Starts:Fri. 19 Nov. 06:00 CET (UTC+1) Ends:Mon. 22 Nov. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
+100% XP bonus for the first win of the day
−60% to the cost in Credits and Doubloons of Type 1, Type 2, Type 5, Type 6, and Type 59 camouflage patterns
−50% to the cost of researchable U.S. Tier II–V ships
−30% to the cost of researchable U.S. Tier VI–VII ships
−15% to the cost of researchable U.S. Tier VIII–X ships
The exchange rate for converting Doubloons into Credits is 1,5002,000 Credits : 1 Doubloon
−50% to the cost in Doubloons of a Port slot
−50% to the cost in Doubloons of a place in the Reserve for a Commander
Ships
The bundles will be available for purchase until:Fri. 03 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
Five new black ships await you this year. You can purchase X Yoshino B, IX Pommern B, VIII Saipan B, and VIII Loyang B from the Armory or Premium Shop, and VI Dunkerque B can be obtained from sequential bundles in the Armory.
[table][tr][td]
Yoshino B
2 itemsYoshino B
Bundle includes
X Yoshino B
Port slot x1
-15%34,950 29,650 Doubloons Purchase[/td][/tr][/table] X Yoshino is a variant of the never-built Project B-65 battlecruiser that was under development in the early 1940s. The ship's main battery is represented by rather accurate long-range 310 mm guns that can unleash a weighty salvo. Yoshino carries two quadruple-tube torpedo launchers on each of her sides. Players who helm her can choose between long-range 610 mm torpedoes and torpedoes with an average range that are faster, can deal greater damage, and have lower detectability.
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X Yoshino B is a standalone Special ship. The only difference in comparison with her standard counterpart—X Yoshino—is the color scheme of her permanent camouflage.
[table][tr][td]
Pommern B
2 itemsPommern B
Bundle includes
IX Pommern B
Port slot x1
-15%19,300 16,350 Doubloons Purchase[/td][/tr][/table] IX Pommern, named after an eastern German province, is a variant of the H-class project battleship. The ship is armed with twelve 380 mm main battery guns. She also has solid armor protection, powerful secondary armament, torpedo armament, and the Hydroacoustic Search consumable.
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IX Pommern B is a standalone Premium ship. The only difference in comparison with her standard counterpart—IX Pommern—is the color scheme of her permanent camouflage.
[table][tr][td]
Saipan B
2 itemsSaipan B
Bundle includes
VIII Saipan B
Port slot x1
-30%11,300 7,850 Doubloons Purchase[/td][/tr][/table] VIII Saipan is a light aircraft carrier that was built following the end of World War II. The hull of a Baltimore-class cruiser was used as her basis. She has powerful but small squadrons. While the aircraft on her deck aren't numerous, they have high survivability and decent armament. Her torpedo bombers each carry two torpedoes, bombers—two HE bombs with high chances of causing fire, and her attack aircraft—powerful Tiny Tim rockets.
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VIII Saipan B is a standalone Premium ship. The only difference in comparison with her standard counterpart—VIII Saipan—is the color scheme of her permanent camouflage.
[table][tr][td]
Loyang B
2 itemsLoyang B
Bundle includes
VIII Loyang B
Port slot x1
-30%8,300 5,750 Doubloons Purchase[/td][/tr][/table] VIII Loyang is a destroyer that was initially built for the U.S. Navy. She is armed with four rapid-firing 127 mm guns. The ship has good maneuverability; offers a choice between two types of torpedo armament; and has access to a wide variety of consumables for slot 3: Engine Boost, Defensive AA Fire, or Hydroacoustic Search.
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VIII Loyang B is a standalone Premium ship. The only difference in comparison with her standard counterpart—VIII Loyang—is the color scheme of her permanent camouflage.
You can also look forward to the Armory offering ships from previous years' Black Friday events.
Combat Mission
You will obtain a special combat mission if you meet either of the following conditions from the beginning of the Black Friday 2021 event:
You already have the standard counterpart of the ship, and before December 31, 2021, you become an owner of her themed black version.
Before December 31, 2021, you become an owner of both versions of the ship.
As part of the combat mission, five victories gained playing both ships in Random, Ranked, or Co-op Battles will bring you Doubloons. You can obtain and complete the special combat mission for these ships only once until December 31, 2021.
Sequential Bundles
Sequential bundles await you in the Armory! They provide VI Dunkerque B, Black Friday 2021 Premium containers, Distant Voyages containers, themed camouflages, 10 days of Warships Premium Account, and other items at special prices. The bundles will be available for purchase until:Fri. 03 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
VI Dunkerque B can only be obtained from sequential bundles that you can find in the Armory.
Premium Containers
Black Friday 2021 Premium containers are now available in the Armory and Premium Shop! The bundles will be available for purchase until:Fri. 03 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
Each Black Friday 2021 Premium container includes one item from the following list (the percentage indicates the drop chances of each group of items):
One of 16 Black Friday ships with a black permanent camouflage, Commander with 10 skill points, and Port slot — 12%
21x Shadow Lurker camouflages — 27%
10x Type 59 camouflages — 12%
14 days of Warships Premium Account — 10%
1,250 Doubloons — 5%
35,000 Free XP — 17%
100,000 Elite Commander XP — 17%
More details about the mechanics of containers, as well as the chances of obtaining their specific contents, are available here.
Combat Missions
Containers
[expand type="details"] Earn up to 10 Black Friday containers by completing a chain of combat missions playing Tier V–X ships in Random, Ranked, and Co-op Battles, as well as in Arms Race. To complete the chain, you need to earn various ribbons and deal damage. Starts:Fri. 19 Nov. 06:00 CET (UTC+1) Ends:Fri. 03 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
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Patches and Flags
[expand type="details"] To earn the commemorative flags and patches of the new Black Friday 2021 themed ships, you need to destroy seven enemy ships in Random, Ranked, and Co-op Battles, as well as in Operations, playing X Yoshino B, IX Pommern B, VIII Saipan B, VIII Loyang B, or VI Dunkerque B, respectively. Starts:Fri. 19 Nov. 06:00 CET (UTC+1) Ends:Fri. 31 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
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News From the Front
Knowledge is power! There is no better weapon for a Commander than timely information about changes to the balance of power. By reading the news on our website, you get both valuable information that helps you take your bearings in battle and also direct benefits.
Claim special combat mission chains on our website every week during Update 0.10.10. Each subsequent chain will be more difficult than the previous one, but the rewards will also be greater. During this update, you'll be able to earn a total of five More Resources containers and four Black Friday 2021 containers, as well as Community Tokens, signals, and Credits. You can unlock and complete a combat mission chain before:Thu. 09 Dec. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
Important Message for the World of Warships Community
Captains!
It has been two months since we published an important message for the community, which you can find here. Today, it's time to share our progress on our commitments and the plans for the foreseeable future.
Monetization
An important change has been the disclosure of drop rates for items: from November 2021, all new containers and random bundles that go on sale will also be provided with the complete drop rates. Initially, we promised a much less precise deadline (basically somewhere in 2022). There were a lot of open questions and we were not certain that we will manage to get all the details and descriptions clear in time. The upcoming Black Friday and New Year monetization activities will also be affected by this change as well as all new activities involving containers from now on. You can read more about this change here and here.
Subsequently, after these publications, there was another frequent question: how will New Year containers work? They will work in a similar way to our current WH40k containers, with different categories of drops and all content within a category having the same chances.
On top of this, we also have two more initiatives that we also promised to implement—warning about the nature of randomness and additional protection for children. This year, for all containers and random bundles sold for real money or Doubloons:
We will add a warning about the nature of randomness and the need to approach the purchase reasonably.
We will add the requirement for a user to confirm the age of 18+ to make such a purchase.
We continue to search for alternative monetization mechanics. For example, in Update 0.10.9, we used the auction mechanics to sell Early Access to new German Tier X battleship Schlieffen instead of random bundles or containers.
Update 0.10.10 kicks off Black Friday. We have carefully considered your feedback from the previous Black Friday regarding missions that return some Doubloons or resources when obtaining a Black ship, if you already have the original version. This mission was added from our side to reward our loyal customers who already purchased the standard version of the ship and provide them with an opportunity to earn extra Doubloons or other resources. In order not to confuse players, on the upcoming Black Friday we will not position this mission as part of the bundles that can be sold, especially when the original ship is no longer available for purchase. The mission will be credited only if you have both ships on your account—the original ship and the black version. You'll be able to complete the mission playing both variants.
The New Year celebrations in Update 0.10.11 will feature not only the disclosed drop rates for items from containers, but also reworked victory bonuses. You will be able to play Tier X ships to earn New Year Certificates—a special temporary resource that can be exchanged in Update 0.10.11 for Santa's Gift containers, as well as Santa’s Big Gift and Santa's Mega Gift containers, which include more rewards and have higher chances of dropping a Premium ship. The bottom line is that now you have a choice of different types of containers and all the information you need to make a decision. More details are available here.
An important change in the coming year will be the replacement of Khabarovsk and Grosser Kurfürst by Delny and Preussen in the Tech Tree. More details are available here and here. The replacement is similar to the one that was made for Moskva and Alexander Nevsky. But last time, players who had a permanent camouflage for Moskva didn't receive a similar camouflage for Alexander Nevsky, and we decided to change our approach. Now all players who own any permanent camouflage for Khabarovsk or Grosser Kurfürst at the time when the ships are removed from the Tech Tree will receive the Type 20 permanent camouflage for Delny or Preussen, respectively. All players who had any permanent camouflage for Moskva on their accounts at the time when Update 0.9.5 was released received the Type 20 permanent camouflage for Alexander Nevsky within a week of Update 0.10.9 being released. Those who already have the Type 20 permanent camouflage received 5,000 Doubloons as compensation.
Feedback and Communication
We have done our best to significantly improve our communication lately and will continue to work in this direction.
We have recently shared our planned balance changes for Update 0.10.10. In the future, we will continue to gradually adjust the parameters of ships if needed. Since last year, we have been using this approach to balance the ships that have already been released.
These changes are part of our approach to balancing. We would like to incrementally influence the balance in the game, instead of a few huge changes to the released ships as possible. Thus the ship may be changed several updates in a row, but by a little margin.
In the first half of November, we will publish a special video, which will tell you more about how we are working on the balance of ships in our game. We will continue to release videos on issues of concern to you on a regular basis.
We have noticed your positive reaction to the voting on the choice of appearance for the future map. Thanks to all voters. We will keep holding similar activities in the future.
The Update 0.10.8 release became a serious challenge for us. The final build contained several bugs that had a negative impact on the festive update. We explained in detail why these errors occurred and how we planned to fix them. We will do our best to avoid making errors like this, but should this happen again, we will inform you in detail about the cause, expected time of fix, progress update. Read more in this post.
Also, this month we released a Clan Season review where we gave a detailed breakdown of the reasons for format selection and changes that we had implemented during the season. We are planning to tell you about the entire restriction system in Clan Battles and inform you more thoroughly about the decisions we make.
Submarines
After the test of submarines in Ranked Battles, we made some major changes, many of them based on your feedback—the biggest one was the addition of anti-submarine weaponry to almost all ships in the game. As our next step, we added submarines as rentals to Random Battles to be able to assess which additional changes we have to make in the future. In our announcement we tried to tell you as thoroughly and as openly as possible about the changes and the reasons behind them. After publishing that message, we decided to prepare another post with additional statistics to answer your frequently asked questions.
While we continue testing submarines in Random Battles, we do our best to respond to your feedback as quickly as possible. We would like to thank everyone who leaves their feedback. Based on your feedback we‘ve been working on changes for the next update. Many of you highlighted that the Sonar Ping mechanic provides too many advantages, so we decided to divide the benefits into two types of torpedoes. Players will have to choose in the future between homing torpedoes or unguided torpedoes with higher damage output. We also doubled the distance at which the guidance for homing torpedoes is disabled for both cruisers and destroyers.
To implement this plan and continue moving towards better transparency and communication, we also made many changes to our internal processes. We strive not only to answer your pressing questions and concerns, but also to become a better team that creates a better game for you. Over the past months, we have made a leap together with you, and to turn it into sustainable and long-term growth, we may need new people with fresh ideas who love video games. If you are interested in working at Wargaming, check out our vacancies page.
We are currently looking for the following positions at our office in Prague. If you think you would fit and want to give it a try, feel free to apply and learn more at the following links:
We also still have open positions in our publishing team in Austin, Texas. Unfortunately, at this time we can only consider candidates who are currently authorized to be employed in the United States of America. If that applies to you, feel free to check out this page.
In conclusion, we would like to thank you for both your constructive criticism and your support. Criticism allows us to identify our shortcomings, and your kind words help us understand when we are on the right course.
We will continue to keep you informed about our plans and important updates. See you soon!
Public Test of Update 0.10.11: Round 1+Developer Bulletin for Update 0.10.11
Captains!
It's now much simpler to participate in the Public Test—you can log in using your main account. To do so, select Public Test in the Game Instance section of Wargaming Game Center. You'll receive Community Tokens as a reward for participating in the Public Test. These can be exchanged for Premium ships, permanent camouflages, Supercontainers, and other desirable items!
Update 0.10.11 brings a new Dockyard, New Year activities, and other fresh new features. Take a look at the Developer Bulletin, and welcome to the Test! See you on the Public Test Server!
Starts:Thu. 18 Nov. 17:30 CET (UTC+1) Ends:Tue. 23 Nov. 06:30 CET (UTC+1)
Combat Missions and Rewards
The rewards for activities on the Public Test Server may differ from those on the Live Server.
The rewards will automatically be credited to your account within a few days of the release of the new version.
All players will have access to Tier VI, VIII, and X submarines.
You can receive III Dreadnought, VI Repulse, and IX Marlborough for completing shipbuilding phases. However, you will not be able to helm Repulse and Marlborough into battle. The ships will only be available to view in the Port.
You can earn Community Tokens by completing combat missions on the Public Test Server.
[table][tr][th]Round[/th][th][/th][th][/th][/tr] [tr][th]1[/th][th]2[/th][th][/th][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Earn 250 Base XP in a single battle in Random or Co-op Battles.
Reward on the Live Server: 100 Community Tokens [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Earn 1,000 Base XP in Random or Co-op Battles.
Reward on the Live Server: 200 Community Tokens [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Earn 8,000 Base XP in Random Battles playing submarines.
Reward on the Live Server: 1x Wargaming container [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Complete 32 shipbuilding phases at the Dockyard. At least five of them must be progressed through by completing Dockyard combat missions.
Reward on the Live Server: 1,000 Community Tokens [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Obtain any unique Commander of the New Year's Eve event.
Reward on the Live Server: 500 Community Tokens [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Earn 70 "Caused flooding" and "Torpedo hits" ribbons in Random Battles.
Reward on the Live Server: 450 Community Tokens [/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td][/td] [td][/td] [td] Win five Co-op Battles playing Tier X ships and deal at least 30,000 damage in each victorious battle.
Reward on the Live Server: 250 Community Tokens [/td][/tr][/table]
Each Wargaming container drops 1 day of Warships Premium Account, 3x Papa Papa signals, and 3x Juliet Charlie signals.
If you obtain a unique Commander of one of the teams in the New Year's Eve event during Round 1 of the Public Test, you will need to obtain a Commander of another team to complete the mission during Round 2.
Starting Bonuses
The research prices for ships and ship modules will be substantially discounted.
Players will be able to reset Commander skills free of charge.
If you're joining the Public Test for the first time since Update 0.10.9, you'll be awarded the following additional bonuses:
At the start of the Public Test, every participant will have all researchable Tier VI and VIII ships, helmed by Commanders with 19 skill points, credited to their PT accounts.
500,000,000 Credits; 30,000 Doubloons; 250,000 Coal, and 90 days of Warships Premium Account.
50 signals of all types (except for special signals) will also be added to your PT account.
If you fought at least one battle on the Public Test Server during the 0.10.10 Public Test, your account will be copied from the Live Server to the Public Test Server.
IMPORTANT! Because the update is still being tested, the information in this bulletin is tentative and reflects the state of game development at the time of its publication. Some changes and new features may be removed entirely or implemented differently by the time the update goes live. Screenshots, specific values of certain characteristics, and details of in-game mechanics will not necessarily be relevant after the update is released.
Please note: The rewards for activities on the Public Test server may differ from those on the Live Server.
In Update 0.10.11, you will be able to start building new British battleship IX Marlborough at the Clydebank Dockyard. She is based on a 1947 project with some of the design solutions borrowed from the Vanguard-class and King George V-class ships. Her primary feature is a powerful main battery consisting of quad-gun turrets that house sixteen 356 mm guns with a high rate of fire for a battleship and a decent range of fire. She has good speed, maneuverability, and concealment, but her armor is not as sturdy as that of her counterparts, and her firing accuracy is low.
Event Rules
The construction process at the Dockyard comprises 32 phases.
These shipbuilding phases can be progressed through by completing Dockyard combat mission groups or by spending 1,500 Doubloons to pass through each phase.
The combat mission groups span two updates—0.10.11 and 0.11.0—and the Dockyard itself will remain in your Ports until the end of Update 0.11.1.
In total, you can progress through 27 out of 32 shipbuilding phases by completing the Dockyard combat mission groups.
You'll receive III Dreadnought in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage, a 6-skill point Commander, and a Port slot as a reward for completing the 6th shipbuilding phase.
Completing the 18th shipbuilding phase will reward you with new battleship VI Repulse in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflages, a 6-skill point Commander, and a Port slot.
Completing other shipbuilding phases will bring you Santa's Gift, Santa's Big Gift, and Santa's Mega Gift containers; New Year Sky expendable camouflages, days of Warships Premium Account, Coal, Steel, Research Points, and other valuable rewards.
Upon completing the 32nd shipbuilding phase, you'll receive IX Marlborough in the War Paint camouflage, a Commander with 10 skill points, a Port slot, and a commemorative flag.
If you decide to complete the construction of IX Marlborough by spending Doubloons, you'll still be able to progress through the Dockyard combat mission groups. However, in that case, instead of the usual rewards for completing the shipbuilding phases, you'll get 250 Steel for each completed phase.
On the Public Test server, you can receive III Dreadnought, VI Repulse, and IX Marlborough for completing shipbuilding phases. However, you will not be able to helm Repulse and Marlborough into battle. The ships will be available only for viewing in the Port.
New Year Celebrations
We have prepared loads of activities to celebrate the New Year: the New Year's Eve competition, a festive collection, new Commanders, and heaps of other rewards!
New Year's Eve
One of the primary features of our New Year celebrations is a temporary event called New Year's Eve. This competition is being organized by three snow giants who were brought to life by magic stars. Each giant has its own responsibility in the New Year preparations. Help them contribute to the celebration!
New Year's Eve is similar to the Aircraft Bureaus Rivalry and Battle of the Beasts events, with minor interface improvements:
Updated the tooltips on the team selection screen and above the mission cards.
Added the display of the previous day's winning team on the event's main screen.
New Year's Eve Rules
The event starts 2 weeks after the release of the update and runs until the end of Update 0.10.11. It is divided into four stages, with each stage running for 1 week.
Once a week, you can choose one of three teams named after the magic stars: Modus, Sertum, or Munera.
During the event, you need to complete personal missions that are issued daily to all participants. The missions can be completed throughout the day in Random, Co-op, and Ranked Battles.
Completing the missions will advance you through the personal and team progress bars and unlock rewards.
Each team offers different unique rewards such as themed Commanders—snow giants with 6 skill points—and V Omaha, V Jaguar, or V Conte di Cavour in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage. The first time you earn a unique reward from any team, you will also receive the New Year's Eve achievement.
Other rewards include a new temporary resource—Sinterklaas Tokens, Christmas and New Year in the Navy collection containers, and New Year Sky expendable camouflages.
The Christmas and New Year in the Navy Collection
The festive collection is dedicated to New Year and Christmas traditions in the navy. It consists of four pages, with six elements on each. The reward for completing each page is 1 day of Warships Premium Account. The reward for completing the entire collection is a Santa’s Big Gift container. Collection elements drop only from Christmas and New Year in the Navy containers. These containers can be obtained by participating in the New Year's Eve event and in exchange for Sinterklaas Tokens, Credits, and Doubloons in the Armory.
New Year Fleet
In Update 0.10.11, five themed combat mission groups will be available to you. The reward for the first group is the New Year permanent camouflage for Tier VIII ships. Completing groups two through four will earn you VI Weser, VI Fubuki, and VI Izmail in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage, as well as Commanders with 6 skill points. The reward for completing the last combat mission group is VI Kijkduin in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage and Dutch Commander Sinterklaas with 10 skill points.
All five combat mission groups will become available simultaneously. However, the first combat mission group can only be completed playing VI Repulse.
Snowflakes
You will be able to continue earning bonuses for combat results—the Snowflakes introduced in Update 0.10.10. Depending on the ship tier, "blown off" Snowflakes will bring you Coal, Steel, and a temporary resource—New Year Certificates, which can be exchanged in the Armory for any of the three types of Santa's Gift containers.
The bonus for combat results can be obtained by either scoring the first victory or earning 300 Base XP playing a ship.
List of rewards
Tier V–VII: 750 Coal
Tiers VIII–IX: 75 Steel
Tier X: 1 New Year Certificate
Please note: You can blow a Snowflake off each ship only once during Updates 0.10.10 and 0.10.11 in battles of any type, except for Training Battles.
The Port of London has been decorated for the upcoming New Year celebration.
German Battleships
When Update 0.10.11 goes live, the German Tier III–X battleships will become available for all players to research.
Other Changes
Submarine Tweaks
The torpedo homing mechanics have been updated:
At the maximum launch distance, they will home in strictly on the impact point of a sonar ping without considering the target lead.
As the distance to the target decreases, torpedoes will home in with a gradually increasing lead. At a specific distance from the target, torpedoes will home in strictly on the lead point.
At the same time, just like before, torpedoes stop homing when they are within a certain distance of their target.
This change will allow torpedoes to home in on their target in a more natural way and reduce the frequency of situations where homing torpedoes launched in the proximity of islands at ships highlighted with a sonar ping would hit the land. Moreover, it will be somewhat easier for the target itself to dodge homing torpedoes if the sonar ping effect is removed before they hit.
Other Changes
The Hydrophone now becomes available some time after each battle begins. Unlike main battery or torpedo launchers, the time that the Hydrophone takes to prepare for battle is longer than its reload time.
Added an underwater torpedo reticule.
You can enter Training Battles playing submarines on maps that feature the underwater world.
Added the indication of additional dive capacity depletion for a detected enemy submarine.
Added information about the additional dive capacity depletion of detected submarines to the post-battle statistics screen.
Added new tips for submarines when they launch sonar pings at a target: "The ping will be dispersed" and "Insufficient time for torpedo homing."
The ship status screen that is brought up by pressing H now displays the ship's detectability from a submarine that is at the operational or periscope depths, as well as when the ship is inside a smoke screen.
Added the ability to switch to torpedo launchers by pressing 3 for all submarines.
Sound Presets
Added a sound preset system.
The game currently has numerous sliders and parameters to set up the sound, which can be difficult and time-consuming for some players to figure out. Sound presets allow you to adjust the sound image of the game to your preferences in just a couple of clicks.
Added sound presets:
Standard: Default sound settings.
Cinematic: Sound effects are brought to the foreground; the sound is vivid and saturated.
Simplified: The volume of sound effects is reduced; additional sounds are disabled. This setting helps focus your attention on in-game notifications.
Night: The settings are optimized for playing at low and medium volumes; at the same time, all effects and notifications are preserved.
Custom: Gives you the ability to set up the game sound yourself using the fine-tuning sliders.
Sound presets can be selected in the game settings. The Standard preset is active by default.
Other Changes
Changed the screen transition sequence after purchasing a ship:
Now, when purchasing a new ship from the Tech Tree, players will be taken to the ship demonstration screen. From there, you can go to the Equipment tab, to the Port, or back to the Tech Tree.
Ships can now be purchased from the ship viewing window.
Added the "To Tech Tree" button to the ship viewing window.
Added the underwater world to the following maps: Ring, Defense of Naval Station Newport, Operation Killer Whale, and Raptor Rescue.
HotFix: Game Balance
World of Warships' gameplay constantly changes and evolves. New ships are introduced, the game mechanics are updated, and players come up with new tactics.
To keep the game interesting and battles fair, it is extremely important to maintain balance in this ever-changing sea of game mechanics, new content, and creative playstyles. In today's article, we're going to tell you how the game balance in World of Warships is created and dispel several popular myths.
First of all, we need to define what balance is, since the concept of balance can vary across different games.
For us, balance is a set of actions aimed at keeping the game process interesting:
In general, the game should be interesting for both the players themselves and those who play with and against them.
Each battle should bring different gameplay, even if a person plays the same ship in a hundred battles in a row.
To achieve this, it's important for each player to have an equal opportunity to affect the battle outcome, regardless of the ship they choose to helm into battle. For example, if a ship is too strong, playing against her will be unpleasant and commanding the ship will also get boring pretty quickly. Moreover, a strong ship will likely become very popular by virtue of its effectiveness and thus reduce the diversity in battles.
Statistics, Feedback, and Decision Making
The primary difficulty in maintaining the game balance is the fact that each player may perceive fairness and balance differently, depending on their experience and understanding of game mechanics and the situation in a specific battle. Each player has their own favorite and hated ships, ship types, and playstyles.
Since our game has a wide audience, there are numerous opinions about the game balance and how it should work. It is only natural that these opinions can differ very strongly and even contradict each other.
At the same time, we, as developers, consider it to be very important to help the game evolve in a balanced way and take the majority opinion of our players into account. To create a new feature or make a change and then evaluate the results and plan the next actions, we need to process all these opinions and see the big picture. Next, we need to compare them with what happens in battle and make a decision. We need statistics for analysis.
Statistics can be divided into two main components:
The first is the opinion of players that we obtain from various surveys and the feedback that we collect via different platforms.
Battle statistics—various data gathered from battle results.
Feedback from players is extremely important to us, and we are infinitely grateful for your involvement and for helping us improve the game. However, our project is very complex, and it grows even more complex with each new release. To find the cause of player dissatisfaction, we often need to solve a huge tangle of interconnections and sometimes arrive at a solution in a completely different area. In other words, the "pain point" itself is not always the place you need to change something.
Statistics and data analysis hold a special place in our work. They are quite powerful tools, but they are the most difficult to use at the same time. We have the ability to collect a huge amount of data about everything that happens in the game, but collecting data is only the tip of the iceberg—you also need to process and analyze it. Since there are so many interconnections in the game and they are so complex, making decisions based on statistics becomes quite a challenging task. At the same time, the consequences of decisions made about some aspects of the game can have unpredictable effects on others.
For example, Update 0.7.5 saw the introduction of the "Hit Hard! Hit Fast! Hit Often!" campaign, which comprised numerous missions that could be completed playing only American ships—cruisers, in particular. This led to a dramatic increase in the popularity of American cruisers, and their distinctive feature is the Surveillance Radar consumable. This had a significant impact on destroyer gameplay.
Working with Data When Making Decisions
As we mentioned earlier, statistics are an important tool for tuning the balance in any game. This is because many interactions in the game are largely random and unpredictable within a single battle or series of battles.
For example, how do you estimate how much damage a battleship receives from torpedoes? In one battle it may not encounter a destroyer because they were on different flanks; in another battle, there may be no destroyers at all. We can give a ton of examples like this. In other words, it's impossible to analyze something on the basis of a single event. To understand how things actually are, you need quite a large sample of battles. Collecting various metrics and analyzing them helps us fine-tune interactions in the game in a much more efficient way than by doing it only on the basis of our own expert appraisal and player feedback.
It is quite obvious that the more data we collect, the higher the load on our servers is and the more difficult the data processing will be. In many ways, analysis of metrics in the game is a process that naturally evolves as the game develops and new ships, mechanics, modes, and other components are added to it.
Just a couple of years ago, we had quite a modest toolset for game balance at our disposal. For example, we used certain average indicators of ship efficiency without dividing players by skill level. Of course, we understood that all people play differently, but we had no idea to what extent.
It happened because we used far fewer metrics than now, and at that time, we had relatively modest server capacity to gather and process them. However, our game grew and became more complex. While the simpler methods of ship balance were generally enough at that time, as our game grew and the variety of game factors and unique gameplay types increased, so did the requirements for ship balancing tools. Now, we gather significantly more information as our game grows. Apart from that, our approach to evaluating ship efficiency also changed. For example, if we speak about ship efficiency, we don't just evaluate average values now, but also consider the experience and skill levels of players, peak and average values, and we take how these values are distributed over time into account. We used this approach for almost all main metrics: a ship's winrate, damage, relative damage, survival time in battle, and many others. Apart from that, we now have more experience in planning data analysis. For example, from the very beginning of submarine testing, we were able to receive a significant volume of a variety of detailed data, whether it was how long submarines spent in each state, how many times they hit with sonar pings, or how much damage their torpedoes dealt to different targets.
And we could look at all this data for different groups of players. This allowed us to make decisions faster and better. Of course, there were mistakes. The Italian battleship branch is one such example. At the time of its release, the ships were weaker than their counterparts in terms of combat efficiency. As a result, their efficiency had to be brought to normal values across several subsequent updates.
Statistics is pure mathematics, but dry numbers always hide player experience, and some interconnections can be lost or invisible after mathematical processing. Therefore, you always need to keep in mind that numbers are not the whole truth when working with statistics. No matter how much we want to calculate everything as accurately as possible, statistics are not omnipotent, and there is always room for data interpretation.
How Decisions Are Made
Apart from the dry numbers of statistics, we also take guidance from the feedback from our players and use our own judgment. In other words, you need to consider a combination of three factors to make an informed decision: statistics + player feedback + developer experience. Based on these three pillars, we can be sure that a decision we make is in the best interests of the game. [table][tr][td]
MYTH The developers don't play their game.
In fact, the developers play their game all the time. This is especially true for the Balance Department, whose employees simply must be aware of what is happening in real battles. The developers must play their game to enhance their firsthand knowledge, which allows us to resolve possible conflicts between player opinions and their results. We don't just play a lot on the Live Server, but also on test servers and on various local development servers. In addition, we spend a significant amount of time playing test ships and in various battle modes. [/td][/tr][/table] [expand style="more"][/expand] Thus, when making a decision, we have to analyze a large volume of data, apart from the feedback itself. Because of this, some players have the impression that we do not pay attention to their feedback, which of course is not true.
Creating balance in World of Warships is not a confrontation between players and developers, but a form of close cooperation. We draw the ideas for many of our solutions from suggestions put forward by our players.
For example, when adding anti-submarine weapons to ships in the game, we initially decided to give them only to some of the branches so that these would become a new "national" gameplay feature. On paper, players were not happy about this idea. However, even ideas that players do not initially like still need to be tested, since the result may turn out to be quite positive in the end. For example, players did not like the concept of destroyers without smoke generators or torpedo tubes when they first appeared, but in the end, the idea turned out to be successful and these ships found their niche and gameplay. In the case of anti-submarine weapons, however, the test results confirmed player opinions. For this reason, we added anti-submarine weapons to the majority of cruisers and battleships in the game.
Any change to the game balance, be it weakening a ship, strengthening it, or adding new mechanics, affects almost every aspect of battle gameplay and also affects the game experience for both the ship's owner and other players. For this reason, when changing the game balance, we try to find a solution that will benefit both the majority of players and the game in general.
It is not always possible to find such a solution right away, and sometimes it is necessary to wait until it appears. We always keep the unresolved "pains" of our players at the forefront of our mind and work on solving them.
A good example of a long but successful search for a solution to a balancing problem is the story of battleship X Thunderer. Her playstyle—showering enemies with HE shells from a long range—annoyed many players. Based on past experience with other ships, we decided that the problem lay in her excessive popularity, and we thought that we could reduce player frustration by reducing its presence on the battlefield in this way. Therefore, we decided to withdraw her from sale. Unfortunately, the diminishing popularity of the ship did not solve the problem. Players suggested numerous ways to resolve the issue—decrease her rate of fire, reduce her accuracy, or weaken her HE shells. However, detailed analysis of the statistics and player feedback on X Thunderer showed that there were two main styles of playing this ship:
A mid-range X Thunderer that used both AP and HE shells.
A long-range X Thunderer that exclusively used HE shells.
Players did not have any problems with the first playstyle, so we did not want to weaken the ship for all of her owners at once.
The solution was found in reducing her firing range. This did not affect the players who fought at medium range, but it significantly changed the gameplay for those who liked firing HE shells from long distances—they had to either change their playstyle or mount an upgrade that increases the range of fire at the expense of rate of fire.
Conversely, our decisions sometimes feel sudden for players. It could be the case that a ship that has shown good performance over many updates and brought joy to players, or vice versa, a ship that has long been considered not very effective, suddenly undergoes balance changes when she hasn't undergone any before.
Game balance is not set in stone. New ships and mechanics are constantly appearing; the ways in which players approach the game are changing; and a ship that did not require any changes before, since she was normal in terms of her characteristics, can move beyond the limits of her battle effectiveness. In this case, we must make adjustments.
For example, recent statistics showed that old-timers in our game, such as X Zaō and IX Buffalo, needed their battle performance to be increased a little, so balance changes have been applied to them in Update 0.10.10.
We're also trying to stick to our strategy of making only small changes. This helps us not to change ships too much in a single take and carefully bring them to the required efficiency level, and to do it all without making sudden moves and without hurting the game experience.
Development of New Branches
Returning to statistics, it is worth noting that they can be extremely useful when creating new ship concepts. For example, X Shimakaze's popularity showed that some players are interested in a purely torpedo-oriented gameplay for destroyers. This led to the creation of the European destroyer branch with ships that also have torpedoes as their primary armament but offer different gameplay compared to Japanese destroyers. When adding a new branch of German destroyers, we analyzed the roles played by destroyers in battle based on data on damage caused, Key Area capture, spotting, interaction with other ship types, etc. We came to the conclusion that our game lacked destroyers that deal significant damage to cruisers. This is how the German destroyers were born, and they cause about a third of their total damage to cruisers.
At the same time, players often criticize us for creating new ships exclusively around "gimmicks," i.e. prominent features in the stats or equipment of a ship, such as Airstrike on Dutch cruisers.
However, these prominent and strong features make a ship unique, and as we mentioned earlier, one of our tasks is to maintain diversity in the game. If we keep making similar ships, this will quickly lead to stagnated gameplay and players will get bored.
For the same reason, we do not make ships that are too strong. Players will immediately understand what ship is the easiest to win on, and it will eventually lead to a decrease in the overall enjoyment of the game, both for those who play the ship, because they will quickly get tired of winning without effort, and for those who play against her. In addition, this will greatly increase the popularity of a ship and will also negatively affect game diversity. At the same time, it is very important for the uniqueness of a new ship to be the key to preserving the uniqueness of the old ships. [table][tr][td]
MYTH: The developers give preference to particular nations when creating and balancing ships.
Just based on the development objectives, it is not beneficial for us to create a bias toward any nation—this would violate the principle of variability in the game and ultimately lead to ship imbalance and deterioration of the game experience. From the perspective of simple logic, for us—the development team—there is simply no reason to give preference to any nation because the whole game is our brainchild and all the ships in it are valuable and loved by us. We do our best to develop the game in a balanced and even way, and any particular preferences contradict this task. [/td][/tr][/table]
How Ships Are Tested
Ships arrive in testing after the initial set-up and trial runs by the development team.
Next, they fall into the hands of supertesters and involved Clan players, as well as Community Contributors and other volunteer groups. They help us a lot with testing, and we thank them for their help.
We would like to express our gratitude to participants of the Clan and super tests—you contribution is very important, and your help is invaluable. Thank you!
During testing, we don't look at the ship's balance. We first check the feedback from players to see whether they like this ship or not. When we receive the survey results, we act in one of two ways:
Keep the current concept and begin balancing the ship to bring it to the required efficiency.
Completely abandon the concept and do something else.
When we move to fine-tuning the ship, we pick specific facts from the player feedback about what they liked and disliked about the ship:
If a ship needs to be weakened, we try to "cut" the unnecessary things but preserve the ship's concept.
If a ship is not effective enough, we look at what test participants disliked the most and work with those aspects of the ship. However, it should be noted that not all weak points of a ship need to be fixed because the uniqueness of a ship lies not only in its strengths but also in its weaknesses.
Unlike ships that have already appeared on the Live Server, quite drastic and significant balance changes can be applied to test ships. There are two reasons for this: First, these ships are not available to regular players, so their experience will not be affected by drastic changes to test ships. Second, if we make a decision to apply significant changes to a test ship, there is no need to implement them carefully and in stages, since this will significantly extend the testing of this ship and slow down its arrival to the Live Server.
After passing the closed test, most ships are tested on the Live Server. This stage is extremely important because it allows us to test the ship in real combat conditions.
This approach to testing often raises questions from our players, who believe that ships should be tested on separate servers. Unfortunately, no closed testing can create the same environment and provide the same volume of data as the Live Server.
Moreover, on the Live Server, we test not only the ship settings, but also the concept: how players perceive her in battle—both the owners of the ship and those who play against her. This allows us to fine-tune the ship balance, anticipate possible difficulties, and make the necessary adjustments even before the ship is released.
At the same time, on the Live Server, we don't only test individual ships, we also test new ship types, concepts, and mechanics—for example, submarines or superships. Testing them on the Live Server is quite an important process because it allows us to better prepare them for full-fledged introduction to the game and avoid repeating the mistakes we made with the aircraft carrier overhaul in Update 0.8.0, when insufficient testing led to a long period of changes, including several major fixes soon after the update's release. [table][tr][td]
MYTH: The developers do not consider player feedback about test ships.
We listen to player feedback about test ships very carefully, and we base ship concepts on this feedback. X Schlieffen is a good example—the main thing that players criticized was her number of hit points. When we realized that the ship had not achieved the required level of combat effectiveness, the first thing we did was increase the ship's HP pool. [/td][/tr][/table]
Ship Type Balance and the "Rock, Paper, Scissors" Principle
At the moment, we are trying to balance ships according to the "Rock, Paper, Scissors" principle—a particular ship type is effective against some ship types and vulnerable to others.
The reason for this is that the game features over 400 ships, and it is very difficult to remember the specifics of each of them. To keep things simple, all ships in our game fall under five types: battleships, cruisers, submarines, destroyers, and aircraft carriers.
The "Rock, Paper, Scissors" principle allows players to understand how they should play their ship type, what strengths and weaknesses it has, what its role in battle is, and what interaction principles with other ship types exist.
Knowing this information, a player will not be confused in battle, even if they have little experience. It helps define in general terms their tasks in battle, how they should act while playing the selected ship of a particular type, what ship types are their primary targets, and who will target their ship first of all.
The "Rock, Paper, Scissors" principle also improves gameplay variability—each ship type will be in demand in battle because each can be effective against ships of another type, and, at the same time, each has its own counter-class.
Moreover, there are also differences between ships of the same type, and these become obvious to players once they gain a certain amount of experience in the game. For example, there are artillery destroyers, torpedo destroyers, ships that fight for Key Areas, those that engage enemies over long distances, etc. In other words, ships of one type may have different purposes in battle, and you will need to play them differently according to their purpose. These differences are more complex and subtle because the boundaries between the different kinds of ships are not always obvious. However, the more experienced a player grows, the clearer these limits become and the more knowledge they will have about how to use their ship in battle based on her strengths.
Working on balance is an ongoing process aimed at maintaining old mechanics and introducing new content. The balance team is currently focused on submarines and superships—they create gameplay for them and for those who play against them. We do not forget about old ships and possible changes for them either. We strive to make adjustments for them as unnoticeable and painless as possible for players. Our goal is to provide each player with the opportunity to find their own gameplay, creating sufficient diversity in the game. At the same time, we want all players to have equal opportunities to apply their abilities in battle.
We hope that our article helped you learn how balance works in World of Warships, which is largely created thanks to your feedback and the battles you fight.
4th Anniversary on Steam
Captains!
Exactly 4 years ago this week, World of Warships made its first appearance on Steam. To honor such a significant milestone—one that we couldn’t have reached without you—we’re throwing an all-out birthday bash filled with exclusive rewards and shiploads of fun, and you're invited! Check it out!
Anniversary Combat Missions
To kick off our shindig, we’ve prepared some special in-game missions that will allow you to get your hands on some brand-new content that's been created to celebrate our Steam anniversary. Newcomers to the game will even be able to get a mid-tier Premium battleship! All absolutely free!
The missions can be completed until November 29
For All
All Captains are invited to participate in a simple two-part mission chain that will allow you to sail away with new and unique Steam Anniversary content.
Objective: Over any number of battles, earn 3,000 Base XP then destroy eight ships.
Restrictions: Tier V–X ships; Random Battles, Co-op Battles, Operations.
Rewards: A Steam-themed container, camos, and the Anniversary commemorative flag and patch.
For Newcomers
Newcomers to World of Warships on Steam whose account level is between 1 and 7 can enjoy a warm welcome activity.
Objective: Win two battles.
Restrictions: Tier III–X ships; Random Battles, Co-op Battles, Operations.
Rewards: Soviet Premium battleship Okt. Revolutsiya with her Victory Day permanent camouflage, as well as special Steam-themed containers, camos, and the Anniversary commemorative flag and patch.
Community Event
Here’s an irresistible chance to win a Premium ship of your choice and even a Steam Anniversary t-shirt and hoodie! Just complete a simple mission, and you’ll be entered into a fantastic giveaway of 244 rare prizes!
To participate in this special giveaway event, you only need to open this news in the game, click the “Participate” button, and complete the following mission that will appear in your Port:
Objective: Over any number of battles, deal 1,000,000 damage.
Two weeks after the mission ends on November 29, we'll distribute 200 Community Tokens to everyone who completed it and pick the lucky winners of the following prizes:
200 random players will get 2x Steam containers and 2 days of Premium Account.
40 random players will get 2x Steam Supercontainers and a t-shirt.
Four random players will have the choice of any Premium ship that's currently available in the Armory/Premium Shop, along with a World of Warships t-shirt and hoodie.
New DLC Bundles
On top of all that, we’ve also stocked up the Shop with some special new packages.
We’ve also designed some beautiful wallpapers for you to download and trick out on your PC with some epic World of Warships art.
Happy anniversary, Captains—enjoy the celebrations!
Anniversary Community event
Time flies when you're having fun, Captains!
Though it feels like yesterday when World of Warships first sailed—guns blazing—into Steam, this week, we're already celebrating our 4th anniversary on the platform. To celebrate this important milestone and show our gratitude to our active community of swashbuckling Captains on Steam, we're going all-out with a special competition filled with snazzy rewards for all participants!
How to participate:
You only need to complete a single combat mission:
Objective: Over any number of battles, deal 1,000,000 damage
Battle types: Random, Co-op, Ranked, event
Ships: Tiers V–X
Note: To join the competition, you need to open this news in the game and click the “Participate” button. https://steamcommunity.com/games/552990/announcements/detail/4492898490982126960 The combat mission will immediately appear on your account.
Prizes:
Guaranteed prizes: 200 Community Tokens.
The "4th Anniversary on Steam" combat mission offers guaranteed prizes. After completing it, every participant will receive 1x Steam container.
200 random players will get 2 days of Warships Premium Account and 2x Steam containers.
40 random players will get 2x Steam Supercontainers and 1x Anniversary t-shirt.
4 random players will get 1x Premium ship from the Armory, 1x Anniversary t-shirt, and 1x Anniversary hoodie.
Rules:
Winners will be picked at random from the pool of participating users. Each participant can win only one prize.
All the event winners will be announced in this post on November 29.
In-game prizes will be credited within a week. Anniversary merch winners will be contacted via email on November 29. Please reply to our message within a week so we know where to ship your prizes!
Premium Subscription in Return for Applying Tags to the Game!
Captains!
Which component of the game is most important to you? Global multiplayer gaming? The militaristic naval setting? Is it realistic ships? Tell us about your preferences, and we'll grant you one day of Warships Premium Account!
Find the "Popular user-defined tags for this product" section on the right-hand side of the main page of the game.
Click the "+" symbol.
Select a tag (or create your own) that’s applicable to World of Warships. To select an existing tag from the list, click the "+" symbol next to the tag of your choice.
Share your list of tags in the comments of this news item.
Within a matter of days, you'll be granted 1 day of Warships Premium Account (for your account associated to the Steam account)!
Attention! During this event, 1 day of Warships Premium Account will be granted only once, regardless of the number of tags issued.
Good luck in battle, Captains!
Singles Day Community Event
Captains!
The 11.11 Global Shopping Carnival is about to begin! Come and take part in our special community giveaway with guaranteed prizes!
How to Enter:
Leave a comment under this announcement post.
Complete the [Singles Day] combat mission (over any number of battles, earn 1,111 Free XP; battle modes—PvP, Co-op, PvE, Ranked, event; ships—Tiers V–X).
Prizes:
Guaranteed prizes: 1x daily container and 200 Community Tokens.
Superprize for three random winners: 1x Premium Ship VI container.
Rules:
Three superprize winners will be picked at random from the pool of participating unique players (players who leave a comment and complete the combat mission).
Any comments that break the discussion rules may be deleted or excluded.
The results will be announced in this thread on November 15. Prizes will be awarded within a week.
Please note that the servers will be temporarily unavailable due to the release of an update. The schedule is available below. Maintenance times are tentative and subject to change. Please accept our apologies for any inconveniences. [table][tr][td]
[/td][td] 10.11.2021 02:00 AM—05:00 AM PT (UTC–8)[/td][td] 2021-11-10 10:00—13:00 UTC[/td][/tr][/table] The new update will go live some time after it's been downloaded because the client and server sides are updated separately. While the client begins to update immediately, it takes time for the servers to be updated across all regions.
If there are problems with downloading or launching the update—please perform files integrity check. steam://validate/552990
Subtitles can be enabled in the video player separately. [previewyoutube="_sU4FDYk4j4;full"] The following new features await you in Update 0.10.10:
Superships piercing waves in Ranked and Co-op Battles
Arms Race as a standalone battle type
Massive graphics update
Combat mission groups with the ultimate completion reward being VI Novorossiysk
New season of Clan Battles
Tweaks to submarines
Let's dive into the details of these and other changes!
Read through this article carefully and keep an eye out for a gift! Share the article with your friends and Clanmates so they can stay on top of all the essential info for this update!
Superships in Ranked Battles
Update 0.10.10 kicks off the Fifth Season of Ranked Battles, which you can join at the helms of superships.
Apart from super battleships Satsuma and Hannover, which you already had a chance to helm during the Grand Battle event in Update 0.10.5, four more superships await you in the game: Condé, Annapolis, Yamagiri, and Zorkiy. Like their forerunners, the new superships boast unique features that will allow players to pursue alternative gameplay tactics and employ different decision-making strategies in battle.
Condé, Annapolis, and Zorkiy have one additional firing mode that can be activated by pressing the F key. After switching to this mode, each separate turret can automatically deliver several consecutive salvos in rapid succession before being subjected to a long reload. Depending on the ship, activating this mode changes the characteristics of shells or guns.
Yamagiri is armed with two types of torpedoes that can be switched between in battle. The torpedoes differ by various parameters such as range, speed, and damage. Switching to the alternative torpedoes takes an additional fixed amount of time that is separate from the reloading mechanic. Torpedo-tube reloading is suspended while switching to the alternative torpedo type and then resumes immediately after.
We have changed Combat Instructions—the unique feature of Satsuma and Hannover. Now, the adjustment fire bonus will not trigger automatically. Instead, it is now activated by pressing the F key. This change will allow these super battleships to apply the power-up bonus at the most optimal moment.
All six superships will be available for rent from random bundles that can be obtained in exchange for a new resource— Supership Tokens—in the Armory. You can earn Tokens by completing special combat missions playing Tier X ships. This will help us prevent the battle queue from filling up with superships only.
In addition to Ranked Battles, you can also helm superships into Co-op Battles—a great place to tame the new ships and get to know their mechanics in a more relaxed environment.
Ranked Season Format
7 vs. 7
Tier X ships and superships in all three leagues
The season is divided into six Sprints. The first Sprint lasts 1 week. All the other Sprints each run for 2 weeks. Each new Sprint starts immediately after the end of the previous one.
This season will not feature submarines. The matchmaker will apply the standard ship type restrictions. In terms of superships, team lineups will be mirrored. Details of the new Ranked Battles season and superships will be released in a dedicated article on our website.
Novorossiysk Service
A week after Update 0.10.10 goes live, players will be able to access five themed combat mission groups named "Novorossiysk Service." Completing those combat mission groups, as well as individual missions, will reward you with expendable camouflages and signals. Once you have completed the fifth group, you will get VI Novorossiysk, a Commander with 6 skill points, and a Port slot. Check the game client for details about how to complete the missions.
German Battleships
In Update 0.10.10, Early Access continues for German Tier III–IX battleships.
You can spend German Tokens on sequentially available bundles with these ships and the following permanent camouflages: German Eagle for IX Prinz Rupprecht and X Schlieffen; German Navy for VII Prinz Heinrich and VIII Zieten.
A special combat mission will become available with the release of the update. Completing it will reward you with a flag and a "German Battleships: Part 2" patch.
We have decorated the Port of Hamburg.
Visual Improvements
Update 0.10.10 brings quite a few large-scale improvements and changes to the graphics as we continue working on the game's visuals.
New water
Water simulation and visuals have been completely reworked for all maps. The new simulation system can create waves of any shape and height while also adding realism to wave dynamics. This means that waves will now gently rock a ship, and the ship will produce a response that varies according to the wave height. This change will not affect gameplay.
We have improved the display of the sun glitter path over water and other optical effects on the water's surface. Added dynamic seafoam and updated the ship wake effect.
With low graphics settings, water simulation will remain unchanged.
HD textures on maps
We are launching a massive update for all maps and Ports to accommodate enhanced HD textures. In Update 0.10.10, high-detail textures will be added to the Two Brothers and Hotspot maps, as well as the Philippines, Saint-Petersburg, and Twitch Prime Ports.
Future updates will bring high-detail textures for the other maps and Ports. However, like with HDR lighting, such an update requires a huge amount of content to be reworked and an individual approach to each map and Port. For that reason, adopting the new technology for all maps and Ports in the game will take time and be implemented incrementally with the release of future updates.
Underwater world, vegetation, and animations
We are continuing to improve the underwater world in our game. In Update 0.10.10, we have added underwater vegetation on the Two Brothers and Hotspot maps. The underwater world will also appear on the Haven, Sleeping Giant, and Crash Zone Alpha maps. In the nearest updates, we will focus on adding improvements to the underwater world on other maps as well. Vegetation has been enhanced on all maps and in all Ports. Trees look more realistic with enhanced shading and rays of sunlight shining through the green foliage. We have also reworked the wind-tree interactions. We have added more trees and other green foliage on maps.
Ports and maps with HD textures now feature birds, fish, flying flags, and other moving objects. We will continue adding more animated objects to maps and Ports over time. More details on how we have been enhancing graphics can be found in a dedicated article.
Submarine Tweaks
The periscopes of submarines have been piercing through waves in Live Server Random Battles for an entire update now. We are extremely grateful to our players for the battles played helming or countering submarines, and for all the feedback that is helping us shape the new ship type and make the experience of helming or countering them more interesting and engaging.
In Update 0.10.10, we have introduced a number of important changes for this ship type based on collected data and your feedback.
Changes to torpedoes
The only "meaningful" weapon that submarines carry is their torpedo tubes. Mechanics like sonar pings and homing are essential for submarines as a ship type to offer distinctive and interesting gameplay that is relevant for an action-packed battle. This, however, comes at the cost of subs being fragile and firing only a tiny number of torpedoes per salvo.
But even though the data suggests that submarine torpedoes are not over-powered, we have heard our players say that submarine torpedoes are currently both effective and easy to master at the same time, while countering them poses quite a challenge. When used wisely, sonar pings could give sub Captains everything at once, i.e. both torpedo homing and increased damage. For the other ship types, interacting with such torpedoes in battle could hardly be called a pleasant experience.
To solve this problem while preserving the unique gameplay of submarines, we split their torpedoes into two types. They receive deferent bonuses from sonar pings.
The first type is homing torpedoes. These have reduced maneuvering capabilities, and the distance at which they cease to home in on cruisers and destroyers is increased by a factor of two. The other characteristics correspond to those currently in effect for submarine torpedoes. As long as the effect of one sonar ping hit remains active, these torpedoes will home in on a target. The effect of a second sonar ping hit improves homing but does not make it any better than it currently is on the Live Server, nor does it have any effect on how much damage the torpedo can deal.
The other type comes in the form of torpedoes that can deal increased damage. Their standard damage is slightly higher than that of homing torpedoes. The effect of the first sonar ping hit reduces the detectability range of these torpedoes by 25%. A second ping hit increases the damage dealt to the target by a factor of two if the torpedoes hit the ship's anti-torpedo protection. With the ping hit effect still active, this type of torpedo can home in on a target vertically (i.e. it can ascend or dive, depending on positions of the target and sub) but not horizontally.
Tier VI subs will receive homing torpedoes only when submarines of Tier VIII and X are equipped with torpedoes of both types. The torpedo switching mechanics are the same as those used for destroyer Yamagiri. Switching between torpedo types takes a certain amount of time, and the reload status of the torpedo tubes remains the same as it was before torpedo switching was activated.
The different torpedo types will offer sub Captains a choice between accuracy and damage while also substantially improving the gameplay experience for players helming the other ship types.
Submarine spotting range at depth
Apart from their damage-dealing capabilities, subs are pretty good at detecting hostile ships while underwater. We decided that these capabilities were excessive and did not fit well into the basic concept of this ship type. For this reason, the standard range of surface ship detectability by submarines at their operating depth has been reduced to 2 kilometers, and in a future update, it will be replaced by the assured acquisition range. That said, subs will no longer be able to spot hostile ships while lurking in the relative safety of the depths.
Changing depth and sub detectability tweaks
By constantly switching between the surface and periscope depth levels, players were able to reduce their submarine's detectability without depleting dive capacity. This was because their detectability range would start to change almost immediately as they shifted between depths. This does not fit with the intended gameplay, and from now on, detectability will change at the periscope and maximum depths.
Testing will continue
While these changes will have a substantial effect on gameplay, there are still many submarine mechanics that we have not even approached yet. We need more data to be able to test subs in the best way we can. This will allow us to effectively decide what other changes are needed. With that being said, we will continue testing subs, despite the fixes planned for release with Update 0.10.10. For this reason, all battles played before Update 0.10.10 hits the servers are still extremely valuable in this respect.
Division Achievements and Division Stars
We have added the following five achievements that can only be earned by playing as part of a Division in Random Battles: [table][tr][td][/td] [td]Coordinated Attack[/td] [td]Your Division must destroy at least seven enemy ships.[/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td]Shoulder to Shoulder[/td] [td]Your Division must damage at least 10 enemy ships. The damage caused to each ship must amount to at least 20% of her normal HP.[/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td]Brothers in Arms[/td] [td]Each Division mate must destroy at least two enemy ships in a single battle.[/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td]Strike Team[/td] [td]Damage caused by a Division must be equal to 50% or more of the consolidated total normal HP of all enemy ships.[/td][/tr] [tr][td][/td] [td]General Offensive[/td] [td]Your Division must destroy hostile ships of three different types.[/td][/tr][/table]
The above achievements can be earned in Random Battles.
During the update, players will be able to earn Division Stars—special bonuses issued for playing together with each Clanmate.
You can get a Division Star by playing in a Division with your Clanmates.
The Stars can be earned in all battle types, except for Training Battles.
Earning certain numbers of Stars unlocks access to various rewards.
If you switch Clans, any Stars and rewards you previously received remain with you.
To see the roster of Clanmates who you can team up with in a Division, as well as the list of rewards you can get, navigate to the Division Star tab in the Clans section.
Starting from Update 0.10.10, playing with each of your Clanmates can bring you up to three Stars:
One for a victorious battle.
One for earning the Coordinated Attack achievement.
One for earning the Strike Team achievement.
Armory
The following ships will become available in the Armory with the release of the Update:
X Gibraltar is a heavy cruiser that carries twelve 234 mm guns housed in three turrets. She fires shells along a flat ballistic trajectory. The ship is armed only with AP shells that have enhanced ricochet angles and short fuse delay, which significantly increases their efficiency. Gibraltar is equipped with Hydroacoustic Search, Repair Party, and a variant of Smoke Generator with a short smoke screen setting time and long smoke screen dispersion time. All consumables are available in separate slots.
The ship is available in the Research Bureau for 59,000 Research Points.
IX Tulsa is a ship based on the Oregon City-class heavy cruisers. She is armed with six 203 mm guns that have a short reload time for the caliber and AP shells with enhanced ricochet angles. Tulsa has a good AA defense system and decent set of consumables: Repair Party, Surveillance Radar, and a choice between Hydroacoustic Search and Defensive AA Fire.
You can get the ship in exchange for
We have added the Shark Rage permanent camouflage for X Austin. You can obtain it in exchange for 3 Clan Tokens.
With the release of Update 0.10.10, all Festive Tokens and Soviet Tokens will be converted into Credits at the rate of 1:90,000 and 1:6,000, respectively.
Other New Features and Changes
Changes to Economics
We have changed the availability, cost, and characteristics of certain signals and camouflages:
Expendable camouflages "For Meritorious Service," Rising, and Blue Lagoon, as well as economic signal India Bravo Terrathree, can no longer be obtained.
We changed the bonuses and cost of the Type 1 and Type 2 camouflages. They will differ from the Type 5 camouflage only visually:
The camouflages will provide –3% to the detectability range by sea and +4% to the dispersion of shells fired by the enemy at your ship.
The cost of the camouflages has been increased from 7,500 to 22,500 Credits.
We are working to differentiate elements of the exterior (camouflages and signals) from economic bonuses. The above changes to the accessibility and characteristics of the camouflages and signals are a part of that large-scale change. We will share more information at a later date.
Battle Performance Bonuses
We are starting to the get things up and ready for the New Year frenzy! As early as in Update 0.10.10, you can earn festive battle performance bonuses on all of your Tier V and higher ships. Depending on the ship's tier, you can grab Coal, Steel, or a special temporary resource called New Year Certificates that you can exchange for Santa's Gift containers in Update 0.10.11. You can get 1x Santa's Gift container in exchange for 1 New Year Certificate. A Santa's Big Gift container will be available in exchange for 3 Certificates, and a Santa's Mega Gift container will require as many as 5 Certificates.
Access to the festive battle performance bonuses will open 1 week after Update 0.10.10 goes live and will continue until the end of Update 0.10.11. This way, players will have more time to get New Year Certificates and other festive bonuses.
Changes to the Naval Battle
Throughout the entire duration of Update 0.10.10, the Engagement stage of the Naval Battle will be held in a group format. Clans will be randomly divided between several groups of 25 or 50 Clans each. The amount of Oil earned depends on the number of Stars obtained and the Clan's place in its own group.
Once Update 0.10.11 goes live, the standard format of the Engagement will be replaced by the group format every 4 weeks.
Thank you for being an attentive reader! Click "Collect Your Gift" to claim
Starts: Fri. 19 Nov. 06:00 CET (UTC+1)
2,000 Credits : 
1 Doubloon
X Yoshino B, 
IX Pommern B, 
VIII Saipan B, and 
VIII Loyang B from the Armory or Premium Shop, and 
Doubloons Purchase[/td][/tr][/table]
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10 days of Warships Premium Account, and other items at special prices.
35,000 Free XP — 17%
[/td] [td]
[/td] [td]
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250,000 Coal, and 
VI Weser, 
VI Fubuki, and 
VI Izmail in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage, as well as Commanders with 6 skill points. The reward for completing the last combat mission group is 
VI Kijkduin in the Snow and Stars permanent camouflage and Dutch Commander Sinterklaas with 10 skill points.
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X Thunderer. Her playstyle—showering enemies with HE shells from a long range—annoyed many players. Based on past experience with other ships, we decided that the problem lay in her excessive popularity, and we thought that we could reduce player frustration by reducing its presence on the battlefield in this way.
[/td] [td]Coordinated Attack[/td] [td]Your Division must destroy at least seven enemy ships.[/td][/tr] [tr][td]
[/td] [td]Shoulder to Shoulder[/td] [td]Your Division must damage at least 10 enemy ships. The damage caused to each ship must amount to at least 20% of her normal HP.[/td][/tr] [tr][td]
[/td] [td]Brothers in Arms[/td] [td]Each Division mate must destroy at least two enemy ships in a single battle.[/td][/tr] [tr][td]
[/td] [td]Strike Team[/td] [td]Damage caused by a Division must be equal to 50% or more of the consolidated total normal HP of all enemy ships.[/td][/tr] [tr][td]
[/td] [td]General Offensive[/td] [td]Your Division must destroy hostile ships of three different types.[/td][/tr][/table]
