World of Warships- What The Hell Happened To The Playerbase??

The age old mantra of "the game is dying" is one of the many subjects we take a look at today! Enjoy!

Outro Music: Stranger Think- C418

[flite]

containers in containers, 15 temporary currencies oh let me count the ways they screw the game. And that's without messing with mechanics.

[edwardknudsen]

I remember when having the Kongo made you the deadliest on the map. Yeah, playing since Beta.

[MrAshJ]

Took a break of a year from the game and now I'm back because high tier operations. Napoli in ops is super fun

[GDViperWorks]

Ask any business. You don't listen to your customers, you lose them. It's that simple. We all know what choices WG is making that has decimated people's desire to spend time and money.

[GrizzK]

I don't mind the idea of subs but it's the homing torps I can't stand

[j.p.vanbolhuis]

game dying...

One risk factor i see is the the amount of (new) ship lines. The game runs the risk of suffocating under choice. Especially as some choices don't even matter, or are outdated, even though the information is still around..

[MaineLander]

It's odd. I play two games, PUBG and WoW. Both games player bases have tanked.

However, the player left in PUBG are the best of the best, which makes the games incredibly difficult. The player left in WoW is the worst of the worst, which, makes the games incredibly difficult.

[minicribbe]

Imo the thing thats killing the game slowly is the playerbase that cant and wont change the playstyle for the diffrent modes cus the focus of the playerbase has gone from fight for caps and try to win to farming high dmg numbers, and it dont matter if the team wins or not as long as they get high dmg numbers

[irishwind]

Is it dead? No. But if WG were smart, they would have a big welcome back campaign after the carrier re-work goes live to try to get players back.
Oh, and bring back the forums AND listen to the players.

[runamuck]

I want them to fix the match maker. If I want to play a T8 I should be able to do a T8 battle, not T10 always.

[nickbrennan]

Some of the player base are down right nasty and instead of teaching/helping newer player just rag them. They then choose not to play so don't learn.

[angrybeargaming]

Maybe people are tired of watching wargaming getting more and more greedy all this year and with each new event it gets worse and worse and they're back to not listening to the player base again

[seandocherty]

Hi Sea Lord, Long time fan from Scotland here. As others have said, I played WoWs since the begining and loved it. However it is no longer the game it once was. Using your argument about the numbers being stable generally implies it is indeed in decline as the amount joining the game, Players who dont know WoWs when it was more "balanced", is barely balancing people like myself who have finally had enough "fanatasy" and have left or leaving. Let me explain what pushed me over the edge.
1. CV's that somehow seem to be 3D printing new aircraft. The old RTS style was hard going at times but it more a challange rather than OP. CV made a mistake he got deplaned fast. Also throw in AA being virtually useless now doesnt help. Russian CV's lol come on, they cannot even build one in the modern era and yet their fantasy versions in game are some of the most powerful with their style of attacks.
2. Subs. period. Ok not just because they are subs but how they are implimented. Speeds that out do modern nuclear attack subs and come on, Homing torpedoes? Really? 1981 RN had to use unguided torpedoes to deal with the Belgrano during the Falklands conflict as the guided ones were STILL not reliable. Im not saying subs should be removed. far from it as they give you something real sneaky to cope with but the speeds they do should be pulled down somewhat and all Homing Torpedoes removed. DD's dont get them so why should subs?

Im not a purist in any way shape or form, But I started playing WoWS because it was a simulator of an arcady sort of WW2 Naval combat. Sorry about my fingers running away with me. This is the first post ive ever put up in a Youtube video and Ive been here since before the internet was common place and PC's did NOT exist ;) Hell, my first Online gaming experience was Everquest on Dial up to the USA servers.
Maybe Wargaming should follow the path and put out a "classic" version for those of us who loved the game right up to the subs. Not even the first CV rework put me off. Homing torps and Formula 1 Subs did that. WHats next? US cruisers with Standard ER SAM's and Destroyers with Ikara ASW weapons? Heck go the whole hog and insert Harpoon and Exocet Missiles. These are things im sure the newer, younger players would love :)
Anyway, Keep up the good work. Have followed yourself and Potato for many years and even though I no longer play, I will continue to do so. Well at least until WoWS finally sinks :D

[Blacksheep]

Win rate is irrelevant when you have these blow out games with incredibly lopsided teams. New players are advanced far too quickly. One look at the team lineups and you know you got fkd again. MM has been truly horrific lately.

[Fateherald]

New player here.

It’s just kinda harsh to get into the game. I haven’t played a game like it before and that’s not a great thing imo. I was pretty much brow beaten into it by friends into trying it.

Got to tier 10 pretty fast but holy hell why is it an expectation to grind for months to get to a lines specialization? I’m not for instant gratification but there are so many low tier ships that pretty much act the same and I’m usually playing against bots in random battles, just gets old fast.

CVs weren’t too bad and nor was learning against subs, but the RNG pf landing shots feels bad a lot of the time. Dispersion seems to constantly fuck me and at some point I just want a gun that’s just accurate, then there are citadels which are turbo headshots and in some cases just kills you outright even from the front if that ship is bigger than you.

There are so many feels bad mechanics just starting out that it’s seriously pushing me away from the game, which is a shame because I was always enthusiastic about driving massive vehicles in most games if anything for the nuance.

[sardaukerlegion]

You cannot compare this summer with the C-Virus summers.

[sgoldsworth]

Your comment about rookies being able to get into higher tiers is spot on. My clan has been led by a young man who was able to work his way into clan leadership with less than 500 battles. Now, to be fair to him, he has been humble and willing to learn the characteristics of various ships and has always seemed to be receptive to feedback.

[davidwhitfield]

What are we on the SE Asian Server? Chopped Liver?

Given that World of Planes is still going I think we can use them as the canary in the coal mine. Only when WoP final goes do we have an indicator that WoW and WoT may have its days numbered.

[OllieVK]

Tier IX/X/☆ Operations are going off. Long overdue.

[Con]

As someone who has played comp at a higher level before, the main issue with competitive in wows is that the game's past changes have made it increasingly more difficult for players to improve. WoWs is a lot more of a point and click adventure, while missplay's are not punished nearly as heavily, especially for BB's. The top players had the chance to play the game when it was more cqc based, with positioning being less restrictive and the gameplay itself less kite-heavy.

Since (especially) BB's have had their surviviability, overmatch, shell volume and accuracy increased significantly recently, their mistakes often cannot be punished, since they're basically "hand-held" in some way. Playing around islands has purposely been made more inconsistent with submarines and cv's providing permanent unconditional spotting, that forces cruisers to be more passive. If a CV or sub wants to prevent a cruiser from playing an island, they will. Their alpha potential has increased so significantly that cruisers either have to leave the island and get clicked for 20k by 30mm overmatch or SAP or take 30k from torps/rockets/HE-SKB'S on the island.

For the majority of players that are in the "gap" between a good and a good comp player, this is extremely problematic. By not being able to consistently play around islands, they often lack the ability to make rational, good decisions when it comes to their positioning. Especially if they have difficulties deciding which islands to utilize, having the better ones made unplayble is making them unable to reflect their positioning properly.

Since Comp players do have to meet certain stat-requirements to be considered by better clans, playing ships that are inconsistent without extreme amounts of experience, will be less favourable. If these players see that they'll just get clicked in their 30mm cruiser, why would they bother to continue playing it, if they can either play one of the new broken BB's, which essentially have most BB-characteristics strapped and replaced by those supposed to be found on cruisers, or one of the armored cruisers; Stalingrad, Petro, Moskva, Napoli.
These ships don't teach you how to properly react to game scenarios, they don't teach you on how to decide upon future positioning or chancing. If all else fails, they'll just end up as a bluenicum that permakites for 20min.

The game itself has become more focused towards casual and/or bad players, which is done by decreasing the skill floor; If you look at the more recent BB's (BB's are 'New/bad player's favourite class') they tend to have close-to cruiser conceal, speed and farming potential, while retaining overmatch, alpha and surivivability (which has also increased). At the same time, every single recent BB (exc: Tsurugi and maybe Lauria but that thing is stupidly tanky bow-in regardless and the cit is not too consistent if you dont park people flat) has either had waterline cit behind 50 layers of copium or spaced, angled plates behind torp belt that will make cits extremely inconsistent.

If ships cannot be consistently punished for playing poorly, while angling, island-positioning and pushing is made more inconsistent and punishable, then eventually players won't be able to tell what they did wrong and can't possibly improve further than bluenicum/unicum(w/ padding).
Learning how to afk permakite or delete torp dd's with broken gunbotes or abusing demented BB's does not make you a good player, it will increase the purple number on stat page but it does not make you good.

This becomes extremely appearent in CB's: Most players, even at hurricane, don't know how to play the game. They go to their position on WotTactics and then sit there all game long till their FC yells at them to push or stop being afk. These players, while trying to get better, simply lack the ability to make decisions based on enemy positions. And it gets increasingly worse if e.g. a BB has 30s traverse; You can't use their turret position and cross certain areas when they look away, they'll have their turrets turned immediately once you try. This in combination with the increasingly consistent main guns (specified above) makes them hesitant to play aggressively or reposition. Instead of taking that risk, they will continue to sit afk at their rock till the game ends or they're yelled at.

World Of Warships no longer offers players to become good in competitive. They may be able to play Typhoon and accidently park in hurricane, but they will lose against the veteran comp players (e.g. from TWA, RAIN, OHBOY or AAO) every. single. time. (also the last 2 also struggle with finding new good players to replace the retiring ones, while other comp clans simply stopped existing.)

And as you said, having to play the same crap over and over again does certainly not help. Nor does a T8 season however, since the amount of viable ships are nearly as low as the T10 ones. (I'd honestly say that the T10 seasons have more viable ships)

With the way they seem to balance ships, I don't think its going to improve. They disregard any feedback from comp players and randomly buff ships that never needed it or give ships UU's that are straight up upgrades that make them overpowered beyond believe. (e.g. Gouden against any island cruiser, Petro UU that makes the nerfs obsolete or Lombo UU thats probably the dumbest UU ever added)
The game has gotten to a point where if they don't 180° their ways, there is basically no hope left for Comp. Or maybe there is but its not going to be of good players fighting good players but 1-2 clans stomping everyone else, while every other game is just sad to watch (because noone knows how to play properly).. Though that's basically current KotS in a nutshell.