Figment

So you say no to completely revamping sub-play... (starting with ASW) Because it has to be completely revamped. Right. Good argument. Plain and simple, READ.

Damage farming can provide a lot of exp, this damage can be dealt too late to make it easier for the team. That said, I’ve had a lot of slow starts last year where my game wouldn’t load for three even five minutes and I’m frustratingly stuck watching the loading screen and seeing the dots move around on the map without me. Yet in most those game I somehow managed to get first in exp and in many cases even carried the game. So I guess that isn’t always needed. Isn’t even class dependent as I’ve done that with Vermont, Hindenburg and Gearing for instance.

That and even a 1% chance on thousands of people playing for thousands of days is actually not bad odds for something occuring now and then. Don’t think he considered those maths yet. Plus when someone is in a “mood”, they act differently, likely downgrading their own performance subconsciously by either trying too hard or more or less giving in to defeatism. I mean, when you start blaming the system rather than your performances, you must be having a pretty defeatist attitude already. Why else look for a scapegoat?

I think we should get WG to create a player OP designer mod kit. Loads of publishers use player made content in their games and this really shouldn’t be that hard. I got SOE to let players do the custom skins and all as well for PS2, in the end they just needed to approve submitted content rather than make it and it was very lucrative for both modders and publisher. Just need to find an angle to make it more lucrative for WG, like removing all coding time. Free content generation… But WoWs is set up to draw players ever closer, most of the bigger map wouldn’t be used, too big and you can’t find players that don’t want to be found. With the type of objectives we have, subs should be able to move around the map at a reasonable cruise speed. (IMO -4% to -10% wrt DDs of the same tier should allow for enough catching up). I’m realistic as well, I’ve had way more success with other dev teams. However, I’ve also not have had to spend so much energy fighting apathic, yet hostile to non-apathic players trying to drive other players away and spamming your topics with garbage posts elsewhere either. People want to act desillusioned and don’t want to be constructive? They should go right ahead, in their own topics. All they do is make devs stop reading topics that might have peaked their interest. My problem with these people is that all they do is complain, without being able to point to an alternative that the community does want. When that happens chances of being implemented rise, due to reduced risk and greater acceptance while not obsoleting all investment made thus far (removal is not an option).

Don’t think we need bigger maps at all. What we need is to get subs in a position where they’re more easily taken by surprise due to a lack of situational awareness. Sneaking up on its target should be dangerous. Managing that should be a feat. It means for one that the sub has to get closer to their enemy than now and more often stay close to the surface in order to strike, given that their detection range is by nature so short. Hence I would limit dive time more, forcing subs to ping to get their bearings to see if it is save to surface. The stealth is a bit problematic against the distance they can currently cover with fast moving torpedoes, while the countermeasures are very specific and too hard to lead for most players with poor feedback on what constituted a near miss or a hit. What’s the point of making a glass canon with high camo, if you don’t absolutely need the camo to get close and risk an attack? IMO we need to get to a situation where subs get to within 5-8km of their target, preferably closer even, thus vulnerable to detection and being chased down and due to long reload, after one or two volleys having to be running to try another ambush. Cat and mouse play and therefore situational awareness should be important. Long range and fast torp weapons thus shouldn’t be applied as today. Rather, slower torps with shorter range, so dodging can be attempted. But if such a sub hits it should be powerful in order to have carrying potential. High speed as they have now is okay, as long as it comes with a long turning radius, so escape is still hard and needs to be planned and initiated in time lest the sub runs straight into their enemies. It should be vulnerable to agile ships, that can out-manoeuvre it, so even if it has speed to get into position, it needs a lot of path planning before and after the strike, particularly given poor situational awareness. The few strikes it will get should be meaningful to be decisive, it may not get that many chances. So yeah, IMO WG’s vision of subs is all wrong. It should be a short range assassin with all the risks that come with getting close to the enemy, not a long range stealth harasser. PlanetSide 2 made a similar mistake. In PS1 you had cloaked infiltrators with next to no range (1.5m effective range with one shotgun pistol and you still needed four to five shots (5s ttk)). You basically had to sneak up to knifing distance in the back of people and engage while they were distracted to have a chance by getting a headstart in the coming duel and with so many people around not immediately being shot and being able to lose pursuants with dark light. They were basically base saboteurs to allow people to enter bases and at high risk assassins. Snipers didn’t get camo. Those were only allowed with heavier highly visible suits. Good infils stood in high standing because it was hard and took a lot of patience. In PS2 they gave stealth infantry short range 1s ttk UZIs and one shot sniper rifles. But no meaningful sabotage to do at bases that jetpacks (obsoleted walls…) couldn’t reach more easily. Role definement in context is important. People hated infils for sudden death from everywhere. PS: after spending 18 years on online development forums it’s funny how consistent the defeatists keep demanding others to scrap any idea generation and be as defeatist as themselves to make their self-fulfilling prophecies of dev inaction and game destruction true (whereas I’ve had about 80+ ideas implemented in various games where “devs wern’t supposed to be listening”)… I will never understand desillusioned self-defeating stupidity. Play the long game. Remember: And also wonder why after years of posting in the same forum environment I have to explain a number of those same people I don’t give a rat’s arse for their unconstructive, nothing accomplishing, dimwitted whining. :/

Yeah. You don’t trust certain people and therefore conclude there is a conspiracy. You literally said so. But you don’t even notice when you say you cannot trust these people for watching their blogs online that you in the same breath conclude there is something nefarious going on. And if you were that good with DD., Ranked would be a breeze to get through, since you ought to score top 3 win or lose, resulting in higher star retention and gain rate. And if you really are better than me in a DD, which I don’t even bother to question, you should probably get a 60+% WR in ranked. I don’t get ten or even long streak streak losses as regularly as I get long win streaks. I do get hit and miss streaks that keep me in place during longer star grinds like qual, but that is mostly due to the chance of gaining stars vs losing with any ship other than a DD while grinding for missions, which reduces star retention rate, but not winrate per say. Ship selection in ranked is important. At tier 6-7 and due to the smaller maps, Italian ships work great with just SAP. At tier 8-10, you’re better off with a lower tier DD, as it will improve your exp ratio and ensure the enemy had lower tiers as well that your scouting can dominate.

Uh huh. It's conspiracy.

Wait until you decide it's a conspiracy against you, rather than that you should just get a DD and win regardless of what the mod says about your chances.

Now, the ping mechanic is absolute crap and I'll get to that later, but you're in large part blaming your own misconception of where you thought the sub was compared to where it actually was on the game. So just as a pointer, try to keep in mind that your aim was always going to be off because your choice to fire where you did would have been bad regardless of the game. Whether you'd make the same choice if the game gave you more information is a different situation. As is, you simply didn't take the time to evaluate the position of the sub, you just launched without thinking. You can blame the game for not providing sufficient information, but you should also blame yourself for not having the patience to try and derive any of the information you lacked. If you aim like this you're never going to hit a sub in the current (or previous) system. Whether or not you're aware of it, you made a number of assumptions, each of which could throw off your aim. Now, there are some things that you can blame on the game wrt subs as you have very little information to work with, but you also blame your own basic ASW aim on it. The assumptions you made were: - Since you aimed AT the ping wave direction you assumed the submarine is stationary. Why would it stay in one position and become an easy target? Do not assume it's there. Assume it's a point from which to extrapolate the actual position of the sub as you watch the ripple and THEN, where the sub will be. All that time it is moving! - Since you aimed AT the ping wave direction you also assumed the submarine is facing you and kept facing you as the ASW is a line that comes from your ship position at the moment you called the strike. But if it already launched torpedoes, or just tried to make you nervous, then it might have pinged you while sailing sideways. Why not assume it will be trying to get to a new position? As with the current bad mechanics a sub can ping backwards, sidewards and forwards, a ping position without a second ping to determine its positioning over time is only semi-useful, but you'd still need a sawed-off shotgun to hit anywhere around that position to even hope for a hit. Think of it like firing at the gunflashes of a smoked up ship that's on the move: you'd be firing at where it was, not where it will be by the time your shells land. Same for ASW. It'd be better to wait for a second ping and then extrapolate the likely next position based on the time it takes between launching an air strike and the explosion. - And there's probably your third assumption based on inexperience, that the air strike is virtually instant as you aimed AT its former position. Remember, a sub can move out of the way of an ASW air strike and even has a little time to sail away from sinking charges. The time to strike is often around 12-15s? So you need a lot of lead. A sub can move well out of the way of it most the time by just moving to the side of a strike. To catch a sub, you need not only know where it was, what angle it was at, but also where it wants or preferably has to go next in order to decide where to bomb. Then account for lag between ASW launch, depth charges landing, sinking and exploding. That's a lot of lead time and variables to check, most of which you need at least a sighting or multiple pings for in order to extrapolate. And even then you can be off as the ASW is pretty poorly designed with little to no options. Regardless, given you acted hastily, why would you be surprised it's nowhere near the position you dropped the bombs? Anyway, the ping mechanic has to change such that people get information on recent angle of the sub, direction and approximate distance. And IMO ASWs should have multiple pattern options as the one line is rubbish. IMO the ping mechanic should be a 360°, passive, automatic ping, a way for the submarine to acquire situational awareness, which can give its position away as well and when still active within a certain distance can warn enemies of their presence and location. It should be a double edged sword that can be used to hunt it down. Especially when used to triangulate its position when a ping hits multiple enemy ships within radio range of one another. And yes I think it should be possible for the sub to turn it off (like P does for AA and secondaries), but where ships with ASW on board can activate their own pings with a little bit shorter distance. Hell, I wouldn't mind giving a direction controlled ASDIC to the hunting players (in comparison to surround sound hydro).

That's a different game.

5. He's in a ranked save spot, notes the odds of winning due to some mod, considers it a pointless waste of time and in leaving hopes for a quick match over, or maybe a free rank up, while doing something else with his time like watching Obi-Wan, thinking he's just as masterful in defeatism.

Pretty much always appears when I play that Op. Some IJN ships spawn rather far away. Far enough that they practically aren't within normal scouting vision or practical reach and players ignore them unless they go looking for them. Some seem to spawn a lot closer at the very end. Could be they are triggered by ships moving in specific areas though, but I've seen them appear out of thin air right next to my DD once while taking a short cut to get back to the rest of the group (had to take care of carrier and several cruisers alone and had taken significant damage from a DD torp). So seeing them spawn within 2.5km was... rather unsettling. Luckily I had just reloaded torps. :)

Also including AI, not just players. :p But yeah. The one mission you could bring actual Russian ships to without being a paperweight. Does need British fishing vessels though. That sort of thing yeah. Kinda need an Ottoman fleet to fight for the Italians, Brits and Russians of the lower tiers though. Unless everyone takes on the role of the Ottomans…

I don't think it's very representative of a person's skills beyond perhaps the DD and some cruiser players since the rest is reliant on upgrade captures to keep up. It's too much of an uphill battle when attrition means little due to heals. Not quite sure, but think I recall those heals being even more pronounced (faster and stronger) in this mode years ago. The lack of attrition used to feel worse. Recall chasing down a half dead cruiser in a BB and it popping back out full health a minute or so later, despite it not having a heal of its own. Enemy team was fully healed time and again and our team was just limping on with fewer players and no chance to get to the zones or even a kill.

Yeah, the Arms Race mode is annoying, certainly when you have players who yolo for some upgrade and die without support or have ships that seem to go for an upgrade (or just keep more and more distance) and never get the team an upgrade. The fact that any leverage in numbers tends to skew the fighting faster and faster makes these type of modes very prone to roflstomps.

Epicenter is fine... If there'd be more cover and closing in = being spotted + in range of everyone wouldn't be so punished by an instant pile on. The mode itself isn't the problem there really, problem is they're put on maps where the maps were not designed for the mode in question. Kinda like how a lot of those brawl maps were not designed for brawling, but just random cut-outs from various maps, sometimes creating instant map advantages for one side.

I want to have a reason to use my low tiers as well. :/ My Albany wants to go on pew-pew missions. There's already so many times you use the T8-T10 in Ranked, plus I'm kinda tired of pulling those ships out of port constantly for missions and Ranked, while having absolutely no reason to bring a lower tier ship. Ever. Except when you want to sit in a 5 min queue to club baby seals, of course. Which is... Never? Give T2 BB players a reason to catch HE and torps play as well!

Sounds like a time zone issue, low numbers 6 hours earlier in the day (morning till mid-day for NA) sounds about right as you'd have to be close to midnight (depending on where in the EU you are located) before the NA servers would pick up in post-work/school numbers. Not sure what the differences in total players for WoWs servers currently are though. Regardless, I doubt the added lag is worth it as the players will be roughly the same quality (and sadly in my experience with US servers often fastly more offensively racist, competitive within the team and/or petty childish in other ways too). Used to play some games where servers migrated to the US, where I used to have 15ms ping to Amsterdam, then 125ms to Virginia and eventually 245ms to San Diego. That was pretty noticable in the bad way as that game was especially lag sensitive in the sense of players warping all over the place on top of sudden "oh you died on their screen some time ago already" (clientside ping).

Arkansas B. One of my favourite TIV BBs actually. :) It’s a pretty okay ship. Plenty stamina, good range, fairly high alpha, decent accuracy. Easily can sink a cruiser before a CV even flew over once so I can’t say the lack of AA is a problem since you ought to have been decisive before the CVs can apply their DPS. Especially if you stay around cruisers with A2A fighters. Or just rambo in and kill one or two ships before you die. Pretty fire resilient too, so can kite away and wear down five-six ships in pursuit for others to kill and keep that up for quite some time if you started just out of their max range and slowly lose ground on ‘m as you lure them into broadside fire for friendlies (they will keep going after you since you can’t escape with abysmal speed). Got a 75% WR on it over 16 battles personally with 45K average damage. 95K tops (incl. two killed CVs then :)) Similar stats to my 71% Wyoming. The type of BB works well for me I think. Significantly better performance than my Myogi (much lower av damage). More luck than my Kaiser, Courbet and Gangut (more av. damage on Kaiser and similar on the rest, but think it gets that later in battle where the US BBs can more quickly create decisive numerical advantages to your team by sinking a cruiser reliably near the start of the match. Kaiser stays alive longer to do damage over time, but can’t as easily kill off enemies quickly in my experience). Dante is a bit better I think if you know how to use SAP and nose angle. Ischi is probably among the most flexible TIV BBs. Orion was pretty meh for me. Oklahoma too is just way too slow on dps and reliable shots to get that much early impact. Misses are too expensive, So yeah, fun ship the Arkansas B. Didn’t really use it much though given there was a lot to grind and it is basically a seal club tool and aircraft can be pretty much ignored at T4 if you know what you’re doing…

It’d make the double fighter squadron almost worthwhile…

There's been several ways to make fighters more actively controlled during the RTS period. Some of these were nuts (liked the locked path spam firing or having a CV configuration with virtually just player controlled fighter squadrons to roam the map and do nothing but hunt enemy CV planes / scout). But indeed the huge difference between the loitering radius and the active radius / activation makes having fighters pretty useless for defense often enough. A shorter radius and larger active radius would go a long way to making them more immediately useful as AA, rather than after you've been attacked and might make them more prone to actually defending the ships you're escorting too. Being able to deploy them and reassign them to either following other ships or areas is one of the things I'd have liked to be a feature for all ship launched fighters.

Just going to sum up in a nutshell my thoughts about the game and its classes and mechanics here, since it's so obvious people like to put words in your mouth. There's more obviously, but yeah. Many of these topics I've done more extensively elsewhere, some I've not mentioned at all before, some I'm still pondering about the best implementation.c General mechanic changes: Goals: - Improve and stimulate stealth, initiative and aggressive play. - Make players shorten distances before engaging, overall decreasing the amount of enemies engaging one another at the same time to make it easier for individuals to make a last stand, rather than be dogpiled. - Mitigate effectiveness of CVs Radar - Slightly longer duration - Rotational detection - Intermittant localization (short periods of target visibility as the radar turns in circles) - Line of sight detection only - Works on surfaced subs, but provides less info about a sub at periscope depth (just a blip, no profile) Hydro - Not able to detect stationary ships over max hydro range -2km - Intermittant map detection at +1 to +2km from current range depending on captain skills - More effective against subs than it is now - In combination with onboard ASW creates ASW targeting indicators for subs up to a depth of 40m - Affects depth setting of depth charges to be closer to actual depth of submarine (better targeting than with new ping mechanic (see below)) ASW - All ships that can encounter subs should have some form of ASW Radio - larger effect on battles by being less available with fukll map overlap - visible spotting only for first hand information (includes aircraft) - map spotting only for second hand (relayed) information Smoke - More captain skills related to smoke to create trade-offs or changes to smoke - Thicker, but shorter duration cloud: slightly reduced detection (incl. while firing) compared to normal - Short duration thin barrier cloud with anti-radar capabilities - just shows one big barrier on the map when radared - Wider, shorter duration cloud (trade-off) - Smaller, longer duration cloud (trade-off) - Smoke deployable while remaining unseen at slightly higher speeds Goals: More variety in smokescreen effects and smoke DD gameplay (may be applied to Italian cruisers and BBs) New weather effects on maps: - Slow moving fog banks (act as smoke screens) - Low hanging cloud cover (acts as smoke screens against higher altitude aircraft only, would have to make an attack run to get under it) - Heavy fog conditions (overall reduction in visibility across the map) - Heavy snow and rain conditions (reduces aircraft range too) Captain skills - Package the too situational skills together (AA fighter, AA and ASW for instance) to make them more attractive - By packaging, create some room for more specialized options or alternate strengths (particularly for things like smoke screens) Goals: more variety that are also valid choices. AA: A2A fighters: - Less power distance between tiers of CV aircraft and fighters in general through luck based engagement rather than DPS and hp - Fighters from CVs and ships can be assigned to friendly ships, deployed to protect an area or circle one's own ship (default). When deployed from a CV they have to fly to that spot, from the CV. Not drop out of a bunch of aircraft. (Limits immediate spotting advantage over an area). CV deployed fighters can be deployed one squadron at a time while other squadrons are flying and return once their fuel runs out (bit more fuel than bombers). Hence they have limited range. (Basically like the older RTS fighters) - Fighters will engage enemy aircraft that are detected in a larger radius than the one they're circling from the moment that circle is touched and they've reached the circle themselves. Should be less engagement lag than currently the case. Ship AA: - More luck based AA than DPS based, allowing lower tier AA ships to also get a chance to kill aircraft of higher tier more consistently. Hit rate depending on angle of approach wrt to AA bubbles. Luck level increased at better AA ratings, but higher basic luck level for lower tier ships to compensate a bit for their lack of AA bubbles. Higher tier ships get better angle coverage and increased frequency of luck checks based on AA modules alive, making it harder to reduce damage by approach route for CV. Should be easier for CV to get a lucky low-damage-taken run against low tier AA ships, but should never be without danger. Approaching a broadside would be a lot more risky for a CV - and thus impactful for AA firing ships - but of course the chances of hitting with torps would be higher too. - Light to medium panic effect increasing the spread for enemy fighters upon activation of an AA boost (less severe than the old one) depending on AA rating of the ship. - Note that I'd have CV attacks lock in earlier, giving the target ship time to maneouvre and for instance decide to increase or decrease the amount of AA by angling at the oncoming aircraft, or opting to dodge. Either way, it gives targets a choice on how to fight back: eat away the CVs capabilities to sustain attacks, or try and dodge damage, or try to do a bit of both. General class changes (would not necessarily affect all ships of said class): BB: - Rudder reduced back to beta quality (less able to steer fast to dodge torps) - Slightly more effective torpedobarriers (% reduction) - Reduced % of damage from citadel hits on cruisers - More effective secondaries (in general, not for Schlieffen types). - Reduced accuracy at range - Torps instated for BBs that historically had them, regardless if it fits with the rest of the line (captain skill argument is crap IMO) - Fewer BB in regular MM per side (possibly allow BC to sit in for BB and cruisers alike, provided each side gets one) - Occasional BB only matches (get the excess amounts out of the queue, would probably be enjoyable for BB players) Goal: more CQC situations, less punishment for ships taking the initiative. DD: - Reduce radar range on DDs with radar a bit to off-set the power distance with smokescreen centric DDs. - Ping mode to detect submarines when in ASW targeting mode (for when hydro is not on the ship or in effect) - Ping mechanic let's enemy sub and nearby enemy vessels in line of sight (<5km) know where the pinging vessel is Cruisers: - Increased AA rating of nearby ships when an AA cruiser sails in proximity of other allied ships ("AA escort boost") - Reduced detectability (-4% tot -10%) compared to now for some ships, allowing improved firing from safety and easier disengagement and short range engagement with torps - Disappear from sight slightly faster (-3s to 5s depending on ship) - Ping mode to detect submarines when in ASW targeting mode (for when hydro is not on the ship or in effect) - Ping mechanic let's enemy sub and nearby enemy vessels in line of sight (<5km) know where the pinging vessel is Carriers: - Start of line at T5 - Optional alternative to T5 CV if T4 is a must: * Protected MM for ships with barely any AA at T3-4 * Severe hardcap limitation on amount of T4 and T5 CV matches per year after initial grind is concluded. Consider them training ships. - Shorter exp grind, with CVs at each tier again - More limited numbers of aircraft on board (more attrition sensitive), shot down aircraft cannot be replaced once the reserve is gone. - Fewer waves per sortie (at most two waves) - Fuel limitation on flight range to aircraft (either: sit too far back and your aircraft don't make it home, or: they auto-return home after a certain flight distance) - Must enter AA zone with aircraft to engage a ship (of course island cover and leading torps might still work around that) - Better AI pathing options and controls (including setting ships to reverse), goes for other ships too, but it's a must for this class - Able to switch between air and ship control more fluently without air having to return or having just AI control over your ship - Limited radio information sharing from aircraft (map knowledge, rather than direct visuals, unless first hand information) -> reduced direct effective spotting ability without reducing the ability to spot - Lock in attack decision making earlier in the attack akin to the RTS period - Removal of passive bonus to repair etc. - Reintroduction of deckfire delays (delaying rather than completely blocking air strikes. Disables switching squadrons. Provides extra vulnerability at close engagements) - Reintroduction of prelaunch squadron selection of squadrons as during RTS (makes it harder to adapt to the current situation, requires some forethought and more attrition sensitive) - Slightly higher HP to compensate if needed - Slightly improved secondary stats - ASW added: detection buoys deployable from torpedo bombers, creates localized hydro/ping until destroyed or expired (3mins) - ASW added: HE /AP bombers can be used for depth charge drops (less effective and fewer drops than current) - ASW added: Rocket bombers can engage submarines at periscope depth or on the surface Goals: Localize air power more to allow other flanks to have more initiative, reduce impact of aircraft spotting, force ships to engage at closer ranges, require CV to sail closer to the front line and thus in more relative danger, at max distance, reduce effectiveness of CV by reducing its angles on the target. Improve experience in lower tiers for poor AA ships. Subs: Aside from aforementioned changes to ASW on other ships - More forward starting position - Shorter radio distances to mimic isolation effects - Ping for situational awareness underwater beyond 2km, including map awareness beyond 3km., - The slower a sub sails, the more knowledge it can get about its surroundings through listening to engine sounds (a submerged sub gets basic map information of approximate ship locations on compass vectors, with a range estimate. Think of a circle divided in directional sections and distances, rather than ship silhouettes. Only at periscope depth can they actually start targeting ships). - Detection and targeting of subs is done with pings up to 8km away in the same map detection way, but become clear targets at 5-6km. Could be targeted with acoustic torpedoes, countermeasures like decoys could be available. - More fog of war if not pinging, but also less chance of being sighted - Different situational awareness levels and balance (actual use of a periscope to detect stuff at periscope depth for instance). - The more you ping, the more accurate your situational awareness, drawback: your enemy can home in on your position too (every next ping provides a more narrow direction and range estimate) - More diverse modules - Remove homing torps as standard torps, only for specific nations and with more limited arcs, range or speeds as special torpedo - More sensitive to surface ship hydro than today, avoid by deep dive - Deep dives (40+m) can cause spontaneous floodings if they take over 20-30s - Lower torp frequency (ship dependend) - Diving choice with more consequences (ballast and air tank) - Flooding and fires on board can affect need to surface by draining air and drag ship too much ballast - Oil spills and wreckage creating a path in the direction of flight (kinda implemented differently from what I'd do recently, but it gives a similar idea). - Possibly fake death oil spill by sub (counts as kill for enemy and costs sub captain exp./silver) Goals: major overhaul, more overextending sensitive glass cannon with ways to destroy them indirectly (by forcing them down), little bit more of an assassin. And yes, not going to happen, but hey.

I could make a similarly long list for today's situation. It's not too complicated though since much of it will be passive or intuitive, or occur in odds calculations by the game. A lot of these would be inherent in the tools through player interfaces (like how one uses the size of reticules, cycles through torpedo spread lead indicators etc.) and won't be something players will have to actively think about as they'll learn to integrate it naturally. Some of it will be simple map interactions and prompted. Better players contributing to winning more matches, yeah... That's not exactly a problem, is it? Thing is, the relative power compared to other players than the enemy CV will be reduced, so the impact will be less overall and it will allow mitigation by other players far more than today, since today's reach of the CV player is greater and therefore more influential for the entire battle, not just the local flank. Taking together with the remainder of changes, the influence of DDs, brawling BBs and (AA) cruisers in particular will increase, that of sitting back BBs and CVs decrease and that of subs become more situational. I'm not out to produce better quality players per say. Though I am out to naturally stimulate and encourage teamwork and enhance the strength of teamplayers, as well as stimulating initiative, which the current system punishes. As a consequence, player behaviour will shift naturally, because it's just going to be more rewarding and some things will simply not be possible or sustainable. For instance, if you can't rely on other people's scouting as much, you'll have no choice but to move in closer as a BB. That automatically makes these players "better", because they'll be better positioned to provide close support to others. Getting players to share information is a good thing. It automatically makes a team better and starts creating bonds between people. Getting people to communicate instead of doing all the communication for them will strengthen the ties a player has to other players and indirectly to the game. I'd also like there to be some proper map tools to inform others that aren't directly related to language though (and limited in spam ability). The current grid click spam for instance is not properly designed for positive player interaction. Inconsistent it is not. Less predictable outcomes can occur, yes, but over time and thus most the time, preset odds will give somewhat consistent results, it's however not as much of a given either way as it used to be. As a player on either end, you'll be able to influence the odds by controlling approach vectors and timing. Units will have better or worse mitigation odds, but it'll never be such that you will have completely unreliable results. I'd hope to see some of that in A2A as well, like engagement timing resulting in a dogfight with one side getting the drop on enemy fighters giving a few extra damage checks before retailiation for instance. This is also dependent on how dog fights are scripted in general and what the AI sets as priorities (is a fighter engaging enemy bombers and intercepted, do they continue following bombers or engage the fighters? etc). In fact, I wouldn't mind some player choices here as well by setting A2A fighter stances to defensive, aggressive, evasive or guarding.

The most important conceptual and principle balancing mechanics selected/changes have been mentioned already. But you opted to ignore even the most major changes earlier, while relating everything within the framework of the current system. That's not how it'll work. So I can't say your assessment and conclusions, subsequent behaviour and justification for that behaviour are correct. I propose you keep an open mind, and realise you're being very defensive out of fear of the unknown and due to making assumptions. I'm not out to neuter CVs into oblivion. I'm trying to make them more palletable to other players and define their role and interaction better. However, I understand you're in need of more information, fair enough. Just remember you can't expect me to draw up extensive damage tables for a system I'm not going to be balancing personally however, especially not if we consider the low chance of implementation and how much personal and situational interpretation it's going to leave regardless that will lead to off-hand dismissals. Besides, I have a life. ;P Still, we can get into some examples later if you want. Regardless, I'll try to write out what's in my head a bit more precise for you and hope you appreciate the effort I put into this. Please appreciate this is complex stuff to convey and cover in a way that's brief and clear to everyone (hint: it's never going to be easy to explain in short as it's complex). I've covered this in many separate topics throughout the years, so I sadly can't just link you to them. I'm sure I'm leaving out some inter-CV balancing details, so feel free to ask or make suggestions. The general gist is the following with respect to CVs: AA: The relation between AA and aircraft, the limitations imposed on range and volleys of attack are the primary difference with today where it comes to interaction between aircraft, friendly and target ships. Instead of hitpoint/dps basis, I would use a luck factor per offensive and defensive unit and checks for critical damage as an alternative to today's hp system, allowing a higher chance for low-AA rated units to shoot down air, while higher rated AA units get better protected AA angles to the sides especially and more checks at a lowered luck rate compared to low rating AA. Basically, there's more ships should be able to do to mitigate damage and more over, reduce the threat of CVs down the line by wearing down their airpower. Some AA ships will have improved influence over air strikes on them and in their vicinity by reintroducing the "panic" effect (at a less severe rate than during RTS, which was silly as you could go broadside on a stationary cruiser and miss all torps at times) that spreads the attack predictably slightly wider, improving dodge chances. It means aircraft would not have hp indicators anymore, instead they'd get module damage affecting their performance and whether or not they die. You could say that's akin to hitpoints for modules in the aircraft (say: wings, engine, fuel, fuselage, pilots, payload). A hit could be cripling and cause a crash or mid air explosion at worst, or make the chance of the next hit being critical higher. It could mean the first shots kills an aircraft, but it could also mean it takes 30 checks for a lucky pilot. Higher tier aircraft get slightly better odds. However, this also means you can make A2A between aircraft of different tiers more equal than if you'd simply boost both DPS and HP of a higher tier as is what WG has always done in the past (HP and DPS can never be balanced if one side always gets more of both after all). There was no way to overcome that without AA dps. With a module based system, this can be tweaked to be near even, even for lower tier aircraft. It means CVs can face +1 higher CVs again, thus making a case to reintroduce odd numbered tier CVs and make the tiering more even and progress better. Air approach angles should become more important in both attack and defense, giving the defenders a better chance to control the engagement to some degree, it'd be more about risk and exposure management vs attrition. Overall the main goal is to increase the sense of control for the target over the engagement, improve teamwork and increase the chance of engaging the CV directly by reducing the distance required to travel to reach it, while retaining the enjoyment of the CV player as a jack of all trades, despite of narrowing their focus and constraining their abilities to sections of the map and having to target more challenging targets. Live for CVs would improve in the following ways: Reduced exp grinds to the next tier MM at -1 to +1 tier, not -2 to +2 reducing AA gaps Much needed improved movement controls Improved captain AI and map controls (especially in terms of backing up and plotting courses at variations of speed) Proper switching from flight to sailing as in the RTS setup (just between ship and aircraft view). I would be inclined to have the old map method for aircraft with waypoints reinstated, so you can simultaneously control ship and aircraft as is required, especially when the ship is forced to be closer to the action Improved non-AA secondaries effectiveness (similar to the effectiveness of some German CV secondaries, but nothing too excessive, aircraft remain primary source of firepower and DDs must be able to approach), to compensate for its higher closer-to-frontline risk profile. Bit higher accuracy for non-AA secondaries Slightly greater range (depends on tier and CV) Improved A2A fighter benefits and control (see below) Higher hp or slower BB style heal to compensate for increased risks to ship (slower since CV will be more likely to stay in hiding) Reduced squadron size or hp of aircraft when you run out of air no longer affect your ability to get close Enemy CVs can't quick multi-drop A2A anymore Improved direct and indirect ASW capabilities MM time should be reduced Can enter ranked battles at odd tiers unless otherwise restricted Much higher exp gain for protecting allied ships from enemy air strikes Squadrons won't necessarily get instagibbed from enemy fighters engaging Note that reduced hit rate might result in compensation of damage per hit. Live for CV's will worsen in the following ways: Less mapwide engagement power Reduced match influence Higher chance of DDs breaking through Higher chance of losing caps, including HQ Having less flight range and time to engage means: Having to get closer to the frontline and thus brings one closer to effective enemy range Increases chance of detection and thus increases risks to the ship If you do not get closer, fewer targets will be available Having to make quicker decisions (engage or not engage) Worse optimal strike angles Less optimal target selection (having to engage in areas with multiple AA coverages instead of picking out just the easy targets) Being less able to keep targets scouted for a prolonged period of time Not being able to drop fighters on a whim Reduced spotting damage Reduced suppression of stealth ships Reduced perma-spotting (knowledge for the team) Normalised repair perks + reintroducing flight deck fires Fire more dangerous Worse repair rates mean burning becomes more dangerous Aircraft effectiveness reduces when on fire as they take longer to take flight Flooding more dangerous Submarines more dangerous as pings aren't auto-cancelled No regeneration of aircraft anymore: you can run out. Have to pre-select and rearm/reload your aircraft like in RTS times. No quick changing on the fly. No more quick multi-drop of A2A fighters by launching aircraft dropping A2A and skipping to the next air unit Enemy CV has more control over their fighters blocking your paths and protecting enemy ships Less picking on ships with low AA ratings Can't sealclub endlessly with low tier CV after going through the exp grind (can still have multiple low tier CV, so it's relative) Variations are just that. Variations of variables allowed to be varied within a general scope of fair competition, specializations and accompanying strengths and weaknesses. General premise behind a CV is being a jack of all trades, but that means it must be weaker at each job than other ships, so its combination is an equal. Its power should be projected and concentrated on the area it resides in and be less of a long distance threat to units on the other end of the map. Especially in terms of spotting. I cannot and will not jump to specific spreadsheet differences for each nation as this is a balancing issue that you can't discuss on forums very well as you have to tweak that in practice. I can however set limitations based on today's and the past transgressions of what should be considered reasonable attack waves to deal with. Aircraft For all aircraft, limitations are introduced compared to today. Aircraft will have fastly more limited radio ranges compared to today, in order to reduce the scouting ability and allow fleets and units to be detected, but not outright neutered or pulverized by the CV's allies or the CV itself by being near permaspotted. Range limitations by flight time (fuel). All aircraft will have a timer before they have to return to the CV. Radio limitations through direct and indirect information sharing. Being within radio range of an aircraft provides direct visibility on targets scouted by the aircraft. Being connected indirectly by another ship (or other aircraft squadron) provides map position and direction knowledge, but no visible target. Not being connected indirectly by another ship provides just blips on the map with unit type, but without directional information. This information will have to be requested/told by the players through this wild concept called chatting and teamwork. As such aircraft will be used to detect enemy positions and direct units towards one another, but less so to direct fire until ships are closer to one another. As such they'd act less as a passive force multiplier throughout the entire match. Torpedo bombers Amount of torpedoes in a wave: 2 to 5 (where tier level is slightly more relevant to the amount of torpedoes than the nation) Spread: converging slightly to diverging significantly The narrower the spread and higher the speed, the lower the potential damage per torp. Torpedo activation distances and speeds: similar for all CVs, similar to RTS era Waves: max. 2 in a row (not simultaneous as in RTS period) Reduced flight range, but slightly longer flight time than other aircraft due to longer lining up distance need Torpedoes may be deep water or regular torpedoes depending on nation. Can drop temporary/destructable ASW buoys that listen for subs using pings lighting up subs in the area intermittently AP Dive bombers Probably: Lowered citadel damage (down to ~60%-75% of today to reduce the devastating effect it can have in one strike). Better survival luck rate to resemble more protection from AA due to steeper attack angle Slightly sooner locking of attack distance on approach (akin to RTS period) to allow for maneouvring units to become a bit less vulnerable. Think of how Dutch air strikes can miss if improperly timed, but decision is made from a little more close up, so should be easier to time than Dutch air strikes. Reduced flight range, slightly more range than HE aircraft due to more precise lining up need If needed compensation for reduced citadel damage and approach locking: slight spread improvement in width direction of reticule slightly lowered chance of ricochets (slightly higher average damage for non-citadel hits). More reliable average damage. Can drop depth charges HE bombers Not much change wrt today, aside from distance being more limited Sooner locking of attack distance on approach (akin to RTS period) to allow for fast maneouvring units to become less vulnerable. Think of how Dutch air strikes can miss if improperly timed, but decision is made from a little more close up, so should be easier to time than Dutch air strikes. Reduced flight range, slightly more range than rocket aircraft due to lining up need Can drop depth charges AP rocket bombers Slightly more consistent damage Reduced flight range, slightly more than HE rocket aircraft due to lining up need. Can engage subs down to periscope depth with missiles that might cause flooding. HE Rocket bombers Not much change wrt today, aside from flight distance being more limited Most reduced flight range due to requiring little angling to do some damage and to protect DDs a bit extra Can engage subs up to 15m depth with HE explosions A2A fighters AI controlled, with more control for the player Can be called into specific areas using the map mode, but have to fly in from the CV. Can be attached to friendly ships as in the RTS era Can be relocated on the map if there's "flight time" left. Cruiser and BB controlled fighers can be deployed in the same way Engage swifter once detected aircraft approach their sphere of influence Limited flight/reposition time, but fixed minimal loiter time to protect an area. Any time not spent on relocating increase the loiter time once the fixed loiter time is used up. Can engage aircraft encountered on their path from CV to destination Increased Exp gain for shooting down enemy aircraft

With some of you, it is laughably ridiculous. Played since beta, I’m a bit brighter than conditioning myself. No, WG doesn’t condition anyone. People react to them in predictable fanboy fashion because they can’t help and articulate their actual issues in something more meaningful than “I don’t like it, it hurts my personal playstyle, remove it”. Not “tweak it like this”, not “overhaul it in this manner, but keep that and this element”, not “I would have done it this way from the ground up”, not “this thing they did is nice, could be used with this and this to make it work”. No, from beta (though really, alpha probably), people just go straight to “it can’t be done, because I can’t imagine it any other way than this way and thus it must be removed, I’m right and anyone who doesn’t agree is a WG patsy and I’ll bully those who disagree or just show of my negativity.” That is just laziness, unconstructive trolling and probably a lack of education (in design). Because you can do these things in a million and more combinations of mechanics and balances. Just because WG tried a couple that didn’t quite work is no reason to assume it can’t work in any way, shape or form. That’s just stupidity speaking. In fact, that they havn’t broken the game with some I must say very poor combinations of choices shows it actually can be done if the right mechanics and balances are combined. I mean, I just put up a topic with some of the things I’d do and clownfish and admiral for instance would still accuse me of wanting the opposite because they’re too busy labeling prejudices and denouncing people that disagree with their laughable quality argumentation. Your description isn’t detailed, but your earlier description of how you fight and aren’t on the lookout for subs in your area spoke volumes. It is what you didn’t say more than what you did say: you’re busy with cruisers and BB, you ignore other threats and then complain that you didn’t see it coming. Worse, you explicitly argued you didn’t want to know how to deal with them or adapt. That’s your limitation and self-imposed handicap. But you blame the subs, not yourself. Again, doesn’t mean subs are fine as is, it means you’re crying and exaggerating because you put yourself in harms way and your ego can’t accept that you didn’t do everything right. Am I? Really? Are you putting words in my mouth again? Oh gee yes you are. Come on Mary, let’s dance again! No cuteness. Figure it out and grow up. Except you did… Multiple times while crying “no counterplay”. Few people have the stamina to talk to stupid brick walls and take their abusive toxicity and just left the forums eons ago. If it were an untenable position than how is it you can’t come up with any arguments to disprove it? And no, simply stating the same utter nonsense out of ignorance and anecdotes where you messed up time and again just makes me respect you less and dismiss you more easily. Aww. So cute. The Clownfish is attempting an argument ad populum (read: “I have more trolls than you on my side”) on top of more bullying due to having no arguments to fall back on… Yep, doesn’t seem to get much traction that argument of yours. Do I look like the kind of person who likes you, jumps on the troll bandwagons of easy and misplaced arguments, when I explicitly went out of my way to pull of the bandwagon’s wheels, point out none of them know what they’re talking about because their argumentation is too shallow to get anywhere, knowing the trolls would all fall over me as usual? Do you think other people who share my view would enjoy this? Your kind doesn’t tolerate the presence of other views, you want a single view (your arrogant and ignorant want) to dominate and you’ll try to silence others. Guess what. Doesn’t work on me. Still here since beta. Try something else. Maybe something intelligent, if you can. As for popularity of my views… Try reading my suggestion topic. You might be surprised what you find.