9.19 Official Patchnotes - The Armored Patrol

1. Ranked Battles

Ranked Battles is a 15v15 mode exclusive to Tier X vehicles, where the first team to eliminate the opposition or capture their base secures victory. Basically, the setup is the same as Random Battles. And that’s where the similarity ends. Ranked Battles is all about individual results. Your ultimate goal here is to put on a stellar individual performance to climb the Leaderboard, earning ranks and rewards along the way. The more successful you are in battle, the higher your rank in the special Leaderboard of the Ranked Battles.

Matchmaking: The matchmaker puts you in a team with players whose rank is similar to yours (±1). If getting a ±1 match would take too long, the matchmaker will loosen its restrictions a bit to get you in a battle quickly. The two teams will always have the same number of players with any given rank. Simply put, you play alongside tankers of similar ranking and have competition to match. The higher your rank, the higher the competition that you face. If the matchmaker fails to assemble the teams within 5 minutes, the Ranked Battle will not start: the player will be sent back to the Garage.
Progression: Getting in the Top 12 by XP on the winning team earns you a chevron, taking you a step closer toward earning a new rank. So does getting in the Top 3 on the losing team. The 1st rank will cost you just one chevron, and the higher you climb, the more chevrons it takes you to progress. The bottom 3 players of the winning team do not earn a chevron, while the bottom 12 players of the defeated team lose a chevron.
Upon reaching the 1st and 5th ranks, you progress is saved. On top of that, after you reach the 5th rank you get an option to prove your skill on a certain Tier X vehicle by leveling it to the max. Each vehicle rank is bound to the vehicle, in which it was earned (each vehicle has its unique progression), and remains there throughout the stage. Just one exception here: the number of vehicle ranks is not limited
Timeline: Ranked Battles are divided into seasons. The Beta season will consist of four 7-day stages. When a new stage begins, rank leveling is reset to the beginning. The progress achieved by the end of day 7 is included in the Leaderboard. When the season ends, your results over the last 28 days are totaled and you receive rewards, depending on your final standing in the Leaderboard .
Economy: Along with the usual earnings per battle, you will get bonuses (сredits, consumables, and Personal Reserves) for reaching a new rank and fulfilling the special combat mission, exclusive to Ranked Battles. At the end of each stage and season, you receive crates with rewards and a certain amount of an all-new in-game currency, Bonds, which can’t be bought with credits or gold. Bonds can buy Directives and Improved Equipment that significantly boost crew skills and vehicle parameters. The higher your score for the stage and season, the more Bonds you earn.
Leaderboard: Each rank earned for the first time in each stage provides one point. These points are totaled over the entire season and determine the player’s position among other participants of the Ranked Battles. The player should earn a certain amount of points to take position in the Leaderboard, whereas the required amount of points increases in each following stage. At the end of the season, the leaders are selected from those who earned enough points. The leaders are divided into three leagues. The first league are the first 10% of players, they receive the highest reward. The second league are another 15% of players, they receive smaller rewards. The third league are another 25%; these players also receive rewards. The reward of the season final is the best and always higher than those received for stages irrespective of the league where the player ended the season.
Improved equipment: Analogy of the standard equipment that already exists in the game. However it provides a bigger bonus to the technical characteristics. Such equipment can be purchased with Bonds only.
Directives: A new type of single-use consumables used for increasing technical characteristics of vehicles. The directives can increase the bonus of the mounted equipment or learnt skills/perks of the crew members. A player can equip only one directive at a time. Once used in battle, a new directive needs to be purchased.
Badges: Players can earn Badges (new vehicle customization element) as a reward for participation in a season. Badges are unique icons that will be displayed next to the player’s nickname in battle and everyone will be able to see it. This is the simplest way to show off.

2. Missions 2.0

The visual and functional part of the Missions and Specials window underwent considerable changes within the first iteration.

The Missions tab will become available in the Garage: it allows displaying the corresponding screen. Missions are conventionally divided into three tabs: Events, Missions, and For Selected Vehicle.

Events: tasks that require considerable efforts (for example, marathons).
Missions: tasks that can be grouped according to their idea (for example, daily missions, Training Missions, etc.).

Each mission is displayed as a tile; all missions are logically sorted: high-priority missions are displayed at the top of the list. Each mission (tile) can be opened to view its detailed description. The new design of the Missions will simplify understanding of this game entity by players.

Now Specials are available as a Store menu option. There are various specials in the game: basically, the discounts for vehicles, consumables, experience conversion, etc. Each special is represented with a tile with a detailed description of the discount, its amount, and other information. All specials are interactive: specials can be used right in the game client by clicking on the corresponding tile.

3. Clan Management

The update extends clan management options. The following will be available in the game client:

Distribute gold from the clan treasury
Change ranks of clan members in the game client
Transfer Clan Commander’s permissions
View detailed statistics of clan members

4. Improvements to Strongholds

The below awards that could be received for Stronghold-related activities up to version 9.17.1 were transferred to the Special category:

Skirmisher
For Decisive Battles
Capturer
Fortress Crusher
Retaliation

5. HD models

The following vehicles were reworked to the HD-quality:

KV-13
Т-44
IS-2
BDR G1B
Renault FT 75 BS
Renault UE 57
Renault FT AC
Alecto
Excelsior
Vickers Mk.E Type B
STA -1
MTLS-1G14

6. Sound

Added female voiceovers. The National voiceover option was replaced with the Commander option that provides voice notifications that depend on both the nation and gender of the vehicle Commander. Thus, if the crew Commander is female, the voiceover will also be female.

7. The Tank Company Battle mode was removed from the game.

8. The Recruit Training missions were disabled.

9. Changes to the Matchmaker

We made some changes to the matchmaker to decrease the number of one- and two-tier battles in favor of the 3/5/7 system.

The number of one- and two-tier battles will decrease in favor of the 3/5/7 system. The change will be noticeable at high battle levels (vehicle tiers: VIII to X).
Most three-tier battles will be created according to the basic 3/5/7 pattern.

We will slightly tighten the requirements for matchmaking in terms of Platoons, SPGs, tank destroyers, and light tanks, which will decrease the number of battles with the corresponding imbalances.

10. Changes to perks

The Sisterhood of Steel perk now becomes Brothers in Arms, which allows mixed crews (female and male crew members) to benefit from this perk.

11. Changes to Controls

Changed the operation logic of the button that locks turret rotation: the Auto-Aim button is now used for locking the turret. Previously, the default button for locking the turret rotation was RMB.