Verblonde

Reminds me: I really ought to go back and have another go with Clemson. I hated her the first time I played her, but that was one of my earlier DDs and I don't think I had a very good captain, plus - of course - I was even more rubbish then than I am now...

I have to admit to being slightly torn on all this. On the one hand, I like the Xmas boxes; in the position I'm in (almost all premiums already), they usually work out quite well for me in terms of what I get back for the spend, and that's counting cammo/flags as valueless. However, for players with less idiotic well-developed fleets, the value proposition is very different, as you're going to get a lot of clunkers before starting to get the more worthwhile ships. Where I do get wound up is unnecessary randomness in mission rewards; I would much rather have a clear progression, such that I know that if I put in x amount of effort, I will get y reward. As we all know, WG do it this way because it encourages more spending/hours in the game, but I'd still much rather they didn't.

The experience may be different for a unicum, but I found the Ikeas to be a pretty decent and logical progression i.e. the T8 is more or less an improved version of the T7; ditto the T9 to the T8, and finally the T10 to the T9. Whether that's a good thing or not will depend on your view of the ships' whole concept; for me, it's great, as I like them a lot - if you're less keen though, it'll suck.

Halland is quite worthwhile in Clans (at least at the level I play at) too - the fast, long-ranged torps, plus heal are quite useful in combination with a coordinated team to provide the alpha. The same ought to be true for the T7+ Ikeas in general, if/when we get a tier for Clans that isn't 10.

Probably very first thing on Thursday - my WGC was pre-downloading the patch yesterday.

You may well be right about this; I'm very keen on the T7+ EU DDs (despite the fact that I'm almost certain my Halland is Cursed), but I much prefer to use them in modes where you have the opportunity to make use of their key strengths i.e. DoT and the heal. If you want to dump huge amounts of damage on people in a very short period of time, there are better choices. The way I tend to try and think about the torps is as rather ponderous, and very large, shells i.e. you seem to get more hits with the things (mainly due to the speed), but - as you identify - you don't have the alpha to one-shot too many things (although they're monstrous against DDs hiding in smoke, and sometimes in brawls). With a high alpha DD, you might be able to worry a bit less about 'after' your torp strike as the huge alpha should make your target smoking boots; with an Ikea, you have to pay a lot more attention to the 'after' aspect i.e. escaping if/when your torps don't kill the target outright.

Dev Blog (a couple of new ships): https://blog.worldofwarships.com/blog/34 " Anchorage is a universal heavy cruiser capable of fighting at close- and mid-ranges. The ships has a decent main caliber guns. "Hydroacoustic Search" consumable and torpedo armament allows Anchorage to feel comfortable in close-range combat, and a "Smoke generator" consumable, which is uncharacteristical for American heavy cruisers, will let her avoid enemy's focued fire or take a break in battle." ("uncharacteristical"?! Wut?) "The ship has a good firing range and main battery reload time, as well as brand German HE shells' penetration and effective AP shells. The ship's concept is similar to German Tier VIII cruiser Mainz." (re: T7 Munchen)

Quite - a chap can never have too many Atagos...!

As others have covered off most satisfactorily: nope, nothing with a realistic probability of success, unless you spend a lot on Xmas crates. You *might* get lucky (my Kami fell out of a SC, but that's spectacularly unlikely), but the chances are pretty poor by all accounts. A useful question to perhaps ask is why exactly do you want MO? If it's because of the history etc. associated with the ship, then there isn't much you can do (besides picking up her sister ship from the main tree). If you want a radar on a BB then you're also doomed (unless I've forgotten something). However, you have lots of options if your motives are mainly to do with silver earning and captain training. For silver earning, the various T9 premiums aren't a bad second best (assuming you can do consistent damage with them), or the T8s that have Kobayashi permaflage available (Kii and Roma). For US BB captain training, GA isn't a bad shout, or the various US T8 premium BBs; although many folk will (for maximum fun) put specialist manly captains in GA/MA, I believe that 'optimal' (as in most likely to win) is still the standard tank build from the silver line.

I wouldn't: I suck in cruisers, and I don't think my Edinburgh has a very good captain (probably 10 points), plus I have several far better choices. You quite probably should though: as others have said, the 'best' ship for Ranked (or any mode that you're taking seriously) is whatever you do the best with normally. For Ranked, you ideally want something that you're very comfortable playing and have a good captain for...

Dev Blog (German CVs event, Part 1, amongst other things): https://blog.worldofwarships.com/blog/29

A lot will depend on the presence (or not) of CVs, especially for DD folk like me. I can't imagine there won't be CVs, so... Loyang, as always. Lightning. Or Cossack if CV numbers aren't excessive. Maybe Kidd, because of the AA, although the useful heal isn't unique any more. Orkan might be worth a lash, because radar, or Oland - heal and good AA. That's assuming only getting to R10, and the presence of lots of radar calling for much hiding, so things that can see through islands/smoke will be helpful.

We don't need jammers IMO (plus WG won't be keen - I imagine the needed coding would be extensive); what might have some legs is chaff - a consumable that's a direct alternative to smoke in all respects (to keep it simple), or maybe exclude engine/creeping smoke: Before battle, you choose either smoke or chaff. Smoke continues as before, while chaff does exactly the same thing, only impacting radar only and not vision. Personally, I would still take smoke in that scenario, but that's me; quite apart from anything else, I don't view radar as excessive, but the lesser of two evils (CVs - their spotting specifically - being far more of an issue).

Are you making extensive use of the radar? As predominantly a DD player, I view Baltis as a serious threat mainly for that reason - the long duration is a menace in particular. Once you're spotted, the HE is pretty horrifying too (assuming your own side's BBs aren't awake enough to blap said Balti). That said, I'm entirely awful in my own one, mainly because I'm a long way from successfully learning how to cruiser.

Manly CVs? I'm liking the sound of that; GZ is a promising start, but I feel there is far too much emphasis on the planes, and not enough emphasis on the dakka... Good work with the original post, @Widar_Thule - very interesting.

That's more or less what I did with all the others, with trying to finish some of the missions I missed just by normal playing since. I have to admit, I'd semi-forgotten about the EU campaign until I saw this thread; I think I'll just leave it ticking over until we're maybe two months from the deadline and maybe make more effort then...

Click on 'Campaigns' and click on the 'Strong Willed' campaign: The special EU captain is the final reward: BTW note that we have a little over four months left to complete the campaign...

I don't really like cruisers (mainly because I suck in them), and I didn't think Donskoi was particularly awful - I found her more fun than the US T9 CL, for instance. Perhaps cruiser aficionados have a different view?

You aren't unique in this by any means; a few premiums are useful to have though (captain training, extra silver etc.), so it's worth focusing on those you can get for free, so mission rewards, coal (and steel if you can get it) ships, free xp (Nelson etc.), and Shinonome from the campaign. I say 'premiums' but the T10 'almost premiums' are also well worth having too.

If one is a new player these days, it's quite hard to avoid getting a free Warspite - if you use an invite code, you get her after your first T6 battle... Older lags and/or those who missed out on the code may well not have her, although she seems to periodically turn up as a mission reward too.

I generally agree with this sentiment, but you are allowed to pat yourself on the back a little bit - most people with your battle count (especially at some of the tiers you've been playing) would be languishing in the mid-forties...! This is a very good aim (and one that I used to fail entirely miserably at, and still do although to a marginally lesser extent); you've already mastered something that I'm reasonably confident most players haven't grasped! After all, you can't influence the battle if you're all kinds of dead.

Generally, T5 is as low as you usually want to go for a couple of reasons: T4 CV plague being the main one, plus the bulk of missions call for T5+. I find T5 to be a bit sparse in terms of actively fun ships, mainly because of the protective MM that ships up to T4 get i.e. T5s never get -2, and will quite frequently see +2. There are some worthwhile ships though: The Kami sisters are easily my most fun ships at T5, which is a bit of a problem as they're not really available any more; if WG ever relent, get one - they're a hoot. I've only played T-22 once since it got hydro added, but it seems to have made it a bit of a monster if used correctly (smoke/hydro is always good value). Exeter might be worth a look, if you dig RN CAs; mine spends most of its time in Coop, but an old friend of mine swears by his (and he's infinitely better in cruisers than I am). T6 is where (IMO) the fun ship choices get rather wider: T-61 is an utter monster (put a coal hydro mod on her); one of the best DDs in the game tier for tier, and fun to play too. Shinonome is great fun too, if you can finish the campaign that gives you her for free; she also has the merit of being able to take one of the credit-boosting 'national' permaflages (for doubloons). It's worth picking up Graf Spee (free next patch) and Warspite (common freebie), if you haven't already; I find the former more fun, but I'm slightly allergic to BBs outside of Ops. They can also both take 'national' permaflages. I'm not really a CV sort of a chap, but I do love playing Ark Royal in Ops... One (or both) of Perth/Huanghe might be worth a look (especially if you dig Leander); Perth is usually felt to be better (and gets DCs in the current sub mode, if you care about that). Bear in mind that both basically require a specialist captain, so having a way to generate elite xp is helpful to get their captains to a respectable level (although you could probably get away with a silver DD captain in Huanghe). I quite like London (she's real for a start), but have very little idea how good she is against real people - mine lives in Coop/Ops, but is great fun for those modes. Bear in mind that 'fun' isn't necessarily the same thing as 'good' (although ships can be both e.g. T-61/Shinonome)...

You'll certainly pick up quite a bit this way (and your stats do suggest that whatever you're doing is working!), but to really 'feel' how the other classes work, you do really have to play them at least a bit. You can always play in Coop if you just want to understand the 'physics' (as it were) of the other classes - then it doesn't matter if you royally mess up, as it's only Coop (sorry, Coop mains!).

The talking bit, although helpful, isn't essential (I really only use voice when I'm actually playing clan battles, or when an old friend is on and we won't disturb those around us); if you do want to avoid the whole talking thing, there are clans about which exist only for the bonuses and/or will accept occasional folk like this for the oil they contribute (the clan I'm in has at least one non-speaking Coop-only member for example). BTW joining a clan isn't a 'forever' thing - you can change clans, although I believe there is a cooldown of a couple of days between leaving one clan and joining a new one. Edinburgh? Most excellent city! The accent could worse though - some of the folk from the highlands are *much* harder to understand (if you've seen the cartoon 'Brave' you'll have already realised this)...! The bulk of premium ships are - IMO - over-priced; although I have the vast majority of them a) I've been playing for several years now, and b) a lot of mine came from gamble boxes, which (according to the spreadsheet I was sad enough to do at the time) reduced the unit price dramatically, and c) quite a few of mine were bought on sale. It's worthwhile having at least a few premium ships IMO, but it's worth picking your spots carefully (and get as many free ones as possible, provided it doesn't seriously derail whatever approach to the game you find most fun); older ones are generally slightly less expensive, and it's a good idea to select things that match well with your silver ships' captains (as others have alluded to) as that speeds up captain development - essential for higher tier play. Also: read reviews and ask on here for opinions - some premium ships are distinctly better than others, and which ones they are can vary with time and changes to the game (ask the Atlanta owners what happened to their baby when the CVs got changed for example).

That wasn't my intention, but so far I'm seeing very little new; doing the same old thing over and over gets tedious. This is an intelligent idea; basically, it looks to me like - kind of - a permanent ranked mode? That, in and of itself, isn't necessarily a bad idea - IMO Ranked in its current form needs some work; perhaps rather than making it an end in itself, using it as tool to sort people who want to be sorted in such a way might be a good idea. The main problem I see here though is that the numbers of people who would fall in the better categories is likely to be small (as @Gebe_ says), which would most likely hammer queue times for such people - would you really want a drastically increased wait time to be in battle with only people who are a similar standard to you? Personally, I'd be fine most likely - I'm a poor player, so the pool at my level will be comparatively extensive (plus, removing the unicums would make my chances of making a positive difference to my team slightly better). Incidentally, this wouldn't do a thing to stop snowballing; it might even make it more prevalent - if everyone on both sides is of a similar skill level, the pure 'maths of the snowball' becomes more significant as you'll never (if the pools are working properly) have anyone significantly better than anyone else to avert the snowball, if it's starting to happen to the team with said magnificent beast on it...