War Thunder: The Secret Map Krymsk

Hello all,

I've been enjoying my Japanese low tier fighters and by the Rising Sun, they are some sexy planes!

But in my last game, War Thunder and Gaijin decided to treat me with the ultra rare, almost secret, map called Krymsk.

 

The interesting thing about this map is that it is a Domination type but with only a single (one!) airfield. This naturally generates a lot of dogfighting right above the airfield.

My impression is that this map is a fun alternative to the regular Domination maps and I hope to see it more frequently.

The map itself is somewhat bland - few features to distinguish it, but on the plus side, there is so much action that you do not have time to admire the view :-).

Although I didn't get Bandicam ready in time to record the game, I've saved the replay and recorded that - this does show the map in great detail.

My game went alright, I managed to survive the entire game in my Japanese A5M4 and got five enemy kills and multiple crits. Top of the board so I cannot complain. I began by avoiding the initial deadly skirmish in the centre and went to hunt isolated enemies on the flank. Following their destruction I entered the central dogfighting, trying to maintain enough speed to get out when the enemies got interested in me. 

At the very end my engine got destroyed but I managed to glide the few seconds it took before the game was won by my side.

Good fun, and I really recommend the low tier Japanese fighters so far - if you happen to agree, disagree or be madly in love with me, please leave a comment or a tip :-). It really motivates all blogowners to keep blogging!

All the best,
Kasper

Enjoying the British Reserve Airplanes

Hello all,

Although I've focused almost entirely on the Russian Nation (as a consequence of not having a lot of time available for gaming) I have made a small foray into the British Nation. Primarily to get to the Spitfires -these look so archetypical and seem to handle well, so I would really like to try them out.

But on the way to the spitfires are a few levels of Reserve aircraft and similar.

But thats alright, as it turns out they are really fun.
There are quite a few different Reserve Airplanes in the British Tree, but they are practical identical in armament and Flight Model, but have different skins.



Here are a couple of videos showing me flying them - nothing special but I manage to kill a few enemies in these small beautiful planes.
Here it is the Fury Mark III, above Stalingrad:

 And here its the Nimrod Mark I in the same domination scenario:

 
Good fun - if you happen to agree, disagree or be madly in love with me, please leave a comment or a tip :-). It really motivates all blogowners to keep blogging!

All the best,
Kasper

War Thunder: Why War Thunder Beats World of Tanks (and will beat Warplanes)

Hello all,

I've already discussed why I switched from World of Tanks to War Thunder (read it here), but since that inital reaction-post, I've thought of several reasons as to why War Thunder offers so much more intense fun, than World of Tanks does.

Nothing like sharing a brain-storming list, so here goes:

No Camping:

Unless you are playing in a fast light scout tank, during the duration of an average World of Tanks game (app. seven minutes) at least half of these is either passively camping (sitting in a bush waiting) or 'actively' camping (i.e. driving to the same spot you went to last time, and sitting behind the same corner with the same type of tanks waiting on the other side). World of Tanks does not really support/allow any initiative, and most bold moves are instantly punished (although they can still be fun). The best way to win a game is to be cautious, bordering on passive, and waiting for those two intense minutes wherein you can kill the best players on the opposing side and secure victory.

War Thunder - Campers never gets the girl

In War Thunder, there really is no camping - you are thrown into the action from the beginning and the following ten-fifteen minutes feels like a non-stop action packed war movie, where you are zooming and booming, watching your six and blasting the enemy with lead. Getting to the action is quick, and unless you are in a bomber, there is never a dull moment. And initiative, and bold moves, often pay off and the rewards are huge - sneak capturing an airport, outflanking an enemy, divebombing a destroyer, its all possible and fun!

Fair Rewards:

If your team looses, you won't get shafted experience and money. In World of Tanks, even though you do great, if your team sucks you will not get great rewards. But why should I be punished for getting on a team of lemmings, if I kill the five tanks on my side of the map?

In War Thunder it is almost all down to how well you yourself played the game (there is a small bonus for being on the winning side of an encounter, but it is very small) . 

You did well = A ton of experience and money. 

You did well, but your team sucked = You still get a ton of experience and money. 

On the other hand, this also means that if your team did well, and you sucked, well, then your rewards will suck equally).

Multiple In-Game Achievements:

I love getting rewards for playing the game how it is supposed to be played - and then getting extra rewards for all different kinds of things. 

I.e., in a given game of War Thunder you are awarded for killing other players - but you are also rewarded for air kill streaks of 3, 5, etc dead enemies. So, thats extra money and experience for doing well. 

You can get all kinds of awards, Bullet Proof, Magnet (getting rammed five times in a single game, ouch), Fighter Rescuer etc., often just for doing what you were supposed to do, but doing it well.

The Crew Advancement system:
I really, really like being able to customize my crews skills. Now you can do this in World of Tanks as well, but in any given tank you are looking a dumbfoundingly slow progress and perhaps, realisticly, two crew skills for each crew member.
In War Thunder there is a ton of possibilities and choosing between them (after each battle) is great fun - should I get that low level Keen Sight up, or wait two more games and get better at Reloading the Gun? I enjoy that, even though I realise that it is somewhat illusionary and that each crew will, with time, look identical. But I also believe this is an area that will be further developed as the game grows.

Tons of Challenges and customizable models:

I love the in-game challenges (i.e. get so and so many kills in that particular plane, or kill x-amount of ships with torpedoes) and getting new plane skins, or equipment for completing them. This is a huge factor for me.

Also, the sheer amount of customizable elements is stunning - in principle you should never see two identical planes - me like! For instance, I've been persuaded by my family to paint the same two decals on all my Russian planes:

But there is still room for uniqueness. In some, I'll have Russian Slogans (For Stalin!) while others will have kill marks in the hearts.

Its New...
Let's not forget to factor this in. Instead of World of Tanks where I new each map intimately, and the 20-35 tanks you always encountered - here I'm a noob again. I hardly now any of the maps well and most planes are something of a mystery to me. But its fun figuring out which canyon to attack through, and what planes to fear. Or which bombers to attack from the front, and which have noses made from machine guns :-).

Oh well, just some random thoughts - if you happen to agree, disagree or be madly in love with me, please leave a comment or a tip :-). It really motivates all blogowners to keep blogging!

All the best,
Kasper

War Thunder: Best Russian Plane?

Hello all,

One of the interesting things about Google Analytics is that it shows what searches led people to this blog. Which can be quite entertaining at times. For instance, a lot of people would really like to know which Russian fighter plane is the best in War Thunder?

Well, I recently discussed the more general question of which plane is the best in War Thunder at the moment (can be found here), and there was no mention of any Russian fighters. Does this mean that Russians are not great in War Thunder?
No, far from it, but their best planes do not, within the current Flight Model in Arcade Battles, beat the Spitfires and the Zeroes out there.
What the russian do have is the best manouvrability at low levels and in the low tiers. For instance, the Russian reserves are excellent and will out turn anything.
Following the reserves the Russian pilot will face a few levels wherein the Fighter Bombers are the best alternative - these are excellent and will rack in a lot of money and experience from destroying ground targets.
And then the pain starts as the first Yak's are quite painful to fly. They are basicly boats with wings and serious armament. They might be a pain, but it is also quite fun to fly them.

War Thunder: Best Russian Plane is the YAK-9T

But afterwards you get the real deal - the Yak-9T. This is a monster with its cannons and acceptable turn speed. I must say that I really love this plane - it swats bombers out of the sky and any isolated enemy pilot will get destroyed. At the mid tiers, this would be my choice as the best Russian Fighter Plane.

Anyways, here is an early example of how you can (fail) play the Yak-9T in War Thunder:

When I'm flying this plane, I'll normally start high going high, searching for isolated bombers and let loose on them. Afterward, if the furball down below has begun to separate I'll swoop in, and otherwise I'll continuecruising around at a high altitude. This plane does not manouvre well, if you want to keep the nose on the target so the key is to be able to predict when and where you will intercept the enemy and prepare to go *Boom* Boom* at that spot.

Also, a word of caution. While searching for pictures of a Yak-9T at work, I found out, in a very not-safe-for-work way, that there apparently is a porn site with a similar name and a .com ending. I really wonder why they chose such a name, but anyways, be careful what you search for on Google :-).

If you happen to agree, disagree or be madly in love with me, please leave a comment or a tip :-). It really motivates all blogowners to keep blogging!

All the best,
Kasper

War Thunder: Best Mid-Tier Fighter Plane in the game?

Hello all,

One of the interesting things about Google Analytics is that it shows what searches led people to this blog. Which can be quite entertaining at times. For instance, a lot of people would really like to know which fighter is the best in War Thunder?

Well, lets try and answer that question, shall we? (I'll discuss the question of which Russian fighter is the near future..)

The first thing to realize is that contrary to other games (say World of Tanks) all planes can destroy all other planes. A reserve Russian aircraft, outturns almost all mid tier aircraft, due to its biplanes, and with a bit of luck its machine guns can kill Spitfire pilots or LaGG-3 planes. With a bit of luck, yes, but it is possible. So there are no planes in War Thunder that does not offer you an okay chance at getting some kills.

That said, some planes are definately better than others at the moment.

Due to the dynamic flight model in arcade battle mode, the advantage currently lies with the dogfighters - as everyones climbing speed has been boosted, and thus everyone can climb fast, the path to a great fighter lies in manouvrability, i.e. who can turn the fastest. 

The winning formula is turn speed, armament, and general speed. All the advantages are with the dogfighters, whereas the Boom-and-Zoomers are not as easy to use effectively.

And here the Spitfires and the Zeroes are the winners. So the best fighter aircrafts in War Thunder at the moment, would be all the Spitfires, all the Zeroes, and the Bell P-39 Airacobra.

War Thunder: the A6M2 Zero - one of the best fighters in the game

The conclusion is that it is just much easier, within the boundaries fo the current Flight Model in Arcade, to do better in Dogfighters than in Energy Fighters. So if you want to kill the most enemies, choose a Dogfighter. And in my opinion, the dogfigthers I fear the most are the entire Spitfire line in the British tree, and the Zero type fighters (e.g. the A6M2 Zero) in the Japanese tree, precisely because they are the best dogfighters at the moment. 

These will outturn, outrun, and gun down most other planes, and thus could be considered the best fighters in War Thunder. Although, they will still die quickly when you line up your cannons and begin blasting them from behind :-).

War Thunder: the Spitfire - one of the best fighters in the game

(Historical battles and Full Real Battles are something completely different, precisely because they have a different flight model.)


All the best,
Kasper

War Thunder: How to get more ammunition for your plane

Hello all,

One of the interesting things about Google Analytics is that it shows what searches led people to this blog. Which is quite entertaining at times. For instance, people are apparently searching heavily on Google for the answer to 'how to get more ammunition in War Thunder'. 

Well, search no more - as a special service I shall now disclose the answer to this enigmatic question :-).

War Thunder - How to get more ammunition

There are two methods of replenishing ammonition in War Thunder:

In normal Arcade battles the answer is the simplest. When you've unloaded your machine guns on the enemy fighter, or have dropped all your bombs on the enemy ground targets they will automatically come back. If you have not completely emptied your barrels, you can press "y" to reload your weapons. The time this takes is dependent upon the very important skill called "Reload Skill". 

This is found in the tab called Ground Service, and may be the most important skill to invest points in as soon as possible. This can quite dramatically cut down your reload time, and may often either save your life, or enable you to destroy that pesky enemy bomber.

If you are flying in a Historical Battle and you've run out of ammo, well then you will have to go back and land at your friendly airport. And wait to get a new stock of weapons. No in-the-air-resupply, sorry.

What is interesting is that there appears to be no way of loading extra ammunition onto a given plane. No matter how skilled your ground crew, there is no way of getting a few more rounds of ammunition packed into the plane. I would really like to see this added as an extra bonus of having maxed out your plane's experience bar. At the moment, once you've completely filled this bar, there is no bonus (actually there is a negative bonus, as you will receive no more experience bonus, sadly), but wouldn't it be sweet if at every x-thousand gained experience on top of this your machine guns could have another 25 rounds, or your cannons could load another 5 shots. Wouldn't be a gamechanger, but would give you that extra little something to be proud of :-).

Anyways, all the best,

Kasper

War Thunder: Improvements I would love to see implemented

Hello all,
While playing the game I've compiled a small list of things I would love to see implemented in the game...

1) The ability to de-select a crew slot for matchmaking. At the moment once you've put a plane into a crew slot you can never empty it - i.e. you'll always have to choose five planes to fly with even though you only have four low tier planes for instance.

2) More statistics! I would love to see how many of each type of plane I've shot down so far. And hell, if possible, to see how many times I've shot down the player in front of me.

Improving War Thunder

3) More Award types :-).

4) Tier level in the game - I have yet to memorize all the different planes and it would be great if there was a tier indicator above the plane I'm chasing or being chased by.

5) More Ground Targets. And more ships.

6) More Maps.

7) An ammo count - I can't remember how many bullets each plane carries - so would be lovely to have a count, even before your approaching empty.

8) More, More, More!

Guess thats all I could remember at the moment - feel free to add your own suggestions.

World of Tanks or War Thunder? Which is best?

Hello all,

This post is an attempt at answering why I've switched to War Thunder from World of Tanks. 

Now don't get em wrong, World of Tanks is a brilliant game. It looks great and I've had a lot of fun with it. And I'm not that abd of a player either. The last time I looked my global win percentage was 55-56%, a decent percentage that was achieved with no Gold ammo and by always playing alone, i.e. no company battles or platoon farming :-). So I know the game and I enjoyed it, so why switch?

War Thunder - more fun than World of Tanks

Well, the simple answer is that War Thunder is much more fun. It is full on action in a setting that is even more beautiful.

I found a comment on You Tube where a chap named Adrian Schnitzer, explains his point of view:

"When you start play War Thunder going back to WOT you seen how boring that game is.You sit, hide pray not to be hit by arty and depend on decent team to win.Here even if your team is not very good you still get what you deserve after good game.And its all action all the time not campy game."

I agree with this, the biggest difference is that in most World of Tanks games, half the game is spent hiding or sneaking, and then there is a few intense moments of gunfighting at relatively short ranges and then the game ends.

But World of Tanks still have prettier Booth Babes :-)

War Thunder is so much more than that - it is action more or less from the beginning to the end. And great scenic action at that. It really feels fun, and intense. And above all, it is a change - I was getting pretty tired of playing more or less identical tanks on the same maps. Maps where from the first second of analysing the two teams' tanks you know what is going to happen, where the fight will be, and where the last survivors will try and duke it out. War Thunder has the advantages here as everything is new (although I already feel I know a few of the maps too well already :-).)

The biggest difficultiesin starting anew with War Thunder is getting used to being mediocre - in World of Tanks I know that in the average game I can play a large factor in whether or not my team wins, and I'll probably have killed 4-6 tanks once the game is over. In War Thunder? Hah, there I'm the noob who thrilled whenever I get a kill, and those games where I've managed to kill 5-7 planes have been very memorable.

Now most of this post has been why I switched, there are of course a few central elements that made this switch easier but I'lls ave those for a different post, hell it could be entitled "Why War Thunder is Best" :-).

Feel free to comment if you disagree with my 'Wall-of-Text', but keep it civiliced and remember both are just games and whatever one you enjoy the most I am fine with that.

All the best,

Kasper

War Thunder: IL-2 & SU-2 M-82 Russian Fighter Action

Hello all,
I seem to only be getting the Domination map called Peliliu. It is a beautiful map, but I would love to try the new Fjords map.
Here are a few minutes that give a quick example of the brilliant free to play game, War Thunder. In this Domination game, I once again take to the skies over Peleliu in my Russian fighters IL-2 & SU-2 M-82 . I destroy four enemy fighters and bombers during the action and get multiple awards, including Hands On for most Assists.

All in all, the game netted me 20000 exp with premium, so not a brilliant game, but it does show the trouble a single enemy jet fighter can cause. The Mig-15 turns up and we all die, more or less. Luckily the clock is ticking and he cannot kill us all...

War Thunder is Sexy!

This was patch 1.27.


All the best,
Kasper

War Thunder: YAK 1B Russian Fighter Action

Hello all,
I seem to only be getting the Domination map called Peliliu. It is a beautiful map, but I would love to try the new Fjords map.
Here are a few minutes that give another quick example of the brilliant free to play game, War Thunder. In this Domination game, I once again take to the skies over Peleliu in my Russian fighter Yak 1B. I destroy four enemy fighters and bombers during the action and get multiple awards, including Hands On for most Assists.

All in all, the game netted me 20000 exp with premium, so not a brilliant game, but it does show the trouble a single enemy jet fighter can cause. The Mig-15 turns up and we all die, more or less. Luckily the clock is ticking and he cannot kill us all...

This was patch 1.27.

War Thunder

 All the best,
Kasper