how to smoke, rn cl workaround

[TheRonson]

The smoke is irregular though, split second differences means you don't always get the same result which lay's you bare for a good old pasting.

I found the best way to fix the problems such as Smoke, Awful Ballistic arc, to easy to damage,  all these exist with the Edinburgh & the Neptune.

Just Bin them both, there is very little fun or enjoyment to be had and no credits to be made, all they do is drive you away from the game. 

 

[MrWastee]

great tests, thx !

 

just a sidenote regarding any uncertainties on the mechanic: that hard reverse from around 20kts yet worked for me on every rn cl since leander up to neptune, so to deploy 2 puffs and not drift out.

[RobS80]

If somebody got the old smoke boundaries mod active (the one that highlights the smoke circle you're in), than a more accurate measurement would be possible.

 

 

Just a note, they are in vanilla now, in settings.

[Allied_Winter]

The thing is though, testing with non constant speeds (other than Full, 3/4, 1/2, 1/4) is rather difficult. It could be though, that the 3/4 of the Leander was just a tad too fast.

 

@RobS80: I know that we have "Show smoke screen boundaries". But I didn't know where to set, that it highlights the one you're currently in?

 

 

Greetings

[RobS80]

 

@RobS80: I know that we have "Show smoke screen boundaries". But I didn't know where to set, that it highlights the one you're currently in?

 

 

It shows the edge of all available smoke (however many puffs). From my experience of moving around in them, you wont be spotted until over half of your ship crosses the line.

[Allied_Winter]

 

It shows the edge of all available smoke (however many puffs). From my experience of moving around in them, you wont be spotted until over half of your ship crosses the line.

 

True! But the old mod, showed each individual circle, and highlighted the one you were currently in (it was green). See the NA forum for this: http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/82122-smoke-boundary-mod0581created-by-wglast-and-final-update-714/

 

 

Greetings

[EdiJo]

 

Yeahhhh NOT!

 

I know you that this issue is rather critical, but: Going 12.5kts has been (since the rework of smoke in patch ... 0.5.6?? or was it 0.5.7) and currently still is the way to lay smoke, while moving and staying concealed at the same time. You move with the boundary of your smoke.

 

[..]

The QnA today made a few things clear:

• Smoke works as intended for speeds up to 12.5kts!
• What we refer to as 'rule for n puffs' is simple the outcome of smoke generator timer and speed. Hence it's for the devs correct to negate any 'rule for puffs'. But this makes it less intuitive for the players
• At any speeds above 12.5 you're not concealed. At least that seems to be a tested value if Sub_Octavian gives us this value over and over. Apparently for the devs it is logical, that if you're not concealed, it doesn't matter how many puffs are generated. This has never been a problem since the smoke generator time for other ships was allways long enough to activate the smoke and then starte braking. With the short generator time for RN smokes this design became obvious
• I know we like to refer to this thing as bug, BUT (and this is a big one) if you want a bug to be fixed, there has to be a bug! Apparently the software does what it should (hence no bug), but we don't like it (deign is bad). If we stick to that wording (or as I did with "poorly designed"), than the devs recognize that there is a problem with the feature!

 

Greetings

 

Geez. 

1) what is the smoke (laying) timer for, if the smoke finishes emitting before the timer expires?

2) speed during laying the smoke should have nothing to do with being smoked up after stopping or not, unless of course you can't stop AFTER timer expires and you glide out of correctly set smoke area.

3) being concealed during smoking is TOTALLY DIFFERENT MATTER, and has NOTHING to do with smoke emitting ending too soon, leaving the cruiser to die exposed & stopped.

 

Of course it is a bug. It is like brakes in your car would really activate only if you go between 20 and 23km/h, not when you press the pedal. Or brakes would release themselves, according to some hidden pattern, even before you stopped pressing the pedal. You have 7s of smoking in the specification, so if you stop before 7th second you HAVE to be in the smoke, isn't that obvious? 

 

Currently you often stay stopped like an idiot in the open water, shot by everyone and their sisters, looking back at this sad single little smoke circle some 50m from your ship, and only after a while you hear "smoke set" - which sounds like a bad joke at this moment. 

 

The bug is introduced by the design of the battlefield (discrete cells), by the time granularity in the game, and by the "smoke design" which is supposed to go in discrete "puffs".

And the solution is very simple: add the last one puff after the timer expires. Problem solved. 

[Allied_Winter]

 

Geez. 

1) what is the smoke timer for, if the smoke finishes emitting before the timer expires?

2) speed should have nothing to do with being smoked up or not, unless of course you can't stop AFTER timer expires and you glide out of correctly set smoke area.

3) being concealed during smoking is TOTALLY DIFFERENT MATTER, and has NOTHING to do with smoke emitting ending too soon, leaving the cruiser to die exposed & stopped.

 

Of course it is a bug. It is like brakes in your car would really activate only if you go between 20 and 23km/h, not when you press the pedal. Or brakes would release themselves, even before you stopped pressing the pedal. You have 7s of smoking in the specification, so if you stop before 7th second you HAVE to be in smoke, isn't that obvious?

 

The bug is introduced by the design of the battlefield (discrete cells), by the time granularity in the game, and by the "smoke design" which is supposed to go in discrete "puffs".

And the solution is very simple: add the last one puff after the timer expires. Problem solved. 

 

1. The smoke generator time is the time the generator emits smoke.

 

2. You're right, it shouldn't, but unfortunately according to the devs it currently does!

 

3. Apparently not, otherwise the devs wouldn't point with their finger on the concealed/not concealed part of smoking up everytime we ask them about it.

 

 

Look, I know it's frustrating and adding a puff simple at (in this case the 7th) and last second of the smoke timer this would be an equally perfect and quick solution like the one I proposed. And sure you should be in smoke at the last second (if you have a speed that allows you to stop within 7s), but atm it's just not the case. BUT: According to the devs, the software was programmed to do that (so no bug on the software side). That we don't like the effects this causes on the battlefiled is (from a dev point of view) a different issue. Usually those in Community Management should be able to translate our issues (press 'smoke', press 'S' four times, stop inside smoke) into dev speak. For whatever reasons this is not happening (or at least I don't see no such things happen).

So I dig back into my experience of working with devs and translate the issue myself on a direct way to at least one dev (via reddit, unfortunately). 

 

AND: Apparently Sub_Octavian recognized also, that the way smoke is currently implemented with the RN CLs isn't what we wanted! As said above I forwarded Cpt_Andre's requirement to him. There's not much more we can do, but if we keep saying it's a bug, then the devs don't understand what we're upset about, because to the software does what it should.

 

Maybe this example can help: The devs think of a programm to add to numbers together --> RAND + RAND = X. This program works. However we'd like the outcome to be always X < 10. The program isn't buggy, because it adds perfectly. But we have to raise the issue, that RAND has to be RAND [0 .. 5]. And yes, this shouldn't be our concern either. For us it shouldn't matter, what we call it, WG should recognize our problem with it (the smoke) and act upon it. But as said, I don't see such things happening.

 

 

 

 

Greetings

[EdiJo]

 

1. The smoke generator time is the time the generator emits smoke.

 

2. You're right, it shouldn't, but unfortunately according to the devs it currently does!

 

3. Apparently not, otherwise the devs wouldn't point with their finger on the concealed/not concealed part of smoking up everytime we ask them about it.

 

 

Look, I know it's frustrating and adding a puff simple at (in this case the 7th) and last second of the smoke timer this would be an equally perfect and quick solution like the one I proposed. And sure you should be in smoke at the last second (if you have a speed that allows you to stop within 7s), but atm it's just not the case. BUT: According to the devs, the software was programmed to do that (so no bug on the software side). That we don't like the effects this causes on the battlefiled is (from a dev point of view) a different issue. Usually those in Community Management should be able to translate our issues (press 'smoke', press 'S' four times, stop inside smoke) into dev speak. For whatever reasons this is not happening (or at least I don't see no such things happen).

So I dig back into my experience of working with devs and translate the issue myself on a direct way to at least one dev (via reddit, unfortunately). 

 

AND: Apparently Sub_Octavian recognized also, that the way smoke is currently implemented with the RN CLs isn't what we wanted! As said above I forwarded Cpt_Andre's requirement to him. There's not much more we can do, but if we keep saying it's a bug, then the devs don't understand what we're upset about, because to the software does what it should.

 

Maybe this example can help: The devs think of a programm to add to numbers together --> RAND + RAND = X. This program works. However we'd like the outcome to be always X < 10. The program isn't buggy, because it adds perfectly. But we have to raise the issue, that RAND has to be RAND [0 .. 5]. And yes, this shouldn't be our concern either. For us it shouldn't matter, what we call it, WG should recognize our problem with it (the smoke) and act upon it. But as said, I don't see such things happening.

 

 

 

 

Greetings

 

The programmer should think that way:

 

* you have specification: smoke generation timer gives the time span of laying the smoke. Smoke should be emitted until timer expires.

 

And the program should be written according to that specification. Not the specification adjusted to some peculiar behavior of the program.

Solution is simple, and should be just implemented. Add that one bloody puff after timer expires, end of story. I don't understand that "dev's resistance".

 

EVERYBODY tells them the smoke does not work as expected: YT videos, long forum threads, reddit articles - yet they close their eyes and keep telling it is a feature.

Someone is wrong here...

[Allied_Winter]

 

The programmer should think that way:

 

* you have specification: smoke generation timer gives the time span of laying the smoke. Smoke should be emitted until timer expires.

 

Agree 100%. But the devs thought otherwise (for reason probably forever unknown to us).

 

Maybe there was a different specification or (what seems more plausible to me) when the mechanic was implemented nobody thought of the mismatch at the end of the smoke timer. And look no problems (although it's repeatable) with DDs or the Kutuzov whose smoke run quite long (18 - 25s). And when the RN CLs came, either it wasn't thought of, or some said, that it wouldn't be an issue. 

 

It is an issue, but you can't demand the devs to sell out their colleague (iEarlGrey calls him Bob). Unfortunately, because many would like to have a few words with Bob.

 

 

So, what does that leave us with: Trying to point out what's wrong with this smoke. And it appears to be the first step has been taken, the devs have recognized that something is off.

 

 

Greetings

[EdiJo]

 

Agree 100%. But the devs thought otherwise (for reason probably forever unknown to us).

 

Maybe there was a different specification or (what seems more plausible to me) when the mechanic was implemented nobody thought of the mismatch at the end of the smoke timer. And look no problems (although it's repeatable) with DDs or the Kutuzov whose smoke run quite long (18 - 25s). And when the RN CLs came, either it wasn't thought of, or some said, that it wouldn't be an issue. 

 

It is an issue, but you can't demand the devs to sell out their colleague (iEarlGrey calls him Bob). Unfortunately, because many would like to have a few words with Bob.

 

 

So, what does that leave us with: Trying to point out what's wrong with this smoke. And it appears to be the first step has been taken, the devs have recognized that something is off.

 

 

Greetings

 

I don't want Bob's head. I want my smoke to work as expected, and not finish suddenly & randomly (or semi-randomly) before I stop. 

Devs should fix their software so it agrees with the definition of "smoke generating time". 

 

Changing the specification to "To get the proper smoke, you have to go at 12.345 knots, turn 37 deg left, and the Moon must be full" is not the solution, sorry 

[Allied_Winter]

 

Devs should fix their software so it agrees with the definition of "smoke generating time". 

 

Changing the specification to "To get the proper smoke, you have to go at 12.345 knots, turn 37 deg left, and the Moon must be full" is not the solution, sorry 

 

The problem is, that we don't know the devs definition, so it could be possible, that your (and mine, and the whole playerbase's) definition is different from the devs. Would be bad, but could happen. Wouldn't be the first time, that devs implement something, that all customers don't like ("Yes Microsoft I'm looking at you!")

 

And for the specification for proper smoke: The last time this was changed was in patch 0.5.9 (read here), so they announced way before the arrival of the RN CLs that if you want to stay concealed while moving you have to drop your speed to 12.5kts. It was this patch where blinking while laying smoke was patched out, so we knew that magic number for 6 months now...

 

 

Greetings

[Bladezfist]

 

The problem is, that we don't know the devs definition, so it could be possible, that your (and mine, and the whole playerbase's) definition is different from the devs. Would be bad, but could happen. Wouldn't be the first time, that devs implement something, that all customers don't like ("Yes Microsoft I'm looking at you!")

 

And for the specification for proper smoke: The last time this was changed was in patch 0.5.9 (read here), so they announced way before the arrival of the RN CLs that if you want to stay concealed while moving you have to drop your speed to 12.5kts. It was this patch where blinking while laying smoke was patched out, so we knew that magic number for 6 months now...

 

 

Greetings

 

Still not convinced that number has any real meaning. Would rather them show us the algorithm.

[EdiJo]

 

And for the specification for proper smoke: The last time this was changed was in patch 0.5.9 (read here), so they announced way before the arrival of the RN CLs that if you want to stay concealed while moving you have to drop your speed to 12.5kts. It was this patch where blinking while laying smoke was patched out, so we knew that magic number for 6 months now...

 

Omg. We are NOT talking about staying concealed while laying the smoke. We are talking about smoke not emitting anymore while "generating timer" still counts.

I don't care about being visible while laying the smoke. But it is a big no-no if I stop, my smoking timer is still at <7 seconds, and the smoke does not appear! 

 

Once again. Issue of "12.5kn when laying the smoke" is totally separate from "timer still at less than 7 seconds and smoke finished puffing long ago".

[MrWastee]

 

Omg. We are NOT talking about staying concealed while laying the smoke. We are talking about smoke not emitting anymore while "generating timer" still counts.

I don't care about being visible while laying the smoke. But it is a big no-no if I stop, my smoking timer is still at <7 seconds, and the smoke does not appear! 

 

Once again. Issue of "12.5kn when laying the smoke" is totally separate from "timer still at less than 7 seconds and smoke finished puffing long ago".

 

while i have no clue if u get 2 puffs when goin on 12.5kts, i gotta 2nd this.

[Allied_Winter]

 

Still not convinced that number has any real meaning. Would rather them show us the algorithm.

 

Probably never going to happen, but yeah would be nice.

 

 

Omg. We are NOT talking about staying concealed while laying the smoke. We are talking about smoke not emitting anymore while "generating timer" still counts.

I don't care about being visible while laying the smoke. But it is a big no-no if I stop, my smoking timer is still at <7 seconds, and the smoke does not appear! 

 

Once again. Issue of "12.5kn when laying the smoke" is totally separate from "timer still at less than 7 seconds and smoke finished puffing long ago".

 

True these are two different issues, but the former is the one, the devs thought we talk about since the RN CLs were released. That's why the answer was always the same. The later issue (timer still at less than 7 seconds and smoke finished puffing long ago) has been probably been in the code for long enough or I don't know. And I do not care since how long it has been there. The only thing that matters is how to make it clear to the devs, that the later issue is far more important to us players. 

 

Hence we need a way to show them what we're not satisfied with! Nothing else I'm trying to show here. Code works for issue one. Issue two and code apparently don't match up (and appart from the players) obviously the devs, never thought that this would be an issue.

 

 

 

Greetings

[EdiJo]

 

while i have no clue if u get 2 puffs when goin on 12.5kts, i gotta 2nd this.

 

it shouldn't matter how fast you go, if only you are able to stop before "generating timer" finishes. Sure, some weird recipes work, but it is a bug that it doesn't work ALWAYS.

I understand that the bug may be connected to the "puffing mechanism", but discrete puffs when laying the smoke were in the specification, and finishing smoking before timer expired was not (at least 99.9% users understand it this way).

[Deckeru_Maiku]

Solution: Given above, prolonging the smoke timer by 1 or 1.5s. In Scenario 4 even a 0.5s longer smoke generator would've deployed a second puff. Although I didn't know if I would've been able to slow down to full stop within the second puff.

 

 

For me, a solution would look more like this:

 

Press button. Short time later the first smoke puff appears. Independent of my speed, postion in or out of smoke, possible overlap of smoke puffs, moon phase or whatever, a couple seconds later a second smoke puff is produced.

 

Expected Result: when I'm too fast, I drive through both smoke puffs (which may or may not overlap depending on my speed) and stay visible to the enemy. When I slow down enough, I end up stopping in (hopefully overlapping) smoke (pufs) and invisible to enemies.

[Dominico]

In Belfast travwlkng half soeed while in reverse setting is enogh to safely pop smoke and stop in it consistantly. I never gave problems. Turning also seems to help to slow you down.

 

At full speed it always seems to drop 2 as i use this to cover a retreat often.

[159Hunter]

Why are we still discussing the fact that speed interferes with a second puff?

Kutuzov, US DD and IJN DD get puffs no matter what their speed is. The only thing the speed defines is if the puff conceals you or not. So why on earth should this be any different on UK cruisers?

It's a bug. As Flamu clearly demonstrated in his latest Minotaur video and as I get from time to time in my UK ships as well ( the notion being; from time to time => bug ). And usually it results in your ship taking tons of useless damage because of some error in programming. If WG doesn't know what exactly is causing the bug: fine, can live with that. But than say exactly that, don't come up with some useless 'this is a special feature for experienced players'. Flamu ( who I consider a super unicum player ) even manages to have this one twice in one game.When slowing down and what not. It's a bug and WG is clueless as to what is causing it. End of story.
 

[Stugga]

All kidding or raging aside, can we have an official response whether the smoke puffs is a bug or works as intended so as to take a decision whether to leave our RN cruisers on standby and play them later when this is fixed (if it's a bug) or abandon RN cruisers altogether or decide to play them as is (if it works as intended)?

 

Just one response to the playerbase, that's all.

[MrWastee]

Why are we still discussing the fact that speed interferes with a second puff?

Kutuzov, US DD and IJN DD get puffs no matter what their speed is. The only thing the speed defines is if the puff conceals you or not. So why on earth should this be any different on UK cruisers?

It's a bug. As Flamu clearly demonstrated in his latest Minotaur video and as I get from time to time in my UK ships as well ( the notion being; from time to time => bug ). And usually it results in your ship taking tons of useless damage because of some error in programming. If WG doesn't know what exactly is causing the bug: fine, can live with that. But than say exactly that, don't come up with some useless 'this is a special feature for experienced players'. Flamu ( who I consider a super unicum player ) even manages to have this one twice in one game.When slowing down and what not. It's a bug and WG is clueless as to what is causing it. End of story.
 

 

 

i see there's something weird about it. not watched the vid, but anyway. though i can say, that whenever i've been within that 2kts range around 20 kts, on full reverse, it worked with 2 puffs and not seemed buggy at least to me. outside that bracket it always ways kinda weird and seemed buggy for sure.

[159Hunter]

 

 

i see there's something weird about it. not watched the vid, but anyway. though i can say, that whenever i've been within that 2kts range around 20 kts, on full reverse, it worked with 2 puffs and not seemed buggy at least to me. outside that bracket it always ways kinda weird and seemed buggy for sure.

 

I strongly advise you to watch the movie. For all I care you turn of the sound so Flamus' opinion won't influence you

 

 

[RogDodgeUK]

closed at OP's request