What is a platoon, and how do I do it?

A platoon is a way of playing World of tanks with one or two friends. You form a platoon by inviting your friends into a platoon that you form, or by accepting their invitation. A platoon consistes of two or three players. Here’s how to:

How to form a platoon

If you want to get full advantage of playing in a platoon, you should be able to talk to each other, either using Skype or Teamspeak or any other voice communication you prefer. This post is going to concentrate on a few basic principles regarding what tanks you should use.

As a general rule, you should always use tanks from the same tier. You can choose to let one player use a tank one tier higher or lower, but it is not recommended. This is because a platoon doesn’t dictate the matchmaking, or what tanks the rest of the team and the enemy team are using. It is perfectly okay if one member of the team is playing a medium, and the other a heavy tank, or a tank destroyer.

But be aware if you want to play light tanks. Some tanks are designated the role of a scout tank, and scout tanks are usually the lowest tier tanks on a team. So if one of the platoon members choose a tier 5 light tank, and the other(s) choose a tier 5 heavy tank, it is possible that the other tanks are tier 8. (This matchmaking is subject to adjustment by Wargaming.) As a thumb rule, a scout tank on a specific tier will meet tanks that are from one to three tiers higher. A tier 6 scout can meet tier 7, 8, 9 or 10. A tier 4 will occasionally meet other tier 4s.

These are the current scout tanks from tier 4 to tier 8. Some of them get “normal” matchmaking from time to time.

Tier 4
Pz. Kpfw. 38nA
Pz. Kpfw. II Luchs
M5A1 Stuart
T-50

Tier 5
VK-16.02 Leopard
ELC AMX
M24 Chaffee

Tier 6
VK-28.01
AMX 12t
59-16
T21
MT-25

Tier 7
Aufklärungspanzer Panther
T71
AMX 13 75
WZ-131
M41 Walker Bulldog
LTTB

Tier 8
AMX 13 90
WZ-132
T49
RU 251
Light T-54 (or Light T-54)

If one of the platton members are playing any of these, it is recommended that the other members in the platoon choose a tank at least one tier higher, or maybe two tiers higher.

Just recently a played in a team where there obviously were some newbies in the same platoon. One platoon member played a T1 (tier 1), while the other played his KV-1 (tier 5). The rest of the teams played tanks from tier 5 and 6. A T1 has nothing to do in such a battle. (It cannot even play the role as a scout, because it is to slow and has a short view range.)

Therefore: You should use tanks from the same tier. I will write about some basic platoon tactics in a later post.

Help! I’m in a match, and don’t know what to do!

From time to time, you enter a match with a really good player, either on your own team or on the enemy team. Because they know what to do with their tank, they do well, even if the drive a “shitty” tank. Learn from them, and do as they do.

Here are a few principles good players follow:

• Know your tank. Be aware of what it is capable of and what it’s weaknesses are. Is your gun depression good? Go to a hilly terrain. Is the gun accurate? Snipe. Good armour? Fight close to the enemy. Good players know these things and use their tank accordingly.
• Know the role of your tank. If you are driving a medium tank, use it’s speed, and play a supporting role. Don’t go head to head with a heavy tank, unless it is a lower tier heavy. (If you drive a tier 7 medium, you can engage tier 5 heavys. But be careful.)
• Be aware of where your allies are, and support them. Basically, a tank left alone on a battlefield with two or three enemies close by, will die.
• Before the battle starts, look at the enemy team. Where will they move? Who will go where? What enemies should you avoid, and what enemies should you engage?
• When the battle starts: Check where your allies go, and decide who to follow and support. If one side of the map is abandoned by your team, try to secure this side defensively. Ask for help if necessary. (Press the F7 key.)
• When you meet an enemy, and shoots at him/her and you cannot penetrate any of your first shots, withdraw. If 3 shots cannot penetrate and damage the enemy, nor will the next 3 shots. Find another target, don’t hope for miracles.

But rule number is always: Use the minimap. Check where your allies are and where the enemy is. Good players ALWAYS do that.

Accelerate crew training

What is the “Accelerate crew training” option? When you have unlocked all modules on a tank, you get the possibility to tick the box called “Accelerate crew training”. The box is located right above your crew:

Accelerate crew training

This means that all the xp you earn on that specific tank is used to increase the skills on your crew. In addition, the crew member with the lowest skill will get trained twice as fast.

If you do not check this box, you increase the xp in the same way you do while unlocking modules and tanks, and the xp is locked to the tank in question. This means that xp you earn on a tank after you have unlocked everything is somewhat “wasted”. To use that xp you have to convert it to free xp, and to do that, you have to pay gold.

Personally I don’t like do that, so what I try to do, is to guess if my next match in a tank will be the last match necessary to unlock everything. If so, I use free xp to unlock everything, and check the “Accelerate crew training” box. By doing that,  I can save gold and use it on something else. (At the moment I have about 170.000 free xp, so I have enough to use on unlocking modules and tanks like I describe here.)

How to scout?

Good scouting can help a team to win. Good scouting is difficult, and most new players don’t know how to do it. Here are a few do’s and don’ts on scouting.

There are two ways of scouting: Active scouting or passive scouting. Active scouting is used when you are in a fast light tank. You have to be in a forward position, and never, ever stop. Keep driving all the time, turning from side to side, avoiding hits. Change direction now and then so no one can guess where you will be next. Do not rush into the enemy base and get killed. Why? You will spot lots of other tanks, but your teammates won’t be able to shoot at them, because your teammates will be so far back that they won’t be able to see the tanks you have spotted. Therefore: Stay a bit in front of your allies, drive from side to side, so that the enemies you spot can be hit by your allies. From time to time you have to go back towards your own base and disappear from your enemies. Then you can move forward again. If you manage to stay alive long enough, and your enemy has lost enough tanks, you can start to spot for arty. When you are active scouting, you can shoot at whatever you see, just to annoy your enemy. But don’t ever stop. Keep driving.

Passive scouting is quite the opposite: Rush to a bush in a strategic place, and stop there. Don’t move your tank unless you are spotted. You will be able to see the enemy, but they won’t be able to see you. Your allies can then shoot at whatever you spot for them. Do NOT shoot at the enemies you are spotting, because this will reveal your position and you will be killed. I have tried this tactic a few times, and my record is more than 10.000 spotting damage. (They shot at what I spotted for them, and inflicted more than 10.000 damage points.) In one early game I drove to the other side of the  map in a tier 4 light tank and hid inside a bush. 6 tier 8 heavys drove close to me, unable to spot me. But since I was so far ahead, my allies couldn’t shoot at them. What did I do? I took a shot at the side of one of the heavys, revealing myself and got killed immediately.

Why should you be scouting? There are two reasons: Some light tanks are automatically designated for scouting, like the french ELC AMX. Sometimes you get an ordinary match making, but you often end up in a tier 8 match. If so, your role is to spot for your allies. The other reason is to get xp. When you spot an enemy and one of your allies inflict damage points upon the enemy, half of the xp your ally earn will be given to you. In the match where I got 10.000 spotting damage, the result was that I was second best on my team at earning xp.

This video shows how to do it:

More about premium tanks

As I recently posted, you should consider using premium tanks both to increase the skills on your crew and to make more in game credits. I found a couple of videoes explaining how to do this. I advice you to watch these three videos to understand how to use premium tanks: