0.4.1 - US Destroyers Tier 6+ Get Defensive Fire

[Leonadios]

So from my understanding of the patch notes, US destroyers that are tier 6 or higher will receive the defensive fire ability when mounting the top hull at their expense of a turret.

 

Why was this implemented? Were US DDs having a hard time with aircraft?

 

Torpedoing a destroyer is already difficult (dive bombing one is almost impossible) with their extreme manoeuvrability, so why are they receiving this ability? Surely with new classes of ships being given previously class specific abilities, carriers should get something too? After all, it's the only class without an active ability. Perhaps an "all hands to stations" ability for a temporarily increased service time or something similar.

 

Edit:

 

Image this

 

Tier VII CV (US)

Tier VI BB (US)

Tier VI BB (IJN)

Tier IV BB (IJN)

Tier VII CA (IJN)

Tier VII CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VII DD (US)

Tier VI DD (US)

 

A 12 player matchup - 8 of 12 ships have defensive fire

3 ships are reasonable targets for a CV (The BBs)

And the other ship's fighters wreck IJN CV aircraft (The CV)

 

And just a thought, it seems that unless you can avoid torpedoes from planes reliably 100% of the time, it's not balanced. But when someone unloads a full broadside from their tier 8 BB, doing 20k damage, that's okay?

 

Edit 2:

 

Everyone seems to think i'm complaining about US DDs now being able to hurt aircraft more. This is NOT the case. I'm all for increased AA firepower, the problem I have with defensive fire is this:

 

(This picture isn't mine by the way, this drop is way too close for the torps to arm)

 

Defensive fire grants immunity to dive bombers and torpedo bombers for the duration of the ability.

The ability has a range of around 5km, meaning any ships the destroyer is near will also be protected by this 'immunity'.

 

 

[anubisDCB]

Lol

[Figment]

Probably to stop CVs from perma-spotting them.

[Woel]

Lol

 

This.

[Vaderan]

WG wants to give the US DDs a more unique flair. IJN DDs always had the advantage of being able to launch their torpedoes while being "cloaked". USN DDs are more the gunboat style of the DD class. They counter DDs better than IJN DDs, but suffer from their short torpedo range.

Since complains about CVs using their fighter squads to keep DDs perma spotted increased during the past weeks, WG decided to give at least USN DDs the ability to hurt those "spotters". They explain this step with the fact, that the US used her DDs more in a kind of fleet escort style, then for ambush attacks, like the japanese did. This is just one step further towards placing the USN ships as THE anti air ships/nation in this game.

I´d say it depends on how much they buff the AAA performance of those DDs, wether this new ability will pay out on DDs.

 

However, no matter how much this change will increase the defense capabilities of US DDs, i doubt it will improve their capabilities in combat against other ships.

[LetsRockAndRoll]

Because they can't get near anything without being spotted & immediately evaporated. So WG has decided they can circle the friendly CV and give AA cover.

[Leonadios]

Because they can't get near anything without being spotted & immediately evaporated. So WG has decided they can circle the friendly CV and give AA cover.

 

But a team that looked like this:

 

Tier VII CV (US)

Tier VI BB (US)

Tier VI BB (IJN)

Tier IV BB (IJN)

Tier VII CA (IJN)

Tier VII CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VII DD (US)

Tier VI DD (US)

 

A 12 player matchup - 8 of 12 ships have defensive fire

3 ships are reasonable targets for a CV (The BBs)

And the other ship's fighters wreck IJN CV aircraft (The CV)

[Woel]

 

But a team that looked like this:

 

Tier VII CV (US)

Tier VI BB (US)

Tier VI BB (IJN)

Tier IV BB (IJN)

Tier VII CA (IJN)

Tier VII CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VII DD (US)

Tier VI DD (US)

 

A 12 player matchup - 8 of 12 ships have defensive fire

3 ships are reasonable targets for a CV (The BBs)

And the other ship's fighters wreck IJN CV aircraft (The CV)

 

Now imagine a matchmaking where almost nobody has defensive fire and half your enemies are basically free kills for your torpedo bombers. Such are random battles.

Besides, 9 out of 10 DD captains usually die in the first two minutes - so it's not like something worth complaining about.

[Leonadios]

 

Now imagine a matchmaking where almost nobody has defensive fire and half your enemies are basically free kills for your torpedo bombers. Such are random battles.

Besides, 9 out of 10 DD captains usually die in the first two minutes - so it's not like something worth complaining about.

 

Except that's not a valid argument, because that never happens. A ship without defensive fire isn't a 'free kill', just too many people ignore planes and then cry when they are punished for tunnel visioning. Besides, cruisers already make up the majority of the team, so in any tier 6+ game the majority of ships already have defensive fire. 

 

To add to that, 'DDs usually die within the first two minutes' is also not a valid argument. If it was, you could make DDs super overpowered and any time someone complained, just pull that out.

 

And oh look, you have only ever played a CV once.

 

Because they can't get near anything without being spotted & immediately evaporated. So WG has decided they can circle the friendly CV and give AA cover.

 

CAs already do a decent job of protecting CVs at higher tiers. We don't need 2 ship classes with super powerful AA.

 

 

[LetsRockAndRoll]

 

Except that's not a valid argument, because that never happens. A ship without defensive fire isn't a 'free kill', just too many people ignore planes and then cry when they are punished for tunnel visioning. Besides, cruisers already make up the majority of the team, so in any tier 6+ game the majority of ships already have defensive fire. 

 

To add to that, 'DDs usually die within the first two minutes' is also not a valid argument. If it was, you could make DDs super overpowered and any time someone complained, just pull that out.

 

And oh look, you have only ever played a CV once.

 

 

CAs already do a decent job of protecting CVs at higher tiers. We don't need 2 ship classes with super powerful AA.

 

 

 

Go tell WG that. I'm sure they'll listen.

 

 

 

[Woel]

 

Except that's not a valid argument, because that never happens. A ship without defensive fire isn't a 'free kill', just too many people ignore planes and then cry when they are punished for tunnel visioning. Besides, cruisers already make up the majority of the team, so in any tier 6+ game the majority of ships already have defensive fire. 

 

To add to that, 'DDs usually die within the first two minutes' is also not a valid argument. If it was, you could make DDs super overpowered and any time someone complained, just pull that out.

 

And how is listing a possible matchmaking a valid argument? I've seen battles where my team had no CV (unlike the enemy team) and we had roughly 8 Tirpitz - which has the worst AA of tier 8. That's 8 large targets with low amount of AA - how can you say that never happens?

 

Also about crying, too many CV captains rush their planes into Cleveland/Atlanta defensive fire and then complain that none of their planes make it. Yet there're better CV captains who know better to avoid certain cruisers and even bait cruisers to use their defensive fire skills. 

In any tier 6+ games CVs usually outperform everything by quite large margin in both terms of experience and damage. Experienced CV captains of higher tiers currently can reliably kill DDs without seemingly much effort. And then you're telling me that the most underperforming ship class/nation combination in the whole game shouldn't have slightly better AA capabilities? 

 

And oh look, you have only ever played a CV once.

Well spotted!

Oh, and look! You've played IJN DDs up to tier 4. A total of 24 matches. Your highest tier ship is a tier 8 premium - I'm sure you're competent to decide whether higher tier DDs require any form of boost.

No need to get personal here, especially if the same argument can be pretty much used against you.

[ApexTitan]

I would rather they just decreased the spotting distance of DD's from the air to something like 1.5-2km, so you would have to be constantly making your planes follow them to keep them spotted, or maybe give DD's a passive ability to become invisible to planes completely if they went at 1/4 speed or below, i think defensive fire is something that should only really be for USN cruisers, IJN cruisers have their torps and many other advantages over USN cruisers but thats a story for another day XD

[Leonadios]

 

And how is listing a possible matchmaking a valid argument? I've seen battles where my team had no CV (unlike the enemy team) and we had roughly 8 Tirpitz - which has the worst AA of tier 8. That's 8 large targets with low amount of AA - how can you say that never happens?

 

Also about crying, too many CV captains rush their planes into Cleveland/Atlanta defensive fire and then complain that none of their planes make it. Yet there're better CV captains who know better to avoid certain cruisers and even bait cruisers to use their defensive fire skills. 

In any tier 6+ games CVs usually outperform everything by quite large margin in both terms of experience and damage. Experienced CV captains of higher tiers currently can reliably kill DDs without seemingly much effort. And then you're telling me that the most underperforming ship class/nation combination in the whole game shouldn't have slightly better AA capabilities? 

 

Because matches are already majority cruisers, so having every DD be US isn't optimistic.

 

The argument is not about planes getting shredded by the ability, it's the fact that the ability panics aircraft. With IJN TBs, you can only ever get 1 hit if you're super lucky when the planes are panicked (if they survive the AA to begin with).

The torpedoes don't have a centre, so the drop looks like this:

 

And how is listing a possible matchmaking a valid argument? I've seen battles where my team had no CV (unlike the enemy team) and we had roughly 8 Tirpitz - which has the worst AA of tier 8. That's 8 large targets with low amount of AA - how can you say that never happens?

 

Mirrored CV matchmaking comes in 0.4.1. Tirpitz has the worse tier 8 AA, but it's still over 40. Any AA rating over 40 means that it can shred planes at a steady rate if you get close.

 

Killing DDs is a long shot from requiring no effort. It's by far the hardest ship to kill with air dropped torpedoes. And no, it shouldn't have better AA capabilities, because defensive fire immediately brings it up to par with cruisers. A trait of cruisers is good anti-air, it is not a trait of destroyers.

 

Woel, on 02 September 2015 - 12:54 AM, said:

Well spotted!

Oh, and look! You've played IJN DDs up to tier 4. A total of 24 matches. Your highest tier ship is a tier 8 premium - I'm sure you're competent to decide whether higher tier DDs require any form of boost.

No need to get personal here, especially if the same argument can be pretty much used against you.

 

I played destroyers in closed beta all the way to tier 10. My brother also divisions with me regularly in his tier 7 destroyer.

[Woel]

The argument is not about planes getting shredded by the ability, it's the fact that the ability panics aircraft. With IJN TBs, you can only ever get 1 hit if you're super lucky when the planes are panicked (if they survive the AA to begin with).

The torpedoes don't have a centre, so the drop looks like this:

The most used loadouts come with 2-3 torpedo bomber squads for the IJN, so even with defensive fire you still have a fair chance of hitting 1-2 torpedoes. It's pretty much the only counter against torp bombers - I don't see what's wrong with that. If a DD is "countered" by a ship that's simply changing course, it's most likely ending up with no hits at all. 

Additionally the DD torps are spotted by planes, currently you can simply keep them spotted with fighters and they pretty much can't do anything against that.

The defensive AA fire lasts 40 seconds and then there's quite a bit of cooldown after that. So it's not like cruisers can keep it up permanently - if you send Dive bombers first, chances people will waste it on them. 

Mirrored CV matchmaking comes in 0.4.1. Tirpitz has the worse tier 8 AA, but it's still over 40. Any AA rating over 40 means that it can shred planes at a steady rate if you get close.

 

Killing DDs is a long shot from requiring no effort. It's by far the hardest ship to kill with air dropped torpedoes. And no, it shouldn't have better AA capabilities, because defensive fire immediately brings it up to par with cruisers. A trait of cruisers is good anti-air, it is not a trait of destroyers.

And yet I still regularly see pretty much everything getting hit by torp bombers. High AA rating may kill your planes, but torp bombers also kill ships. The only difference is that higher tier CVs have ample supply of planes, but your ship only has so much HP. You might lose occasionally one or two planes to a Tirpitz, but to a few torpedoes he'll lose a significant percentage of his hit points (as well as likely to get steering jammed and flooding).  

 

I do believe that DDs should be the hardest to kill with CV. If anything due to their mobility, they should be one of the hardest to get. But the fact is that any kind of planes even just flying by can ruin their day. They'll be spotted along with their torpedoes, which quite often can ruin their game just about instantly. 

Also I don't see why USN DDs can't have decent anti-air as a trait. Most of the mid/high-tier USN DDs are severely lacking (pre-4.1) due to their low range torpedoes. Their only "trait" is having good guns that can potentially kill enemy DDs fast. That's significantly less than what you can say about most CVs for example (which are currently best spotters, best experience/credit/damage earners, least prone to RNG and such). 

I played destroyers in closed beta all the way to tier 10. My brother also divisions with me regularly in his tier 7 destroyer.

Then most likely any of you would agree to that it's stupid a CV can park anything above your DD, effectively making the DD unable to do anything against it (except for possibly moving back to the team for AA support). 

[Fenrir2205]

So from my understanding of the patch notes, US destroyers that are tier 6 or higher will receive the defensive fire ability when mounting the top hull at their expense of a turret.

 

Why was this implemented? Were US DDs having a hard time with aircraft?

 

Torpedoing a destroyer is already difficult (dive bombing one is almost impossible) with their extreme manoeuvrability, so why are they receiving this ability? Surely with new classes of ships being given previously class specific abilities, carriers should get something too? After all, it's the only class without an active ability. Perhaps an "all hands to stations" ability for a temporarily increased service time or something similar.

 

Edit:

 

Image this

 

Tier VII CV (US)

Tier VI BB (US)

Tier VI BB (IJN)

Tier IV BB (IJN)

Tier VII CA (IJN)

Tier VII CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VI CA (US)

Tier VI CA (IJN)

Tier VII DD (US)

Tier VI DD (US)

 

A 12 player matchup - 8 of 12 ships have defensive fire

3 ships are reasonable targets for a CV (The BBs)

And the other ship's fighters wreck IJN CV aircraft (The CV)

 

For one, IJN DD's are ambushers, US DD's have to run the gauntlet of almost every ship they want to atack for 1-2km (more depending on how fast the enemy ship is going and if its running away) And with the IJN DD's having stupid long range torps and US DD's bearly reach 10km until tier 8 or 9,,, why not make them effective at something other than being target practice.  And with torps being spotted at around the 1-2km range from ship if there are no frendlies or planes around you always know if a low tier US DD is about to send you some High explosive gifts in the water... The exact oposite for the IJN ones. 

 

Secondly its going to be a new hull upgrade/ side grade for the top hull. so you have to unlock another hull to use it.

[Kenliero]

I think it is good idea to buff DD's, but adding defensive fire is not a good idea.

 

What defensive fire basicly does, is make the ship immune to Divebombing. I generally don't like features that give "immunity" against other players(in any games).

Buff/nerf as you will(for example AA), but I dislike spreading immununity features in games. No matter what game it is.

[anonym_hqO9wrVAEQYQ]

Make CV planes have a fuel timer and this will stop them being parked over ships all game long spotting.  Simples. 

[Leonadios]

The most used loadouts come with 2-3 torpedo bomber squads for the IJN, so even with defensive fire you still have a fair chance of hitting 1-2 torpedoes. It's pretty much the only counter against torp bombers - I don't see what's wrong with that. If a DD is "countered" by a ship that's simply changing course, it's most likely ending up with no hits at all. 

Additionally the DD torps are spotted by planes, currently you can simply keep them spotted with fighters and they pretty much can't do anything against that.

The defensive AA fire lasts 40 seconds and then there's quite a bit of cooldown after that. So it's not like cruisers can keep it up permanently - if you send Dive bombers first, chances people will waste it on them. 

And yet I still regularly see pretty much everything getting hit by torp bombers. High AA rating may kill your planes, but torp bombers also kill ships. The only difference is that higher tier CVs have ample supply of planes, but your ship only has so much HP. You might lose occasionally one or two planes to a Tirpitz, but to a few torpedoes he'll lose a significant percentage of his hit points (as well as likely to get steering jammed and flooding).  

 

I do believe that DDs should be the hardest to kill with CV. If anything due to their mobility, they should be one of the hardest to get. But the fact is that any kind of planes even just flying by can ruin their day. They'll be spotted along with their torpedoes, which quite often can ruin their game just about instantly. 

Also I don't see why USN DDs can't have decent anti-air as a trait. Most of the mid/high-tier USN DDs are severely lacking (pre-4.1) due to their low range torpedoes. Their only "trait" is having good guns that can potentially kill enemy DDs fast. That's significantly less than what you can say about most CVs for example (which are currently best spotters, best experience/credit/damage earners, least prone to RNG and such). 

Then most likely any of you would agree to that it's stupid a CV can park anything above your DD, effectively making the DD unable to do anything against it (except for possibly moving back to the team for AA support). 

 

The cooldown on the defensive fire is all well and good, but the panic it causes has a range of around 5km. This means that while one ship might have the ability on cooldown, the one a few kilometres across from it will have theirs ready to go. This is especially problematic in higher tier games where ships tend to stick together more.

 

USN DDs can have decent anti-air as a trait, but the defensive fire ability causes planes to panic, essentially making it immune from being hit by torpedoes.

 

I think it is good idea to buff DD's, but adding defensive fire is not a good idea.

 

What defensive fire basicly does, is make the ship immune to Divebombing. I generally don't like features that give "immunity" against other players(in any games).

Buff/nerf as you will(for example AA), but I dislike spreading immununity features in games. No matter what game it is.

 

A very good point. Panic gives invincibility to dive bombers 95% of the time. Not to mention it's almost impossible to hit ANYTHING with a panicked TB squad, yet alone a destroyer. 

[Hauptbahnhof]

 

Besides, 9 out of 10 DD captains usually die in the first two minutes - so it's not like something worth complaining about.

 

And Why do you think they die in the first two minutes?

 

Maybe because the CV fighters or airplanes spot them first on their way to the other side?

[Mister_Greek]

First of all,if anyone has tested Defensive Fire ability on PT might have noted that its nowhere near as effective as the Cruiser one in most times.Sure you can get down some planes but thats it.Its not made for fleet defence like the CA one,its purely made for self-defence.

 

For me,DD needs some urgent love,considering how few i encounter on the matches.Buffing AA in DD makes no sense,cause it will make the CA "obsolete",not to say that "Defensive Fire"  adds and a bit of a strategic factor as you get only a handful of them.

 

Everyone knows that good CV players go for the DD first,evaporating them within the first 4 minutes,as the stats reveal.Giving DD that particular ability is 100% correct for me without solving though the fundamental problems of DD from T5 and onwards......

 

We shall wait to see the performance when this goes live.

[bloomoon11]

CVs are immune to most ships weapons for the majority of games by virtue of the the fact that they're able to hide (either behind their fleet or behind an island).  Why are you complaining that another class now of one nation now gets to be immune to you for a small proportion of a match?

 

Anything which makes CVs slightly less OP is a good change in my book.

[Blue_Bug]

Don't over estimate the impact of this. How often did you see a DD escort a BB or CA ? It is very rare when a DD is so close that she can really add something to the AA defense of others. Besides the DD's with defensife fire loose their speed burst ability. Something that is critical for an ambusher, so I don't think many DD's will choose this ability.

 

And don't call the AA of a DD strong. Even with defensive fire it is still weak. It is only good for preventing to get bombed or torped. You hardly kill any planes with it.

 

Maybe it is an idea to see how things turn out instead of whining in advance.

[Teaz]

The defensive fire option is like putting a band-aid on a ruptured artery, that is the current state of US Destroyers.

 

Currently you can circle the Gearing and/or Fletcher (and it's IJN counterparts) with Tier VIII-X planes risk free; Your pilots might even enjoy a cup of tea, or coffee,  while spotting the destroyer, and it's torpedoes. The defensive fire option won't solve this problem, as the AA bubble is smaller than the spotting range. CV's with minimal game experience, will just stay out of the bubble, if the defensive fire even is a risk at higher tiers.

 

There are numerous balance issues involving CV's, but in particular that planes spot ships and torpedoes at ridiculous ranges, it is really a huge issue; But WG refuses to acknowledge this, hence we get a defensive fire, so US DD's can shoot down a plane or two, before we are wiped of the map by afore mentioned CV.

[tacomaco]

Probably to stop CVs from perma-spotting them.

 

Yes, because shooting at planes will prevent the DD from been spotted.

 

To be honest I think they added defensive fire so they can say they did something in patch 4.1. Of course for Co-op they did nothing. How about increasing the Co-op team size to 12-14 above tier 4 and activate the matchmaker?

[Mister_Greek]

The Defensive Fire was mainly added to give the DD a line of defence against the Bombers mainly,not the Fighters.The DD were getting evaporated by the bombers in the first minutes,so they give them this to try and counter them.

 

The problem with the perma-spot will still remain imo as the ability charges you get are too few and you have to use them correctly.