My feelings about the game.

[Hanse77SWE]

I have for some time now felt that this game isn't fun anymore.

 

And the question I ask myself then is "Why? What makes me feel that way?" I've had a thinking-session and I've come up with some answers but first I'll introduce myself.

 

I'm 42 y.o. and have played WoWs since OBT. It all started with me looking for naval documentaries on YT. I stumbled over a WoWs vid (by Jingles I believe) and I liked what a saw and started playing the first day of OBT. I'm not a "main" but play everything but CVs (more on that later) and I have decent stats. I consider myself a "casual" and I'm not in this game to be the best or win everything. I'm the commander of a casual clan. (Feel free to join.)

 

So, back on-topic.

 

I started by asking the question: "Why do I play games?" and the answer was pretty simple: "To have fun." Now, that isn't "Haha"-fun but more like "Satisfaction"-fun. You know, that feeling you get when you pull of a nice maneuver, hit with a well aimed salvo or outsmart an opponent.

So the next question was: "Why don't I feel that way anymore?" and that answer wasn't as simple. In fact, I had to break it up.

 

1: I've played for a long time. I've done all the things I set up as goals when I started and I have no more long term goals to do. I have 21 T10s in port (no CVs) and I've played 278 different ships in randoms. So it's more like "Been there, done that" and this happens with most things if you do them long enough, you get bored. Can't really blame WG for me playing the game "Too much". That's just the way things are.

 

2: The community has changed. It has become harder, colder, more demanding and less forgiving. But also more cautious and passive in the way the game is played. Now, I call my playstyle "A-A". That's "Active-Aggressive". I want to do things and I don't want to sit around waiting for someone else to get his thumbs out of his arse so I get going from the start.

 

      This playstyle doesn't work as good as it used to and mostly because the rest of the team scatter from the start. Some duck in behind the nearest island, some waste time "switching" sides and some just sit in the spawn and don't give any sign of what they will do. I never know what my team will do so I can't do anything either and it just ends with every one sitting still waiting for someone to do something. It's hard to play aggressive when you don't have a team to back you up. Yes, I said "Back me up" because it's usually me up front no matter what ship-class I play. Now, some of you might say "Why don't you change your playstyle to fit the game?" and the answer is that I have. I've become more cautious but at some point I pass a line where I feel that this is now so cautious that's it's not fun and if I'm not having fun then why am I playing? Nowadays I play mostly Co-Op and Scenarios. Why? Because a bot will never hide or run away. He will fight and that's fun! 

 

    The attitude of the players has also changed. You get reported for practically nothing and compliments are few and far between. Many players take time to type negative comments in chatt rather than focus on what they are doing with the ship. The community has also become more selfish. It's often you see in comments on FB and in the forum like: "I want this!" or "Why haven't you done what I told you to do?" We are hundreds of thousands of different people playing this game but some of us seem to think that everything should be the way they want it. In short: Selfish behavior. Don't get me wrong, I also have things I would like to see in the game but I'm not so self centered that I believe that WG will do everything I tell them to do. Feedback, yes. Demands, no.

 

The game becomes what we, the players make of it. And if a majority of the players are camping salt-spreaders then that is what the game will become. Do I think that's fun? No, I don't.

 

3: The CVs. First I want to make it clear that CVs was never a sellingpoint to get me to play this game. I'm here to play ships and that's it. If I want to play with planes there are other games and if I want to play RTS I play a RTS-game. But the CVs have an impact on the game that can not be ignored.

 

      I don't like to play CVs. I've tried and it didn't grow on me so I don't play them. It's that easy. But they are in the game and I still face them in battle so I can't avoid them even if I wanted to. What are my feelings about playing against CVs? In the "old days" it wasn't a problem. The good CV-players were few and far between so if you got deleted by one every 100 games, it wasn't too bad. But now there are CVs everywhere and that has an impact of itself.

 

* It's not fun being spotted in the first minute of the game and stay spotted for most of it. It limits what you can do if everybody can see you all the time. You can't use islands bc planes can fly around or over them in a few seconds and now you're pinned behind that island and can't move bc half the enemy team is just waiting for you so they can shoot you.

* It's not fun trying to outrun/outmaneuver a craft that is five times as fast as you are.

* It's not fun being focused by a CV because you can't do anything else but dodging and weaving while praying to RNGesus that you at least shoot down some planes before they drop. And while you are dodging and weaving you're no use for your team since you can't fight other ships at the same time. (But they can still shoot at you.)

* It's not fun taking hit after hit from airdropped weapons and still see full-size squadrons come at you no matter how many you shoot down all while you are going in the wrong direction on acount of all that dodging and weaving AND you are now a sitting duck because you lost half your speed in those maneuvers. (And you're spotted so all the enemies that can, will shoot at you.)

* It's not fun having to spend half your skillpoints on AA-skills that hardly does any difference so when you're in a game without CV or the CV doesn't attack you feel that "That was a waste of skillpoints." Not to mention how I feel when I've picked Deff-AA and there's no CV or I picked Hydro and thee is a CV. It's too much guesswork. I might as well just flip a coin on how to equip my ship!

* It's not fun being under air-attack for a full minute just to have the next wave coming for you 40 seconds later.

 

When I play a BB and have planes attacking me I want to shoot them down before they drop their bombs/torps/rockets. But on the other hand, how fun is it for the CV-player to lose all/most of his planes before he can drop his bombs/torps/rockets. I find these two sides incompatible. We can't balance the game so that we get the same result when a T8 CV attacks a T10 AA-cruiser as when he attacks a T6 BB. Yes, +1/-1 MM will help some but what's the difference between a "Wooster" and a Seattle, and a Nagato and a Ashitaka? The Seattle will still shred planes and the Ashitaka won't. Personally, I can't see a way to balance the game as long as the CVs are in it. But that's just me.

 

The CV increases the tempo of the game. It increases the multitasking and it increases the RNG and guessing. As a casual player I don't want to play a high tempo-, high stress- guessing game . It's not fun. Will I demand the removal of CVs? I could but would that be fair to those who like the CVs? If there was a vote on it I know what my vote would be.

 

Now, why am I telling you all this?

 

I just want WG, and anyone else who's interested, to get a notion of what a long time, casual player feels for the game. I'm not trying to make demands or force the game to change. My take on any game I've played for the last 30 years is "It doesn't have to be perfect, just good enough." I just want to have fun and I don't have that feel for WoWs anymore. I loved what it used to be but it has changed and I have changed. It might come a time when I stopp playing the game altogether, not by decision, but more because I've found better things to do so it just fades away. It's sad because I've had alot of fun with this game and I really would like to have fun playing it in the future.

 

I've tried to keep this short, to no avail, and I know that it can be a bit fuzzy so if you want me to clarify something, don't be afraind to ask. Stat-shaming, salt and bad behavior will not be replied to. The topic is: "How we feel about the game."

[Solstad1069]

Well said and i agree with you on CVs in general taking too much focus away from playing a warship game.
What i also dislike is the way Cruisers have to be played in this game, camping behind islands, simply because they are so fragile they risk getting one shot if they present themselves.

[Hanse77SWE]

25 minutes ago, Solstad1069 said:

Well said and i agree with you on CVs in general taking too much focus away from playing a warship game.
What i also dislike is the way Cruisers have to be played in this game, camping behind islands, simply because they are so fragile they risk getting one shot if they present themselves.

I feel that the cruisers need BBs to "camp" behind rather than islands. But since the BBs like to stay in the back the cruisers now have to rely on islands.

 

BBs should push up so they:

1: Leave room behind them for the cruisers to get within gun range.

and

2: Pose a threat to the enemy so that they draw fire away from the cruisers and put their armor and HP-pool to work tanking.

 

Both these points also rely on DDs screening the BBs from enemy DDs and torps.

 

Again, this is just how I see it and thank you for your comment. :-)

[Mr_Snoww]

33 minutes ago, Solstad1069 said:

Well said and i agree with you on CVs in general taking too much focus away from playing a warship game.
What i also dislike is the way Cruisers have to be played in this game, camping behind islands, simply because they are so fragile they risk getting one shot if they present themselves.

i would like to remind you that cvs were also ships. they have as much place in the game as anything else

[Beastofwar]

Im sure you have seen these images, all WOWS by WG. This is about the game, it is how the game should be.

 

Every class and all aspects of the game are in it.

 

 

[Panocek]

2 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

Im sure you have seen these images, all WOWS by WG. This is about the game, it is how the game should be.

 

 

But then, to pull off CGI like that in real time you wouldn't be able to run game on your typical russian computer

[quickr]

I've played this game for almost 2 years, over 10k games, unlocked everything, so I know what you mean when you say "there are no more long term goals". Wear and tear is certainly a thing, play something long enough and you'll get bored and move on. Thing is, for me at least, I still see the potential, i still see the fun, but it's buried somewhere deep, behind CV rework, unreasonable buffs and nerfs, bait and switch scams, etc.. It's like they are deliberately trying to ruin the game, a good game... well at least it was when I first started.

 

Other thing you said is people changed, community changed, meta changed. New players come in, old players become veterans of the game or give up, buffs and nerfs affect the meta... it's up to us to adapt or perish. Normal process in any online multiplayer game.

 

You made good points there and I agree on most of them. The way I see it, if people complain and raise their voices it's because they care, they want to see it better and improved. I would be more scared(?), concerned is a better word, if WG changed something and absolutely no one said anything about it, if the players were indifferent.

[Hanse77SWE]

1 minute ago, Mr_Snoww said:

i would like to remind you that cvs were also ships. they have as much place in the game as anything else

Yes they are ships, but the active part is planes. I've seen CV-players that doesn't move the ship for the whole game. Is that still "Playing with a ship?" If we should remove the ship and let the planes take off from a landbase nothing would really change. The ships being attacked wouldn't notice anything different and the "CV-player" would still use his planes in the same way. So are you playing a ship or are you playing with planes? I'd say you are playing with planes and why are we doing that in a ship-game?

 

Again: It's not about "What is and isn't a ship." It's about "Is it fun?"

[Panocek]

Just now, Hanse77SWE said:

Again: It's not about "What is and isn't a ship." It's about "Is it fun?"

I'm pretty sure old RTS carriers with current CV popularity would be even less fun. Yes, they couldn't constantly harass, but had potential to delete something every 3-4min

[Solstad1069]

Totally agree with you Snoww, CVs, planes and AA is a factor in this game we need.
The problem is to balance them and instead of doing lots of adjusting in different directions you just simply cut down to 1 for each team.
 

What i also find strange is how poorly the different CVs are balanced in their respective  tiers.
Tier 4 CVs are pretty much useless, 9 out of 10 battles they are at the bottom of the XP list. Tier 6 are so much stronger and have a much more impact on the battle.
Then you have tier 8s and with 2 of these they ARE the deciding factor on who is gonna win. And that is very wrong.

[Hanse77SWE]

1 minute ago, quickr said:

I've played this game for almost 2 years, over 10k games, unlocked everything, so I know what you mean when you say "there are no more long term goals". Wear and tear is certainly a thing, play something long enough and you'll get bored and move on. Thing is, for me at least, I still see the potential, i still see the fun, but it's buried somewhere deep, behind CV rework, unreasonable buffs and nerfs, bait and switch scams, etc.. It's like they are deliberately trying to ruin the game, a good game... well at least it was when I first started.

 

Other thing you said is people changed, community changed, meta changed. New players come in, old players become veterans of the game or give up, buffs and nerfs affect the meta... it's up to us to adapt or perish. Normal process in any online multiplayer game.

 

You made good points there and I agree on most of them. The way I see it, if people complain and raise their voices it's because they care, they want to see it better and improved. I would be more scared(?), concerned is a better word, if WG changed something and absolutely no one said anything about it, if the players were indifferent.

I don't think WG are trying to ruin the game. It's more about trying to please everybody and by doing so they mess it all up. The players don't really know what they want. ("Buff this." No, nerf it"!) I belive in "KISS" "Keep It Simple Stupid". WG should have stuck to the core of the game, i.e. ship vs. ship and not trying to fit too much into the game.

 

But again, just my two cents.

[Hanse77SWE]

4 minutes ago, Panocek said:

I'm pretty sure old RTS carriers with current CV popularity would be even less fun. Yes, they couldn't constantly harass, but had potential to delete something every 3-4min

My point exactly. It was bareable as long as the numbers were low.

[quickr]

1 minute ago, Hanse77SWE said:

I don't think WG are trying to ruin the game. It's more about trying to please everybody and by doing so they mess it all up. The players don't really know what they want. ("Buff this." No, nerf it"!) I belive in "KISS" "Keep It Simple Stupid". WG should have stuck to the core of the game, i.e. ship vs. ship and not trying to fit too much into the game.

 

But again, just my two cents.

I've already said it in other topic, WG is catering to 95% of the population, the casual ones if you like, shitting on 5% really passionate and dedicated players. From business point of view I guess it's the right call.

Players DO know what they want it's just there are so many players, each with it's own thoughts and opinions, it's a community not a hive mind.

[Panocek]

Just now, Hanse77SWE said:

My point exactly. It was bareable as long as the numbers were low.

Which finally started to bother WG as <2% players using one of 4 classes is kinda sign of imbalans

I'd argue RTS was perfectly salvageable instead having to come up with putting gameplay on its head and then sideways but whatever. WG doing WG things is a given

[MRGTB]

RTS CV play was generally boring. The new iteration is far more appealing to play CV now, seeing as you are actually in the main game mode view flying around and not spending it sat most of the time looking at the map screen and feeling completely disconnected from the game (compared to playing a normal ship). Which sums up what RTS CV play was, just boring as hell in map mode view all the time.

 

I reckon WG knew that was only going to appeal to a very small minority of people playing CV. Why it was vastly changed since to try and get far more people interested in playing CV.

[Mr_Snoww]

26 minutes ago, Hanse77SWE said:

Yes they are ships, but the active part is planes. I've seen CV-players that doesn't move the ship for the whole game. Is that still "Playing with a ship?" If we should remove the ship and let the planes take off from a landbase nothing would really change. The ships being attacked wouldn't notice anything different and the "CV-player" would still use his planes in the same way. So are you playing a ship or are you playing with planes? I'd say you are playing with planes and why are we doing that in a ship-game?

 

Again: It's not about "What is and isn't a ship." It's about "Is it fun?"

Well technically in the description of the game it is a game about battleships. That's literally what the website says when you search for it. So why are dds and cruisers in the game? 

Oh and sorry I forgot that old cv mains don't and never have mattered lol. We don't want to have fun at all. 

[Hanse77SWE]

5 minutes ago, Mr_Snoww said:

Well technically in the description of the game it is a game about battleships. That's literally what the website says when you search for it. So why are dds and cruisers in the game? 

Oh and sorry I forgot that old cv mains don't and never have mattered lol. We don't want to have fun at all. 

CV-players should have fun as well, but not at the expense of the rest of the game.

[Azalgor]

41 minutes ago, Hanse77SWE said:

I don't think WG are trying to ruin the game. It's more about trying to please everybody and by doing so they mess it all up.

And instead of fixing an issue with a scalper they use a hammer, thats the main problem. Instead of playing the game themselves to find and adress flaws to come up with multiple ideas for solutions, they use whines and cries of our less skilled playerbase and some fictional statistics. Supertesters get spit in the face more often, unjustified game changes where human factor is completely ignored.

 

[HystericalAccuracy]

2 hours ago, Hanse77SWE said:

The community has changed.

In the beginning there were mostly grown-ups with interest in naval warfare. They knew that ships are slow, take time to react and reload.

 

Nowadays we have many (let´s call them "kids") which are bored of all the other games they tried out at "some gaming-platform" and give Wows a try because why not. They want to buy their way to Bismarck or Yamato as fast as possible because at some point they saw a documentary about these ships with mega phatt gunns and wanna shoot stuff with ´em. At least their parent´s money keep the hamsters fed.

 

As a side effect we got speed boost on BBs and reload boosters with <20 sec reload on >400mm shells. Duh... And the upcoming Mogador-DDs will run ca 45kn while max speed on trials was 33kn, in service 30kn. This a-historical  is what bothers me second-most at this game.

 

The worst part are people who combine bad skill with bad manners. The FdG in my last game that run to line 10 instantly, sniped HE and called us "forking retaaded loser team" , eh.... it takes a toll on my moral. But that is something WG can´t change. Overall i try to see the changes as a challenge and enjoy the game but it becomes difficult.

 

i just hope that you @Hanse77SWE won´t leave the game before me because we need people like you 

[Gnirf]

11 minutes ago, drmajga said:

 

 

As a side effect we got speed boost on BBs and reload boosters with <20 sec reload on >400mm shells. Duh... And the upcoming Mogador-DDs will run ca 45kn while max speed on trials was 33kn, in service 30kn. This a-historical  is what bothers me second-most at this game.

 

43,45 kts on trials so why do you state 33 for Mogador?

[Krikkio82]

I agree with you. I have no fun anymore, sure I did many things and it cannot be fun forever but I think this CV rework is worst thing happened to WoWs ever. 
I hope WG are looking to improve a game like you and I like but I'm afraid they going in another direction and our days on this game are maybe over. Let's see. ATM I gave up playing. I can't take this sh*t anymore sorry.

[HystericalAccuracy]

Just now, Gnirf said:

why do you state 33 for Mogador?

You are right, that´s a hiccup on my side

 

Spoiler

 

Must have confused it with another DD in that line 

I remember that one of the FR-DDs runs over 10kn faster in-game than he could irl, but can´t remeber which one 

[Gnirf]

2 minutes ago, drmajga said:

You are right, that´s a hiccup on my side

 

  Hide contents

 

Must have confused it with another DD in that line 

I remember that one of the FR-DDs runs over 10kn faster in-game than he could irl, but can´t remeber which one 

Trials were often held at light condition with forced engines, but in general FR DDs held their speed, maybe some Italian Cruiser you are thinking of?

[thiextar]

The problem cv-wise is that they have no real counter, aa cruisers are supposed to be their counter, but even a fully aa-specced Minotaur cant stop a drop...

[Hanse77SWE]

5 minutes ago, thiextar said:

The problem cv-wise is that they have no real counter, aa cruisers are supposed to be their counter, but even a fully aa-specced Minotaur cant stop a drop...

AND the fact that you can't have a AA-cruiser by your side all the time. I don't know how many times I'm in a BB and the cruisers just takes of leaving me to the vultures. "Stick with the cruisers!" they say. But HTF can I do that when they are 8-10 kts. faster than me?