[WoWS] Battleship "D", Preliminary IJN Design.

Hi everyone!

Today is a good day to show you a very interesting IJN design. This design is definately from 1920s times, and it is a direct successor of such ships as Nagato, and, of course, Kaga and Akagi (in their original design).

Here it is:

As you can see, this is a very powerfull ship: it has six twin 410mm guns, what gives us twelve in summary.
While it is fast with the approximate speed of 30 knots, it is comparatively well armored with his 12" belt aswell.

Also, if you look closely to how the gun mounts are situated, you'll see that mounts are divided into three groups of two mounts each, thus making firecontrol easier to operate.

When taking into consideration the actual rate of fire of the Nagato class, which was 1.5 to 2.5 rounds per minute, we will get the 18 to 30 tonns weight of salvo per minute.
Iowa had "only" 22 tonns weight of salvo per minute, for example.

I think this ship will take a respected place in the post-release updates of World of Warships.

KGB out.

[WoWS] Rare USN Designs

Hello, everyone.

While I was away during most of January, and half of this time I've spent in Saint-Petersburg, taking part in conversations, meetings, holywars and so on, I still think I have something to say. This is not about the game itself, just because everything small that I can tell, I'm telling at NA and RU forums - and big news aren't going to happen until OBT starts. But as a man, taking part into the making of ship trees process, I want to share some more info.

Today we gonna look at some rare USN ships, which were actually never-built due to some reasons.

Let us start with this one:

This is a so-called "small" battleship, year 1919 project, or, to be certain, the "Small Battleship - Design F-3" preliminary design proposal, dated April 1919.

Normal displacement - 21.500 tonns.
Speed - 18 knots.
Armor - 12" belt.
Guns - two twin 16".

Of course, Mr. Freedman's book can tell us what is it and why it was proposed with far greater detail.
I'll just tell that in my own words: Chief Constructor of USN in 1919, Rear Admiral David W. Taylor, felt that ships were started to grow into a very large ones, so he tried to let see what can be done with less effort in materials, money and crew.

The results were...not the ones he hoped for. Even the smallest of these small battleships were larger than a dreadnought, while being slower, somewhat with same protection and only with four 16" guns (which was half of the firepower of Colorado class, for example).
The 29 knot version of this "small" battleship had normal displacement of 37.000 tonns, which was a 5.000 tonns larger (!) than a Colorado class battleship. Of course, when actual numbers appeared, all of this "small" battleship designs went right to the far-far shelf.

So, you can understand why this beautiful concept of "more battleships with less money" crashed. All in all, for the country with such an industrial potential, like USA, it wasn't so attractive anyway.
While it was not the first time, when great ideas weren't in touch with a reality, this case is a rather demonstrative one.

Thanks for reading,
KGB out

[WoWS] Early Russian Dreadnoughts preliminary drawings

Hi everyone. I'd like to tell you about early dreadnought drawings in Russian Empire Fleet.

As all of you know, the HMS Dreadnought was laid down in october, 1905. Of course, all great powers of early 20th century kept their eye on everything, related to navy powers, and the first news about an absolutely new type of warship came to Russia in autumn, 1905.

In 1906, the so-called "special meeting" was founded under the leadership of the Minister of Marine Birilev; the main goal of this comission was to define the demands of the characteristics of the future dreadnoughts.

In common, the projected characteristics of the dreadnoughts of 1907 programm are listed below:

Speed: 21-23 knots, 

Armor: 8 inch belt, 10 inch barbettes,

Armament: ten 12 inch guns with barrel length of 50 calibers,

Displacement: 19000 to 21000 tonns.

Thats how these ships might look like:

As you see, the drawings are closer to predreadnoughts than to real dreadnoughts, but still, these ships are rather realistic in terms of "paper drawings". 

It is expected that one of these ships will be the first battleship in Russia/USSR tree.

Thanks for watching,

KGB.

[WoWS] Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!

2012 was a hard year for World of Warships team.
We changed conceptions and expanded maps couple times, we fought and keep fighting for FPS rate, we tuned ship movement like hundred times; in 2012 WoWS got Hit Location system and great ballistics. We even implemented flooding!

In 2012 we held three gameplay Focus Tests, to ensure that we are moving the right way - and every time people told us "That's a great game!". From 4x4 BB only format we came to 8x8 BB/CA, and the FT3 got 12x12 BB/CA/CV.

There are still many things to do: torpedo bombers, complex HL, upgrades and presets for ships, etc.
But I can tell you that we will do everything and even more to make the great game for you!

Happy New Year!
See you in 2013!

KGB

[WoWS] People, Who Are Making the Game for You

Hi guys!

I came up with a great idea to introduce you those who’ve been developing the highly anticipated naval MMO World of Warships.

Let's start!

Anrew Gashkov aka Tarn, Lead Producer for World of Warships

It is he who makes final decisions on gameplay, economics, balancing and other project’s issues. He is also acts a mediator between Minsk and Saint Petersburg offices, promptly acting if something goes wrong.

Ivan Moroz aka Black Warrior, Production Producer for WoWS

An extremely experienced game industry professional, who’s published dozens of titles, including notable Pacific Storm by Lesta Studio.

Malik Khatajaev, General Manager at Lesta Studio (Wargaming’s St.Petersburg studio responsible for WoWS development)

The real stager at game industry, who founded the studio more than 21 years ago. Being a merit professional manager, he is also famous for creating comfortable and cozy atmosphere within World of Warships development team. 
 

Danila Volkov aka Danny, WoWS Project Manager

His will-to-win spirit and eagerness do their best for World of Warships’ future success.

Petr Porai-Koshitс aka PPK, Head of Game Design at Lesta Studio

An unbelievably creative person who leads GD-team with his ideas on how to implement just the best game features. 
 

Slava Makarov, the mighty Vice President of Wargaming. Each upcoming title by Wargaming depends on his approval and – just believe me – World of Warships’ strategic vision is in safe hands. 
 

Slava Goncharov aka Uldor, Historical Consultant of our game

He is the person who seeks the best references, drawings and blueprints for every ship, which will be delivered in the game just for you. 

Well, that's me, Alexey Levakov aka KGB. Being a producer for World of Warships, sometimes I perform as a talking head… As you can see, I’m incredibly fond of DSLRs (and mirrorless cameras), though I’m far from calling myself a professional photographer.

Vladimir Gremitskiy. Guess, who's the Head of Art Department? Yes, exactly the person, who’s looking at you with sharp eyes from the picture. His religious exactitude and thorough attention to details let us be sure that World of Warships is going to have the highest quality ship models ever made. 
 

Polina Malisheva is a Creative Director at Lesta Studio. Her experience and inapproachable artistic taste are the traits that will reliably assure World of Warships a perfect look. 
 

These are the people patiently developing World of Warships. In the near future you will get a chance to evaluate the result of their joint efforts and talents, playing our ass-kicking game! 

:)

Thanks for reading, folks.

KGB

[WoWS] Previously Unknown Designs

Hi everyone,

I told you that my second post would be about ship blueprints and design, so here it is:

As some of you may know, the Yzuru Hiraga is the famous Japanese naval architect of the beginning of the 20th century. Such ships as Yubari, Yamashiro, Nagato are a part of his work.
Moreover, in 1916 he became a chief engineering director of the Eight-eight fleet program, according to which by the 1927 Imperial Japanese Navy must have had 8 top class fast battleships and 8 top class battlecruisers.

I will come back to this program in future posts, but now I want you guys to know, what could be one of the starting point of completely different IJN:

Here you can see one of the preliminary dreadnought designs, based on the famous Mikasa.
This blueprint was found in the Hiraga's archive, and is dated as 1903/1904 design - the time of ironclads sunset, the time where Russian Imperial Fleet was still alive, the time before Russo-Japanese War.

The ship is approximately 18000 tons displacement, has four main caliber turrets with dual 305mm 45 caliber guns, and can probably go as fast as 18-19 knots; it is very similar to South Carolina/Michigan, isn't it?

We all know, that the first dreadnoughts built for IJN were Settsu and Kawachi, but this particular design shows us, that history could have gone another way, and who knows, how could it change the future?..

KGB.

[WoWS] Answering Questions

So, let us start with the answers on previous World of Warships related post.

First of all, I'd like to say that many questions are already answered in corresponding topics on NA forums:

http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/36-developer-qa-1/
http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/322-developer-qa-2/

I'll try to answer all questions, that I consider worth answering.

1. What ships classes will there be in:
Battleships/Battlecruisers, Aircraft Carriers, Cruisers Light/Cruisers Heavy and Destroyers.

2. Maneuvering will be very important, because active maneuvering will help you to dodge incoming shells, like in real life. Of course I mean shells, that were fired from long distances - 20km and more.

3. We will start with WoT-like "capture the base" mode, with one or two bases. There of course will be more game modes at start, but I can't say anything about them yet.

4. Alpha testing of World of Warships will not begin this year. Expect Spring or even Summer 2013.

5. We will use our own matchmaker system, with some limits in quantity of some ship classes per battle.

6. For customization of ship's armament: we will use a preset system, which can be described as a whole bunch of weapons, FCS, etc, that can be researched and installed at once.
There of course will be some player-manually-selectable parts of ship configuration, but the main ship's fighting capabilities will depend on what preset is bought and installed.

7. There won't be upgradeable main caliber guns for Yamato and possibly for Montana and Iowa class BBs.
The reason is that these guns are good and more than enough to sink anything.

8. Players will be able to research and upgrade planes on their CVs; the mechanism will be similiar to research and upgrades of guns/turrets for tanks in WoT.

9. There will most possibly be a limit to at least one type of each plane type squadron on a CV, so that players cannot use fighters only or bombers only CVs.

10. No preliminary tech trees now, sorry. All I can tell, that I'm the person who is actually making the trees with the help of historical consultants, of course :)

11. CAs/CLs/DDs will be able to use torpedoes, of course. The question whether BBs and BCs will be able to use torpedoes is still open among our dev team.

12. Bismarck/Tirpiz class post-Washington BBs will of course be a part of HSF/KM  BB tree.

13. About naval strategies, blueprints and so on - I'll make posts on this topics, of course.

14. No, our gameplay mechanics won't mimic Battlestations game series.

15. We are trying to make a balanced ship trees and a balanced differences between different classes.

16. Our first nations will be the USA and Japan, as nations with biggest navies in WWII.

That is all for today.
Feel free to ask more questions, though my next post will be about ship blueprints.

KGB.

[WoWS] Extra Talking Head

I'm glad to present you the following:

Hello, boys and girls!

Let me introduce myself: my name is Alex Levakov, and I'm  producer of World of Warships, you may know me as KGB on NA and RU forums.

I've kindly asked Overlord to let me post in his blog, and he agreed, so you can start waiting to get some news about World of Warships from the first hands!

Now, what exactly do you expect to hear from me? What topics should I cover first? 

I'll post things about ship designs mostly, though some useable information about what is going on in the development of World of Warships in common. Post your ideas in comments to this post.

KGB

Hope you, guys will enjoy it. Mind who is the author of each new post from now on. :)