DrMechano

Especially the tier 7 BBs, that 25mm bow can be a right pain when it comes to being uptiered but since tier 8-10 has 32mm which only the mighty Yamaushi twins can deal with head on means you stand a chance. Saying that having gone back through the IJN BB line due to the Naval Center has given me a new appreciation for the Izumo. When I first played her I rushed the crap out of the line and she has some terrible stats (like really terrible) but now thanks to the buffs shes had in the meantime as well as me learning a more yammie playstyle she is actually fairly tolerable.

Sadly I can't really recommend anything because my credit earner is no longer in game..the old Musashi...slapping some flags on her along with a credit bonus camo and, with a premium account, my record stands at 1.4 million credits in a single game. Sure the old Mighty Mo could easily beat that with the same setup but I fell the Musashi gets a better deal because of those 460mm guns and overmatching everything it meets tier 10 or...bless their souls...the poor tier 7s that she regularly goes up against. Though if you want a fun mid-tier ship I'd highly recommend the Arizona or the Warspite. The Warspite might not overmatch everything she meets but she is very accurate and those 380mm guns are pretty damn punchy. The West Virginia '41 also gets this with the 406mm guns but she lacks the enhanced heal of the Warspite and is less accurate. The Arizona trades overmatch for sheer volume of firepower, whilst she doesn't have the AA of her silver ship cousin (the New Mexico) she gives that up for enhanced accuracy on her main battery which, when you're slinging 12 356mm guns downwind can do some good old American justice.

So just a general question, it feels like that the IJN BB line, while it ends in the Yamato which still has a unique property (460mm guns) the rest of the line feels somewhat...eh... The Russian BB line usually outclasses them tier for tier, the US line got their citadels lowered a touch, the RN line...eh...now they've raised the citadels on everything tier 7 and up....ok yeah they're not as mighty as they once were (if the KGV was really ever...mighty...) so I'd say they're probably on par with the IJN line. The German line is...an odd duck but it is much tougher than the IJN line (though I imagine most Kreigsmarine players would trade toughness for better gun accuracy). Thinking about it, it IS mainly the RU BB line that is the problem, the Izmail is like the Fuso and New Mex but...well better (ish), I would say the Sinop far outclasses any BB of its tier.

To be fair the Yamato/Musashi I feel still have a place since they've confirmed that no other ship will get the 460mm guns able to overmatch the bow/stern of almost all other battleships (with the exception of the old Currywurst but that thing has the accuracy of Spaceball 1 "I said across her nose, not up it!") even the Kreml only gets the lower back portion of the bow armoured, unlike say, the Moskva which actually gets 50mm of middle plating. The Nagato is definitely in need of some buffs, she is accurate but she has less guns than the Sinop (8 vs 9), the Sinop can bring more guns to firing from the front (6 vs 4) and she is generally more accurate at proper engagement ranges AND she's quicker to boot with a very good AA suite. All the other ships get a trade off, the Lyon gets a lot of guns but they're low caliber, the KGV is...well...now they've raised the citadel...actually kind of a turkey only good for starting fires, the Gneis is tougher and faster with torps but...again...accuracy is an issue and the Colorado is sluggish but gets the nine guns and ridiculous AA. The Sinop gets all the best bits and none of the worst apart from a raised citadel.

I recently switched over to playing some time on the US account....and sweet jesus that pissed me off no end. That entire unlocking process is not fun at all. You don't actually unlock camo, even at a fair speed, until you're nearly tier 7 down one line. Heck I still haven't unlocked clan battles on there...not that I'd play them.

The classic example of a massive credit multiplier is the good old Mo Money, Mo Problems, aka the Missouri I think that has a ridiculous 2x or greater credit multiplier (if you deal anyway damage, you make money and even a halfway decent game nets you 700K plus). I know the Musashi has a large credit multiplier, nowhere near as high as the Mighty Mo but I feel it is higher than regular premiums since it was meant to be a replacement for the Mo.

The idea of dealing with them in other cruisers is that you can usually outrange them OR push comes to shove the Mino can only fire AP, turn bow or stern in against them and they'll be down to dealing scratch damage. The Mino is a high skill floor, high skill ceiling type of ship, it takes a good person to do well in it since it is also the squishiest of the tier 10 Cruisers, I've seen many a Mino blown up from long range from a BB salvo if they weren't careful and god forbid the Mino try to close the distance and get autopenned through the nose by all other BB guns. Its why I don't do well in RN cruisers (I only got up to the Fiji), they take some skill to use decently.

Yup add more options to other Ships. Give them a new set of planes that is purely anti-submarine (Aerial depth charge squadron), sure it's one of those "but if there are no subs, it's useless" well DFAA is useless if you take it when a CV isn't in the game and they're not losing planes, they're just getting another squadron but purely with anti-sub duties. Give subs at periscope depth low surface detection range but higher aerial detection range along with allowing Spotter planes to see them. Give Cruisers the ability to hunt subs as well, I mean they already get hydro and numerous light AND heavy cruisers already have the depth charges modeled on the ship. I also like the idea of BBs having an 'decoy beacon' consumable with a fairly long cooldown where if they suspect they've been pinged, can throw out a decoy to lead the homing torps off target. The player won't KNOW they've been pinged so they have to make an educated guess when and where to deploy the beacon.

The thing was they COULD have balanced these ships but they would have had to offer full cash refunds for said ships, which is something WG are very reluctant to do since "oh my god, we might lose a bit of money". If they were really interested in balancing the game they'd nerf the ships, take the hit to the wallet and keep plodding on.

I use to think the "Noob buys his way to high tier with premium ships" was basically a stereotype that never ACTUALLY happened (and yes I know, my stats are average). But my god...Today I ran into someone who actually fit the bill. Now obviously name has been obscured but just look at this... Notice that he only has 752 battles and the majority of his games are in tier 8 premiums. So basically he booted the game up, bought several tier 8 Premiums and that is all he's done. He spent the entire battle I was just in with him spamming HE in his Tirpitz and launching torps at targets well beyond his torp range...the guy was THE reason the flank folded (Me and a Neptune killed 3 ships between us, a Nelson, a Neptune and the enemy Tirpitz)...meanwhile he sailed at the back of the map, spamming his HE...Eventually me and the Neptune were overwhelmed by the weight of firepower bought against us...and still he just sailed around near the map border spamming HE and missing ALL of his shots. Like I honestly thought this type of player was a myth, a kind of urban legend made up as a straw man argument but jesus christ they actually exist!

Well hopefully they tweak this but chances are they don't. WG basically balance around top tier and thats about it. Meaning the Furious will remain a badbote until probably some time in a year when they actually do a buff pass on it...maybe...

Yeah the Furious is by far the worst tier 6 CV. Her 'gimmick' of level bombing is basically useless since it doesn't have large enough attack runs (really 1 plane at a time? Really?) or large enough squadrons. Personally I would have made it so the Brits had high HP aircraft with high squadron numbers but very low reserves. Meaning that for their tier they had very good alpha strike capabilities but virtually no backup if things went back.

Yeaaah....that CAN'T go live, I think someone had hit the vodka a bit too much when thinking "Da, it is balanced for tier 5 Comrade!"

Ok someone explain to my WHY the Hatsu and the Shira are in the 'gunboat' line. Their reload on their 127mm guns suck compared to the 130mm guns on their russian counterparts (with BFT 6.8 seconds for the Shira vs 4.5 with the the Minsk), the turret traverse is just AWFUL (If I wanted to play a ship with glacial turret traverse, I'd play a Musashi). Sure they have good torps (that can be spotted a mile off it seems) and much better detection ranges than the Russians but it feels like those trade offs aren't worth it. It's like WG couldn't decided whether they wanted a gunboat DD or a Torp boat DD and sort of made a generally 'meh' DD that's not so great at both. Are these two a hold over from the pre-split line when awful turret traverse and meh guns was a feature of the IJN DDs? I assume the Shira is the result of nerf after nerf being piled onto it back when it could 'wall of skill' people.

I've heard great things about the Kitakaze, so much so that people say to stick with the tier 9 and not upgrade to the tier 10 since apparently the trade offs aren't worth it. Yeah I can't wait to get the Kita, she looks just ridiculous.

Sure it's only got 1 launcher but come on, if you're using torps in a Aki, you're either in serious trouble or you're being opportunistic with them, the TRB is kind of wasted on the Aki since it isn't its main mode of attack, unlike the Shira.

Just got the Aki and I think it's replacing the Kiev as my favorite DD. BBs, it melts those, enemy DDs, it melts those, same tier cruisers from smoke (as long as they don't have radar of course), IT. MELTS. THOSE. It turns the game into a bullet hell shooter for the enemy, sure its cruiser slow but my god I'd trade that speed for that kind of firepower any day.

Russian DDs, the line is fun from tier 5 and upwards. Gunboat style in the extreme. The Podi is basically a DD bully since at lower tiers you'll often get enemy DD captains making the mistake of opening fire on you, blowing their concealment and then you proceed to destroy them with your fast reloading guns. The IJN Gunboat DD line only really gets going from tier 8 but my god does it get going from there. Think of them as mini American cruisers, hug islands, abuse smoke and help friendly DDs bully other DDs off the cap with your ridiculous DPM.

Well I used free XP to skip past the Shira and what do you know, the tier 8 gets both smoke AND TRB...but it's a gunboat...like what the hell were you thinking WG? On a side note, sweet jesus the Aki may be slow for a DD but good lord that rain of death she can bring (yes if have a 19 point IFHE captain in her), I've never seen a DD just straight up bully everything and anything that comes her way...as long as she isn't radar'd..she turns the game into a bullet hell shooter for the enemy and I dread to think what the tier 9 is like...also 15km range is just a cherry ontop of that cake.

Still I'm finding more success with smoke than TRB, just think it's more my playstyle. Still will grind through it to get to the real show of the gunboat line.

Most people have stopped using rockets to go after DDs on the USN CV line and have switched to the HE DBs, much harder to hit but much more damage. With the IJN line you're stuck with rocket planes though :(

I meant mainly in the Musashi since one of its biggest weakness is its terrible AA which the fighter makes up for. I run spotter plane for the range in my Zao for example because it has decent enough AA and being able to set fires halfway across the map and fire over islands.

The problem I have with torps is, as several CCs have put it, that they're unreliable damage apart from at near suicide ranges OR if the enemy doesn't expect to be hit by torps at extended ranges (the Zao 12km torps often catch chasing opponents by surprise). The Shira's torps have quite a large detection range and she only gets 2 launchers. I've had much better success with smoke with her than with the Torp reload booster but then that's because I'm usually a very aggressive DD player (hence my current favorite line being the Russian line. With the congratulatory camo on the Keiv I'll probably be keeping her since she's basically a premium ship with that camo)

So, the Hatsu and the Shira are basically penalty boats you have to play to get the to good stuff at tier 8...essentially free XP sinks of the line and I doubt they're going to be seeing modifications or buffs any time soon to make them better fit the idea of a gunboat line...Well I shall grind through the Shira as quickly as possible then.

Yup most ships apart from like, 2 or 3, have a larger detection range than Radar range. Off the top of my head I know the Chapyev can stealth radar but that was before the concealment nerf and not sure on the other two. The rest of the Ruskies have a least a 1km-2km gap between detection and radar. Hell in my Kiev I've baited radar out of them before by just going into it, letting them set off radar and then speed boosting at 48 knots back out of range and just waiting the 30 seconds until it's done.