall this change to the matchmaker is a large step towards filling the community’s desires. It is also something that can be continued to be improved and balanced. 

 

This is good news.  The only downside to sub 15 tank matches is that there is a less potential earnings for those involved.  But, given that those matches will be more balanced, there will be more opposing tanks that a player can actually do damage too, and so the actual earning will probably be higher.

Overall, this is a good improvement.  Trading time for flexibility, and allowing some variations in matchmaking should be good.  Now the matchmaker will not just throw your mid-tier medium tank into a match of all high-tier heavies to balance out some artificial equation, it will hold and check for other potential matches and determine a “best fit.”   Doesn’t mean you won’t get into those lopsided matches still, but it should be a more rare occurrence.

Another Max Level Milestone

I finally got to the real maximum level available in World of Tanks:  a tier 10 heavy tank.  Heavies are the only tank that goes to tier 10, with mediums and TD’s stopping at 9, and artillery stopping at 8.

 

 

I kinda just creeped across the line last week without a whole lot of fanfare.  And then it was this week before I had enough cash to train the crew and buy the ammo (end game ammo is *expensive*).    I chose the US line for the speed of the heavies, allowing me to redeploy early and often to meet changes in the battle line, and also because the US is home to the best gun in the game, the 155mm T7.  Matching the highest damage output with the best penetration available means basically one thing:  it is rare that one of my shells is deflected or I hear the disappointing “dink” sound of a shell that doesn’t get through the enemies armor.

 

Its also a good choice because of the upcoming changes in the .7.2 patch.  Essentially, the top two American tanks will change.  The old tier 9, the T34, will be moved to a premium tank and anyone with one of those bad boys gets it for free.  I have one so I will be getting one, and of course from here on out, it will be my primary bread winner.

 

This tank though, the T30, will move to become the new top tier of the US tank destroyer “b” (turreted) line.  So owners of it will keep this max tier TD and also get a copy of the new tier 10 heavy that will replace it, the T110.  With that change, I will have a max tier tank in every category except artillery…which to be honest, I’m not much interested in.

 

In fact, there is little I’m interested in now, having accomplished this.  I intend to dink around with some low levels, but in truth, I’m waiting mostly for historical matches and I’ve also begun looking into active Clans in the ongoing Clan Wars metagame that accompanies World of Tanks.  Basically, my ignore list from random matches is so long, its depressing.  I’m ready, not so much for challenging foes, but for teammates who actually do basic things like: look at the map, understand simple tactics, and who know how to use their tank to its fullest affect.

 

Anyway, I’m laid up with a knee injury at the moment (apparently playing indoor soccer on a basketball court can lead to injuries…who knew?) so my gaming interest and ability is limited.  That said, I have a few more words to say about TOR and hope to have them up later this week.

 

Til then…happy gaming!

 

A Merry Gaming Christmas

I was impressed this year with the number of games that gave tangible, and fun, benefits to its players.  There was, I think, an overall sense of generosity.  I think every year I have seen things like XP boosts or XP potions, or the fun “throwaway” items that are common to the season.  But a few games stepped up and offered more.  I have a feeling some people may feel differently than me, because these items, while not directly “pay to win” were certainly at least “subscribe to win” or even in some cases “login to win.”

World of Tanks, of course, gave us a tank.  Well, will give us a tank when they finally get update .7.1 up and running here in North America.  Even cooler is that its a tank that I had wanted to buy anyway:  the British Mark VII Tetrarch!

 

Coming Soon (TM) to a Battlefield Near You

 

Eve Online, perhaps reflecting the nature of commercial Christmas here in America (ie, EARLY) , was giving presents to active accounts or resubs, so long as you claimed your gift by the 21st of December.  You know, before anyone could buy you a Time Code or something.  The gifts were so good, I almost took them up on the 60-day resub option just to stock my hanger.  Choices included actual real, functional, in game ships (unlike years past), cleverly named groupings of high quality ammunition/fuel/items, or even Aurum, their version of in game money.   All in all, a huge step up for them from previous gifts.

 

BY THE 21st! OR IT WILL SPOIL!

 

But perhaps the most generous one that I encountered was from Iron Grip: Marauders.  In true seasonal fashion, unlike CCP, IG:M gave out Advent gifts every day of Advent.  Technically you had to have Gems, their real world currency buy in, to open the gift packs, but since they also give you a couple of gems at each level up, I was actually able to open most of them without actually having spent money on the game.  And the gifts in the packs were very generous and in every case worth far more than what you paid to open them.  I have now four licensed premium units that I would otherwise not have access to, as well as heaping mounds of gold and iron (their in game currency).   Then they also dropped a New Years gift pack.  And on top of that, they were giving a 20% discount on their Gem buying options.  They said this would end on January 2nd, but as of this morning, the deal still exists, and I suspect it will continue through Epiphany (Jan. 6th) given how they have celebrated the season thus far.

 

Do not shake. Live ordinance is present.

 

Also, in an unintentional effort to make this blog more sexy, I have to point out that IG:M also gifted its players with Christmas Elves of a more adult fashion.  I’ll post the most appropriately attired here, which should serve as an indicator of how the rest of the elves were clothed (or not clothed).

 

Twelve Days of Cleavage

 

Astute readers will not this indicates a change in stance from previous posts…and I don’t mean regarding sexiness – get your head out of the gutter.

 

So, all in all, I was impressed with what I saw out there.  My real question for next year is if we will see companies step up their generosity again, giving similar tangible gifts next year, or if this was a one time deal, a rare year where everyone was feeling generous…or perhaps just feeling some market pressure.  Either way, we, the players, came out the winners.

German Armor Decisions

So Rift is on hiatus for a bit, since my brother is actually physically around here with me, and the nights we have free we prefer to spend playing awesome boardgames, like Mansions of Madness.  But there are still nights where I have meetings and things and we don’t really have time to play (we aren’t quite the night owls we used to be, as we get older).   And in those nights I’ve been grabbing a match or three of World of Tanks.

And I’m kinda hitting some decision points that have given me pause.  Most recently in the German tank tree.  Now I will say upfront, I’m a huge German Armor-o-phile in real life.   So in Beta testing, that is what I did – I climbed the German tree with a passion, heading for my personal favorite, the Tiger I.  When the wipe happened and launch came, I had decided to try my hand at other things.  Most particularly,  I wanted to experience medium tanks, which I had not actively pursued in Beta, and when it came to heavies, I wanted to put the American line through the paces.   Well I’ve done both, with the T34 treading water until the M103 hits, and with the Russian medium line capped out.   So I have been fooling around with the other two medium lines.  And I have just about finished with the respective tier 6′s – the Sherman “Easy 8″ and the VK 3001 (H).  The American line is easy – proceed to the T20, ???, profit.

But the German line has left me with a little indecision.  I can either, at this point, unlock the VK 3002 (DB) or the PzKpfw V Panther.  Observe:

 

 

Green is tanks I’ve unlocked/used.  Red I have not.  Yellow is the current decision making process.   Now, I would like to uncover all the German line eventually, being the avowed lover, as noted above.   And I am particularly keen to have some of these tanks unlocked for the Historical Matches which will be coming to the game soon (where only real production tanks and not experimental ones can be used, and teams are grouped by nation).   So with that in mind, I can proceed to the Panther, and have a solid historical tank available, while trekking on down the medium line to the superb E-50.  And normally I would do just that.

But the 3002 has me intrigued.  Originally it was much maligned as a tier 7 medium, in part because it stood in the way of reaching the Panther, a tank many people wanted, but that was underwhelming as a tier 8.   In reality, its probably on par with the Panther (and they were, after all, competing designs at one point).  However, it trades some of the Panther’s (potential) firepower and armor for additional speed.

In addition, it has the added benefit of being able to be used to unlock both the Tiger and the Panther – the two tanks I want for historical matches, and do both of those things relatively easily (about 25k xp each).    The downside is spending a lot more time in tier 7, rather than making the straight climb for the top.

I could move over to the 3601, which is what normally unlocks the Tiger, but I drove it in Beta and was unimpressed with it for the most part, and I wouldn’t mind skipping over it.  But it does have all the same components as the Tiger and Panther line, allowing you do get equipment unlocked and paid for at a lower tier – always a bonus.

And then there is the cash crunch.  Until the T34 goes premium, I’m going to have trouble raising the money for all these end-game tanks I want.  I have some half a million credits now, and we are talking about tanks that will run 1.5 million credits and more.  I can earn an average of 20k with my best premium right now, but that is slow going (50 matches per million credits!).   So if I do go the DB, it may be some time until I can afford a Panther or Tiger either one.

I hate making decisions.  But I guess in the long run I can’t really go wrong, right?  Either way I will get where I am going, and this way, hopefully, I get to satisfy a curiosity while doing it.

I Finally Capped Level! or…$30 for a virtual tank?

Well, sort of.  I have reached the end of the line in World of Tanks…

 

T-54, aka The Beast, aka Sally.

 

Now I still have upgrades to purchase on the tank, obviously, but I kinda equate that to the alternative advancement in other games.  I have reached the top tier of medium tanks in my chosen faction.  This is the end of the line!  And yeah, WoT is not exactly the traditional MMO, but I haven’t reached this level of excellence in an online game since Star Wars:Battlefront 2 (where I was in the top 1% of players in the XBox Live standings).  So its a little exciting for me.

The T-54 has been every bit of what was advertised.  It is devilishly maneuverable, a tough nut to crack, and creates tactical advantages for other players.  The only downside has been one of the things I grudgingly admire about WoT – they have a perfectly balanced money sink.   If you look a little closer in the top right of the image, you can see what I had left in my wallet after buying this bad boy.  And it took me another 100k or so built up from runs in my two mid-tier premium tanks (Panzer V-IV and Sherman M2A4, aka the Beta Sherman) before I could train the crew and be sure I could afford repairs in case my first couple of matches were busts!

Now I will admit, I have never ended a night with less money than I started – but since Tier 7, unless I have played those premy tanks, I have not come out that much further ahead of where I was to begin with.  And that’s with a premium account running too.  So the balance factor is there, but it can be frustrating, especially with the cost of end game tanks (the T-54 runs just shy of 3 million credits).  Hence the popularity of the Tier 8 line of premium tanks (Lowe, KV-5, Type 59, M6-preorder version).  If you intend to play and run end game tanks, or at least if you plan to use more than one of them, you are going to need a top-shelf credit generator like that to hang with the big boys.   And I of course, am not willing to shell out $30 for a virtual tank.

Enter the changes to the lines of advancement in the game.  In the next 2 months, the T34, my heavy of choice, will be replaced with the M103.  To make up for the generally underpowered nature of the T-series heavy tanks in the US line, and because of the time investment required, and the general love the T-model anyway, the T34 (Tier 9) will stay in the game as a premium tank, and anyone who has one in their garage at the time of the switch will receive the M103 to continue the line, and that new premium version – for free.  Free is good.  One match in a Tier 8 premium can generate as much as 100k cash, vs. my current mid-tier premiums, which generally draw me 15k-20k per match.

So until that change happens, I’m afraid my time in both the T34 and the T-54 will be limited by the number of matches I sacrifice from them to play in those premium tanks.  Fortunately, WoT does the game well, and I have fun in those smaller premiums as well.

And above all, its good to be at the top of the heap with a max level (max tier) character (vehicle)!

Real Life Controversy Boils Up In MMO Update

Buried among the patch notes for this months update to the popular international MMO World of Tanks was this little tidbit:

- Wittmann’s Medal substituted with Boelter’s Medal

It didn’t take long for people to notice it standing out in the midst of number crunching statistics changes around reload times and traverse angles.  And the obvious question was: why?  In the same manner, it didn’t take long for a few forum members (game updates are actually announced and detailed on the head developers blog first) to come over and explain why.  You see, Wittmann was a Nazi.

As you can see, the normal game drama about updates took a radical real life turn at this point.  Nobody was griping over who got nerfed and who was OP!  To briefly unpack both sides of that argument, here’s a few of the highlights:

Those in favor of the change point out that:

1) WoT has always had a policy not allowing the promotion or encouragement of national socialism in any way.  In the past, this rule has been enforced around Clans that have tried to take the name of SS Panzer units or anyone who utilized the pageantry or RP flavor of such a unit.  Some people have pointed out the dual standard of having a medal named after arguably the most famous tank ace of the SS.

2) That Wittmann was not just a tanker who happened to be in a Nazi unit.  He was in the Allgemeine SS from 1936 onwards.  There is no evidence to suggest he was anything other than a true supporter of the Nazi party and its policies.

Those arguing against the change have pointed out:

1) The Soviet Guards units weren’t exactly angels themselves, and there is no evidence that any of the tankers who have elite medal’s named after them in the game committed war crimes directly.

2) Most of the war crimes committed by the SS were in fact done by the SS-Totenkopfverbände units, who were in charge of the concentration camps, and were in fact an independent unit that had its own command structure separate from that of the Waffen-SS.  (If that’s confusing, basically it boils down to this – Wittmann was involved in the general SS organization, but when it split between the two above named units, Wittmann went with the front line army branch, not the political MP/Paramiltary branch directly responsible for carrying out the holocaust).

As of awhile ago, Overlord disable the comments section of his blog, which was rapidly descending into a firestorm of critique and name calling that went above and beyond the usual trolling.  Probably a smart move on his part.  But me…well, I think there is a worthy discussion to be had.  Please add your two cents in, and feel free (you fellow bloggers) to weigh in on the discussion in your own realms as well, I’ll be sure to link them here.

For my part, I find the argument separating the tank aces themselves from atrocities committed by their respective armies and countries pretty compelling.  I’m also not convinced that when one says “Michael Wittmann” it immediately conjures up images of war crimes or the holocaust.  He was simply a good tank commander.

On the other hand, I am not Jewish, nor am I from Europe, or in particular from Russia or any of the other former states of the USSR.  So while I am not personally touched or haunted by this, I can see that it would be possible that others were and are.  And I supposed you could just chalk this up to good PR or marketing for Wargaming.  After all, its a small, non-mechanical change to their game that has the potential to garner it more attention and acceptance in the European community, which is arguably a bigger market for them than us here in the US.

Your thoughts?

Now WoT Needs Friends Too…

Only, they are requiring a little more commitment.  Download two social media programs, use them, fill out a questionnaire, and maybe we will let you be an Alpha Tester for World of Warplanes.

Maybe.

 

 

/facepalm

 

State of My Game: July ’11

What I’m Playing

Rift.  I’m currently trucking through my 29th level as a Cleric, and for once, alt-itis has not really struck.  Kudos for the billionth time to Trion for making a character creation system that has loads of flexibility.  I currently have a casual questing role (Justical/Sentinal/Inquisitor), a raiding healer role (Sentinal/Warden/Purifier), and a third role that I swap out for fun when I get bored.  Right now its kind of a farming role – a Cabalist/Purifier mix with the third soul (with 0 points of course) being rotated as needed to keep things fresh.   The world events and “programming” unleashed by Trion are excellent.  I think some of us questioned if this new variation on Public Questing was going to be problematic, but its so dynamic and fun, it seems hard now in retrospect to even try to compare them.  I have some minor quibbles, but nothing worth writing about at this time.  And I have to say thank you again to Trion for spoiling us bloggers by bringing us along on the ride from the very early phases.

World of Tanks.  Not only did I get sucked in, when 9 months ago I would have told you there was no way I was playing this game, but so did my brother and dad.  The end result has been mayhem.  A full three man platoon to roll with any night I want to.  I wanted a full on gaming group as one of my goals this year, I just didn’t realize it would take this form in this game!  Speficially, since launch I have dedicated myself to US Heavy tanks.  Initially I wanted the T29, as I admired it in Beta, and specifically the way a skilled player could capitalize on its strengths and minimize its weaknesses (incidentally, from my win % in her, I’m going to admit I’m not a skilled player lol).  But when the full tree changes were announced and I realized that if I just dug a little deeper, I could grab a tier 8 premium in the T34 – and specifically, have a nice premium tank that looked and played just like the T29, I had my goal set.  Currently, I have enough XP to grab it, but since the patch is still 2+ months away, I’m sitting on the free XP I’ve converted and started working my way up the Russian and US medium lines.  And here I confess that I am a medium tank player at heart.  My win % and XP earned stats on medium tanks is consistently higher than with the US heavies.   The patches continue to improve the game, and I think concerned about matchmaking are over rated.  WoT still needs to do more to address the “invisible tank” problem, but other than that, they are in good shape.

What I’m Testing

Nothing.  I’m actually not currently in any Beta’s or testing programs at the moment.  I was never able to get Gods and Heroes working, so…I can’t really tell you if it was good or not.  Perpetuum still intrigues me, but since I have no itch to play EVE at the moment (even less with Incarna out – I don’t get the whole desire or issue myself), I’ve put it on hold as well.

So, if you need someone to play and test (or write about) your game or your Beta, give me a yell.

What I’m Not Going to Talk About…okay, yes I am.

The Old Republic.  Seven months ago, I went ahead and joined a TOR guild, thinking it would help keep a check on my impatience for the game to come out, and help me settle into some good relationships for a game that, by all accounts seems to be just as fanatically multi-player as it is fanatically single-player (how these two worlds will mesh in reality is still a good question I think).   I recall thinking that I wasn’t sure I could wait another 4-6 months for the game to come out.  I was concerned that my brother would not be back from Russia in time (he spend the first 6 months of this year living over there) to be in the game at launch with me.   But mostly I was worried because there was every indication that the game was not actually 4-6 months away.  For those who don’t believe me, I have a draft of a post I wrote but never published (happens more often than you think) from last October, arguing those points.  And I was right.   And it dawned on me yesterday that there is still no indication that the game is no closer to launching than it was last Fall.  In other words, I have patiently made it through the time I wasn’t sure I would make it through, only to find that I have made no progress whatsoever.  This is another definition of hell is it not?  Add to this the multiple confirmations that the game will have no Open Beta (riddle me that one Batman…) and this means that launch will be launch, with no teaser a month before to scratch the itch.

To put this in perspective for you: would you be surprised if there was an announcement that the target date was moved to next Spring (2012)?  Me either.

I’m not sure what else to do here other than keeping marking time.  And my stance is well documented – the longer this takes, the more they push it back (and don’t let them kid you, it has been pushed back, whether they published an official date or not), the worse things are.  You can argue that if you like, but MMO history is clear, and the burden of proof otherwise rests squarely on the backs of EA Bioware.  And the other half of my stance is well documented also: worried though I may be, rooting for them I am.