Is HE the better ammo-type?

[Myrmix]

First of all, I'm well aware of the fact that ammunition should be switched depending on the situation, to get the most effect...for this discussion I want to avoid fast-reloading ships like DDs or CAs and focus on battleships, especially high-tier.

For most people, the best reason to play battleships are those devastating strikes, annihilating one ship from full health completely.

But once you reach higher tiers, the average gamer gets smarter and you rarely see full-broadside ships (angle-and-reverse-tactic, anyone?).

In this case, you can't really do something with AP, except against some cruisers who are stupid enough to offer their broadside long enough without maneuvering.

And even if you get to see a juicy broadside target and you hold your fire long enough, you still have to pray to rngesus to guide your shells into the right spots, or you get 3 overpens and some watersplashes.

Meanwhile, those cruisers torch you with 5-10k HE-salvos and the fire itself.

So my question is: In overall gameplay at high tier, is it on the long-time battleship-reload smarter to use HE against anything, because of the more consistent damage-rolls and maybe overall more damage?

 

Despite the neat damage you can get on structures, you still have the advantage of a very nasty dot you can apply up to 4 times.

I am curious, if the devs ever try to test flooding for AP-hits at the waterline (with much smaller chance than fire, of course)

[StuntMan0369]

If you're on my team, no keep AP. If on the enemy team, by all means shoot HE. 

 

Nah, I've been tempted to try out HE, but at the end of the day, not every target can be in a perfect angle at all times. If one target is angled against you, look for another. I've been 100% AP in BB's for months, hasn't done me any harm.

[kod87]

99.9% AP in BBs for me, I rarely bother to switch to HE for dds because of long reload makes it pointless, if someone is angled I wait patiently for them to give me a better shot or I switch target.

[Myrmix]

If you're on my team, no keep AP. If on the enemy team, by all means shoot HE. 

 

Nah, I've been tempted to try out HE, but at the end of the day, not every target can be in a perfect angle at all times. If one target is angled against you, look for another. I've been 100% AP in BB's for months, hasn't done me any harm.

 

i'm just curious of someone trying it out (i don't wanna, got no prem :<)

you can keep your guns firing on cooldown, don't have to wait for them to turn. and every hit hurts, no bounce. plus fire.

do you think this could make up for citadels?

[Xevious_Red]

Although it's not exactly scientific, I tried using all HE on the nagato for a few games after getting annoyed with a run of over pens. Although you don't get the over pen, and the dot fire is nice, you miss out on the citadels including the ones through the deck, so the average damage per shell for AP (Inc citadels and over pens) was still higher. 

[Elenortirion]

 

i'm just curious of someone trying it out (i don't wanna, got no prem :<)

you can keep your guns firing on cooldown, don't have to wait for them to turn. and every hit hurts, no bounce. plus fire.

do you think this could make up for citadels?

 

if you aim correctly you can still pretty much citadel a cruisers with a BB ap even throught angling [i've received way to much citadels STRAIGHT TO THE FACE on my aoba to not notice that the citadel penetration is still a possibility even with face on bearing and reversing - althoug on long range.. there is nothing more satifying that the sound of bounced BB salvo ^-^]

 

but overally the rule of thumb is that you use HE on BBS only against destroyers [cause AP overpens and does nto wipe those pesky DDs fast enought] and on really good angled BBs

 

if its cruiser or BB that is not angled and offers you a broadside shoot AP

 

also about cruisers showing broadside - when facing a BB and not being able to reliably push the CA captain face a choice - either put the bow against a BB and go full reverse or instead take a 180degrees turn and be able to retreat faster

 

also alot of cruiser have to show way more than enought of juicy citadel to fire their full salvo at you

[Vaderan]

Depending on team setup, i usually start with HE in the barrells of my BBs. If i can be pretty sure to either encounter a charrging DD or a BB frontally towards me, i will have a decent chance to do some damage and maybe cause a fire. With closed distance and the probability of broadside shots, AP is the ammunition of choice.

 

[robihr]

HE is mostly useless cause of the long reload times. few times i switched to HE on angled BB, just for it to show me a broadside... unless dd close to you, keep AP loaded all the time..

[Myrmix]

 

if you aim correctly you can still pretty much citadel a cruisers with a BB ap even throught angling [i've received way to much citadels STRAIGHT TO THE FACE on my aoba to not notice that the citadel penetration is still a possibility even with face on bearing and reversing - althoug on long range.. there is nothing more satifying that the sound of bounced BB salvo ^-^]

 

but overally the rule of thumb is that you use HE on BBS only against destroyers [cause AP overpens and does nto wipe those pesky DDs fast enought] and on really good angled BBs

 

if its cruiser or BB that is not angled and offers you a broadside shoot AP

 

also about cruisers showing broadside - when facing a BB and not being able to reliably push the CA captain face a choice - either put the bow against a BB and go full reverse or instead take a 180degrees turn and be able to retreat faster

 

also alot of cruiser have to show way more than enought of juicy citadel to fire their full salvo at you

 

yes, i'm quite aware that you can citadel cruisers from the front, but your shots have to hit a very small target and i don't sacrifice enough virgins for that.

some matches ago, i had a full-hp zao who stubborn chased me down, completely angled and came up to 2km to my Izumo, despite 3 ap salvos in his face (he lost about 1/4 health), then a friendly bombed his broadside away.

i am the guy who gets perfectly leaded shots on 12km-cruisers who splash in front and behind enemy ships (so my aiming is actually on the ship, right? right? *cries*)

[StuntMan0369]

The one problem with HE and fire is that all of it is heal-able. You'll spend 3-4 salvoes shooting him, and he'll just regenerate 90% of it back. Another 3-4 salvoes later, his heal will be back up and most of it will come back again. In the long run, it's just better to run with AP. I spent 12 minutes of a match running full HE, ended up with 60k damage, switched back to AP for the last 5 minutes, almost doubled it at 110k. Haven't switched back since (Well, except for the odd DD hunting).

[Deckeru_Maiku]

About 90% of the time I only use AP on my BBs, even when firing at DDs. Against DDs I usually don't fire a full salvo, but each turret seperately, which seems (!!personal opinion!!) to lead to more hits - and most DDs are down even after some overpenetrations...

 

The rare occasions for me using HE as a BB is when there's no more or less broadsided target in range and I have to fire at a BB coming straight at me or driving away straight from me. Mostly to make the target use his emergency button and then the repair for the fire and caused module damage.

[AnotherDuck]

Yeah, even overpens do significant damage to DDs due to the high base damage of AP shells and low max health of DDs. I only switch over to HE if I'm explicitly hunting DDs and won't fire on other targets for more than one reload.

[BadGene616]

There are a few instances where he is the better choice. If you're the only t4 bb against all t6 and there are very few cruisers, the guaranteed damage at range can be OK. Especially as the slow speed of the new York for example means you're going to struggle to set engagement range.

 

However, the contentious part for me is the ONLY use he concept.

 

You nailed it when you said use the appropriate ammunition for the situation.

[SkybuckFlying]

Simple answer:

 

Shoot HE first to disable guns if you like.

 

Then switch to AP to finish enemy off more quickly... unless it's some kind of target where AP works less well... like perhaps DDs.

[Nechrom]

I only use HE with BBs against other BBs when I'm horribly undertiered or when I'm up against angled US BBs at long range.

The only exception to that rule is early IJN BBs (Mikasa, Kawachi and Ishizuchi) which have abysmal AP shells but good HE shells.

[tyco]

As I usually head directly to a cap at the beginning of the match, my first salvo is HE quite often. If no DD pops up, I switch to AP and I only shoot HE when I expect to face a DD.

[VC381]

The maths doesn't quite work out. A mid to high tier BB citadel typically is what, 12k damage? HE shell full damage is about half that, so 6k, but you can't get full damage without a citadel, so HE will basically never do more than 3k direct damage. AP will still do 6k damage on a regular pen, you can get salvos that hit for 15k-20k damage without a single citadel (and that's only about 2 to 4 hits depending on ship).

 

Fire doesn't fully make up for it, unless someone else is helping they'll repair the first fire then due to low rate of fire their repair will be back up almost as soon as you can reliably set fire again. Module damage is meh, AP wrecks BB turrets better anyway.

 

I know that the RNG can be very frustrating at times and I've considered using HE on some targets (in the past I did a few times with Fuso vs. bow on New Mexico). I would be willing to test it more just for fun but like I said maths isn't in favor. Also I only have normal BBs to Tier 7 and I'm not using HE in Tirpitz, that's just a terrible idea.

[Procrastes]

When last I faced a destroyer up close in my Tirpitz, I loaded HE and swatted him like a bug. It was pretty satisfying.

[ilhilh]

I don't even bother loading HE for DDs in my BBs.  I really don't see the point of it.  And, I enjoy watching BBs firing HE at me as I know I can get their health down faster than they can get mine down.

[Procrastes]

It might be worth it when shooting at extreme range? That shot at 21 km which probably won't hit anyway, but if it does then I can light a fire and get an enemy to press the repair button?

Of course, a better plan would be to learn how to reliably hit things at that range. I'm working on that.

[ilhilh]

It might be worth it when shooting at extreme range? That shot at 21 km which probably won't hit anyway, but if it does then I can light a fire and get an enemy to press the repair button?

Of course, a better plan would be to learn how to reliably hit things at that range. I'm working on that.

 

But what if another target pops up at closer range?  If you are going for repeated fires then you need to stick with HE and stick with the same target (assuming it even remains visible!) so that you can start that second fire for DoT (hopefully).  So, you are committing to 2 salvos of HE taking about 1 min of loading time and a lot can happen in that time.  I'd still rather take my chances with AP.

[Procrastes]

Yeah, you are probably right.

[Bulrim]

I can see the merit in swapping to HE when you're targeting a ship on lowish health, 6k to 10k. Too often I've fired at such a target and just got 4 op hits and I end up taking another 30 seconds worth of damage from them where 4 HE hits would have finished them off.

[VC381]

It might be worth it when shooting at extreme range? That shot at 21 km which probably won't hit anyway, but if it does then I can light a fire and get an enemy to press the repair button?

Of course, a better plan would be to learn how to reliably hit things at that range. I'm working on that.

 

Except if it does hit you're quite likely to get a citadel by penetrating the deck with that kind of shot, so still worth the gamble with AP.

[Procrastes]

 

Except if it does hit you're quite likely to get a citadel by penetrating the deck with that kind of shot, so still worth the gamble with AP.

 

Didn't know that; thanks!