Crew (WoWP)

Crew are an essential part to World of Warplanes: You can not fly a plane without crew. And seeing that automated planes have not yet been added, and most likely won't be, crew are needed for all planes. This page is dedicated to getting you familiar with your crew.

Crew Types

There are two crew that you will encounter in the game: The pilot and the rear gunner. Each type has its own set of skills that it can master, though it takes much time to master one skill, let alone two.

Pilot

The pilot is the most important of the crew. Your plane would be a pile of metal scrap if there were no pilot. Pilots drive the plane, shoot the guns, and do everything else related to the main functions of the plane. You will be seeing a pilot from your first plane onwards.

Rear Gunner

The rear gunner is the second crew type you will hear about. It will appear in planes with turrets. They are responsible for getting whoever is on your tail... off your tail. They will shoot at enemies that come within their range. However, they have a shallow range, much less than of your plane as a whole, and they have less accuracy, so do not rely too much upon your rear gunner. But in some certain situations, they can save your life. Note that planes on your tail, while getting shot at by the rear gunner, will often injure the rear gunner too by firing.

• 

  The pilot's seat is the one in the top left corner. The one in the center is where the rear gunner sits, facing backwards, of course.

• 

  Here you see the rear gunner in action. It may be hard to see, but yes, he is shooting.

Skills

There are multiple skills that a pilot and rear gunner can learn. There are some skills that both can master, and in fact must before learning another, and some skills unique to the pilot or the rear gunner.

You can choose a skill to start levelling, as well as find out how much experience will it take, by clicking a crew member and selecting his Personal File.

Proficiency

The first skill every member of the crew learns is a main proficiency – pilot or rear gunner. Basic crew members have a 50% proficiency which grows with every bit of experience you get in battles. You can also train them in a Training Wing to gain 90% proficiency for 100,000 credits, or for 400 gold you might send them to a Combat Wing and train proficiency to 100%. For new payers, when retraining the original 100% crews, it's recommended to retrain for free. When you have more credits, 90% is recommended.

Proficiency is the most important characteristic for the crew. At 50%:

• A pilot guides the aircraft poorly. This means that the aircraft achieves its maximum rotation speed on all its axes (yaw, pitch and roll) 20% slower and its engine achieves maximum power in both normal and boosting modes 20% slower.
• A pilot Shoots and aims bombs poorly. With 50% pilot proficiency all the guns mounted on the aircraft have a 10% larger aiming spread than is optimal, while bombs and rockets have a 20% accuracy penalty.
• A rear gunner with 50% proficiency takes a 30% longer pause between salvos, so, in effect, he protects your aircraft almost a third less effectively.

While a crew member achieves proficiency, the penalties to his skills are reduced linearly, so for example at 75% they will be reduced by a half.

After gaining 100% proficiency, the crew gains access to additional skills that affect various aspects of their effectiveness. As with proficiency, they start working right from the start when you choose them with effectiveness corresponding to the percentage you've gained. You can use free xp to convert to crew xp at a rate of 1 to 5 Crew experience. This is generally not recommended unless you have a lot of free xp or are very close to the next skill.

Since the 100,000 credits needed for retraining to 90% proficiency are not incredibly much players are advised to do so if they can afford it. The remaining 10,000 experience needed to gain full proficiency can be gained in few battles.

Pilot Skills

Here are skills that only a pilot may learn. These can only be learned after the crew becomes 100% skilled at one other skill.

Universal Skills

• Fire Resistance - decreases damage taken from fires and shortens the maximum fire duration by 20%. This is a good skill for planes like the zeroes that are set on fire easily.
• Eagle-Eyed - Increases range at which enemy aircraft are detected by 10%. This effect is cumulative with the effect of the gunner's skill "Vigilance". It is useful for planes like attack aircraft or bombers that may want to avoid direct confrontation
• Battle Tested – Reduces chance of injury to the pilot by 20%. Improves aircraft controllability by 25% when aircraft wings, tail and fuselage are critically damaged. Remember that an injured pilot cannot shoot accurately, while critically damaged wings and tails drastically decrease the aircraft’s turning rates over the roll and yaw axes. Good for lights that are basically dead when they get crit.
• Engine Guru I – Increases engine thrust by 3%. Significantly improves aircraft acceleration. This affects both acceleration rate and boost effectiveness. You should use these to improve the speed of already fast aircaft.
• Engine Guru II – Increases engine thrust and top speed by 2%. The effect is cumulative with the effect of the skill “Engine Guru I”.
• Marksman I – Reduces dispersion of forward-firing weapons by 5%. Significantly increases chance of hitting a target. This skill is most effective for aircraft that are armed with particularly inaccurate weapons like machine guns and close-medium range cannons. For “sharpshooter” aircraft like the I-215, the skill is mostly only beneficial when firing at extreme ranges. However, it's also a nice edge to have the extra accuracy in a tight turnfight to get rid of enemies before they outturn you.
• Marksman II – Reduces dispersion of forward-firing weapons by 5% and increases accuracy of firing at actively maneuvering targets by 10%. The effect is cumulative with the effect of the skill “Marksman I”
• Demolition Expert – Increases damage caused by bombs and rockets and their blast radius by 10%. This is a great skill for attack aircraft, heavy, and multirole fighters, as well as bombers who may need to utilize their ordinance.
• Aerobatics Expert – Increases maneuverability in all axes by 2%. Provides a significant advantage in close maneuvering combat. It has a rather low effect for low-maneuverability planes, however, it is useful for light planes as it comes without damage to their already low survivability.
• Aerodynamics Expert – Increases the positive effect of the mounted equipment on aircraft maneuverability and speed by 40%. This gives a major improvement to all your speed and turn related stuff, so it's pretty useful.
• Protection Expert – Increases the positive effect of the mounted equipment on aircraft durability and resistance to critical damage by 40%. Very useful for bombers and attack aircraft that need as much health as they can get.
• Expert Rocketeer – Significantly increases chance of directly hitting an aircraft with rockets. With this skill it will not be necessary to hit the aircraft dead on, the rocket will explode and deal damage even when passing the target at close range.

Special Pilot Skills

• Fire Fighter – Extinguishes fire by active maneuvering. Gain and maintain a high angular velocity in any axis to extinguish a fire.

-Allows aircraft to quickly extinguish fires via active maneuvering. To activate the skill certain conditions must be met: The aircraft must be on fire and turning with high angular velocity over the roll axis and slightly over the pitch axis. A typical example is an aileron roll. After the skill is activated the fire will be extinguishes in 2-2.5 seconds. Keep in mind the aircraft must first reach the necessary roll speed which does not happen instantaneously, which is why this skill is most effective for the maneuverable fighters rather than heavies, bombers or attack aircraft.

• Cruise Flight – Increases the view range by 20% and engine thrust and top speed by 3% when the aircraft does not receive damage for 20 seconds. The effect is lost once the aircraft hits an enemy target or receives damage.

- This skill is automatically activated at the start of a battle and is disabled temporarily if you take or deal damage to enemies, including ground targets and the use of rear guners. The effects of the skill are stacked with similar effects from other skills and equipment.

This skill will be useful for attack aircraft who are able to reach enemy ground targets faster, detect them and choose the approach direction from further away, as well as retreat to a safe place and hide from the enemy fighters later in the game. It also helps high altitude fighters and heavies reach their optimum altitude faster once a battle starts.

• Resilience – Repairs all critical damage and heals all crew injuries, reduces engine and weapon overheating by 50%, and increases maneuverability and engine thrust by 5% when aircraft loses 70% of hit points. The skill is activated automatically once per sortie.

It will be most useful for fighter pilots, providing a significant momentary advantage that can tip the scales of an engagement in your favour.

• Evasive Target – Reduces damage received and chance of receiving critical damage and pilot injuries by 25% when actively maneuvering. Gain and maintain a high angular velocity in pitch and roll axes to activate the skill.

To activate the skill, the aircraft must maintain a high rotation speed over the pitch axis and be slightly rolling. The speed must be no lower than 20% of optimum airspeed. Evasive target is disabled if the rotation speed over the pitch axis decreases or after 2 seconds pass since activation. It is very beneficial for light and multi role fighters that engage in dogfights and perform a lot of sharp turns.

• Raptor Strike – Increases chance of setting an enemy aircraft on fire and causing critical damage by 50% when diving and attacking with forward-firing weapons. Takes effect when aircraft speed approaches maximum dive speed an pitch angle exceeds 45 degrees.

To activate the skill your aircraft needs to reach at least 60% of its maximum dive speed (you can find this in the aircraft specifications panel), the dive angle must be no less than 45%. The skill is deactivated when you exit the dive. Raptor strike is a great choice for machines with a high altitude, especially for heavies and fighters with high caliber armament. It not only emphasizes the advantage of this kind of weaponry, but also works great with the typical play style of boom and zoom aircraft.

• Adrenaline Rush – Reduces weapon overheating by 25% and increases firing accuracy by 10% after destroying an enemy aircraft. Effective for 10 seconds.

This skill only works for 10 seconds but can be reactivated by further kills. Keep in mind that a series of frags does not increase the skill duration by 10 seconds every time, it only resets the timer and starts it anew. So, for example, if you manage to get 3 kills within a 1 second interval between them the Adrenaline rush will be active for 12 seconds, not 30.

Rear Gunner Skills

Here are some skills that only a rear gunner may learn.

• Endurance - Reduces injury of the gunner by 20%.
• Vigilance - Increases view range by 10%. Stacks with the pilot skill Eagle Eyed.
• Armorer - Increases the burst length of a turret by 20%
• Ballistics Expert - Increases the range of a turret by 10%
• Quick Reflexes - Turret aiming time is reduced by 50%.
• Defensive Fire - Reduces damage from an aircraft which the gunner is firing at by 30%.
• Precision Gunner - The rear gunner has (significantly) more chance of scoring critical hits on enemy aircraft.
• Weakest Link - The rear gunner automatically starts shooting at the target with the least HP. Works only if at least 2 aircraft are in turret range and field of fire.

When choosing a combination of skills to level as a priority, you should consider the aircraft type and even model. For example, highly maneuverable fighters will benefit much from Engine Guru or Aerodynamics Expert, while heavily armored Ground Attack Aircraft pilot might prefer Protection Expert. In general it is good to focus on improving strong points rather than mitigating weak points of an aircraft, unless the aircraft's combat ability is severely hampered by the weak point.

While each aircraft has skills that benefit the plane more than others. However, never pick up skills that have no effect whatsoever: a fighter does not have any ordnance, so both Expert Rocketeer and Demolition Expert have no use. For Ground Attack Aircraft, Bombers and most Heavy Fighters the skill Fire Fighting is practically useless: although fire can cause a lot of damage to these aircraft, the skill needs active maneuvering, which is something these aircraft typically struggle to do.

A skilled crew will be much more effective in battle because the aircraft will become faster, more maneuverable and it’s weaponry – more accurate and deadly.

Injury

Crew members can be injured from shots, which decreases their abilities for a limited amount of time, such as an injured rear gunner loses accuracy. Crew can be healed in-battle by a first aid dressing package. Crew also is healed, like modules, when repairing at an airbase . A injured crewmember will perform less well than a non-injured crew member.

Crew Ranks

Pilot	USSR	Germany	USA	Japan	Great Britain	China	France
0 skill points	St. Serzhant	Feldwebel	Technical Sergeant	Itto Hiko Heiso	Chief Technician	Sergeant 1st Class	Adjutant
1-2 skill points	Starshina	Oberfeldwebel	Master Sergeant	Joto Huko Heiso	Flight Sergeant	Warrant Officer	Adjutant-chef
3-4 skill points	Ml. Leytenant	Stabsfeldwebel	Flight Officer	Hiko Hei socho	Warrant Officer	2nd Lieutenant	Aspirant
5-6 skill points	Leytenant	Leutnant	Second Leutenant	Shoi	Pilot Officer	1st Lieutenant	Sous-lieutenant
7-8 skill points	St. Leytenant	Oberleutnant	First Lieutenant	Chui	Flying Officer	Captain	Lieutenant
9-10 skill points	Kapitan	Hauptmann	Captain	Taii	Flight Lieutenant	Senior Captain	Capitaine
11-12 skill points	Mayor	Major	Major	Shosa	Squadron Leader	Major	Commandant
13-14 skill points	Podpolkovnik	Oberstleutnant	Lieutenant Colonel	Chusa	Wing Commander	Lt.Colonel	Lieutenant-colonel
15 skill points	Polkovnik	Oberst	Colonel	Taisa	Group Captain	Colonel	Colonel

The gunner always has a rank one step lower than the pilot (if he was earning experience alongside that pilot). Consequently a recruit gunner will have a Serzhant rank (Unterfeldwebel | Staff Sergeant | Nitto Hiko Heiso | Sergeant | Sergeant | Sergent-chef). As we mentioned before, the gunners cannot reach Colonel rank.

Unique Pilots

https://worldofwarplanes.com/news/world-of-warplanes-unique-pilots