Verblonde

Good morning from Canada! Looks like the matter got squared away while I was asleep...

If the coupon does say '200% return', standard English usage (I'm a native speaker FWIW) is that for - say - every 1,000 doubloons of 'worth' that you spend, you would get 2,000 doubloons on top of that 'invested' 1,000. In money terms, if you invest $1,000, you would get $3,000 back at the end, in total, with a 200% return. This, for example, is one of the first results I get when I Google '100% return': https://personalmba.com/return-on-investment/

Without seeing the wording on the coupon, it's difficult to comment; however: If the wording was along the lines of 'get 200% of the value you spend' then WG's argument is - just about - okay. If the wording was along the lines of 'get an additional/plus 200%' then their argument is specious. This is the sort of thing that WG do that irritates me: they struggle to write cast-iron promotional prose. Where you have something like this (where 200% of something is not the same as a 200% bonus), you really have to chose your words carefully to avoid being misunderstood and/or pi$$ing off your paying customers. In fact, it's always better to spell it out in the advertising blurb. In previous lives, I used to be involved in writing similar things myself - you absolutely have to look out for ways that whatever wording you use could be misinterpreted, especially in ways that will result in disappointed customers. (And that's without getting annoyed that more than 100% of something is impossible; I'm not that much of a pedant.)

Say " it!" and leave ranked alone until next time? That isn't quite as glib/asinine as might appear at first glance: once you get above R10, you need to string together a lot more wins in a row (and/or save stars) to progress, and frustration is a significant part of ranking out - certainly for typical players. This tends to result in a mind-set where you start to feel a powerful urge to put a boot through the screen, which in turn increases the likelihood of messing up yourself, so resulting in more frustration, and so on. I would suggest only playing Ranked for as long as it's fun (or at least, not unreasonably exasperating) - the rewards aren't *that* good...

Nice! She's probably of more use than the T4, as you can play Ops with her. (Again, don't forget to mount the better modules though.)

Not really - they're sometimes used as a means to introduce new silver ships early, but gradually so as to try not to swamp MM with whatever the new toy is. WG sometimes use other mechanics for such introductions though. BTW when you get an early access ship, it will have all its upgrades researched and purchased, but they won't be fitted - remember to fit them, so you aren't playing the thing stock...

Is there any data to indicate that DD numbers are down? I'd never notice if they were, because I'm nearly always in a DD myself so don't get DD-free games.

Yup. Bear in mind you do have to overcome the 'generosity quotient' in WG's dropping stuff algorithms though...

No idea if this is a waste of time, but you never know - it might come in handy for someone. Others have, with varying degrees of tact, covered off why much of the above isn't terribly accurate; I've had a quick look at your stats, and I suspect you have a bit of a knowledge gap rather than having been the victim of the game malfunctioning. I would suggest perhaps thinking along the following lines: Play all the classes, and do so evenly as you advance up the tiers, at least until you're into the +2 MM bracket; take the time to make sure that your rate of advance isn't so fast that your knowledge and skills can't keep up. Play everything so that you understand from practical experience everything's strengths/weaknesses and what their general in-game aims are etc. Have a look at the following graph: This is showing your distribution of numbers of random games by tier; this is actually not too alarming-looking, although you would ideally want to spend more time at T7, before heading to T8. The only real 'too high, too soon' issue you have is Odin, which isn't hugely surprising, given the recent event. Bear in mind that Odin isn't 'easy mode', mainly due to being quite fragile; I would suggest making use of her in Coop until your skill-set in randoms has caught up. In the past, the 'standard issue' advice would be to play T2-4 a lot more, to nail down gunnery, angling, predictive torps - all that good stuff. Because WG have seen fit to bring us the T4 CV plague, I might suggest using T5-6 as your 'skill and knowledge polishing' tiers, even though you're into +2 MM, which does make life harder. Take the time to understand captains and upgrades, how they work, what they do for you, and make sure you haven't done anything too ill-advised with them. As a benchmark, to survive in +2 MM, most players need at least a 10 point captain (with a sensible skill build), and rather more so at higher tiers (bear in mind that as you go up the tiers, the likelihood of meeting players with just such captains increases). Take the time to understand the vision mechanics (https://wiki.wargaming.net/en/Ship:Detection); this is perhaps the single most important thing to understand to perform in the game. Also, make sure you've got all the necessary range/detection circles enabled on your mini-map (which should be as big as your monitor can cope with, if it isn't already). Keep an eye on your stats (a useful site for doing so:https://wows-numbers.com/), but from the perspective of identifying strengths, as well as what needs to improve; things like damage, and how well you're surviving are generally of more importance than WR (get the former looking healthy and the latter will generally follow). Avoid getting too hung up on stats though, and beware small data-sets (a losing streak will make you look worse than you are, whilst you generally aren't as good as a winning one makes you appear). Your general aim is to survive in each battle for as long as possible (because it gives you more opportunities to do something useful); if/when you do mess up and get deleted early, stay in the game and watch what other players do - sometimes, what they're doing may well serve as a wonderful 'what not to do' example (especially, it seems, at weekends), but usually you'll be able to learn a lot from what others do. Play in divisions (ideally with voice comms) with more experienced players; besides a slightly enhanced chance of winning (coordinated players usually do better), your division mate(s) can provide you with useful real-time feedback, which should speed up the rate at which you learn. As a general rule, any time someone is accused of cheating, it's almost always because someone else didn't understand game mechanics and/or wasn't skilled or experienced enough.

By and large, Ops - and the odd Coop game - are about the only times I do play CVs; I probably ought to make the effort to try and suck less in PvP, but there always seems to be something more fun to do instead...

This would certainly dramatically reduce my ranked-related stress levels dramatically - I'd be barred! No more stress! (I think my overall PR is rather lower than 1000.)

I rarely play CVs against real people (unless a mission or similar calls for it), and avoid Newport entirely; but given that, my current impressions are along the following lines: It took me a while to get used to having very little in the way of effective anti-DD weaponry, although the torps will do in a pinch; you seem to generally be better at focusing on what you do well and leave sinking the DDs to your team-mates (plonking fighters on DDs to keep them spotted still works, of course). The torps get the job done reasonably well, and - thus far - have been my primary weapon (fwiw I seem to be generally getting 'normal' levels of damage, compared to other CVs, although possibly slightly more towards the lower end of my usual range). I keep forgetting I have AP bombs. Because I'm an idiot. I used them a bit more heavily in a battle last week and my damage numbers improved noticeably, but I need to play more to see if that was just fluke. The current scenario has slow and/or stationary BBs, which are splendid targets for the bombs, although I still like torps against the faster ones, as the common floods slow them down for your team-mates to shoot. I like the AP rockets, mainly because racking up citadels against cruisers never gets old (even if the damage isn't often that spectacular); I am struggling to reliably hit the forts though (mainly because I'm still getting used to the aiming on these things), so I am needing allied heavies to do their job and silence them. Secondaries are nice, and have saved my posterior a few times, mainly against DDs. I'm (possibly) not an idiot though, so secondaries are entirely 'out of the box' (no BFT/AFT or upgrades), just in case I need to play the thing against sensible opposition. I'll be interested to see how the upcoming premium 'proto-GZ' turns out in this regard, but I digress. You get biplanes! Doesn't matter one iota for gameplay, but they are pretty... My overall view is that she's fun for Ops and provides a bit of a change compared to more usual CVs; it's worth getting her, but not worth losing sleep to do so...

Zero freebies, so far, but I got the T4 and T6 from paid gambling boxes; I rather like the T6 for Ops - provides a bit of variety with the AP rockets.

Thanks, @Ocsimano18!

This. As a DD driver, I can usually deal with (more or less) most single-axis threats; the danger comes when you're having to react to more than one threat from different axes. Incidentally, this is why one of my standard bits of anti-CV advice is to try and keep some hard cover between you and the enemy fleet when under air attack...

I like Orkan a lot, although I suspect she'll never be an unqualified "don't pi$$ about - buy her" for the bulk of players, if only because of the lack of smoke. So long as DD radar remains rare, I think she'll have a place. Of course, if the typical CV player base ever gets good, she'll be in serious trouble (which goes double on small maps); happily, for the discerning Orkan driver, there doesn't seem to be too much danger of this at the moment. I should perhaps re-emphasise that I stopped at R10 (and usually do, with full ranked), so my views are based on largely facing lower ranked players - I wouldn't be at all surprised if I would be forced to pick something else if I was ever sufficiently masochistic to try and get to higher ranks than 10. P.S. Bonus points for Dreadnoughts, and double bonus points for CQE awards (which I have yet to get on Orkan)..!

As far as I can tell, I played 12 battles this season, of which all but one were in Orkan; my WR was 58.3% (compared to low seventies in the last Sprint), and I stopped as soon as I reached R10. So, small data-set. In that context: On a small map, any DD is boned in terms of sneaking about if there is a competent CV in play; as you identify, Orkan doesn't have smoke - which makes it worse. At the ranks I was playing at though, most CV players were simply not good enough to close me down (this isn't a 'yay - am I not magnificent?' thing, but rather a 'dear gods, you can't even shut this idiot in his DD down?!' one), and the ship is very effective when you don't get CVs, which happened (total guess) maybe a third of the time. At the moment, there appears to be a (slowly diminishing) knowledge gap about Orkan; given the multiple DDs that saw me coming and promptly parked in smoke, I'm fairly confident that news of her radar isn't that widespread yet. Even when people do know about it, it can still be very powerful if your team is half awake - for me, that made up for much of the problems with CVs. A lot of the ranked games I've been in have been fairly short affairs, so - unsurprisingly - you have to make every moment count as much as possible; this applies to the CV drivers too. I run rudder shift on Orkan, to wring every last shimmy from her, and know to avoid driving in a straight line at constant speed (cries of "cheat!" from off-screen); a typical CV will get fed up trying to land solid hits fairly quickly if he isn't getting a reliable damage return on his time. Given that the small maps make stealth much less of a thing than usual (when a CV is present), the lack of smoke - although not terribly helpful - is less of a disaster than one might expect. Of course, small maps also mean a DD can more easily bravely run away to its bigger mates' AA umbrella too. You only get one torp launcher, but they are long-ranged and fast torps bunny kisses (even without the zoomy torps mod), but you can still do quite a bit of damage, including via making people dodge and expose broadside etc. (it appears that people largely react the same way to Ikea bunny kisses as they would to proper torps). Other than that, your guns are very good, on the occasions where you get to use them, and your AA is similar to something like Lightning - most less good CV players seem to be even less enthusiastic about attacking a small and nimble target when it knocks down even one or two of their planes. So can Orkan handle herself in ranked with CVs? I would give a cautious (and qualified) 'yes', if you are facing typical CV drivers, although it basically comes down to a decision based on whether you want a radar DD enough to put up with the down-sides. I suspect the wisdom of choosing her will continue to diminish as more people learn about her capabilities too. One final thing to bear in mind: a lot of the discussion around ranks has tended to focus on how good Cossack is (with good reason), and Loyang is another perennial favourite for this type of mode; Orkan is a pretty effective counter to both of those ships due to the radar, which - I think - may also contribute to her usefulness. Edit: I forgot - Orkan gets a heal; that's actually really useful, and often allows you at least one mis-play (and discourages typical CV players further when you heal back some of the rocket damage they just did)..

In a vague sort of way; as you saw, I'm not very good with cruisers, so it's an on-off sort of a thing. I'm mainly after the RB points when I get the T10. Splendid to see you! (Slightly surprisingly, I wasn't embarrassingly exploded in the first 30 secs too.)

In case anyone hasn't noticed (who isn't allergic to weebery), there's a mission chain for a free AL captain BUT you have to click to participate: https://worldofwarships.eu/en/news/sales-and-events/azur-lane-third-wave/

All WG need to do - to make an excellent start - is rework the ones that got killed off (allegedly) by the reework; from memory there was Dynamo, plus a couple of T8 ones (the night one - Cherry Blossom, was it? - in particular was very good)... Entirely new ones would be nice though; I'd like to see a second T7 one, and perhaps a T9, after the above mentioned are fixed/returned. Don't hold your breath though; to see any effort expended on Ops would be a reversal of WG's stated policy, and rather a lot of evidence that they'd rather see them binned altogether.

Hmmm, it would appear that it isn't just Ranked at the weekends that's troublesome: In all honesty, I messed up spectacularly in at least two of those games (and am painfully aware of the one constant in all these cases), but still... (Despite the appalling results, I do rather like my new ship though.)

FWIW Nelson doesn't need a different captain build to a typical RN BB, as far as I know; that said, the freebie Nelson is a useful starting point for a silver BB captain that you could then use on the ship Nelson, so stroking the OCD. (I think I currently have three or four captains on their various namesake ships, so I too embrace the OCD!)

Not at all; I suck in BBs generally, but love Nelson for Narai and Coop; you just have to be mindful of your citadel. Is she worth the free xp? That's a knottier question, in the context of there being several T9/10s that you can save for instead...