Fears about the IJN destroyer line rework

[Kanmen]

 

Hi captains, 

 

I am a fellow IJN enthusiast with 2500 played games and I wanted to share my opinion and fear about the future update. While I always welcome new ships and new idea, I am very worried about the changes and addition into the Japanese destroyer line presented a few days ago. As the update is not launched yet, I still have some (slight) hope that it will be different at the end of the day...

 

What troubles me especially is the numerous up and downs of existing ships. IMO, these changes are a real mess and as a customer I am definitely dissatisfied with the current future project. They are mixing different types of destroyers, meddling with players' habits and days-long researched ships! The worst being the Fubuki nerf from t8 to t6.

 

For instance, putting many efforts (and often real money) into an objective, e.g. playing a T8 Fubuki, to have it fall down to lower and less interesting tier with no historical nor obvious reason is just outraging. I know players that installed the game to pilot this particular ship (this destroyer is well known even outside the military world, and it was one of the most successful in WW2) and have high expectations. I highly doubt that you can get satisfied customers with delivering a mid-tier nerfed ship you expected high in the ladder. And this is one ship only, inconsistent tier changes might also happen to 4 other ships! I try to figure out.. did they realize that they messed up the branch after it was released and try to correct?

 

I heard they will add more USN-ish gun focused destroyers, in an environment already dominated by such ships, and with no real interesting gameplay imo, I am surprised. Also why didn't they just add a new line with this new type and leave the already nerfed and fragile torpedo line as is? The stealthy and torpedo-focused line gameplay is unique, and is imo the only interesting way to play a destroyer. It suffered nerfs already, and I fear that this update will be another yet fatal straw.

 

​Some players theorized that replacing Fubuki and Kagero will lower the "torp soup" at higher tiers, by replacing them with the gun-type. While having several Shimakaze-like destroyers launching torps in every direction might be tricky to some players, it is not impossible to overcome (I am also a BB and CA player). Besides torp are an essential and constructive feature. On the other hand, the fire rain gameplay definitely gets the fun out of the game. Therefore if this theory turns true, it won't do to me.

 

Anyway I wonder how they will compensate the highly prejudiced players and customers (real spent money, camouflage, and the hours of game experience burnt into unattractive tiers)?

 

It is not just like a reworking of the armor calculation for instance, a torpedo nerf, or something that you can eventually make do. This time it can deeply affect the players and their experience. When you retroactively make changes in normal business with customers, well.. you lose them. I hope WG is aware that it is the same with players and paying customers, and will make this plan right.

 

Should you have any comment or question, let's discuss! Otherwise it was my 2cent.

 

The proposed rework:

http://worldofwarships-eu.gcdn.co/dcont/fb/image/ed669f5a-7397-11e6-bb32-ac162d8bc1e4.jpg

 

[malasme]

Clearly the game designers are actively nerfing the stealth torpedo destroyer aspect of the game at higher tiers and therefore it makes complete sense to bring out some Japanese gunships to replace them and to drop the higher tier stealth destroyers down to a level that isn't quiet so radar spammed to minimise the cost of time of effort invested by players of stealth destroyers at higher levels.

 

As any DD captain knows, an aware BB captain at higher levels is almost impossible to torpedo. We have all seen battleships cruising at half speed and then doing a 0-60mph acceleration in 1 second, easily avoiding torpedo's they saw spotted by a scout ten seconds ago.

 

We have all seen the dreaded I am going to sail bow on, backwards, battleship captains who merely have to slam their ships into full stop to easily avoid a torpedo spread with their narrow profile showing.

 

And of course there is always the constantly sailing away battleship captain who then has to struggle with the task of avoiding a torpedo spread closing at 30knots over a period of 20 seconds. Of course the slower torpedo's may be closing at the speed of a slow battleships, so its a bit like dodging a battleship that can only travel in straight lines.

 

All the above captains you can spam torpedo and possibly get a lucky hit or two, but nothing epic. 

 

And then there is the noob who is sailing his Yamato in straight lines at constant speed. Ah yes this is indeed a worthy target, torps away, full load out, narrow spread... pay day. But is war gaming really trying to make the game more accessible to such a player at such a tier. This player has a significant ship under his control whilst simultaneously lacking the ability to shoot or manoeuvre or play with balanced aggression.  Surely tier 10 should be for the guys who have considerable skill and tier 1 should be for the new guys.

 

The real answer to the spam torp problem was always to limit the number of destroyers in a game to 2 per side. So many games these days have 6 destroyers a side and even I must admit that 12 invisible destroyer invisi torping each other in the first 5 minutes of the game, is hardly interesting or fun, followed by one side ending up with 3 surviving destroyers, whilst the other side has none. Nothing like 3 surviving destroyers picking off the enemy battleships one by one. that makes for a really boring game for the battleships because all they can do is constantly sail away.

 

So in conclusion the current changes are intend to dumb down the game to make the game more accessible to the occasional player. But this may be a good thing because there will be a lot more noobs to torp at tier 4 while they are on their way to grinding out that Yamato!  The down side will be that the standard of play at tier 10 will be no better and no less random than tier 1. 

[ParEx]

So in conclusion the current changes are intend to dumb down the game to make the game more accessible to the occasional player. But this may be a good thing because there will be a lot more noobs to torp at tier 4 while they are on their way to grinding out that Yamato!  The down side will be that the standard of play at tier 10 will be no better and no less random than tier 1. 

 

Thats the most important point.

Thing is, if you limit CVs (already done) and next DDs to 2 per side, the next ones complaining will be the CAs because they get onshotted for the lolZ of BB captains.

Game gets boring.

[Battleship_Nagato]

Fubuki getting to tier 6 has a historical precedent however, she was quite an old boat compared to her peers.

[makhot]

 

Thats the most important point.

Thing is, if you limit CVs (already done) and next DDs to 2 per side, the next ones complaining will be the CAs because they get onshotted for the lolZ of BB captains.

Game gets boring.

Then you can limit BBs to 3 per side, resulting more CAs burning down the few BBs and DDs (radar), resulting in BBs AND DDs complaining about CAs... Balancing is a bit*h.

[Kevbar]

We have all seen battleships cruising at half speed and then doing a 0-60mph acceleration in 1 second, easily avoiding torpedo's they saw spotted by a scout ten seconds

 

I call 'Exaggeratorhax'

[Kuso_Teitoku]

​Some players theorized that replacing Fubuki and Kagero will lower the "torp soup" at higher tiers

 

I dont think thats the case the only real Gunboat in that new Line ist the Akizuki. The rest will probably still focus on torpedos

 

Anyway I wonder how they will compensate the highly prejudiced players and customers (real spent money, camouflage, and the hours of game experience burnt into unattractive tiers)

 

If you own the Fubuki it will probaly get replaced with a Kagero in your port. The only thing that they need to sort out ist the camo Issue.

But you wont lose any credits XP or progression through this change

 

 

[B010011A]

I hope they'll replace my fubuki with kagero and that kagero to have the same characteristics as my "old" (not yet) fubuki or refund me all the credits i have spent on Fubuki. I actually have kagero researched but never bought it cause I only wanted Fubuki.

[Fino_93]

 

I dont think thats the case the only real Gunboat in that new Line ist the Akizuki. The rest will probably still focus on torpedos

 

 

 

They have declared that the "standard" line will be balanced between torp and guns (like americana, i suppose) and the other one will be more gun focused, so maybe not a gunboat line but there will be no more ships focused on torpedoes...

 

[Allied_Winter]

They will all keep their ability to stealth torp.

 

I'm quite excited though for the changes, even if this means to say farewell to my beloved Fubuki. I'm glad WG buffs the guns, because torpedoes are not consistent enough as a DMG source. I consider myself a rather good player and even I have games, where I don't land any torpedo hits. In other battles the torpedo hits keep coming on and on.

 

And as you allready said: This game focus is more on the casual player that does 2 or 3 battles an evening. The trick is to make the skill entry so low, that beginners can have fun, but the skill ceiling so high, that pros can stretch their performance. But if you look at the CVs you see how hard to balance this is.

 

 

Greetings

[Capra76]

Meanwhile, the BB plague continues.

[Quetak]

I happy with change since I cant get my Kagero to work. I had few good games with it but most games are 0 torpedo hits and all dmg is done in gun fights with other DDs. Kagero is worst DD I ever played and for T9 is shame. It worse than Fubuki and probably even than Hatsu. I hope that shima will be better but after all I read about her it will not great also. 

And when I take Fletcher to comparison with Kagero...its like God.

Japan DD line needed rework imo.

[Drunken_Jedi]

I'm very curious to see how Wargaming will handle (read: f**k up) compensating players who dropped say 3000 gold on the premium camo for Fubuki, since she will be getting nerfed to tier VI there will undoubtedly be some who feel like the "new" and "rebalanced" (nerfed into the ground and then beaten with a giant hammer) Fubuki isn't worth playing anymore - and thus feel like they've been cheated by dropping gold on a ship which was pretty comfortable at her tier which has since been reduced to a worthless wreck.

 

I'm going to Tesco's today, will be sure to stock up on popcorn 

[Allied_Winter]

I'm very curious to see how Wargaming will handle (read: f**k up) compensating players who dropped say 3000 gold on the premium camo for Fubuki, since she will be getting nerfed to tier VI there will undoubtedly be some who feel like the "new" and "rebalanced" (nerfed into the ground and then beaten with a giant hammer) Fubuki isn't worth playing anymore - and thus feel like they've been cheated by dropping gold on a ship which was pretty comfortable at her tier which has since been reduced to a worthless wreck.

 

I'm going to Tesco's today, will be sure to stock up on popcorn 

 

It's likely that you get the perma camo for the new T8 of that line instead. So the premium camo for the "new" T8 Kagero.

 

Thing is, how many want said a premium camouflage for said ship.

 

 

I have now the Kagero researched but not bought. Once the split goes live and I (as I assume) get the T8 Kagero as a replacement for the Fubuki but with all XP in place, I can immediately jump to the Yuugumo (the new T9).

 

 

Greetings

[Mayv]

I am actually looking forward to the changes. IJN DDs are a mess at the high tiers currently. They are pointless to play, they barely do torpedoes better than their USN contemporaries. Even back prebuff and buffed I thought USN DDs were much better than the IJN DDs. IJN DDs rely on the enemy team to play as badly as you play good. The Gearing and Fletcher were my preferred high tier DDs during the Shimakaze torpedo soup fiasco. When I heard they planned changes (which turned out to just nerfs) to the IJN DDs I hoped that they would be buffing their guns to balance out the changes to their torpedoes.

So I am happy WG is realising their IJN DD design is flawed. I hope they don't butcher this change and I look forward to it. My biggest concern is what will be the differences between Fubuki and Akastuki, and Kagero and Yugumo.

[Hedgehog1963]

If you own the Fubuki it will probaly get replaced with a Kagero in your port. The only thing that they need to sort out ist the camo Issue.

But you wont lose any credits XP or progression through this change

 

 

 

I have every expectation of this.  For those of us with a Fubuki we can reasonably expect to have a Fubuki at Tier VI and to be given the tier VIII replacement as well.

 

To give you the precedence:  Approx 2 years into WoT the Soviet Heavy Tank line was split into two.  The Tier IX IS-4 was buffed and made a Tier X tank.  Those of us who had the Tier IX tank got the new tier X version and a replacement, the IS-8 (now the T-10) at tier IX.  So we gained a tank and a crew and a slot.  I'm less enthusiastic about the "crews."  One of the ships is probably going to end up with a much poorer commander.

 

That's what I'm expecting anyway.

[Spellfire40]

 

I have every expectation of this.  For those of us with a Fubuki we can reasonably expect to have a Fubuki at Tier VI and to be given the tier VIII replacement as well.

 

To give you the precedence:  Approx 2 years into WoT the Soviet Heavy Tank line was split into two.  The Tier IX IS-4 was buffed and made a Tier X tank.  Those of us who had the Tier IX tank got the new tier X version and a replacement, the IS-8 (now the T-10) at tier IX.  So we gained a tank and a crew and a slot.  I'm less enthusiastic about the "crews."  One of the ships is probably going to end up with a much poorer commander.

 

That's what I'm expecting anyway.

 

​credits are a isue If you have both in Port., -)). Well hope underlevel modules wont vanish either.

[Hedgehog1963]

 

​credits are a isue If you have both in Port., -))

 

I don't follow..?

[Spellfire40]

 

I don't follow..?

 

if you have Fubuki you get Kagero instead.

If you have Fubuki and Kagaro? Hopfully not just the 

Credits for a Sold T9 DD. Probably the the new T9 but nobody knows plus there are the isue with T9 and T8 upgrades: they just get demonted ? Reshuffling leaves a lots room for making mistake.

[th3freakie]

As someone who has Shima as their only T10, I too am worried.

 

The people who complain about Torpedo-Snipping being boring are, by definition, not the ones currently playing IJN DDs, People who invested time and money in getting to Fubukis and beyond did so because the enjoyed the play-style, so you are not doing them any favors by removing it entirely.

 

The people who could benefit from this change are the ones who do not enjoy being victims of this play-style. But will they really prefer more smoke HE spammers? Is that really a preferable thing to be attacked by? I fear the game will not only grow less fun for me as a DD player, but also as a BB and CA player, since there is absolutely nothing I can do vs someone invisible 10 km away raining fire on me. 

 

 

[Hedgehog1963]

 

if you have Fubuki you get Kagero instead.

If you have Fubuki and Kagaro? Hopfully not just the 

Credits for a Sold T9 DD. Probably the the new T9 but nobody knows plus there are the isue with T9 and T8 upgrades: they just get demonted ? Reshuffling leaves a lots room for making mistake.

 

 

Yes.  It is not beyond the realms of possibility that the players will get screwed.  There is precedent for that also.

 

I have both Fubuki and Kagero at the moment.  What should happen for me?   At the end of the changes I believe I should have:

 

• Tier VI Fubuki;
• Tier VIII Kagero; and 
• Tier IX Yûgumo

 

 

[GenerallKrizmuz]

If they touch Shima torps I go nuke their HQ

[th3freakie]

If they touch Shima torps I go nuke their HQ

 

You mean, again?

 

Also why are you fellows assuming you'll keep the same ships once the change comes? It's much simpler for WG to just replace whatever ship you have for the equivalent ship in the reworked line. So if you have a Fubuki you get [DD t8] and nothing else.

[Allied_Winter]

I don't think they'll change the Shima. She's already in a rather weak spot. Maybe buff her guns a little, but other than that.

 

Notser put up some theorycrafting regarding the researched and not reasearched ships of the new line:

 

 

Greetings

[bloodynicknames]

If they touch Shima torps I go nuke their HQ

 

couldnt really make that thing any worse.