Verblonde

They still have the ping thing, mitigated by DCP, in conjunction with homing torps - that alone means they should not be in the game.

Welcome back!

That's pretty close to what my reaction was. I'm wondering if these containers are a test of what the market will bear; I'm normally pretty cetacean, but if even I'm saying "hold on..." (certainly for my NA account anyway)...? I think WG are over-valuing the 'other stuff' you get from the containers (coal, silver, signals, and assorted xp); I might have been more inclined to spend if they'd made it - rather than *a* ship - a voucher (say) that you could exchange for the ship of your choice from the list. Incidentally, I seem to recall - when the captain skill rework came out (especially with the expensive extra points) - that many people predicted captain xp being sold more extensively; these crates would seem to prove those people's foresight...

This may not be as far from the truth as you think, if we look at the ship list: WG are asking 150 quid for a guaranteed T10 ship (if you have the worst luck imaginable and trigger the pity mechanic), but it's not a specific ship for all that money, it's *a* ship. The point being that reasonably experienced players will hopefully have a sense of which types of ship they like and get on with, so only a complete newbie is likely to think words to the effect of 'any T10 is good'. I personally represent a couple of scenarios for an experienced player: EU account: I have everything on the list apart from Forrest Sherman, therefore the question is 'I am going to get Sherman if I get a ship; is the necessary spend worth it for her?'. NA account: I have a couple of the ships on the list, so there is no guarantee of getting something I like (DD main, and I like Napoli), so on that server the question is 'is the thing on the list I like least worth spending 150 quid for?'. On NA, I'm not going to be whaling these containers because I know that the odds dictate that I won't get my money's worth, as I would have to spend stupid money to get ships I actually like (on average). A newbie, on the other hand, might care less and so be more likely to open their wallet, because they are less aware that not all T10s are created equal, and they are certainly not all as good as each other...

I have to admit to looking thoughtfully in that direction too; assuming the review I read is right, the entire game costs about a third the price of 25 firepower (or whatever they're called) crates...

Well, FWIW here are the prices (from my NA account) in CAD$: That's a bit shy of 150 UK Pounds for 25 containers...

If that's the case, they should just ditch homing altogether, and stick with dumb torps. I do wonder if that's part of what Sherman is about - to see what happens with limited arc dumb torps at higher tiers...

I agree absolutely; the problem - IMO - is a lot to do with the whole ping thing being mitigated by DCP, and we're not seeing any signs of that being ditched yet. As I've said before, I would love for submarines to be added if it was done well. Quite apart from anything else, I wants me a Das Boot submarine...

Madam Olga's Liaison Officer? I must admit, I normally can't remember who's who at WG; the whole tone-deaf responses to customer concerns (particularly the PR business), mean Sub_O was one of the few I could vaguely remember. Presumably, we'll now see how much of <gestures vaguely around> all this was him, and how much is fundamental to WG as an organisation. I won't take the return of submarines as evidence one way or the other, as a potential new broom won't be able to act right away, although I tend to assume that most of the stuff we've been so annoyed about was the result of more than just one person.

Nah - it's what you get if you play at antisocial hours (server time); for example, if I'm playing on EU at 22:00 my time, that's three in the morning in the UK...

Excellent Coop fodder; wouldn't touch her with a barge-pole against real people...

This is a very good point; I've had several battles recently where I've faced radar ships that apparently didn't know they had radar e.g. I ended up surfing my detection distance in a Smaland around one of the Russian cruisers on one occasion, and he didn't radar me once...! I know that the occasional maniac doesn't take radar on Des Moines (I think it is), but the Russian cruisers...?!

From my perspective, you don't (approach the cap), at least not to start with. Although the opposition is clearly at a significant advantage if they have all the radar, your side isn't completely boned; that said, as a DD you have to bring your A-game in such situations. You know which ships have radar; check out the team lists before the game starts - that tells you from the start how big a problem (or not) you have that game. If you're going into the teeth of lots of radar, play accordingly - don't get too far ahead of your support, and always make sure there is an island within reach if/when you get radared. Use F3 to highlight radar ships; it's surprising how many typical players don't know which ships have radar (especially when they're new). Play a lot more cautiously than you might normally; I know this sucks (why play DDs if you want to be cautious?), but you have to force yourself if MM has dumped on you. Accept that you may well be boned regardless; if you get stuffed, try not to get too stressed about it - it'll mess up your head for the next battle, and you'll play worse. FWIW I pretty much always play DDs in Ranked, and I also always pick things that suffer less than most in a radar-heavy environment (and are good at killing other DDs, ideally). Another more general piece of feedback: playing Ranked is not the same as Randoms; the approach that works in Randoms may not be the same as that which works in Ranked - you may want to tweak your play style slightly, to adjust for the smaller teams and maps?

This is vaguely equivalent to the steel you got from the Satan Boxes for a duplicate; this approach strikes me as odd - if you have all the available ships already, this relatively poor reward for a duplicate is a motivator to stop spending on the crates. It's clearly a good thing to have a cap on encouraging people to spend, regardless of how many people actually are impacted (the number of folk with *all* the ships has to be pretty small); I'm just wondering why WG would do it at all - surely they would want as much money from everyone as possible?

Dev Blog (unfortunately, bloody submarines are returning, complete with pings): https://blog.worldofwarships.com/blog/279

I'd probably pay money for the Swedish Chef as a captain...

I think @Panocek pretty much nails it! I suppose, if one were feeling generous, she makes a bit more sense than Khaba did, in terms of being a continuation of what went before at T9 (although Daily Bounce isn't hugely complimentary*: https://thedailybounce.net/world-of-warships/final-review-soviet-tier-x-destroyer-delny/). It does also make the 'which Russian DD line' question easier to answer too, so there's that...? Er, she's arguably prettier than Khaba. [barrel-scraping intensifies] *Could be worse though; have a butchers at the new KM BB review (https://thedailybounce.net/world-of-warships/final-review-german-tier-x-battleship-preussen/) - ouch!

Not even remotely sure! In the past though, if you dropped a ship you already had, you'd get another ship from the list remaining at random, until you ran out of ships... For crates that weren't Satan boxes, it's generally not been possible to drop duplicate ships though (this year's Satan boxes dropped steel if you ran out of ships to drop)... As always, for these new crates, nobody should buy anything until they've carefully read the small print!

It's only that chance if you have none of the ships on the list (assuming the ships all have an equal chance of dropping): I would think most old lags at least will have at least half of that lot (especially given that two of them are the latest silver-to-gold transition ships)? Personally, I'm looking at a 1 in 20 chance of getting Sherman...

C'mon, in a video game (large chunk of customer base: puerile males) the chances of this *not* happening were probably about 0.00000000000000000017%...!

I was under the impression that this was a key element of the mobile-gaming monistisation strategy that WG seem to be enamoured of? Presumably, they know that quite a few people want Sherman; I imagine a fair number of them will buy loot boxes to avoid having to wait for those extra two weeks. The tips jar at Madam Olga's will be grateful...

If it's testers playing them, then they'll presumably perform better than an average player? I may be wrong, but I'd got the impression that these things are all about close range engagements? If that's the case, they'll be much harder work at the tiers that matter (sorry - that's a bit high-tier-centric, but you get what I mean), due to all the vision control consumables running around (hydro/radar), and CV spotting (not to mention the imminent return of bloody submarines)...? Whether it's true or not remains to be seen, but didn't the Dev Blog make them sound kind-of like a tree of Yolo Emilios? If that's the case, they could be fun, but probably not excessively influential?

Perhaps I'm a minority - I was just hoping for a tea-flavoured Atalanta (without the radar) that wasn't hopeless. Mind you, I'm dreadful in cruisers, so her being OP or otherwise in my hands is a bit moot. To be fair to WG, I have seen several test Didos before now in competent hands, and they were pretty fearsome...

Whilst I'm very 'careful what I wish for' given what they did to Dido (per @Aragathor), I'd quite like to see the following: Cavalier (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Cavalier_(R73)) Caroline (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Caroline_(1914)) Averof, although she's borderline - it's far too much fun watching the Greek nationalists have conniptions over her exclusion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_cruiser_Georgios_Averof).

Oh yes: "Dee-do"?! Oh dear...