Another Instance of Arbitrariness to Struggle Against: of Wakeful, Lightning and for comparison Orkan

[Project45_Opytny]

I have to admit I was rather pro-developer until very recently. I play regularly and spend only a moderate (at least in my opinion) amount of real money on necessary investments: premium battle passes, dockyard stages and a few premium ships twice a year. When the Santa crate "short list" was unveiled I did not buy any (and would in fact accept Viribus Unitis or Vanguard due to historical values), and despite I spend for Tier VIII premiums the initially proposed alternate list that ignited the ongoing protest events still consists of some ships that interests me.

Yet two events today shocked me to the point of making this post. I love this game and it is a crime to allow this instance of arbitrariness, a blow to something even more fundamental than premium items, to slip away unnoticed. Thanks to the original poster from Baidu Tieba Chinese WoWS Community "maxp_share".

https://forum.korabli.su/

The first, the also Invision Community-powered official forum of the Russian-Belarusian Mir Korabli is well active, alive and kicking (and have someone lamenting over their possibly permanent separation from any further anime collabs). This reinforces speculation about the closure of official forums is to better silence playerbase complaints and the pro-players faction of the development team ended up in Russia (where they now offer Gascogne for 128000 coal). And the second one...

https://tieba.baidu.com/p/8561984074

There has been an unpublished, secret nerf on IV Wakeful and VIII Lightning early this year that significantly nerfed the ballistic performance of their 120-mm HE 62 lbs HE shells: now they are the same as the old 120-mm HE used by Acasta, Icarus, Gallant/Jurua, Jervis, Cossack, Gadjah Mada and Muavenet. Another case of interest is Stord that have her HE shell described as "120-mm HE 62 lbs" and now shares the same ballistic performance with the said old series. So far WG staff has been silent about this topic.

The newer 120-mm/50 QF Mk XI DP guns aboard Lightning used to have better ballistics comparing with most of her British peers thanks to heavier shell weight and lower drag coefficient, and how Wakeful enjoyed the same benefit is mysterious. Anyway, earlier this year they were nerfed without notice (and got caught red-handed thanks to attentive players sensing the difference). Besides the original post, the premium ship Orkan seems to also preserve what Lightning and Wakeful's HE shells should have been (minus an additional 50 damage per shell) thanks to the established taboo on nerfing older premium ships. There is even a claim that Fushun suffered a similar unpublished change (that similarly gutted her ballistic performance) much earlier.

The struggle have to be carried on!

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

FYI, this isn't the first time WG has made unpublished gameplay changes. (See 0.9.9 for changes to CV gameplay)

Is the change a good one?

There is no actual taboo on changing premiums. That is a playerbase self deception. WG has, in the past, changed individual premiums for a variety of reasons.

Any ship can be changed at any time for any reason.

The devblog does not contain a full list of game changes.

Furthermore, the devblog has been known to be used to mislead players as to WGs intent.

Caveat Emptor.

[Project45_Opytny]

7 minutes ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

Is the change a good one?

No. The shells now take more time to arrive on target and thus have become more difficult to use in destroyer knife-fights.

The change gutted a principal advantage Lightning had over premium ship Cossack and hasn't been published anywhere.

And such indifference has allowed these changes. Why shouldn't we take advantage of the ongoing events?

Edited August 21, 2023 by Project45_Opytny

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

37 minutes ago, Project45_Opytny said:

No. The shells now take more time to arrive on target and thus have become more difficult to use in destroyer knife-fights.

The change gutted a principal advantage Lightning had over premium ship Cossack and hasn't been published anywhere.

And such indifference has allowed these changes. Why shouldn't we take advantage of the ongoing events?

Sorry, I meant the change to Wakeful.

WG may have made the change as a 'bug fix's, which historically they have not documented exactly what they changed...yay, more bad communication.

[Frostbow]

54 minutes ago, Project45_Opytny said:

The first, the also Invision Community-powered official forum of the Russian-Belarusian Mir Korabli is well active, alive and kicking (and have someone lamenting over their possibly permanent separation from any further anime collabs).

😂

55 minutes ago, Project45_Opytny said:

This reinforces speculation about the closure of official forums is to better silence playerbase complaints and the pro-players faction of the development team ended up in Russia (where they now offer Gascogne for 128000 coal).

No longer mere speculation, but the unvarnished truth. 

Oh wow, Gascogne for 128,000 coal!

[Project45_Opytny]

15 minutes ago, Frostbow said:

No longer mere speculation, but the unvarnished truth. 

Oh wow, Gascogne for 128,000 coal!

Adding the evidence...

[Project45_Opytny]

55 minutes ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

Sorry, I meant the change to Wakeful.

WG may have made the change as a 'bug fix's, which historically they have not documented exactly what they changed...yay, more bad communication.

The HE ballistics of Wakeful was also nerfed. Previously they should be the same with Lightning and Orkan (and their AP shells) for some mysterious reasons.

[New_Jersey_prpr]

1 hour ago, Project45_Opytny said:

Adding the evidence...

I thought if T8 ships can be exchanged for coal it should be around 160k but the actual number is way lower

Just can't help myself getting jealous

[Verblonde]

18 minutes ago, New_Jersey_prpr said:

Just can't help myself getting jealous

FWIW - if memory serves - prices on the RU server (at least for WOT) always used to be lower. WG always used to pitch their prices at whatever the market would bear; I believe that the EU/NA servers in particular were viewed as particular cash cows in the old days.

Not sure what the current state of play is - I haven't looked recently.

[Project45_Opytny]

Just now, Verblonde said:

FWIW - if memory serves - prices on the RU server (at least for WOT) always used to be lower. WG always used to pitch their prices at whatever the market would bear; I believe that the EU/NA servers in particular were viewed as particular cash cows in the old days.

Not sure what the current state of play is - I haven't looked recently.

Talking about this, just prior to the 8th Anniversary affair, WG made a Global premium contents price adjustment (price increase) basing on something like a corrected calculation on currency exchange rates.

The CN server's premium shop itself survived intact, yet for many Chinese players playing in APAC/NA/EU this turns into like earning in China but consuming in Japan (the price of APAC region become the most expensive in fact after the changes).

And back to the topic, how can the playerbase get the original ballistics of Wakeful and Lightning back, considering the current state of affairs?

[Aragathor]

2 hours ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

FYI, this isn't the first time WG has made unpublished gameplay changes. (See 0.9.9 for changes to CV gameplay)

Is the change a good one?

There is no actual taboo on changing premiums. That is a playerbase self deception. WG has, in the past, changed individual premiums for a variety of reasons.

Any ship can be changed at any time for any reason.

The devblog does not contain a full list of game changes.

Furthermore, the devblog has been known to be used to mislead players as to WGs intent.

Caveat Emptor.

That's not true in the European Union. The laws of EU state that an item cannot be changed to the "detriment" of the buyer after the sale has been completed.

That's why WG had to create a disclaimer and change the sales contract to make any changes possible.

There's even a nifty list of ships they are allowed to nerf because of that - https://worldofwarships.eu/en/content/ships-to-which-balance-changes-may-be-applied/

That's one of the reasons Enterprise isn't being sold anymore, WG screwed up and now they cannot change it legally in EU.

 

The only reason is when they can document a change that is global, for example for the whole class or specific armament.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

21 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

That's not true in the European Union. The laws of EU state that an item cannot be changed to the "detriment" of the buyer after the sale has been completed.

That's why WG had to create a disclaimer and change the sales contract to make any changes possible.

There's even a nifty list of ships they are allowed to nerf because of that - https://worldofwarships.eu/en/content/ships-to-which-balance-changes-may-be-applied/

That's one of the reasons Enterprise isn't being sold anymore, WG screwed up and now they cannot change it legally in EU.

 

The only reason is when they can document a change that is global, for example for the whole class or specific armament.

0.9.9 changed some ships individually...like Graf Zeppelin, since the changes included changes to glide bombing...which at the time only impacted her.

So, if what you say is true, WG did not make that change legally...which may explain their lack of transparency.

I've often wondered what would happen if a court subpoena was to be made for internal WG documentation of some of these things...

...how fast would leadership be scurrying?

[Aragathor]

1 hour ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

0.9.9 changed some ships individually...like Graf Zeppelin, since the changes included changes to glide bombing...which at the time only impacted her.

So, if what you say is true, WG did not make that change legally...which may explain their lack of transparency.

I've often wondered what would happen if a court subpoena was to be made for internal WG documentation of some of these things...

...how fast would leadership be scurrying?

Was this listed in the patch notes? The only thing I see around 0.9.9 is a global change to attack aircraft.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

13 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

Was this listed in the patch notes? The only thing I see around 0.9.9 is a global change to attack aircraft.

No. It was not listed in the patch notes, that was the scandal.

WG then promised it would be...and then did nothing and banned anyone asking questions about it.

[Aragathor]

3 minutes ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

No. It was not listed in the patch notes, that was the scandal.

WG then promised it would be...and then did nothing and banned anyone asking questions about it.

Then it would clearly be a violation. But the proof will be soon deleted with the forums from what I see.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

4 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

Then it would clearly be a violation. But the proof will be soon deleted with the forums from what I see.

The proof was already deleted from the forums.

You would need to search out the CV videos exposing the change...then know that the official WG statements that remain are lies.