The Mutsuki (T6 Japanese Destroyer)

[Major_Tankosic]

IJN O2 torps were next to impossible to see because they left no foam trail. The Devs should just implement that (to a well-balanced extent) to make higher tier IJN destroyers more playable. If not, at least fix their guns.

 

What they did to higher tier IJN DDs kinda bugs me alot.. IJN Sailors all had long and rigorous training compared to the USN Soda&Icecream Boys. I'm sure everything aboard IJN Ship was

on-the-double compared to USN one, and IJN DDs have proven themselves to have sharp teeth in all those battles where they were seriously outgunned.

 

Also, i'm sure Ships like IJN Yuudachi wouldn't be able to spend most of a battle within USN Cruiser formation, crossing the line multiple times and exchanging artillery fire while totally outgunned if they had turret traverse like we have in the game.

 

On the other hand, In the real life, you don't reload torpedo tubes while under fire and rapid maneuvering - that was impossible. Especially on a DD. Those guys had only one chance to hit or miss with torpedo spread.

 

What he said

[DeleRT_]

I will put it in a spoiler, but I made a quite extensive videoguide for the Mutsuki.

I think it covers the destroyer pretty well and would like to help everyone here that thinks it is a let down after the Minekaze:

 

 

 

[Sub_Eleven]

I think it covers the destroyer pretty well and would like to help everyone here that thinks it is a let down after the Minekaze:

 

We don't think that, it simply is. Doesn't mean you can't be succesfull with it. But simply being able to score kills does not qualify it as a good ship.

 

Good video, nicely done.

[Thlurp]

the mutsuki is good for its tier if you ask me, i can only repeat it.

 

the problem is that the minekaze is over the top on t5 and people expect to have the same op DD at t6 onwards.

 

let me tell you something, they get harder to play with each tier after t5, that doesnt mean they're worse.

of course they lack the balance of a minekaze but they work, they just need some more training than being at a max t5 battle with numb BB's where you can just fire and forget your torps and move on to the next target

 

i for example started very badly in the hatsuharu, had an embarassing 18k dmg average in my first 10 battles

i was able to catch up and i'm fine above 40k right now

also had the so far best match in the hatsuharu with whopping 153k dmg

 

yes, the DD's after the minekaze are a bit of a let down, but trust me ladies and gentlemen: training, training, training 

 

edit: @alalos: dont skip the mutsuki, you will most liekyl be frustrated in the hatsuharu as well, t7 means way more aircraft in the sky, means your trops will often be seen much earlier, train with the mutsuki, she's a great ship

[TerTerro]

Mutsuki is a dream compared to Hatsuharu

 

[Takeda92]

the mutsuki is good for its tier if you ask me, i can only repeat it.

 

the problem is that the minekaze is over the top on t5 and people expect to have the same op DD at t6 onwards.

 

let me tell you something, they get harder to play with each tier after t5, that doesnt mean they're worse.

of course they lack the balance of a minekaze but they work, they just need some more training than being at a max t5 battle with numb BB's where you can just fire and forget your torps and move on to the next target

 

i for example started very badly in the hatsuharu, had an embarassing 18k dmg average in my first 10 battles

i was able to catch up and i'm fine above 40k right now

also had the so far best match in the hatsuharu with whopping 153k dmg

 

yes, the DD's after the minekaze are a bit of a let down, but trust me ladies and gentlemen: training, training, training 

 

edit: @alalos: dont skip the mutsuki, you will most liekyl be frustrated in the hatsuharu as well, t7 means way more aircraft in the sky, means your trops will often be seen much earlier, train with the mutsuki, she's a great ship

 

Compared to the pinnacle of OPness that is Cleveland or the reliable/accurate Aoba, or the Shotguns that are Fuso and New Mexico or even the angel of death that is Ryuujo (soon to be nerfed though) what does Mutsuki bring to the table? a torpedo stats of less than 20? 6 torps that reload 75 seconds and 2 guns only? IJN DDs had that 2 tiers ago and will still have it in tier 7. 

The only thing you can hit with those torps are those who sail in straight lines. If you consider meeting opponents who know how to minimize the damage from 0 to 1 torps (like what happened in my CBT experience) those torpedoes are very lack luster, with damage per torpedo of 8-9k on BBs. Higher DDs at least get guns that enables them to pop shots at other ship and set them on fire, or finish off other IJN or low health DDs if you play your cards right. Shimakaze for example can defeat any IJN DD she meats 1v1 and possible even Mahan if played right. Mutsuki can't say the same if she faced an Isokaze with better guns and torpedoes for close range combat.

 

In Hatsuharu at least, once you get used to the longer detection range you will feel that you have more options.. The torps are actually good speed and damage wise and the guns aren't terrible either. Now Minekaze with the slower guns is also not very good gun platform (worse than Isokaze) but she compensates with fast, spammable torp reload, something Mutsuki can't do.

 

Mutsuki has the same issue as Kagerou at tier 9. the guns are terrible at turning (but slightly better) but in Kagerou at least you do get very powerful torpedoes. so even though you are one trick pony you at least are good at it.

[Thlurp]

You're right, I never said anything else, I just wanted to point out that they're not as bad as everyone makes them.

And yes, I agree, there is some space for tuning them up.

 

The minekaze is just over the top if you're not looking at the guns.

 

And I can't wait for my Shimakaze, I loved her in the CBT

[Kaladania]

I have as well some strange dmg problems with my Mutsuki guns. Like on paper they are same but in battle i hitting for less then i been with Minekaze - or it looks that way. When i hit enemy destroyer with my Minekaze guns, they do around 2-3k - Mutsuki hit same targets for 1-1,5k

 

Added: As well it seems as Mutsuki is damn a lot more likely to Detonate then Minekaze - i actualy does not remember get detonated in my DDs before - but in Mutsuki already 3x times from 12 matches.

[Benden]

Some of you guys can try the hardest they can to defend this DD or find some advantage after the minekaze but you really wont manage.

I'm not the ultimate expert on ijn dd in this game but I've played them alot, and grinded shimakaze twice (thanks to wipe).

Right now I'm really trying to get some pros for the Mutsuki  but it's just a frustrating ship to play. Expect fun to come back only with kagero (maybe, as they swaped it with fubuki at the end of cbt so I can't say now) and shimakaze after a helluva lonnnnnnnnnng grind.

[Foofight]

Some of you guys can try the hardest they can to defend this DD or find some advantage after the minekaze but you really wont manage.

I'm not the ultimate expert on ijn dd in this game but I've played them alot, and grinded shimakaze twice (thanks to wipe).

Right now I'm really trying to get some pros for the Mutsuki  but it's just a frustrating ship to play. Expect fun to come back only with kagero (maybe, as they swaped it with fubuki at the end of cbt so I can't say now) and shimakaze after a helluva lonnnnnnnnnng grind.

 

I play it like the minekaze and its really not that different. Same cammovalues allows it to sneak upon ships and launch from 6km undetected like the minekaze.

I find my self also playing more aggressive with this ship, going "chicken race" against BBs and CAs is a very good tactic that I use alot with Mutsuki!

Head straight on em ( front on front)! They wont see you until u are 6km away. And when they do, they need to turn their guns... maybe reload to HE..  + they will miss alot cus of ur narrow ship.

But they cant kill you before its to late and you pass by in 40 kts! ( BBs have not enough time to reload to HE from the moment he spots u till pass em with ur torps.) Offc u take some minor hits from this taccs, but sinking a BB or CA from full hp to 0 is always worth the trade of my chicken race taccs ;)

[Torashuu]

Biggest problem with mutsuki for me isn't its stats or even its long(er) reload. Its the fact at this point planes, from carriers, cruisers and battleships, become so numerous all torpedos you launch get detected waaaay before they are in 'ship detection' range. Meaning there are no good angles to attack from anymore. It doesn't help that TB get more numerous as well, and still attack from the same ranges, giving the target less time to respond. What you're basically seeing is that DDs anti capital ship role gets subsumed by the carriers, as they do the DDs job, and prevent DDs from doing their thing at the same time. While the faster planes mean over the tiers CVs give targets less time to respond as you go up in tiers. While with the DDs because of planes scouting your torps, the targets get more time to respond the higher you go in tiers.

 

Personally I think it would benefit tier 5+ DDs more if they made torpedos unspotable by planes. Or maybe only the Long Lances.

[Takeda92]

Personally I think it would benefit tier 5+ DDs more if they made torpedos unspotable by planes. Or maybe only the Long Lances.

Only Kagerou and Shimakaze carry Long Lances though! (in the game I mean)

[Thlurp]

Personally I think it would benefit tier 5+ DDs more if they made torpedos unspotable by planes. Or maybe only the Long Lances.

 

or at least limit the detection radius by quite a bit would help as well

 

Only Kagerou and Shimakaze carry Long Lances though! (in the game I mean)

 

and they get screwed over by higher detection range, even though they where stealthier in RL

[Thlurp]

just to add, sorry for the double post

 

it is possible, but extremly rare in the ijn DD

 

165'328 dmg

 

 

 

 

edit: i forgot to add, the hatsuharu is actually the only IJN DD with pretty respectable AA (aside the shimakaze)

[TerTerro]

Nice

 

[GulvkluderGuld]

Been grinding on the IJN Destroyers and have just reached the Fubuki, and I have to say the destroyers after tier 5 seem a bit redundant, from my experience:

 

-at about 6km most ships can avoid torps or eat one or two, at widespread you might hit a cruiser with the odd torp

-at about 5km you can get potentially guaranteed kills or a lot of hits on a battleship, but then you have to face the death gauntlet of enemy counter battery fired

 

 

So for a minekaze, whose detection range is 5.8km, you only have to run 0.8km gauntlet to get a decent hit, you have extremely fast reloads to keep the heat on your opponent and are mobile enough to escape the death gauntlet, which makes it in my opinion the best destroyer of the game right now.

 

 

However, as you level up I seem to get awarded unwieldy  ships, larger reload times and less torps for my effort (I'ev only been regiven 3 torp barrages with the fubuki, even though the minikaze had three at tier 5!). Coupled with the expensive repair costs for using these new suicide ships they seem fairly unsustainable in higher tiers without premium (im averaging about 130k per game with premium, my repair cost is about 70k, and adding on reload costs, 80k. This means once my premium goes I get about 65k per game, meaning im in a deficit from damaging enemy battleships but getting wiped because im unable to escape)

 

 

It feels as though I'm being punished for persisting in the tree to be honest, and although people say "ambush" and "use smoke", it is extremely hard to do those things when you have battleships and cruisers hugging the blue line and air recon all over the map, and as a destroyer you really should not be attracting attention by being an AA platform.

 

 

I now have, to get a decent shot against veteran players who know and understand how to dodge torps at high ranges as soon as they catch a whiff of a destroyer, got to undergo up to 2km of death gauntlet to even conceivably getting a decent hit on an enemy battleship, and don't get me started on cruisers. The fubuki has a detection range of 7km, meaning to get a sub-par shot unlikely to hit, I need to traverse a kilometre of no mans land (no one is 1k from an island in tier 5-10 unless they have a death wish), or 2km to get a very decent shot which is more then likely to hit.

 

 

Then I have to drag my unwieldy snail destroyer, less useful then a minekaze, out of the gauntlet of enemy destroyers spotting me, enemy Battleships secondary fire, cruiser cannon spam and potential aircraft recon,  to be giftedwith a 2 minute reload, and spend my time wandering around until the torps reload to try and run the gauntlet again. Although people argue the longer range torps are the bonus for higher level dd's, as I mentioned anything above 6km is resting on luck or extremely poor enemy ability.

 

 

I would recommend that wargaming either reduce detection to a maximum of 6km or at least increase torp speed and reload timings to negate the dangerous distance high tier destroyers have to traverse  just to get a decent shot. Right now I would rather have my minekaze in tier 10 battles then my fubuki.

 

USN DD captain here, happy to introduce you to our exciting life on the high seas 

 

Joking aside: It sounds to me like you gotten spoiled by the (unreasonably good) Minekaze stealth and developed a playstyle more akin to US DDs than IJN DDs.

eg: running the gauntlet on the Minekaze carried a much lower risk than the potential reward. 

Thus, the fault is with you playstyle, not the ship (although I agree the IJN dd line does needs rework).

 

Risk is supposed to be balaced with reward. 

- Running the gauntet is a high-risk, high reward scenario. I

- Firing torps from concealment and zoning carries almost NO RISK.

- The advantage of the IJN dd's compared to USN dds is their ability to make low risk plays, something that is impossible with USN dd's. 

- Thus IJN DD play (in my experience) revolves around torpedo spam from stealth and predicting when the opponent will be distracted enough be a duel with another ship to eat a facefull of torps.

 

If you dont like this playstyle, I recommend you switch over to the USN. Personally I stopped playing my isokaze after I got to the USN tier 4 Clemson and realized i prefer the USN playstyle.

 

And lastly I would just like to point out that it is most definitely possible to hit torps fired from steath in IJN dds, but it usually takes a long time and lots of torps. And more patience than I, a USN dd driver, possess

However, the strength of the IJN DDs are they have the speed to run from anything and the range to hit from stealth, making them the best scouts in the game. 

They are also almost impossible to root out without carrier support, despite facing many ships.

 

So no. I strongly disagree with your opinion. IJN DDs do not need better stealth. They have more than enough already!

[Thlurp]

However, the strength of the IJN DDs are they have the speed to run from anything and the range to hit from stealth, making them the best scouts in the game. 

 

i have to disagree here, the only DD with the speed to outrun others is Minekaze and Shimakaze, all others are at the same speed or sometimes even slower than CA/CL

 

the way to play IJN DD's is different for me, as i do tend to use my guns quite often, at least the guns at t7 upwards are strong and you shouldnt forget them.

You just need to be aware of guns facing you or guns that could face you

torpedoes at the spotting range they have right now and the mass of planes in the air get pretty useless, or lets say very hard to use, as you have to shoot them at extreme ranges

 

for any DD i hope they make torps harder to spot from planes, USN DD's will have nice torps at t9/10 as well and suffer a similar problem, just not as hard as the IJN, because USN has powerful guns

[Kaladania]

 

USN DD captain here, happy to introduce you to our exciting life on the high seas 

 

Joking aside: It sounds to me like you gotten spoiled by the (unreasonably good) Minekaze stealth and developed a playstyle more akin to US DDs than IJN DDs.

eg: running the gauntlet on the Minekaze carried a much lower risk than the potential reward. 

Thus, the fault is with you playstyle, not the ship (although I agree the IJN dd line does needs rework).

 

Risk is supposed to be balaced with reward. 

- Running the gauntet is a high-risk, high reward scenario. I

- Firing torps from concealment and zoning carries almost NO RISK.

- The advantage of the IJN dd's compared to USN dds is their ability to make low risk plays, something that is impossible with USN dd's. 

- Thus IJN DD play (in my experience) revolves around torpedo spam from stealth and predicting when the opponent will be distracted enough be a duel with another ship to eat a facefull of torps.

 

If you dont like this playstyle, I recommend you switch over to the USN. Personally I stopped playing my isokaze after I got to the USN tier 4 Clemson and realized i prefer the USN playstyle.

 

And lastly I would just like to point out that it is most definitely possible to hit torps fired from steath in IJN dds, but it usually takes a long time and lots of torps. And more patience than I, a USN dd driver, possess

However, the strength of the IJN DDs are they have the speed to run from anything and the range to hit from stealth, making them the best scouts in the game. 

They are also almost impossible to root out without carrier support, despite facing many ships.

 

So no. I strongly disagree with your opinion. IJN DDs do not need better stealth. They have more than enough already!

 

Risk is supposed to be balaced with reward. 

- Running the gauntet is a high-risk, high reward scenario. I

- Firing torps from concealment and zoning carries almost NO RISK.

- The advantage of the IJN dd's compared to USN dds is their ability to make low risk plays, something that is impossible with USN dd's. 

- Thus IJN DD play (in my experience) revolves around torpedo spam from stealth and predicting when the opponent will be distracted enough be a duel with another ship to eat a facefull of torps.

 

If he decides in Mutsuki run gauntlet then we have MAX 6 torps witch get spoted much faster then US torps. Fire torpedos from concealment is maybe without risk BUT nearly everyone now have situacional awareness so they know you are there and start evading you + we can´t go duel anyone with guns. I can´t engage even carrier as my 2x guns do nearly nothing and my speed does not let me even keep up with Independence or Zuiho if you are engaged by enemy aircrafts as well.

[canuckster]

I've had a few games in my Mutsuki and thoroughly enjoy it. No it's not the Minekaze, but if you keep it more in the defensive role it is an awesome ship to play in, a truly great ship to decap with. Those torpedoes... 

 

 

[Khul]

Stupid question guys, but I finally unlocked all the modules on the Mutsuki...

 

Wiser heads than me: is it worth mounting the last hull & the gun upgrade? I've researched them both & have toyed with them, but from a few games it seems I can no longer reliably bully CVs when I make a breakthrough, & I'm thinking of switching back to the multi-turret, old-style IJN DD guns set-up.

 

Anyone got any opinions on this please?

[Unintentional_submarine]

Stupid question guys, but I finally unlocked all the modules on the Mutsuki...

 

Wiser heads than me: is it worth mounting the last hull & the gun upgrade? I've researched them both & have toyed with them, but from a few games it seems I can no longer reliably bully CVs when I make a breakthrough, & I'm thinking of switching back to the multi-turret, old-style IJN DD guns set-up.

 

Anyone got any opinions on this please?

 

Well, you gain a couple of advantages, DP main guns, more AA and the individual guns are slightly better.

However, I don't believe in DD AA. At most it can pop a plane here and there, and that's if you are lucky (Gearing AA is actually not that terrible tbf). So generally you want to compare the guns alone against each other, and there I find that the earlier hull has the advantage.

 

Also, and this is something you can easily 'fix' your way out of, the DP guns are relatively long range AA. And long range AA tends to get you spotted. You 'fix' that by turning AA off, unless you get spotted anyway. That essentially loses a lot of the value of the DP guns.

I'm sure there are some that prefer the AA hull, and good for them. But I don't, so I stick with the previous hull and guns.

[Khul]

 

Well, you gain a couple of advantages, DP main guns, more AA and the individual guns are slightly better.

However, I don't believe in DD AA. At most it can pop a plane here and there, and that's if you are lucky (Gearing AA is actually not that terrible tbf). So generally you want to compare the guns alone against each other, and there I find that the earlier hull has the advantage.

 

Also, and this is something you can easily 'fix' your way out of, the DP guns are relatively long range AA. And long range AA tends to get you spotted. You 'fix' that by turning AA off, unless you get spotted anyway. That essentially loses a lot of the value of the DP guns.

I'm sure there are some that prefer the AA hull, and good for them. But I don't, so I stick with the previous hull and guns.

 

Thank you mate, out of plus-ones, but I'll be sticking with the previous hull & the single-purpose guns.

[VonVolks]

The Mutsuki isn't too bad at AA with the final setup though. Mind you if you never want to use AA there isn't much point.

 

I had too to clear AA missions add none of my other ships had any AA at all

[canuckster]

AA is handy if you're being divebombed or scouted, if you're being scouted then you need the AA. I find it quite handy.

[Sotahullu]

It's been pretty fun with it but unlike Minekaze, I'm using the 10km torpedoes as the 6km torps were little bit hazard to use. 

 

Bit lackluster in gun fights but it's not fully elited yet.