Now you see me: concealment & smoke

June 27, 2026 · naval combat

Until now the sea had no secrets — every ship saw every other ship across the whole map. That's the one thing a World-of-Warships clone can't do without: concealment. Ships are now hidden until they're spotted, and that single change turns the naval theater into a game of positioning, ambush, and nerve.

Hidden until detected

Every hull has a spotting range — its concealment. An enemy only appears in your picture (and on your minimap) once one of your ships or planes gets inside that range. A destroyer's is tight, so it can slip far closer than a cruiser before anyone sees it. The range isn't fixed:

Firing your main guns balloons it for a few seconds — the muzzle bloom. Open fire from concealment and you give yourself away, so the first salvo is always a decision.
A star shell strips concealment outright: anything under its light is spotted, no matter the range. Now the illumination rounds have teeth beyond just lighting the dark.
Smoke cuts it to almost nothing — see below.

When the enemy can see you, a DETECTED warning lights up, so you always know when you've been made. Vision is shared across your team, so a scout that spots a hull lights it up for everyone.

Smoke screens

The destroyer's answer to being seen: press C to lay a smoke screen — a bank of cloud you sit in and vanish from. Anyone inside is concealed unless an enemy is almost on top of them, so smoke lets a ship break a lock, cover an advance, or shoot from cover while spotters do the seeing. It's on a long cooldown, so when you pop it matters. The AI destroyers use it too, ducking into smoke when they're caught in the open.

A low bank of grey smoke spread across the blue sea, a warship standing off to one side firing blind into it while another hides within — A smoke screen on the water — a destroyer vanishes into the bank while the cruiser shells its last-known position blind.

How it sits in the engine

Spotting is computed once per naval tick: each hull is marked seen when an enemy is inside its current range, and the per-recipient snapshot then simply omits enemy hulls your team hasn't spotted — so they're gone from the 3D view and the minimap alike, no client trickery. Your own team is always sent, and spectators still see everything. The AI navigates with full knowledge, so it keeps fighting; concealment is the human captain's to exploit. And it's all behind the naval theater's seam — the air game's snapshot is untouched.

The sea finally rewards a cool head: hold fire, use the islands, slip into smoke, and strike from where they aren't looking.