Purpose of this blog

Dmitry Yudo aka Overlord, jack of all trades
David Lister aka Listy, Freelancer and Volunteer

Saturday, January 19, 2013

[ALL] ChrisK Has Joined the Club!

I'm extremely excited to introduce one more speaker (finally native with English :)) who has just joined the blogging crowd and is going to use this resource as means of communication with you, guys. Chris Keeling aka ChrisK is Senior Producer at Wargaming.net, make him feel welcome here.

Overlord

I started freelancing in game writing and design on Panzer Elite for Wings Simulations in 1998, while I was still on active duty with the U.S. Army. After I transferred to the reserves, I continued to work freelance on games like America's Army: Operations, America's Army: Soldiers, Twilight War, and Order of War. I also squeezed in a year and a half combat deployment to Iraq, published my own World War II tabletop miniatures rules, and earned a Master of Fine Arts in Videogame Production and Design along the way. In 2009, I accepted an offer to teach full-time in the Game Design program at Full Sail University.

Things changed fairly quickly after that - I developed and taught several classes, and eventually became the Program Manager of the entire Game Design program (responsible for more than two dozen Course Directors and over 1,600 students!). I retired from the Army Reserve after 23 years of total service and continued to freelance part-time for Wargaming.Net. After the release of Order of War, the company kept growing, from about 60 developers in Minsk (plus one American consultant!) to over 1,300 developers in several studios with offices in about a dozen countries. We could only do this because of the amazing success of World of Tanks, and the potential we could see in World of Warplanes and World of Warships

After about four years of freelancing, I was offered a full-time position as Senior Producer here at Wargaming.Net. I have now embarked on the adventure of a lifetime working for a really amazing company loaded with vision, drive, and purpose. Among other things, I suggest Westernization practices and features that will enhance our appeal to players in North America and Western Europe (and, hopefully, everywhere else!), while working on secret new game ideas that may see the light of day in the future. On this blog I will help clarify some of the reasons behind our design decisions, predict some of our future endeavors, and occasionally explain some of the “historical elasticity” used to keep our games balanced between authenticity and fun.

When I’m not slaving away over my keyboard, reading player feedback in the forums, analyzing development plans, or playing other games (it’s research, honest!), you can find me playing as ChrisK on World of Tanks and in the World of Warplanes closed beta, or alpha testing a couple of games still under wraps, like World of Warships. 

See you on the battlefield!

ChrisK

75 comments:

  1. welcome,and: 'a couple of games still under wraps' interesting, you probably can't tell anything about those, can you?

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    1. If he told anymore he might get sent to SerB's gulag : o

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    2. I hear it's pretty nasty down in those dungeons... think I'll try to stay on SerB's good side!

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    3. SerB does not have a good side

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    4. No love to the father of tanks. How cruel.

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  2. Which alpha games you know about Tanks that can compete with World of Tanks ? I am sure there is a game or at least will be .

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    1. Tanks specifically? What platform? :)

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    2. I want to play a game with lot of tanks and true balance . Do you know some game which meets all those conditions ? Personally i do not .

      Platform ? Windows 7 lol what else .

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    3. That's very good idea . if only i had enough time and enough skilled friends for it . And i don't really have much money to maintain server and avoid hacking and many other issues .

      Just look at Blizzard , A very good example .

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    4. The produce high quality games, though I don't think they are going to change their setting that much. Very unlikely.

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    5. I mean , that Blizzard is a company which know how to balance their game correctly , Unlike WarGaming.NET .

      The balance is not done only by statistics , Read about StarCraft's game design , How did they balanced the best strategy game ever on this planet .

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    6. Best Strategy Game ever??? StarCraft??? Best Strategy game ever???...hahahahahahaha

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    7. Just take a tour in GameSpot and IGN , Will you ?
      SC2, SC is the best balanced strategy games ever .

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    8. StarCraft :
      IGN : 9.5 / 10
      GameSpot : 9.1 / 10

      StarCraft 2 :
      IGN : 9.2 / 10
      GameSpot : 9.5 / 10

      I assume this is the best RTS game ever in history of humanity .

      I am sure you are C&C fan ..

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    9. IGN and Gamespot is not subjective .

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    10. @David if you don't enjoy the game feel free to bow out.

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    11. @Yaspa , Do you have any source reference to this claim ? Did i said that i don't enjoy the game ? Just read what you write here before posting . You really think that i wont leave a game which i don't enjoy to play with ?

      >_>

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  3. And EU server has crashed again,same shit happened last week too :(

    Please WG upgrade server capacity for the EU server

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    Replies
    1. Hardware failure. Its not related to the capacity.

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  4. #1: Wot server crashed...

    #2: When will there be a Wot Generals alpha?

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  5. What do you mean by "Westernization practices and features"? And welcome!

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  6. Thanks for the welcomes! And by "Westernization practices and features," I mean those techniques and concepts that will enhance the appeal of the game to our Western audience, particularly North America and Western Europe. For example, last Summer's rebalancing of the MM Battle Levels, the recent SPG cap, and the upcoming implementation of a new tutorial system. These are things that Western players have been asking for. The things Western players expect from a game.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for the explanation, I was curious as to what was meant when you first showed up a few weeks ago.

      Here's a question, which appears to be in your area of responsability. When will the EU forums get a Dev of our own to replace the much missed Overlord as the face of WG.net?

      I only ask becuase the current system for Q&A's is utterly unfit for purpose.
      Last answer session was December, and only three questions were answered of the hundreds asked.

      To us in the EU it feels like we're the last people to know anything, and we have no face of WG.net whose involved with the forums. Ectar and Challenger are both as active as they can be but it still feels like we're not important to WG.Net (which is silly).
      But ask yourself when did news break first on the EU forums? There's been news on the NA and always on the RU forums, but it seems the vast majority of ifomation comes from everywhere else. Which is why we miss Overlord.

      It just seems somewhat out of kilter for an international company.

      Thanks for listening to my gripes.

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  7. Welcome to Overlords blog and be aware of the rage!

    If u want to Westernize them, you have to tell them, that they should tell us the truth and not lie directly into our face!

    For example: The EU-sever was attacked by a DDOS-attack this afternoon and it was even confirmed by a WG-employee! But in a news u are telling us, that it was some "Maintenance work on servers, community site, forum"!

    To confirme, that we dont like it, take a look at the link:
    http://forum.worldoftanks.eu/index.php?/topic/200968-maintenance-work-on-servers-community-site-forum-world-of-tanks-19012013/

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    Replies
    1. definitely, always when the server crashed they post a news message afterwards 'announce' scheduled maintenance, just admit something went wrong and give ppl that had a prem acc a day prem to compensate

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    2. It wasnt scheduled. One of the servers went out of the order. Guys are investigating the reasons. Prem accounts are compensated when certain downtime threshold is met.

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    3. It was completely obvious that it wasnt scheduled, but the community team just decided not to admit that and lie about it announce 'scheduled maintenance' afterwards, which is insulting IMO, how hard can it be to just post that there was an issue and that is why servers were down?

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    4. @Overlord ,If this attack is true , then i very hope that WG is backing our own accounts !

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    5. David Diamond,

      no attack, those are regular rumours. And ofc we have a few DB replicas.

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    6. angrybanana,

      really don't know why they did so. Might be a mistake or miscommunication since all hardware is controlled for Minsk HQ.

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    7. Im quite sure that it wasnt a mistake, since the do this every time the server goes down unexpectedly.

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    8. @angrybanana , yep , this is not the first time i experience this kind of server failure .

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  8. I thought Overlord did a pretty good job communicating with those of us that speak English, but having someone else on board can't hurt, so welcome.

    Out Of interest since you help with some game decisions can you explain with MM why the ELC AMX gets treated like a scout?, even though in a WG video it was noted that it was not really suited to scouting for a variety of reasons.

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  9. Stefan, who said that it was an attack? I didn't even know it went down (I'm traveling at the moment) but when I checked it was running fine. Whatever the hiccup was, looks like it didn't take long to fix it! It could easily have been something like a bad router cluster or internet linkage that broke down and caused a rapid degradation in service to that host, but as I said, I don't know what it was - I leave the servers to the server experts!

    Recludere, The ELC was not designed to be a scout, even though it's light and fast. It was designed to be an airmobile tank, like the American Sheridan M551, or to a lesser extent, the Soviet ASU-85 and British Scorpion. This is why it's not a "classic" scout; however, in WoT parlance, it does fit best into the LT role. The thing that hurts it the most for scouting is its short radio range (the half-turret doesn't help either, since it can't spin around enemy tanks and stay out of their turret arc while shooting them). It's best as a sniper in support of an advance, instead of true scouting. Which, after all, is what the French designed it for in the first place.

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    1. It can be a fun tank, and that is the role I prefer it as "sniper in support of an advance", but MM puts you in high tier 8+ battles, then you get expected to scout because you're a fast light, but it's really not suited to scout so I ended up selling it, but I assume it's MM value will not change?

      On a semi related note, some time ago it was mentioned, can't recall where, of introducing roles for tanks, e.g sniper, scout etc, or introducing hybrid types, as to better indicate the role and how to play a certain tank, but I have heard nothing since, so I guess the idea was rejected?

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    2. ChrisK, it was said by Kacsa1 (he is a Moderator)! He wrote it first in the general chat of the game and afterwards he replayed to it in a thread on the forum, that it was a organized spam attack!
      The downtime was from 21:30 to 23:59 (Paris Time) on 19.01.2013.
      Link to the thread: http://forum.worldoftanks.eu/index.php?/topic/200917-wg-is-under-ddos-attack-hence-down/page__pid__3784240#entry3784240

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    3. Stefan: While Kacsa1 did say that, keep in mind that the mods are just regular players, that police the chat and forums for chump change (200 Euro or something per month), they only have access to some of the moderator forums, but that's it, as far as I know they aren't privy for example to development plans. Or technical status. The "attack" message was related to the fact that certain clan used the opportunity to spam the hell out of several chats and some people did put those two events together.

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  10. Welcome aboard Chris.

    On the Westernisation front, I never even tried to convince my friends to play WoT with the old matchmaker and gold ammo. I knew they wouldn't be interested. With those fixed I've started trying with some success. They play LoL and DotA2 so thats the F2P model they're comparing to.

    Gold consumables are still a sticking point, I'm sure you guys know that already. What might suprise you is that premium tanks cause them to turn their noses up. LoL and DotA have no equivalent of these which really hurts.

    The other thing is skill based matchmaking. I'm not sure what the norm is in Russia but some form of ELO system is quite common these days. The first guy in got started in WoT bought premium within a few weeks. Hes started commenting about horrible players in T8 premium tanks already.

    Since DotA2 and LoL don't have either of those problems it makes WoT a bit less attractive by comparison. Which sucks because I have no interest in playing LoL or DotA. I need to get people on board here.

    -Draco

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  11. Hmm... Westernization. With Chinese tree on EU and NA servers this game is less Western then ever. For many of EU players game was spoiled cause WG wanted to make Chinese happy (but there is almost no Chinese players on EU server so why the hell we must watch those Chinese tanks from late 1950's fighting with Crusaders?, what for historical consultants, when there are such decisions, which spoil all historical accuracy?). And yesterday I read that there are plans to add more "Chinese" tanks - Carro Veloce, Ha-Go and Pz I. It is pathetic IMO. First Italian tank will be probably in "Chinese" tree. As first Japan wasn't enough.

    At the same time we were waiting ages for British tanks and historical battles are still in plans, while they were first time mentioned in beta. 2 years ago!

    I was always rather pro WG and many times defending you on forums. But in last weeks my patience run out. IMO, you are ruining great game you made. At least for me.

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  12. "Panzer Elite"???? Hahaha, this was BS.

    War Thunder will eat WoT, WoWS and WoWP

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    Replies
    1. Tell me when they finally give some tanks you can actually play. Cause planes without guided missiles are not for me (so I want be whining on Chinese planes in WoWP, Overlord ;) )

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    2. IF only Gaijin Entertainment would be successful to launch a MMO of Tanks from the WWII to the Vietnam War , This would be great story , and of course i will run from the greedy WarGaming.NET without hopes to another greedy eastern company that maybe also greedy as WG is , but lets give them a chance , they are Russians maybe a bit different than the Belorussians :)

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    3. Just dont have overexpectations in this regard.

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    4. Dead_Skin_Mask

      Chinese planes? Im already waiting for them.

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  13. Welcome Chris!

    And thanks to Ovi too, a lot of people don't realize how many things you did for EU, but you know what they say, i think people have been even pampered by the fact we had such an amazing person posting almost daily Q/A s. Now we miss you, yes, the community team is trying to do something more, but a daily (hell, even weekely) Q/A is nothing compared to a month long period before getting some answers (Like now, we didn't have any since 20 days or so...

    So yeah, the fact Overlord is letting other people post in HIS blog for the benefit of all of us (Not only european ones ofc) is really something to be grateful of.

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  14. Welcome Chris. I hope you will give us some juicy info

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  15. hey overlord,
    how can it be, that my tank FV215b is set on fire by an arty hit on the gun mantle? The fueltank and engine wasnt even damaged after the fire was extinguish!

    second: The side armor of this tank still feels to be bugged!

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  16. Welcome to the lion's den, be careful...

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    Replies
    1. There are no Lions and no Panthers here . Nor any big cats trolls .

      Just game critics .
      :)

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  17. @Overlord \ @ChrisK ,

    Is this British lovely tank :
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FV101_Scorpion
    Is planned to be an scouter for the British tech tree ?

    And if not , Then which scouter you would give for the Brits' fans ?

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    Replies
    1. Following this path we can get up to Challenger.

      Looking towards http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FV300_Series

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    2. A TV-15000 is more likely than a Scorpion. As it fits in the time line (scrapes in by the skin of its teeth!)

      Have a look here:
      http://www.tankmuseum.org/asset_arena/object/high/TracerPix/Vehicles/Post%20War/British/Scorpion/TV15000/E1987.122_TV15000%20prototype_Chertsey__7187-A1.jpg

      You could also slap a second turret on it with a 30mm Auto-cannon as options (and it'd be balanced by the odd ammo type!). The only high tier auto gun. Fun fun fun!

      Oh I wish they'd ask me about the British light tank tree, I got ideas all over.

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    3. If it is implemented I hope it's kept in scale, unlike other Brit tanks...

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    4. I think that the FV300 series is the best choice here . But what Challenger now ? I do not understand you , this is a modern MBT , wtf ! I hope that the British scouters would be small in size , at least as the German VK28 scouter , and not as the Centurion which is (mistakenly) bigger than the German E50M .

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    5. Here is a detailed picture of FV300 :
      http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/seryj221221/38009428/296939/original.jpg

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    6. Excuse me for the triple post , but i found here some nice British stuff :
      http://henk.fox3000.com/cromwell.htm
      @Overlord , BTW you mean the "A30-Challenger" and not the Cold War MBT .

      Delete
  18. Kv-1s is OP. Why that doesnt lose 122 mm gun?

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  19. I know many tanks in which I have better stats that in the KV-1s. So I see no reason to nerf that tank. Also his server stats do not show that he is overperforming.

    People scream "nerf!" cause are afraid of his big gun. But that gun is also inacurate and very slow.

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  20. hey Overlord

    i got a question regarding the SU-101/Uralmash-1!

    how high is the rate of gold ammo on this tank?


    Because it feels, that it has to be very high, because when u play it without gold ammo it feels like a tier7 td!
    And i bet, that without goldammo for credits it´s winrate would be around 40%!

    So please give it the gun of the T62A and a better gun depression!

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  21. Hiya ChrisK,

    How long until the second German Tank Destroyer Tree?
    Likewise the British Tank Destroyers and SPG's?
    Lastly, will there be a rework and reintroduction of Swamp and Komarin maps?

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  22. Hey Overlord I just spotted this modelling error on the Caernarvon, the storage bin doesn't seem to be connected to the turret!

    http://i280.photobucket.com/albums/kk171/fattoler/shot_028.jpg

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  23. Hi ChirsK or Overlord

    with the 8.3 patch u nerfed ther arty a bit:

    How much has the number of arty per battle changed since then?

    the only thing i realiced is that the arty players in my team are really bad players but the number of artys hasnt changed for my feelings!

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  24. We're told that many of the focus for Windows windows 7 professional product key Phone application improvements is related to hardware release and refreshes. The future GDR3 update will contain help for 5- and 6-inch Windows Phones with 1080p resolutions, and quad-core chipsets. These windows 8 pro retail box devices will debut later this year

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