Manual secondaries and AA

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

This has probably mentioned before, but I thought I'd bring it up again after the previous bar lowering mechanics.

It would be nice if we could control our own secondaries and AA guns, because this will lead to more intense gameplay. 

Secondaries
By giving players the option to control their own secondaries it will give them a feeling of more control in close combat. This will mostly be a buff for BB players, because they have the armanent for it.  It will make sense to go in and to use all that armanent. 
This will only be a nerf for those who attack BBs like a Kaiten. 

AA
The thing that always bothered me with ship to air combat is that I have zero influence in a battle over these fights, because it is a game of dice. To promote ship to air combat it would be nice to receive control over our own AA guns. 
It will make taking damage feel more fair. 

 

 

I think these should be an option for those who want more. Or do we really want to continue on the path of the automatic damage control party and zero carrier control during flight?

 

Greetz Lemon


 

[ColonelPete]

• you have influence on your AA
• manual aiming would be too powerful
• it would overtax most of the playerbase
• WG clearly said they will not do it

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

Just now, ColonelPete said:

• you have influence on your AA
• manual aiming would be too powerful
• it would overtax most of the playerbase
• WG clearly said they will not do it

1. Yes, the sector mechanic is amazing, or are we talking about the letter P here?
2. Come on, please continue.
3. Do you mean all ships need automatic damage con's?
4. Yes, WG has said multiple things they would never do. Yet here we are.

[1MajorKoenig]

2 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

• you have influence on your AA
• manual aiming would be too powerful
• it would overtax most of the playerbase
• WG clearly said they will not do it

 

You can‘t say whether it would be powerful at all. It’s pure guessing on your side.

 

And no - manual AA gun control would be exactly what’s needed. Manual attack vs RNG Defense is a badness idea to begin with 

 

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns? You could even leave an automatic weaker base Defense in place in case you are doing other things such as manoeuvring or attacking 

[El2aZeR]

4 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns?

 

Have you already forgotten that the great majority of this playerbase can't even WASD?

[1MajorKoenig]

Just now, El2aZeR said:

 

Have you already forgotten that the great majority of this playerbase can't even WASD?

 

The less you ask for the less you’ll get. I am sure people are very well capable to learn much more if needed. And it’s a rather obvious concept to aim AA guns at attacking planes - I think a lot of people would get that ...

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

2 minutes ago, El2aZeR said:

Have you already forgotten that the great majority of this playerbase can't even WASD?

It should be an option, same way the automatic DCP should have been for carriers.

[Mr_Snoww]

you want more powerful AA? *Edit*

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

40 minutes ago, Mr_Snoww said:

you want more powerful AA? *Edit*

?

[ColonelPete]

12 minutes ago, LemonadeWarrior said:

1. Yes, the sector mechanic is amazing, or are we talking about the letter P here?
2. Come on, please continue.
3. Do you mean all ships need automatic damage con's?
4. Yes, WG has said multiple things they would never do. Yet here we are.

1. both+WASD+positioning+Ship/Captain Setup
2. Main batteries around two times per minute + 50 or more seconds of CL gunfire should be balanced? Most BB have nearly the same or more secondary firepower as some cruiser have main battery firepower
3. no and I did not say that
4. then lets ask them every hour, they might change their mind

14 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

 

You can‘t say whether it would be powerful at all. It’s pure guessing on your side.

 

And no - manual AA gun control would be exactly what’s needed. Manual attack vs RNG Defense is a badness idea to begin with 

 

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns? You could even leave an automatic weaker base Defense in place in case you are doing other things such as manoeuvring or attacking 

see point 2, that is a pretty easy guess

 

game works without it

 

see El2aZeRs answer

[1MajorKoenig]

40 minutes ago, Mr_Snoww said:

you want more powerful AA? *Edit*

 

Agree with that.

 

However skill vs skill in CV vs AA would solve a lot of the current balancing dilemma 

[ForlornSailor]

14 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns?

 

About 75% of our fellow captains out there?

 

15 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

You could even leave an automatic weaker base Defense in place in case you are doing other things such as manoeuvring or attacking 

 

Thats the direction im favouring myself for a long time, yup. Would make a great addition and removes this stupid feelings, that you sometime as a CV have, when you see a lineup like 2x Atlanta, 3x Alaska 3x Jean bart as enemys and you have Yorcks, FdGs and Ibukis. No sh!t, that happened to me. Game over?

But now we can discuss and agree for days to come, even if we somehow bring 99% of all active players to agree with that, S_O will come and explain to us, how wrong we all are. Or we get a dev letter: NOPE!"

[Verblonde]

5 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns?

Whilst I'm not automatically against the idea, the answer to the above is anyone in combat with surface vessels, and using rapid firing guns. For example, if you're aiming/firing almost any kind of 'dakka' guns at enemy ships, you'll struggle to aim AA guns at planes at the same time.

 

Presumably, for the idea of aimable AA guns to be workable, you would need some sort of AI to take over the main armament whilst you were shooting at planes. I would think that would call for quite an advanced bit of coding, and that's before you take into account things like friendly fire (especially if you're going to include torps in the equation) etc.

 

Player-controlled secondaries already exist in Blitz - you just toggle between them and your main guns as the latter reload; for a BB, say, the cycle is usually something like main guns, secondaries, secondaries, main guns...etc. (assuming you have targets in range of both).

 

If we're thinking about the Blitz model, it's fun to take pot-shots with secondaries, and they can make a real difference sometimes; the down-side is that one can lose time between shots at targets where you are trying to engage something that is moving around the maximum range of your secondaries (the aimer loses lock when things go out of secondary range, even though they are still in range of your main guns, if you have the former selected), and trying to engage two targets at once (e.g. secondaries going for a nearby DD, and main guns trying to sink a more distant cruiser, say) is a non-starter, unless they're basically on more or less the same axis to your ship.

 

My feeling is that player-controlled secondaries could be quite doable (although they would need careful balancing, as they would no longer automatically fire at centre mass), although they would risk the danger of magnifying the difference between the good players and the less capable, whereas player-controlled AA is less likely to happen, as you'd need a lot of AI coding to make it remotely worthwhile (personally, I don't want all my surface to surface weapons to necessarily remain quiet when I'm being attacked by planes).

 

Can't see WG doing much of this though, as it would be a lot of work, and would probably only significantly benefit a fairly small section of the player base.

[1MajorKoenig]

1 minute ago, ColonelPete said:

game works without it

 

see El2aZeRs answer

 

Seriously? Currently the balance is not good and WG greatly struggles to balance CVs. This skill vs RNG is one of the issues 

 

And works? Sure but does it work well?

[Tyrendian89]

20 minutes ago, 1MajorKoenig said:

And who in hell would be overwhelmed by manning AA guns?

how about every ship that doesnt have a 30s reload and massive armour to keep it safe while it pays attention to AA? Manually controlled AA would be yet another massive BB buff - no thanks...

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

8 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

1. both+WASD+positioning+Ship/Captain Setup
2. Main batteries around two times per minute + 50 or more seconds of CL gunfire should be balanced? Most BB have nearly the same or more secondary firepower as some cruiser have main battery firepower
3. no and I did not say that
4. then lets ask them every hour, they might change their mind

1. WASD and positioning doesn't influence AA. Ship plus captain setup does, but that doesn't make the game more exciting.
2. They can tweak it down. You act like cruisers can survive at close range now. IFHE BBs would be mean indeed, if you are willing to spend the points on it.
4. There are plenty examples of things that WG would never do and yet they happened. You know it as well.

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

9 minutes ago, Tyrendian89 said:

how about every ship that doesnt have a 30s reload and massive armour to keep it safe while it pays attention to AA? Manually controlled AA would be yet another massive BB buff - no thanks...

The buff is just as big for cruisers and for DDs.
Cruisers have just like BBs plenty spare time and it gives DDs a chance to shoot down planes as well.

[Bics93]

2 minuti fa, LemonadeWarrior ha scritto:

he buff is just as big for cruisers and for DDs.
Cruisers have just like BBs plenty spare time and it gives DDs a chance to shoot down planes as well.

 

Secondaries build on Kiev, I’m coming! 

[ColonelPete]

3 minutes ago, LemonadeWarrior said:

1. WASD and positioning doesn't influence AA. Ship plus captain setup does, but that doesn't make the game more exciting.
2. They can tweak it down. You act like cruisers can survive at close range now. IFHE BBs would be mean indeed, if you are willing to spend the points on it.
4. There are plenty examples of things that WG would never do and yet they happened. You know it as well.

1. Rethink your approach to AA. There is A LOT you can do just by WASD and positioning (kiting, making yourself harder to hit, combine AA with other ships,...)
2. You would need to tweak it down a lot.

4 minutes ago, LemonadeWarrior said:

The buff is just as big for cruisers and for DDs.
Cruisers have just like BBs plenty spare time and it gives DDs a chance to shoot down planes as well.

Good luck using your secondaries or AA on a quickfiring CL or a DD.

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

Just now, ColonelPete said:

1. Rethink your approach to AA. There is A LOT you can do just by WASD and positioning (kiting, making yourself harder to hit, combine AA with other ships,...)
2. You would need to tweak it down a lot.

Good luck using your secondaries or AA on a quickfiring CL or a DD.

Look it is not obligatory. If you can't do it you don't have to. ^^

1. I don't have to rethink my approach to AA. I am just saying it is boring currently.
2. I doubt that. Secondaries have long hangtime and more dispersion than cruisers.

[Aotearas]

I think what you're looking for is Warthunder Naval Forces.

[Corvi]

What if change is give the ability to select TWO targets for manual secondaries so that the second side can fire too .. 

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

5 minutes ago, Aotearas said:

I think what you're looking for is Warthunder Naval Forces.

Does that require more brain power?

[invicta2012]

A big yes from me to more manual AA control. An AA boost which affects attack dispersion would be best as that would be of more use to smaller and more nimble ships. The CV would still have their planes but they would be more likely to miss or fail to score a significant hit

[LemonadeWarriorITA]

15 hours ago, Corvi said:

What if change is give the ability to select TWO targets for manual secondaries so that the second side can fire too .. 

My idea was just to give more control over your ship. 

People like @ColonelPeteforget that secondaries are programmed to be useless. Besides his point is because he can't do it we can't either. 
It is nice having an amazing secondary battery slamming shells into an unpenetratable hull. Just as nice as having an automatic DCP repairing 1 or 1 flooding. I mean for some people it is what they like. A little bit of action combined with plenty RNG.

I also expected some more insight from @Tyrendian89. I was hoping he saw some more opportunities, except of just a simple BB buff. The opportunities I saw was being able to shoot down planes with crappy AA based on skill and making brawling fun. Currently when you play a German BB you just follow the main force, move that big ship into the cap, delete everything and move on. You win the games, but it gets a bit boring. It would be way more fun if I could also use my secondaries while doing it. 

Yet everyone is complaining about BBs staying in the back. Of course they stay in the back when you don't have any control over your secondaries. Giving you access to your secondaries doesn't mean they get OP, they give you a feeling of control. Yes, at close range they will still murder lightly plated ships, just like they do now. My point is that they give you a feeling of control, more action.

AA wise similar. Giving the player an option to control his own AA guns give you a feeling of control. Ofcourse I do understand after 9,000 games, while having 2 Montana's, 2 Zao's, 2 Des Moines, 2 GK's, 2 Yamato's, 2 Hindenburgs, 2 Moskva's, 1 Minotaur, 1 Daring, 1 Z52, 1 Khabarovsk, 1 Shimakaze, 1 HIV, 1 Stalingrad, 1 Gearing, 1 Republique and 1 YueYang how to deal with planes. I know what skills or modules to use, or how to position myself on the battlefield. My point is that it doesn't feel exciting to let WG's automatic DCP software controlling my AA guns. I want to do it on my own.
Aren't we all annoyed when we have a plane flying over our head when playing a DD, while watching our AA trying to hit the planes? I am not saying that with manual control you will shoot down the plane, but it will give you the feeling of doing something useful. And even if it happens that you don't have time for controlling your AA guns you still have the automatic AA.

@Mr_Snoww My point is to give an option to have more control over their ships. In the end it comes down to the skills of the AA player and CV player.