After havin played casually for about 10k battles, with an abysmal win rate (I forgot what exactly, but around 47-48% I believe, and a shitty wn8), I've decided to look into game mechanics and play the game better and literally just use my brain a little more and look at the minimap every 5 seconds (even when Im in intense close-range brawls).
To be a better player, I first started to play with light tanks and understood camo mechanics (for those that don't know camo mechanics: if u have 40% camo on light, that means if enemy has 450m view range, they won't spot u till 270m away (450 – 450×0.4)), looked up weak spots on tanks, understood common positions for different tanks on all maps, looked into penetration values, using the right equipment to maximize a very specific stat on a tank (so it out-performs others in that specific category of stats), deceiving the enemy, knowing that 6th sense comes on 3 seconds after getting spotted and goes away 10 seconds after getting spotted, etc, etc.
Not long ago, I 3 marked a tier 7 tech tree light (AMX 13 75) within 90 battles I think. By focusing a bit more, using ur brain, and being self aware, the game is actually SO MUCH MORE FUN, and u don't rage as much (most people rage cause they're actually shit and expect more out of their team, I was like that before). So yeah, over a couple thousand more games, I raised my win rate by around 4% and still going up, wn8 also went up drastically (from daaaaark red to yellow at least on normal xvm, green on some other modpacks).
Comparing my older tier 10 tanks (which have something around 44-47% win rates), in my newer tier 10's (TVP T50/51, BC 25t), XVM says that I do better in them than 95-98% of the players that also play the tank, and have around/more than 60% win rate. So another advice is, don't hardcore play tiers IX/X when ur new or don't understand game mechanics just yet, grind lower tiers of almost all tech trees, this will give u more options/crew later on in the game, and u can go for whichever tech tree fits ur style (take ur time, figure out the game, have fun at lower tiers first).
Having said this, like how I found my very first play style in lights and auto-loaders, you will eventually find ur unique style, get good in them, then branch out into other play styles later on, as our beloved streamer skill4ltu always says: "you hef all de time in de world of tankes" (also, watch streamers/utubers, u'll learn so much, I recommend, skill4ltu, dezgames, iyouxin, dakillzor, qb, ragingraptor, etc, etc, just off the top of my head).
Also, guide for better players out there, if you're using XVM, don't underestimate ur opponents if ur a good player just cause they have shittier stats, I've had soooo many "above average+" players with the "x" symbol beside their usernames (meaning they also have XVM) just try to rush me or kill me quickly BUT get outplayed by me, I love those moments when I kill someone who doesn't use xvm correctly (for me I use it for better garage interface and also not raging at newer players with sub 7k games when they mess up, cause I know I was just as shit back then).
My username is Immy0118Tayy on NA, here's my wotlabs stats if ur interested in my progress overtime: .
