Now, gold or premium ammo, whatever you wish to call it garners a lot of mixed feelings from players of World of Tanks and for good reason I think. Now, for clarification I have played the game for a long time, since the beta, back when gold ammo could only be purchased for gold. Though by that token it was also rare to run into and often just ignored as who would want to spend what amounts to real money for ammo in an online game?
I forget which version or patch it was but they decided to make it so you could buy the 'gold' or premium consumables and ammunition for (a lot of) credits technically giving everyone access to it. Now with the more recent addition of a shot tracker as the screenshot above shows, you see gold ammo flying around all over the place which brings it's own issues.
It genuinely feels like my more heavily armoured tanks can't really use their armour the moment the gold ammo gets loaded up. People see my O-Ni and despite it having weak side armour and being pretty easy to flank, they just punch holes in the front with gold anyway. Okay, fair enough heavily armoured tank but then I see people spamming gold at my tier 7 Swedish TD, a tank with 15mm of armour, a tank that could be penetrated frontally by low tier HE rounds.
Personally if it were up to me I'd entirely rework it or just remove it as it is not much fun to be on the receiving end of. There is no in battle trade off to using premium ammo most of the time, sure it costs more credits but that should not be a balancing factor. To that end here are a few possible ideas I personally have had over the last few weeks.
- Make it do less damage: This to me makes the most sense as it gives a direct trade off for the increased penetration. This will at least mean players will have to make the choice of whether they want to risk more damage at the potential of bouncing or do less damage but have a better chance of penetrating
- Give it special effects: I know there are a lot of types of premium ammo from HEAT to HESH and APCR or even just standard AP. Just a couple of examples though, APCR might do less damage but guarantee module damage (not destruction.) So, you slam a shot into an enemies engine as they cross the open and boom, slowed to a crawl. HESH/HEAT may be more likely to injure crew and such but this would need additional balancing bringing me onto the next idea.
- Limit the amount of premium ammo a tank can have in battle: This would be the easiest one to add in. Simply make it so you can't carry a full load of premium ammo, limit it to 5-10% of the tanks ammo capacity. Will stop it from being spammed at the very least.
What about tanks that almost have to use premium ammo?
No tank in my opinion should ever have to fire premium ammo though there are a lot of tanks that do feel as if they need it due to their standard ammo not being very competitive. The Comet, the Churchill VII to name the two I have played that felt like they needed it but they should be buffed to be competitive. Also I am not asking for it to be removed as that's highly unlikely just changed and balanced like.. Well a lot of aspects of the game need right now! Yes, I'm looking at you, matchmaker.
It's not an IWIN button though, you still need to know how aim.
Whilst you do have to be aware of the quirks of premium ammo such as HEAT (spaced armour such as tracks nullifies it completely) the point is more that it can make heavily armoured tanks feel pretty pointless. If they can't use their armour effectively due to getting pummeled with premium ammo and penetrated frontally anyway, then their biggest advantage is already gone.
I also think it doesn't promote good gameplay, rather than outflanking that Ferdinand or trying to get around that KV-4. People just load the premium ammo and knock holes in the front anyway.
Final Thoughts
All in all I highly doubt they'd ever remove premium ammo but I do personally think they should change or re-balance it in someway. Every advantage needs a trade-off, that's a key component of balance, tanks with heavy armour move more slowly, smaller caliber guns fire faster but do less damage etc. Simply saying it costs more credits is a non-issue, economic balancing should not affect battle balancing. Anyone with a half-decent premium tank can likely afford the credits to run tanks with premium ammo.
Is it the biggest issue in World of Tanks right now? Probably not but I do feel it's something that perhaps needs looking at. Along with the matchmaker but that'd be a whole other post to make.
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