HaachamaShipping

1050 hp or concealment over another smoke?

Fair enough. Might go for BFT when I get to 13 points then. Not like that will be anytime soon, as it'd be pretty much just a captain for ultimate sealclubbing, but over a long enough, we'll get there.

Ich verstehe unter Nahkampf für deutsche Schiffe die Distanz auf welche die Sekundärgeschütze anfangen zu feuern, also unter 7 km auf der Gneisenau (Zielsystem Mod ist bei der Streuung fast schon muss, Sekundärgeschütz Mod kann dann auf der Bismarck kommen). Auf die Entfernung sind die Geschütze halbwegs zuverlässig (aber auch nicht immer). Wenn der Gegner keine Breitseite zeigt schießt man am Besten wohl noch auf die Deckaufbauten. Ist immer noch ein bisschen Schaden und mit etwas Glück ein Geschützturmausfall. Das Schöne im 1v1 gegen Schlachtschiffe ist nicht so sehr, dass man so viel Schaden austeilt, sondern, dass die Gneisenau (und Scharnhorst) angewinkelt auch nicht viel Schaden nehmen und man hoffentlich länger überlebt. Natürlich funktioniert das nicht immer... Irgendwie kommt mir bei den deutschen Schlachtschiffen vor, dass die bloße Präsenz bald schon mehr wert ist als der direkte Schaden.

Did I miss anything, because to my knowledge Derzki has 3 guns and a 5 seconds reload, so it should be inferior? As for going BFT over DE, I felt like it already has a good enough RoF and HE damage to gun down DDs and most cruisers, but BB typically just don't care much, because the 102 mm shells shatter. And the 11.1% increase in RoF helps little, while an increase in fire chance from 5% to 7% is almost 50% more fire chance, leading to an increase from 2.4 fires per minute to 3.34 fires per minute average.

Yes it does. Your standard hydro will boost acquisition range to 3-4 km, which, if one is actually paying attention, can be enough for even a battleship like the Bismarck to dodge the torps (German BBs above Bismarck might be too clumsy, but if Bismarck manages it, then cruisers should have few issues). That said, given hydro isn't going to last forever, I think the best protection against DWT is some destroyers inbetween yourself and the enemy DD. Insofar, DWT make teamwork even more important.

Nice summary. I got Vampire today and took her out for a bit and amidst the mess that is the lower tiers, the ship isn't OP, but certainly has potential for sealclubbing. As mentioned, the firing arcs are incredible (though ballistic arcs are terrible like most low-tier ships and the turret traverse isn't good either). Playing her with the 6 pt captain (didn't want to spend my valuable free exp on it and it already is likely more than most tier III ships have) and got PM, LS and DE (felt like fires deal more damage than a rate of fire boost on the peashooters, though SI would be a good one too), but now I was wondering whether to go for CE or just go for IFHE. I got the feeling like IFHE would allow her to do pretty good damage and given the smokes are pretty good and the firing arcs are splendid, it might be not unreasonable to forsake the stealth for actually having decent damage on those guns. What are other people's thoughts? Overall though, definitely a good ship that certainly will be nice to take out every once in a while just for random low tier fun. Just like the Albany.

Roon and Hindenburg are both paper design ships, which were given appropriate German cruiser names, just like all other paper designs in the game that got no proper name already (Montana has already a name, Myogi, Izumo and Zao would be the ships that like Roon and Hindenburg were renamed). So no, these won't be some WWII battlecruisers, they'll be late-war era heavy cruiser designs, appropriate for their tier. Also, 305/310 mm caliber did make a reappearance in late WWII, with the designs of large cruiser killers like the Alaska-class, the B-65 design of Japan and the Soviet Stalingrad-class, which were armoured against 203 mm shells and given 305/310 mm guns to outclass any existing heavy cruisers. I'd be doubtful though whether Hindenburg would ever get an upgrade to that though (from what it looks like, she doesn't have any now). It seems more like a 203 mm 4x3 arrangement à la Zao, with the same ROF but slightly greater range and better turret traverse. Might be the standard for Tier X, with Des Moines being special with autoloaders that give 50% higher firing volume per minute.

Hmm, guess I'll try it out then. Worst case, it's a few games more to Aoba. Furutaka isn't that much of a pain to play now anyways.

Playing the Furutaka prior to 4.1 and now, I don't know whether to say it has become a decent ship or not. It kind of worked already before, at least with the commander skill for faster turret traverse and now combined with the buff it's down to just over 31 seconds, which I consider pretty nice. It's not fast enough to keep up with wild maneuvers that spin your ship around, but at least you can now conveniently change between targets on the same side of the ship to better take advantage of any opportunities (especially between islands, where enemies could pop in and out of cover). I did like my Furutaka prior to the patch and like it even more now. Though, I do want to ask, is it worth going for the long-range torpedos? I haven't yet researched those, as I wasn't convinced whether I'd actually need them. To me, Furutaka's torpedos always seemed like a closs-quarter weapon when someone got too close for comfort, where I found the combination of short range and good speed to score reliable hits. I am a bit concerned that the Furutaka with 10 km torpedos may have range, but that speed decrease may make it much easier to just dodge the torpedos.

Wonder what the Germans will have get going for them then. May just stick to their cruisers.

I heard the Germans will get faster reload speed on some of their battleships.

I wouldn't consider 20 knots fast. It's at best passable, but with a ship that is as retarded in its gun range as Kawachi, 20 knots is just lame. There aren't many ships that are slower, except maybe stock USN BBs (by something like 3 knots) and ships that took one to the engine.

Took me 23 battles. It's actually not that much. If need be, just throw in one match inbetween matches with more fun ships, like the Tenryu. Myogi to Kongo is far longer (though the ship is less frustrating, imo).

Try to use the only good points it has. The detection range and the guns that need not too much traverse to point anywhere around you. You can try use islands to make some approach and try get in range. Others may have more experience on this POS, but I found it worth investing the 3k free exp I got from achieving rank 7 or 8 on the Kawachi to Myogi grind. Also, don't get too used to this ship, most ships after it are different. With good speed, long range (not great accuracy though) and thus greater flexibility.

1v1 a BB can usually still win, unless it's one of those 21 knot US BBs and the DD runs away, so it ends in a draw. Fast BBs with 25-30 knots may actually try to just go cap or protect their own cap, whatever is closer. The hard thing with a battleship isn't dodging destroyer torpedos from IJN destroyers, unless those were fired at you from quite short range, cutting down on reaction time, but it's dodging the aerial torpedos of torpedo bombers, which can just be dropped right next to your ship. If you know there's a destroyer out there that isn't accounted for, you better readjust your course every now and then (~20-30 seconds is sufficient) and the stealth destroyer is nigh-useless, because all torpedos miss and once they fire their puny guns, you can just fire HE for massive damage. If you think duelling DDs in your BB is a hard thing, you most likely haven't seen much here, because the real challenge comes with carriers. BBs can perform just fine against DDs.

3:34 am is usually ~3,000 to at most 5,000 people, from my experience. But I guess not everyone is up there at Tier VIII-X.

Also it's quite fast, which I'd guess helps staying in more advantageous positions. Enemy got better BBs to make up for the Taiho. With 4.1 and mirror MM for CVs, this shouldn't occur though indeed.

Definitely would be useful. Also, does repairing nothing actually use it up? I only had it once that I tried to repair and nothing happened (not even using up a repair), so I clicked again, before guessing that most likely I repaired everything that wasn't a citadel hit already. But could be that it just lagged around.

Haven't been around that long, so can't comment much, but I'd think ships already get more XP when firing at targets closer to them. Because at 10 km range you just hit more often than at 20 km. With anything but battleships such a mechanic seems utterly ridiulous, because some cruisers just work by shelling the enemy at close to their max range and staying away. If for example a Kuma (or any cruiser with up to 15 km max range) would be suddenly getting half the XP for not taking on enemies within 6 km range, you got the choice between engaging ships at a range where you can dodge, though for low XP, or to go at a range that may mean getting one-shotted by a battleship. I see the problem there is with people being overly cautious, but I think this one would need some refining. If it is necessary...

If you hit a cruiser from 15 km. And the sole battleships you reliably penetrate from the side with 280 mm are the battlecruisers. Penetrating a Fuso, a Nagato or all the USN BBs with 280 mm is at best possible with plunging fire, which is where 203 mm works actually too, because the lower tiers got less deck armour.

Well, aircraft from a sunk carrier at best spot. An AFK ship might actually still come to life and do something useful. Taking care of it while it's helplessly sitting there isn't that wrong. Also, compared to aircraft, a sunk ship gives some good exp incentive.

Well, he got "Decisive Strike" for sinking it with one salvo that took out most of the health.

You do realise that all the cruisers on tiers IV, V and VI have paper armour where you pen regardless whether you have 155 or 280 mm AP loaded? The only improvement of greater caliber is that slight angle will still be penetrated better and you can use them better against BBs.

You can't AFK to tier 10, given you get 0 XP and just a bill for maintainance. Best case scenario, every tenth battle some aircraft flies into your AA and dies. Most people AFK just had suddenly something come up IRL, they disconnected or their game crashed. Happens at times.

I know that feeling. Though I take her out at times for a short battle in co-op, where it's stress-free. Then get matched with it on Ocean map against South Dakotas. But if you can't take a joke, don't use the Albany...