Aotearas

Lesson of the thread: how to shoot yourself in the foot 101. Also, Google translate? Really???

<- forever alone. WG, you lied. You said your Valentine's stuff would protect me

Nope. Potatoes can grow. And not just into bigger potatoes, is what I want to say. As long as you intend to learn and are willing to accept that you make mistakes, then put some effort into trying to make less of them, you will become a better player and sooner rather than later you'll leave the potato salad and start enjoying the main dish! Tier I btw is quite chaotic anyway, so it's really not a place to try and find yourself. Go for tier III or IV if you want an easy reference point, the game balance has matured to a degree sufficient enough that player skill makes a nice difference.

Just wanted to note that this argument stands on an incredibly thin sheet of ice. Derpitz is all I'm going to say. I can't talk about others, but the reason why I'm engaging in this discussion is not because I think the Belfast is blatantly OP, but because a handful of people seem to be tryharding in an attempt to whitewash that fact, pulling brain acrobatics and drawing circular conclusions trying to convince everyone (or maybe just themselves) that the Belfast isn't somehow overpowered compared to regular cruisers at tier VII (or any other tier really, since the Belfast is the only ship in the entire game to get access to smoke, hydro and radar at the same time). It's quite possible that my insistent counterarguments to paint the picture of me being being obsessed with the Belfast OPness, but really I'm just flabbergasped at people who try to argue the ship is perfectly balanced.

Just wanted to note that this argument stands on an incredibly thin sheet of ice. Derpitz is all I'm going to say.

Wut? Do you know how laughably easy it is to hit a DD below 10km? And even if it doesn't get sunk, any HP lost will put it at a greater risk later on in a game. And fat chance trying to evade a Belfast at the start of the game when nothing's been spotted yet. The moment you spot the Belfast, it can activate radar to counterspot you and if the enemy team has half a brain they'll all be shooting at you. Something is going to hit you.

Had a couple neat games today, including a ramkill Kraken, but the game I felt was the bigger achievement was this one: Mostly because our battleships weren't exactly doing their job (well) ... or doing anything. We had an AFK Amagi, our North Carolina was just maxrange sniping the entire time and our Friedrich, to be entirely fair I hadn't paid much attention to him, but the score says that whatever he did, it wasn't exactly spectacular. Meanwhile my Princess Eugene had to pick up the tanking slack: ~1.5kk potential damage, at one point I was fighting three ships all by myself and ultimately the enemy NC ended my harassment streak because our own dear NC was too busy keeping its precious two thirds full HP save rather than actually defend the B cap. My partner avenged me though

Our division (fun6utzi in MK and me in PE) ran into Evoside (HMS OP) and a mate of his whose name I didn't recognize (and sadly forgot, he was playing Kiev). Ended up a rather hardfought match at least for our side (many thanks to that maxrange sniping NC). I made sure to throw a compliment his way

Not allowing players to unlock ships with free XP unless they have already unlocked a ship of the same class of equal or higher tier through regular grind.

Welp, I just had this game in my Bogue ... Bogue with 11 skillpoint captain (naturally with AS perk) in 1/1/0 setup (because 2/0/1 is boring as hell and 0/1/2 ... well, if the enemy has a CV with a fighter squadron and the player isn't completely braindead he can just feast on my poor attackcraft). Fighters did their thing and earned me 'Clear Skies', torpedo bombers did their thing and went three for three: three kills, three 'Devastating Strikes' and a High Caliber. If the two outermost torpedoes in that drop hadn't scraped past the Langley's bow and aft respectively, I would've gone four for four. Alas, I had to settle for just almost nuking that one too. Game had quite interesting MM though. Only one BB per team, but lots of cruisers and DDs, plus double CV. Ironically, as you'd think that would be a nightmare for those poor BBs I didn't bother with it (and neither did the allied Langley from what I saw). Our cruisers and DDs chewed that one up on their own as I went about my way obliberating enemy cruisers (with one free kill on an AFK Phoenix, what can I say, I like free XP and credits).

Sounds like typical Ranked to me ...

I mostly stopped playing ship classes that are too dependant on your team not utterly letting you down. That means I hardly play cruisers and battleships solo anymore. That's why you don't see non-Ranked solo stats for my Belfast. If you want to compare my alltime (division) stats in the Belfast (32 games played): 81.25% winrate 65,941 average damage 4.1 K/D ratio 1.8 average frags per match 56% survival rate 38% mainbattery hitrate Comparing that with the Fiji which is the closest regular ship (31 games played): 77.42% winrate 71,542 average damage 2.9 K/D ratio 1.2 average frags per match 58% survival rate 40% mainbattery hitrate Since you mentioned the Yorck (42 games played): 80.95% winrate 50,966 average damage 1.8 K/D ratio 1.1 average frags per match 38% survival rate 35% mainbattery hitrate The usual disclaimer, with relatively few battle played those stats aren't exactly very reliable. It should be moderately bereft of extreme variations, but they're not a satisfying sample size compared with the global games played in those ships. Also, because I'm sure someone will call me out for "statpadding" or some such, most of those stats are from playing in divisions with skilled players. I am excluding my measly couple Ranked games played in the Belfast since I have nothing to compare them to. Now, the numbers on the table I'd like to preface that I consider myself a competent player. I'm not a WoWs Wunderkind, but I like to think that I know what I'm doing, so I won't be comparing those stats to the server average, because the lot of you should know plenty how the average dudes we meet in the matches tend to play. I'll compare the stats of mine of those ships only against each other. Now, I could write a fancy essay about what one might extrapolate from those stats, but frankly that would ludicrously superflous since I know exactly how those stats came to be, I played those games myself after all. So you'll just have to take my word for it that I'm talking from personal experience when I say the following: I do better in the Belfast (much higher K/D and average frag ratio) than in the Fiji for one prominent reason: teamwork (duh). In case it wasn't made abundantly clear yet, I much prefer the teamwork aspect and play in divisions. That means I have two pals I can coordinate with. So when I tell them "guys, I'll light up that ship inside that smoke, are guys ready to blow it to smithereens?" -> *affirmation* -> "lighting up in three, two, one" -> *use Radar* -> *pewpew* -> *ship sunk* is the typical result. I can not do that in a Fiji. QED Which is really just a very fancy way of reiterating everything I've said about the Belfast. Now, the much more interesting point here that I'd actually like to non-sarcastically answer would be the difference between my Ranked solo stats in the Belfast and those from my non-Ranked games in her: Ranked is full of potatoes. In normal Random battles however, I have at least one competent divisionmate backing me up. Usually two competent skippers. In other words: I actually get proper teamwork in regularity. That's why my Ranked stats are so much worse, because more often than not, the players in ranked that I get on my teams wouldn't know teamwork if it jumped into their faces arsefirst and on the rare occasion that there actually are competent players willing to coordinate, doing the whole thing via chat is obviously less efficient than over voicecomms, further diminshing the synergy. And as I've always said: I don't consider the Belfast overpowered because I win significantly more games in it (even though I do win slightly more often, but 4% really isn't that big of a difference, now is it?), or that I'd do more damage in it (which would be a lie). I consider it overpowered because the whole package of the ship with its excellent concealment, adaptable firepower (not RN, but still very solid AP shells, good HE shells (which only get better with IFHE, a skill which I haven't used yet since I use my regular RN CL captain on the Belfast and naturally I don't need IFHE on AP-only ships ...)), smoke, hydro and radar all in one to be too much utility concentrated in one ship/at the hands of a single player. This ship can do by itself that you need an additional ship/player to perform with if you sail another ship. I consider that overpowered. I presume at this point we could get into a semantics debate on what constitutes "overpowered" and if any single person's opinion conforms with a uniformly accepted paradigm of that definition. We'd probably get better results with that particular discussion ... because I'm pretty sure that's really the issue here, with people doing the usual statistics thing and interpreting the numbers to fit their own opinions rather than anything else. Now I'm going to bed, writing this exhausting blabbering has made my sleepy. tl;dr version: Trying to use my statistics to invalidate my arguments even though you have evidently zero understanding of how those stats came to be and in what relation that stand to another. Try better! And better don't make me look up your stats. I can be way more creative in misreading those than you, I can promise you that.

Any good guesses (or perhaps even facts) when 0.6.2 will hit the live server? Could it arrive in february already? Because I wanted to try and grind to the Khabarovsk (with help of a bit free XP if need be) before the RU DD line splits (naturally in the hopes of getting a couple free ships, portslots and mayhaps permament camouflage/captains).

Had a couple nice games, but since patch 0.6.1 suddenly started frequently causing WoWs to CTD multiple times per gaming session, I kinda didn't get to save screenshots from the matches that I would've shared. So yeah, that. WG might want to put a bit more effort into QA next patch.

Met Earl_of_Northesk today. His team was ... spectacular in its own right.

I'm sorry, but if you can't make it work, that's an issue with your positioning and situational awareness, not the ship. The only instance where the radar can't be used effectively is if no one is trying to hide ... at which point I'd ask if you've played Ranked at all this season, because really, there's smoke and hiding everywhere. Not getting a couple golden opportunities to use Radar during a game in this season is more of an (sad) accomplishment than the other way around.

Again you're trivializing. Just because people can't use the radar all the time doesn't make it an immensely powerful tool to have for when it does come in helpful Belfast has radar, one of only threee ships at tier VII and easily the best ship out of those three. And you don't need a team for it to make it work, you can use it entirely just for yourself, but when the team can make use of it, its value increases proportionally with the teammates that can exploit that opportunity. And Fiji can just weather the HE? With its flimsy armour it takes a great deal of HE damage and if the Fiji doesn't angle, the Belfast AP is more than sufficient to blast the Fiji to Kingdom come in just a couple salvoes. And torpedoes aren't exactly an equalized in a straight up fight, you have to turn your ship to launch them and with the Fiji's thin armour that is enough for 152mm AP to citadel you. Those torpedoes are only really good at ambushes, but you can't ambush a Belfast in a Fiji if we're assuming equally skilled, competent players. And why would a Belfast sit in smoke to get rushed by a Fiji? It has all the advantages outside the smoke, it can angle and kite whilst peppering the Fiji with HE and setting fires, whilst the Fiji can only hope for the occasional AP penetration that doesn't bounce off a halfway decently angled Belfast. If you showed me a Belfast sitting in smoke whilst a Fiji is rushing him, I'd show you a potato that doesn't understand his advantages!

You make the same mistake as many other people, thinking the radar's utility is only occasionally helpful. You don't appear to give the fact it can use it the necessary due. Radar is a very powerful utility. It doesn't only spot targets for you, it also spots targets for everyone else. Even if you may not be in a position to exploit that (say you don't have a line of fire on the now lit up ship), others may. If you coordinate that with your team (announcing you'll be radaring this cap zone to your team and telling them to get ready to fire), the moment a target gets spotted it won't just get fired upon by one ship. I can end up facing the business end of several ships shooting it at once. If said target was easy to hit (stationary in smoke or close enough to the other players that it doesn't make much of a difference), the results are utterly devastating (in many cases quite literally, I've lit up many RN cruisers in their smokes to have a BB smack it with a couple citadels for Devastating Strikes). That is just as useful in ranked as it is in random battles. I'd even say it is MUCH more useful in random battles if you sail in a division, which is at least two teammates you can more or less guarantee on being happy to exploit such a moment. And in ranked battles that kind of coordination is very much meant to be (though rarely ever realized, but I doubt I'd have to tell that to anyone who's palyed ranked). Either way, it's an incredibly powerful tool, especially now that the ranked meta is very heavy on the smoking. Radar is the hardcounter to that meta and among all the ships that have radar at that tier (Belfast, Atlanta and Indianapolis), the Belfast is the strongest ship. The Fiji is an amazing ship. The RN AP is extremely potent against cooperative targets (but suffers from a dramatic decrease of performance depending on the enemy angling), the torpedoes are a nice ambush or brawling ace, it has smoke and hydro plus the heal let's you weather more damage. Against anything that isn't radar equipped, the Fiji is a fearsomely potent opponent. However it only takes one radar lighting you up in a vulnerable position and one, maybe two solid salvoes and even the heal won't save you. In a 1vs1 between a Belfast and a Fiji, the Belfast has all the advantages. It is stealthier, so it won't get ambushed. Fiji may detect it with hydro behind a visual obstruction, but the Belfast would know due to the UI feedback and could equalize the situation with its own hydro. With hydro active, it's nearly impossible for the Fiji to torpedo the Belfast. And if it tries to sit in smoke, radar can just light it up and the Belfast can either bite into its broadside with AP or deal less but still considerable damage against a heavily angled Fiji with HE. The best chance a Fiji would have in a 1vs1 would be to try and force a knifefight and get close enough for a torpedo run that even hydro won't save the Belfast, but that is obviously an incredibly risky tactic. And in a fleet vs fleet situation, the Belfast simply has an additional tool to supplement its team, whilst the Fiji doesn't. Smoke isn't what makes the Belfast OP. Radar isn't what makes the Belfast OP (although it is very close, since it is THE hardcounter to smoke). Hydro and HE shells don't make it OP. Superiour concealment doesn't make it OP. But all of that in a single package ... that is OP. The only saving grace from turning the Belfast into a bonafide pay2win ship is the fact that it's squishy and making mistakes would see you instantly punished like every other light cruiser. Whether the Belfast is statistically overperforming is largely irrelevant even, since no other ship at its tier can compete with that superb allround utility, it's incomparable. Belfast is quite literally it's own league at its tier. Why people actually try and rationalize that simple fact away, or attempt to trivialize it is simply beyond my understanding. Belfast is such a useful tool in competent hands (or even just a competent team that can capitalize on someone using the Belfast's tools when they get a chance) that it's brokenly good.

No one is saying the Belfast is OP because it does huge amounts of damage. It having access to smoke, hydro and radar at the same time is what makes it OP. The sheer utility of this ship is incomparable to ANYTHING in this game. Fiji is a great ship, but it's only really good at ambush and defensive playstyles where you can work your AP dpm, preferably from the safety of concealment /smoke). Belfast however does also get to fulfill the smoke counter role thanks to radar. In a 1vs1 between a Fiji and a Belfast I'd expect the Belfast to win significantly more times than not given equal player skill. If you can't tell how a cruiser with excellent concealment (and access to the Concealment Module thanks to somehow getting the tier VIII upgrade slot on top of that!), smoke, hydro, radar and HE shells (which only got stronger after IFHe got introduced) is considered OP, you might have to reevaluate your OP/UP criteria.

I'll just have to note that after the 0.6.1 patch, the game is crashing frequently for me. Beforehand that was incredibly rare for me. It typically happens in between pressing battle and map loading so I typically have enough time to kill the process and restart to join the game with only few seconds loss, but others might just crash randomly ingame. I wouldn't be surprised if a good number of those AFKers simply crashed. Other than that possibility, I don't really see many people that could be bots. Every now and then I notice such behaviour, but mostly it's just players tunnelvisioning hard.

Harrassed? No. Though a couple armchair-admirals failed to see the irony in my clantag and mistakingly derided the clan for it because I (or other clanmates in the match) weren't following their meticulous orders ... the usual prattle of Dunning-Krugers that I'm sure a lot of you know. I like to imagine them eating their words after the scoreboard shows the results but who are we kidding here, those people wouldn't realize their error if it jumped into their faces arsefirst. What I have been seeing a lot lately though is tinfoil hatters on the forum complaining about multiple clanmembers getting into the same match that's in most cases just shy of actually accusing clans in general of cheating. The willful ignorance and more often than not hypocrisy of such posts is mildly vexing.

And we're back to square one: just because there's potential for some douchecanoes to cheat, why should everyone be penalized for it? I'm pretty certain you're overestimating the frequency of such douchecanoeing, it really isn't common at all when I think about dodgy instances throughout my number of games so far. A handful at worst and maybe another handful that smelled fishy but might aswell just been freak-incidents.

I am in a clan. Obviously I'm a bit biased against discriminating matchmaking in that regard, though in all honesty my opinion wouldn't change if I weren't in one. And you're mistaken on an important note: clans aren't WG's doing. It's players commuting. Many of the clans you see these days have been informally around long before clans were officially introduced into this game. People used to play with friends all the time, the only difference is now they may share a clantag. I personally have been playing with a bunch of players I've come to know very regularily. In fact I only rarely play solo these days and that started well before I joined the clan. Those same players I played with also happen to be in the clan that I was invited to and ultimately joined. I get where you come from (though I'd disagree about this being cause for concern for the reasons I've given), but the most important argument here is that it's more or less impossible to adjust the matchmaking in the way you'd like it to as there's too many variables that WG simply can't account for (the premier being that people can still play together, communicating over TeamSpeak, etc. without actually being in a clan, hence filtering the matchmaker for clans wouldn't effect any of those players, at which wpoint you'd have to ask yourself if it would be fair to potentionally unfairly penalize clans vs non-clan players). On another note, any particular reason why you wouldn't want to try out playing with a clan yourself? Lots of flavours to be found in the recruitment section, from highly competitive all the way down to mostly social clans and my experience during my gaming years has shown that you can become fast friends with otherwise total strangers and you may be surprised how quickly it might grow on you (particularily in games that promote/require teamwork!). Warning though, it can spoil you rotten and you might not be able to enjoy playing alone when you've gotten used to having people that watch your back.

I'll trust clans to not do something fishy exactly as far I trust random solo players not do the same cheating stuff. Naturally I can't speak for everyone, but the majority of clans are made up by nice fellows who simply like playing with a closeknit bunch of friends and like any other sporting gamer hate the notion of playing unfair. There's always bad eggs but I doubt you'd see them with any regularity. Besides, how would you suggest to limit the MM in a way that clans can't play together/in the same match? Check for clantags? Anyone who wanted to could simply l leave the clan and suddenly the system could no longer distinguish that player from any other random dude in the player pool. I'm fairly certain that once WG actually implements clan activities a good deal of clans (at least those who're looking to be competitive) will be spending a lot more time doing that stuff. At this moment there's simply nothing else for them to do but play the game same as everyone else. As for recording games, it's a simple .ini tweak. Or even more simple yet, check out Aslain's Modpack, it has an easy to use checkbox in its modlist that will do the tweak automatically and the game will create replay files on its own that you can rewatch with the game client (plus save and distribute if you ever feel like sharing something or filing a ticket with support because something fishy went down).