I would go further - there can be a very wide variety of both smartphone performance and desktop PC performance. Some top-of-the-range smartphones may be able to do quite well. Older PCs can sometimes struggle. Can I ask that the graphics quality be something which can be set in the tanki settings page? I know there are a few options now, but I'm sure more can be added. I would hate for the new graphics to prevent a large number of tanki users being able to play because their PCs aren't fast enough, even though the level of graphics on the smartphone would have worked.

Would that not be a form of multing? The rules seem a bit vague on this.

I'm surprised to read here about the stuff about some sort of tracking of karma. I'm a Brigadier and I didn't know anything about that. I can't see it in the FAQ, so how would people be expected to know? (This is a genuine question, which you can potentially interpret as a suggestion for adding it to the FAQ if it really isn't there!) As for whether forums are safe or not, sometimes I've seen people making silly mistakes, just having a joke (even if not a very good one!) and perhaps being a bit foolish, but not maliciously so. But it seems the moderators seem very quick to resort to banning, rather than keeping that as a last resort. Maybe there are things that have happened which mean I'm only seeing a very partial view; but it does appear that has happened quite a few times. Perhaps someone can explain what actually happens, so everyone understands? In other website forums, usually there is a greater use of initial warnings (and the offending post is still edited away of course). Can this approach be used more actively by the mod team? I think some people, especially the newer ones, might actually realise their mistake and apologise - at the moment they wouldn't be able to do that because they're banned! Might this approach spread more peace, harmony and love? :D

It doesn't seem a bad change to me - new people can join the opposing team with a new spread of weapons for which you have a useless paint. But I think being able to change all of them is a bit too easy. I think it would be better to be only be able to change one property in the 15 minutes. So you can change a turrent or a hull or a paint, but not all three, or even two. That would make people have to think more carefully. I don't see any problem with people being able to buy supplies - they could have bought the supplies before the battle anyway. One thing I do fear is that while people are at the garage, they aren't playing. That means the teams are uneven, and no-one can join to replace them. For battles with small teams, that could be a disaster. I hope there will be some strong limitation on time (even the pause timeout of 5 minutes is way too long if you ask me - some battles are only 15 minutes in the first place), and you'll still be able to vote them off.

Another tank game BZflag has a Guided Missile with a simple control - you point at the player you want to target, right click (or press 'i') and fire. But there are limitations to stop it being too powerful: it usually has a more limited range than standard shots (bzflag doesn't have the choice of turrets in the way tanki does) reload time can be longer it takes time to travel and the GM has a limited curve, which means targeted players just need to make sure they are travelling sideways relative to the GM, and the GM will miss. Targeted players are warned when they are targeted (including who by). It does not know how to dodge buildings or anything like that, just flies in a curve and will blow up at the first thing it touches (which can be teammates or different enemy players maybe). They have a distance to arm, which means if a target is too close, the GM cannot hit them. They can be defeated by a tank with another ability "Stealth", which means GM cannot lock onto them. Since certain maps lend themselves to camping from a virtually unassailable position, server owners often put a "shot limit" on GM too, so your GM flag (flags being what give you these special abilities) drops, so you'd have to search around to find a GM flag again. A lot of this could be translated into Tanki I'm sure.

If you're in a DM, you'll still get credit based on damage. If it's a CTF, then you're meant to be working as a team, in which case it can be helpful for the team to work together. It's not stealing kills so much as preventing your team mate from dying. Remember that no-one on your team can see the health of your opponent, so they can't know whether you or your opponent is going to win. It's better for the team if the opponent dies. Sometimes I "steal" kills (not intentionally), sometimes I have kills stolen, it's just part of the game.

There's a bit of a question of what's best when the teams are very lob-sided. If it's 8 against 2, it's hardly in the spirit of fair gameplay to be capturing lots of flags. It also means that it will be less likely that anyone new will join the enemy team once the flag scores are massively different. Of course if the teams are roughly balanced then yes it's sabotage. Particularly if it's the same mammy parked over your own flag. And because some people do hand the flag over, then they can't be downvoted to get rid of them because their score is too high :( Another related issue is friendly fire battles. I don't play them at all now because it only takes one person to park themselves on the flag and kill you (usually you're weakened after getting the flag) so they can cap the flag. It makes friendly fire with CTF almost pointless. A nice improvement might be for players to be immune to friendly fire if they're holding a flag.

this is so cooooool!!! thanks for madness being brought back!

I don't see why the maps need to be deleted. I think it's great to have choice, and occasionally have to learn an unfamiliar environment. Wouldn't it also be better to wait a bit longer to see how things settle now that low ranks can access all maps? But if I had to save 2 it would definitely have to be Canyon and Scope. I like them and have played them many times - don't know why they're in the bottom 10 when there are other maps I *never* see that aren't on that list.

Can I ask why it closed early?

Nooo! I finally finished it, but I don't get the form everyone else saw! I just get: " Newspaper's QuestLe formulaire "Newspaper's Quest" n'accepte plus de réponses. Essayez de contacter le propriétaire du formulaire si vous pensez qu'il s'agit d'une erreur." Is it broken? Or does this mean the contest is over? I thought it was meant to finish on the 6th? After all my searching and work... :(

I'm stumped by this. I can't get the password for the dl-protect thing. I've tried names (real and tanki account) for the first contributors (Our stories in issue 1), and Bruce Lunga and almighty01 as that's who kicked off the newspaper according to history articles. I've found something from Cablaz saying he dreamed about tanki too, but that isn't it. I've searched the forum, the helpful newspaper summary. There are a few mentions of dreams, like dream teams and a story "The Dreamer". Sandbox is mentioned - that map was created by "Clan S.N.K.", but that, and a zillion variations of that, don't work either. And I found the fiction story in issue 1 about Prehistoric tanki, edited this month by Raphael2, although I now see in the comments that that's irrelevant. There's clearly alliteration with 'l' (last long lines etc.). And birds singing? Is this meant to be a play on words because it's like birds singeing, i.e. birds on fire, i.e. firebird? I've tried all sorts of things that I think could sensibly fit, but none of them do. Help? Just a little nudge in the right direction please?

Thanks AMDTU, but you can try the link in the Day 7 solution yourself and see that there's only a 0 byte file there. But even if there's some way to get that picture, how is the answer "wasp"? The most I can think of is wood and stool to give the W and S.

Is there going to be an official set of answers posted for The Game? Semyon said here that they would be. I'm particularly wondering about Day 7. The zip file linked to under Semyon's video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNcbDnjigBQ had a zero byte file inside so I don't know how we were meant to make progress on that one. I know that people guessed that "wasp" was what you had to submit, but why?

Yes, and I'm amazed no-one has made more of an issue about this. The zip file at http://www.mediafire.com/download/wyd0lo9bds3yasq/7_word.zip is empty - the contents are a zero byte file. FBI, try it and see. So really the English community never ever had a hope.

I think planetawesom has summed up exactly my sentiment on The Game. I should still say that I did enjoy the challenges of all the days. I thought it was an excellent idea, and fun, and of course free, so I shouldn't be complaining. I do thank all at Tanki who worked hard on this. But part of my motivation was of course at least thinking I might be able to win, and I had been looking forward to attempting to do this on the last day, so I can't help but feel a bit disappointed with the way things ended. I can't help it, it's just the way it is. I'm also concerned to see @OnIyGodCanJudgeMe saying that they know members of the RU community did have special inside knowledge. If that's true, then it may mean that Tanki can't be trusted with keeping competitions fair. I hope it's not true. J

Before the new physics, tanks would regularly push each other. Since the new physics, this can go very wrong many times. Now, tanks seem to be able to push under other tanks a lot. Last night I had a wasp push under my titan, which left me unable to control (or hit anyone). This is wrong! A wasp should never be able to push around a titan. I should have been pushing him back. I'm wondering if it is more associated with network latency - have tanki developers not tested the new physics much with slightly higher network delays - I'm not in Russia after all, but they are and will have great network latency.

I've had flags drop for no reason a few times too. I'm using firefox, not opera. I think it does seem associated with lag, but even with lag, dropping a flag is wrong!

My team certainly suffered last night on Silence when the opposing team had three drugging isidas. They're just unkillable. If you kill one, you won't be able to kill the rest before the first has respawned and is back to heal the others. Two isidas can be killed with thunder at least (assuming you've got someone with thunder around). Three makes it harder. I think the best way to nerf it would be if double power did not change its self-healing. Double-power for killing yes, for healing others yes, for self-healing no.

I spent many hours this week, trying to get them all, preferably independently rather than with the forum posts. I thought the first was EXIT, and fifth IDDQD even when few others seemed to. The only one I wouldn't have got right first time was 6 (I thought it was christmas or christmas tree) and maybe 7, who knows. I set my alarm to wake up early in time for when the video was posted. I wasn't expecting to find that everything had been answered before the video was open. I am very disappointed :( . I think in future, some changes are needed: No entering the competition answers before the final video. Announcing a precise time when the final video is posted (and competition can be completed) Entirely separate answers and prizes for each community (english/russian/etc.) Not having unlimited attempts to get it right by trial and error. Particularly the last question! So the answer to the last should be something a little obscure (unless you've solved it the correct way). And maybe a limit of 5 attempts. And on a separate note, don't rely on youtube videos which are not controlled by tanki and so could be removed, or "not available in your country" - day 3 had me confused for quite a while for that reason. While the 100 supplies are something I can't complain about, I am still disappointed that I never even had a chance of winning.

The picture in Semyon's video is specifically from this youtube video announcing christmas to christmas event: It is exactly 5.08 seconds in, at frame 127. At that point he's saying the word "coming". So perhaps that is the answer?

Highland 1 and 2 may not be very different, but the gameplay of Silence 1 and 2 is totally different. Please don't merge them together. The walls around the blue base and single width access ramp make things very different. As for reverse CTF, that sounds good, although it's not new! If they don't already know about it, Tanki developers should have a look at another tank game Bzflag where there are many maps, different weapons, and different game modes. Like "Hunt the white rabbit" where you have to kill a particular tank, and whoever kills that tank then becomes the next rabbit, and so on. Or games like CTF where you don't have to cap the flag, but just hold on to it for a certain amount of time. Lots of good inspiration there. It's still a great game, although the graphics and physics aren't as good as Tanki.

Destroying tanks has never been so much fun!

I don't like the new kits, but ironically I've bought one. Mostly because I know that there's bound to be a lot of people at my rank who do buy, and I won't be able to keep up unless I do as well <_< I'd have preferred that the kits were unlocked at the appropriate ranks; or perhaps you could buy the kit and anything beyond your rank is greyed out until you get promoted.

You can because Rafael2 posted this earlier entry for the Best Of Guides contest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p21Ho6JZvo It's the same YouTube user, and the player on the screen there is clearly Rafael2. The voice is clearly not the girl in the Miss TO video. Any explanation as to how to rationalise these facts would be very far-fetched.