After some experience in WT Mobile, I really doubt that subs can be easily added to the game. While I think that they won’t be as problematic in PC version I think we can easily see big balance issues which will transfer.
Currently in WTM the submarines are extremely frustrating to play against especially in anything bigger than DD. Even though all ships can equip sonar and DC the issue is that larger ship lacks agility to chase subs and avoid torpedoes at the same time. This will be even worse in PC version since larger ship simply don’t have access to DCs and the bombs carried on hydroplanes is insufficient.
And DDs really aren’t answer because the chasing subs equals suicide by bigger ships.
I am well aware that the speeds of ships and subs especially are artificialy increased which won’t be the case in normal WT but that won’t solve the issue. As long as we have cap points there is well marked area where subs can wait for larger ships. And I really doubt the subs would get big fleet spawns instead of something closer.
Another thing is gyro steering torpedoes which is present in WTM and currently isn’t in game, but that is something which subs had in WW2 so it can appear in WT. And even if it didn’t it would matter only against smaller ships since against larger targets the sub agility is good enough to set up ambushes. Especially when in PC version the CL/BB won’t know about the sub.
Considering all this I believe that implementing subs into current gamemodes is really really bad idea. But I can see them added if we get better convoy mode.
I’ve been dabbling in naval battles and the main problem with them, as I see it, is the game mode itself. Yes there are tons of other problems with the naval side of the game, but with just the game’s current assets and mechanics, I think that Gaijin could make a fun game mode. I think that only gets easier if you add submarines to the mix, because it allows for more diversity in game objectives and it helps destroyers find a reason to exist when there are bigger ships in play.
Anyone interested in even semi-realistic naval battles, however, needs to be willing to play long matches. Something like air sim with 3h matches that you can join/leave at any time would be ideal. “Realistic” and “quickplay” are incompatible when it comes to navies. If you want fast matches you’ve got to gamify everything like World of Warships. War Thunder doesn’t want to do that, so everyone needs to be willing to commit to bigger, longer, slower, objective-driven gameplay.
They could add anachronistic Air-launched torpedos or ASW rockets(e.g. 5" Mk 34 Mod 0; an alternate ASW warhead to a HVAR) to appropriate BR airframes to account for this, or introduce pattern running or homing guidance for ASW duties.
I would agree, I have no problems with subs if they are added together with expanded convoy and other AI objectives so DD and other ships can have proper use in battles with BBs.
But I think that simply adding submarines into current objectives and expecting DDs to properly counter them is silly and wont work.
I would say that duration around 3 hours is too much in anything but EC event format the amount of people willing to play in such way is way too low. But I think times around 1 hour could allow semi-realistic gameplay and wouldn´t be so problematic but I still think that for AB even such times are in the eyes of most players and gaijin unacceptable.
But yes trying make NF fast paced like GF is bad decision which wont work.
The issue is that there are a lot of ships which dont have acces to ASW equipment on the planes, moreover most don´t have acces to sonar/hydrophones so they are mostly blind. And same applies to DDs and the ASW torpedoes.
You don’t have to play the whole 3 hours and if they’d allow you to pick an ongoing game, as you can in Air EC, you could always jump straight in, play as long as you want and then leave. Even better, maybe they’d create true persistent game world lobbies on a large map where the action carries on 24/7. There could be areas where both sides have a port/spawn, allowing for instant action if you only had 30 mins spare, and other more open areas allowing room for extended patrolling, surprise attacks on rear areas, extended high-seas action between fleets of big ships or anything you can think of to fill a whole afternoon or evening. Add in some airfields and larger islands where ground forces can battle, either in amphibious ops with naval interaction or inland beyond the reach of naval forces.
But you’d need some imagination and vision to create such a game mode and we’re stuck with Gaijin, so ‘more paper stuff and prototypes’ going head-to-head in 25-min death matches fighting over meaningless cap zones and if we can sell some premium subs we’ll throw them in too. Who cares if they work?
This post is for people who recently discovered naval WT and came from the other ship game where subs apparently have a bit of a balancing issue.
I never really tested this game, so i decided to check out some replay action from submarines.
Assuming the subs implemented by gaijin are as close as reality as it gets (which they’ll probably do), the list of difference between “the other ship game” (i’ll refer to it as TOSG for short) submarines and war thunder submarines are probably going to be as follow :
speed : in reality, ww2 submarines would be limited to 30-40 km/h on the surface and around 15-25 underwater (slower than battleships), in TOSG, they can go as fast as 55-60 km/h, on the surface or submerged.
sonar : ww2 submarines only used passive hydrophones to get a bearing of enemy ships surrounding them. They could also get a rough idea of their distance using the intensity of the signal heard and some basic geometry while in TOSG, they are apparently equipped with some active sonar to guide torpedoes, talking of which :
torpedoes : this is where it goes a little wild. In TOSG torpedoes can be guided (which didn’t exist during WW2 except for some german torps, but their guidance wasn’t that reliable). I also noticed they tend to go really fast in that game. So fast in fact, that they almost are as fast as some anti tank missile present in war thunder (>500 km/h) Oo. Torps during WW2 would usually run at around 75 km/h, more or less. Even modern torps don’t run that fast. The fastest guided torp to my knowledge is spearfish, with public figures giving it a ~150 km/h. Even the supercavitating russian one “only” goes ~350 km/h per public figures too, nevermind 500.
battery : one artifitial limitation in the other ship game is battery management. Considering a real sub would be able to run for several hours underwater, i don’t think we will see such a mechanic in war thunder, especially when this is counterbalanced by all the negative points stated above.
noise : in TOSG, there is apparently no malus on spotting distance depending on the speed of the submarine, while IRL, a submarine going fast will be easier to detect.
engagement rules : subs in TOSG can fire torps when submerged. While it works for modern submarines, ww2 subs would have to be surfaced or at periscope depth to do such a thing
With all that in mind, i think subs in WT are going to be just fine, and, dare i say maybe even a bit underpowered (at least the WW2 ones). Since they are so slow, and since they can barely keep up with battleships, i think they will require patience and some skill (how to set up an ambush for example).
In terms of balance, I believe there will be a huge difference in the power of subs between AB and RB.
Since the main way of dealing damage with subs is their torpedoes, which reload infinitely in AB but not in RB. That’s present to some extent with destroyers, but DDs have a decent amount of guns and are very fragile and vulnerable, so they can’t linger next to a spawn and launch torps even in AB.
Subs on the other hand might be great at spawncamping, launching torpedoes periodically and diving to avoid detection/damage.
There are some assumptions at play here, such as that submarines would reliably be able to reach a position where they can fire torpedoes unobstructed at the other team 's spawn at such a time in the match when players would still be respawning into the spread, and the idea that submarines will certainly be able to use AB reload mechanics while submerged.
while waiting for subs, i tried to do submarine exploration, just to check how the depths are currently modelled in the game
I just did some modifications on the very good u216 user mission made by polaska, you can find it at this link : WT Live // Model by Polaska001
Just changed the map to midway, and somewhat tuned my submarine (it can go 320 kph and can dive 1000m, making it easier to explore)
The luminosity under water seems somewhat correct, since it was already dark at 680m, but with some residual light (and it should be complete darkness once you reach 1000m)
Undersea terrain and bathymetry does not always correspond to what is displayed on the map however. I only tested Midway and Fiji. Midway was quite accurate, while Fiji wasn’t.
The terrain is quite simple (just like the terrain on an air rb map, quite angulous and not detailed), but overall it’s quite fine.
The new year (2024) blog had a christmas tree with a few toy-like decorations.
One was a plane, an other a tank, and interestingly the last one was a submarine. Considering all the testing done in November, i really wouldn’t be surprised if the first subs come this year
So now we just got to merge the 2… Sub launched Antiship missiles when ? :P
