Anti Aircraft Power Creep

[silence5]

I've seen the topic on NA server (http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/94935-anti-aircraft-power-creep/)

 

TL;DR version:

 

Back when I originally ground the IJN line the were a couple AA powerhouses (Cleveland, Atlanta, Yubari, Texas, NM, maybe a couple others) that needed to be avoided and a lot of ships with relatively little AA but if they grouped up their AA would make strikes costly. The biggest most recent example of the AA power creep seems to the KM BBs with a very strong long ranged AA that can brutalize squadrons that are not even close to their ships. Probably the best example is currently the Gneisenau which has a crazy amount of long range AA which upgrades extremely well with AFT and Manual AA. 

	Gneisenau		Colorado
Range (km)	Damage	Range (km)	Damage
5.2	136	4.2	58
3.5	62	3.5	161
2	92	2	133

 

All this really good AA has two effects on the game:

1. It makes CVs very difficult to use against even solo targets.
2. It devalues ships that are built around the AA escort role. 

 

What do you guys think? Nowadays ... all ships (besides the IJN) have very good AA, the only difference being the range. Even the British cruisers are rumoured to be AA machines. 
This situation is the definition of powercreep. What can be done?

 

Edit: Thx mods

[Panocek]

I've seen the topic on NA server (http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/94935-anti-aircraft-power-creep/)

 

TL;DR version:

 

Back when I originally ground the IJN line the were a couple AA powerhouses (Cleveland, Atlanta, Yubari, Texas, NM, maybe a couple others) that needed to be avoided and a lot of ships with relatively little AA but if they grouped up their AA would make strikes costly. The biggest most recent example of the AA power creep seems to the KM BBs with a very strong long ranged AA that can brutalize squadrons that are not even close to their ships. Probably the best example is currently the Gneisenau which has a crazy amount of long range AA which upgrades extremely well with AFT and Manual AA. 

	Gneisenau		Colorado
Range (km)	Damage	Range (km)	Damage
5.2	136	4.2	58
3.5	62	3.5	161
2	92	2	133

 

All this really good AA has two effects on the game:

1. It makes CVs very difficult to use against even solo targets.
2. It devalues ships that are built around the AA escort role. 

 

What do you guys think? Nowadays ... all ships (besides the IJN) have very good AA, the only difference being the range. Even the British cruisers are rumoured to be AA machines. 

This situation is the definition of powercreep. What can be done?

 

Add more AA for IJN ships?

 

German bottlesheeps matching Freedom ones in terms of AA is actually one of the least concerns - whole "USN brawling BB" concept is out of the water with ze Germans.

[SBS]

 

Add more AA for IJN ships?

 

German bottlesheeps matching Freedom ones in terms of AA is actually one of the least concerns - whole "USN brawling BB" concept is out of the water with ze Germans.

 

Yep. US BB seem a bit more obsulete in my opinion. But that could come down to personal preferrence.

 

What I do not like is that even a lone BB can now shoot down a lot of planes and minimize damage taken if he just turns a little. I do not ask to be able to nuke someone, but I would like to punish people caught out of position.

Who else should I got for, the big blob covering each other?

[silence5]

I havent played enough battles in my Taiho yet so I don't know how high tier CV gameplay goes ... But from the shokaku I know that ... at tier 8 there is a sudden realisation of players that sticking together makes them strong. Which renders my planes useless ... except for north carolina... those sihps don't give a sh*t about planes in the air, and thats ok, but now the germans can rip appart your ships as easily .... and from longer range.

And don't get me started on american DDs ... thats a topic for itself(maybe its just my bad luck, but I lost a bomber squadron flying 4km away from from a Gearing in 10 seconds, withouth him activating defensive fire a few matches back)

[SBS]

I havent played enough battles in my Taiho yet so I don't know how high tier CV gameplay goes ... But from the shokaku I know that ... at tier 8 there is a sudden realisation of players that sticking together makes them strong. Which renders my planes useless ... except for north carolina... those sihps don't give a sh*t about planes in the air, and thats ok, but now the germans can rip appart your ships as easily .... and from longer range.

And don't get me started on american DDs ... thats a topic for itself(maybe its just my bad luck, but I lost a bomber squadron flying 4km away from from a Gearing in 10 seconds, withouth him activating defensive fire a few matches back)

 

Personally I think that tier 9 and 10 CV (at least the IJN, can't comment on USN) are strong enough. Mostly due to the planes speed, with them being so fast that most enemies can't evade them in time, especially with how poor ships turn at that tier. This means that the planes can stay in AA a lot less. Also, high tier CV can loose more planes with more squadrons in the air and bigger reserve, thus take more risk.

Not to say that their aren't dangers to CV at tier 9 and 10, certainly some ships have formiddable AA, especially from cruisers.

 

But tier 7 and 8 can be a huge hurdle, I mean sitting in a tier 7 CV and meeting tier 8 or 9 BB can wreck your planes with AA, same with tier 8 fighting tier 9 and 10.

A lot of the time all you can do is try to hunt DD.

[creamgravy]

KM Battleships have KM cruisers for sonar and US cruisers for AA support built in. They just need Stalinium shell and smoke consumables to make every other ship redundant. 

 

Personally I think that tier 9 and 10 CV (at least the IJN, can't comment on USN) are strong enough

 

The 2 new lines can have fearsome long range AA at that tier.

 

Total AA (max)	DPS
Montana	1246
Neptune	1097
Minotaur	926
Des Moines	914
Hindenburg	814
Großer Kurfürst	764
Cleveland	359

 

Long range AA (max)	DPS	Range (km)
Minotaur	833	7.2 - 8.6
Des Moines	777	7.2
Hindenburg	708	6.5 - 7.2
Großer Kurfürst	670	7.2 - 7.5
Neptune	584	7.2 - 8.6
Montana	475	7.2
Cleveland	220	7.2

 

 

[Ishiro32]

I wouldn't go that far to call it a power creep. Saying it's power creep seems like it's natural progression of things in online games.
Naaaah, what we have here is just bad balancing of the flawed mechanic. WG just wanted to have more AAA... that's all. There is no power creep, because it was conscious design choice, it was a buff to global AAA.

[silence5]

I wouldn't go that far to call it a power creep. Saying it's power creep seems like it's natural progression of things in online games.

Naaaah, what we have here is just bad balancing of the flawed mechanic. WG just wanted to have more AAA... that's all. There is no power creep, because it was conscious design choice, it was a buff to global AAA.

Its not like I'm saying that CV's are useless... I'm having my fair share of fun with them. The fact is that AA is slowly getting out of control and if they continue like that, it might make it impossible to avoid all those big AA ships to get any kind of effective damage. 

 

PS: No need for stupid pictures of disrespect. 

[Ishiro32]

I meant no disrespect. This is just my thing with pictures, don't worry about it.

 

Anyway, CVs are not useless and will never be useless. Still for me it's clear that WG is not happy with them and making new lines with stronger AAA is just a way for them to make sure that CV population is low. There are still issues with CV line that withou big AAA would show up again. This is stalling tactic in a way, because AAA overall is a flawed mechanic.

That's what I wanted to say.

 

I doubt it will go out of control, simply because WG is balancing hard by server stats. Their moves regarding AAA are not mistake

[Namolis]

The idea is that people can actually do something by playing well. If you angle your ship such that the CV must either accept a poor attack angle, or expect to take losses going around to get a good angle. I don't see the problem here.

 

Even a Montana can be hit by a Lexington if you just go in and out fast.

[Drunken_Jedi]

The retarded thing is, look at the most recent patch notes. Gneisenau got it's short range AA BUFFED to like 100dps. AAA has just been a joke of late, before I actually read the patch notes I joked to myself "how are they going to buff AAA this time" and bam there it was as at the bottom. I was like...

 

 

Here's the actual summary from the patch notes:

"Gneisenau (A): added 2 20-mm Flakvierling 30 AA guns. As a results of this change the average AA damage on 2 km distance has increased by 12 points (from 89 to 101)."

 

[silence5]

Even a Montana can be hit by a Lexington if you just go in and out fast.

No just ... NO does not happen. Yes you would do damage but it would be petty damage. The main point of CV's is damage over time and you simply cannot get enough bombs and torpedoes on a montana with a tier 8 ship to make it worth attacking and loosing all your planes. Either you use all your planes in one wave and do some nice initial damage around 20k and he repairs it all with the use of one repair or you try to force him to use his DCP and wait before runing in with your second wave.... but here is the problem ... if you seperate your air groups in 2 waves he has enough firepower to destroy all your squadrons or 80% of them before you manage to drop reliable. 

 

I just wanted to point out the flaws in your thinking. In theory it works in practice it doesn't. 

[G01ngToxicCommand0]

I've seen the topic on NA server (http://forum.worldofwarships.com/index.php?/topic/94935-anti-aircraft-power-creep/)

 

TL;DR version:

 

Back when I originally ground the IJN line the were a couple AA powerhouses (Cleveland, Atlanta, Yubari, Texas, NM, maybe a couple others) that needed to be avoided and a lot of ships with relatively little AA but if they grouped up their AA would make strikes costly. The biggest most recent example of the AA power creep seems to the KM BBs with a very strong long ranged AA that can brutalize squadrons that are not even close to their ships. Probably the best example is currently the Gneisenau which has a crazy amount of long range AA which upgrades extremely well with AFT and Manual AA. 

	Gneisenau		Colorado
Range (km)	Damage	Range (km)	Damage
5.2	136	4.2	58
3.5	62	3.5	161
2	92	2	133

 

All this really good AA has two effects on the game:

1. It makes CVs very difficult to use against even solo targets.
2. It devalues ships that are built around the AA escort role. 

 

What do you guys think? Nowadays ... all ships (besides the IJN) have very good AA, the only difference being the range. Even the British cruisers are rumoured to be AA machines. 

This situation is the definition of powercreep. What can be done?

 

Roll with it, the game has to be balanced player vs. player as teamplay is more or less non existing and combined with a general poor skill level of the average player the consequece of balancing the strike aircraft of the CVs against the AA aura of multiple ships would make them super OP against single isolated ships which would lead to an even more toxic game than it already is because the vast majority of the players would completely defenceless and without any chance of survival as you should remember was the case in closed beta?

 

The game would not be fun if carriers are to be the primary damage dealers of the game as their risk free high damage style of play would be a very disruptive and frustrating game mechanic which is already bad enough as is.

[Namolis]

No just ... NO does not happen. Yes you would do damage but it would be petty damage. The main point of CV's is damage over time and you simply cannot get enough bombs and torpedoes on a montana with a tier 8 ship to make it worth attacking and loosing all your planes. Either you use all your planes in one wave and do some nice initial damage around 20k and he repairs it all with the use of one repair or you try to force him to use his DCP and wait before runing in with your second wave.... but here is the problem ... if you seperate your air groups in 2 waves he has enough firepower to destroy all your squadrons or 80% of them before you manage to drop reliable. 

 

I just wanted to point out the flaws in your thinking. In theory it works in practice it doesn't. 

 

I did the other day. I lost a grand total of 3 out of my 15 dive bombers hitting a Montana. I don't know how that happened, but it did.

 

And the strike itself only did about 10k dmg, but 3 fires stuck. That ended up costing him another 35k hp.

[SkybuckFlying]

I did notice some of this power creep I think.... even in my essex I was like... wow... what's shooting down my planes ? might have been a north carolina or indeed these new german ships or both ! ;)

 

Care must be taken... problem with this german thing is... it's non-stop... hmmm...

[cro_pwr]

 

I did the other day. I lost a grand total of 3 out of my 15 dive bombers hitting a Montana. I don't know how that happened, but it did.

 

And the strike itself only did about 10k dmg, but 3 fires stuck. That ended up costing him another 35k hp.

 

Was he battered down with shells allready, so he lost most of his AA guns in a process, or was he fresh out of the port?

My bet is on first one, cause 2nd one would eat your planes alive (especially if hes smart enough to manual select them)

[cro_pwr]

And from what I've seen @OP, new RN cruisers should have better AA then USN ones?
AGAIN? I mean, really, another line of ships with AA better then USN ones?

So USN cruisers lost their role completely allready, and will suffer even more...

[creamgravy]

And from what I've seen @OP, new RN cruisers should have better AA then USN ones?

 

Only the tier 9 and 10 and they don't have defensive fire. Maybe only US ships get defensive fire?

[kfa]

As a carrier player i totally agree.

- Every new ship line has insane AA (Roon, Hindenburg, Dmitiri Donskoi, and German BBs as mentioned before can also tear up the sky if they are not completely alone + british cruisers as well)

- Carriers have def AA now

- Destroyers have def AA now

- My mother has def AA now

- Fighter barrage ability and stupid OP ammo to go with

 

All this makes me frustrated every time i (try to) play my Hakuryu or Essex, and has gotten to the point that i will go back sealclubbing in a Langley and a Zuiho because WG has no idea whats going on in their own game and they try to balance things staring at server statistics.

[ShinGetsu]

[Panocek]

Even a Montana can be hit by a Lexington if you just go in and out fast.

No just ... NO does not happen. Yes you would do damage but it would be petty damage. The main point of CV's is damage over time and you simply cannot get enough bombs and torpedoes on a montana with a tier 8 ship to make it worth attacking and loosing all your planes. Either you use all your planes in one wave and do some nice initial damage around 20k and he repairs it all with the use of one repair or you try to force him to use his DCP and wait before runing in with your second wave.... but here is the problem ... if you seperate your air groups in 2 waves he has enough firepower to destroy all your squadrons or 80% of them before you manage to drop reliable. 

 

I just wanted to point out the flaws in your thinking. In theory it works in practice it doesn't. 

 

Thing you're missing are AA losses from bombing/HEspamming. So few healthy HE salvos can significantly reduce AA output, same with successful bombing run with TB as AA bait.

[S4h3L]

KM Battleships have KM cruisers for sonar and US cruisers for AA support built in. They just need Stalinium shell and smoke consumables to make every other ship redundant. 

 

 

 

 

The 2 new lines can have fearsome long range AA at that tier.

 

Total AA (max)	DPS
Montana	1246
Neptune	1097
Minotaur	926
Des Moines	914
Hindenburg	814
Großer Kurfürst	764
Cleveland	359

 

Long range AA (max)	DPS	Range (km)
Minotaur	833	7.2 - 8.6
Des Moines	777	7.2
Hindenburg	708	6.5 - 7.2
Großer Kurfürst	670	7.2 - 7.5
Neptune	584	7.2 - 8.6
Montana	475	7.2
Cleveland	220	7.2

Can you add M. Kutuzov please?

[ulcusrodens]

i still get hopelessly nuked by every carrier a tier above mine, and can barely manage to resist a couple of focused attacks from same tier CVs.

the only way for a cruiser to actively protect anything else than itself is using AA consumables, and that can happen a couple of times per battle.

i mostly see click...carriers finish battles completely unscathed, with 2-3 kills each. whatever your AA, whatever dodging skills, 2 TB squadrons mean at least 3-4 torpedo hits on a big or simply slow target. so what's the problem, OP? that carriers can't and should be able to erase 10/15ths of the enemy team alone? (single handedly could sound a bit too literal, with carrier players...)

 

for god's sake, an atlanta can't even kill half squadrons from a bloody saipan if the AA alert is in cooldown. and that means that something's got really wrong in AA/CV balance.

[ulcusrodens]

As a carrier player i totally agree.

- Every new ship line has insane AA (Roon, Hindenburg, Dmitiri Donskoi, and German BBs as mentioned before can also tear up the sky if they are not completely alone + british cruisers as well)

- Carriers have def AA now

- Destroyers have def AA now

- My mother has def AA now

- Fighter barrage ability and stupid OP ammo to go with

 

All this makes me frustrated every time i (try to) play my Hakuryu or Essex, and has gotten to the point that i will go back sealclubbing in a Langley and a Zuiho because WG has no idea whats going on in their own game and they try to balance things staring at server statistics.

 

 

german cruisers have AA that's quite useful for personal defense and not much more. you simply don't fly over them. not that difficult.

carriers always had AA. and still sink in 30 seconds every time that someone thinks using an attack loadout is a cool idea. i mean, perma-hovering on an enemy carrier with 3 fighter squadrons could be a neat idea, i wonder why devs made it more difficult than it sounds

DDs have AA. lol. who on earth uses C hulls? for a 1% more chance to shoot down a fighter after 5 minutes hovering, for that... killing bombers with DD AA is so hilariously hopeless, unless you try to bomb an hatsuharu with tier 5 planes,

 

[edited]

[viceadmiral123]

WG just wants the CVs to die off with time. Keep an eye on for AA buffs/CV nerfs in every major patch.

 

p.s. I wonder if people really think that the USN fighter buff was really a "cv buff", when in fact it's just another AA buff/cv nerf.