The New Damage Control Mechanic for Naval

Official News, Development Blogs and Updates
85

Who is blaming anyone for anything? Gaijin implemented a mechanic 5-6 years ago which is being used in ways they don’t intend and making the game less rewarding to play. No blame.

And when your parents told you it was for your own good to go to sleep at night; Did they not mean it? Were they wrong?

If you read the thread you’ll notice that actual, mature discussion around options and their feasibility has occured. You have not evidence to suggest that these changes aren’t prompted by players in the first place. Would it not be natural to suspect that the Naval players who enjoy the unintended mechanic will be very vocal about it, were those who left because of it will not be around to notice the new changes coming in?

All of your arguments mis-represent the situation to one degree or another in order to make your point sound more rational or correct than it otherwise would be; i.e. Strawman-ing

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86

I’m a Bluewater GB main, I just got the squadron SKR a while back and used it a lot for events Actually I just enjoy Naval generally, especially missile and rocket boats, of which Russia have many in game - Imagine lunging for ad hominim after being accused of Strawman-ing

87

We don’t repair modules because we are busy prioritizing fire fighting so we don’t magically blow up from an AA gun fire spread into the ammo hold in 7 seconds.

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88

That’s true of people who actually repair, but some people leave the AA-guns destroyed so that there is less fire-risk and to act like spaced armour for other components. This change isn’t stopping your from fighting fires and in fact helps you to do so without compromising other repairs. What do you think this change does?

89

Who is blaming anyone for anything? Gaijin implemented a mechanic 5-6 years ago which is being used in ways they don’t intend and making the game less rewarding to play. No blame.

Yeah they definitely couldn’t fix this in these 6 YEARS of naval, to address it only now.

The only reason this change is here is to make ships across the board live less. Under heavy bot HE spam even the heaviest battleship will now die in 5 - 10 minutes without its armor being penetrated at all.

The only thing it will do (except for destroying any interest in playing) is make people get less rewards from battles.

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90

I think this mechanic will completely ruin DD and PT boats

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91

I understand that conspiratorial thinking is part and parcel of being on the internet, but the changes in the type of ship we’ve seen over the past 5-6 years and think about if that may have something to do with the changes coming now?

92

Yeah be ready to live for 1 minute. Anything more is reserved for battleships now, they will live for the whole 5 minutes.

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93

I worry about that too, especially after the changes they made allowing for hull-break in PT boats.

94

Pretty sure this change is aimed at BBs and Heavy Cruisers and will likely affect their survivability more

95

You said so yourself here

96

I mean, if they tried to fix damage control FOR 6 YEARS system by NOT TOUCHING damage control system, I am not sure how the game is still afloat. I mean, it does sound like gaijin’s work but even that’s too much.

And even if it’s like that, why are all the previous changes to survivability not being reverted? Where is the removal of hull sections destruction with automatic sinking after that?

97

its also a exploit to drive away from a arty strike which prevents the player which commands the arty from its success… sarcasm off

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98

They messed with flooding, compartments, crew, fire spreading. You name it, they’ve tried to make changes to it. It’s only now that they’re trying to tweak the player interactions with the mechanic that anyone seems to be noticing.

Just because you didn’t see the changes didn’t mean they didn’t happen.

And idk why, maybe ask?

N.B.
I’m going for dinner w some family now.
Try to give actionable feedback please, then they might take you seriously.
And instead of assuming things about Gaijin’s decisions/process, just ask. You might not agree with their logic, but you’re far more likely to get a good answer if you’re polite and reasonable instead of just moaning and going “No, I don’t like it”.

P.N.B.S.
Sorry if that came off as condescending, I’m just tired of people treating people online like they’re faceless demons; as much as it pains me to say - Mods and Devs are people too

100

Could I suggest to balance it out we have a toggle included to unman decks guns like AA and auxileries? If there isnt an immediate air threat your not going to have all your deck ghuns manned while undergoing enemy ship fire. a toggle to unman them would effectively turn off the auto AA and secondary protection as a trade off for managing crew lost unnecessarily and the downside of auto repair becomes irrelevant.

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101

5 minutes? Dream on! 1:48 Don’t you want to?

Spoiler

https://youtu.be/RWVoBYyCI4c

And that’s if we deliberately delay the repair as much as possible with the new system!

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102

But you do understand that engaging a critically damaged ship is much easier because

so it is way easier to hit follow up shots to critical components or outright ignore it and let bots or whatever finish it off and focus on more dangerous threats? And its not that getting kills in naval isn’t completely random to begin with cause you can set the elevators of an enemy ship on fire and if any bot hits it with some random he shell dealing 0 damage before he explodes the bot gets awarded the kill which happens all the time (in goddam naval rb you literally get about 50% or less of the kills that you should actually get credited with). And a lot of times you dont even get credited an assist after that. Is this some sort of sick joke claiming this stupid mechanic is here now to make rewards fairer and then not fixing the damn kill credit in general??? That much to fairer gameplay and

??? what is it with that consistent aiming for making gameplay more automated and dull in war thunder? To dumb down naval gameplay and basically one of the only parts that was somehow functioning (the damage control) now you constantly have to repair everything, even the things that you do not need to be repaired? seriously who comes up with stuff like that? Would you repair all the stuff on the deck like aa guns while being shelled by multiple enemy ships? IT MAKES NO SENSE. And its not like the old mechanic was that hard to understand so that cant really be a reason to rework it. (like, set one thing on auto and yes, it is fire, because its only fire in our barbettes that can instantly kill you and only needs to be cancelled if you took a lot of water in very quickly by torps or lots of pens in multiple compartments so you need to stop and pump first if nothing important is on fire and only last is repairs and those are only important if main guns are damaged (at least as long as theres no planes coming for you) or you need to move and engines are out). But really you are telling me now i need to automatically repair (lets take the amagi as an example) the amagis engine room with -for some reason only the snail knows) 600 people which is 40% of its crew in it??? what for? so that it can get penned twice and im down to 20% crew (or dead if crew levels are really low)?? would be a bit smarter to not do that but shoot back, something the amagi is actually good at instead of tanking shots with its mediocre belt armor?? interactive gameplay my gluteus maximus.

If this turns out like many people that tested it on the dev servers then im afraid thats it with naval for me. Not a big loss in case of naval rb, which is neglected for years now considering maps, objectives and general playability (surprise surprise, damage control was the least of its problems but maybe it would have been more useful putting in some work into areas of naval gameplay that might actually need it?) its just a massive shame ditching naval ec now. But i guess theres lots of other games on the market where the devs arent that destructive to their own game?

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103

This might be the single worst change of mechanics I have seen in this game so far. I don’t particularly enjoy excessively high skill ceilings myself, since I’m a more casual arcade, mainly mid-top tier naval player and actually didn’t mind the aiming changes (just took some getting used to for proper lead, while boosting the accuracy of new players).
And I agree that reducing the skill gap between very experienced/skilled players is probably a good idea to make the game more enjoyable for casual or newer players. Clamping down on player activity itself is a bad idea and simply not fun however, like cutting down on the size and sniping spots of ground maps.
This might even slightly help with improving the gameplay balance with the inferior shells certain ships have, like the Bismarck or Richelieu not having enough penetration to engage Iowa or the Soyuz properly at range.
Repair speed modifiers are a fantastic idea too, in fact and combined with some options like magazine flooding or proper modeling things like barbette bulkheads, magazine and ammo storage compartment fire management etc. it would be even greater.
The problem with this change is that it not only makes gameplay tedious and annoying with forced chip damage from every source, but also invalidates the interesting part of the visible interior models of the ship, as repeated shots to the same modules will be rewarded just the same as aiming for different modules or ammo stores.
This change also makes keeping distance, dodging or cover the only effective methods to actually prevent chip damage which actually DIScourages active and thoughtful gameplay and absolutely will lead to prudent players simply avoiding high threat areas such as the capture point/interior of the circle and staying at even more range than they already do or simply camping instead.
I know for a fact that pretty much every other player of Iowa would agree that keeping distance while dodging is already the best way to become borderline unkillable and this will only encourage more of that.
If considering the reward perspective, this will only encourage ships with a fast fire rate main battery or secondaries to focus targets already low on crew to steal RP with last hit sniping even more effectively, as such this argument feels very dishonest. Just think of poor Roma and its reload rate, when compared to the horrible experience ships like Scharnhorst, Cleveland, Brooklyn, Atlanta and Roanoke will cause with the HE spam this will bring.
Additionally this change will only expand the incredibly frustrating repair death loops ships like Arizona already have to every other ship which doesn’t make for dynamic or enjoyable gameplay.
Also just imagining being part of the first wave of players to spawn instead of waiting is a complete horror, being stuck in a traffic jam while getting spammed with HE and SAP shells to lose 30% crew directly at the start… Truly awful D-Day experience.
Maybe force everyone spawning at the same time as the next change of this mode as delayed spawns surely must be another form of exploit or something :^)
I would love to see more people get into naval, especially high tier bluewater, but with the steep grind and now increasingly tedious gameplay is very discouraging and the perceived “complexity” of proper DC is the least of this mode’s issues.
Please consider more varied mission types with proper NPC targets for stock HE ships and a broader spectrum of point sources of instead of making bluewater suffer and then generating more hype by adding submarines, which will either be useless or absolutely awful to play against.
The forced way this change will be implemented will not improve the gameplay experience or enjoyment for anyone, besides automated bots who would shoot against burnt out wrecks in ground battle, nor will it increase player retention or growth among new players in all likelihood.
As can probably be seen by the dev server thread and this thread players are clearly not happy and this might cause players to just straight up quit due to the added frustration and tedium. Maybe one of them could even create his own naval game and permanently split the potential pool of players which would be very bad for revenue and player counts I imagine.
Please consider adding a toggle and accepting player agency in repairs and “pardoning” the “exploit” of delayed damage control, I was very excited for the possibility of H-39 and O-Class BC being introduced but this has change is so frustrating and counterproductive that I’m quite close to losing hope when it comes to naval mode in general due to the direction the development seems to be leading towards.

17 Likes
104

I saw a lot changes, but they weren’t game breaking.

None of them made ships that can survive the whole battle in the previous update, almost always die in 5 minutes in the new one.

Most of the changes made in early bluewater naval were incremental and somewhat based on how things actually might work. They made HE shells a bit weaker, they made unwatering slightly faster, they made armor plates breakable but only by the highest caliber guns, etc.

Slow progress with time to test each change and all the changes were mostly adding things to the gameplay. There were most likely bad changes but there weren’t any catastrophical ones.

They did make changes to lower survivability, but again, they mostly weren’t that big.

Barbette fire was genuinely a decent change which managed to raise the importance of quick damage control reaction and managed to introduce weak spots to ships which were almost unsinkable before. Yes, a change to lower survivability, but a good one, and which did not break any core game mechanics and which, if anything, improved naval balance overall.

One of the bigger ones were to hull destruction. First iteration of compartment destruction was disliked but realistically it affected your game only after a great deal of time (> 15 - 20 minutes), considering that at the time there was no constant bot HE spam.

Second iteration of hull damage was EXTREMELY BAD at first. The Yamato could be sunk in a few minutes by light HE spam hitting nowhere near the waterline and without ever penetrating the belt. But community (literally every active voice in naval, both EN and RU) actually managed to talk gaijin into raising HP of hull sections and I do think that currently this system is very much useable, THANKS TO PLAYER INPUT, AND ONLY TO IT.

Right now gaijin basically does the same thing as they did with the second hull HP change, but they decided to not listen to the community. The change WILL result in the biggest BBs dying to small HE spam in a matter of minutes, just not due to hull break, but loss of crew through secondary guns and some AA mounts. Although the result is the same - ship sinks in 5 minutes.

Good luck I guess.

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105

So a scharnhorst that is - in the current damage control implementation - repairing some random unneeded stuff is not disadvantaged when suddenly his barbettes are set on fire? let me tell you, youre in big trouble now if youre repairing for no reason and then suddenly something really urgent has to be dealt with. even with ace crew. good luck extinguishing that fire in time because you felt the need to repair some aa guns on the deck thats constantly getting shelled, just for them to break again when a fire is racing through your ammo elevators towards your magazines.

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