Aotearas

You know, the sad thing is I actually considered this not being bait for a second or two because I absolutely think WG being capable of pulling a stunt like that. But for the sake of my sanity (what's left thereof anyway (and WG can't claim exclusivity on that decline, as much as they seem working for it)) I'll assume it is actually bait, since I don't feel like opening the game and checking the stats-preview again (also the lingering doubt about how I'd react if I actually found it to be true ... uninstalling wouldn't cut it).

Also of the opinion that AFT isn't needed or not even recommended. Hell, until with the recent IFHE change that reduced the firechance debuff for <139mm guns I hadn't even used the upgraded GFCS just because the reduced firechance was so low that trying to set fires wasn't worth risking return fire. Now I'm using the upgraded GFCS (without AFT) and I can say I'm more than confortable with the range. Don't think I ever needed the extra range and fairly certain the extra distance at which I could've been spotted with AFT would've turned sour a good couple times. Even adjusting to the upgraded GFCS range had mixed initial impressions. Without AFT it frees up 4 captain skill points that I'm happy to eventually put into either Superintendant or Demolition Expert (using Survivability Expert as my current tier III captain perk). Naturally I think CE and IFHE are a must.

See, that's the reaction I believe will be most common for the next couple weeks. The good ole' "OMGWTFHAX" ... On the flipside: I've already seen a good chunk of people circumventing the smoke-detectability debuff on some cruisers and battleships by not entering the smoke itself but using it to obstruct line-of-sight. Can't really say I hadn't had much chance to explore the reliability of that workaround yet (the couple games I had on patchday weren't exactly spent experimenting, or at least not with that in particular). Will probably take a couple weeks to find halfway reliably spots that allow managing line-of-sights with a friendly smoke without having to enter it. Since CVs are still mostly absent from hightier games at least, the chance to get spotted via aircraft is manageable as long as you don't stay too close to wherever the enemy team huddles up and pops all their catapult aircraft. Or alternatively, more reason to grind the Moskva with its 8,2km longrange AA now that aircraft have a fixed spotting distance <8km so I can simply shoot them down fast enough.

To be honest, I think that looks fugly. If it at least had some kick-[edited] ... sweet auto-censor; fine! I mean amazing bonuses, but nope. Also 4K doubloons is rather hefty ... any other permanent camouflage at that tier offering the same bonuses costs you what ... 1K doubloons? I don't think just aethetics is enough to ask for 4x the price, even I didn't find the looks ugly (the stage 2 halloween ships look neat though). Wouldn't say no to getting it for free as event reward and perhaps using it every now and then because why the hell not, but WG would never see my pay for something like this.

I for one am looking forward to the new weekly (perhaps daily at the starting phase) forum threads about "Smoke not working" and hackusations. I mean, we're still getting "wtf repair costs even though I never took a hit" threads despite the economy change being a year past now. And the smoke change ought to be a bit more intrusive ...

Well the start went rather smooth for our first time, though it was a bit awkward to work it out. I almost finished early as I took an unexpected load in the arse. The second one was a bit messier as we had just finished the last and the other partner was experienced, but we ended up on top and rode it out.

Google "jumping spiders with water droplets". It's staged (sadly jumping spiders don't actually like to wear water droplets as hats normally), but it's just looks so adorably cute that even arachnophobes like it (insofar as you can trust online comments ... they do look adorable though!). And jumping spiders are like the energetic puppies of the spider world anyway, so a neat entry level to start with getting more familiar with spiders anyway (certainly more appreciable than running facefirst into the early project of a particularily overachieving spider who intended to spin its web across an entire walkway ... nerd!). Ontopic:

Großer Kurfürst w/ full secondary spec X Gearing is the new meta I tell you!

What we can and should take away from this is that WG will stop at nothing to gimp gameplay and MM to make the game as accessible to everyone as possible, but then still muck it up with utterly counterproductive and arbitrary limitations such as BS primetime and only clan leader positions being allowed to create a clan war division. In short: lolWG

Can't say I experienced something like that. Then again I hardly expect WG to have implemented anything correctly without causing bugs or such, so ...

Sure? In my game with the Gearing, the gun and reload sounds were perfectly consistent (and timed with my actual gun reloads). Maybe the transition between third person view and gunnery zoom is a bit wonky, but that video of yours proves very little considering it's a couple short clips chained together. In fact I'd say the reload sounds seem quite consistent each time you zoomed in, certainly not different from what I heard, it's just the sound effects are much more prominent zoomed in than zoomed out.

Then make World of Warships pachinko slot machines. And treat your employees as if they were criminals on parole and start systematic slander compaigns about every employee that quits. Then make World of Tanks pachinko machines. With premium pachinko balls!

Sound team must've been bored again. They tweaked the gun ambience sounds again (particularily the reload sound effects for mainguns and torpedo launchers). The sound effect volume scales with zoom, so you may not notice it as much when you play fully zoomed out, but becomes quite pronounced if you fire continously in gunnery zoom. Was a bit offputting at first, but after playing some games in ships like the Minotaur and Gearing I must say I can see the appeal Will probably still take some time getting used to it in ships with longer reloads where I zoom out in between volleys as the sound volume scaling creates a rather sudden volume jump, maybe something the sound team wants to look at to smooth the difference.

Oy

Hallöchen miteinander, wollte nur mal kurz vorbeischippern und nochmal grüßen nachdem wir uns grad in den Clan-Gefechten getroffen haben. War'n herausforderndes Spiel (und die zwei Caps im Zentrum sind echt 'ne fiese Falle von WG) und schön uns gegen ein kompetentes Team zu messen (einer von uns fand es so schön dass er sich ein bisschen Trashtalk nicht verkneifen konnte). Vielleicht trifft man sich ja wieder (aber wahrscheinlich nicht mit mir ... blöde Primetime). Cheers and free bump

Welp, first two clan battles (you guys roped me in) were victories (including a flawless 7-0). Think those were also the very first matches for our clan in general, so yay I suppose. We done popped our cherry and bloodied those who wanted to penetrate our lines (mandatory innuendo, you know how it goes).

Whoopsie, hadn't seen the thread (blame second page):

A little tip on handling the last stage of the phase 1 'Saving the Transylvania' operation. You can divert the Transylvania's course by ramming and blocking it with a Jackal, causing it to make a large turn, giving the rest of your team enough time to engage the Rasputin without risking it getting too close to the Transylvania (and thus failing a submission). The ship has non-scripted pathfinding that will automatically correct the course back towards the portal on its own, so there's no risk breaking the script. It does effectively remove the blocking ship from the fight though, so make sure you have enough ships to focus down the Rasputin before attempting. Also make sure those Zikasas who spawned in the back don't actually catch up That's all, have fun.

You see that audience munching popcorn as those two fight another? Those are the cruiser players; happy for once not being the target of both.

@MortenTardo and me swam across @Runner357, @T33kanne in a division and @Gojuadorai on the red team. Little to say though since our team just crumbled for an easy mop-up for you guys, whilst Morten and me were busy securing the C cap (by ourselves mostly, rest of the team seemed too preoccupied feeding themselves to your team). Sadly got denied nuking a rather gung-ho Amagi as he only took 7 out of 8 point blank torps because one of them somehow managed to clip the island, Amagi survived with a couple thousand HP ... (and I'm using the shortrange torps, not the longrange tickle fishes, Sims torps really could use some love). Also met @SteDorff in another game. That game it was his team that broke themselves on ours. In general today's random gameplay quality was on weekend levels. Must've been a holiday somewhere or whatnot, all the potatoes bubbling about. At least I managed to unlock the Octorusskieskajak Renovationslav so I can farm those crimson containers for the remaining week for a couple extra goodies.

Those are anti-trust suits though, not about refund policy. Technically Steam isn't breaking the law with not offering law conform refund policies. They're only breaking it if they refuse a refund when asked for it (and the local law contrasts Steam's EULA). Then the commission can drag Steam to a local court, but that requires a customer to make the effort. And what customer is going to drag a huge company like Steam to court over a refund? That's the only reason why Steam is still holding on to its farcical refund policy. The actual EULA wouldn't hold up in court at all in most european countries, easiest win an attorney can ask for. And then for the money he charges for representing the case, which is a lot more than a potential refund is worth.

Because no customer takes them to court. If one did, local legislative ALWAYS supercedes whatever fancy wording in any EULA agreement you signed. Steam has long been at war with european trade laws and only grudgingly even introduced refunds. Sad thing is the EU trade commision can only give recommendations and not force Steam into a lawsuit unless customers file a suit.

That doesn't change that a couple ships apparently were effected so much they decided they will no longer offer them for sale. Take note that other ships effected by that change did not see any reimbursement options, such as the permanent camouflages for the regular RN cruisers. They got changed aswell, but apparently not so drastic that WG needs to offer refunds for doubloons spent on those. Everyone equally you say? And not offering refunds on specific products because others also got effected by the same changes isn't actual refund policy. That's just WG's excuse they gave for not having offered refunds beforehand. Let's not mistake actual status quo with what WG would like to have as status quo here.

Actually, considering they significantly changed the mechanics of smoke around which those ships are balanced around, they no longer represent the same product they were within the previous gameplay environment before that change and it is a significant enough change that it doesn't really fall under the usual caveat of smaller balance adjustments. As such, the company actually very much should offer refunds in the same form of payment as the product was originally purchased with which they don't, they only give you doubloons so the money you spent for the ship is still in WG's pockets, not exactly a refund, more like store credit. If they offer a refund they should reverse the original purchase. People who bought the ships with doubloons get doubloons back, people who bought it real money, get real money back. WG may not expressly owe anyone thanks to lots of fineprint (though that doesn't always hold up to court if it were challenged), but requesting alternative forms of reimbursement rather than just ingame currency isn't unreasonable if the purchase was made through another payment method. Which is precisely why companies tend to be veeeery careful with changing product characteristics, because it can become quite expensive to deal with a lot of refunds. WG saw fit to make a drastic change anyway, so they ought to take the consequences on the chin and offer proper refunds, not just store exclusive credits that stay in their pockets anyway!

Damn XCOM:EW, u so cruel. Got the Infestation mission ... killed 28 of those damn buggers, nearly lost three soldiers during that mission (damn good I had my support with his triple use medkits!), make it to the extraction point with all my soldiers at the very last possible turn ... and I got none of those corpses as a reward (and they would be SOOOOOOOOO useful!!!). This game really loves to make you work and then still suckerpunches you. I'm only playing on normal difficulty ffs ... and I still savescum every now and then when ludicrously bad RNG results in a soldier death (I will not lose a captain rank soldier because three soldiers missed 80+% shots, thank you very much!). But that's part of the charm, among all the recent games that hand you achievements, hold your hands and shower you with instant gratification, playing one that eschews all of that and tells you to "git gud scrub" is so refreshing. Also, XCOM: EU/EW is damn fun to play and a brilliant game. XCOM2 is even better (though gets minus points for no M.E.C.s ). Also, addictive as hell. Anyone in here who doesn't have 'XCOM: Enemy Unknown' (or the 'Enemy Within' expansion) and likes challenging turnbased-strategy games (or at least doesn't actively dislike them) should ABSOLUTELY get it. Anyone who has and enjoyed it, but doesn't have 'XCOM2', get it, period!