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I've been doing a lot of thinking recently about tournaments. The twister cup has passed and many clans will be in the winter season and the community produced Clan Wars 6. To get right to it, I'm going to inject my extremely controversial opinion on what should be done to tournaments in the future to make them better.
Premiums tanks should not be allowed in tournaments, at any level.
It's kind of past as prologue that I'm preaching this now (you'll see why later). I thought more tanks = more diversity. Well, that is only true if tanks are balanced. Yes, I know there are massive tech tree outliers like the Foch and Progetto, and maybe even the 215b that will most likely receive their divine judgement, but for the most part, tournaments are ruled by premiums. Additionally, these tanks are reasonably accessible for everyone. You aren't obligated to open your wallet to purchase the Foch, Progetto, or the 215b.
That T-22 made a significant impact, being quite possibly the only medium that can pull off a reverse sidescrape. You can even watch TJFBleu [RGN] pull off bounces from his butt on a Mayan Ruins game this twister during an impromptu reverse side scrape in a focus fire brawl. It has classically Russian DPM and -6 degrees of gun depression, like the Obj 140. It also has a better turret than the 62A, which should not even be a thing. The mobility is more than good enough to get the job done. This tank needs a nerf, and shouldn't even be allowed in tournaments in the first place.
This brings me to my next point, that only banning one tank is quite unfair. So in my twisted version of fair, all premiums should be removed from tournament play.
If the OP argument doesn't do it for you, consider whats next. In fact, don't even consider this from an OP tank perspective, but consider this from a role perspective. For example, we know tanks like the Chieftain, or the AMX 30B, or the 121B are not considered OP by the community. However, all of them have a role to play in these coordinated team settings, where having the right tool for the job means the difference between winning and losing. Yes, the T22 can pretty much do it all, but we can all assume there are situations where a Chieftain Mk. 6 would dominate, or an AMX 30B would be much better in a certain spot on a certain map. Even the 121B's alpha advantage may make some kind of small difference in a tournament strategy. I'll concede we have yet to see this because of the Swiss Russian army knife known as the T22, but I'm sure we can think of examples where a certain tank on a certain map is clearly the most efficient choice.
What if the "most efficient choice" comes at a cost? 25000 gold? $50? Maybe try your luck at the crates that just went on sale? The point I'm trying to make here is that when the "most efficient choice" is not an equally accessible opportunity for everyone it skews the lines that define the term "fair play." I'm not saying that [RGN] won undeservedly. No, they definitely proved their hutzpah with some fantastic tactical play this past year. However, I think it would be more ethical to prevent tanks that do not exist in the tech tree from seeing the light of tournament play. The lines only get skewed further when the most efficient choice or the right tool for the job, also happens to be the right tool for any job and is downright OP, or noticeably better than the similar tech tree counterparts.
To relate, I read an article recently about a new running shoe, known as the "NIKE VAPORFLY." This running shoe has some pretty fancy tech that absorbs more energy in the sole and gives more propulsion to your next step, creating an almost gliding feeling. Less energy loss means more energy to the runner, and having a bit more spring in your stride is always lovely. The article discussed that many previous world records were smashed by runners that wore this shoe. The sports community is now calling it "tech-doping." What is actually making these runners win? Are humans suddenly becoming faster in 2019 in some evolutionary process we are undergoing? While these runners train tremendously to even compete at this level, evidence suggests that the technology behind these world records may be inflating scores and results.
For those of you that don't understand my running analogy but are still into sports, consider the use of corked bats in baseball. I'm essentially getting at that, except right now in pixel tanks the corked bats aren't considered cheating.
And that's just tier 10 folks, what about tier 6 and tier 8? I personally don't play these tiers often, but I don't need to be a meteorologist to tell that it's raining outside. Would someone like to argue with me that the most winning teams in tier 8 don't use tanks like the WZ-120-FT, the OBJ 252U, the M41 lekPz, Lowe, T54 mod.1, or other IS clones? I've played in enough quick tournaments to get the gist of the meta. It's not around player skill, it's around equipment. Teams that have no business winning can spam 252U's and smash higher skilled opponents that use tanks like the VK4502A and Caernarvon. Yes, the Tiger 2 is buffed now, but it's still a relatively odd choice in tournaments because of the fundamentally stronger hull down IS-X style heavies. Most tier 6 clan wars videos I have watched of teams winning it all are littered with slews of Cromwell B's. You might see a KV-1S once in a while. Can someone look me straight in the face and tell me that the tournament meta is not being overrun with spam from premiums?
Premiums, which are not easily accessible to everyone, are starting to pollute a facet of the game whose intention is to find the most skilled teams. When players can buy something that is the most efficient choice and is also OP, and it is not available for other players to grind (even a long, dedicated grind) to receive that same advantage, it is logically undeniable that the boundaries of fair play are warped. The search for the "most skilled team" then does not become a contest solely about skill, but also about outside factors.
Speaking from experience, I played in CW3, during the updates where mediums were nerfed into the ground, and then premium ammunition was nerfed as well (3.6 and 3.7). The only tank not affected by these nerfs was the then exclusive M60, which was "randomly" given out. I put quotations around randomly, as data collected revealed that high spenders received this tank as a "loyal" gift from WG. Some criteria is still unknown, but correlation illustrates whales and wallet warriors were rewarded for their heavy investments. Not saying that's bad at all, I like that whales and wallet warriors pay for the game. With as many premiums as I own, I'm probably a wallet warrior myself. Thank god I'm not one of those collectors though... ugh, I'd hate to have to purchase every tank that came on sale.
Anyways, returning to my story about CW3, some clans had a high propensity of M60's given. My clan members did not receive any M60's, while other clans in our same group received anywhere from 4-6+ M60's. The M60, retaining its massive HEAT pen and unnerfed premium alpha, dominated the rest of clan wars. Clans with members who had it ended up undoubtedly dominating tier 10 clan wars that year. The other clans didn't really stand a chance. People who had the tank said it wasn't OP and argued it was no different than the then nerfed M48, but after the M60 was nerfed in line with every other medium, you didn't even see an M60 or an M48. To this day, I still hold that the original STR8 clan would have been a much different story if it weren't for a fateful day of my team playing nerfed mediums, and our opponents spamming exclusive, overtuned M60's. You can even watch this on video. I'll provide the link at the end. I was basically told to f*ck off and git gud when I complained about this 3-4 years ago, but hindsight is 20/20 as certain now ex-CW council members told me that their decision not to ban the M60 was a mistake. Guess I was right.
If you've read this narrative to the end, I applaud you. Long story short, exclusive tanks should not be allowed to help define who is the best. Compound exclusive with overcooked, and we have a serious problem. I observe that is what is happening now, and as someone who has experienced the short end of the stick regarding losing to teams that had exclusivity and OP on their side, it's not a fun way to play the game.
Ban premiums from tournaments to keep the playing field at its most fair.
~DMG
Edited by Dark_Magician_Girl, 19 November 2019 - 01:22 AM.
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