WoWS: 0.5.5 Patchnotes

~ Sebastianul

The patch is scheduled for 28 April and will be applied on the servers from 05:30 CEST until 07:30 CEST (UTC+2) during which the game server will be offline.

Selecting a Crosshair for Binocular View

  • You can now select a crosshair for the Binocular View using the Controls tab of the Settings window.
  • At the moment, you can select a dynamic crosshair or one of several static crosshair types.
  • With the dynamic crosshair, the distance between vertical marks on the horizontal crosshair line will scale when the camera zooms in and out.
  • You can select a crosshair both in the Port and in battle. In addition to the standard static crosshair, we have permanently added popular crosshairs made by our players: z1ooo, DeCease, and Mebius_LW

In-Game Weather Effects

  • Implemented the mechanics that make it possible to change weather conditions on game maps, that is, change both visual settings for the map and the parameters of ships and aircraft.
  • Random selection of displayed weather conditions at the start of the battle has been introduced on the following maps: “Ocean”, “Solomon Islands”, “Strait”, “Big Race”, “New Dawn”, “The Atlantic”, “Fault Line”, “Islands of Ice”, “Two Brothers”, “Land of Fire”, “Shatter”, “Mountain Range”, “Hotspot”, and “Trap”.

  • For these maps, players will have a chance to see various “bad weather” effects (rain, snow, heavy low clouds) during the countdown before the battle starts. After the battle starts, these effects will be disabled and players will see the usual “good” weather.
  • Weather settings for these maps are visual only and will not affect gameplay. The chance to see “bad” weather effects on these maps is about 50%.
  • For the “North” map, we added the “Cyclone” (working title) weather conditions (heavy rain, fog, heavy low clouds), which occur with 50% probability. During the cyclone, the maximum surface spotting/detectability range (ship to ship) is 8 km, and the maximum air spotting/detectability range (ship to aircraft, aircraft to ship, aircraft to aircraft) is 3 km.
  • The chance of a cyclone and its duration are random values that may significantly differ from one battle to another. The Cyclone will start randomly in the time period between the 2nd and 10th minutes of battle.
  • The change from sunny weather to a Cyclone takes 120 seconds and the Cyclone duration can be from 2 to 10 minutes.
  • During “bad” weather, the aircraft carriers will be able to spot only the targets that are spotted by their aircraft or are directly visible
  • Depending on the current weather conditions, the length of the view cone displayed on the Minimap will change to match the spotting range
  • When the weather starts to change to “bad” weather, the following message is displayed: “Cyclone inbound! Spotting range will be decreased to 8 km!” (or a different value, depending on the scenario)
  • When the change from “bad” to “good” weather is complete, the following message is displayed: “Cyclone is over! Spotting range restored!”
  • Moreover, when the weather changes an audio cue is played and the music track is changed as well.

Sound System

  • Implemented audio feedback for crossing map boundaries. When the player’s ship crosses a map boundary, a special sound effect will fade in and several sound groups will be muted. This sound effect will be played until the ship leaves the map boundary area and returns to the battlefield.
  • Added new music tracks, including tracks with vocals
  • Introduced special sounds for long range hits on ships and the landscape, played when using Binocular View.
  • Started working on the Points of Interest technology within the game’s soundstage. Sound sources that are visible to the player have priority over sources that are invisible to the player. However priorities will not be changed for important sounds.
  • Improved aircraft engine sounds. Now the engines have more realistic sounds, and performance has been improved for these sounds.
  • Improved sound design of ship destruction effects.
  • Now you can set the volume of gunfire to a personally comfortable level in the sound settings. However you cannot completely mute the gunfire sounds.
  • Now environment sounds are customised for different Ports.
  • Enhanced sound effects for fighter attacks.
  • For the Binocular View, implemented ambient voice communications about detecting enemy ships and added sound effects to standard voice messages (ship’s public announcement system effect)
  • Implemented setting for dynamic range width. By default, a wide dynamic range is set. Players can toggle dynamic range presets in order to choose the most suitable range for their equipment. Narrow dynamic range is recommended for small speakers or built-in notebook speakers.

Wide dynamic range (set by default) is recommended for sufficiently powerful audio systems and headphones. If the “Wide dynamic range” checkbox is cleared, strong range compression is applied to various sound groups, resulting in normalisation of the volume level for loud and quiet sounds. Because of this, quiet sounds become much louder and are better perceived when small speakers are used.

Implemented full screen effects for fires

  • Added a new full screen effect for fires on the player’s ship. This effect is enabled by default. A new option (Reduced fire effect) is available in the settings. If this option is enabled, then the previously implemented fire effect will be displayed. The fire effects are displayed in all camera modes.
  • The effect visuals will change depending on the fire intensity:
    • Minor fire (when one or two ship parts are on fire)
    • Massive fire (when three or four ship parts are on fire)

Rendering of the Shell Model

  • Implemented functionality for rendering artillery shells in flight.

Visually, a new shell model consists of three parts: the shell body, shell end, and the heat haze around the shell. This new shell model is visible when the camera is zoomed in.

Visuals for Sinking Ships

  • Improved the mechanics of sinking ships. Now the ships will sink in a more realistic manner.

The ships will sink in different ways depending on their type, the cause of their destruction, and the amount of damage they received in battle.

Changes in Ship Parameters

  • Changed Kirov cruiser draught – it is now 88 centimetres deeper in the water.

Kirov’s draught now corresponds with its full load weight. Altogether, this will have a positive effect on its survivability because the armoured box is deeper in the water and thus less vulnerable.

  • Improved cruiser Hermelin (its firing range was extended by 800 m, from 7.8 km to 8.6 km).

In order to effectively implement the advantages of Hermelin’s artillery, its firing range has been slightly extended. This will help novice players to get the hang of the German cruiser branch.

  • Upgraded battleship Izumo. Shells from her top guns are now available with the stock hull.

To ease the progress to the top configuration of Tier IX battleship Izumo, all her hull configurations were supplied with top shells (previous shells were not efficient enough).

  • For battleship Ishizuchi, the penetrability of the steering gear and magazine modules by HE shell fragments is reduced. Moreover, the rate of fire was increased for her main guns. Now they can fire every 25 seconds (previously every 30 seconds).

To provide a better gameplay experience with the Premium battleship Ishizuchi, we improved the armour protection of its magazine and steering gears against high-calibre HE shells and increased its rate of fire – the ship has to fight at maximum distances as its armour is not good enough. Here is where the rate of fire comes into play, given that it is most often purchased and used by novice players.

  • The chances of setting fire with HE-46 shells (available on Soviet destroyers of Tier V and above) has been increased by 1% to 8% (previously 7%).

In order to improve the efficiency of Soviet destroyers when countering larger targets, we increased the chances of setting them on fire with HE shells.

  • Changed the parameters of Type 93 model 1 and model 3 torpedoes mounted on destroyers Kagero and Shimakaze.

As a partial solution to the ‘torpedo grid’ problem, we increased the spotting range of Type 93 model 1 and Type 93 model 3 torpedoes from 1.7 km to 2.5 km and from 1.7 km to 1.9 km, respectively. Moreover, the range of Type 93 model 3 torpedoes has been reduced from 15 km to 12 km, while the speed of Type 93 model 1 torpedoes is reduced from 67 kts to 62 kts.
By implementing these changes, we want to make it easier to avoid being hit by randomly launched long-range torpedoes for all players with good game skills that play with high-level ships.

  • Added torpedoes to Fubuki, Kagero and Shimakaze.

As a compensation for players that prefer a more aggressive and risky style of play with the Japanese destroyers, we added shorter-range, yet much quicker, Type 93 model 2 (Fubuki, Kagero) and Type F3 (Kagero, Shimakaze) torpedoes, that players could sample on cruisers Ibuki and Zao, respectively.

  • Increased hit-points for turrets housing small-calibre (from 131 up to and including 160 mm) main guns and main guns of calibres under 130 mm by 1.5 and 2.6 times, respectively.

To reduce the risk of a complete loss of one of the main types of weapon, we increased the number of hit-points for small-calibre main guns to make it more difficult to destroy such guns with a random hit. The primary reason for this is an increase in the number of rapid-firing artillery cruisers.

  • Increased the range of Soviet Model 1908 and Model 1910 torpedoes to 4 km.

We have carefully examined the behaviour patterns of novice players who choose Soviet destroyers. Often, they tend to play in quite a risky fashion, but what nearly all of them lack is a longer range for Soviet torpedoes, while the main guns are generally considered of less importance at earlier stages of the journey along the branch of this type of warship. That’s why lower-tier destroyers within the branch are moved closer to the ‘standard’ characteristics typical for ships belonging to these tiers and get a longer torpedo range than the one they used to have.

  • Reduced the increase in the detectability range (as viewed from ships) resulting from gunfire by 1 km for destroyers Storozhevoi, Derzki and Izyaslav.

The standard coefficient for an increase in the detectability range, typical of Soviet destroyers, was excessive at lower tiers, which is why we decided to soften its effect.

  • Reduced the duration of incapacitation time applicable to engines from 120 seconds to 60.

Long engine incapacitation time periods were a cause of concern for many players, and could be regarded as a serious incentive to acquire the enhanced Damage Control Party II consumable, taking its maximum efficiency into account. This created a lot of discomfort for thrifty players – therefore, we reduced the duration of the engine incapacitation time to one minute. In fact, this is the minimum time (without taking improvement from upgrades into account) required to effectively stop any warship in the game and keep it static for a short period of time.

  • Reduced the duration of incapacitation time applicable to steering gears from 120 seconds to 40.

Long steering gears incapacitation time also used to be the main reason behind using the Damage Control Party consumable, as it was, in most cases, the only option when steering gears were incapacitated. This also created discomfort for thrifty players – therefore, we reduced the duration of the module incapacitation time to forty seconds. This is a reasonable time period for the incapacitation effect and related unenjoyable experience. Besides this, a ship can effectively survive that long, even without using consumables.

Aircraft Carrier rebalancing from Tiers VIII-X

At the moment, encounters solely between aircraft carriers is a common thing in high-tier battles. We think that this situation negatively affects gameplay and makes it less interesting. In most high-tier battles where aircraft carriers are present in the teams, the carriers encounter their opponents first (at the very start of the battle) and all players who participate in this battle just have to leave the outcome of this game to chance. The players on the team that loses a carrier at the beginning of the battle are at a great disadvantage and in fact just wait for defeat for the rest of the battle. To prevent this from happening in as many battles as possible, we made the Defensive AA Fire consumable available on high-tier aircraft carriers. Unlike the counterpart available on cruisers, this consumable is intended for the aircraft carrier’s own protection from enemy air attacks and is very poorly suited to helping allied ships.

  • Added the Defensive AA Fire consumable to U.S. Tier VIII–X aircraft carriers:
Defensive AA Fire parameters for U.S. aircraft carriers:
  • Lexington: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 40-mm AA guns — x1.05. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
  • Essex: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 40-mm AA guns — x1.25. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
  • Midway: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 40-mm AA guns — x1.25. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
Defensive AA Fire parameters for Japanese aircraft carriers:
  • Shokaku: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 25-mm AA guns — x1.75. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
  • Taiho: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 40-mm AA guns — x1.75. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
  • Hakuryu: Active for 120 seconds, AA power multiplier for 40-mm AA guns — x1.75. Reload Time (for regular/enhanced consumable): 360 (240) seconds; number of uses — 1 (2)
American bombers under attack now disperse their bombs over a larger area. The dispersion ellipse diameter increase is now not by 125% but by 150%.

Introducing the Defensive AA Fire for aircraft carriers created too big of an advantage for U.S. bombers whose bomb dispersion area didn’t significantly change when under attack from AA fire.

  • Campbeltown – can’t be destroyed by blowing up the stern magazine anymore
  • Pensacola – towers and hull armour increased by 1-6 mm

Slightly increased the armour of the towers because of an adjustment of the data for the gun-mounts of Pensacola type cruisers and other cruisers using the same guns.

  • Budyonny – anti torpedo defence is no longer applicable for the ship (previously – 9 tenth of a percent protection from torpedoes, now – no protection)
  • Svetlana – lowered the engine module permeability for the HE shells fragments. Also decreased the engine module size

Ship’s engine was modelled with excessive accuracy and came out too large compared to the other ships of its tier. Decreasing its size will lead to a decrease in the amount of critical engine damage.

  • Bogatyr – fixed the automatic camera switch between main battery guns groups. Changed the camera switching scheme that could cause some difficulties when firing and manoeuvring at the same time
  • Kirov – fixed an error causing a visual blackening of the hull when the superstructures were damaged

Economic changes:

All the price corrections are aimed for keeping at the same level the overall cost of the levelling, which changed, because of the introduction of the new modules.

Fubuki:

Top hull:

  • Experience: 19,500 –> 16,500 (price reduced by 3,000)
  • Credits: 1,500к –> 1,400k (price reduced by 100,000)

Top torpedo tubes:

  • Experience: 22,500 –> 18,500 (price reduced by 4,000)
  • Credits 1,900,000 –> 1,600,000 (price reduced by 300,000)
Kagero

Standard Hull:

  • Experience: 24,000 –> 21,000 (price reduced by 3,000)
  • Credits: 1,800,000 –> 1,600,000 (price reduced by 200,000)

Top hull:

  • Experience: 30,000 –> 26,000 (price reduced by 4,000)
  • Credits: 2,200,000 –> 2,000,000 (price reduced by 200,000)

Top torpedo tubes:

  • Experience: 38,000 –> 24,000 (price reduced by 14,000)
  • Credits: 2,800,000 –> 2,200,000 (price reduced by 600,000)
Shimakaze

Top torpedo tubes:

  • Experience: 52,000 –> 30,000 (price reduced by 22,000)
  • Credits: 3,600,000 –> 2,500,000 (price reduced by 1,100,000)

Game Locations and Ports

Changes in Ports

  • The “New York” Port has been reworked for daylight illumination.

Added two new maps

Mountain Range

The South China Sea has been an area for territorial disputes and military conflicts since the 18th century. This sea was an arena for intense action during World War II as well. It is in this sea that a naval battleship force, with full freedom to manoeuvre in open waters, was sunk by aircraft attacks alone for the first time ever. Strings of exotic islands and vertical cliff sides are fraught with danger, hiding the enemy.

Trident

An archipelago of small and low islands in the Indian Ocean. During any war, the Indian Ocean was a favourite for pirates and raiders. It was a conglomeration of transport routes for providing resources to huge territories of colonies belonging to the British Empire. It was a honeypot for raiding operations conducted by the Imperial Navy of Japan – another militant empire controlling vast territorial expanses. On this map, visuals were implemented for different times of day.

Added onshore objects to the following maps:
  • Solomon Islands
  • Two Brothers
  • The Atlantic
  • Shatter

Balance Changes in Maps

“Trap” and “The Atlantic” maps were reworked on the basis of feedback from players and analysis of statistical data. Moreover, spawn positions for ships in both teams were revised for the “Trap” map.

The “Trap” map
  • Available for Tier VIII–X battles in Domination mode.

We have received a lot of feedback for this map. In particular, the feedback we received indicated that most battle encounters on the “Trap” map tended to shift to the lower left part of the map. The statistical data that we accumulated has proved that such a shift is actually present. Because of this, we have extensively reworked this map in order to make its upper right part more accessible and popular.

Large Islands at Spawn Positions

For both teams, large islands have been moved away from spawn positions. Now nothing should be in the way when proceeding towards the chosen flank. This is especially true for the right flank. One of the islands has been moved to the upper right corner of the map, to become a visual reference for the map boundary on this side of the map.

Right Part of the Archipelago

The right part of the map contained too much open water and was rather monotonous as a result. Because of this, we moved large islands (mostly from spawn positions) to the upper right part of the map and closer to the map centre, and replaced the volcano with a small oblong island. Thus a chain of four islands was created in the upper right part of the map. This chain can be used as cover for detour manoeuvres.

Spawn Positions

We moved spawn positions up and to the right so that it would be easier for you to reach the upper right part of the map. Moreover, the spawn positions are now closer to the map centre to effectively decrease the time required to enter combat with the enemy.

Volcano

The volcano that used to be in the right part of the map now has been moved to the left, right in the centre of the atoll. Moreover, it became half as big. Now a small additional piece of cover is available in the middle of the atoll. This cover can be used when fighting to get control of the Key Area.

“The Atlantic” map
  • Available for Tier IX–X battles in Domination and Standard Battle modes.

We decided that the middle part of this map contains too much open water and due to this provides too little tactical variety. To fix that, we tried to put the islands in a more dense formation around the Key Area in the middle. At the same time, the position of the Key Area remains the same.

Central Part of the Map

We moved some islands from the map edges and spawn positions to the map centre, which resulted in less open water around the central Key Area. Our idea was that it would make the central part of the map safer and provide more tactical variety there. At the same time, the upper team will now have less obstructions in the route to Key Area C.

Key Area A

One of the two large islands covering the Key Area in the lower left corner of the map was moved closer to the middle of the map, and the second island was rotated in such a way that the line of sight is broken between this Key Area and the central one. Now Key Area A has cover to protect it from fire from the map centre, but players from both spawn positions now have a better view of this Key Area (and a better firing solution).

The “Tears of the Desert” map
  • Added the “Tears of the Desert” map into the list of maps available for Ranked Battles and Team Battles.
  • For this map, the scenario with three Key Areas has been selected. When captured, a Key Area adds 3 points every 5 seconds.

Fixes and improvements on the available maps

Bugfixes and Improvements:
  • Fixed a bug that caused damage to be incorrectly inflicted to ships in the introductory mission. Sometimes it was impossible to destroy an enemy ship when it had a few hit-points left
  • For the Introductory Mission, we readjusted parameters for the enemy ships, so that it would take less time to destroy them
  • Fixed the issue of incorrect spawn positions for teams on the “Strait” and “Hotspot” maps. In some cases the ships would be divided into groups unevenly
  • Fixed the issue of incorrect spawn position for the aircraft carrier when in a Division with a battleship on the “Tears of the Desert” map
  • Fixed the bug that caused an incorrect spawn position for a battleship on the “Shatter” map when played with by a Division member
Spawn Positions Revised on Certain Maps
  • Reworked the ships’ spawn positions on the “Land of Fire” and “Islands of Ice” maps for Ranked Battles and Team Battles
  • To decrease the time required to enter combat with the enemy, we readjusted the distances between spawn positions of players on opposing teams on the “Islands of Ice”, “Trap”, “Land of Fire”, “Shatter”, and “Strait” maps for Random Battles
Changes In Matchmaker Settings
  • The “Two Brothers”, “Hotspot”, and “Land of Fire” maps were moved one level up in the matchmaker
  • The “Two Brothers” map will now be available for Tier VII–X battles (used to be Tier VI–X)
  • The “Hotspot” map will now be available for Tier VIII–X battles (used to be Tier VII–X)
  • The “Land of Fire” map will now be available for Tier VIII–X battles (used to be Tier VII–X)
  • Readjusted the mechanics for decreasing propulsion power when in contact with the map boundary. Now ships will lose propulsion power faster in these cases
  • The “North” map has been excluded from Ranked Battles and Team Battles

Game Client File System

  • Optimised the game client file storage structure.
  • The game client files are packed in .pkg as per battle type and map, thus reducing the number of files and battle loading time as well as the Port loading time.

Other Changes

  • We harshened the penalty for damaging and destroying allied ships. From now on a player can receive the “Team Killer” status even if they caused relatively slight damage to an ally/ a player will instantly receive the “Team Killer” status when they destroy an allied ship (except for destruction by ramming)
  • Added functionality for marking a ship as a favourite in the carousel. Right-click the ship icon in the carousel, then select “Set as favourite” from the list. Ships that are marked as “favourite” will always be displayed at the beginning of the carousel, unless other filters are applied to these ships. The “favourite” mark is stored on the player’s profile on server side
  • New filters for the carousel make it possible to select only ships with or without a Commander.
  • Added functionality for sorting the ships in the carousel by the last time a ship was used in battle.
  • Added functionality for displaying three or four rows of ships in the compact carousel view, if it is possible with the current screen resolution.
  • Added functionality for changing the selected filter without opening the main filter panel. To modify a certain filter without opening the main filter panel, click on the desired filter above the carousel.
  • In the confirmation windows for purchasing, researching, or mounting in-game items, hints with their parameters and descriptions are now displayed when the cursor is placed over the icon of the corresponding item.
  • In the confirmation windows for purchasing, the functionality for selecting the in-game currency if an item is available for purchase with either Credits or Doubloons was added.
  • For an Upgrade mounted on a ship, the “Destroy” operation is replaced with the “Sell” operation.
Now additional ship parameters are displayed in the Port:
  • Torpedo Protection — percentage values of decreasing damage from torpedo hits and the risk of flooding
  • Initial shell velocity for main battery shells
  • Initial shell velocity for secondary battery shells
  • Detectability range of torpedoes
  • For attack aircraft with rear gunners, the damage caused to the enemy by their self-defence armament.
  • Common ship name abbreviations are now used in lists and other GUI items where text length is limited.
  • The Detectability Range term was replaced with “Visibility”.
  • Fixed a bug which caused the squadron’s markers indication during take-off while they were out of observer’s view range.
  • Interface markers on the battle screen underwent a stage of technical optimisation. Reduced the number of freezes when in battle.
  • Added the “Destroyed” status to ship markers.
  • In the Controls tab, added a new option in the battle camera settings group: “Always start the battle completely zoomed out”. By default, this option is disabled. When enabled, the battle camera will always be as zoomed out as possible when the battle starts. All other settings will be ignored. Otherwise, the battle camera will be focused on a main turret during the countdown before the battle starts. This option works for cruisers, destroyers, and battleships.
  • If the player presses the same square on the Tactical Map or Minimap multiple times, only one “Attention to square…” message is displayed in the battle chat.
  • Added the field “reason” in system notifications regarding the addition of in-game valuables.
  • Added the functionality for flashing the game client icon displayed on the taskbar. The game icon will start to flash if the game window is out of focus or not active (minimised, overlapped by another window, and so on) for 5 seconds before the countdown prior to the battle starts ends, or when the player has entered a battle that was already in progress.
  • Now, the multiplier factor is not applied to the ship’s detectability range for 20 seconds after a shot from the main battery is fired, if at the moment of the shot the ship cannot be detected by the enemy, even with the potential detectability range increase being applied.
  • Integrated the Tobii EyeX technology.
  • Updated the version of the in-game web browser.
  • Reduced micro stuttering of ships during the battle when the network connection is unstable.
  • Improved visual quality of wave crests and decreased flashing artefacts when they are far from the player’s point of view.
  • When the game client is launched, a randomly selected background image is displayed on the game loading screen. The same image may be displayed for several game launches.
  • A randomly selected video is played on the log in screen. The same video may be played for several game launches.
  • In the Team Battles session schedule, different time zones are displayed depending on the region: UTC for the RU and ASIA regions, CETCEST for the EU region, CST for the CN region, PSTPDT for the NA region.