Verblonde

As a matter of interest, is there a summary anywhere of the current thinking on these things (specifically, which don't suck)? I watched a rather good video by Flamu (I think) just after they were initially released, but something more recent - with the benefit of actual experience - would be nice to see. The only one I have so far is Groz, which seems to be okay, but 'no great' - I think I'll go back to a conventional build with the next free demount...

PSA: for anyone who's made a pig's ear of their CV build (either captain, or modules), the free respec/demount allegedly starts today...

Dare I ask: what happens when a thread reaches Critical Poi?

This is what I'm hoping for a bit - I love Scharnhorst already for example; I just need to learn how to not potate in her against real people... Edit: thinking about it on the drive home, this is quite good timing - the free respec next week will allow me to assign some more appropriate captains, skill-wise to some of my BBs - several of my German and French captains are 'uber-manly' at the moment, which probably isn't terribly sensible against real people...

You're absolutely right; my problem is that I'm a bit conscious of letting my team down, so I tend to focus on the class I'm least bad at. I do play cruisers and BBs quite a bit, but in PvE mode, which rather limits the value of the experience gained. Coincidentally, I was thinking of deliberately trying to play some other classes this weekend as there aren't any missions of note (unless I missed something), so dropping down a few tiers and trying to learn to cruiser/BB might be worthwhile...

Careful what you ask - you may get answers...! <shudders in fear>

No, they don't; what they do provide is a solid indication of how good (or otherwise) a player is, what and how they play, and that allows others to gauge how valuable that person's input is on the subject in hand. For example, if you look at my stats (https://wows-numbers.com/player/526131254,Verblonde/) you might make a number of observations: I'm moderately experienced (3K battles in randoms). I'm not very good ('below average'). I have *lots* of ships, but only a few have been heavily played. I'm a whale (lots of premiums). The vast majority of my games (in randoms) are in DDs. I mostly play randoms solo (2.8K of the 3K). From those observations, you might draw a number of conclusions: My opinions aren't based on a snapshot, but neither are they of a hyper-experienced old lag. I probably understand the basic game mechanics reasonably well, but I'm not good enough to make full use of that knowledge (wide experience, but not deep). My views on premiums are reasonably well informed, but not those of a unicum. I know of what I speak when it comes to DDs, but only playing at an average level. You can generally cheerfully ignore almost anything I say on 'how to play' anything that isn't a DD, at least when I'm not recounting what other - better - players have said! Based on that, and the fact anyone can do a similar exercise to anyone who hasn't hidden their stats, you can't be surprised that people give some players' opinions more weight than others? For example, @El2aZeR has spectacular stats in CVs (or did, the last time I looked); it's reasonable to assume their opinion on the class is exceptionally well-informed, no? The only significant 'filter' I apply when contemplating their views is that I have very little chance of being able to implement the more advanced stuff, as I currently Potato for Britain in CVs.

I'm probably a 'yes' as well - the Ranked season using that mode sold me on it - slightly to my surprise...

I'd missed that; I don't think it's any different to flogging the free xp ones, in general, although I'm not hugely keen on the gambling element - you *may* get the coal you need. Why not just stick them in the shop a la Alaska etc.?

In strict game terms, she's a T3 BB, with all that that implies i.e. don't expect splendour. That said, I would have bought her myself, if I hadn't bagged a freebie already - it's Dreadnought, after all. If you want to engage in a bit of unprincipled seal-clubbing, there are better choices, but she's splendid from the point for view of a history buff/collector...

Isn't it a little early to be that 'refreshed'?

I suppose that gives a working week to un- whatever got ed up by the update...? Sounds quite sensible.

As another DD main, I don't mind this; as others say, it's the equivalent of getting your DD sunk, and still doing damage with previously fired ordnance that hasn't arrived yet. It would feel rather incongruous to me if, at the moment of its sinking, a CV's planes suddenly vanished/fell out of the sky; it makes logical sense for them to behave as they do now i.e. unload remaining weapons, but have a limited time to do it (as they'd need to be thinking about finding somewhere to land, quite possibly at the limits of their range - yes, I know it's an arcade game, but occasional nods to 'reality' are still nice to have). BTW do CVs get flesh wound awards if those final planes sink something? Just curious...

I'm rubbish at reading paper stats - would I guess correctly that Yudachi has the typical poor IJN AA? If that's the case, I would expect this thing to be a bit of a hard sell with all the CVs around, poorer torps would only exacerbate that, surely? (I know - it's a WiP)

Bugger - I'd forgotten that; apologies!

Valuable bonus?

BTW @Snaques, when the upcoming Yudachi* makes it into the game, I suspect you'll soon yearn for the blissful quiet of yesteryear; it's an historical inevitability that chat will become utterly infested with variations on the theme of 'Poi'... * See thread below.

It's still very early days, and at the tiers you've mainly been playing (3-5 in randoms) almost everyone doesn't have much of a clue yet, apart from the odd seal-clubber. To be fair, most of the player base (me included) still don't have a clue at higher tiers either, most of the regulars on here excepted; the difference is that the number of people who do think they have a clue increases, and their willingness to explain why everyone else is doing it wrong also increases. At lower tiers, a lot of players are too busy trying to work out what all the controls do to type in chat... Sensible suggestion: join a clan; you'll get a bunch of useful economic benefits, assuming their base is reasonably developed, but (more relevantly) you'll also get people to division with, many of whom will use voice comms of some sort, or at the very least communicate in chat with the rest of their division...

BTW @deathman16 if you haven't found it already, Ship Comrade is worth a look apropos captain builds: http://shipcomrade.com/captcalc The wiki (http://wiki.wargaming.net/en/World_of_Warships) also includes suggestions as to which skills work best for each ship in the game.

I was feeling unkind, I might suggest you buy something like a Tirpitz, and see how you get on; I'm reasonably confident that you would relocate the 'missing' toxicity in fairly short order...! Being a bit less flippant, WOWS is certainly less toxic than WOT is (although that isn't terribly difficult); my current hypothesis is that the WOWS players base is, on average, a bit older, and less likely to be of the spotty adolescent variety - this tends to lead to a slightly more civilised environment, because a lot of us got that sort of thing out of our systems when young + stupid...

Something I should have mentioned: even if you're not great in them (being polite in my case), RN CLs are a hoot in coop. So, even if you find them to be a bit much in randoms, you can still make use of your ships against bots. I like Leander a lot, but I would still suggest playing the previous tiers properly and extensively first; at the very least, it'll help teach you the basics of RN CL play in a less alarming environment. Emerald is, IMO, a good learning tool, but spectacularly unforgiving; make sure you spend plenty of time in the T4 (with its +1 MM) first, to pick up the necessary basic skill-set.

Did anyone actually advocate that? The impression I got was more of a resounding chorus of 'be careful'. Early caps are good, if you can get them, but less so if you get blown up getting them, hence the need for caution...

Whilst my abilities in RN cruisers are similar to the levels you might expect from a concussed whelk in the matter of quantum physics, I'd suggest they might actively teach you good habits: If you give someone broadside, there's a good chance they'll delete you in one salvo, so it encourages angling, and hiding your vulnerable bits. No option of HE, so spamming said ammo type not possible - forces you to learn what to do with AP. Single fire torps, with their associated skill needs. Teach you to manage DCP/RP with a very fragile ship. Personally, I find them a bugger to play well (plus, it helps to have a high point captain); although I'm showing zero signs of it myself, if you can master them, you'll probably be a rather better player at the end of it. If you want to learn to play torp cruisers, I would suggest that the IJN ones are perhaps rather more forgiving...?

Absolutely, although it may be a little slow in the long-term. Keep an eye out for free (ideally) 10 point captains; besides winning them in operations, you can get a few from the Arsenal, plus with the upcoming space thing, there is a probably quite a good chance of some 10 pointers being available in connection with that too (I picked up several last time around). It's way too early for this yet (with, at time of writing, 235 battles), but your ultimate aim is to get to the point where you have at least one 19 point captain; besides being more powerful than more prosaic ones, all the captain xp you earn with them goes to elite captain xp, which can be used to help advance other captains. As you'll spot immediately, the effect then snowballs - the more 19-pointers you have (and play), the faster you'll accumulate more, and so on. Different players will have different views on where the balance point lies, but one has to decide how much emphasis to put on getting your first captain to 19 points, versus getting other captains to 'good enough' (10 points, say). As you'll have noticed already, each captain point takes more and more experience to gain, compared to the last e.g. to go from 18 to 19 points requires 300,000 xp (more details here: http://wiki.wargaming.net/en/Ship:Commander), versus 2,500 to go from 1 to 2! A helpful state of affairs to eventually arrive at is to have a high point captain for a high tier silver ship, plus a couple of premiums that he also works well with, to cycle through: that way, you get the benefit of more than one daily win bonus. For example, since we're talking about Brits, I have (I think) an 18 point captain assigned to my T9 RN DD, so every day I can bag the daily win bonus for the T9, plus Cossack, plus Gallant, plus Cambeltown, making his journey to 19 points faster, plus generating more elite xp after he gets there... BTW if you complete the Dunkirk collection (via coal in the Arsenal) you get the Jack Dunkirk special captain, who's a 10 pointer, although his special skills are more suited to CLs (and maybe BBs - players with more RN experience can help here?). You can also buy his 'twin' straight from the Arsenal (1,500 doubloons). The various 'unique' captains are a whole separate topic though; the short version is that a few of their skills are better than the standard version, so making them especially suited to some ships more than others e.g. the 'Doe' twins have boosted EL and EM, which is suggestive of being a good fit with a BB; meanwhile the 'Ovenchicken' (the hockey guy) captains, have boosted EM, and SE (I think) making them great for Russian DDs particularly, and so on...

True - I probably should have been a bit more expansive. My approach is to assume I can cap straight off, and then run for cover if/when any warning flags are raised. Much of the time, I want the enemy planes to disturb me, especially early on before any AA gets knocked out - if I can make an initial strike costly, then the CVs sometimes give me a wide berth after that...