Procrastes

How much xp - free or regular - does it cost to reset a line anyway? And how many resets do you need in order to get 55 000 research points?

I would have quite liked to have the Benham. But she was locked behind a grindwall of such magnificent height that I didn't have to feel even slightly conflicted about giving her a pass. So in a way, WG made that one easy for me.

Absolutely! If it's not all about what I want - me! - then what's to write about? You're right, of course. I freely admit that the post you quoted does not hold up under objective scrutiny. It's an expression of my own personal feelings, which have for a while now been that tasty high-tier premium destroyers have almost all been available for hard-to-get resources only, such as steel, probibitively large amounts of free xp or research points. I am thinking of such ships as the Black, the Småland and the Vampire II respectively. But one only has to mention the one you named, the Marceau, to realize that my perceptions does not correspond to reality. My psychiatrist, if I had one, would probably say that I suffer under a case of confirmation bias; I predominantly yearn for destroyers and experience disproportionate feelings of rejection whenever a new "steel/RB-points only-DD" turns up. Time for a reality check, then. Is there any basis for my impression that high-tier premium destroyers have been made availaible for easily obtainable resources (coal or cash) less frequently than other ship types? Over to you!

If you say so. I'm not even all that annoyed with having the ARP Yamato in the game, although I resent what she represents - namely, WG:s increasing tendency to prioritize short term monetary gain over the long term health of the game. That being said, if they do release an ARP Vampire II for money, I'll probably get her. My moral standards evidently have their breaking point as well...

Since Wargaming seems to be set on never releasing a top tier destroyer for anything other than steel or research points, I doubt I'll ever see the Vampire II in my port. I simply don't have the time and the wherewithal to regrind enough tech trees to ever get her, even though I'd like to. As it is, I suppose they will conclude in about six months or so that she's too popular to keep in the game, and remove her from sale after a time period careful adjudged to send the RB scrubs* into a proper frenzy. I'm not one to call for more tier X ships to be sold for money - in fact, I abhor the practice - but if they're gonna do it anyway, it would be a decent thing to cater a bit to the DD mains as well. But no, the Vampire II is put on the shelf for 55 000 research points, whereas they sold that abomination ARP Yamato for cash, cash, cash... Ye Olde Hypocrite * Please note that the term "RB scrubs" is not used as a negative. It is used with a sense of proper awe at those indivuduals whose skill and dedication to the game so far surpass mine own, that they have reached those lofty shelves where Vampires and Ohios dwell.

The T-61 is a much stronger ship than the Ernst Gaede, indeed almost shamefully so. There is no reason that I can see to play the tech tree ship where the premium one is available. This design choice can be questioned, but it does not - in a of itself - make the T-61 overpowered. I would further argue that a ship is not neceassarily overpowered merely by virtue of being the strongest at its tier. I agree with the rest of your evaluation of the T-61, although I will stand by my own opinion that she is not overpowered. I feel that there is too great a tendency on this forum to designate a strong ship as overpowered, especially if one has lately been facing off against a skilled enemy in said ship. I have myself been in that position more than once, fired up into a good old rage of frustrated admiration after having been on on the receiving end of a well-played Kamikaze. I don't think I'd call the Kami a one-trick pony, however. She can stealth torp, she can scout and relocate, she can lay smoke - and she's fast enough to be able to dictate the terms of engagement. Her only true weakness is her weak AA in combination with the Double CV plague, which latter anomaly is a result of WG:s lamentable CV policy and no fault of hers.

I would like to make a comparison with my own favourite ship in WoWs, the T-61. The T-61 is mentioned by Captain @Verblonde in post #81 above, and for good reason. She is, in my opinion, the best tier VI destroyer currently in the game. She has good concealment, decent overall stats otherwise, good torpedoes with a very fast reload, and access to hydro. This is balanced out with her having fairly anemic guns and not the best mobility for a destroyer of her tier. Is she a strong ship? Absolutely so. Is she an overpowered ship? Absolutely not. The T-61 has an excellent toolbox that will let you deal with just about any situation you might find yourself in when you sail out in her. But by God, she will make you work for it. In order to do well in her, you must play to her strengths, plan your actions with forethought, and choose your battles wisely. In short, the T-61 rewards clever play but punishes mistakes harshly. She encourages her captains to become better players, but if you don't work for it, you will not have an easy time sailing out in her. This combination of traits makes her, in my opinion, one of the best designs Wargaming has ever made.

Good points. I don't think there's much doubt that any player who has mastered the basics of what it means to be an all-out torpedo destroyer, will find the Kami to be a very rewarding ship. She does indeed have fairly large margins with respect to her strengths.The main hurdle, as I see it, is to master the required play style to begin with - and doing so typically takes both time and effort. Being a torpoedo ninja is probably not for everyone. And if you mess up in the Kami, she is no more forgiving than any other destroyer - she will punish mistakes quite harshly. Is the Kami "easy to do at least ok in"? She might be. Does this make her overpowered? Again, I'm not sure.

Can I pick up on this one? The Kami has a lot of strengths and only one real weakness, namely her outrageously bad AA. Her guns are no real weakness since she's an all-out torpedo ninja and not supposed to use them for DD duels, but - and this is a big but - if she does find herself in a position to use them, they pack quite a punch. Her torpedoes can be a nightmare to deal with, but only if - and this is a big if - she's left alone to use them at her leisure. Is the Kami a strong ship? Yes, undoubtedly. I'd say that she is, with your words, very very strong - but that strength is not so easily accessed. The Kamikaze sisters require both a high level of skill and a patient playstyle from their captain, before granting their favours. Is the Kami an overpowered ship? She might be. To be honest, I'm not sure. The best definition I've ever read of what constitutes an overpowered ship, is "a ship that even an unskilled player can expect to regularly do well in".* By this definition at least, the Kami is not an poverpowered ship. Her playstyle is quite hard to master, especially these days when she can expect to have to deal with hydro-equipped ships at every turn (and even the occasional tier VII radar). And this is without even mentioning the ubiquitous planes that come with the Double CV plague at lower tiers. In short, a potato will potato in a Kami just as hard as he would in any other (non-op) ship. All in all, I think most veteran players would be happy to agree that the Kamikaze twins are two very strong ships. But if we are looking for ships in need of the theoretical** nerfbat, in this day and age, they are pretty far from being at the top of the list. * The Giulio Cesare could probably be said to qualify as overpowered with this definition, in my opinion. The Smolensk, most certainly. ** 'Theoretical' because WG does not usually make individual nerfs to existing premium ships.

Again with the 'remove/nerf the Kamikaze' song? This tune sure is getting old. Yes, the Kamikaze sisters are viciously dangerous in the hands of a skilled player, but so is any good destroyer. In the hands of a normal potato (such as me), they can be countered or played around just like any other ship. Even a moderately competent battleship player can confound a lot of the torpedo launches by changing course and speed now and again, or just driving the other way. With a couple of allies on hand there is every chance the Kami will be countered before being able to sink you, and if you're all alone in a battleship with only an enemy destroyer for company you've been outplayed anyway and the rest is just closing credits. Or if the WASD hax seems to hard, then by all means jump into a carrier? The Kami has, what, one single machine gun for AA purposes? Two? With Double CV games currently being all the rage down at tier 5, the Kamis are most definitely not in a happy place.

CV:s in their present state are a bad psychological design. Will Wargaming learn from this and do better in the future? Strange as it may seem from the title, this is not a CV post. Nor is it intended to be a whine post. Bear with me, and read on. CV:s are, at present, easily the most pampered ship class in the game. While the above statement is of course a very subjective opinion of mine, the fact is that the plethora of invulnerabilities and automatically deployed countermeasures - such as fires being put out almost instantly, immunity to detonations and fighters being launched automatically - contribute to reduce CV gameplay to a repetitive formula of "fly out - bomb target - get shot down - fly out again" that is really more reminiscent of a 1980's era arcade game than the nuanced, interactive and challenging experience that makes up the gameplay for ordinary surface ships. Giving CV:s endlesssly regenerating plane squadrons and leaving them one last squadron alive even if the carrier (God forbid!) should be sunk, compounds the error since it has removed any need for consequence thinking and resource management on behalf of CV players. I'm not saying resource management isn't a good thing for them to have, but it isn't necessary. The above factors are well known to all of us and are not the main point of this post; they are merely recounted to provide the backdrop. The main point of my post is what a strikingly bad game design CV:s are from a psychological perspective. The design flaw I am talking about here, is the one that is manifested in the game by how universally loathed CV:s are by a large part of the community. Without making any sort of excuse for harassment or abuse of CV players - for there is absolutely no excuse for this kind of behaviour - the ill will that currently exists towards CV:s (and which sadly tends to spill over on CV players) is a direct consequence of Wargaming's own design choices. It is really a question of basic psychology: If you select one person or class from a given group, and pamper that person/class with very visible special privileges and advantages, this treatment will inevitably lead to resentment among the rest of the group. The WoWs community is no more immune to this than any other group of people have been throughout the course of history. I have on more than one occasion expressed my honest delight over how nice and friendly people in the World of Warships community generally are. While there are certainly isolated instances of bad behaviour, there is nothing on the level of the recurring toxicity that many have come to expect when logging in to, say, the World of Tanks. Battles and forum discussions in WoWs are typically conducted in an atmosphere of friendly competition and polite debate, respectively. It is up to us - all of us - to maintain this pleasant status quo. With this in mind, I can't help but to feel concerned when I read statements such as "Sky Cancer" or "Report all CV Players" in the battle chat. I am equally dismayed when I myself experience feelings of budding resentment after having spent an entire battle in my Daring being constantly spotted and eventually sunk by proxy by the enemy CV (who played a very good game, by the way). I am not suggesting that Wargaming has put the current CV mechanics in place with the intention to cause division and discontent among the players. But they must, by now at least, be aware that this has in fact occurred. The question is if they are prepared to acknowledge it and act to redress it. This is a relevant concern not only with regards to the future development of the CV class, but also with regards to how they may choose to go ahead with other future design choices (their plans for a possible future submarine class come to mind). Inequality breeds resentment. This is as true in the World of Warships as it is in any real life society. Wargaming should take note.

I somehow got the feeling that the trend of releasing more carefully balanced (that, non-op) premiums started a few years ago when WG felt compelled to scrap their plans on making existing premiums subject to nerfs?

Unless one takes into account that meme secondary builds require you to put skill points into secondary gun skills instead of primary gun skills. Wow. No wonder WG disabled the comments to that one.

Duly noted, and I have edited my post accordingly. Ideally, creating a fun and engaging experience should be gainful for Wargaming as well. Out of curiosity: What 'misconceptions around changed secondary workings'? I know a few things have changed about the secondaries, but I still run my German battleships loaded for bear (and damn the torpedoes)!

This is a good point, and one reason (out of several) why I'm worried that the introduction of submarines might compound the problem by introducing another loathed ship class. Just like planes, submarines move in another dimension in relation to surface ships. Even worse, they move under water and are thus typically invisible to ships without access to hydro and invulnerable to ships without access depth charges. So, how do you have fun playing against something you can neither see nor damage? Simple anser: You don't. Playing a game is about interacting with the other players. Game mechanics that limit this interaction or render it pointless - such as current CV mechanics, and any of the trial runs for submarines we've had so far - make the game unfun for all parties involved. Again, this is neither a CV nor a submarine post. It is a tip for Wargaming to not ignore the softer values when they go about laying their plans for the future. People play this game in order to have fun together. Acknowledging this agreeable fact might pay off - even for Wargaming.

The thing here is, that I see such a lot of good things from Wargaming as well. Their efforts to flesh out the historical background, their promotion of such excellent features as the ongoing 'Armchair Admirals' series, and the genuine enthusiam and good cheer displayed by the various WG employees on this and other forums... they have a lot of assets going for them. I'd hate to see all that wasted on needlessly limited or short-sighted politics or business decisions...!

You mean that the "sunk cost fallacy" trap is the only thing keeping Wargaming from acknowledging and fixing the problem? That's, like, even more basic psychology than what prompted my opening post. Surely Wargaming is aware of the dangers inherent in tossing good money after bad? They employed much the same mind game themselves in the Puerto Rico debacle, after all. Again, I hope you are wrong about this...!

I hope you are wrong, but I fear you are right. I realize that Wargaming bases their business decisions on what is good for, well, business. I can't fault them for that, since they are a private corporation and not a charity. At some point, though, they might find themselves in a situation where they will have to balance projected CV revenues (if that is even a thing) with any player drop-offs due to dissatisfaction with the effects (in-game or otherwise) of maintaining a blatantly unbalanced ship class. Acknowledging this possible development, and taking action beforehand, might be something for them to consider.

And this... ...is precisely why I very rarely play CV:s outside of co-op or scenario battles.

Your approach, to quote... ...is doubtless a sound and commendable strategy, Captain @Bindolaf_Werebane. I try to employ much the same outlook myself. The fact that most of us are hopefully able to weather the occasional hail of abuse from other players does not, however, make the abuse itself excusable. Nor is it a valid reason for Wargaming to ignore the problem. To be fair, it should be said that they do have an active anti-abuse policy in place, and that they are also (as far as I know anyway) enforcing it in individual cases. My point, though, is that as long as the underlying problem - in this case, a deliberately unbalanced ship class - persists, so too will the friction generated thereby. In a PvP game where balance is of such paramount importance, this is an unfortunate state of affairs.

What you say here, Captain @arttuperkunas, namely that... ...is completey accurate and to the point. If my comparatively long-winded post gave any indication that this is not my opinion as well, I guess I worded it badly. I must say, though, that I can't really see a relevant distinction between those CV features that are part of (as you put it) "the goodies they get", and the features that make them unfun to play against. To me, this is just two ways of describing the same problem - namely that Wargaming have, for reasons of their own, deliberately created an unbalanced ship class.

Just wait for the double-split Russian CV line: Well-armoured carriers with combined AP/HE rocket planes and a heal consumable.

Indeed. In his video about these new Air Strike cruisers, Flamu hypothesizes that consecutive Air Strikes over the cap circle could potentially be used to delay capping by enemy destroyers, through being able to hit them with "blind drops" over the entire area. As a DD main, I find this scenario somewhat less than appealing. Mind you, this is just wild speculation at this point since no one outside WG presumably knows even remotely how Air Strikes are going to work if and when they hit the live servers.

AI carriers can't shoot for sh*t and that's a fact. I have yet to be hit with a single AI launched rocket.

Thanks for a nice and informative reply! I will admit that it seems like an interesting idea. With regards to the overall game dynamic, though, I would say that a new carrier class especially geared for spotting is the last thing* this game needs. Having carriers in play is bad enough for other ship classes as it is; a new class of flying super scouts would make the tactical interaction between other classes more or less meaningless. If Wargaming wants a new class of flying super scouts, they should go the whole way and launch an entirely new game: Carriers and Sidekicks. ...oh, wait. They already did that, right...? * Or next to last thing, if I count submarines.