If you’re going to complain about Gaijin removing sniping spots, maybe don’t lead in with them removing one of the most infamously inbalanced positions in the entire game. That spot on Middle East effectively allowed any halfway competant sniper to completely lock down the other team’s northern spawn, and there was no useful way to counter them outside of CAS.
Meanwhile, 38th Parallel before these changes was infamous when one team had a sniping advantage. There were positions the northern team could push to that could literally pick off people rolling out of the southern team’s spawns seconds into the game. If you tried to play aggressively in the middle, someone sitting up near the spawn would roll out behind a rock in one of the half dozen ever present camping spots and nail you if you weren’t psychic enough to react in time. That map was not designed for gameplay with tanks that have LRFs, stabilizers and ultra high velocity shells.
Sniping is fine as a concept, much like brawling and flanking are fine. What’s not fine is maps that cater to one playstyle and screw over everyone else, whether that be a city map screwing over snipers or a wide open map with no cover screwing over flankers and brawlers. Every playstyle should have a somewhat equal ability to influence the game. This is hard to accomediate, and Gaijin’s rather terrible map design team has consistently failed to achieve this time and again. But that’s the standard we should be shooting for, not just having an assortment of maps where one playstyle trumps all others.
They could have addressed specific issues, but instead they completely dumbed down those maps. Also, it seems that some people are incapable of learning and the concept of choosing the other spawn point wass just too advanced for them.
Brilliant idea, just cede half the map to the enemy team and hope for the best. Even if you succeed in taking the southern point, you’ll then have to push north against an enemy team that can freely flank you as they push uncontested across the north and behind your lines. This would be bad enough even if the B point wasn’t incredibly vulnerable from all angles, but trying to take that with enemy tanks able to position all around it is a death sentence unless you have a lot of backup.
And, the more salient point, why is it that one team can be locked into giving up half the map by 1-2 decent snipers, while the other team has no recourse? The map change may have lead to snipers not having anywhere to go on that map, which is a bad change, but at least it somewhat balanced the map, which is good. Push for them to add balanced positions for snipers, not to re-add incredibly unbalanced or overly powerful ones.
Capture points are the means to an end, not the end. They are a mission type, that is to say an organising principle, a structure to get us into the game and try to achieve something. But it’s not why we’re here. No one downloads War Thunder thinking “I can’t wait to finally play a game where I can capture map points!”. Lots of games have that.
Capture points are the objective of the match, but not the reason we play. The reason we play is… the vehicles themselves. Obviously. It’s the thing WT has, and others don’t.
The rest follows logically and organically from the premise. We’re here to play vehicles, ergo the only reason why a vehicle should be added to the game, is that people will play it (otherwise it’s a waste of effort on the devs’ part). And for people to play it, in a competitive context, the vehicle also needs to be competitive.
As you yourself implicitly admit, this is a game where the extremely limited selection of mission types is extremely unfavourable to vehicles that are built for long distance engagements. This issue is compounded by other elements of game balance and, most egregiously, by the ever-shrinking maps.
Maybe that’s not a problem to you. Maybe you don’t care if people in TDs or even just long-distance-leaning mediums and heavies have fun or not. Maybe those vehicles could even be axed from the game as far as you’re concerned. All of that is fair, subjectively, I suppose.
But the only thing that’s scummy here, is that the game dev has introduced a plethora of vehicles with no mission types and almost no maps that suit their playstyles. By focusing on “what’s wrong with snipers” instead of “what’s wrong in a game that has snipers but they’re ineffective” you’re looking at the finger, rather than the moon.
Which is why players who like TDs will continually feel aggrieved until people who support the CQCification of maps can answer this simple, elementary question:
I suspect that the answer is “don’t care” or perhaps even “shouldn’t be in game”. Like I said, fair, though in that case, there is nothing left to talk about.
Yes. And given the other side an equivalent spot.
Players clearly feel that it’s “unfair” to be killed by a vehicle not in their immediate field of view, which I suspect is one of the reasons behind the slow CoD-morphosis of War Thunder maps.
Funnily enough, it’s sort of the opposite. An ambush/sniping playstyle is much more in line with the way an ADHD brain works. Take it from a player with ADHD. :)
That sense of entitlement is wrong (as is the judgemental attitude to arcade, btw). All playstyle preferences are valid.
That said, keep in mind that it’s not CQC that is getting squeezed into oblivion by WT right now.
People keep saying this, but that’s simply not true.
The northern spawn had an incredible firing position towards the road to A, this is absolutely true.
The southern spawn however had (and still has, it hasn’t been touched) a similar sniping position that looks directly into said northern sniping spot. It was balanced in a way that the southern sniping spot was technically less powerful in stopping people from reaching a cap, but it was more versatile: you could surveil a wider area of approach to B and even some bits around A, counter-snipe, and then move towards B to cap it. The northern sniping spot could also do it, but the road to B is slower there, and you might be better off just going C instead.
I’ve used both spots extensively, and it would usually go something like this.
Northern spawn: I go to “the spot” and kill one, maybe two of the enemy tanks rushing A. This done, the marginal utility of that spot rapidly reduces, so there is a binary choice. If there are enemy snipers on the southern spot, I duel with them and try to pick them off. If there are no snipers, or B and C are in trouble, I go there.
Southern spawn: I go to “the spot” and immediately look for a sniper doing what I’d normally do from the northern spawn. Again here if there’s no ongoing sniping duel, you can then look at your options and choose where to move up.
I usually got more kills from the southern sniping spot than I did from the north. One of my best Jagdtiger games was from that southern spot (13 kills). It’s particularly funny to me that it still exists, while its counterpart to the north no longer does.
This was one of the few maps where, on both sides, turretless tank destroyers could bring a decisive contribution to the game, and where slow vehicles like the Maus or Tortoise could see action almost immediately without having to drive for eight minutes.
Now? It’s just another map where you’re better off spawning something brawly and/or fast.
You are absolutely correct. This is perfectly logical. However, it is formulated in a way that misrepresents what’s currently happening in War Thunder, because it gives the false impression that all playstyles are being equally shafted, and that is simply not true.
Once again, I’ll quote something I said back in early September, before Sons Of Attila:
As far as I can tell, there are seven maps with the size required to provide actual long range options in Ground RB (thus excluding the sim, enlarged version of some maps): Fulda, Maginot, Red Desert, Fields of Poland, Surroundings of Volokolamsk, European Province, and Fire Arc.
That’s seven out of, I think, fifty-tree- A fifty-fourth map is coming in this update, Test Site 2217, and it looks to be another urban close-quarters map, though we can’t be sure until we actually play it, naturally.
Out of those numerous smaller maps, as many as thirty-five are under 2x2km, total. If you actually consider just the playable area, it drops to below 1.5x1.5km.
This, in and of itself, is already bad. The game has thousands of vehicles with different strengths and weaknesses. Purely going by these numbers alone, vehicles that specialise in sniping and struggle in close quarters are inherently penalised. This is, of course, on top of the additional issue that the game is built around capping points, which already makes long-range specialists more situational.
But this is only the beginning, because this is a whole onion of bad, and there are many more layers left to peel.
First of all, while those may be seven maps out of fifty-four, the map rotation system does not feature maps equally. I don’t know if there are global data available on this, but I can report my individual experience at least. I get Seversk, Hurtgen Forest, Alaska, Sweden, Golden Quarry and (small) Ardennes with embarrassing frequency. I can’t even remember the last time I got Volokolamsk.
The numerical preponderance of short-range maps is thus augmented by their preponderance in matchmaker selection. This penalises the performance of vehicles that do poorly in knife-fights even more.
The next layer of this ugly onion is map design. Even the “sniping” maps are not, in fact, built around sniping, or say, the effective utilisation of gun depression. Ultimately all of these maps still require you to get very up close and personal if you want to win, because of how they’re broken up. For example, even the infamous Fire Arc - the key to that map is the B point, which of course is inside a tiny cramped village whose control is usually decided by knife-fights and corner peeking.
Such maps are also frequently altered to further “streamline” the fighting towards the cramped areas, too. Meaning that the open areas simply become long drives on the way to the objective, where you’ll be slugging it at under 300 metres once more.
And even on the small maps, it sounds like whenever sniping-oriented players adapt and find locations where they can minimise the weaknesses of, say, turretless tank destroyers, those positions are immediately taken away.
Look at what happened to Jungle. The spot behind the F-row rocks, south of C, was my go-to when playing something like the Jagdtiger. There was no guarantee you’d get there uncontested. Even if you did get there, you could be flanked and be in a tough spot reacting, since turning right could expose your left side to people down on the road or up the opposite hill. It was also a prime bombing spot for CAS. In other words, it was not overpowered. Sometimes it didn’t work. Other times, I nearly get a nuke staying up there.
Now, that spot is sealed off. That is one fewer map where it makes sense for me to spawn in a JT first. Note, I’m not saying you can’t do well with it on Jungle, but that if you’re minmaxing, you’d always rather spawn in something else first, which is why now Jungle is a map I greet by spawning in a LeKPanzer first.
This is a balance problem. You can’t just handwave it away…
People like what they like, and it’s fine. I’m happy for people who like brawling to get brawling maps. But the lopsidedness is really bothersome, especially because every new map they add is invariably small. We’ve had Golden Quarry, which I don’t think I need to expand on, and Iberian Castle, which is imho a very good map and has at least one place where it is possible to have 900m-engagements, but is on the whole an urban map, won or lost by fighting in the town itself.
Sometimes it feels very disheartening, because there’s no acknowledgement whatsoever that this is an issue.
And I play WW2 almost exclusively. Can’t imagine what it’s like in top tier…
Sniping the whole map is just terrible game design. It makes the game all just “Who drives to the snipey spot first?” Boring. No counterplay. Bad design.
Sniping should have some utility, but it should be spots that overlook NARROW areas where unaware people might drive, but which aware people who notice you can bypass by some other route. So that you can’t just lock down the whole map.
That’s what they are moving toward, and it’s a great change. You still matter for your team for that one narrow sight range, but you don’t matter 5x more than anyone else like before. Great!
now i completely disagree with this one… That is a large part of the game and certain tanks/rounds strengths… as well as letting Experiences players use advantages they have earned (both in knowing the maps and being able to snipe)
id say a good 40% of the tanks in the game are Meant to snipe and excel at sniping… changing these maps is a punishment to experienced players and should not have been done.
If they want to give spawn points and areas more cover, then add/do that, but dont remove/block off sniping spots, they are a natural way of battles and the game.
Like I said, include sniping avenues, those tanks STILL have those strengths.
But no tank should have as one of its “strengths”, “literally locking down the entire map”. There are 16 people on a team. You should have a limited portion of the influence on a game. A NARROW angle of sniping covered allows you to do exactly that. You are contributing very much so. You are enjoying the strength of your tank. What’s the issue?
You just aren’t enjoying the strength of 5-7 tanks all at once by yourself with a ridiculously OP view of everything all at once. You’re enjoying a reasonably proportional strength of ONE tank, locking down a proportional PART of the map, as is reasonable for a single tank’s role in the battle.
i still think a Much better option is to make more cover on the Other side for the other tanks/teams. Not completely obliterating a map and good spots on the map.
Sniping has its use, as have slow, heavy and fast, light tanks. Snipers are to sit in the back on elevated points to control the cap zones and protect the forward moving tanks from enemy fire. Heavy tanks are supposed to go to the cap zones, while fast tanks do flank manoevres.
If you are not able to take out a sniper it is because your team either has no own snipers or they rush after the cap points with their dicker max…
There was a time when squads were playing that know each other, how they set up a supressing fire from the back and then slowly advance. Not rushing to the cap point but controlling it, setting up your positions and then go in to close it.
the whole map design meanwhile aims for not discouraging dumb people that have no idea what they are doing other than rushing head on to a point, while firing at everything that moves and not using their binoculars even once. These maggot brains DESERVE to be taken out immediately. That is what the snipers, and their elevated sniping points were for.
also the differences between artillery, light and heavy tanks got completely razed, meanwhile even f*cking ZIS Anti Air trucks have enough armour to rush after a cap point while being able to be pummeled by tanks and not die. And kill a heavy tank with a bloody machine gun.
I am at a point now ( the trees were actually the last drop to it ) where i dont play tanks anymore. No tactics, no brain, no challenge. I fly a bit every few days, and thats it, because if i want a quick head on tank brawl i can play WoT on my mobile ( which i do… if i am bored and not at home ).
Snipers are to sit in the back on elevated points to control the cap zones and protect the forward moving tanks from enemy fire.
Yeah that’s their use… in a badly designed game that makes snipers OP, sure. Ah yeah “Just stopping all forward progress and the entire objective of the game” no big deal, lol. Just merely everything you’d ever want from one tank. What of it? No problem there!
If you are not able to take out a sniper it is because…
let me finish that for you: “…because they drove to the good snipping spot first, the end.” The game is just determined by which of 3-4 guys drifts the least in their boarhound or whatever in the first 45 seconds. That’s a dumb “game”. Play Super Mario Kart if that’s your jam.
There was a time when squads were playing that know each other, how they set up a supressing fire from the back and then slowly advance. Not rushing to the cap point but controlling it, setting up your positions and then go in to close it.
Sounds horrendous, glad I wasn’t around at that time.
dumb people that have no idea what they are doing other than rushing head on to a point
It has nothing to do with being “dumb”. I can be brilliant, and know that there’s a guy in that sniper spot 1 millisecond after he gets there. So what? if his spot covers the whole map, I can’t do anything about it. “Not rushing out” = Not doing anything at all and watching paint dry until we lose, because he’s covering ALL angles.
The only logical solution is to not allow positions that cover ALL angles. Which Gaijin wisely chose, as they learned how to design games better. Bravo to them. Dumb people still get punished as they blindly wander into the narrow firing arcs that are covered. Smart people have options now.
What map had that position? Can’t do anything about it?? Smoke? Artillery? CAS?
The absolute refusal of people to use all the tools the game provides is absolutely bewildering.
So nobody on the entire team had access to smoke? Yeah right.
Artillery obstructs vision extremely well. 2 or more people doing artillery at once is devastating.
That mode has always had aircraft.
Again: people resolutely refuse to use all the tools provided, let alone communicate and work with their teams…
The original people complaining were complaining that they have narrow sight lines now. So if you’re disputing that there ever was anything but limited, narrow sightlines to begin with, then you’ve negated the whole conversation. They would just be complaining about imaginary things being gone now, then ;) I have no reason to argue with that. Great! No problem then, we all agree! Moving on, lol
Smoke?
Tons of tanks don’t get smoke. My most played tanks recently are SMK, KV-1E, KV-1S, 2S3M, 2S1, IS-2. Only 2 of those 6 get smoke, for example. And then it blocks the sniper for barely 2x longer than it takes you to reload. So 1 guy can hold off 2 snipers if he does nothing else for the entire game and brought 40 rounds of smoke (which he didn’t, because you need to bring less ammo than that total if you like not dying).
Artillery
Not a single one of those 6 tanks above gets artillery. When you do get artillery anyway, on about half of tanks in the game, the sniper can literally just back up like 10 meters, wait a few seconds, then go back to sniping… It’s even less effective than smoke.
CAS
I play arcade. Thankfully, CAS is super nerfed there, because it shouldn’t be in a non-air mode at all.
And even if arty and CAS both worked super well, they’d still be terrible game design solutions. “Instead of tense PVP fighting, click and delete your problems from orbit with no skill” is not a good design solution lmao.
I already gave the good design solution, which thankfully Gaijin has found as well: Simply making sniper lookouts have narrow angles of coverage. Solves everything, the end. No lazy click to delete needed, because no problem to begin with.
The absolute refusal of people to use all the tools the game provides is absolutely bewildering.
The absolute refusal of people to applaud good game design tools to solve design problems is absolutely bewildering. We don’t NEED any tools to “solve” the “problem” that Gaijin already solved by making sight lines narrow.