Procrastes

Is it any good?

Oh, yeah, this is so familiar... "let's gradually lower the incentive for all playstyles other than head-on brawling, and make it really hard for small, fast and lightly armoured combat vehicles to survive, and see what happens!"

I agree. RPF - or is it RL, for Radio Location, now? - will probably be used by destroyers and cruisers far more often than by battleships. It's going to be an offensive (pun intended) rather than a defensive skill, if I'm any judge. I am speculating as to which will be the best first level 4 skill for destroyers and cruisers, Concealment Expert or Radio Location. I still think CE is going to be more versatile and useful in the long run. If you "locate" the enemy DD:s bearing first, but he's still the first to spot you, he will probably have the advantage. Unless you spot him almost immediately afterward, having charged in with the help of Radio Location, and you already have your guns pointing in the right direction, in which case you will probably have the advantage. Crap. This is just going to be a competition of skill choices, not of individual player skill.

The Adrenaline Rush skill gives a +0,2 % bonus on reload speed on European ships, as opposed to only a +0,1 % bonus for North Americans. At least if you compare the update information on the respective regional homepage. Too bad we can't have inter-server battles, since we Europeans would have the decided advantage in a New Mexican standoff! Or maybe there's a bit of a fuddle communications-wise. WG might want to clear up these numbers, before the update goes live.

Leningrad: 23Blyskawica: 41Flint: 23Belfast: 39 Scharnhorst: 45 + 1 = 46. Still the most beautiful ship in the game. Hiryu (2/2/2): 14Saipan (Torpedo Bombers): 8 - 3 = 5. Will probably be hit hard by the upcoming skill changes.

I'll give it a try: "It's good to see an enemy Emerald closing in, when you're in a battleship."

Leningrad: 22Blyskawica: 40 Flint: 23Fiji: 6 Belfast: 39Scharnhorst: 47 + 1 = 48. Pushing for 50. Hiryu (2/2/2): 17 - 3 = 14. Levelling the field.Saipan (Torpedo Bombers): 8

Actually, I believe that "clairvoyance skills" like RPF are not at all uncommon in tactical online games. The sad part about it is that their effect is to diminish the impact of true player skill on a game, lessening the element of intellectual challenge in trying to out-think and out-guess the opposition, and taking the whole thing more in the direction of click-and-play. In short, it means replacing true player skill with a game mechanic. I think we must assume that this is a conscious decision by WG. That is their prerogative. Personally, I think it's the wrong decision, but there you are.

The Emerald is indeed very easy to citadel. Then again, so is the Leander, but at least she can bite back so it hurts. Best of luck with the grind! (I must admit, I free-xp:ed to the Leander, and then later on to the Fiji. Sometimes I am weak.)

I was about to write something silly and cynical about a new skill that allowed you to see all enemy ships, except battleships, marked on the map for a few seconds. But that would have been just, well, silly and cynical. So I didn't.

This would likely break the spotting mechanics completely, since a lot of DD:s would just maintain permanent radio silence.

I guess that might work. But having it "ping" once every 60 seconds or so, as suggested by mikelight above, is probably a better alternative, if it's going to be a practical skill choice. Although I doubt that the skill would remain at tier 4, it that was implemented. It should be noted that I still prefer that WG scraps the RPF skill altogether.

Actually, you tend to get a lot of citadels when you turn broadside on as well.

This is disconcerting. And it confirms certain theories, that RPF will predominately be a cruiser DD-hunting skill, rather than a given thing for battleships.

Please don't do that, we do need constructive input. And we shouldn't give the battle up for lost, and assume the game is broken for good. Having said this, I too am sceptical to the odds of getting Wargaming to abolish, or even change, RPF at this stage. It's their continued silence in relation to the ongoing discussion that bugs me the most, more than the decision itself - I'd understand if they said they were going to introduce the skill in spite of the criticism, and then evaluate its effect, or something along those lines. But as it is - not a sound from them. As for making the skill into a consumable, well, if getting that consumable would require a 4-point skill, then I agree with mtm78 above - no one would take that. So there would be no point in making that kind of change; at least not straight away. The same would probably go for making RPF into something that just "pings" once a minute; it would be so situational that it would not be worth 4 points. Still, it would be a lot better than the skill as it is now, I give you that. Introducing some kind of Radio Silence counter-mechanic would probably have the same effect of making RPC an unchoosable skill, and it might also cripple the spotting mechanics (there have been other posts about this idea). As for me, I am currently hoping that an enemy battleship that uses RPF to spot my otherwise flawless island torpedo ambush, will thereby have sacrificed his Advanced Firing Training, and will thus have rendered his secondary batteries unable to stop my heroic torpedo death charge in time to save his shiny metal arse from certain doom. And that he'll be lamenting that foolish choice all the way to the bottom!

Shiratsuyu: 6 - 3 = 3. Nothing against her in principle, just shortening the list. Leningrad: 25Blyskawica: 38 + 1 = 39. Always fun, whether top or bottom tier.Flint: 23Fiji: 15Belfast: 36Scharnhorst: 45Hiryu (2/2/2): 17Saipan (Torpedo Bombers): 11

Elite was another of those good old games that have never, in their category, been surpassed. They tried to follow it up a couple of years later with the game Frontier, but that was a total flop, due to the downright stupid position in which you started out in the game. You either had a spaceship that was too small to take any meaningful cargo, which meant you couldn't trade, which was a weird design choice for a game that was all about interstellar cargo trade. Or, you started off with a ship that could take a good load of cargo, but to balance this unfair advantage out, you also started by being outlawed throughout the galaxy. Which meant you couldn't trade, since no one except pirates would trade with you, and all space stations would shoot at you and refuse entry. Which was a weird design choice for a game that etc etc. Today, they would probably just have released a patch. Which goes to show that not everything was better back then, I guess.

Atlantic Fleet - turn-based tactical naval warfare game. Some of you may already be familiar with the computer game Atlantic Fleet. It is a turn-based game of tactical naval warfare, set in World War 2, and it's available on Steam. Jingles just released a video on Youtube, in which he plays out the scenario where the British aircraft carrier Glorious, together with two escorting destroyers, were attacked by the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. In real life, all the British vessels were sunk, while the Germans suffered only light damage to the Scharnhorst. Jingles sets out to try and change history, which he neatly accomplishes by sinking the Scharnhorst and leaving the Gneisenau heavily damaged and taking on water, without suffering any loss of ships himself. I am not really surprised by the outcome. I bought "Atlantic Fleet" some months ago and played a few scenarios. I also started off the campaign, from the German side. I played out the scenario of the battle of the River Plate, sinking all the British ships while suffering only light damage to the Graf Spee. Then I tried the campaign mode for a few hours, collected enough renown (which represents the in-game currency with which to purchase more ships) to get me the light cruiser Leipzig, used her to totally wipe out a British convoy with a couple of escorting destroyers, and then got her sunk by a torpedo from British submarine as the opening action in round one in the next battle. I haven't played it since. My take on the game, so far, is that while I like the simplicity of the game design, torpedoes - and submarines especially - seem to be a bit too effective. So much so, in fact, as to probably be game-breakingly overpowered. Added to this is the all too common drawback of single player games, that the AI seems to be cripplingly bad at making viable tactical decisions. WW2 naval artillery fire is rather neatly simulated, with it's inherent inaccuracy well represented. Salvoes land in the same turn they're fired, with accuracy that stats off bad but improves the more turns you keep firing at the same target. Torpedoes however, function so that you must try to predict where the target will be in one, two or more rounds, and then fire your torpedoes at that point. If the target ship changes course or speed, the torpedoes are likely to miss. You can avoid this completely, however, by simply moving up so close that the torpedoes will reach the target in the same turn they are fired. If you do this, the torpedoes will hit automatically. Since torpedoes do ma huge amount of damage, as well as cause flooding, you can pretty much insta-kill any target with this tactic. A destroyer might have some problems closing to insta-kill distance, especially if the target ship actually performs evasive manoeuvres and tries to defend itself. In the scenario played out by Jingles, both German battleships accommodated him nicely by sailing on obliviously in more or less straight lines, firing exclusively at the Glorious and refusing to react to the oncoming destroyers until the Scharnhorst was sunk. I think we might have to admit to the possibility that the German commanders may have performed somewhat differently in the actual battle, some 77 years ago. Submarines, however, will typically not have any problems closing to insta-kill distance with a surface ship, unless that ship is sailing away from the submarine. A U-boat ambush is, consequently, a very efficient tactic in Atlantic Fleet. And while destroyers do have various weapons against submarines, they have to get really close to use them - and they are no more immune to automatically hitting torpedoes than other ships in the game. Less so, in fact, since they usually sink from a single torpedo hit. Add to this, the fact that you can purchase a huge number of submarines for the same amount of renown that will get you a single cruiser, let alone a battleship. If I play this game again, I will try out the tactic of simply purchasing shitloads of submarines, and keep throwing them at the enemy ships until these are all sunk, or I run out of submarines. (I leave it to the history buffs to comment on whether this tactic actually corresponds to strategic thinking within the Kriegsmarine during WW2.) Jingles heaps praise on Atlantic Fleet, saying - if I recall correctly - that he "can't recommend it enough". I am, as would by now be apparent, somewhat less enthusiastic. It should be noted, however, that I haven't played the game for several months. It has updated once or twice since then, and crucial game mechanics may very well have improved considerably. Or not. I am a little bemused by Jingles review, and so I thought to make a post about it on the forum, and see what people may have to say about all this. I shall try to attach the Jingles' video below.

Shiratsuyu: 12 - 3 = 9 (why there are jpn DD still in here? go play us/ru gunboats, they are 10x better)Mahan: 7Leningrad: 24Blyskawica: 35 + 1 = 36Myoko: 4 - 3 = 1Flint: 23Fiji: 20Belfast: 35Scharnhorst: 45Hiryu (2/2/2): 20Saipan (Torpedo Bombers): 11 It seems logged on too late to save Eisengnu! Then again, I could only have delayed the inevitable. There's a lot of them out to sea right now, the lists are brimming with little Gnu's. Are they all just grinding for the Bismarck?

I bought the Dunkerque on a whim, and I don't regret it. I've had only a few battles in her so far, but they've been fun - I even got a Dreadnought achievement out of the last one. And she plays differently to all other battleships, on account of her gun turret placement, so there's the added incentive for varied gameplay. My advice would be, if you can afford her, buy her and give her a try!

I hear you. At this point, I think it would be a good thing for Wargaming to come out and make a statement regarding RPF, addressing the concerns expressed by us - their playerbase. It is their game, they can take its development in whatever direction they want - but it would be a nice and sensible thing to do, from a goodwill point of view.

If any navy will receive battleships with uncommonly high accuracy, I know where I would place my bets. (Hint: It wouldn't be the British.)

There is this psychological mechanism called "anchoring". (A fittingly naval term, in this case.) Say you are in negotiations and you want to achieve the result '5'. You start out by demanding '10'. Your counterpart reacts with disgust. "What? No way! We could never agree to that!!!" So you say, "Ok, how about '5'?" Your opponent - who really rather would have wanted at the most a '3' - is gratified by your swift accession, and the matter is settled. '5' it is. Krautjaeger has a good point: Besides RPF, how do we really feel about the other skill changes?

Some people argue that RPF will not be so damaging to the game, because many players will probably choose other skills instead of it. Leaving aside the inherent fallacy of basing an evaluation on an unknown factor - namely, that we do not know in advance which skills will be most popular - I do not consider this to be a valid argument. It might be relevant, if other skills had been added, that by themselves created an unbalance that would be fixed by also adding RPF. This is not the case.

Love that BB-Bingo card! The text in the box furthest to the left in bottom row should read, "Destroyers should be limited!" Otherwise, this about covers it.