Verblonde

Thanks for the swift response. Looks like I'll be avoiding Ranked this time around then...

So, am I correct in thinking the 'fix' to invulnerable planes hasn't worked then? If so, it's useful to know - I can do other things (as a DD main) then get ulcers playing Ranked.

Full disclosure: I'm awful in cruisers, so some of this may be spectacularly ill-informed. I don't really see the point (for me) of Cheshire: fewer gun barrels seems to make a primary cruiser job of blapping DDs harder, whilst not giving very much in return. You have single fire torps (good), but with only 8 km range. The heal is nice. I focus on those aspects as it seems to me that Atago is superior in most regards, and I already have her (three times, technically). Cheshire is also paper (albeit not some vodka-fuelled fever dream), which although not crucial, is a minor point against her for me. So, I'm filing this in the "don't need now" category, but it will be a decent motivation to buy Xmas crates, assuming the 2020 editions are similar to previous ones.

A small note, just in case anyone hasn't noticed: there is a free captain respec in place at the moment (don't know what the dates are). I assume it's marking the end of the present season of Clans. Came in handy for me: I'd noticed a couple of stupid captain set-ups left over from my early career in the game...

Assuming this is 'working as intended', and not a soon-to-be-fixed bug, I picked a good time to be playing other games it would seem. Does anyone happen to know definitively which it is? I think I'll entirely give Ranked a miss this time, if it's the former.

There's your problem right there - very few BBs do anything useful at that distance. You generally need to be closer to tank damage and blap cruisers.

<chuckle> You're a bad person!

WG are just doing it to wind up the Greek nationalists - they do react so hilariously to this stuff...

That's not a bad thing, it means you can choose premiums based on your silver lines, rather than being pushed in the other direction. Since the silver lines represent a much bigger investment in terms of time, that's arguably the more helpful way round; it also means you can pick sensible early lines to push (PA, for example, isn't really - because of things like the DWT and radar option at higher tiers; although it's all about to change, you can *currently* make a case for avoiding lines that more or less require IFHE, at least until you can generate elite xp quickly).

You are, of course, absolutely correct - I mis-remembered (old age!). If anyone is interested, this is the detailed breakdown of a quick Coop game in HMS London (no cammo, to simplify the results): It's been a while since O'Levels, but I'm reasonably sure that 639 = 639...!

As I understand it, the ship generates xp, which gets split between free xp (a little) and ship-specific xp (the bulk of it); those two numbers combined are the same as the captain xp you get awarded for the battle, assuming no boosts to either free xp, or captain xp. If anyone cares about the detailed formulae: https://wiki.wargaming.net/en/Ship:Economics

Use doubloons (500) if you absolutely must play the captain in the destination silver ship, right now and without penalty. Build up a reserve of elite captain xp (or free xp), so as to reduce/eliminate the retraining grind when you subsequently get to it. Make use of premium ships where possible. Basically, the mechanic for switching captains between silver ships is a key driver for doubloon sales, I suspect - it's the classic micro-transaction; costs comparatively little and drastically reduces the player's time to progress, such that people are likely to just say "f*ckit!" and open their wallets (I do, but then I'm a whale). How to approach all this will vary a bit with how much, if any, money you can/are comfortable with spending on the game; some ideas: If you already have useful premiums, it can be helpful initially concentrating on silver lines that have captains that work well with these premiums. For example, I see you have Smol and Molotov; the latter obviously suggests playing the Russian silver line cruisers, whereas the former is either cruisers again, or even DDs (I use my Groz captain in mine, for example). Your Loyang is pretty much ideal for the higher tier PA DDs, and so on. When thinking about future premiums to either buy or earn, it's sensible (at least earlier on) to focus on things that will be good trainers for any silver lines where you don't have a premium already; avoid the weirder premiums that really want a specialist captain, and avoid premiums without a corresponding national silver line (e.g. Haida and Perth are great fun, but almost entirely worthless as trainers as there isn't a silver commonwealth line - at least until/unless you get a 19-pointer in them). Do you have a high point captain? If you do, try and focus on him as much as possible/practical (including acquiring corresponding premium ships), to get him to 19 points; this is usually a longer-term project as the higher point 'jumps' take a lot of xp (300K for 18 to 19, from memory), but once you have a 19 pointer, all the captain xp he earns can be used on other captains. Each 19 pointer you get speeds up the acquisition of the next one, and so on. Try and build up reserves of elite xp and/or free xp before you jump your captain to a new silver ship (if you aren't going to use doubloons); ideally, you want to avoid playing in the target silver ship without an entirely trained captain. If you can't build up the reserve in advance, ideally just play him in a premium until he's trained up; for example, your Scharn will work admirably in this way for pretty much all the German BBs from T5 and up (doubly so if Narai ever comes back). Use xp boosting flags (signals), but pick your spots: the rewards in Coop are generally poorer, so this isn't a good mode for maximising return on signal use; far better to use them in Randoms, Clans etc. Also, recall that flags stack (and review how the different xp types are calculated) e.g. +100% xp, and +100% captain xp will actually generate (I think) 200% captain xp - captain xp basically equals xp+free xp, so the first flag boosts the standard xp, and then the captain xp flag boosts that even further for the captain.

This is a good point, but it is kind of WG's job (as a commercial entity). I know we all take the pi$$ out of the mighty spreadsheets, but somewhere there will be one (or an equivalent) that cross references measures of player aggravation versus income and server population etc. WG will, as a matter of policy, always be trying to see what more they can get away with - it's pretty standard business practice. All we can do as individuals is decide where our "hells, no!" lines are, and hope that enough other players agree to drive WG in a direction that we like. For example, the PR event was so far over my personal "hells, no!" line that it wasn't even visible on a clear day, but I view the current directives as entirely fine (for me personally only): If you have a reasonably diverse port, they are flat-out easy (provided you don't mind pratting about in Coop for a bit). The rewards for the individual elements are poor; this is actually a good thing as it reduces any sense of missing out if you resist OCD urges to be a completist. You basically gain nothing meaningful if you do more than the minimum, which suits me fine. I think I've played pretty much all the directives so far to some degree (I believe I've completed the vast majority), and they don't seem to be getting any harder (to get the main reward) - apart from the PR stupidity. What does change is what WG are trying to get us to do/move towards with the nature of the directives; for example, the current set (and others with class-specific conditions) are trying to move us away from being single class monomaniacs, but aren't worried about nations. We've had blatant 'play specific nations' things in past, and no doubt other attempts to mould the customer base's playing behaviour will come in the future.

To be fair, that does seem to be a sensible position to take vis-a-vis WG; occasionally, we get a pleasant surprise (ARP freebies being a recent example), but the key word is 'occasionally'.

Not going to join the pile-on (it's wicked to mock the afflicted). However: according to wikipedia, the guns on the Friesland should have a ROF of 84 rounds per minute per turret; in game the thing gets 1.8 sec reload (before skills). In the interests of - ahem - historical accuracy I demand (demand, I say!) a buff...!

I haven't done the maths, but wouldn't it be cheaper (if taking the 'throw money at the problem' approach) to simply convert suitable xp to free xp, get a regular T10 DD, and put a permaflage on it? This assumes that the 2 million free xp turns out to be accurate.

The key driver of rewards is how much damage you do, as you know, specifically proportional damage (10K damage to a DD better than 10K to a fatty); so, pick something that you can consistently do lots of damage with. Besides that, in terms of pure credit generation, the T9 premiums do best - all things being equal. As mentioned earlier, the Kobayashi cammos make the relevant T8s similarly good, but they only exist for a few ships (one of which is a T7, so of less use), and aren't available for coal/free xp. The T10 'semi-premiums' (Thunderer, Smol etc.) are pretty decent earners though, and have the merit of being usable in a wider range of modes...

This, assuming WG's view of Ops doesn't change. If it does, I would *really* like it to be fixed so as to be able to play the thing with randoms... Yup.

Purely IMO, of course: Shima is a classic IJN torp boat and as such stealth is a lot of what she's about; my feeling is that radar (and there will be plenty of radar) alone could be worked round, as could a CV, but both together will erode Shima's key strength far too much for her to be viable. Of course, you could mount the 20 km torps, with TA and the zoomy torps mod (which you probably already have), but then you might as well just take Gearing as she does the 'stand-off torp spammer' job better in a CV environment (less bad AA, probably more useful guns, but at the expense of a torp launcher). BTW I'm assuming LU Gearing; normal Gearing loses some stealth but gains DPM by comparison. I have to admit that - as others have said - Daring will be my 'starter for ten', but that's wildly unhelpful as you don't have her. Things like Groz, Daring, and Zed are all balanced around having rather mediocre stealth, so when that stealth is removed they suffer comparatively less than something balanced around being sneaky (so, Shima). Like I said though, just my opinion at this point, and we really are only guessing at the moment... Post-script: if someone wasn't taking things very seriously, they could take a 'guns' Shima into ranked for a laugh...?

+1 for Smol. Once it's removed from the shop, that's yer lot, and she's useful to have around - quite apart from anything else, she's perhaps the most efficient way to complete 'main gun hits' and 'fires' type missions. If you're squeamish about playing her, it's always better to have the option, rather than no choice. 13.8 km (https://wiki.wargaming.net/en/Ship:Smolensk) base, but everyone sensible seems to put at least one 'range extender' on her - either AFT, or the relevant upgrade. FWIW I use the upgrade, as it means I don't *need* an AFT captain, and I can't hit anything with floaty shells out to 19-odd km anyway...! Edit - ninjaed by @DFens_666

Besides what others have said, especially @HMS_Kilinowski (excellent post, sir!), a couple of additions: You only need to deactivate your AA when its range is longer than your detection distance from the air (if you're an airhead like me, it's worth getting into the habit of double-checking at the start of battles). The P key is the default toggle. While you're easing yourself back into the swing of things, it's worth picking DDs with (relatively speaking) good AA; it won't help one iota against a good player, but it might deter a more average one (especially if you have DefAA as well, and get to use sector reinforcement). Anything American (including the PA 'Americans') is usually okay, the IJN 'dakka' line maybe, the KM, and some of the Russians; there is quite a lot of variation though. Against most CV players, if you follow the advice others have offered, perhaps the key threat they represent is spotting; if you expect to get buzzed by aircraft, try and arrange matters such that you can put an island between you and the opposition surface ships - it's easier to deal with a threat from one axis than two at once. Try and kill planes when you can get away with it (and regardless, if you're going to die anyway) - at the very least, you'll get better rewards at the end of the game!

That's pretty close to what I have available too. The glib answer is 'whatever you do best with', although you may need to spend a few games working out what the latest Ranked meta looks like, plus the optimal choice(s) may well vary as you head up the ranks. For example, the prevalence of CVs will have a significant impact on what's viable and what isn't, plus I won't be surprised to find that you can 'get away with it' against CVs more frequently at the lower ranks than at the higher ones - as we know, a good CV will pretty much always kill you with relative impunity; you're basically hoping to meet average ones (at worst) - luckily, there are plenty of those around. I have zero intention of going above rank 10 myself (basically, I aim to get the reduced service cost flag and then call it a day - the frustration beyond that is intolerable), and I'm thinking that - depending on meta - Groz might be worth a punt (fierce - for a DD - AA, fast, decent balance between dakka and torps, a heal; plus, if there turn out to be a lot of CVs, an AA build *might* be worth a look, although it'll do nothing against a good player); Z-52 has the nice smoke/hydro combination and is another good hybrid, and *maybe* Gearing (long-range torps to keep radars at bay, and tolerable AA by DD standards; I run the LU build, so mine is quite sneaky too). YY is still probably too heavily nerfed (plus, at lower tiers anyway, most players won't take advantage of your radar, and with a smoke build Gearing is better), and Shima will likely get crucified if there are plenty of CVs and radar about...

That's a major plus for WOWS; you have to be mindful though that a lot of the time, a captain build for one class won't work well with another. It's by no means universal though e.g. several of the premium cruisers work pretty much optimally with a decent DD captain, and several of the 'supercruisers' suit a decent BB captain build. This is the problem with a lot of the 'special' skins - they cost more than the standard ones, and the only difference is aesthetics. Unless you are insanely keen, or have so much money in your pockets that you need to hire people to hold your trousers up, the standard ones are - functionally, anyway - almost always the better choice. As always, there are exceptions, the most notable ones are the 'national' permaflages (from memory, Shinonome, Warspite, and Graf Spee have them available), which do also improve the economics of the ships in question, plus the Kobayashi cammos, which *massively* improve the economics of their respective ships (Kii has one available, as do Roma, and Ashitaka). Even so, they're still quite expensive for what they are, and their value comes down to how much you need the extra silver.

No (as already stated), but permaflage does have the merit of saving you some silver (or better consumable cammo) each battle you play with it. As a fairly poor player, I do find that T9 and T10 (especially the latter) permaflages are very much worth having though; the T9 reduces your service charge at the end of each battle, which makes it far easier to turn a profit with the things (or reduce the loss in Coop), while the T10 turns the economies of ships of that tier into something not too far from a premium. It's all about the economy though; arguably, the key value of most premiums is their utility as captain trainers, and a permaflage won't help you with that.

I got the impression that the main reason people got upset was not that forumites would use the mod (clearly most won't), but rather that more typical players would. Whilst it's not entirely sporting to farm BBs that sail in straight lines, it is a significant part of one's game economy, so a reduction in that ability might hurt (plus, from a practical standpoint, even a hopeless BB is a damage sponge for their team - for a while at least). I haven't played enough since the new mod hove into view to comment intelligently, but in the games I have played, I haven't detected any significant change to a typical BB's ability to evade my torps in their favour (if anything, the new zoomy torps mod *may* have made DDs' lives easier).