In a game about tanks that fire big guns in an intense battle settings, we surely get A LOT of precise sound clues.
A lot of people think it’s fine.
I don’t.
Here’s why:
in WT we have a ton of situations, where frontal engagement is a suicide. F.e. early T-34-85 vs 75mm Jumbo. T-34 dies easily, as Jumbo has better gun handling, frontal armor that only has small weakspots and a stabiliser.
So, what does T-34 do?
Once M4A3E2 is spotted and egaging his team, he drives around city streets to shoot jumbo in the…
face?
As Jumbo is already aiming at the street corner T-34-85 is about to appear.
Said Jumbo also knows his back is safe, as he doesn’t hear enemy approaching from that direction.
He is impossible to flank, even if we both attacked at once, one of us would most likely get shot.
Said Jumbo even knows what type of tank is approaching and how fast.
Same applies to any other tank that has to be flanked to be killed.
If the player in said tank has headphones, GL HF.
Since I’ve stopped listening Youtube podcasts, I went from absolute vegetable to this:
Mind you, I still suck and I only play WW2, but that’s beside the point, as before I also got clobbered at WW2.
Thing is, sound gives you enemy position, tank types, information on their movement and speed, and even if they are climbing/kinda stuck, or doing fine.
This is a RIDICULOUS amount of information.
What do good players do with this information?
Corner camp of course. Basically 9 out of 10 times, stopping and aiming is the best idea. If you’re not moving, enemy will take more time to react.
So, essentialy, sound scouting murders maneuver warfare in some areas, or even on some maps.
But it’s not only that.
It’s random.
When it comes to sight, you know everyone’s looking.
But sound?
75% of players will not notice, as they have normal sound settings.
25% of players will hear you through 200m of concrete while under artillery barrage.
And there’s nothing you can do other than NOT MOVE.
See the pattern?
Sound scouting is a counter to the movement.
Sound scouting can only be denied by not moving.
but also getting sound scouted is a fairly random occurence (you can’t predict if you’ll get sound scouted unless you know what player exactly you’re trying to flank), so you can’t really assume you’ll get sound scouted either.
In FPS games you can prevent getting sound scouted by just moving slower, “flanking” but at lower pace.
No such luck in WT.
Artillery won’t stop people from sound scouting.
MG fire will not.
Getting clobbered by a goddamn autocannon while firing your own will not.
It’s NOT immersive.
It’s NOT realistic.
And the ONLY thing it achieves is giving a boost to players who, in certain match, are already doing good. You simply can’t flank them, so if they are in a superior vehicle, GL HF.
The answer to such players is CAS. How lovely…
Now, on the realism part:
imagine you’re in a warzone, infantry (which should be a part of WT soundscape at least!) is firing almost non-stop, grenades artillery, mortars, tank engines, and you are trying to “sound scout” from behind a few cm of steel.
GLHF
But lets say you open the hatch, OK, you’re letting all that noise in, once you fire your gun, you can’t hear anything.
Sound scouting IRL does not work.
Also, lets even imagine you’re in a city, nothing is happening for some reason and tank is driving 90m away, that is, there is a street and 2 rows of buildings in-between you and the tank.
90m is way less than WT sound scouting.
Do you HONESTLY think you’ll be able to tell the direction with the noise of the engine getting reflected by all the walls around you?
IMO sound scouting should be nerfed to the ground.
You should be able to tell that something is driving around, but neither WHAT nor where it is with any degree of certainty.
This would make the game more dynamic, would stop players from going solo vs the world (as they would no longer be able to provide a full 360 degree informational coverage within 150-200m circle), or at least make them less effective.
This would most likely at least partially increase teamplay and importance of scouting. Maybe some other mechanic (“scout the enemy” that only works for 10s, instead of half an hour, for everyone) that could simulate real life information exchange between tank crew.
I know you guys will hate me for this, but seriously, why the hell can’t I drive around an enemy and shoot him in the back, like people did IRL? In WT if the player is of any quality, he’ll always be able to tell which direction I’m coming from. This basically means every tank in game behaves like it’s fed info from a drone. Yeah, my immersion during WW2 gameplay skyrockets.
