SXLightning

Try playing it like a USN DD, Ambush and guns, it has pretty decent guns and rotation speed for a IJN DD. Below are my general tactic to use. You will get better once you start using all these in a game based on the best situation available to you. 1. Hide/Ambush the only torp option for <T8 (USN) but IJN DD can also use this tactic. 2. Fire in a cone to increase the chance of a hitting a blob. 3. Fire while sitting in smoke is the other way to deal damage without receiving any. 4. Get range upgrade and fire but still stay invisible. +4km detection range when firing 127mm guns. You can do the math. (only mostly applies to USN DD since you dont really want to fire you guns and the range on IJN DD are not very good. 5. USN DD now can get defensive fire??? not used it yet, it might be useful to at least push the planes away from you???

Yeah, I am only on the farragut myself, so I don't know the high level in too much detail. However, generally the USN DD get better as the tiers go up. 1. Hide/Ambush the only torp option for <T8 (USN) but IJN DD can also use this tactic. 2. Fire in a cone to increase the chance of a hitting a blob. 3. Fire while sitting in smoke is the other way to deal damage without receiving any. 4. Get range upgrade and fire but still stay invisible. +4km detection range when firing 127mm guns. You can do the math. (only mostly applies to USN DD since you dont really want to fire you guns and the range on IJN DD are not very good. 5. USN DD now can get defensive fire??? not used it yet, it might be useful to at least push the planes away from you???

I believe the Kagero is more agile than the fubuki. That's is defiantly useful!!! Additionally, once you learn to play around the planes you have a good chance to stay hidden. Know where the planes usually come from and go around them or just wait for them to appear. It will be a boring early game but a hidden DD is the best DD.

So basicly, to sum up everything everyone said: 1. Too many planes on high tier 2. No reward for the things DD does 3. Unreliable Toros at long ranges (torp detect ability and speed) 4. Cost of running a DD I know these have been the problem for DDs since OBT. However there are a lot of benefits or little tricks most people don't know. 1. Firing your 127mm guns only increase your detect ability by ~4km. A lot of new players don't know this and it's not some stats openly avaliable. I had to look very hard to finally find these or to test them myself. I think making a guide/spreadsheet of these stats would be very useful. I found one someone made with all the gun ranges and another with all the detect ability after skill/upgrade and camo. @ to answer your observation about my stats. 1. I am very selfish player. I prefer to live than die, I would go for kills that help me instead of the team. As long as I get exp I don't care if I win or not. It's something I am trying to change. 2. I division a lot with my friend who is 2 tiers higher than me. Trying to play the hatsuharu or fubuki in tier 10 games is difficult. 3. I been doing better in the jäger I because I feel it suits my play style. Additionally I been playing the USN DD a lot so now my play style is more diverse. Mixing long range torp and am use much better. I used to only play long range torp. 4. I am a new player after all, I only played this game for about 2 weeks, I took a break of 1 week and just got back again to continue playing so I used to suck at this game. I personally think the Kagero is great ship as long as you mix your play style and play like a American DD. additionally I gives you the option to play 15km or 20km. At the end of the day, I admit playing DD requires a lot more skill to play well then any other class and I am learning, as you can see from my exp graph and win rate graph. I am slow climbing my way back up from my terrible start at this game. But I personally don't care about stats, as long as I get exp, credits and kills I am happy. (Even terrible players have good games and a good game replay is always useful to see what the energy did wrong or what you did right and it will defiantly help new players or at the very least fun to watch, because everyone like to watch someone win xD)

Hi all, SXLightning here. I am a dedicated DD player and after 400 games I have finally reached the Kagero. I had some terriable win rate when i started playing because I divisioned with my friend who was already T6-7. It was probably not the best idea and I accumulated a win rate of about 20~30%. It is during this time that I decided to play the DD. I was a fun experience till the minekaze. However, I will get to the point. T6-T8 are some of the worst experiences and finally getting the Kagero makes me feel that the pain I went through is worth it. I do not know if its because I got better at the game or the Kagero is just a better ship. I am currently on the stock 15km, even without captain skills because his retraining. This ship just feels much better. I am committed to getting the shimakaze. However, I do not see many youtubers making videos for actual game play for the high level JPN DDs. I am thinking of making some tutorial guides and demonstrate some tactics of how to play high level DD so the grind for others become easier. If someone already does that then please tell me so I don't make duplicate videos. I feel that when i started, T2-T5 vs T6-T8 play style is a huge change and it took me many hundreds of games to finally adjust to it. I am not saying I am now a good player, (I am not, my stats suck). I am a very greedy player. You can probably see from my survival rate which is like 66%. I have seen a few guides here and there but there is no consolidated knowledge and I would really like to call out to all the DD players out there to help build up a knowledge bank for the new players that are about to join on the 17th. TL;DR we need more guides and videos on high level DD play. Thank you for taking the time to read this SXL Problems in the High tiers 1. Too many planes on high tier, perma spotted or torps being spotted form miles away. 2. No reward for the things DD does. 3. Unreliable Toros at long ranges (torp detect ability and speed). 4. Cost of running a DD. 5. Slow reload time, leading to less fun gameplay. Tactics 1. Hide/Ambush the only torp option for <T8 (USN) but IJN DD can also use this tactic. 2. Fire in a cone to increase the chance of a hitting a blob. 3. Fire while sitting in smoke is the other way to deal damage without receiving any. 4. Get range upgrade and fire but still stay invisible. +4km detection range when firing 127mm guns. You can do the math. (only mostly applies to USN DD since you dont really want to fire you guns and the range on IJN DD are not very good. 5. USN DD now can get defensive fire??? not used it yet, it might be useful to at least push the planes away from you??? Solutions There are plenty and many good ones listed by people but I will not discuss them here. I will focus on how to make the current DDs work, but a fix (buff) is defiantly needed.

DD's are terrible, I only started playing during OBT. I only play Jap DD (occasional american CA when I am depressed and angry and frustrated). Its the only way to stop me from raging. I play the DD because of the feeling when the torps hit. its amazing but ever since T6 I been getting more and more frustrated. Up till now, everything I done, i have done and learnt myself. This is the first time I am coming onto the forums and I can honestly say, it doesn't fill me with hope from what people are saying about Jap DD. I am current't on T8 Fubuki. 8/20 games I died 3 mins into the game from TB. This ships got the worst turning of all the DD's i played. I am beginning to feel the need to quit.

I have like 38% win rate with DD, I am a IJN DD only player most of the time and I have horrible win rates. I am working my way toward the Tier 8 DD Fubuki . wish me luck