AnotherDuck

Radar is stupid enough as it is. And then WG decides it's a good idea to put it on battleships and destroyers. There's been jokes about how the devs have let their children design stuff. I don't think that's true. I think that if that was actually the case, the current balance situation would be better.

I have the Bismarck camo, as I wasn't really using the money I've got from random quests, ranked, and stuff for anything. Planned on getting that since about when I started playing, which was long before the German BB line was introduced.

I mostly play the IJN DDs, but I've played the US ones as well. Didn't like the Germans, and won't play the Russian for a while. That said, Benson and Fletcher are excellent ships. Benson is a great upgrade from occasionally awkward Mahan, and Fletcher is a better Benson. You also have Lo Yang, which is Benson. The actual Benson, not just a Benson-class ship. Not going to include Black, since that's a fundamentally broken ship. Of the T5 destroyers, the Kamikaze ones are the best ones, since they're equipped with the Premium Nerf Avoidance System. Minekaze is still good, but only almost as good. On T6, I really like Shinononome, since she has decent guns that, while not at gunboat level, still suffice for self-protection, support fire, and unfair gunfights. Most of the time I don't find the shorter ranged torpedoes (8 km compared to 10 km) to be a problem.

You mean, just like the ship has a historical context and a legacy?

But, but, what if there's a sneaky DD trying to flank the fleet? Someone has to take her out! (Later on: Eek! DD spotted! Halp!) Actually, in games with fewer DDs, I find that there's a whole lot more pussyfooting around. And if long range torps are a contributing factor, it's not one I've noticed. Mostly because the range of torpedoes has been nerfed, so it's nowhere near the range BBs hang back at. Quite often out of range of the not entirely optimal Shima 20 km torps. Even if you yolo, a BB can still very often deal out enough damage while their massive HP pool diminishes to not have a crap game. In games where I go straight in and die in the first few minutes of the match, I often end up in the middle of the team. I just find BBs to be so safe to play that it's hard to have a bad game. Or at least what a DD would call a bad game.

Who here is arguing that T8 should mostly face T10? I must be doing pretty well for having no clue about the game. I find radar easier to deal with at T10 than at T8. While there's not a huge difference, T8 often gets smaller maps (and smaller caps in particular), and the lower tier radar cruisers have much better concealment, so they can just pop radar the moment they're spotted, rather than having a bit of space between their concealment range and radar range where DDs are safe. Don't get me wrong, I still think radar is stupid and should be removed from the game, since it's one of the major contributors to the campy gameplay everyone just loves. It's possible to deal with, even if it just detracts from gameplay experience.

Myogi was one of the first ships I played back when I was new at the game, but I don't remember having any particular problems with her.

Kagero is one of the ships I don't want to encounter in a T10 match. Or at least not one played by a competent player. If you play a Kagero, and you want to "duel" someone else, anyone else, you should probably rethink your strategy. Yeah, some BBs have a long secondary range. Like Bismarck. Your point? But it's not that huge of a power spike, and it's absolutely comparable. If I meet a Moskva or Des Moines in my Bismarck or Amagi, I say "Hello." The only ship I'm really wary of in those is Yamato, but even that's not an impossible barrier to overcome.

There's a serious lack of Khabarovsk discussion in this thread.

I get that while the game is loading the screen up (after loading all other things), and once or twice it's remained more than a second or two.

DDs sometimes need it, actually. They can't spot through mountains, aside from the sonar ones and the broken Black. A lot of the time, it's to be able to launch a torpedo ambush without risking getting killed yourself, as it takes time for torpedoes to arrive, and by the time you see the ship again, it may be too late. Sometimes it's a DD that's forced to hide in smoke and can't see an approaching ship. With spotting support, that ship is often dead, but without, the DD is probably likely to die, with or without taking the other ship with her. I've seen that kind of use from time to time. Or at least, I'm pretty sure that Des Moines didn't actually want someone to provide him with AA support, and I'm pretty sure the DD didn't want another smoke screen apart from the one he was laying out... Pretty sure. Almost.

"Second line" means you have allied ships between you and the target. The advice here is that you never fire your torpedoes if an allied ship can get hit by them. That includes if she suddenly turns towards the torpedoes. No one should ever have to look backwards to spot torpedoes to dodge. Priority Target is the first of the first tier of captain skills. It gives you a number of how many ships are aiming their main guns at you. While it doesn't sound like much, it's incredibly useful, in particular for cruisers. If you turn at random times, it's much harder to predict. If it's already very late, the standard is to turn into the torpedoes, as that will allow you to minimise the number of hits. Only turn away if you're already heading that direction, or if you'll ground otherwise. Only pedants, mostly misinformed, care about which word you use for navigating a ship.

Haven't played the others (yet), but Benson has no problems with T10 matches. I very frequently see T8 ships at the top of the scoreboard in those matches. You can contribute, and you can contribute well. Sure, the ships aren't as good as at higher tiers (that's why they're higher tiers), but player skill matters far more than ship statistics. Seriously? Out of all ships, the IJN DDs care the absolute least about tiers. For them, higher tiers means you can do more damage.

Why is it that just about every time someone argues for "realism", what they really mean is, "realism only as far as it benefits me"? Sure, let's make battleships as powerful as they should be, and remove non-historical torpedo reloading. But then also add almost invisible torpedoes that will with a fairly high certainty sink or incapacitate any ship they hit. Also add historical costs for battleships relative to destroyers. I'm not sure what the difference actually is, but the prices don't have the same number of digits. For more fun, let's add random equipment failures, and no possibility to repair anything significant outside the docks.

That's a general advice: If you see an enemy ship heading in a straight direction, and there are torps heading that way, don't aim at that ship. You're going to annoy one of your destroyers, and you're at most going to do redundant damage (and most likely less than a torpedo strike), thus not affecting the game in any positive way whatsoever. Just stealing some damage from a teammate and probably lowering the team's damage output.

People respond far better to someone honestly asking for help rather than to someone complaining about stuff. You more often see the latter, so you more often see the negative and sarcastic responses.

Kraken is in itself bad for teamplay. It encourages holding fire and only attacking when you have a kill shot. And while taking kill shots is generally good, often it's better to leave those for other ships who may not have better targets, or don't have to waste a full 30 second reload to do so. High Calibre and Confederate help a little, but they're still more geared towards rewarding people playing battleships, which we don't need. Strangely, there are no such achievements for spotting and capping, which are primarily DD tasks. Funny how that works.

Worth noting is that an AA build and a secondary build are a little bit similar, so you'll get good improvements on both regardless of which you spec for, thanks to BFT and AFT. You can probably spec relatively high on both if you want to.

Umikaze is an awesome sealclubber low tier DD (see my stats). Personally I find she actually works better at T4-T5, though, where her stealth has more space to make itself unknown.

There's no map that's unplayable in a DD. However, on some maps WG apparently wants DDs to use the fun and engaging strategy of max range torpedo soup, since that's the best option they've left them with.

For BBs, the best thing is to learn and master map awareness. Check what DDs the enemy team has at the start of the match. If they're spotted, make a note of where they are. Change course for a few seconds. If there are signs of DD activity, such as torpedoes spotted, smoke that's closer than cruiser range, caps being capped, there's probably a DD in that area. Change speed. If there's at least one DD not spotted, and you're not completely behind allied ships, assume there are torpedoes heading your way, and take evasive actions. Change course again. For DDs, map awareness is still crucial. Check what radar ships the enemy team has at the start of the match. If they're spotted, make note of where they are, and unless you know what you're doing, stay at least 10 km away from them, or 12 km if it's a Russian cruiser. If someone tells you to cap within that radar range, don't cap. Take notes from the BB section on figuring out where enemy DDs are. Find a good target. A good target doesn't have spotting support, and isn't sailing away from you. Ships that sail away from you are much harder to hit, even if your torps can reach them. Observe the target while getting into a good position. Does she make any turns, change speed, or otherwise seem aware? Try to get where you have about 1 km left of your detectability and you're sailing in the same direction the target. Be careful to not get closer than that before you have the same heading. If you don't have detectability on the minimap, get it on the minimap. It's the single most important circle to have there. However, if there's a risk of being spotted (unknown DD locations, etc.), take it very carefully. If a ship is sailing towards you, you can stealth fire torpedoes even if you've got a lower torpedo range than detectabilty. As a rough estimate, cruisers travel half the distance your torpedoes do at the same time, while battleships travel a third of the distance at lower tiers, and half once they get fast. Small anecdote, I once forgot I had Torpedo Acceleration, which lowers range and increases speed, on a captain I used on Kamikaze, which at that point don't have stealth torpedoes, only because I could still stealth fire with that technique. If point 5 tells you it's a straightliner, go ahead, and you can chance a very focused launch pattern. If not, spread out more. If you're not certain and you have a long reload, observe a little more. Depending on what torpedo reload and range you have, you have a few different torping options. However, narrow spread is the only choice unless you know absolutely everything about what you're doing, in which case you don't need a guide like this. Full salvo works most of the time if you spread them out. Don't use wide spread, but aim one salvo at the white marker, and one in front or behind, depending on where you think the ship will turn. Most ships will turn towards you if they spot torpedoes, as that will generally limit the number of hits they take, but it's not certain. Single salvo works if you have large salvos and long reloads (Shimakaze being the archtype for that strategy), as you can adjust the aim after you see reactions. That also keeps flooding if both salvos hit, which will give you a ton of flooding damage. If you're very close, you can focus fire. Just remember that if you're passing a ship at odd angles or within a ship length or two, aiming can be surprisingly tricky. I've often seen people miss at 500 m because of that. Watch your torpedoes, either with Shift zoom or follow them with Z. Learn how players react to torpedoes in different situations so you can better predict them next time. Use the reload time to reposition yourself for the next strike.

The reason why BBs hug the map border: Turret traverse doesn't matter. Speed doesn't matter. Support doesn't matter much. AA doesn't matter. Smoke doesn't matter. Fear of getting paint scratches? All the matters.

I don't really have a problem with being in T10 games in T8. It can get a little annoying if it happens constantly (which it does some days), but if it's not more than some 40%, it's fine. As for the ships, I only really have a handful them at T8, so I can only comment on them. Kagero and Benson are destroyers who just don't care about tiers, especially the former. Bismarck and Amagi are both powerful battleships that are still viable at T10 (and T9 is barely different from T8 for them). Takao is so stealthy and have a somewhat trollish armour that you can get away with more than you should be allowed to, so she works at T10. The last ship I have is Chapayev, which I still do reasonable well in (personal results) thanks to out-stealthing her radar range, even if I get an absolute crap win rate (that ship attracts so many potato teams you can't even carry with a T10 ship in a T8 battle). On the whole, no I don't think there's any particular problem with T8 ships facing T10 ships. It would be nice if there was some kind of check that made it less likely to end up in yet another T10 game in a ship the more you've had those matches before, relative to top or middle tier matches, but that's about it.

The difference between smoke and radar is that smoke might at most make someone slightly annoyed at having missed an opportunity to damage someone. Radar ruins someone's game. One removes a whole lot more fun and adds a lot more frustration than the other. If radar was introduced as a counter to smoke, why has the smoke meta increased since radar was introduced? If that was the one job it was supposed to do, it took the job and shot it in the foot. You don't need to be particularly near to use radar. They've got rather good range. You also don't need to expose yourself either, since it works through islands, or if you're smoked up, or if you've got better concealment than the radar's range. It's not very rare to have a radar pop up from a previously unspotted ship. If it encourages teamwork, why did Flamu say that almost everyone who use radars use it only for themselves? Good encouragement there that no one seems to be encouraged by. No, you don't need to continue, since "just use your brain" is a stupid argument anyway. That was the whole point of the mismatched tier example, since you missed it. You don't need radar, since you can just use your brain. There, problem solved. Radar is not necessary, and should be removed, by your own argument. Removing radar isn't "dumbing it down". It just forces you to use your brain to catch stealthier ships. You know, the ships that used to make life harder for battleships, the easiest ships in the game to play, but radar put a stop to a large part of that threat. Radar is dumbing the game down; removing it is not.