BB's That Shoot Only HE... Noobs or Clever Pyromancers

[Sir_Sinksalot]

Totally noob and clueless play-sytle as I suspect or are they hiding something more deeper and clever that I'm just not seeing??

 

Encountering these BB HE slingers increasingly more often among teammates. I'm trying to add logic to it. At a glance, stupid and noob, but since most the time they are sitting redline camping as far away from the enemy ships as possible, enemy targets which are mostly advancing straight forwards thus bow facing and would thus mostly either ricochet, non-pen or over pen then perhaps BB's using HE with it's high % chance of setting ships on fire, more guaranteed damage dealing capacity, module incapacitating and repair draining initiative is actually not a bad move? would like.... sap these ships with a "money in the bank" sort of mindset in which the latter engagements will put them at an advantage whereby the ships they face will be all beat up, drained of repair kits, drained of most everything "for fixing stuff" along with some broken turrets, anti-AA etc and so overall actually is a sound strat playing strongly for end game superiority with early battle sapping efforts.... or maybe I am flattering them and they are in fact idiots?

 

 Thoughts please. 

[ColonelPete]

Depends on situation.

 

Usually, sitting in a well amored ship, with a lot hitpoints, as far as possible away from the enemy, is a bad idea.

Yes, the enemy ships will be beat up when they come to you. But when they do, your team is no more, and you can face multiple of these beat up ships, who will outflank you and rip you to pieces.

[DFens_666]

Its basicly noobs... Alltho, if (mostly by accident) they all shoot HE at the same targets, managing DCP becomes basicly impossible. So basicly its stupid, but can work

I still rather use AP, delete Cruisers with it. That should still beat trying to spam everything with fires to death.

 

Just from today when playing Soyuz. Thats just a massive advantage for my team. Cruisers need time to be useful. If you take that away, then they cant get to their full potential. When DDs/Cruisers are dealt with, BBs will fall easily too.

[ForlornSailor]

Complicated topic. Not long ago, everyone would have said, HE on BBs is noobish. It really depends on a lot of things tho. Situation, line up, your own ship aswell, your teammates in your vicinity...

Like if you have 2 smolensk around you, might aswell throw HE at the targets aswell to push their DCP completly over the edge.

If you are a Musashi / Yamato however, Id never opt for HE unless you know your next salvo goes into a DD - AP is just too powerful on the 460s not to use it.

And then there is the thing with easy citas on cruisers using HE... in certain constelations thats a big deal. But that depends on matchmaking.

[TruePhoenix]

Anyone claiming the HE spam is noob isn't reading the game.

 

BB's will HE spam (hence the popularity of HE hi DPM BB's) if targets are nose in, might as well rather than seeing the non-pen / ricochet numbers climb ever higher. Its a DPM game in the end and BB HE on CC's does hurt. CC's been doing this forever, HE to nose on, AP only for broadsides on CC's and very close in action on BB's. There is a choice and players are using it, can't blame them.

[Beastofwar]

There are directives, daily missions and more of that  encouraging/requiring setting many fires. So i would not say "noob" too fast. A lot of players just want to complete such tasks and use all ships they want to play for it.

 

On the other hand when not blasting 406+ mm heavy AP why would you not fire HE at angled 15+ km targets ? The explosive damage ( including wrecked modules ) and the fires you may start do more damage then bounces/shatters.

 

And when there is a CV - i know most will never take that into account as they hate CV, even the allied one - you might help that by wrecking AA modules with HE explosions. It might make your win more probable if the CV can operate more freely. Yeah i dont care if Unicums dont loose aircraft to AA ( sure btw...) others do.

[Fodder1978]

Yup. Waste of time lobbing AP at most bows-on targets, they just ricochet (disclaimer: yes there are some scenarios where this doesn’t happen).

 

Unless you are trying to stay dark or are otherwise deliberately holding fire for a good reason, all you are doing is wasting an element of your team’s combat power. Might as well blast some bits off using HE or start a fire. Make the other guy waste a repair team and put it onto  cooldown. Make him more visible too while he’s blazing.

 

Also, and this is sometimes forgotten, it puts pressure on the other guy. He’s at least being distracted by taking hits, and not doing his own thing as he pleases without any return, happily ganking on your team mates in detail while left totally uninterrupted, like I see happen in so many matches. Consider it akin to covering fire...

 

 

[Yedwy]

@OP its both and neither... 

 

HE on BBs has its uses and depending on the target ship in question and its angle twards you on many a BB the HE shell will be the only viable choice in the given situation...

 

On the other hand firing HE the entire match is usually, well shall we say - speshul...

[DFens_666]

9 hours ago, TruePhoenix said:

Anyone claiming the HE spam is noob isn't reading the game.

 

I dont think those players are deliberately shooting HE because they are smart. They shoot HE because

- missions

- its "easier" than AP, you dont have to look for broadside opportunities to deal damage.

They rather take chip damage and are happy if they get a fire. Then they get "high" damage numbers (because of fires) but eventually still lose the game.

 

Unless i really have to fight the bow-on BB, i rather look for broadside crossfire with AP. Also you can try to get those broadsides yourself by positioining. If you dont want to look for proper positioning, shooting HE becomes once again much easier.

[chazwozza]

Nme bow on nuff sed

[Captain_Newman]

A bb that doesn't shy away from using HE when he knows AP won't be very effective (say, a bow on Yama that isn't presenting it's cheeks, for example) is smart.

A bb that just spams HE at all times regardless of the target, angle and range is most likely a potato.

 

Good players switch ammo based on the situation. There are times when even a Smolensk should switch to AP...

[Beastofwar]

15 minutes ago, DFens_666 said:

 

I dont think those players are deliberately shooting HE because they are smart. They shoot HE because

- missions

- its "easier" than AP, you dont have to look for broadside opportunities to deal damage.

They rather take chip damage and are happy if they get a fire. Then they get "high" damage numbers (because of fires) but eventually still lose the game.

 

Unless i really have to fight the bow-on BB, i rather look for broadside crossfire with AP. Also you can try to get those broadsides yourself by positioining. If you dont want to look for proper positioning, shooting HE becomes once again much easier.

 

But Fodder1978 made an excellent point : by hitting an enemy with HE - and setting him on fire - you indeed often force him to look what caused that, distracting him, and possibly to turn guns to engage you while he was planning on what you say : hit broadside allies. I have seen this happen a lot, guns turning to me because i set fires to them. Also it is not uncommon they start firing HE back in ""revenge" which is better then them AP broadside/crossfiring allies no ?

 

Maybe from a stat padding point if view that is not interesting......for team play effort it is.

[blackdagger_gk]

Firing HE with BBs is not something wrong, just it is situatonal. It depends on your ship, enemies' ships, positions and HP.

In general, a burning BB will not be eager to push, so there is a psychological effect of fires.

Players shall not be stubborn to use HE or AP.

[Captain_Newman]

2 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

 

But Fodder1978 made an excellent point : by hitting an enemy with HE - and setting him on fire - you indeed often force him to look what caused that, distracting him, and possibly to turn guns to engage you while he was planning on what you say : hit broadside allies.

 

Maybe from a stat padding point if view that is not interesting......for team play effort it is.

He will be just as distracted by a big AP volley. It's funny that you call AP usage stat padding and HE usage "team play", though, thanks for the laugh.

[Beastofwar]

5 minutes ago, Captain_Newman said:

He will be just as distracted by a big AP volley. It's funny that you call AP usage stat padding and HE usage "team play", though, thanks for the laugh.

 

Not if they are bow angled to you, but not to your team mates being busy at another cap...that is the point.

 

And it is no riddle to state stat padders are concerned only with their own maximum damage. Great if they eleiminate enemies fast that way. Not so good if they allow allies to be killed while they could have prevented it. Some "unicums" openly state they are not concerned with team mates at all. They are not playing the game...they are busy with stats.

[Yedwy]

9 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

But Fodder1978 made an excellent point : by hitting an enemy with HE - and setting him on fire - you indeed often force him to look what caused that, distracting him, and possibly to turn guns to engage you while he was planning on what you say : hit broadside allies. I have seen this happen a lot, guns turning to me because i set fires to them. Also it is not uncommon they start firing HE back in ""revenge" which is better then them AP broadside/crossfiring allies no ?

 

Maybe from a stat padding point if view that is not interesting......for team play effort it is.

IDK about Fodder but if I am eyeballing an oncoming broadside one or even more HE salvoes will hardly put me off exploiting it as that AP broadside will likely take the target out of the fight at least temporarily until it heals and often will outright delete it...

[Beastofwar]

3 minutes ago, Yedwy said:

IDK about Fodder but if I am eyeballing an oncoming broadside one or even more HE salvoes will hardly put me off exploiting it as that AP broadside will likely take the target out of the fight at least temporatily and often will outright delete it...

 

Maybe if you have 3 fires burning - may have extinghuised them and they are starting again after the consumable immunity- you think differently.

[Captain_Newman]

3 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

 

Not if they are bow angled to you, but not to your team mates being busy at another cap...that is the point.

 

 

Which is exactly what I already stated in this thread.

 

The point is, distracting someone from shooting and killing your team mates (which you should absolutely do) isn't relevant to the topic at hand - as always, you select the ammo type based on what will do the most damage based on your target, range, and angle. A big salvo will do more to distract, regardless of it being caused  by HE or AP.

 

If your target is broadside you can do massive damage to it with AP. This will either cause target to angle against you, probably losing the ability to farm your team mates while he does that, or he stays broadside and dies. In this situation using AP is far better than trying to get fires, especially if you're in a bb with your 30-ish second reload (harder to get fires to stick due to low dpm).

[ForlornSailor]

12 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

Maybe from a stat padding point if view that is not interesting......for team play effort it is. 

lulz. Using HE is literally a "stat padding" mechanic since its the only way for those bad BB players to get any meaningful avg damage done. Also, I love, to whom you are preaching about team play effort :D

[Yedwy]

1 minute ago, Beastofwar said:

Maybe if you have 3 fires burning - may have extighuised them and they are starting again after the consumable immunity- you think differently.

No I wont, if I am in a position to be HE spammed it means I am spoted and in range so what do I get from swiching to the HE spamming BB except losing a kill oportunity? Getting in a BB vs BB HE slinging match while other better targets are awailable is pointless bar the option he is extremely low on HP so I might take him out...

[DFens_666]

13 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

 

But Fodder1978 made an excellent point : by hitting an enemy with HE - and setting him on fire - you indeed often force him to look what caused that, distracting him, and possibly to turn guns to engage you while he was planning on what you say : hit broadside allies. I have seen this happen a lot, guns turning to me because i set fires to them. Also it is not uncommon they start firing HE back in ""revenge" which is better then them AP broadside/crossfiring allies no ?

 

Maybe from a stat padding point if view that is not interesting......for team play effort it is.

 

You are basicly using bad players as an example here. You dont need to annoy/distract bad players from anything, they manage to get themselves kill regardless. Its good players you want to punish hard and fast if you get the opportunity. You will not get many of those in a game. If a BB is shooting HE at me in "retaliation" them ill gladly take that. It gives me freedom of movement as i wont be concerned about showing broadside to him.

 

7 minutes ago, Beastofwar said:

And it is no riddle to state stat padders are concerned only with their own maximum damage.

 

which is funny, because shooting HE often yields higher average damage than just shooting AP.

[THE_JUDEAN_PEOPLES_FRONT]

10 hours ago, TruePhoenix said:

Anyone claiming the HE spam is noob isn't reading the game.

Agreed

 

What is the point of sitting in a jean bart at 23km firing ap at a bow on t10 beast.

Throw the firestarter until the range gets closer where the bb cant stay bow on to everyone..

Your damage done will tick over and you could make him use up valuable consumables which could be of benifit to you or/and yoyr team in latter stages of the battle.

[THE_JUDEAN_PEOPLES_FRONT]

55 minutes ago, Fodder1978 said:

Consider it akin to covering fire...

Pardon the pun

[ChatBanForSayingTruth]

AP shooting Conqueror is a noob Conqueror unless you know you will see perfect broadside in 30 seconds 10km away. 

So some battleships excels in using HE shells. Others not. But that's where "knowing the game" comes in. 

[Sunleader]

A BB Spamming only HE is a Noob.

End of Story.

 

Using HE in General is not Noob. BBs do have HE. And HE does have its uses. And for some BBs its actually the Primary Ammo Choice.

But there is not a Single BB which wont deal much more Devastating Damage by using AP in the Right Situations.

 

So if a BB is using ONLY HE. There is 1 out of 2 Options.

 

Option 1. The BB is a Noob because he is Failing to Realize the Situations where AP would be the better Option.

Option 2. The BB is a Noob because he is not getting Situations in which AP would be the better Option. (Which means he stays in the rear all the time and is mostly useless in the Match as he never makes a Push)