[2022] Support CVs Have Entered Closed Testing

This is not true in the slightest.
This is a closed test of a CONCEPT.

You not knowing about them does not mean they don't exist.

Ship lines are conceptualized FAR in advance. They are then hinted at 6 months to a year in advance. Once the line reaches that point, it's going to happen because we aren't conducting a "Closed test" on them as a concept.
These support CV's are being tested as a CONCEPT. There are lots of other things tested as CONCEPTS as well. Changes to CV fighter vision. It's how things get tested.
Currently, we are letting you all know about some of the things we're testing for transparency - the thing that people wanted more of.

Keep that in mind.

Some things do make it through concept testing and some things don't.

This isn't a secret, guys. Letting you know about these concepts is to give you transparency on what's being tested - not implemented.

To everyone in this thread, please remember that when we say "Closed Testing" that means we're using not only our internal folks to test the concept. We have a lot of players that join our Testing programs and try out the ideas that designers come up with. After testing, they give their thoughts and feedback which goes directly to the designers that are working on that concept. If you want to take part in these experiments and make sure that your voice is heard as early as possible, please consider joining the Super Test Program.

There a many concepts which don't make it out of testing. Designing successful systems is extremely hard, after all. If there's something in this test which is found to be so bizarrely unworkable that real, actual players simply cannot abide the forward movement of the idea... please know that our testers are very capable at making themselves very clear.

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Secondly, remember that stuff in testing can disappear or be totally altered within the span of a day. People are going to have reactions to unfinished, untested content but please keep a sense of perspective before rushing out to buy ALL the pitchforks.

Our DevBlogs are a way for us to give information to our players. We've made a conscious decision on sharing more information than we used to and our DevBlogs are how we execute on that decision.

Surprised? No. I've grown used to a rather strong backlash when something which is not already established is brought up.

As to Submarines, they've been worked on for literally years. While there are players which don't want to see them regardless of what form they come in and will never be swayed from that position, the design of the Submarine class has continued to improve iteration over iteration. If they leave testing, it'll be a point where they are in a good enough place to really join our game permanently.

As for SuperShips, their reception has been much more normal amongst the majority of the playerbase. In effect, they're just ships like the other ships in the game, so most players aren't nearly as concerned about their inclusion as they are about the concept of new classes, new consumables, or new styles of play which do not currently exist.

I am a North American Community Manager for WarGaming. I speak on behalf of the company, though many of my posts are primarily just me providing information or perspective to other players.

I study game design and taught CV play, concepts, and mechanics for around 2 years so I do lean on my teaching/information transfer capabilities to be helpful. I find people tend to be extremely concerned, frustrated, and often conspiratorial when there is an absence of information which leads to filling in the blanks. If I can provide insight and information, I'm happy to try to do that where I can.

Please don't make stuff up like this. There are no "ramming DDs" :\

My experience in World of Tanks is quite small. From what I understand, a "stun" in World of Tanks reduces movement, accuracy, and crew performance. Those things can absolutely result in a swift loss of your tank in World of Tanks and damage can be delivered very quickly.

World of Warships is much more about long-term attrition. Losing access to your consumables is not a death sentence in the same way as Tanks might incur. While there are some that worry about a Fires which cannot be DCP'd or Repaired, a player still controls their position on the map. If they have a stun interaction while rushing forward to brawl, that could absolutely result in fires and issues. If a Yamato, which is typically at Medium to Long Range, receives a stun effect, it might have a few fires but full duration fires are not a death sentence. Especially when compared to being bombed for 18,000+ twice by a Midway as opposed to being locked out from a DCP or Heal for a minute or so.

There is nothing in the DevBlog which states Support CVs would not have access to planes which deal damage.

It could be used in competitive situations to focus down a ship, or at least try to.

As stated before, if a GK pushes alone and a Midway sends bombers. The Midway can get two bombing runs off for about 32k damage and potentially more via fires. If the "Stun Bombers" were used instead, then teammates would have to make up that 32k damage difference. The CV gets "damage credit" for the Fire/Flood damage done by others.

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Note: If a GK is pushing in the mid-late game, there are likely only a few ships left with which to deal said damage while the GK's consumables are "stunned". If said GK pushed early game, then they are just throwing their ship away CV or no-CV due to overwhelming fire.

If I understand correctly, the "minutes" plural is supposed to be if ALL the bombs hit a target, but that seems to be extremely unlikely. Further, that's likely against a battleship to even be possible as the ship would need to be large.

It's easy to read it and be concerned, but then again the entire concern/outrage is built off conjecture in the first place as this is a thing that's being tested and not something that's an actual thing.

A "permafire" is not actually a fire that lasts permanently. Fires have a set duration and cannot go longer than that. A new fire would have to be set.

3 Fires on a Battleship is typically around 32% of its total health (10.2ish% each). All Fire damage is 100% repairable so as long as 32% health wasn't a kill, they could heal it back after the effect went away.

The Roadmap was for 6 months and only covers to the Summer. The Support Concepts mentioned here could be literally years away as this is the first time these things have ever entered Testing.

That would be the purpose of the Stun Bomb. It's to aid the Support CV's teammates in applying damage to an enemy ship. That could be through fires from shells or floods from homing torpedoes launched from a friendly sub.

Yes, I understand people are very concerned about weirdness and gimmicks. However, we do not have respawn in our game so making a "ramming DD" would be extremely, extremely weird as it'd be the equivalent of legalizing yolo-based team griefing :\ So no, there are no "ramming DDs".

There is a big difference in speaking with facts, data, and information compared to complete and total conjecture based only on a few paragraphs of describing a concept.

Being concerned that something strange or not-intuitive is perfectly reasonable. Stuns can be something more associated with arcade games which can certainly weird people out. However, nobody has any idea on what size the reticle could look like, how many planes you get per match which means having no idea how many times a player could even use them (twice? four times? only once?).

When there are no specific details, it's extremely easy to imagine the worst possible scenario. My reminding people that this is in testing is to remind people that there is so much more than a description that happens when actually playing a game. Further, playing something that is likely so rough as to not have art, animations, or anything other than so number values in a game for basic testing purposes is something which really should be considered.

Because Savage Battles is primarily a fun torp-jousting meme brought to life as a quirky fun event.

There is a massive difference between a post-apocalyptic short-time game mode and a player loading into a game expect to watch in misery as their DD just rushes forward to try and ram something before they die.

In general, our game is about damage interactions. Players do damage to other players. Ships take damage and sink. This is a fundamental part of our game, even though no player wants to take damage and no player wants to sink.

The Stun Interaction is something where the CV player isn't doing damage, but their teammates are getting to have an easier time doing damage instead. Either way, damage is still damage.

If a normal CV bombs a target for 18k damage, or a support CV stun bombs a ship and it takes 18k damage from teammates... 18k damage happened to an enemy ship. The enemy ship isn't going to want to take 18k damage either way, but our game is set up around ships taking damage.

Stuff in testing like this is months or years away, assuming it even ends up being something the dev team decides to move forward with.

There is no PTS coming soon for this. It's just a rough concept.

This doesn't make sense. Your statement is saying "Nobody wants to take damage", which is true. However, ships take damage in our game as it's part of the fundamental nature of how our game works.

The primary counter to damage capabilities in our game is positioning. On the more basic firm, that can be a bow-in verses broadside. As the gameplay gets higher than can revolve around islands, consumables, teammates, and setting your ship in such a way as to be able to retreat to safety should you become overly threatened.

Bombed by HE Bombs or shelled by enemy ships after being stunned for a duration, that will still fundamentally rely on your use of positioning and having a strategy to stay safe.

Every game starts with the teams seeing what ships they will be facing, so every match can be entered with knowing what capabilities the enemy team has so that they can be planned for.

Regarding Damage Potential,

I'm not really sure I can agree. Battleships are likely large enough that the stun might last a decent duration and fires/floods affect them the longest. However, those fires still have to be set by teammates as opposed to a CV just doing the damage themselves.

Cruisers and Destroyers are smaller target, meaning less Stun Bomb hits. Based on the DevBlog, that could mean a cruiser being locked out for maybe 30 seconds and a DD for maybe 10-15. As far as Fires/Floods, they have reduced damage taken compared to Battleships so that is already less of a concern. The large issue is more about a smoke being locked down? Though the Cruiser or DD could simply smoke before the Bombs get close enough to attack them. In general, Destroyers and Cruisers seem unlikely to be main targets outside of trying to put Radar on Cooldown or finish a low-health target... though a normal squad of bombers would just be able to deal direct damage and likely be better suited for finishing low health targets.

Regarding counterplay,

I realize CV Counterplay is hotly debated, and I have no interested in having a multi-hour discussion in the middle of people being concerned about a conceptual Stun. In general, protecting yourself from Stun Bombs would be the same as protecting yourself from normal Bombs, so there's really not much to explore on that idea. You position to force bad attack lines, overlapped AA corridors, or long flight paths to delay the CV or force them to a different target.

This already happens. A ship gets HE spammed, repairs at two fires, then gets lit on Fire again. This can also happen when being dropped by HE Bombs as they can light fires which result in a DCP and then shelling follows up with Fires.

I don't agree that they are in as rough a state as before. Also, the reception to them being returned was even met with openly positive comments both here and on Twitch, which is a directly notable difference from before.

I realize you may feel that subs are hated by many or most, but it's simply not the reality of the situation. Some like them, some hates them, and many are indifferent.

The last major change to CVs (outside of the Rocket Rework) was patch 0.8.7. They have been fairly locked in since with occasional testing of spotting concepts and the addition of some weapon types like AP Rockets and Skip Bombs.

Worth noting that I hear about "Passive Play" repeatedly, but it doesn't happen nearly as often as people describe. Maybe on SEA, but not in NA.

I actually think the largest confusion about the "hiding at the back of the map" concept is that there are players that don't understand the concept of "Trading". As in, there are players which spend the first 5-10 minutes looking for trades where they deal more damage than they take and whittle an enemy down enough to get a kill or two or break a flank. THEN the pushing in and active play happens... because you just can't rush in and fight in a 12 v 12. No ship eats 6 ships worth of fire for very long at all if it pushes in to just get focused and sunk.

You are stating a fear you have with no information to back that up. This is the danger of conjecture.

"Stun Bombers" could be available on a 4 minute timer, or have extremely low health, or have no regen cycle, or... anything really, because a concept in testing has no definitive balancing concepts applied because it's not actually a thing yet.

Please remember that saying "Hey, we're trying to a thing out behind closed doors" is extremely different than announcing a ship that coming out with X planes or Y concept.

How often does that happen to you in actuality? Try watching your replays and document how often you see something like that occurring. If you find more than three in the course of a day, feel free to make a thread and post the replays so the issue can be discussed.

Planes get shot down and a CV loses the ability to repeatedly use a single squadron over and over. The idea of a perma-stun is unlikely because those planes will become exhausted as they get shot down faster then they are replenished.

Or, as I said, there could be a no regen system, or a timer like on a SuperCV which it's a single shot squad and then it's gone for minutes. There is literally no information on how they would be implemented, so anything at this point is just made up concern about possibly scary situations.

Humans are much more adept at remembering "the bad times" then the good times. I think it's related to a survival mechanism? Either way, it's easy to remember isolated situations and feel like they have more often than they actually do. This is why I challenged you to play for a period of time and actually sit back and observe how often it really occurs.

I've been told for years that ships hide at the back of the map and can't flank in CV games. I've played thousands of CV games on stream where ships pushed and flanked, even though I was in a CV. It's really just a perception problem moreso than a problem in actuality.

AA "wind-up" and Aerial Detection reduction was tested and never happened.

"Radio Distance" was tested and never happened.

"Vision Cones" was tested and never happened.

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Things get tested because someone came up with an idea, time was put it to figure out if it was worth trying, and then folks tried it. That's the perfectly normal process of testing.

Just because something gets tested doesn't mean it's flawless. The idea of testing is to literally gauge how flawed the idea is and if it's worth pursuing.

I'm not sure it's overly related to World of Tanks. "Stun" mechanics have existed in games since the 70's or 80's. They are a common form of control to help a group work on a powerful target.

As for the Support CVs, it was announced years ago that the removed odd-tier CVs would look to be returned in a Support CV concept. We didn't want to just release a mass of Rockets/Torps/Bombs CV so a measure of differentiation is required to allow the previous diversity CVs to be playable in the game.

In a general sense, there are as many for as there are against. There is also a fair amount of neutral.

I'm not authorized to give numbers, but the above is a good approximation.

The Rocket Change was significant in altering how CVs interact with Destroyers, but the same game system exists for pretty much everything else. Battleships, Cruisers, and other Carriers are all functionally the same as they ever were.

Spotting is repeatedly brought up as a pain point, so there is work to figure out how to lessen that issue. As for when a solution will be found, no idea on that one. Still in development.

I was told that WoT stuns involve loss of accuracy, movement, and crew skills. The concept in testing is much, much more basic than that. It just locks out consumables for a duration depending on the number of bombs that hit the target.

Movement and Accuracy are unimpaired by the "stun".

Polls/Update Surveys. We also have data observation, though what I referred to was polling/survey information.

I'm not sure what the "Who is the silent majority" means. They are people that don't speak up unless directly interacted with, hence "silent". Are you asking for demographic data? The "Neutral" section is composed of all types.

Things that were effected:

Rocket Delay and Visual Cue Addition

This that weren't effected:

Surface ship AA values


Plane health values


Plane speed values


Plane boost values


Plane regen values


Air-based consumables


Bomb characteristics


Aerial Torpedo Characteristics


Skip Bomb Characteristics

Yes, there was a change, but the majority of the game-system is the same as it ever was.

I cannot agree that it's the same level of issue.

I played World of Tanks a little. Mostly, I died~ I was never good at pixel hunting, so I'd just get shot from unseen directions and die. To me, having less vision, speed, and accuracy (if I could even see the enemy) would just mean I'd be dead even more easily.

You are correct that Consumables are very important in WoWs. I once heard the "Cruisers are supposed to convert consumable pressure into map dominance or kills" and that I think that's really valuable. That being said, that kinda explains why a stun to prevent a Radar or Hydro at a critical time could absolutely be the clutch play that allows a DD to make their big move.

For the most part, people will just think about DCP and Fires, but disabling detection for a window could also be tactically interesting.

No, I said the number of people that are "For Subs" are roughly the same as those "Against Subs". There is a fair amount of "Neutral", which means folks that aren't for or against them.

If you have no interest in what I have to say, then I will stop responding to you.

The Rocket change was to impact a part of CV interactions and help DD players quickly understand how Rockets work through a visual indicator.

Rockets still work against DDs, though they are much harder to use than they were previously.

As to "Major": A major rework would alter Most or All things, and changing one part of one squadron's interaction areas isn't what I would call major.

You're referring to the reticle weirdness after the introduction of hybrids? That was very strange, but it was addressed within a week or so and seemed like most of the weirdness was reverted.

Unless you're referring to the Broadside Reticle Rework? That did come before the Machine Gun Delay change, but they both were done to serve the same end so I lump them together in that sense.

Yeah, that was the Hybrid weirdness.

Yes, there would certainly be some suspension of disbelief. Stunning/Lockout mechanics are fairly commonplace in games, though.

You should think further about what this assertion means.

If the game is healthy, we will make money.

If we make the game unhealthy, we will lose money

If we are continuing to test Submarines, then we have an expectation of a healthy game

because a healthy game is required to make money.

There is no expected amount of magic money to be made simply by adding something new. While there may be some early adopters, it is in nobody's interest to damage the functioning health of our game. We are well aware of that, which is why submarines have been testing as long as they have. Adding an entire new concept to a game is a remarkably hard thing to do, and even still it hasn't been locked in after a wealth of effort. Should we feel comfortable locking it in, only then will it become a part of our game in truth.

You quoted me telling someone else:

"How often does that happen to you in actuality? Try watching your replays and document how often you see something like that occurring. If you find more than three in the course of a day, feel free to make a thread and post the replays so the issue can be discussed."

Saying that it happens almost every match will simply result in me making the same request to you.

If you play 4-5 games today, and 3 or more of them result in what you're describing, please post the replays on the forum in a new thread and tag me.

What's described in the devblog has nothing to do with movement or ship controls. It's just a mechanic which locks out consumable use for a time.

There is no announced change. The DevBlog was just saying "We are testing a thing". Players have responded with extreme concern just over it being tested and nothing more.

Yes, I acknowledged that. I've been reading this for the past 24 hours.

We're still going to test it internally, but testing something doesn't mean anything in regards to it actually coming to the game.

We'll also be testing Smoke Screen stuff from planes and a Chaff concept as well, so whether or not Stun Bombs matter the test will still give us information on other items.

Yes, there are a variety of suggestions which primarily relate to "buffing teammates" as opposed to "debuffing enemies". In a way, they are both doing the same thing, but people are correct in pointing out that it feels bad to be debuffed.

Ultimately, the CV will still need to be able to interact with the enemy team to an extent, though our DevBlog mentioned that there would be other Squadrons on the CV according to the concept. The likeliest idea of that is simply the that Support CV would have normal squadrons, but less of them because of the inclusion of a support squadron or concept. However, designing stuff like this would easily be months to years in terms of finding it's place in the game, so I don't imagine there's a particular rush to their development.

The NTC never happened. The Research Bureau is a completely different concept than having a repeatable path to buff a ship above base capabilities. RB is a grind-block for ships or alternative ways to play ships, not a thing which alter in-game balance concerns.

Like it or not, the move away from RTS CV needed to happen. There were fundamental problems with the systems used that required the old system to go away and a new implementation to happen.

There are many people that miss the RTS version or dislike the new version, but we still met the objectives we laid out and believe the current version of CVs is healthier in terms of game interactions as well more accessible to players.

If you can it would be helpful. Specific examples can help me to see where issues slipped through cracks and to double-check if those cracks are still there.

It's not uncommon in gaming to have "spells and counterspells". Yes, this is a game with ships, but the gaming terminology is just to say you can have "consumables and counter-consumables".

The largest effect would be if a ship used Radar, but then was Chaff'd and the Radar cut off. Otherwise, hiding a friendly in Chaff only delays the team-spotting effect by an amount. One use is much more effective than the other.

The section regarding Radar was here:

It's worth remembering that we had a pretty massive upset happen about 6 some months ago. We've made a lot of effort internally to address our connection with the Community, as well as making more efforts toward maintaining the better relationship we're pushing for. Yes, there likely have been a variety of painful issues in the past, but we are actively trying to use those experiences to help us do better going forward.

This was something we directly pointed out during the CC Summit of 2019. We put the new CVs onto Public Test and ended up spending all the time we had bug-fixing instead of balancing. When we had the bug fixed for the most part, the hype had passed and we didn't have enough player data to effectively test with.

The change in how we're testing since is reflected in our handling of Subs. There have been MANY, MANY tests behind closed doors, on the hidden test servers, the public test servers, and more recently the actual live server. We are being much, much more careful this go-around.

Submarines haven't be added to the game in a state where people are highly negative to them. Vocally, sure, but not across the total playerbase. Also, they are still in testing.

SuperShips will enter the tech tree in a state where people aren't highly negative to them. Vocally, in some ways, but not across the total playerbase.

Note: You've already expressed you don't have an interest in believing me, so please don't restart that line of dialogue.

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I addressed CVs above where you quoted from in the post you quoted, as well as previously to this post.

The Research Bureau Unique Upgrade move was certainly contested and still is disliked. This is something we are aware of.

A Mage's "Counterspell" is a lockout mechanic. Player A starts to a do a thing, Player B stops them and adds a cooldown timer.

I often talk in terms of mechanics and systems when I speak about games. It's just years-old habit.

I will be honest in that it's strange to read that a player shouldn't expect to be punished by an enemy. You would expect an enemy to damage you, deny you vision, or keep you suppressed. These happen currently through direct weapon damage, smoke screens blocking line of sight, or ships taking positions that force enemies to fall back and lose their preferred firing angles. The stun bomb concept is just a different variant of what already happens in that is helps a ship take damage, suppresses them, and can deny vision in the sense of locking down radar/hydro for a time.

That being said, the feedback here is primarily about "Don't put things in game which stop a player from being able to do something." IE: If you load into a game with a ship that can do X and Y, then the playerbase sentiment as that they should still be able to do X and Y at all costs.

Your suggest of "buffs instead" is more saying:

"Just make a buff system that makes the CV make their allies stronger so they can kill the enemy's better. Do not remove the enemy's ability to do something in any way (other than what already exists in game)."

Is this a correct way of expressing the concern? I feel I'm pretty on-point with my understanding.

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I saw elsewhere that someone had offered the idea of "Incendiary Bombs" which seemed novel. If you dropped a ship with them and they became more susceptible to fire for a period of time, then it would be buffing your allied ship fire chance against that target.

My job is not to defend a concept that doesn't exist in our game. I have received no orders to defend anything.

What I AM doing is making people aware of what "concept testing" means. I'm also trying to convey the ideas in game-terms of why you might see us even trying something like a "stun" in the first place (ie: it's a common game concept for the past 30+ years). But again, testing a concept doesn't mean anything about it actually entering our game.

This is assuming the DD:

Didn't use Smoke before being spotted.


Was in a position where being spotted was instant death.


Couldn't fall back to a teammate that could push the planes off them.

This game is about decision making. If the DD didn't use smoke, and was in a position where they would be shot if spotted, and was hit by bombers they saw coming, and didn't have a way to cut off line of sight to enemy guns or get to air cover to stop being plane-spotted... then yes, that would be a very tough time. Still, it would be a result of that DD driver's decision-making.

I am not lying.

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Why am I responding so much instead of hiding until this blows over? Because leaving a house on fire means other houses can catch of fire.

I have spent months working on this forum to try and help folks get to a place where they speak to each other with a foundation of respect. We have come a LONG way in that last three months. So yes, when I see a massive bonfire party that looks like it's going to cause screaming and insults that will destroy the community-building work I've been pushing for over the last three months... I'm going to head over and try to ask people to stop throwing gasoline on the fire and take a moment to breathe.

It hasn't made it out of the concept phase. It's literally in a dev-blog that is named "Conceptual Test".

Please make a thread with your AA proposals so we can talk at length there.

I actually made literally 2 hours of video just going over that.

The narratives that were spun from it were extremely undeserved.

I disagree in regards to AA, but that's a different topic/thread.

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Remember, you can use islands and other forms of play to deny enemy attacks. This is one of the points brought up on why CVs are problematic as they aren't constrained by islands and such.

If you are in cover and get locked out, you're still in cover. That aspect didn't change because the only damage you could receive would be from other ships instead of the CV (if they were using the stun bomb mechanic).

I suppose I could have a group-discussion stream that goes over the video. Still, it was a long-form dissection of it and was done in good faith.

I'll message it to you. This thread is about the DevBlog.

A Community Manager is an interaction point.

We translate information from the Company to the Community


We translate information from the Community to the Company

We have a foot in both worlds, though Boggzy and I have been players for years so mentally we're still very rooted in the Community-side of things.

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If you're expecting us to publicly disagree with what our company has decided to do, then that would be us deciding to override the values of our company publicly. That would be rather bizarre. We have internal processes for providing our own thoughts and feelings on topics.

Publicly, we ARE the representatives of the company, so it's on us to do our best to convey the What and Why of our company's reasoning.

We have to do the exact same thing in regards to conveying the What and Why of the Community's response when putting forth our own reports. We have direct access to the teams that make decisions, so while we are not designers we are able to make sure that your feedback is heard. In most cases, this is done in terms of general overviews because our playerbase is MASSIVE so highlighting one or two opinions is fairly outlier. However, there are times when a player puts in a tremendous amount of effort to describe the problem, the reasons for the problem, proposed solutions, and the reasons for the proposed solutions. In those cases, the in-depth feedback may be strong enough to hand directly over as the mountain of effort can be helpful in a direct way.

You have to understand that I'm one of the few voices that actually believes AA matters. I've demonstrated why I believe that at length, but that discussion is best handled in a different thread. So yes, on this topic I'm a strange interaction point.

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The reason I point out that I point out the expectation of being punished by an enemy is because I'm very much of the belief that a PvP game involves people using anything and everything in their power to take down their opponent. It's often a very no mercy form of combat. As such, I see being locked out to likely be frustrating while being focus fired, but I can respect that the enemy team is there to sink my ship as quickly as possible and move on to the next target.

The biggest feedback that I'm reading has been that players what access to all of their tools all of the time because the game is already hard enough. So players would rather the CV be able to buff their enemies and make them stronger than to debuff their ship or teammates and make them weaker. That is a very valid feedback point and worth kicking around in terms of design-space. However, in the end, it's all about getting enemy ships sunk.

"Crowd Control" is a common game-support class concept. A Stun that allows teammates to attack more reliably has been around for decades.

It seems that players extremely dislike that idea being used in this game, so it's likely best to just find different supportive concepts to lean on instead.

CC is often required in PvP circles as the most effective means of breaking stalemates. At least where healing or burst threat is involved.

The is no perfect game system.

True, but if you don't have a method of unraveling a situation than it comes down to either Brute Forcing it or relying on extreme out-skilling. Adding in a tactical component does allow for more possibilities in how to overcome a situation.

Flashbangs and other mechanics exist for all kinds of games including Shooters. There's been a massive amount of games created over the past 50 years. Fundamental gaming concepts have been used and reused across nearly every genre of game that exists.

That is correct. So that leads to the question of, "Does adding this concept alter the game? If so, is it good? bad? useful? unpleasant?" All of these things are answered from actual testing of the concept, which is what the DevBlog is about. We decided to test something.

The community backlash being as strong as it is might mean that even if it's well-received by testers (yes, that could actually happen) that it may be altered/abandoned anyway. That is a possibility. However, the strength/health of the game is the most important aspect to us, so actual concept testing is still going to matter to us.

Earlier in this thread, I invited Mouse to start a thread to talk about AA. She's brought it up recently and it could result in a good discussion.

Hopefully it won't just be a lot of people saying little more than "Buff AA" because that's not an actionable argument. Examples, numbers, concepts, and situations are what are needed to push for systemic alterations.

I am not a Game Designer for us, so my opinion doesn't matter very much. I can make suggestions, but I mostly just interact with people on the forum and try to translate player frustration into terms that are understandable in gameplay speak.

To my knowledge, there has been no real in-depth AA discussion since I've been a Community Manager. If there's a chance of me being able to dive into the topic and figure out some ways to describe or system-craft ideas to kick upstairs, then I will.

I've spent literally years dissecting the AA mechanics both on stream and in-video, including mathing out a ship in its entirety for @SaiIor_Moon

Speaking as a player and not as a CM, I have been continually impressed by our Dev Team's ability to balance things. While some newly released ships might be strong or weak for the first several months, we have a practice of giving ships a few patches for players to figure them out. After we have enough actionable data to work with, then we can look at if they need to be altered (like with the Nahkimov).

It can be frustrating from a player perspective to have to wait, but everything is a process and we're bogged down working on a LOT of stuff at the same time.

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The biggest moment of trust from me came from when I was a CC. I was writing out a detailed proposal on how to alter some CV mechanics that were in testing... and in the middle of my typing there was a DevBlog where they had already made adjustments to and addressed my concerns days prior (because testing iteration is remarkably quick).

There is a large difference between stating a concern, planting a flag on where you believe a balance point should be, and then extrapolating out from that balance point as to how to get there and why getting there is indeed a good thing for all parties.

I recently asked what "Powerful AA" might mean and was told

"The only way it can feel powerful is by preventing attacks -- or, to a lesser degree, shooting down a lot (and I do mean a LOT) of planes that aren't fighters."

So, how would that be functionally possible while still allowing CVs to actually be able to play the game? Or, would it mean that CVs would expect to not be able to play the game for X amount of time? If so, what amount of time would be acceptable to a player? If damage interactions are not possible, what alterations are required to allow for non-damage options (ie: support CV concepts).

It's a very large topic and likely a fascinating one. It cannot simply be reduced to "Make AA do more" because there are lots and lots of side effects of what that means and other areas that have to be designed around it.

RTS CV required extremely powerful AA because of the massive Alpha Damage threat. But having that powerful AA didn't completely limit a player as a single squadron being lost still left multiple other planes/squadrons to be controlled actively. The current system only has one, so if complete prevention of attacks is the metric, than that means there is a player which can expect to do nothing in the case of certain single ships, and likely nothing at all against grouped ships either.

Also, there's merit in considered an "aerial heat map" that displays Continues Damage values as hotter and hotter amounts of threat with an addition of Flak as another color or indicator. If this Heat Map existed, Fighter Consumables could be used to plug holes if Surface Ships used their influence areas to make a line across the map.

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It's a massive topic, and an interesting one. Typically it just gets reduced to a meme or talking point that dismisses it which is very unfortunate.

This already exists in our game amongst the competitive scene. I've played with Hurricane teams for over a year, so I'm familiar with how extreme and cut-throat the player-style there can be. It is not kind and it is very focused on winning.

This is one of the reasons why I try to remind people to keep a sense of perspective when discussing issues with high-order unicums. Casual and Average players have one type of game they are playing and I assure you the Unicums and up are playing a Very Different Game.

The concept of "Stun Bomb" in the test only stops consumables. It doesn't stop movement or shooting or any other ship characteristic. This is fundamentally different from waiting 5-7 minutes for an opportunity to shoot at or interact with something because the "stunned" ship could just continue to move and shoot as normal.

I've only been here for around 3.5 months, so there's a lot of prior experience that I haven't had. So, referencing previous issues is something that I can't speak to because I really don't have the background on it.

What I can say is that I'm, to my knowledge, the first Post-Rework CV Main that's played at a Hurricane level which has been hired. A big part of what a Community Manager is supposed to do is to translate feedback into an understandable format, which is something I believe that I am uniquely capable of doing when it comes to CVs and CV/Surface Ship interactions. That being said, I've played Thousands of CV games and I am not of the belief that AA is worthless because I've been in a lot of situations where it was NOT worthless. So, this is not a case of preaching to a choir.

I am absolutely interested in having an in-depth discussion about AA mechanics and trying to relay feedback on what results. One-liners and such aren't going to be helpful, but actual discussion and concepting can absolutely be useful.

I completely understand and there's no obligation to do so. As I said, the current situation with AA is functional enough that while higher-end folks may be frustrated with it, it has been workable in the game for literally years as well as in competitive spaces such as Clan Battles.

That being said, I already have been trying to come up with ideas on how to make flak more of a consistent thing to suggest internally after the discussion where the Flak on the San Diego was summarily dismissed not because it isn't effective but because there is a narrative spread by high-level players that flak doesn't matter because high-level players aren't sufficiently gated by it.

California's raw Continuous Values are already very powerful. The problem isn't the absence or addition of a consumable but the concept of what "very powerful" means. In the current system, the California can kill multiple planes per strike against it, and cause massive plane loss when paired with another ship's AA. The perception that losing just a few planes doesn't matter is incorrect as plane loss is just like "mana loss" in other games. Planes are a resource mechanic and will be exhausted when used at a significant enough loss-rate.

It is a functional design constraint that our Dev Team has to factor for, though. There is no other aspect in the game that "layers" on top of itself like AA can, therefore they have to be careful with the values that exist because of their ability to be overlapped.

I heard there was a time when there was a consideration of using "diminishing returns" for overlapped AA. This was shot down by angry community sentiment, but it would have allowed for buffed up solo-ship AA that diminished some when overlapped to avoid a similar problem. In effect, it would have allowed for more AA to exist overall.

Thank you for the reference!

To my knowledge that's not in the game at present as you can see the damage done by your AA. Whether you are alone or grouped, the damage number ticks are the same.

With all due respect, just repeating the same thing over and over isn't changing the situation. It's very apparent that there's an extreme backlash to the Stun Bomb concept on our forum and other forms of active media.

I understand your intention is to keep "eyes on the prize" so to speak, but having been actively participating in the entire duration of a 400+ post thread and reading the same thing well over two hundred plus times means that repeating it isn't teaching me anything I'm not aware of.

Mind, these sentiments are also echoed on Reddit, YouTube, and on other forums for other server clusters. We are aware that the Community is very freaked out about "Stun Bombs"

Your time estimates are very off, which is part of why talking about something that's only vaguely in a concept test is so extremely hard.

Moving and Shooting is the core of what people do. Consumables matter and are certainly important, but moving and shooting like normal is not the definition of "helpless".

This is why your have to go into a deeper discussion than just "Buff AA". The primary point I'll respond to in this post is about "viable attack wings"

We can assume that a CV will have approximately 50 Planes worth of resources each match (in terms of planes which can be lost). Depending on the loss-rate of Planes Per Attack, that can be a significant change in what the CV can expect to do.

If Planes are lost at a 2 Planes Per Attack rate, then the CV might field 20+ attacks.


If Planes are lost at a 3 Planes Per Attack rate, then the CV might field 13+ attacks.


If Planes are lost at a 4 Planes Per Attack rate, then the CV might field 10+ attacks.

In higher tiers, a single ship can kill 2-4 planes depending on its level of decent AA as well as positioning situation (kiting away or planes forced into a strange angle of attack). This is just from raw Continuous Damage and does not rely on Flak.

As such, two ships together can quickly reach attrition rates which can and will bleed CV resources to low-levels. While planes may still be fielded, their threat is fundamentally different when not at full strength. For example, a Hakuryu with only 8 Torpedo Bombers is a much different threat than a Squadron with 12, or an FDR with an 8 planes squadron as compared to a 14 plane squadron.

The question of AA needs to factor in Loss-Rate which translates to Maximum Number of Attacks which translates to Expected Damage which can translate into Match Influence. The adjustments will alter places all along the line.

Further, increased AA threat will also translate to more time spent avoiding AA to minimize exposure and resource loss. The loss of time also translates to a reduced Maximum Number of Attacks, though the resource buildup does allow for more reckless play should the CV have more Resources than Time.

We really do listen to feedback. I realize that it's regarded as a meme, but I am inside the company and see that feedback is received and acted upon. However, acting on something can occasionally take months due to the extensiveness of the pipeline we are actively working on.

There are instances when something goes live and is regarded as problematic, but was the result of 6-8 months of pipeline'd work. While this may be read as the "sunken cost" meme, it just means that if we're working 7+ months in the future that fixes and changes started immediately may end up being 7+ months in the future. Some things are able to cut in line, but we are a "manufacturing plant for content" in a sense, and it's very hard for a manufacturing plant to alter all the machinery on a responsive, short-term of notice.

The events last year caused a significant internal change to our company. I can report that if there was disdain before, there is not now. We stay in close contact.

This is also a big reason why we were allowed to hire more staff for the Austin office to better keep up with all of the goings on. We're still looking for a Senior Community Manager as well as a 4th Community Manager, so we're not even at full strength yet. That being said, hiring is hard for everyone since labor is so tight everywhere.

Personally, I've been fairly surprised at just how available everyone is in this company. I can send a message to the head of all our regions and expect a response within a day or two. I was definitely not expecting to be as empowered as I actually am.

I won't get into it in this thread, but in a few months we've been able to do things that myself as a player and many others I know would never have thought were possible. As in, we never would have thought there even was a chance for the change desired to happen. However, if there's a will to push something and sensible reason to do it, then initiatives are absolutely possible and encouraged.

There is a reason why I'm still in the office at 8:24pm. It's not because I've been asked to stay here. I just tend to stay because there's stuff going on and I'm genuinely interested in doing the work, perhaps because I lived this game for so long.

We put out a statement 6 months ago and have been using that as a guidance document since. It's considered extremely important.

For those which haven't read it, it is here:

Mathed out for a Lexington and it came to 63 Planes for a 13 minute Match. At 4 planes lost per attack in total (attack and retreat), that's approximately 15 attacks over the entire match.

This can be used as a basis for discerning expected damage of the CV. When that is figured, the question is if it's too high and where it could/should be adjusted to. Then you can find where the losses values can move to and try tweaking AA.

All hiring is currently on hiatus, but we still want to get a 4th CM and a Senior CM. Feel free to apply when the opening gets reposted.

You would prefer to leave AA as it is but simply try an approach which has less planes available? That's certainly a thought, though I think all the narratives about AA will continue to linger if AA is not changed, regardless if the system is considered healthier or not. That's a risky solution.

The other issue is that you often point out how skilled play can subvert AA mechanics like Flak and (to an extent) Continuous through immunity windows. Reducing resource availability would just mean those who lose resources less will be more outlier than before and continue to present Reddit clips and forum narratives.

I personally think AA is likely the better place to look at as people tend to be angry about the core interaction as opposed to the damage numbers. Resources would restrain damage numbers, but do nothing for the interaction other than potentially lessen it.

Not even talking about Support Carriers, Bombers are dangerous.

If you are in a DD and see that a squadron of bombers is flying in your direction and will see you shortly, you can smoke before they see you so that they don't see you. This is a perfectly fine thing to do.

If you are ok with them seeing you (because they are AP Bombers, or because you feel confident you can using positioning knowledge to stop them from threatening you), then you can choose not to smoke and get spotted. This is also a perfectly fine thing to do.

The player with the smoke has the choice.