asalonen

An anonymous red: "This was *hit man"

My personal experience is that the CV's after rework were fairly easy to get into, and do well in, even with zero experience with the RTS CV's. The CV gameplay itself is mostly simple. It's somewhat fast paced, but lacks the multitasking requirements of the previous iteration. I feel it should come fairly easily to anyone who's played the other ship types -- preferably all of them -- with success. If this is the case, you pretty much instinctively know what's a smart course of action in each situation. You already have the map awareness, and appreciate it enough to understand your value as a CV for maintaining it. You recognize the vulnerable and valuable targets in each situation. On a personal level, after somehow getting a hang of the AP dive bombers and finding a good captain build, I find Shokaku to be extremely powerful in the current version (0.8.1.1). My average damage is above anything I've ever played in tier 8, and I feel there's still some untapped potential in there. However, the skill floor is just massive. If the the player hasn't mastered the other ship types reasonably well, I think it's almost unavoidably going to be a frustrating experience. There are absolutely no crutches to help the average player. The USN line might be somewhat more forgiving what comes to executing the individual attacks, but that's it.

(putting on my tinfoil hat for the sake of argument) Customer attrition is a real thing, and some businesses have pretty sophisticated models for actively managing it. The principle is that you analyze customer behavior well enough to understand the behavioral changes that precede the customer leaving. When you get that going, you can then intervene when a customer appears to be reaching that critical point. Say give him a few super containers, or a string of games with highly advantageous match making. It could make him happy again, stay longer, spend more. However, I can't think of any benefit to WG from putting a particular player in a world of *hit. Possibly if they get really tired of his forum postings? If a small group of players were getting preferential match making, if would likely affect all others equally. OP: Take a break! It works wonders, it really does. Or play in a division with other good players: You can still get ten losses in a row, but at least you'll have a support group.

One of those games where everything seems to work out. Dropped 30 torps, 27 hit home. Dropped 12 bombs, 9 hit for 6 citadels. Blessed by match making too -- top-tier and mostly BB's

Agreed, mostly. I've read the descriptions on how the current AA auras work, and as far as I'm concerned WG has disclosed everything. See here. One problem is that the Wiki is not up-to-date. It is what I used rely on when I check out a ship's stats. The bigger problem is that flak efficiency is currently only explained with too many too low-level variables: number of bursts, hit chance, damage per burst. It's nice to know how it works, but I hate bringing out my pocket calculator when I check ship stats in port. In addition there's the important bit that's a constant: As per the description linked to above, the number of bursts in the "A zone" (that you fly into if you go straight) is capped at 6. This means that if your AA generates enough bursts, AA Guns Modification 1 does nothing in terms of shooting down the non-dodging planes. Instead, it makes it a lot harder to dodge the flak (the "B zones"). @Crysantos I would summarize the flak efficiency of an aura with something like AA Efficiency (the total in the A zone) and AA Concentration (the % of bursts that go in the A zone, often 80 % but can go lower). In any case, just a couple or numbers that alone are useful for the player.

On the other hand, you're achieving a 67 % win rate in the Midway playing solo. That doesn't really fit the definition of toothless, but sounds more like you're carrying the games like a boss? Average damage doesn't seem to have suffered either, even with the unavoidable learning period included. I didn't play the RTS CV's so I cannot compare Midway then to Midway now. However, the relative weakness of the torpedo bombers is a distinguishing feature of the USN line after the rework. In the IJN line, on the other hand, they're your main weapon.

In short, avoid the strongest tier 10 AA like the plague. It's not a fight you can win. It might mean that in some games you will have a limited role, but it's worth waiting until mid-to-late game with your planes mostly intact. Quite often the battle develops so that you'll get reasonable targets.

The guys wearing ties in the WG ivory tower could come up with more innovative ways of doing it. As an example, a story about MechWarrior Online I heard: They started selling golden skins for the mechs. To make them special, they made it a limited edition of 1000 skins, priced $500 each. They sold out real fast, half a million raised with the effort of possibly a day's work from one graphical designer and a bit of marketing. It didn't really hurt the game either. The rich preposterous *ucks with golden mechs were occasionally shot in the back by team mates.

It's more about expectations. The player may have a reason to believe that the reportedly very strong premium will not be nerfed -- I believe this is currently very much the case? He might make the purchase with that in mind, and it could be significant money for him. I never bothered to read the small print when I bought premiums, but seriously nerfing or up-tiering them would be, in general, very bad form. On the other hand, nerfing premiums has the same effect has letting power creep make silver ships catch up eventually. The value of whatever you buy will not stay the same anyhow. After a reasonable time, I think it's fine to nerf the worst offenders. Somebody will get angry, but players come and go anyhow, and it might be for the greater good. So something like this: Stop selling the OP ship. Let the customers have their fun with it for a few months. Nerf it. Do NOT repeat the mistake (pointing at you, Stalingrad)

I have similar stats in the Shokaku, currently 86k average damage and a personally satisfying win rate for a T8. Lexington is pretty much the same. In fact those numbers are very close to what I achieve in the Midway, so not a huge difference. The T8's up-tier just fine, like any other T8. In the end, this thread is yet another symptom of the same problem: The CV's are difficult. WG might need to give them a buff of some sort, or otherwise they could end up unpopular like before. However, any buffs would need to be such that they somehow help the average joe, but don't make the unicums any stronger. I can't immediately think of how this would be achieved. Edit: On a personal level I'm very happy with the reworked CV's. I enjoy the gameplay a lot, and as of the latest hot fix they now feel well balanced. The way the rework was rolled out was a bit heavy-handed, but what we have now is good. I've only briefly tried Furious and Implacable, but it feels like we have three lines of CV's that are all both enjoyable yet distinct from each other.

This is often most useful way to use them. In a battle with a lot of DD's you could say that anything else is a waste. If the DD is careless and my first attack run is successful I still summon the fighters when I go over. It often gives me the chance for the second attack run, and possibly a team mate can fire on it. Even if my first attack run misses or is too late, the fighters often give me the chance to nail the second attack run. Summoning the fighters on top of friendlies is a bit problematic. It's the most obvious team player move, and you're often intrigued to do it, but it's just not very effective. Might make more sense if the friendly in question is a strong ship with a particularly weak AA (like Nelson or Musashi).

What's the community opinion regarding the ship upgrades and captain skills for the IJN CV's? For upgrades I'm currently leaning towards maximizing the torpedo bombers. AA is good enough as it is, and so is concealment. Slot 1: Air Groups Modification 1 Slot 2: Aircraft Engines Modification 1 Slot 3: Torpedo Bombers Modification 1: I find the +5 seconds to attack runs massively useful. Torpedoes are the main weapon, and the ability to start the attack runs from farther away keeps your (quite fragile) planes safer. This is considering that since the 0.8.0.1 hot fix you get 30 % less damage from AA during the attack run. AA Guns Modification 1 makes no sense to me, since by WG design it's very difficult to have your hull sunk by the enemy CV alone. Red CV's sometimes try it. Slot 4: Torpedo Bombers Modification 2: Again, your primary weapon. Slot 5: Flight Control Modification 1: Hugely beneficial, and isn't the concealment good enough anyhow? Slot 6: Don't have Hakuryu yet so no experience, but likely would go with Air Groups Modification 2. I have 19-point skippers in both Ryujo and Shokako, and have went with the below. This is the exact same set that I use with Lexington and Midway, although I would pick them in a different order for IJN and USN. 1: Air Supremacy 1: Improved Engine Boost: Not sure about how useful this actually is? Direction Center for Fighters might be good? I often summon my fighters on top of enemy DD's to keep them spotted either for myself or for my team mates. One more fighter would make them last a big longer? 2: Torpedo Acceleration 2: Improved Engines 3: Aircraft Armor 3: Demolition Expert: Demolition Expert is a lot of points for just the rockets? On the other hand, the reticle gets so small that I often find myself aiming at a specific spot of a BB to light one more fire. 3: Survivability Expert 4: Sight Stabilization

All true. I don't have Hakuryu yet, and I think I would appreciate this much more in the Hakuryu. In the Shokaku I don't face the top-tier AA cruisers in every game, and when I do I avoid them like the plague. The initial spotting flight is risky as hell. T6-8 and T7-9 feel comfortable in the Shokaku with the concealment as-is. I think I'll just give it a go, namely ditch Demolition Expert and Torpedo Acceleration, and take Concealment Expert and possibly Direction Center with the extra point. I imagine this only makes sense together with the Concealment Modification, because without it the spotting advantage is too small to be really useful (0.15 km if I did my math right). Much appreciated!

That means running both Concealment Expert and the Conceament Modification... It seems like a lot of investment, and I'm trying to think how often I would actually benefit from them not seeing my planes? These are the skills that I would definitely pick last when I spend my 19 points. Torpedo arming distance is a good point -- I actually hadn't thought about it.

It would be nice, but it's inevitable that somebody joining the queue make battles start. For that somebody there's no cancel. Sometimes it's you, but most of the time you're among the majority waiting the somebody to come. I think it's understandable, fair and no big deal.

How often does it really happen, and how big is the tragedy? What would make sense is changing the UI so that the mistake is less likely to happen. Say changing the "Battle" button to say "Join Random", "Join Co-op", etc. This brings the us to the larger topic of port UI design. It's awfully cluttered, poorly organized and sluggish. It's ugly and unattractive, unlike the game itself. The kind of result that you get when you keep adding stuff but never take the time to rethink and reorganize.

I hate when that happens, but I understand why it's so. The match maker tries to make the battles happen, within its parameters, as quickly as possible. Sometimes you joining the queue is what gets a battle going, hence no opportunity to leave. Whatever window of opportunity you were given, the longer the wait for everybody in the queue.

IJN torps are much easier to hit home. They swim a lot faster than USN torps, and now also aim faster than before. If you get a good attack run on a BB you usually hit both, and it's a lot easier to hit CA's and DD's. With Lexington you can't dream of a similar torpedo hit rate, and you must (and you can) utilize other plane types more. Shokaku is very much a one-trick pony, in comparison, but now it feels effective.

Bad form responding to yourself, but... Just played the first two games with the Shokaku after today's 0.8.1.1 hotfix. As far as I'm concerned, Shokaku is now officially back in business! The torps aim quicker, you get more torp planes on the deck, and their repair consumable is better. Especially with the Flight Control Modification 1 you can just keep the attacks coming much better than before. It's now a joy to play, and pleasantly different from the USN line. Also, Hakuryu got essentially the same buffs.

As I understand this, it will force all visible 3D objects to be rendered with the most accurate models? Or at least with more accurate models. The way 3D engines work is that when the objects are farther away they are rendered with lower quality models, or lower level of detail = LOD. You can't see the difference if the object is far and small enough, or the difference is small enough not to bother you. It eases the workload of the GPU and increases FPS. However, the carrier rework changed how quickly the camera moves. The LOD changes, as they have been tuned in the game, are somewhat too visible. It's the same when you zoom in with the scope of a surface ship, but always present.

Yeah, they did all the *ss-kicking, but it doesn't always win games it seems. I only got something like 50 to 60k, mostly harassing their DD's since I couldn't get through the flak. At the end I was also pretty banged up in the corner with nowhere to go, but saved by the clock. Replay's here if anyone's interested: https://www.dropbox.com/s/3jh4or4zx73onu1/20190305_002247_PASA110-Midway_28_naval_mission.wowsreplay?dl=0

Team was spread out all over the map, but did initially take all caps. Enemy was playing in a death ball that I couldn't really attack. I tried to tell my team that they will eventually kill you all, one-by-one, and we'll lose. Turned out I only got it half right.

I feel that Ranger and Ryujo play very differently, but with a bit of practice both are effective in their tier. Ranger is very versatile, all plane types are easy to use, and are effective in many situations. The Ryujo is much more tricky. The torpedos, especially with Torpedo Acceleration, are much easier to hit home. They're fast enough to be very useful against faster/smaller targets. They're your main damage dealing weapon, and you should be borderline paranoid about not wasting them against too strong AA. The attack planes are trickier as well. They deal good damage if you get a good, steady attack run, and the reticle narrows down real small. Ranger's are more of a shotgun. Finally, the AP bombs... I still struggle with them. Against BB's I can get citadels, but drop so early that many of the miss the whole target. Against softer targets I don't have the figured out well enough, and really need to spend some time in the training room. However, the AP dive bombers' great potential is apparent. I have somewhat higher average damage in Ryujo, with a similar number of games played. I think they're pretty well balanced, both in their tier and against each other. Problems start at T8 where Lexington is very good and Shokaku really, really underwhelming.

I played the Ryujo a lot, and it felt like a very fine tier 6. Great torps, and the others are OK'ish. However, when I eventually got Shokaku I was really, really underwhelmed. Comparing to Ryujo, in Shokaku you get stronger attack planes and dive bombers, but the torpedo bombers are still only two per attack. So the weaknesses of the Ryujo get better but the main strength doesn't. Being thrown to tier 8 makes it feel like you really have no strengths at all. The Lex in comparison felt immediately strong in T8. It up-tiers just fine. I haven't bothered to check the numbers, but in practice, everything available on the Lexington's deck feels better or equal to the Shokaku equivalent. I think it's fine that you're still stuck with only two torpedo bombers. However, the torps should hit like a freight train to make up for it. It would make it competetive (although tricky), yet keep it different from Lexington. Currently if I play the other ship classes and see a squadron from a Shokaku, I'm just never afraid. Also, based on what I'm hearing about Hakuryu, I'm just not motivated to play the Shokaku right now. These two boats really need some love.

It's a fairly limited number of things that the player can do after taking off in a squadron. Changing speed is a key thing in evading flak and executing multiple attack runs, and by making it limited you attach a bit more skill to the gameplay. It felt awkward to me as well, at first, but now I just don't think about it. If it was somehow frustrating or dumb I would be complaining. If it's just unrealistic but serves the game, I forget about it and keep playing.