WOTBB 38 – Where did the noobs go?

Original date of blog: September 9th, 2015

So, moving on in all meanings of the term, it’s high time I blog about the game and the tanks again. First and foremost, I need to revisit the noob-topic. These last few weeks I’ve not been playing all that much, but what I’ve noticed really surprised me.

The noob-problem is lessening. Yes, of course, you still get games where your team exists of a bunch of monkeys who think they’ve nothing better to do than scratching themselves, while the enemy exists of rainbow-farting unicorns, but more and more, you meet teams at tier IX or X where users do at least 1k damage. Which is like 2 or 3 shots for most tanks, but still, that’s 2 or 3 shots more than they used to do.

You no longer lose a game by definition just because you die and the rest of your team can’t do a thing. Most of them still have a very long way to go stats-wise before they would not be deemed a noob anymore, but you can see the potential. They’re learning. You see them bounce a shot, and just want to pet them on the head and go ‘well done, little buddy, well done’.

The other day, I was driving my M103 on Dead Rail and was basically shot from all sides and died pretty quickly (yes, noob me!). After that, I watched, together with my toon-mate, an Object 268 drive about. He had been camping until then, but as we watched (and as we made fun of him in our toon-chat), he managed to actually get shots into enemy tanks. He had to move when they spotted him and he actually went to a strategically sound position, and bounced shots while still doing damage. We won that game, and I checked his stats. They were absolutely terrible. But that does prove my point – even if he hasn’t done very well overall, he must be learning, and learning quickly, to drive the 268 like that.

At the same time, despite doing more damage, listening and reading still isn’t a part of it, it seems. To them, SOS means ‘by all means, stay where you are, everything is just peachy’, and ‘hill asap please’ often means ‘yes, mediums, please camp at our own base and do absolutely nothing’. This could of course be the language barrier, but the instructions are often really not that difficult to begin with. ‘Cap base’ does not mean ‘of course you should use your big and heavy tank to try and chase a medium around the map’ however much they want it to mean that.

Oddly enough, being in a clan does help with this. If, at the beginning of the battle, you talk about going this war or that, players will listen. This means you’re less often alone, and most often, they even understand the meaning of teamwork and you win together.

If someone else says something first, I’m still not sure whether or not I should listen. This mostly because of the gazillion clans out there that people made for just themselves. A clan-tag by no means means the player knows what they’re doing. You can most often tell at least something by how intelligent the tag looks. With all the known and big clans, I’ll definitely follow their lead if they speak first. But when I see a T62a with the clan-tag E100, it doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

I’m not sure this means regarding the noob-virus though, to be honest. Either it’s not spreading as much and it’s dying off as noobs quit the game, or maybe there’s been a cure. Whatever it is, I’m happy with this development overall and hope to see it, and the noobs, evolve further.

Another thing I’ve noticed is the amount of reroll accounts. They’re growing exponentially. You see players with mile-high stats and very few games, that seem to know what they’re doing, and you just know that’s another one. And I get why people do that. Heck, I’ll confess – I have one myself too, even if I haven’t driven a single battle in it yet (I got it because I wanted to reserve the name, really). It’s a way to test if you’ve gotten any better, to see how far you can come if you hadn’t noobed when you first started playing the game.

But on the other hand, rerolling disregards your history. I know my stats could be a lot higher if I started anew. But why would I want to do that? My account right now is as it is. It’s me. All my failures, all my accomplishments. And I’m proud of that. Okay, so maybe it does not reflect how much I’ve grown now, how much I can do now, but there’s nothing wrong with that. If anything, it’ll just make people underestimate me.

And yet, I can’t wait to be a unicorn. Because even if I don’t really care much about stats on their own anymore, getting that colour purple is like being told “well done, honey, you did good” and receiving a friendly pat on the back. It’s so dual. I want to forget about stats and just have fun, and at the same time, I still watch them. I think it’s like that for everyone, though some watch the stats more than the fun.

Another reason I could never reroll for real are my prems. I have too many premium tanks, and I wouldn’t want to have to buy them all over again, or worse, not be able to get them again because they’re no longer in the app-store. I love my prems. Aside from some having pref MM, they just earn a lot more. They’re awesome to help someone grind with, since they often give you an extra edge against the enemy.

I know people that have bought and sold their prems over several accounts several times, and that just feels like a waste of money to me. And I’m not just talking little ones, I’m talking tier VIII prems. I regretted the one time I sold a prem very very much, and have been very very grateful that it has returned to the appstore since then so I could buy it again. I can’t imagine having to start that collection anew.

A lot of these reroll accounts have one tier VIII prem for grinding credits so far. But in the end, if your reroll account is to prove how far and how high you can soar, wouldn’t you be leaving your main account behind? And if not, then what exactly is the purpose of the reroll? I think it’s a dual thing, just like watching stats.

I’m still wondering whether or not I’ll ever use my own potential reroll account, even though I love owning that name. As it is, I’m proud of all I’ve accomplished on my main account and really don’t see a reason to do to start over, other than to have an anonymous account. But then, with all the great people I know in the game and toon with, what would be the fun of being anonymous?