Our next set of answers from the development team is in - learn about the development of the game in this round of questions and answers!
Question: What’s the priority level of wheeled vehicle physics improvements?
Answer: Quite high, it’s something we are actively working on and should have improvements ready for in 0.18.
Question: What are the next vehicle lines expected to be introduced, and in roughly what order?
Answer: While we can’t really disclose all our future plans, the next full line (Czechoslovak and Polish AFVs and TDs) is tentatively planned for 0.18 and we hope to have the French MBT line featuring the Leclerc ready for players this year as well.
Question: Any plans for adding AI wheeled vehicles and giving AI opponents more unique camouflages?
Answer: While we would love to have wheeled AI vehicles in the game sooner rather than later, it takes a considerable amount of time to implement correctly. Wheeled AI movement logic is much more complicated than the logic used for tracked vehicles due to the vehicle’s inability to pivot in place. Without the ability to pivot, wheeled vehicles must perform complex maneuvers in order to navigate in and around spaces which are comparatively trivial for tracked vehicles. Starting in 0.17, each AI faction will have their own unique base color and camo color.
Question: Will Armored Warfare have more detailed in-game vehicle models like in World of Tanks?
Answer: We do have plans to overhaul the older models to look better and bring them to the standard we are currently using, which we feel is of higher quality. When making comparison with other games (in this case WoT), please note that their official screenshots are using special ultra-high-res textures and shaders to make the vehicles look better than they appear in the game for PR purposes. That being said, we are currently improving our shaders and hope to have them ready by 0.18.
Question: The new sounds are awesome, but firing missiles and reloading both ordinary rounds and missiles sounds still the same. Will there be new sounds for these two?
Answer: We do not currently have any immediate plans to change the sound for reloading rounds versus missiles, but it is a good suggestion!
Question: Can we have better warning system features for incoming artillery and missiles?
Answer: Warning system composition (including the size of the icon, a warning sound and such) is a part of the entire missile and artillery mechanism balancing process. Making the missile warning too prominent or loud would not only be distracting, it would also negatively impact the usability of artillery and missiles, which is not something we want. We do want to make guided missiles more useful though, and we are actively working on revamping ATGM balance.
Question: How do you plan to deal with riggers (win-traders) during future events?
Answer: This is decided by My.com – their plans are to continue the same way they are dealing with them now – by disqualifying them from the event and stripping them of their prizes.
Question: Do you have any plans for adding decorative items for tanks, like canvas bags, helmets, ammo boxes and such?
Answer: This is a feature we’d like to introduce, but it is currently something we aren’t working on due to the modeling complexities which come with such a task.
Question: What is the developer’s vision of Clan Wars? Do you plan to consult active Battalions?
Answer: Clan Wars – or more specifically Territory Wars – are organized by each server’s operator independently with Obsidian Entertainment only providing a suitable web plugin for the web developers to use. My.com will be actively discussing the mechanisms with PvP battalions. When it comes to end-game PvP, we are preparing something extraordinary on our end as well – more details will be released in the future.
Question: Can the developers share more information about the planned changes to high tier gameplay?
Answer: The biggest chunk of these changes are tentatively scheduled to appear in Update 0.19. These changes will be far reaching and go beyond simply fixing high-tier gameplay as they will affect all tiers. Because of how drastic and complex these changes will be to AW’s core balance philosophy, we are currently waiting until they are more complete before we unveil them as a whole to the community. Expect to see upcoming Dev Diaries about these upcoming balance changes.
Question: Are we going to see the ghost shell problems fixed and how soon?
Answer: Ghost shells do exist and we are aware that there has been an uptick of them since 0.16 has been released. As a result, we’ve been hard at work attempting to address this issue and hope to have a solution ready in the near future.
Question: Will Panzerhaubitze 2000 ever get its ammo capacity raised to 60 shells?
Answer: At this moment we have no plans to buff its ammo capacity.
Question: Is there a possibility to add a “Today’s Operations” list to the PvE screen so that the players can see what maps are available on each difficulty?
Answer: All missions will be added into the daily PvE map rotation.
Question: Will the “modules being destroyed without penetration” issue get looked at?
Answer: Modules can be sometimes destroyed without penetration. That is intentional. On the code side, modules have the ability to score a saving throw which may destroy the module, but prevents any damage from reaching the internal hull.
Question: Can you disclose what high-tier artillery vehicles will be added?
Answer: Not at the moment – the addition of more SPG class vehicles is currently not planned for the near future.
Question: Will you offer something to players outside the America & Europe time zones, specifically players in Asia and Oceania?
Answer: This is something My.com will decide. Currently, they are considering running more events which benefit the abovementioned time zones. One thing they have to ensure however, is that one server does not have more events than the other due to region specific time zones.
Question: Are you guys already working on a new crew system?
Answer: Yes, this is something that we are working on. We feel the current system does not provide enough choices and is fairly linear in its progression. The current crew system will be overhauled and greatly expanded upon to offer players more viable choices for customizing their vehicle’s performance.
Question: Are you considering making one crew available for multiple tanks?
Answer: No, this is not planned.
Question: Will the Base mechanism be updated this year?
Answer: We do not have an ETA on when the Base will see new content or features.
Question: What's the reason NA and EU servers can't share progression?
Answer: It was decided to have two separate servers at the start to reflect the massive differences between the European and North-American players, styles and economies. Such a change would at this moment be extremely challenging to execute on, both from a developer and publisher perspective.
Question: What are the plans for ramming damage?
Answer: We are currently planning to make a pass on ramming damage in an upcoming update.
Question: Is the in-game armor inspector still planned?
Answer: Yes, but it was pushed a bit further out due to the development of other very exciting features. Make no mistake though, it will be coming.
Question: What are the plans for future maps? We’d like to have them bigger, more open and with fewer corridors.
Answer: That’s what we are planning – Update 0.17 will bring a big new PvP map called “Frontline”, which is rather open and features a large amount of useable space. There are even bigger things planned for the update after that!
Question: Are there any plans for major re-balancing of PvP maps? Looking at you, Highwall!
Answer: Highwall will most likely be our first PVP map to receive major changes based on feedback and analysis. We intend to start revising all of our maps based on what we've learned with improvements coming steadily with the Updates.
Question: Lords of War – will this be the only "end game" PvP mode you have planned?
Answer: No, not by a longshot. Stay tuned.
Question: When will PvE progression be separated from PvP?
Answer: Let’s be clear here, we have no plans to separate progression between the two modes. PvE is an integral part of the game and we want the players to be always able to choose what they want to play – PvP or PvE. We do have plans to improve the PvP experience by introducing various rebalances to make PvP more fun, but we will not be restricting players to only progressing in PvP. We are planning on rebalancing how PvP and PvE rewards are calculated though in order to alleviate some of the more confusing differences between the two, such as the logistics cost.
Question: Why is Reputation income map-dependent rather than performance-dependent in PvE?
Answer: It is not, performance always plays the main role. However various missions have various income coefficients in order to reflect their length, number of enemies and other design factors. We generally want all the PvE maps to offer roughly the same rewards per unit of time, but this can be hard to model in a live environment where each group of players might handle a map in a slightly different way.
Question: Will unique vehicle features such as the 4-wheel steering of the CRAB be added in the future?
Answer: Initially, when the CRAB was planned, we had a working prototype of such a steering, but it was very difficult to control and we did not have the time to fully flesh it out, which is why it was not implemented. Ideally, we’d love to get this system in and working to make the vehicle more unique. That being said, we want to get the baseline movement and collision system in a better place before addressing individual vehicle movement systems.
Question: Is there a chance to see the CV90 family and the S-Tank in Armored Warfare?
Answer: Yes. :)
Question: Are you going to implement the French tanks line in the third dealer?
Answer: Yes! :)
Question: How is the content of the Supply Crates generated (rolled for)? Is it when the crate is acquired or when you click on the crate to open it? To clarify, let’s say I save the crates from Update 0.16 and Update 0.18 adds a camouflage pattern to the general crate loot pool, is it possible to get (roll) the camouflage pattern with the crates saved from 0.16?
Answer: The contents of a crate are generated upon opening it, so yes – it is possible to “save” crates like that.
Question: Do you have any plan for Chinese AFVs?
Answer: We do have a plan for one specific vehicle, but as for a full line – not at the moment.
That's it for today, stay tuned for the next part!
