Update 2.0.6

Pilots!

Meet Update 2.0.6 for World of Warplanes.

A new aircraft line appears in the World of Warplanes tech tree – USSR bombers, including the famous “Peshka” Petlyakov Pe-2. These high-speed machines with a powerful bomb load are very mobile and effective over a wide range of altitudes, destroying ground targets from an unachievable height or launching rapid offensives in a strafing dive. Powerful engines and good defensive weapons allow it to effectively resist fighters, and the Pe-2’s good maneuverability and forward-firing weapon makes attacking enemy aircraft a possibility.

By tradition, a new global event “Summer Storm” will be introduced together with the update. Players will have to work together to reach a common goal, the successful achievement of which will grant them double the number of Special Supplies. Inside them you can find Operation Orders for obtaining new bombers and dozens of other valuable prizes.

Moreover, Update 2.0.6 includes a lot of balance adjustments, expanded equipment enhancement options, reworked bot behavior and interface, and bugs fixes.

 USSR bombers line

Tier III and VI USSR bombers are represented by high-speed aircraft with a 100 or 250 kg bomb load. Tier III and IV planes Arkhangelsky/Tupolev SB and Arkhangelsky Ar-2 are highly effective in high-altitude precision bombing. Their outboard weapon is represented by six-eight 100 kg bombs, which are powerful enough to destroy large ground targets from a single approach. Bombs are dropped one by one and quickly replenished. Instead of a forward-firing weapon, these planes are equipped with powerful nose turrets, but rear turrets have complex blind spots and cannot fire back exactly.

Tier V and VI is occupied by the Pe-2 and its improved version, the Pe-2 M-82. These two bombers have excellent speed and maneuverability. A forward-firing machine gun and even a forward-firing autocannon in the top modification of the Pe-2 M-82 allows you to launch an offensive against other aircraft. The outboard weapon is represented by four 250 kg bombs, which can be dropped either from a horizontal position or in a dive. The high speed and wide range of optimal heights make it possible to use these bombers effectively in a high-speed offensive at low altitudes.

• Arkhangelsky/Tupolev SB – Tier III USSR bomber;
• Arkhangelsk Ar-2 – Tier IV USSR bomber;
• Petlyakov Pe-2 – Tier V USSR bomber;
• Petlyakov Pe-2 M-82 – Tier VI USSR bomber.

New promotional planes added

Hawker Hurricane Mk Ia – UK, Tier IV fighter

Special hangar design based on the movie “Hurricane (Squadron 303)” added.

“Summer Storm” Event

A new global event “Summer Storm” will run from August 22 to September 16. The event will be divided into 4 stages, during which the players will have to fight in battles in the Conquest, Invasion or Attrition game modes. Each of the stages will be divided into 2 identical phases, the first of which lasts from 19.00 ET / 16.00 PT till 24.00 ET / 21.00 PT Friday, and the second one – from 19.00 ET / 16.00 PT Saturday till 24.00 ET / 21.00 PT Sunday.

Players will receive Special Supplies for active participation in battles. Inside these Special Supplies a variety of valuable awards can be found, including Premium Days, gold, consumables, equipment, materials for enhancement and calibration, and hangar slots. The most valuable and rare prizes among the others are the new USSR bombers and the Operation Orders for obtaining them and some other Premium planes. Players can accomplish the missions from the Operation Order to get these planes in their hangars for free without research.

Moreover, each stage and every phase will have a Global Goal, which can be achieved by players’ joint efforts. For example, the Global Goal of the first stage will be earning Capture Points for capturing Command Centers and Garrisons. When the Global Goal is reached during the phase, the players will receive twice the number of Special Supplies. The players will have one additional week after the end of the event to open their crates and accomplish the Operation Orders.

Aircraft balance changes

System adjustments

Turrets

• Vertical shooting angles for bomber, attack aircraft, and heavy fighter turrets were limited to 50 degrees. Aircraft of these types are now more vulnerable to attacks from above and below.
• Vertical shooting angles for fighter and multirole fighter turrets were increased to 70 degrees to improve the efficiency of firing in a turn.
• The speed of capturing a target and opening fire with turrets in automatic mode was increased. This improves the efficiency of forward-firing turrets and turrets with a narrow firing sector.

Damage model

• The chance of damaging an aircraft with an explosion from bombs dropped at a low altitude was increased. Especially for large-caliber bombs.
• The attack aircraft’s resistance to bomb and missile explosion damage was increased, as this type of aircraft is in the immediate proximity of the targets being bombed. It became more difficult to destroy the attack aircraft with a bomb explosion.

Bombers’ altitude

• The speed of all classic bombers was reduced for heights below their optimal altitude. This makes their interception at low altitudes easier.
• Bombers with the ability to launch offensives, the A-26B and Pe-2 in particular, will still be able to fly at low altitude, maintaining high speed (for their type) and maneuverability characteristics. In this case, the altitude of such bombers is now less than that of classic models.

Particular aircraft model changes

USSR

• Il-2 (mod.) – increased the distance of turret shooting.
• Il-2 (t) – increased the distance of basic turret shooting.
• RB-17 – increased the altitude and accuracy of bombing, increased the time of bomb replenishment, reduced the speed at low altitude.

Germany

• Do 17 Z - increased altitude, slightly reduced the angles of bottom turret shooting, reduced the speed of flight at low altitude.
• Ju 87 G - increased the damage and shooting distance of the ultimate turret, the distance of base turret shooting was increased.
• Ju 88 A - increased altitude, slightly reduced the angles of bottom turret shooting, reduced horizontal angles of top turret shooting, increased the damage of ultimate bottom turret, increased boost duration, reduced the speed of flight at low altitude.
• Ju 88 P - increased the horizontal angles and the distance of ultimate turret shooting, increased speed, more speed kept in turns, improved altitude and boost duration, the responsiveness of control was slightly reduced.
• Do 217 M - increased altitude, slightly reduced the angles of bottom turret shooting, increased the damage of the ultimate front turret, reduced the speed at low altitude.
• Me 265 – the turrets shooting distance is increased.

USA

• A-26B - reduced the speed at low altitude.

UK

• Blenheim IV (e.) - added small blind zones in the tail and nose of the aircraft, preventing the turret from shooting through the hull, reduced the speed at low altitude.
• Blenheim IV (e.) - added small blind zones in the tail and nose of the aircraft, preventing the turret from shooting through the hull.

Reassembling equipment

The possibilities for enhancing equipment and its settings have been expanded: an option for reassembling has been added. It allows you to replace the bonus characteristics of Improved, Advanced, and Ultimate equipment with new ones. Depending on the level of quality, when reassembling, you can replace from one to three bonus characteristics. New characteristics are chosen randomly from the full list of characteristics available at a given level of quality. It is impossible to reassemble and end up with an identical combination of bonus characteristics. It is possible to lock up to two bonus properties, when reassembling, replacing only what the player considers unsuitable. Locking properties costs 2 Tokens and a certain amount of credits, which depends on the Period of Equipment.

"Supply Service"

The “Tokens” hangar panel has changed and expanded. Now it will contain all the additional values that are available on the player's account. In the "Supply Service" menu, you can perform the operations with Tokens, view and manage Operation Orders for obtaining airplanes, and open earned Special Supplies and purchase additional ones. Additionally, in the Special Supplies section, you will be able to see the probability of finding each of the prize groups in them.

In the future, the "Supply Service" functionality will be expanded.

Bots

The behavior settings for bots have been changed:

• The ability to make maneuvers to evade high-altitude AA guns has been added.
• The logic of searching for targets for an attack has been changed. Now bots look for targets only within their strategic goal (an attacked or defended territory, which is a priority for each type of aircraft). When playing for the defenders side, the radius of the search area is slightly larger to ensure their interception on the approach to the territory.
• The efficiency of using outboard weapons on all types of fighters for destroying ground targets was increased.
• The behavior of bots on fighters in the absence of air targets has changed, they will now attack ground targets with forward-firing weapons.
• Air-to-ground missiles are no longer used by bots against aerial targets.
• Air-to-air missiles are now used by bots only against aerial targets.
• Bots now more effectively use boost and brake. They always use boost to break away from a chase, and slow down to low speeds, which makes an attack on a low-speed aircraft easier.
• Bots tend to leave the shelling of the gunners if the strength of their aircraft approaches zero.
• Bots on airplanes with gunners start to cause the same damage as players in the manual turret control mode after 4 seconds of continuous turret fire on one target.
• Now attack aircraft and bomber bots will attack an aerial target in front of them if they have forward-firing weapons and sufficient speed reserve for maneuvering.
• Fixed a bug related to the effect of a territory’s capture progress on a bot’s prioritization. Now the closer the territory to changing its state is, the higher its importance for the bot is.

Interface

• In the “Service” hangar panel, the display of the keys that activate the equipment installed on the aircraft was added, if it is activated manually.
• In the “Service” hangar panel, in the equipment installation and replacement menu, information has been added about which planes have suitable equipment that can be installed.
• In the "Service" panel, the ability to view all possible bonus properties and the best calibration values for the main properties was added to a pop-up window with equipment characteristics. This information can be seen by pressing the left Alt key.
• An indication that equipment can be enhanced with the accumulation of a sufficient number of materials was added.
• The display of the "Specialist" configuration on the post-battle results screen was added.
• The pop-up window with the amount of experience gained and bonuses applied was returned to the post-battle results screen.
• Icons with question marks on the post-battle results screen were added, indicating that when you hover over an item, you can see a pop-up window with a description and explanation for it.
• The display of awards and achievements earned by other players in battle was added.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the display of the "Optimal distance of missile flight" parameter in the aircraft characteristics panel in the hangar. Now it correctly displays the optimal launching distance for direct missiles.
• Fixed the display of the number of barrels, bombs, and missiles in the aircraft characteristics panel in the hangar.
• Fixed an issue where 6 Daily Missions could be active on one account, only 3 of which were visible in the hangar. If one of the visible missions is accomplished, it will be replaced by one of those that were not displayed in the hangar, until 3 of the 6 active missions are fully accomplished.
• Fixed an issue where there were no sounds of hitting the aerial target when firing from rifle caliber machine guns.
• Fixed an issue where the progress of Daily Missions could be displayed incorrectly.
• Fixed an issue where outboard weapons on planes were not displayed in the hangar.
• Fixed an issue where a zero value was displayed after the sale of an aircraft with any amount of accumulated experience in the tech tree.
• Fixed an issue where the sounds of bullets passing the aircraft continued to play when turned off in the volume settings.
• Fixed an issue where a pop-up window with the description of Advanced and Ultimate equipment stored in the depot displayed the inscription "Bonus properties do not work".
• Fixed an issue where the cost of changing equipment was incorrectly counted when it was repeatedly reequipped.
• Fixed an issue where the player was charged with the cost of demounting when equipment was moved between two cells of the same type on the same aircraft.
• Fixed the sound of the Vulcan F-94D cannon.
• Fixed an issue where concealment bonus did not display in the "Paint Shop" panel next to the paint schemes types.
• Fixed an issue where modules and/or equipment were not displayed in the depot after purchase.
• Fixed an issue where the information about completed Daily Missions on the post-battle results screen could be displayed incorrectly. 
• Fixed an issue where the information about repairs cost on the post-battle results screen could be displayed incorrectly.
• Fixed an issue where earned achievements were not displayed.