Whats with Riga AP

[KapteinSabeltann]

So I just unlocked the Riga after going through the Tallinn in ranked. I couldn't get the Tallinn to work for me in random but I knew she was strong so I took her into ranked. Got 100% win rate getting to my goal (Rank 12 - I only care about the flags), but then I got greedy and had two cv no dd games and ended with not 100% win rate :D Gotta love them no DD MLG CV on enemy team games.

 

At any rate, I had a hard time getting Tallinn to work for me in random, in spite of her being ace in ranked - the main reason is with the numbers in ranked I can get positions to wreck havoc, but in random in today's meta I struggle getting good games. HOWEVER onto the Riga: I learned how amazing Tallinn AP was during ranked, ganking cruisers and hurting BBs really hard so after ranked I unlocked the Riga I am puzzled. I can't seem to get good AP salvos, I get a lot of overpens and bounces on cruisers and on flat broadside BBs where in the Tallinn I'd do a lot of damage (4-8k ap pen per salvo) I get shatters, overpens and bounces. I figured the 220s would be an upgrade but they don't feel that way.

 

So I am aware of a few things:

 

I know she went through a few nerfs during development:

 

1: AP Pen reduced

2: Projectile arc increased

3: Air drag increased

 

So why am I experiencing this issue compared to the tallinn - is it the arcs? Do you get more bounces due to the steeper angle on impact to a point where she performs worse than the Tallinn except at close ranges. I am sure there exists a ballistic distance comparasion chart between the two but I haven't seen it. Not that it matters - I haven't been able to get closer in the games I have had so far but the disappointment on sending out 9 220 shells on a broadside fat freddie only to get 1900 damage in return when you expect 6k at least is frustrating and I'd just like to know why. I have had one good hit on a BB so far - Just over 12k I believe with no citadels but that was an anomality for me.

 

Any of you penetration and ballistics autists that have a good explanation why Riga guns feel weaker than Tallinn guns when shooting AP?

[kfa]

Penetration and ballistics are good, but not "BB punishing" good. 

Every other thing sucks about the ship though, especially the Mikasa dispersion

[ColonelPete]

Riga has loads more pen power, with flatter arcs and with the same improved ricochet angles and even slightly better sigma.

When you have problems, it is your aiming.

[KapteinSabeltann]

5 hours ago, ColonelPete said:

Riga has loads more pen power, with flatter arcs and with the same improved ricochet angles and even slightly better sigma.

When you have problems, it is your aiming.

Why ppl like you bother to answer when you have nothing to say is beyond me. My aim is fine - or do you think it went magically bad from Tallinn to Riga - Riga had it's arcs changed late development and thats my best bet, I know the pen was reduced too. But why are you wasting both our time. "blah, blah, blah, bad aim git gud". Are you 12?

 

I'm thinking arcs and maybe dispersion like kfa said.

 

[ColonelPete]

1 minute ago, KapteinSabeltann said:

Why ppl like you bother to answer when you have nothing to say is beyond me. My aim is fine - or do you think it went magically bad from Tallinn to Riga - Riga had it's arcs changed late development and thats my best bet, I know the pen was reduced too. But why are you wasting both our time. "blah, blah, blah, bad aim git gud". Are you 12?

Had you read what I wrote, then you would know that PEN and ARCS are better on Riga, than on Talinn. That is a fact.

[TruePhoenix]

15 hours ago, kfa said:

Penetration and ballistics are good, but not "BB punishing" good. 

Every other thing sucks about the ship though, especially the Mikasa dispersion

 What?? Have you even played Riga? Its a very, very good ship.

[fumtu]

Riga AP is great, it is not extreme version you get on Petro but it is basically same pen as Moskva but at T9. Riga can citadel BBs but not on all ranges, above 10km you will struggle to do that. On 10km, Riga AP can penetrate 382mm. For example Soyuz central belt armour is 375mm + 20mm citadel torpedo bulkhead behind or Lion 381mm belt armour. T10 BBs have even more like 406mm belt armour of Thunderer or 410mm of Yamato. So to citadel them you need to be bellow 10km from them. But you should not have any issue of citadeling cruiser at most ranges, if you can hit them in the first place. But Riga AP is still way better then Tallinn AP.

 

 

[kfa]

1 hour ago, TruePhoenix said:

 What?? Have you even played Riga? Its a very, very good ship.

No it is not.

Fight me. 

[Aragathor]

On 8/21/2020 at 9:12 AM, TruePhoenix said:

 What?? Have you even played Riga? Its a very, very good ship.

What a load of horse$hit. This ship is pure garbage.

[DFens_666]

1 minute ago, Aragathor said:

What a load of horse$hit. This ship is pure garbage.

 

After only playing 2 times with Tallinn, i wonder which genius proclaimed that they are supposedly OP... they literally dont hit anything because of that crap dispersion. Great you can citadel something, if you manage to hit the citadel which often just yields 1 citadel and then target is already angled.

Petro might be different, but i guess Riga is much like Tallinn.

[Panocek]

1 minute ago, DFens_666 said:

 

After only playing 2 times with Tallinn, i wonder which genius proclaimed that they are supposedly OP... they literally dont hit anything because of that crap dispersion. Great you can citadel something, if you manage to hit the citadel which often just yields 1 citadel and then target is already angled.

Petro might be different, but i guess Riga is much like Tallinn.

But... but... flolololo said (s)tallinn is of balans

 

AP pen is good by normal cruiser standards, competing with Italian 203 AP, but to pierce 300mm plating (somewhat common on T8-9 BBs) you perfect broadside and be at 10km or closer. Having CL kind of protection doesn't make it any easier to get closer though, at least Riga and Petro fix that with 35/50mm platings

 

Petro AP can pierce 400mm plating at broadside up to 12-13km, above that or with even modicum of angling it start failing. Lower tier BBs are pushovers at any range though. 360 turrets are comfortable as well, even with their slow traverse.

 

Entire sub branch is basically designed to operate within radar range and pummel any and all available broadsides and/or knock turrets off the ships, while being hilariously crippled against destroyers despite stealth radar capacity. Long range HE shelling is absolute worst thing you can do with them.

 

[Aragathor]

12 minutes ago, DFens_666 said:

 

After only playing 2 times with Tallinn, i wonder which genius proclaimed that they are supposedly OP... they literally dont hit anything because of that crap dispersion. Great you can citadel something, if you manage to hit the citadel which often just yields 1 citadel and then target is already angled.

Petro might be different, but i guess Riga is much like Tallinn.

Yup. Tried to make the Riga work, tried using AP, tried using HE. Tried tanking and tried kiting. Nothing works. It's a ship that's not able to carry itself.

It's not a glass cannon, it's not a brawler, it's not a long range spammer, it's an XP pinata for the enemy team.

 

Just now, Panocek said:

 

Entire sub branch is basically designed to operate within radar range and pummel any and all available broadsides and/or knock turrets off the ships, while being hilariously crippled against destroyers despite stealth radar capacity. Long range HE shelling is absolute worst thing you can do with them.

So to sum it up, the line was designed by someone who has never played the game, as in the current meta the ships are useless.

 

[Panocek]

3 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

So to sum it up, the line was designed by someone who has never played the game, as in the current meta the ships are useless.

Or was WG attempt to move "meta" from 20km HE wankfest.

[ColonelPete]

4 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

So to sum it up, the line was designed by someone who has never played the game, as in the current meta the ships are useless.

Sure...

http://maplesyrup.sweet.coocan.jp/wows/ranking/20200905/eu_2month/average_ship_u.html

[Aragathor]

Just now, ColonelPete said:

Sure...

http://maplesyrup.sweet.coocan.jp/wows/ranking/20200905/eu_2month/average_ship_u.html

Keep up with the doctored stats. We believe your shilling.

[Ubertron_X]

Played the Riga for nearly 50 games while working my way up to the Petro. It is not that the Riga is a bad ship and quite tanky even, however I could never make the guns work. Bad dispersion and no improved angles simply made too many AP shells just disappear without effect and the slow reload is not good enough for HE spam either. I usually performed decent due to my damage over time, however rarely by hitting those killer salvos. To be honest Tallin felt a lot better tier for tier.

[Panocek]

Just now, Ubertron_X said:

Played the Riga for nearly 50 games while working my way up to the Petro. It is not that the Riga is a bad ship and quite tanky even, however I could never make the guns work. Bad dispersion and no improved angles simply made too many AP shells just disappear without effect and the slow reload is not good enough for HE spam either. I usually performed decent due to my damage over time, however rarely by achieving some killer salvos. To be honest Tallin felt a lot better tier for tier.

AFAIK entire sub branch have semi improved ricochet angles, but they are just that - partially improved so you can't really tell if they work whatsoever.

[ColonelPete]

4 minutes ago, Aragathor said:

Keep up with the doctored stats. We believe your shilling.

How are they doctored and from whom?

[fumtu]

9 minutes ago, Ubertron_X said:

Played the Riga for nearly 50 games while working my way up to the Petro. It is not that the Riga is a bad ship and quite tanky even, however I could never make the guns work. Bad dispersion and no improved angles simply made too many AP shells just disappear without effect and the slow reload is not good enough for HE spam either. I usually performed decent due to my damage over time, however rarely by achieving some killer salvos. To be honest Tallin felt a lot better tier for tier.

 

It has improved angles, same as Petro. They are not on US level of improved but still better than standard CAs AP.

 

I find it decent. Sure my first games were sh*t but slowly improved with time. AP is bread and butter and if you can use it then it is a great ship, if not .... well you will struggle. Low DPM will be felt in the games where your team is collapsing. But IMO it is a decent ship for T9, neither much worse or better than the rest of the regular pack. I think it is right spot, being good-ish but not outstanding. If its bit stronger everybody will be complain about Russian Bias. 

[Ubertron_X]

14 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

How are they doctored and from whom?

Hehehe...I had this very discussion with a buddy of mine.

 

Me: Complaining about Riga's guns hitting sh1t.

Buddy: Watched a Flamu video just recently where he claimed that it is still one of the best T9 cruisers!

Me: WTF? How can Riga be better than Alaska or Kronshtadt?

Also Me: But wait, if he meant tech tree cruisers, then yes...

[DFens_666]

17 minutes ago, ColonelPete said:

Sure...

http://maplesyrup.sweet.coocan.jp/wows/ranking/20200905/eu_2month/average_ship_u.html

 

Those stats might reflect reality for the average pleb, but if you want ships that can carry, then its just totaly scewed.

Like St Louis is the worst T9 Cruiser OMEGALUL srsly It only shows, the average player is too dumb to use MBRB - and i know they cant. Ive seen above average player fail by not using it properly.

 

Let the same players (most likely above average ones to begin with) who played Riga and Drake, play others instead. I doubt we would see the same we see right now. Infact they wont, since they already played hrough them and there is little reason to keep playing T9 techtree Cruisers if you have Alaska and co.

[SV_Kompresor]

The ship is quite horrible yes. The HE might aswell not exist and the ship's dispersion is preventing its AP from being too useful. You do eventually get used to playing it but I never managed to like the ship.

[ForlornSailor]

16 minutes ago, Ubertron_X said:

Bad dispersion and no improved angles simply made too many AP shells just disappear without effect and the slow reload is not good enough for HE spam either.

I think this hits the nail on the head right here, its also what I was thinking about. With all over high tier heavy cruisers or AP cruisers, you get some sort of gimmick, that is much more worth then the better pen, that Riga has on paper. Compare it to IJN cruisers, who have way better dispersion. The US AP has heavy AP shells with improved angles, which makes a huge difference. Donskoi gets better reload and has more guns. Brindisi has SAP, else we would have people crying about Brindisi beeing useless aswell. Saint-Louis has the HE advantage in combination with the reload booster, which makes a huuuge difference if you manage to use it perfectly. Only one that comes close, is Roon.

[Panocek]

1 minute ago, ForlornSailor said:

Only one that comes close, is Roon.

Roon at least have high HE pen, making her actually quite consistent HE farmer. And then her AP when applied correctly can oof.

[DFens_666]

48 minutes ago, Panocek said:

And then her AP when applied correctly can oof.

 

Exactly the issue with atleast Tallinn (i assume Riga too). You get an opportunity for AP on a Cruiser and... nothing