jss78

Win rate is #1 for me. With random-vs-random teams it kind of cuts across everything else. Whether it's damage-dealing, spotting or capping -- if you do something useful, you'll tend to win more. This'll require a large sample of games to stabilize though, I only start to look at numbers after 100 games or so in a ship. I'll then modify my expectations based on Tier ... In low-tier games I expect to be able to often carry the game (60-70% win rate), but in high tier I'm happy with anything >50%. If it's a ship mainly focused on damage-dealing (especially BB's) I also look at average damage, and hope to be better than the average player. With stuff like DD's/CV's things get a bit more complicated, as you can contribute so much in other ways.

Yup. Personally got up to North Carolina, got a taste of the VIII-X gameplay. Stopped RIGHT there, no way am I going to spend my spare time doing that. Mid tier's where the fun's at.

Was going to post about the same thing. While I agree it's bad if a system can be abused, somehow it's always a small number of people who're having trouble with it. 20 years and counting in online gaming, never been banned for a single day.

Honestly it is a bit bad, though I'm sure there are worse. I think this generally comes down to the average age of the player base. I've played online games where the typical player is 30+, and it really reduces the middle-school level "plz uninstall n00b" stuff.

We've enjoyed running something as diverse as BB + CL + DD, played as a BB with screening ships. Pretty much the only surefire way to guarantee that your little guys don't YOLO in early game and will be there for the big guys when needed.

I'd agree with not allowing them in Ranked. Having to work it off in Co-op, I think this is too heavy-handed. I'm thinking of people of people who generally play with buddies in a Division. For example, I play with a bunch of ~40 year olds, people with jobs and families. We get 1-2 hours in the evening to play together. One of us does an honest mistake (doesn't happen often, but sooner or later it will), and we then can't spend together our well-planned and precious free time? This would suck. Accidents happen, and nine times out of ten that Mr. Pink is no worse than you are. I generally like that we have the dunce cap mechanic though, I wish some other games I play had it too. Maybe it makes some well-intentioned but absent-minded people out there a bit more careful.

I dunno. People say cruisers and destroyers need it to survive, and I get that it's a part of the balancing equation. But then we have lots of cruisers and destroyers that do NOT get stealth fire, yet they manage (smart positioning, WASD skills to evade incoming fire). So at least I wouldn't argue that it's a flat-out necessary balancing mechanism. I guess what rubs me the wrong way about stealth firing is the binary nature of it: giving some ships, but not all (even within same class) that range bracket of perfect invisibility. I dislike game design like this. For the sake of argument, let's extrapolate that stealth-firing is OK, and we give the ability to ALL cruisers and DD's. Would this be a fun game to play? IMO, no, it's better the fewer ships have this ability -- and that to me is symptomatic. I don't have a concrete suggestion on how to best replace it, but I'm willing to entertain ideas.

Carrier K/D's are a bit tricky though ... I have a K/D of 5.5 in my Independence, but that doesn't equal a Kraken in every game. I get about 1 kill per game, but survive four times out of five, and there you have it. Look at the survival rates in the table above. A decent carrier player who reads the map and keeps moving should die relatively little. And yeah, who's winning 85% of games? I won't argue there aren't balance issues with carriers, and the biggest of all is how critical the 1-vs-1 or 2-vs-2 matchup between carriers is. The CV is mainly opposed by the enemy's CV, and if there's a big skill disparity it does get ugly. The unopposed CV is IMO the most OP thing in this game. (But still I feel a lot of those ships whom I insta-demolish could've avoided it. You won't believe how many people I get yoloing around in their BB's with poor AA, without even bothering to WASD when my bombers approach. Get near that Cleveland and I'll be totally powerless against you.)

Having the division entered in MM according to lowest tier ship would be a phenomenally bad idea. You'd get seal-clubbing divisions of three, with people taking turns playing that one lower-tier ship, allowing the other two into a lower-tier game. If the system can be gamed, it will be gamed. In general I'm OK with the one-tier difference allowed. A lot of people out there don't have ships for every tier, which causes obvious issues when playing together. People make a huge deal out of one ship among 12 being one tier lower. In practice more often than not they pull their weight, and any effect gets lost in the noise of AFK's, YOLO's, and other potatoes.

Emphasized the relevant part. While I agree CV's could do some reworking, being able to demolish isolated ships isn't really a problem in my view. As you say, a hard counter exists. It's one of those things where it's helpful to occasionally play as that other side. A decent or better CV player is continuously looking for a soft target, so you'll develop a feel for when you're probably being that target. If there are CV's around (and not running AS loadouts), I'll always consider whether my AA is sufficient, if not, I'll try to stick near buddies so that the combined AA is sufficient. I honestly can't remember when I was last killed by a CV.

I'll agree with the basic sentiment to the extent that I don't like how much DD/cruiser gameplay relies on not being seen at all. Be it smoke or having a range bracket for perfect invisi-fire. I'm not a game designer, and frankly not sure how to best replace it. But it feels like an unsatisfactory mechanic. I play all classes so no major bias. And overall BB's still feel like the ez-mode in this game. That's where I go for guaranteed decent scores.

I felt like this should've been enough for a win, but it wasn't. I got the last kill by ramming a Dunkerque, which will make the game extra memorable. Only my second ramming kill in a CV.

It's unusually slow for T7 BB, that's a deal breaker for many and you'll have to decide for yourself there. Also the grind to all the modules is exceptionally nasty. It really needs to range/AA/handling/speed it gets with the modules to be tolerable. BUT -- fully upgraded I actually really like it. I'm liking it just fine for ranked too. People make a big deal out of what ship you should bring, but it's always mostly about the player.

It's such an obvious choice to be added to the game -- really the most obvious of all carriers, including everything currently in the game. I'd guess the only reason the Yorktown is not on the US tree is that the Enterprise has been shortlisted as a premium right from the start, but then got delayed for whatever reason. I believe there's been talk about the Enterprise coming when they get around to reworking the CV control scheme.

It's honestly not so bad. It's a kind of a low point in the progression because Wyoming is nice for her tier, and New Mexico is again excellent. Plus ANY ship in Tier 5 tends to feel "bad" because the MM is so brutal compared to T4. The ship will really need to be exceptional to not feel like hard work. But looks like I've managed a dmg average of 49.9k over the past month in the NY, and it hasn't been too bad. Some tips: As noted above, don't be hell-bent to use that middle turret. Well angled with 4 turrets > poorly angled with 5 turrets. Don't try to outsnipe Kongos etc., you don't have the accuracy. You're a brawler, so get rather close to enemy BB's unless it's a T7 German with torpedos. If you're crazy enough to keep her (I was), it might benefit of a rather specialized captain. The baseline secondaries and AA are so poor that it doesn't pay to go BFT+AFT (since they give a %-based increase). Instead put all points in anything that boosts survivability: Superintendent, Jack of all trades, Basics of Surivability, High alert. Make it a tank. Stay angled to avoid the big hits, and heal well and often. Just play careful. There are plenty of bad BB players out in T4-7, so don't be one yourself. A well angled NY will win against a poorly angled Nagato.

Of two minds here. I enjoy lower tiers and especially T4 (over T5 mainly due to far more pleasant MM). But if you give major performance rewards, the seal clubbers WILL show up. T5+ for major event rewards sounds about right IMO. You can grind a T5 ship in no time if you want to, so it's not really that exclusive, but it keeps the seal clubbers out of Tiers 1-4.

Hard to compare to RU, as there's such a massive economic disparity between the player bases. For a given product, in RU the prices will have to be lower and/or side perks better. Now EU vs. NA is more interesting. I've always felt like there's an overarching tendency for customer service to be better in North America vs. western Europe (let alone eastern Europe, which is a whole another story). And in short, this is because in Europe, the customers let the companies to get away with this. Americans are pretty conscious and at times aggressive customers, and are quick to take their money elsewhere unless you treat them well. And that's a SMART disposition to have when the other side is out for your money. IMO the best thing to do is be VERY noisy when you feel poorly treated -- just like you gentlemen are doing here. And of course follow through and don't spend. That dragon flag event, is particular, was a big fat joke. I guess it was achievable if you have no family and most certainly no life. Not eating or sleeping probably helps too.

Favorite ship by enjoyment: Kaiser In general Tier IV is my "happy place", it's just fun and comfortable. (Runner-up: Izyaslav. Also Tier IV, and a crazy fun ship to run.) Favorite ship by carry potential: Bogue (1/1/0) Explained well above by another poster. Very strong and reliable CV for its tier. Comfortable tier for CV's in general, and opposing CV captains are often unexperienced. Overall I think the early CV's have unparalleled carry potential. Runner-up: Storochevoi -- IMO the low-tier DD's are another place with an unusually large carry potential. Favorite ship by economic potential: New York. In general, a mid-tier BB with a premium camo. Consistent damage, non-crippling rearmament costs. For me this happens to be New York, could be many others. Favorite ship by achievement potential: Nassau I use this to farm Close Quarters Experts, Confederates, High Calibers, Dreadnoughts. Runner-up: Bogue (for Clear Sky -- you don't even need to run AS for it, 1/1/0 achieves this fine). Personal favorite: North Carolina Very nicely balanced, somewhat brawl-flavoured BB, I like it. The AA rating of 100 makes life less stressful. You get to be a total alpha dog in Tier VI-VIII matches, but even in VIII-X it's surprisingly OK. Least favorite ship to face: Gneisehorst I commonly face these in Tier V-VII American BB's, and I find it very difficult. I'd generally like to brawl, but they have torps. So I'd want to stay in a narrow mid-range bracker, but they are much quicker, so I have difficulty dictating the engagement distance. Yikes.

I too recently went from 1/1/0 Bogue (which I played for a long time) to 1/1/1 Independence. It's a radically, radically different experience. Average AA level is brutally higher -- with Bogue you basically had to look out for clusters of ships, Clevelands and the occasional Texas. With Independence every other ship can absolutely shred your planes, and at you're at worst facing 100 AA rating North Carolinas (which you should of course go nowhere near), and your planes aren't really tougher (the TB's are actually the exact same). With the third squadron, your effective plane reserves are WORSE than with the Bogue. Combine with the AA environment, and you just have to be super, super careful, and really pick your targets carefully. On the plus side, you can actually relocate now, being about twice as fast as the Bogue. Rather enjoying the Independence mind you, though like anyone else I'll rather play Tier 5-6 than Tier 6-8 games. What I did was take my 15-point CV guy to Independence, and keep the Bogue with a 6-point guy. I feel like the 1/1/0 Bogue doesn't really need more captain points anyway, Aircraft Servicing Expert, Torpedo Acceleration and Torpedo Armament Expertise is all you really need with that ship. With the Independence you need all the help you can get.

Not sure why things would be worse now. We're getting the increased squadron size with 10-point captains now, leaving points for new skills, so leaving aside IJN vs. USN balance carriers are getting buffed. Average AA level should be significantly reduced with BFT as a 3-point skill and AFT now having strong alternatives (radar wall hack, camouflage expert) among the 4-point skills.

Only an occasional CV player here, and I only have the Langley, Bogue and Saipan. So no idea about high-tier CV realities. But in low tiers, I think this skill might be useful. Fact 1: a lot of people in Tier IV-V CV play don't strafe. Fact 2: a lot of the time, they'll catch your returning TB/DB's anyway. So they'll catch up, follow and engage you, but not strafe. I'm ALREADY finding the Tier VI TB's on the Bogue to be quite robust in these circumstances, and able to defend themselves when the enemy fighters are at low strength (common in late game). If I stack this this skill, plus Expert Rear Gunner, things should only get better. In US low-tier play I feel like I really need to have my squadrons, which are few in number, to be as robust as possible, and this might help there. The drawback is obviously increased rotation time for the TB's, which again might be offset by the fact that you'll have TB's remaining in late game vs. not having any. I'll have to try and see how it plays out.

For me, it's not really "bad". Looks like I've maintained a reasonably healthy 53% WLR and 43k av. DMG across my 87 games. It's just not one of those standouts you'd keep after working through the tree. The thing is T5 ships really need to be exceptional to be enjoyable to run, as you'll face up to T7 ships. And New York vs. Gneisehorsts is just brutal. So you'd rather keep the Wyoming and have a relaxed time in T4-5 or take the New Mexico which is just a very good ship for its tier. So IMO, it's no stinker, but kind of falls between the cracks as there're more obvious choices for keepers. The best thing about New York, IMO, is that it gets a rather unique and cool-looking permanent camo. I still take mine out once in a while.

I get that the focus is on those high-tier ships, as that's where we gravitate. But if you want a BB that truly relies on the secondaries, look into Mikasa and Nassau. Tons of secondaries, and the primaries have such laughable accuracy that you're best off getting into secondary range anyway. If you want to farm those secondary signals for your high-tier brawler BB's, they are good for that. A division mate of mine likes to joyride in the Mikasa using this crazy high-skilled CL captain with BFT+AFT+DE etc. The amount of Close Quarters Experts he gets is ludicrous. Also, here's a stereotypical game in the Nassau:

Way late into this, and can't possibly read all of this thread. But based on my experience, the OP has a point. The quality of CV's you happen to get vs. the opposing team is incredibly important. It's essentially a 1-vs-1, or possible 2-vs-2 battle between the CV's. As a CV you are mainly opposed by the enemy CV. Good DD/CL/CA/BB players can make your life a bit trickier, but only to an extent. And here's the thing -- a good CV who's not given significant opposition by the enemy CV is INCREDIBLY powerful in this game. It's not as such a problem of balancing CV's vs. other classes -- I think that's fine -- but balancing the one-on-one minigame between CV's. In the 12-vs-12 matchup of the entire game basic statistics (law of big numbers etc.) guarantees that you can leave player quality to chance, and the results will not be TOO horrible. No such safeguards for the CV matchup.

Of course the real answer is it's Russian developer, and there's a sizable Russian player base, so they want to put in full Russian trees. And the only way to do this is to include cold-war era vessels. That said, I don't have a problem... It was never really a dedicated WW2 game anyway, the first half of the tiers are predominantly WW1, with a continuous chronological trend through the tiers. Who says it needs to stop at WW2.