ST, "British Cruisers Part 2", Ranked season 15, new map, and service record changes.

[HannahDaddy]

ST, "British Cruisers Part 2", Ranked season 15, new map, and service record changes.

Update 0.9.1 will continue the British update cycle

The event will consist of directives, new unique commander Andrew Cunningham, and British heavy cruisers which will be leaving early access.

The new commander has three talents:

• After receiving 2 "Caused flooding" ribbons, ship and squadron maximum speeds are increased by 5%. 
• After receiving 2 "Destroyed" ribbons, an additional charge is added to all consumables.
• After receiving the "Witherer" achievement, the reload time of the main battery and torpedo tubes, as well as aircraft restoration time, are reduced by 10%. 

All three talents can be activated once per battle.

Andrew Cunningham also has the following improved skills:

• Jack of All Trades - Reduces reload time of all consumables for the ship and squadrons by 10% instead of the basic 5%;
• Aircraft Armor - Decreases the continuous damage that aircraft takes from AA defenses by 11,5% instead of the basic 10%.

Ranked season

On the 26th of February, the 15th Ranked season will begin. Battles will be held on tier X ships, without class restrictions, in the 7 vs. 7 format. Battles will be conducted in the updated "Arms Race" mode.

Service record

We updated our game's service record system:

• The order in which game features are unlocked has been changed.
• Reduced the number of battles needed to reach most stages of the service record.
• New rewards have been added for unlocking different stages of the service record: Coal, Free Experience, Premium Account Days, Signals, Camouflages, Containers, and upgrades.

Beginners will now need to play fewer battles to gain access to the main game features, and the updated rewards will make this progression easier.

Please note: Players who started playing before the release of Update 0.9.1 will receive all-new rewards for already completed stages, minus what was already received in the old version of the service record.

For example, players who have already reached the last stage of their service record before Update 0.9.1 will receive: 15,000 units of coal, 4 days of Premium account, a supercontainer, 10 daily containers (among which 5 are "More Resources" containers), as well as a large amount of upgrades, expendable camouflages, economic, and special signals.

Other content

A new map - North Waters - will appear in the game. Players will fight among snow-covered islands and ridges. It is designed for tier VIII-X battles and will be available in two game modes: "Epicenter" and "Domination", with three key areas.

A permanent "Nordic" camouflage for the German tier VIII battleship Odin has been added to the game.

The "Recruiting Station" flag has been added to the game.

The ways of obtaining these items will be announced in future.

Please note that the information in the Development Blog is preliminary and subject to change.

 

[Alice_Borealis]

I do like recent ST changes WG has made after new year so far, French ship nerfs, upgrade changes and specific cyclone in Clan Battles, but this one is pretty bad to compare.

First point : Unique commanders are supposed to provide bonuses when you PERFORM WELL, not PERFORM NORMALLY. For example Yamamoto Isoroku to get the bonus you'll need to snatch a first blood which is a once in a match opportunity, Bull Halsey would need a double strike which is rare as well. Now Nikolay, you can just get the bonus from dropping your HP to certain value which does NOT require any skill based gameplay at all, next Luigi Sansonetti a kill is what you get nearly every game and that already increases your firing range, not to mention that 100 shell hits for high tier Italian cruisers are really easy to get, (I've played some games in Brindisi and NOT A SINGLE game where I don't get the consumable duration buff). Now this new captain is even worse, getting two floodings are just literally one or two torpedo salvos. In addition Witherer is a very easy achievement to get using British DD or BB, and two destroyed ships are no different than one ship on Luigi Sansonetti's skill. So In summary, I would like to have these unique skills HARDER to activate since they provide advantages to those who play well, but they SHOULD NOT provide advantages by playing normally without having achieve anything special.

Second point : Arms Race is a great mode, but it wasn't made for player to be using their playstyle and strategy to compete YET. In current state of Arms Race, a superior ship will always win the cap and bonus, which snowball the game even more, Arms Race caps should have a cap time (say 15-20 seconds) so that the other team can contest it to some extent. Lastly, the bonus spawn points are to be adjusted so that island placement on each map will not be easier for one team, or else adjust the islands.

Hope that my advice here would be heard, I do like how the game is progressing after the new year. Please keep it that way and take in consideration from those who really use the ships at their maximum capability and know them truly, without any personal biases.
Cheers 

[S0und_Theif]

Northern waters feels like a modified version of Land of Fire. With lesser islands iMO.

[Project45_Opytny]

10 hours ago, S0und_Theif said:

Northern waters feels like a modified version of Land of Fire. With lesser islands iMO.

And the islets on the right are of more regular shape.

It is also interesting in terms of their respective "bases" in real world: Land of Fire is clearly based on the stormy, turbulent waters around Tierra del Fuego at the tip of South America, while the name of this new map and the screenshots indicate a subpolar environment in northern hemisphere.

By the way where is the Bering Sea and the respective "Breakthough" mode?