Calamrin

that sums it up for me, great post, i believe some people get far too close to the game, and often it turns toxic. Edit: the only reason i dont turn chat off is that once in a blue moon i get a snippet of constructive advice.

That post by Lyster has been a game changer for me. Knowing the key things to do is one thing but you need the experience playing to put it into practice. In random battles with 10 ships when inexperienced, a single mistake or a bad position gets you killed instantly from one of a million angles. In ranked battles its a team of 6, is much more forgiving and less stressful, so you have time to think about what you are doing and where you are and going. Also have had no abuse. Is nice not to get overmatched by uptiering The xp/credits good Learnt more in 24 hours on positioning and movement than all my weeks playing randoms. Thanks for that post Lyster

The current rank battles are for tier 6 and 7. they have bronze silver and gold levels or whatever it is....surely the more experienced players get to the higher leagues, i dont see anything wrong with playing in the bronze league...isnt it why its designed that way? To comment on Von Pruss. When i first started the game, you see all these campains where u need higher and higher tier ships, and all these different types of battles you can do. Nothing states you shouldnt do it, in fact the game is pretty much set up to encourage you to progress. Random battles are random battles...with random players. If experienced players are upset cant you get them to make some kind of division system. That should appease everyone. Experienced players would get the quality they want, and the newer players would get to play with all the toys (nobody can expect people playing the game not to explore the ships available to them) A point i would like to make (and hopefully not get shouted at too much) is that if the levels of play have dropped so much either the number of experienced players is falling or the number of newer players is expanding, or both. So if theres a lot of newer players they deserve to have fun and play the game as its designed without personal attacks (im talking about whispers after a bad game that are borderline illegal, not in game criticism which is often constructive) This is unrelated but a tale from last night: start of battle in my Skane ..random guy tells me to take A. a cv spotter had already spotted 2 BBs and a baltimore cruiser on that side, and my radio location was going mad telling me a dd was in cap(had to be a gunboat as they only had 2 dds and both were) so i didnt i skirted round the outside of it. i got 2 sarcastic well dones, I then made a mistake and positioned badly, and the second dd which was skirting the first one took me by surprise and killed me. Another wave of well dones....after game 2 whispers telling me i should quit game (amongst other abusive stuff i dont want to say), then looked at my battle history and abused me on that (have since turned it to private).

Rear_Adm_Lyster your comments on doing rank battles is a suberb eye opener, and great advice.....all your comments are superb ive been playing about 12 weeks, and i get abuse at every level/tier of the game weekly. Nasty stuff, abusive stuff. Now this is water off a ducks back to me as learning the game and doesnt bother me, but omg i would not let my son or daughter play this game...its lots of people spitting vitriol, and its not new players its seasoned players who think its great to bully new players. Experienced players who brush it under the carpet and say should just be thick skinned, and learn to be better players are no better than people who ignore racism, and other problems in the world. Theres an underlying current of nastiness from some players, and on the forums theres an underlying complicitness to it going on from some posters.