AnotherDuck

I've only ever used Torpedo Acceleration with torps longer than 10 km, in particular with the old 20 km torps Kagero had (16 km is still a little bit excessive for how I use torps, but I still got a lot of hits at that range, and it was fun to make use of it on occasion). Going from 10 km to 8 km is a little more critical than what it seems like at higher tiers, since that's about where radar starts getting dangerous, and getting caught in the 9-10 km range isn't nearly as bad as in the 7-8 km range. That little bit of extra range also means you have a chance of hitting the second-line ships if they're close enough, or at least threaten them enough to make them turn. Overall, I don't find the very slight speed boost to be worth the loss in versatility, so I wouldn't recommend it at all. It's better to take something that's a pure boost to your effectivity. Personally, I like Vigilance for DDs. I sometimes have use for Superintendent, even with premium consumables, but it's kind of rare, and I prefer acting as a more effective torpedo screen for allies. I would recommend using premium smoke and damage control regardless (I have premium damage control on all ships past T6-T7, and some before), since you never want to wait for the cooldown when you have to use it quickly. If you have trouble affording it, try getting them from the loot containers.

That really goes for any ship. You never want a fair fight. Always stack as much advantage as you can in your favour, and work so that your disadvantages don't amount to anything. In a Fletcher, if you engage any Japanese or Russian DD, you probably want to be at closer ranges. They have better shell arcs than you, so by getting close you eliminate the aim advantage they have at longer ranges. That's where the high reload speed really shines. You can even out-shoot some cruisers if they show you a broadside, since many fast citadels will rack up the damage quickly, although you should still not try that in a fair fight, but rather when they're distracted by other ships, or from a smoke screen or behind an island. If you're fighting a ship with slow turret traverse, like the Japanese DDs, you can use your torpedoes to force them to turn (aiming to actually hit them is of course preferable, but it can be very hard to hit an aware DD with torpedoes, unless you're very close), and then be unable to shoot back at you, or have a reduced number of guns pointing your direction. The Fletcher doesn't really have much of a problem even if you switch side, since the turret traverse is so fast. You'll still lose a bit of DPM, but not nearly as much as any other ship.

I'm not sure I've ever seen more than five of any ship type other than cruisers in a team. Maybe destroyers in T2 games, but even that I'm unsure about.

In the games today, I saw anything between 1+2 and 4+5 DDs in the teams (never actually just one per team or five on both). Usually 2-3 DDs per team, and higher numbers were rarer. Battleships, on the other hand, were usually 5+5. The least was 2+2, I believe, but that's rare. There are usually way more than that.

While I posted a few hours ago about those five defeats in a row where I couldn't carry hard enough, I continued playing later on. And you know, never give up.

Fire flags for Bismarck is very nice indeed. Also for my flamethrower specced Ashigara and Takao. So many fires.

I don't really mind playing the occasional +2 tier battle, and for some ships it's just more fun, but when it happens 70% of the time (rounded down), and you're only top tier 15% of the time, then it start to get old. I've had a very lopsided matchup for quite a while now, with my T6 ships (mostly Leander and Buddy) getting into T8 battles, and my T8 ships (mostly Bismarck, Takao, Benson) getting into T10 battles. Statistically, that really shouldn't happen, but before I stopped caring about stats, it was very frustrating to very rarely be in a decent position to carry (which is necessary to win games for me, as I have abysmal win rates lately while still getting top of the team). I'd like some kind of safeguard that if you get into too many higher tier battles, you get a higher chance to get put as top tier.

I'm getting up to playing decently well most matches, and getting in the top three, at least. Not that it helps... This is a typical day for me for the last few months. On the other hand, since getting Bismarck and Shiratsuyu, I'm mostly playing just for fun, and getting variation by playing other ships to get higher in those trees. Names and controversal images edited out.

Playing at a relaxed pace, or whatever you find the most enjoyable, really is the key thing. This is a game. It's meant to be fun. Play it the way you find the most enjoyable. Singular bad games aren't proof of anything. I mean, I've had a rather long streak of crap games where most my team mates just die within a few minutes, so they're losses even if I have great games, and my recent win rate is far below my usual average. I mean, first four matches in new and shiny Bismarck resulted in only one win. That was at T8, where I could carry enough (good damage and Dreadnought). The others were at T10, which isn't great for a stock T8 BB. And sometimes I die early and we win anyway. It can feel exhausting if you only look at the results, especially if you just run into bad luck. But there's always something you can learn from it. What can you do when everyone around you fall like flies? Sometimes, not much, but if you can learn how to mitigate that so that it's not quite as crushing of a defeat as it otherwise would've been, then you can make a difference when your teammates aren't quite so much potatoes, or when the opponents also are potatoes. And, probably more importantly, you can learn to have fun playing even if your games aren't going great.

Late game it's often more okay to go through there. Sometimes it's just the fastest route to where you need to be. If your team is pushing on one flank and is about to reach the opposite cap (having good firing angles into the cap, at the very least), that's one way you can help with some flanking, but it's still risky. The fastest I've ever gone through there was after some five or six minutes, after all enemy ships had been spotted, and they were all wide to the A and D caps. Growing balls, yeah, that's one reason you want to push as a destroyer. If you push, your team might grow a pair. If you don't, they won't.

I usually justify the unlimited torpedo reloads (time allowing) with destroyers being just as expensive as battleships and carriers. All that money can be used for quite a few upgrades. It's a good point that the torpedo reload booster is very Japanese in that regard, though. An actual reload where most ships didn't have one is reflected by a faster reload where all ships have reloads.

If people like Poi, that's up to them. No need to call them out on anything, especially by people who insult others because of something they like, because people who insult others are just worse. <-- Poi. Oh, by the way, concerning that "insulting the actual sailors of WWII", that's plain bull. The only thing I've heard from the Japanese sailors who served on the ships appearing in KanColle is that they appreciate it.

Better to avoid unnecessarily than to get torped unnecessarily.

That usually kind of my reaction as well. I'm not talking about simply oversteering while trying to dodge (which is a fair mistake, especially with larger ships). I'm talking about getting out of the line of fire of previously spotted torps, and then turning back into them, 10-20 seconds after.

I think this sounds like a plain fun ship to play. I like the gun/torp hybrid DDs, and this sounds right up my alley. <-- Poi.

It was the other extreme to sitting still in a cap (or even outside it) and not really doing much other than spotting. Most of the time you'll do something in between. But saying, "that's the wrong plan," is missing the point of it. "A fair fight" isn't part of that. Never, under any circumstances, aim for a fair fight. I very rarely do that (since I prefer to be alive and not count on my team to not screw up as random teams are wont to do). However, sometimes it pays to lead the charge if you're backed up by other ships, so you can take and fortify a good position in a cap. If I'm the only allied to sink, while we sink 2-3 ships, then that's a win (cap + area + ship advantage). If I go that aggressively, I usually take at least one ship with me. I wouldn't recommend it if you don't know what you're doing, and even if you know what you're doing, you're not going to succeed every time either. It's a calculated risk. Going in alone or with insufficient backup isn't a good idea, though. Something that extreme takes a bit more skill to pull off than a Two Brothers middle run. You need the right timing, the right execution, and the right backup. By the way, speaking of backup, as a general advice, if your team mates are camping cowards, don't hesitate to pull back. There's absolutely no reason to die for a team like that. Just play it safe. That also goes if the rest of the team goes for one or two caps, and you're alone to a different cap.

That really is one of the main advantages. People don't expect that, so you get hits people don't think will reach them. I've had several hits people dodged, then turned around and got hit on the back. I've had a very similar moment. After I sunk his Khaba, this player was raging about, "How the hell can you reload your torps in 20 seconds?" I just responded, "30 seconds." "Who the hell uses that?" "Well, I got one kill thanks to it." It's just so much fun torping people who don't think you've got any loaded. I mean, you have to give up the smoke screen, but the Torpedo Reload Booster works very well with the long-range torps. And now we have the new DDs incoming with an improved TRB, along with the smoke. Fletcher has a really nice torpedo broadside. I find most use in them by sneaking around island and surprising ships. In my most or second most recent game, all torps hit, spread on two ships. In Ranked before, with the smaller sister Benson, I had a full-health Amagi trying to sneak up on me. Not a single torp hit outside the torpedo belt of the Amagi, although two of them while she was already sinking.

From what I've seen, Akizuki is basically a cross between Khabarovsk and Tachibana. Which might not be all that powerful, but can be very fun.

I the end of it, what really matters is player skill. You do have some benefits with the captain skills, but being able to strategically out-manoeuvre your opponents, aim better than them, and know when to hold your fire is what really matters. DD is a hard class to play well. Learn where to go, how to remain undetected, and when to go loud. Sometimes just sitting still and spotting for your team is the best way to go. Sometimes it's best to charge into a cap and take one for the team. As for captain skills, in my experience, very few DDs you meet in random battles have CE even at T8. At T9-T10, it's more common, but I will almost always out-stealth any other ship I meet in my Fubuki and Benson (both with CE). The choice of T4 captain skill can be rather significant, since there are three good choices (well, until they revamp the system). Health, range, or fires. Extra range is not that useful on the USN DDs, since they have moon arcs. BBs can easily dodge your shells at that flight time. It is useful both for the SN and IJN DDs, though, as they have flatter arcs you can relatively easily hit with at max range. It's also great for shooting at ships trying to cap, especially if you have invisifire. Whether you pick fires or health depends on what you fight the most. More health is more useful if you're fighting other DDs, while more fires is more useful if you fight larger ships. Or at least it is in my experience.

Personally, what I'm the most sad about is the nerf to what IJN is really good at: HE shells. Having those slower but more powerful guns is still a significant difference between IJN DDs and other DDs, once you get to Hatsuharu and up.

In one way, the long range torpedes are less expected simply because they're long range. If there's no DD within 11-12 km, there's no need to worry about torpedoes, since no one uses them at a range that long, right? One reason I like the long-range torps on Kagero (although that's at 16 km with +5 speed). I often get hits at 13-14 km ranges. And since you don't have to stalk the ship you're aiming for, you can sit in one cap and aim at another. My favourite is probably sitting in the B cap of Hotspot, and fire into A. It's tight in there, and with the right angle, you can shoot straight through A as well.

Most of the time you want all shells to be of the same type anyway, since one shell type is always better than the other. If you're shooting a broadside, you want AP. If you're shooting an angled ship you can't overmatch or a destroyer, you want HE. If you want to burn something, you want as high burn chance as possible. Generally speaking. A mixed load would be okay in more situations, but not as good as choosing the right one. I'm not sure it would dumb it down, since it's adding an option. It would make it easier for bad players (as they wouldn't screw up as much), but good players would probably not use it as much. That's also without the issue of different shells having different velocities in several cases, which would make aiming different. At long distances, you'd only be able to hit with one shell type.

If these are the skills WG will add, then they have a good base idea they do crap with. Giving more choices is awesome, especially since it seems like there aren't as many mandatory picks anymore, with skills that compete against each other, so that's great. However, skills seem to overall favour battleships, which are already fairly strong, and a huge nerf to destroyers, especially stealthy ones, which might be the biggest buff to battleships. Even something like increased smoke screen size also benefits larger ships who can more easily take advantage of smoke screens laid by other ships. However, that might allow for a higher speed while smoking. Anyway, actual skill choices are retarded (although there are some good ideas individually).

Completely broken, for many of the previously mentioned reasons. What's the point of stealth if the enemy knows where you are anyway? Add to that the overall low speed of the IJN DDs, which means they can't even run. WG hates stealthy destroyers and torpedoes, and do everything they can to reduce their impact on the game. And this is for a type of ships that sits in the bottom to at most middle range of performance, in favour of battleships, who sits more firmly higher up.

So you don't take requests from yourselves either?