Panocek

And only way to actually achieve that is replace all DDs, CVs, BBs etc with single "ship" and let players apply Gearing, Yamato or Minotaur skin to it, with no gameplay changes. The moment you start differentiating ships, some combinations WILL be better than others and players will start gravitating towards these. Its not really going to happen, as WG stated repeatedly Random games are NOT going to have any sort of skill based MM to keep things Random, as game mode name implies. At the same time, you can play Cossack only so many times before she gets dull too. And to make things worse, the moment you bring any other not-hyper-carry-DD you will moan "if only I had Cossack/Lightning/something similar here, I'd win this" Added relevant part. You can have quality "DD main" but the moment he brings out Tashkent, odds aren't going to be stacked in your favor

Doesn't seem to be the case, otherwise texture for "red bottom" hull would be adjusted as well.

And it took you only 2130 posts to realize that?

Except Stalingrad casually thrashes Sevastopol. Effectively the same AP pen on both ships, 380mm guns don't sound so almighty anymore when 27mm+ plating is commonplace, so trading 9x 305 or even 220mm barrels for 6x380 is actual downgrade for all intents and purposes. Sevastopol also to my knowledge lacks 50mm plating making her actually vulnerable and relying on her own version of forever reloading 3d printer, making her genuinely the worst of all T10 russian supercruiser options. No radar either.

You've paid for premium experience and premium experience you shall receive Experience of Wargaming shafting everyone, paying customers even more so.

comparable vs compared to, close enough

On gun oriented DDs, it gives you rough idea where enemy destroyer might be, so you can yolo in correct direction to close the gap as soon as possible. On torpedo destroyers, with some practice and common sense you can score surprising number of torpedo hits based on RPF readout, bonus points for "there is a DD this way and its probably a Daring as all other were spotted elsewhere, so lets not go that way". And then RPF for destroyers narrows down enemy sub locations. Sure, doesn't help you against sub at max depth, but surface/periscope, it at least can point you in right direction.

For starters, T7 Pensacola had way back then base concealment on par with her upgraded gun range. And Concealment skill was matter of getting 15pointer captain, not 10 as it is now. Also I don't think 25mm plating was common back then on tier 7, certainly I do know 25mm plating became common on tier 6 after IFHE/armor changes AND then afterwards Pensa/Nope Orlean got plastered in 25mm wholesale Happens when game mechanics are binary in effect. Either you are spotted or you don't. Either you penetrate or you don't. Either you overmatch or you don't.

RPF gives information. It is not "pick and forget" skill like Concealment or Reload ones, you need to pay attention it and crosscheck its bearing with that is going on in battle. Suddenly points into nowhere? DD or sub appeared there. Cap is being capped is rather obvious tell tale, but RPF narrows it down. Also if it points towards big ol island, odds are your Sauron eye will be wasted, as capping culprit is probably safe there. Keep in mind, RPF can be used against you by competent players, as skill shows warning you're radio located. When this warning switches between division mates and this fact is not lost to them, you can triangulate rough location of RPF user.

Obviously, achieving 30%+ hit rate comparable to IRL 3-5% is preposterous

76mm is common citadel plating at tier 6, while to have any hope of stopping BB grade munitions we're looking at 300mm+, not found on any cruiser in game. And ones that do get close to that value, face guns casually having 500mm or more pen at 15km At the same time, Pensacola 25mm hull can ricochet 350mm guns, which are common sight at midtiers, feat not necessarily replicable by other cruisers of her tier.

Just as liberal is gunnery in this game

I'm not so sure whether getting "sudden Thunderer appears" when you're in equally concealable cruiser coated in 30mm plating is a "gameplay improvement". And I'd say game gets passive the moment there is failure of spotting. When you see everyone in your flank, its much easier to determine whether to push. Sure, it sucks for concealment dependent ships, but its case of damned if you do, damned if you don't with whole Concealment mechanic being binary in action. Obviously, getting teammates to press W with you is entirely different matter. For Moskva/Stalingrad, yes. Wandering into Petro/Des Moines headfirst, you WILL get within radar range even if you immediately start turning away. Radar Minotaur/Plymouth on other hand... ye, have fun with that. With "more focus on ambushes" you will get even more stale gameplay as people would refuse to move anywhere out of fear "there might be bad people out there". High stealth ships like torpedo DD would operate as usual, bringing situation back to square one: if you don't have your own spotter slave do do (counter)spotting, you're not going to have fun.

On the same reason why everyone else do: to slow down speedrunners and encourage daily login habit

We had that and it was yeeted because it was actually working as intended

Not really. WG put much effort and planning to maximize profits from Sub introduction. Captain respecs (when we had any discount, let alone "free" one despite subs being constantly changing) as people might be interested to test various skills against new threat. Selectively adding or not ASW of varying effectiveness to existing premiums just to nudge you a bit to... acquire new premium boat that happens to have less dysfunctional ASW package. New class being correctly frustrating to play against so people would spend money and resources to get "that OP griefing tool" for themselves, regardless if they would be up to the task of using one. Introduction of Subs into Rankeds/CBs also will encourage people to get them ASAP, especially when Subs enter game proper on bit more balans side of things.

You mean SubOctavianowsk Given post ww2 army/navy/what else saw major cuts and reductions, odds are, some pen holders would prefer to not acquire 50% MOAR FREEDOM when they already have metric jesuston of surplus ships in very much decent condition. Even more so as jet/missile era was poking its head out. Also afaik for spending bit more than Alaska you had an Iowa proper, or for price of one Alaska you had two Baltimores which were far from bad ships, could be present at two places at once and more importantly for MUH FREEDOM, single Baltimore carried comparable amount of AA to an Alaska so its citizens could properly exercise their second amendment

So does Kronshtadt while being plastered in 25mm plating AND have overmatchable citadel roof, unless there is hidden armor plate like in Iowas. You're literally showing what I've said - only major outlier in CB department is Stalingrad. Otherwise you're looking at 30mm penetration difference at best compared to Azuma twins. And +-350mm pen at 15km can be found wanting when it comes to perforating BB main belts, even more so when any kind of angle kicks in. Against cruisers, 12" guns are overkill and due to 51mm sensitivity fuse, they are also notorious to overpen non-citadel-hits Hold your horses, those are features for MegaPetro

Which pits US 305 against "powerhouses" like Kron, Stalin or for some reason, 380mm on Siegfried Shiptool and wowsft shows Alaska, Agir and Azuma to be "close enough" with less than 30mm difference in pen at 15km and that is inline with my own experience with all three guns - you just don't bother yourself shooting battleships with AP and hope for main belt penetration outside of distances you can charitably describe as "yolo"

"Improving stealth" and "push for aggressive play" are at odds - you can't make informed decision if its worth committing to a push without knowing what lurks out there. That would require Radar to be either constantly active or have MUCH longer duration and range. Otherwise, no one sane would risk their ship only to have few blips and enemy ship locations refreshing every 3-5 seconds which would greatly diminish usefulness of the consumable.

US 305mm AP performance is about the same as German 305 on Agir or 310 on Azuma twins. Its Russians who stand out penetration wise All large cruisers are living up to "large" part of their name, nothing new there. Again, same story with all CBs Afaik she uses usual cruiser DCP, 5s action time and 60s cooldown? Again, the same as on any other CB You mean its the story of every large cruiser with possible exception of Stalingrad, as at least she have some AP pen, comparable to French 380mm or NorCal/SoDak 406mm... which isn't a lot by tier 10 standards and certainly can be lacking at usual combat ranges Stalin performs best AND when not having perfect broadsides to bonk. For starters, as early as Brooklyn class guns were "autoloaded" or required relatively little human input to achieve their 6s reload for 152mm shells. Worcester was "improvement" primarily in attempt to achieve fully automated loading in all elevations for dual purpose role, though idea of double feed for quickly switching between AP/HE and VT rounds apparently proved to be major "reliability issue" (?), all that for "modest" improvement of 5s reload. For reference, dual purpose turrets on Tiger/Minotaur could keep up up to 20 rounds per minute, or 3s reload. My point is, times when battleship or even cruiser grade munitions were manhandled and completely manually loaded were long gone by ww2 period and as weight increases exponentially with caliber, I don't think it would be feasible to speed up loading half a ton 305 projectiles faster than Alaska achieved at 3 rounds/min Second, 76mm AA guns on Des Moines/Worcester/Minotaur WERE outright nasty during RTS days and coupled with AA range extending skills/upgrades, they could deliver their dakka as far as 7.2km, same range as majority of 127mm guns in game. Nowadays, especially with "for balancing reasons"... If they were to make Pay2Rico today, she would have been a supershit now with all the Freedom gimmicks and then some more. Probably premium one as we don't have CB line (yet).

Which explains why you have average damage of a SINGLE torpedo hit... oh wait

At the same time, there was AA that could actually discourage CV from going left right and center. Also DFAA was actually useful, even on lowliest of AA ships.

Only instance where it made modicum of sense to "escort CV" was during early RTS days, when CV sniping was rather common tactic and Iowa/Baltimore or other ship (back then) famous for AA near CV usually was one way of ensuring CV survival. Sadly it came at expense of removing one ship from battle, which could tip the battle elsewhere and not in your favor. More like:

Not going to fix anything, as people even remotely associated with game development: -don't read forums -certainly don't read EU forums sadly, there is no other way than "stop/reduce playtime" when game ceases to be fun.