CapnGebs

I saw some gameplay the other day which suggested that surface ships are not damaged by depth charges...this includes subs when fully surfaced. So if you drop depth charges subs will surface to try and be immune to them. The depth charge mechanic then simply becomes a means to force them to the surface at which point you have to shoot them to actually do damage.

Its ok nambr9 I think they were using sarcastic humour to poke fun at the current game design not actually suggesting it was your fault. Regarding the counter play these arent great but in case they help at all : 1. We can try and keep dodging until their battery/airsupply (I forget which it is now) runs out forcing them to surface then we can hit them with guns. 2. I may well be stating the obvious but just in case its useful to someone, when all you can see is the submerged red sillouette of the ship under water as long as there is a red sillhouette you can still shoot them and do damage. 3. The tendency seems to be for the sub to follow their target head on due to the forward firing torps. If you can get into a position where you can sail very close around an island the underwater terrain may force the sub to surface if it wants to fire torpedoes opening it up to gunfire. Like I said, not great but it may help a tiny bit.

Who knows why players do what they do. Is it because thats how they enjoy the game? Are they new players who dont know any better? Perhaps they are scared of getting blapped. Unfortunately strange ally tactics are something that has to be seen as a challenge to work around and overcome or we would go crazy. I suspect a number of the behaviours are copying what someone has seen on youtube. I've seen mass suicides down the middle of two brothers because "I saw someone do it on youtube". I've seen lemming trains in a Capture the enemy base battle completely expose one flank. I've seen destroyers hiding even further back than battleships. Yesterday I even played a coop in which there was only myself and one other ship left and the bots had all the caps. I tried to carry whilst my last ally just reversed all the way to the edge and never once fired their guns. Unfortunately I caught a torpedo. With the clock ticking down and no caps it was a sure fire loss in coop! I was sure my ally had gone afk. Thankfully the last bot charged at the player and just before the bot could ram the player on the border the player started moving and shooting. Clearly they had just sat there the whole time. If we are lucky enough to get players that work with us in the team thats nice. If not, its all just part of the challenge. I have started trying to ignore "odd" tactics and just focus on "what could I have done better in that battle", seems the only way to keep the blood pressure down.

I was just thinking about the sonar pings and homing torps. It seems homing torps are a bad idea so I have a suggestion that hopefully makes things a bit more sensible and also a bit more realistic (I know, I know...WoWs isnt realistic, but still...). And hopefully more thrilling for sub captains: 1. Remove homing from sub torps altogether, destroyers have always managed without magic homing torps, (but keep the single fire torps). 2. When fully submerged a sub only has a viewing range of what is underwater (land masses and other subs, no surface ships). Could still try and fire torps at surface ships but they will be fired blind. 3. When at periscope depth give the sub the same underwater view as when submerged but also a restricted surface viewing range of their max torpedo range. 4. When surfaced give the sub full viewing range of the surface but no view of submerged subs the same as all other surface ships. 5. Change the ping mechanic so that pings last for something like10 seconds pings have a range the same as the subs max torpedo range. All surface ships detected by a ping get indication of the subs direction relative to them for that 10 seconds similar to a short duration version of the commander skill Radio Location. when fully submerged the ping gives the sub view of all surface ships out to the max range of its torps for the duration of the ping. when at periscope depth give the torps a slightly increased speed. when surfaced there is no benefit to a ping but they get the same torpedo speed increase as when at periscope depth. I think that would make the subs more fun and challenging to play, playing with visibility of targets and their own detection and also give other ships some form of counter-play. Just a thought.

I was looking at the destroyer trees the other day and fancied trying out those low tier german destroyers with their forward facing torpedoes. Sat in the random battle queue for a while in the v-25 and then gave up as there were never more than 5 or 6 ships in the queue :( When I was slowly working up tiers a good few months back, working through tiers up to about 4 was painful. Although you dont get so many ships hiding at the back of the map I kept getting the opposite problem with everyone charging forward all the way into the enemy. No time to try and cap areas or get map control.

The little details are looking really good. I like the 3 stages to each gun barrel. Given the amount of space you will will have internally I was just wondering if you will install a smoke emitter to feed out of the chimneys? I've seen similar on some R/C tanks and ships. Mind you I suppose you would have to put some sort of internal structure in place to hold the parts.

Hmm, time to research some more Tier 4 ships then.

I mostly sail British destroyers. When you go above tier 6 you start to encounter more and more radar ships. It gets to the point where I am virtually perma-spotted by hydro, radar or planes if I want to get torpedoes away. I find that if I go below tier 5 it is far more common for teams to just charge at the enemy or caps and the games are less strategic. I can be capping and holding a flank only to find the other flank has crumbled. I'm nowhere near good enough to carry games in this sort of situation.

Thats a brilliant idea! I look forward to seeing that in progress.

Thats a nice looking destroyer with really sharp lines to the paint job. Very impressive . I'm tempted by the idea of a 1:700 battleship but not sure what I would like. I quite like ships that have interesting history so I can learn about them as I paint which is the main reason I went for ORP Blyskawica after seeing Jingles' video. Just the other day I started reading about what is a "Pocket Battleship", maybe I'll build one of those.

I used to paint warhammer miniatures. At one point many years ago I was trying to get together an army for Warhammer Fantasy Battle but it was just too many miniatures and too expensive. I never did complete an entire army. Now I just paint the occasional figures for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay games. I'm tempted to paint some of the figures and things in some of my boardgames like the starships in the Firefly boardgame but I'm too nervous I'll ruin them and hence spoil the boardgame.

Ooh, thats a beauty. You really have mastered the rigging.

Thanks, it was really relaxing to do. I have taken to modelling to relax whilst listening to Mingles with Jingles. Although there were a few swear words when I was trying to do the rigging. Hopefully this thread can encourage a few more people to try modelling to relax whether thats plastic kits, brick blocks like Cobi or 3d design and printing like Parasit Kaffee. I'll put up a photo of ORP Blyskawica when I have finished her but its a little way off. Main structure is complete and I'll shortly be onto all the rigging....so much more than on a bi-plane <shiver> [Oh and if anyone has seen a nice model kit for HMS Icarus please let me know. She is currently my favourite ship in WoWs but I have been unable to find a model kit of her]

Understood, thanks for the detailed synopsis in an earlier message tocqueville8. I'm unable to watch at work so that was helpful. I was trying to put my thoughts into very general terms in the hopes it helps in future battles.

Given the relative speed of ships this often translates as "DDs who go straight for caps". But if a DD rushes the cap and then gets blapped for whatever reason (overextended, no support, sitting in open water etc) all that has been achieved is that the team is down 1 destroyer. I see this happen a LOT. It took me a little while to learn that this is a bad idea and I got blapped early far too often. If you can sneak a cap because there is no enemy DD great. If not it is often better to focus on killing (or spotting so someone else can kill) the nearby enemy DD first even if this gives the enemy the cap at first. Then taking the cap once they are dead. Another alternative is to let the enemy DD cap a zone and wait 30 seconds for them to sail off then jump in after them and take the zone yourself. Often once a ship leaves a zone and heads for another they focus on the new cap rather than keeping the previous one. If you want to encourage a friendly DD to cap, get yourself into a good position to provide cover fire into the cap and focus down any enemy DD that gets spotted. Even send a message that you are supporting the DD and will focus enemy DDs if they can spot them. As a DD, knowing I have support from another ship willing to help focus down the enemy DD I am far more inclined to push into a dangerous cap. I often start the battle stating "Will search for enemy DD, please focus if spotted". This often gets ignored, shouted down or even responses such as "Why???". If the cruisers and battleships can help focus down the enemy DDs that gives your own DDs far more freedom to cap and sneak into enemy lines and spot the other ships for the cruisers and battleships to shoot at.

The Hitachi is your own design? Very nice work. I was about to look her up online and see if local model shops sold the kit, oh well :)

I like the look of some of the star wars model kits out there but as soon as anyone puts the star wars name to anything the price just gets silly. Any pictures? Always good fun to see everyones handy work. Sometimes a piece I am trying to work on is so fiddly I have to just put it aside for the evening, go and have a cup of tea and come back to it the next day. Usually when I eventually overcome a problem like that it feels rewarding afterwards though so I persevere :)

Thats some really nice work. Even got the tiny railings around the sides. That Hitachi is a very pretty ship. Is that wide piece some sort of radar array on the top?

Parasitkaffee, the level of detail is extraordinary. I tinkered with Google SketchUp ages ago when I was planning some work on the house and that was tricky enough. Getting all those different curves in the hull must have been so difficult.

Goodness me. Where on earth do you put them all. That must keep you really busy. Any photos of any favourites?

LOL oh my goodness. That certainly puts it in perspective. For a second I thought you had forgotten to put the tanks in the photo. Wow!

For my Sopwith Camel I used "EZ Line". It comes in several colours, heavy or fine thickness and it is an elastic polymer. So you stretch it when you attach it and when the glue dries and you let go it is taught. EZ line is unbeatable for simulating Telephone cables and Electric lines (modelscenerysupplies.co.uk)

That fleet looks cool. What is the rigging on the sides of the aircraft carriers? I really like the look of that ship second from right. Is it a battleship? The rigging is so impressive but I think if I tried that I would lose what little hair I have left. You even have some rigging connecting directly to other rigging. How on earth did you do that?

I wondered why people chose certain models to build? For example I quite fancy building the HMS Icarus as its a ship I particularly enjoy sailing in WoWs. Have others made the models of the ships they like playing the most?

Cool, sister ships. Will they be identical or will you have small variations between the 2 ships? Are these real ships, paper ships or your own design?