Verblonde

Ah, the mighty Sharkbait? Alas, in a moment of irrational joie de vivre early in my WOWS career, I actually had the delusional thought process that it might be a good idea to own this towering leviathan. Turns out there is a *really* good reason why I don't often play cruisers, *especially* that one...

Incidentally, I've stopped after 60 'stupid' crates (and one freebie small one from the Armory [sic]), and submitted the data to @black_falcon120's data gathering exercise. That's actually rather fewer than I got last year, but (besides the majesty already indicated) I've now got all the T9 ships I was missing, so I start getting into diminishing returns territory (as of now, I'm probably about fifty quid up versus spend, if you only count the ships). Some observations (on the basis of my small data set only): I actually did pretty well this year on doubloons and coal (but that's probably fluke). No premium time this year. The ships did not drop in pure rising tier order, and I got my missing T9s before I got all the lower tier ships I was missing. All my ships came from SCs i.e. they were all something else before being re-rolled (because I had the original); *if* WG ever reintroduced duplicates for Xmas crates, their value would plummet for those of us with extensive premium ship collections. Within my data-set, the ship probability *appears* to be on par with last year (+/-). Right, I'm going to gird my loins, and prepare to unleash heck on a peacefully unsuspecting server with my Mighty Cheshire... <contented whale song>

It gets better too! What, I hear my teeming hordes of gentle readers cry, could possibly be better than the untrammeled raw power of Cheshire? <drum roll>

I'll let you have my data when I've finished being an idiot (gambling/whaling)! In the meantime though, I shall share the glory - nay, majesty - of what I just got. Behold, mortals, and turn green with barely controlled envy and longing:

Oh, you're no fun!

If you are going to remain as Coop only, it doesn't really matter, although I tend to think that Blysk is better, despite the powercreep. If you want to ever play PvP, then it's a more complicated equation, but I would still go with Blysk, *but*: You absolutely must have *at least* a ten point captain for Blysk (ditto Aigle, but perhaps slightly less so); without CE, you are intolerably gimped. Given that you'll regularly face T9 these days, a higher point captain is better still. It's easier to get the requisite 10 point captain for Aigle, as they're available in the Armory [sic]; I don't believe EU captains are yet. Neither the French nor Ikea silver DD lines are particularly newbie-friendly as neither gets smoke (although both premiums under discussion do); so if you pick either up, you'd probably be better off playing either the US or IJN lines first, and the premium is more an investment in the future for captain training.

<resisting powerful urge to be a smartdonkey>

As I understand it, T10 special ships have the same earning coefficient as their silver counterparts, *but* they tend to be a lot more profitable as their service costs are half that of the silver equivalents. The T10 special ships also have the merit of including a permaflage that further improves the ships' economies (although, as I recall, the bonuses are the same as a silver ship's T10 permaflage. If you want a sense of how profitable the various premiums (and similar) are, have a look at the graphic attached (source: https://www.reddit.com/r/WorldOfWarships/comments/d8m7ud/a_guide_on_premium_ship_credit_income_edited_for/). If you want a bit more info, suggest having a look at the relevant bit of the wiki: https://wiki.wargaming.net/en/Ship:Economy#Service_Cost

I do wonder if Black being held back relates to the postponement of the 'new' Ranked? If the new incarnation allows T9 ships, you perhaps might expect her to be an excellent seller, given her reputation (which seems to be at least partly deserved, depending on the meta - she was meh at best during the 'Pommern' sprint for example, but glorious in more conventional seasons). WG may be hoping that it'll cover the debauch at Madam Olga's in the month that sees the release of Ranked...

Do we know how up-to-date the wiki is? That's the state of play at time of writing, but it could be out of date? Edit: LWM says 6.1 km.

I hadn't heard that - 6.1 is just about doable, IMO; still not essential (especially if you have Benham), but not actively painful.

You are a bad man!

Z-44 does rather look as though she falls very solidly into the 'not essential' category, although being able to tool around at range and spam lots of torps mean she'll probably be fairly popular. For me, her concealment is the real problem; if you want to get reliable torp hits, you generally need to get fairly close (with extreme range shots being more about area denial, and hoping to get lucky against radar ships etc. - unless your target is an idiot), and that's a lot harder when you have poor concealment, compared to the alternatives, and compared to several of the things that will be trying to hunt you. If one were thinking of spending money to get her, why not just bag something like Gearing or Shima with permaflage?

Yay - that should be enough steel for me to bag Somers...

Last time it was here: https://whaling.in.fkn.space/

The cynic (and recovering online retailer) would suggest a third, less ethical, possibility: WG know exactly the effect their wording (which I could easily fix, to reduce the complaints by at least 75%, with about thirty seconds' work) is having, and are taking the view that the increased turnover they believe they are making is more important than the ill-will that doing things this way is generating. I suggest it's more than a lack of care and/or ability; it's actively making the Richard move.

This. There aren't too many 'Lootbox bait' ships left that weren't already added (Kami R is the only other one I can think of, after Fujin was added last year), so a new way to extract money from whales is needed...

As per the other - double figures - threads on this subject: WG haven't technically lied, but they have made a Richard move; as far as the game, and specifically mission eligibility, goes '<ship name>' is as different a ship to '<ship name B' as a CV is to a cruiser. If you read the blurb carefully, whenever the doubloon missions are referred to (specifically apropos eligibility), it uses only '<ship name>', and not '<ship name> B'. Of course, very large numbers of people fail to notice this distinction every year and get annoyed; also, WG could very easily make things infinitely clearer, but the fact they haven't - after three years - indicates that this is deliberate. Presumably, they only see the increase in sales, and don't care about the ill will doing this generates every year, although how they would see an actual increase when they've never actually tried ethical methodology (at least not so far) for comparison is perhaps a mystery.

The problem here is that the forum population is a small (albeit vocal) proportion of the game's customer base; on top of that, only a subset of that population would be prepared to participate, so WG won't even notice.

It's probably because you are a lot less vulgar than I probably am! The first bit is a reference to one definition - usually the first - of onanism (which word has its origins in the Biblical story of Onan, hence 'emulating Onan'). In British slang, a 'to$$er' is one who has an excessive enthusiasm for the aforementioned common first definition of onanism; meanwhile, an iconic activity during highland games is caber tossing, where burly Scottish folk throw tree trunks around. So, via a feeble pun (on the multiple potential meanings of 'toss' and its derivatives), 'more toss than an entire highland games' is suggesting that whoever one is being rude about, *really* goes in for the excessive emulation of our noted Biblical character. You guys know me: why use a single rude word, when an entire paragraph will do...?!

Twenty, if I can count, and at least as many again in the teens. Nowhere near enough spare captain xp to get even one straight to 21 points; looks like there will be some grinding in my future...

I have to admit, that first part is an element of the "me want!" thing! Besides that, and from the perspective of a mediocre player, she looks to me a bit like a (premium) sneakier Groz, with less dakka and better torps. If I understand correctly, she gets a boosted healing potion too, and her AA is 'good enough' as well (against the usual average CV players anyway). Overall, she looks like she's almost exactly the sort of DD that I like i.e. a good balance between sneakiness, dakka and torps, plus - importantly - a heal, and at least a limited ability to discourage CVs. No idea how accurate this impression is, of course, as the only steel (and former steel) ships I have are Flint and Black...

I don't disagree with you there; I view Z-44 as a 'when I run out of coal ships that I want' option... The impression I get of her as things stand is that she's essentially a torp truck; no hydro and mediocre concealment (if my maths is right) mean she's mostly of use for tooling around at medium-long range spamming torps - that strikes me as a) a bit dull, and b) likely to lose games.

Neustrashimy is the one I'm most interested in, although I'll probably pick up Z-44 on general principles (it's a DD) at some point too... She's probably worth waiting for, although - assuming her price is jacked up like the other former coal ships (168K for Flint?! Ouch!) - her benefits, in relation to the coal needed, my be less cut and dried compared to other options.