Panocek

I've tested it, I had ship clearly in secondaries range, once I've designated him - they opened fire. Then I've designated someone else, outside range and secondaries ceased to fire with previous ship still in range.

They doesn't open fire until you designate someone within range.

Gearing + BFT + RoF upgrade + Last Chance = around 1.5s reload

AA goes from "OP" to "brutal". 40mm dps jumps by 25%, from 54 to 68 , 127mm goes from 36 to 91, although AA skill have reduced multiplier from x6 to x4.

There *might* be second test round, presumably with the same setup following: first day tiers locked up to 6, 2nd day up to 8 and 3rd day all tiers unlocked.

But torps with speed over 9000 are OP regardless of their range being shorter than arming distance!!!1!eleven Zao is very powerful on her own without even touching torps.

Considering Zao have one hell of a DP guns, which multiply nicely with AA barrage and manual AA skill works nicely for her too. Actually DM benefits the least from AA barrage, with "only" 91dps to start with, while Zao have 125 and Hamburger 133. If anything you should be afraid of last one, although all kruzers can into AA. Zao knocking 50 Midway planes without dedicated AA build? Why not Still, quick get-in-and-get-out bombing runs gets the job done without massive plane losses unless you attack 4 ships covering each other

Test server ded But Zao definitely confirmed stronk.

AFT and maybe BFT will be in use, together with AA range upgrade. But Tier 9+ no way will trade man battery range for AA dps.

That Montana have half hp before your TB run and looks quite scorched to me

Zao AA is nothing to sneeze at too. Dps values doesn't look intimidating, but once you combine 125dps (more than Yamato!) from DP guns with AA barrage and maybe even manual AA skill, things are going down fast. Trick is to soften up AA with HE, be it teammates or dive bombers. Yolo rush against brand new Montana wasn't exactly successful Also 21 DB on manual drop against battered Yamato can give decent damage as well (20k + 4 fires)

How to say it... if you really want to Midway, you better get acquainted with DB manual drops. TB don't have double torps. Also attempt to torp single Zao - failed Although 21 dive bombers on manual drop against BBs can be "okay" - did about 20k damage + 4 fires against Yamato, with torpedo run following soon after. Also ships that get so much dive bombing became harmless to planes Fighters are... useless. Sure, they win dogfights just fine against IJN (7v5, USN wins with 2 lost), but after single fighter squadron they have almost no ammo to hunt for TB/DB I guess either you wait for teams to batter ships with HE, so they lose some AA or do autodrop DB attack runs to soften up AA. Then you can go torpedo or precise DB runs

Can't you test drive yourself? I'm no clicker scrub and I might strap torps onto fighters and such Surprisingly Vigilance skill seems to be good enough against World of Derpstroyers, although doing evasive manoeuvres when you have DD around still apply.

Did that. sub 2s reload Montana at 5km under AP fire started to melt quite fast. But Zao is balanced/10. EPIC guns (HE dmg, fire chance, AP pen, AP dmg, trajectory, good range), decent agility, speed, some armor against crusier guns, even "ermagad nerfed AA" is good enough to fend off Haku planes. Add to that excellent camo, so you can sneak up gunboats below 10km for some Gonna try Derp Moines soon and its AA, if Zao with +-220dps is gud enough, I can only imagine DM

If in doubt, working as intended

Testserver have all the sheeps unlocked now... So far, Gearing looks okay - so much 0dmg dakka and actually gud torps.

USN BBs from tier 5 to 7 have main battery range upgrade for some time already. To at least have chance to IJN, which enjoy 20km+ from tier 5, while using accuracy mod

Last Chance for now is working as intended - instead granting you 30% reload when hp is below 10%, it reduces your hp pool by 10% and grants you permanent 30% RoF increase. Battleship with 20s reload, why not

Nope. 5 tier CV skill adds 1 fighter and 1 dive bomber to squadrons, so Langley will enjoy 7 fighters, 6 TB and 7 BD

AA still fires and knocks planes without your input. Its secondaries skill that need designation

On test German Kruzers beat USN in AA department from tier 8 onwards, while having pretty good guns. Considering today tier 8 was unlocked, I guess tomorrow T10 will be?

Kaptun, up for testserver scrubbing? NC with AA build is totally balanced against carriers Though her shell velocity is... 404 not found. 16s to 23km

As tier 8 is now unlocked, I've prepped North Carolina into survival and AA setup (SA, BoS, BFT EM, Vigilance, Superintendent, AFT, on top of that 20% AA range, both DCS and TAS) and well, getting anywhere close to NC with planes is pretty much death wish. Although due to serious dps from DP guns (183dps with all upgrades/skills/flags), I can imagine BBs having more use from manual AA control skill than AFT, preferably both combined.