And it's time to introduce a new nation.
…and a new gun type in the game.
The most important thing for this gun is the new mechanics.
The mechanics are highly complicated.
The vehicle that we’re introducing…
We assembled the vehicle piece by piece, literally, like a building set.
We recently announced
a complete Tech Tree for Poland
at WG Fest in Moscow.
It's logical, since the first vehicle
has been in the game for more than half a year now.
And it's time to introduce a new nation. Please welcome the Italians!
We have a great number of nations already added into the game,
and it’s getting harder and harder to add new nations.
To create a full Tech Tree from Tier I through Tier X,
we can use only those nations
that established their tank-building industries immediately after World War I.
After World War I, the Italians, like many other countries,
became interested in the armored vehicles appearing at that time.
The first prototypes were borrowed from the other countries
that had already started development of their tank-building industry.
Primarily, those prototypes were either a combination of design solutions
or a direct copy.
If we are speaking about the Italian Tech Tree on the whole,
as far as our development traditionally goes, low and mid tiers
present either prewar or World War II vehicles,
while the high tiers present postwar vehicles,
designs, and works in progress that could
distinguish the nation among others, including gameplay.
We started with the medium tank Tech Tree—
it will be a complete Tech Tree from Tier I through Tier X.
We’ll talk about this Tech Tree later,
for now let's lift the veil on the first Premium Tier VIII vehicle—
the Progetto M35 modification 46.
The Progetto M35 mod. 46, Progetto 46…
[In Development]
Well, we haven't decided on the name yet.
On the whole, the Italian tank-building school
didn't possess a vast scientific knowledge base or resources; it generally strove
to borrow successful design solutions and apply them to their vehicles.
The vehicle that we’re introducing as a Premium one,
a Tier VIII medium tank, is exactly such a symbiosis.
Historical roots… Frankly speaking, there aren’t many of them.
The vehicle wasn't assembled— it didn't even have a complete design.
We assembled the vehicle piece by piece, literally, like a building set.
The model is as historically accurate as possible.
I mean, there’s enough information on almost any assembly and subassembly,
but there has never been an assembled vehicle.
Someone may say: this isn’t historically accurate. However,
all the historically accurate vehicles had already been used in the Tech Tree,
and there was enough information to create a complete
but not so historically accurate Premium vehicle.
It was important for us that the Premium vehicle
have the same gameplay as the top-tier vehicles in the Tech Tree.
This vehicle will resemble its comrades from the Italian Tech Tree
not only in appearance and gameplay but also in crew.
This means that you can use the vehicle for crew training
and practice the gameplay style of the Italian top-tier vehicles.
The crew, by the way, will consist of 4 people—
this is where I need the girls from the Holiday Ops.
The vehicle represents a medium tank with a classic design;
it doesn't have outstanding armor which is quite typical
for the European tank-building school of that time.
In other words, we focused on mobility, firepower,
and efficient depression angles.
The most important thing on this vehicle is its gun; it doesn't matter what
the vehicle's technical characteristics are: dispersion, accuracy, reload time…
The most important thing for this gun
is a new system, new mechanics— autoreloading mechanics.
Or loading…
Or reloading...
“Relax, drum, I'll handle it”
Maybe it’ll be easier to explain how it works.
In reality, the autoreloading mechanics had a huge number of implementations.
We call it a drum, autoloader...
They had different names:
there was the first order ammo rack that could be loaded quickly,
and the second order ammo rack that could be used for manual stowage of the shells.
Thus, we were thinking about how to introduce this into the game—
the Italians also had similar automatic loaders,—
and that is how the new mechanics were added.
We’re going to talk about it in detail in a minute,
but for now let’s talk about the new interface.
The update won't change the current reticle much,
but it will add some necessary elements so the player can always
take a look and quickly assess the replenishing mechanism status:
how many shells are left, what is the autoreloader status
and what is the reload time between shots.
A player can assess this information using the new interface.
These new elements will be available only for the vehicles with the new mechanics.
Speaking about the autoreloader mechanics, we were thinking
why don't we make a revolver of some kind where you can load or reload a shot
if you like. The mechanics provide variable gameplay options—
you can play it like a standard vehicle without these mechanics
and like a vehicle with a drum gun.
The mechanic is similar to a drum
in the following ways: you don’t have a single shell, but several shells;
there is also a pause between firing the shells when you can’t open fire.
It is a so-called autoreloader.
The mechanic also resembles cyclic guns
in the fact that you start autoreloading immediately after a shot.
The mechanic is peculiar because all the processes occur automatically—
autoreloading starts after you fire a shell.
You don’t need to do anything.
But if you open fire prematurely, before autoreloading is complete,
the process will be interrupted and then started anew.
If we fire a single shell,
autoreloading starts without our participation.
If we don’t shoot during that time, the shell will be replenished.
With just one shell fired,
autoreloading takes, for example, 8 seconds.
With two shells fired,
autoreloading takes 11 seconds, and then 8 seconds.
With all three shells fired,
autoreloading takes approximately 14, and then 11, and then 8 seconds.
The more shells we have loaded, the faster the next shells are reloaded.
If you are waiting for a shell to autoreload,
you will fire slower than a normal vehicle.
If you fire all shells at once,
you will be reloading for so long that even a drum vehicle would do it faster.
One way you definitely shouldn’t play this vehicle
would be to use only a single firing technique.
If you plan to fire all shells all the time, use a drum vehicle;
such a vehicle will do this task much more efficiently.
If you plan only to fire single shells from behind cover,
normal vehicles will do a much better job.
The right way to use a vehicle with such a mechanic
is to combine both gameplay types.
You can play like you’re on a normal vehicle—
fire, take cover, reload, fire again.
You can play like you’re on a vehicle with a drum—
drive out from cover, fire all the loaded shells, and hide behind cover again.
You have an option, for example… The shell bounces off the target—
and you know that you no longer have a chance
to fully unload your potential damage after you have fired the first shot.
You wait, you just wait until one or two shells replenish.
You spend significantly less time on the autoreloader
than on fully reloading a drum.
As soon as a chance comes by, for example,
the enemy team makes a mistake, the gaming situation changes,
you unload a full drum, and you know that you are
going to pay for that with the reload time, quite a long reload time.
But you know that you will have time later
to fully reload.
Thus, by correctly assessing the game situation,
you can use a vehicle with an autoreloader
in a role that will maximize its combat potential.
Over the course of the next few days, our Italian will receive
its primary settings and depart to closed testing.
There are still many tests to be done.
We will experiment with timings. We will experiment with their ratios.
We will see which option is better and which gameplay type is more suitable.
We are currently at the very first test stage,
and these are just preliminary settings.
The mechanics have vast potential and are suitable for more than medium tanks.
We have heavy vehicles too and we have vehicles
that are peculiar in their other in-game characteristics.
On the whole, our task is to make a new gun type in the game.
But don't rush to judge a vehicle for its technical characteristics alone—
the mechanics are highly complicated,
and it would be wrong to judge them by just the numbers.
We want to analyze the gaming experience,
then review and evaluate it based on the test results.
This is why we started testing so early.
Don't expect the Italians in the upcoming update.
Update 9.22 is about Soviets.
And, of course, we want to hear your feedback
on the Italian Tech Tree and the autoreloading mechanics.
Visit our forum and leave your comments on social networks.
See you soon! Bye-bye!