Theorycraft around secondary guns

[Murro_the_One]

With addition of Brit BBs into the game I'm free to explore the depths of the german secondary builds as there is finally something more stupid and dumb in game :)

 

I'm currently on Koenig having vigilance and 2 points from 4th skill.

My idea is, that manual secondaries is better choice than AFT, even at tier6 (when i get it) as next 4 points i will get at tier 8 soonest (and manual secondaries will have that 60% buff at tier7).

Other tier4 will be AFT and then either superIntendant or BFT.

(idea behind AFT versus Manualsec is that those secondaries are blind as shitt and increasing the range might engage target in bigger distance but the hitrate is more important)

 

Please feel free to comment on the build order.

 

Other thing i would like to ask is some hints for this particular gamestyle. Based on my current experience, the seconddaries at tier5 are just a nice to have and cant rely on them. I farmed some close quarters though in recent days.

Dues manually selecting secondary target adds something else than what is in the skill description (like the hidden AA buff for manually selecting planes)?

 

Happy to learn some new stuff here.

[LOZFFVII]

The problem with manual secondaries is that they will ONLY fire at the target you have selected. Basically, costing you half of your secondaries for the buff.

Manual AA fire is a separate skill.

 

Hope that helps.

[Xevious_Red]

I probably wouldnt recommend it.

Below tier 7 manual secondaries has a very low bonus. As in it doesnt really do anything.

 

The higher tier you go, the larger the average engagement distance is. Which means you'll need the range as otherwise there simply wont be anyone for them to fire at (you're large and highly visible, people just sail away to avoid secondary range).

So really for a secondary build you need AFT and Manual Sec, along with secondary equipment and flag.

 

However, you encounter another problem at tier 9: The secondaries fire at belt armour, and at range come down on deck armour. At tier 9 most of the ships you meet have enough armour there that the HE just shatters doing zero damage.

To combat this you need IFHE to boost the pen.

 

I just finished grinding the FdG with an entirely secondary build - AFT/BFT/ManSec/IFHE/AR, all the secondary equipment (including the 3m one that boosts the reload).

I literally couldnt make the secondaries any better, and had to sacrifice a lot to get the things I needed. The result? Mediocre.

 

The bismark would normally be the sweet spot for a secondary build as they wreck tier 6, but commonly now finds itself in tier X games instead

[Capra76]

One thing to bear in mind is that AFT is a dual purpose skill, it buffs the secondary range and it also buffs the AA range which is probably more valuable until you get to T8.

[Aragathor]

 

41 minutes ago, Murro_the_One said:

Dues manually selecting secondary target adds something else than what is in the skill description (like the hidden AA buff for manually selecting planes)?

 

Manual selection for secondaries (CTRL+click) without the skill overrides the target selection forcing your ship's secondaries to fire at the selected target over any closer targets. It provides no added bonuses.

 

[Sargento_YO]

I will give you an example: I used Manual secondaries on my Mikasa (with a captain from the Nagato) and I can tell you it its not worth on that ship (despite the fact it has more firepower on it's secondary weapons than it's primary ones) the 15% extra acurracy it's totally worthless (Same as nothing, those guys can't hit an Elephant from 2 metters away) and even worse, you can't fire upon two targets (sometimes I get surrounded and fire on both sides it's very useful).

 

So, it doesn't works on Mikasa (lots of secondaries, short range battles) it would work even less in tier 5 and 6 battleships.

[Murro_the_One]

47 minutes ago, Captain_LOZFFVII said:

The problem with manual secondaries is that they will ONLY fire at the target you have selected. Basically, costing you half of your secondaries for the buff.

Manual AA fire is a separate skill.

 

Hope that helps.

what i meant is that if you manually select planes, you get 30% buff (even you don't have manualAA)

so if there is no bonus for manually selecting secondaries target (e.g. not having manual secondary skill) i should not select the secondaries target at all....(maybe just in the case i want to prioritize)

 

logic behind chosing manual secondaries instead of AFT was this:

if i chose manual secondaries, i know i wont use the skill to its potential at tier6 but coming to tier7 i will

chosing AFT will delay the other tier4 skill to have it only on tier8 as i don't expect to have 14 point captain any time sooner

 

one way or another i might go for AFT due to its added value in fighting cancer.

[Leo_Apollo11]

Hi all,

 

I have 19 point German captain on my "Tirpitz" / "Gneisenau" (full secondary build) and I used it on my "König Albert" for fun!

 

1st (and only) game (unfortunately I didn't have much time for "König Albert" for time being) and 2 kills with my secondaries...

 

 

Leo "Apollo11"

[Murro_the_One]

9 minutes ago, Leo_Apollo11 said:

Hi all,

 

I have 19 point German captain on my "Tirpitz" / "Gneisenau" (full secondary build) and I used it on my "König Albert" for fun!

 

1st (and only) game (unfortunately I didn't have much time for "König Albert" for time being) and 2 kills with my secondaries...

 

 

Leo "Apollo11"

once i will have 14 points i will be also laughing, but to get there.. ;)

 

what would you take as first, AFT or Manual secondaries?

 

one more: for tier3 i definitely want vigilance, i need to chose between BFT and SuperIntendant...

[BlackYeti]

Manual Secondaries would be ALOT more useful and if it worked like Manual AA e.g. fire as normal without clicking, fire with 60% bonus when clicked. Bismarck/Tirpitz are about the only ships in the game where a full secondary build is viable, although Scharn/Gneise could probably make it work too (especially Gneise because of it's 128mms that benefit from German IFHE).

[Leo_Apollo11]

Hi all,

 

21 minutes ago, Murro_the_One said:

once i will have 14 points i will be also laughing, but to get there.. ;)

 

what would you take as first, AFT or Manual secondaries?

 

one more: for tier3 i definitely want vigilance, i need to chose between BFT and SuperIntendant...

 

Once one get 1st 19 point captain it gets much easier...

 

I got AFT first because it serves multipurpose task: AA and secondaries!

 

 

18 minutes ago, BlackYeti said:

Manual Secondaries would be ALOT more useful and if it worked like Manual AA e.g. fire as normal without clicking, fire with 60% bonus when clicked.

 

Ahh... dreaming (I always have to be on vigil when sailing with Manual Secondaries in order to always click on closest / biggest threat target for my secondaries)...

 

 

Leo "Apollo11"

[22cm]

1 hour ago, Murro_the_One said:

logic behind chosing manual secondaries instead of AFT was this:

if i chose manual secondaries, i know i wont use the skill to its potential at tier6 but coming to tier7 i will

chosing AFT will delay the other tier4 skill to have it only on tier8 as i don't expect to have 14 point captain any time sooner

 

one way or another i might go for AFT due to its added value in fighting cancer.

 

Better choose first AFT on tiers up to 6, because it increases the range of both secondaries and AA, and Manual secondaries after AFT.

[Murro_the_One]

ok, so update:

finally got to Bismarck (still retraining captain) and i got both tier4 secondary related skills. these are clear.

 

however i cant make up my mind regarding tier3 captain skills.

Currently i have Vigilance which i plan to use together with taget acquisition to have that spotting bubble big enough so i could potentially avoid the torps going my way. I know i have hydro but not always you are in ideal position to time your consumables to do the objectives on the map like pushing to caps or crossing some dangerous gaps...

 

i believe that german BB should be played on the edge of madness, while you never cross it and play as aggressive as possible around caps bullying everyone out and supporting your team.

Gneisenau was ideal ship for it with 8km secondary range and torps, you could take on anything

 

tier3 options are:

Vigilance, BFT, Superintendent, Demolition expert

 

I think BFT is least attractive because extra 10% dps on secondaries is nothing, only 20% AA buff makes it worth to take

Demolition expert is something i would currently take (together with vigilance) just based on observation: there is lot of , lets call them "players", who put down first fire as soon as they get hit. By playing aggressively i believe thit type of people but  anybody else would be more susceptible to turn and run after blowing damagecon and that is what is the whole plan. 8% and 5% on Bismarck secondaries + flags and DE could do the trick. (in that case i don't need extra heal/hydro charge, if everyone is gone :) )

 

if there is someone with experience with all these skills please share it.

 

 

 

 

[MrWastee]

http://shipcomrade.com/captcalc/0100100000000010000010001010100019

 

 

kinda squishy in comparison, but that is what u get under right circumstances and with halfway good play ;)...

edit: like 40k on that missiouri been with sec-shells only through the bow at about 8km

[Murro_the_One]

i don't know if i like this IFHE concept TBH

first, i guess germans have the HE pen increased (1/4 instead of 1/6 ) so IFHE might do something for 105mm but not sure about 150mm ones

I'm bit lazy to check the thickness of all the opponents, valivate the pen value and see if it makes sense

not saying it is bad though.

 

why DE is more comp0elling to me is the annoyance/fear factor it brings.

imagine DD gets under fire of secondaries. couple of hits is not a problem but one fire and DD starts to panic maibny if he is tryingto drop detection, not saying about one-fire BBs...

[Sargento_YO]

I tried to use the manual secondaries on the Mikasa (using the captain which I have in the Nagato). In such ship (and by extension any ship below tier 7) it's worthless because the secondaries still misses alot (these gunners can't hit an elephant from 2 metters!), the +15% it's really nothing. And whats worse you can only fire in one direction (sometimes I purposedly put the Mikasa between two enemy ships as long as these doesn't have torpedoes).

Sometimes I tried it on my Ishizuchi with the same captain, and it's the same thing.

[MrWastee]

it mostly makes sense on gneis and GK only in that form, coz of secondary quality. it's an all ot nothing concept, that's for sure. but on the other hand i recommend exactly such an approach for a full secondary build, simply because if one not goes full down that lane it might be better to go for full survival and have awesome range secondaries anyway for the occasional fire.

the psychological effect mostly is triggered through the secs firing anyway.

but if they see their health melt they rather panic, than if they just get flurried a bit with sparkles here and there.

that sec-shell dmg is real though and cuts their total health. fires (mostly) don't.

 

i came down to this concept after fighting a bow on yamato left on llike 350hp a few months ago. i did set my (rather conservative/not ifhe build) secondaries on him and started to turn after he fired, to fight a nearby NC with mainguns.

his reload must have been at least at about 20 secs+, sitting on 350hp marked with secs.... certain death?! nope.... i turned, my secs did zero dmg and he came to drop a full salvo in my turning belly.... took me from like 2/3 hp to 10k hp before i could finish him with turning rear mains....

never again i said and specced for that weird thing above..... but it works :D :).

 

for bismarck and freddy/not ifhe:

http://shipcomrade.com/captcalc/0100100000100000000001001100100019

, where bft or superintendent is kinda question of taste i guess. vigilance and DE are out for me, simply because german hydro anyways ("say hi torps") and 3pt skill for increased fire chance (the least reliable source of dmg) on any bb is a big nono for me :D.

--> with ifhe it's all modules for secondaries range and survivability, without ifhe (bis/fred) it's all for mainguns here.

[ollonborre]

On 2017-12-04 at 11:20 AM, Captain_LOZFFVII said:

The problem with manual secondaries is that they will ONLY fire at the target you have selected. Basically, costing you half of your secondaries for the buff.

Manual AA fire is a separate skill.

 

Hope that helps.

It might seem like you loose half your potential secondaries, but in reality the hit ratio means that manual secondaries increases your overall secondary firepower.

 

Better to have your secondaries really harass and potentially kill one target than having them score the ocassional hit on 2 targets.

[RUSSIANBlAS]

On 04/12/2017 at 10:44 AM, Sargento_YO said:

I will give you an example: I used Manual secondaries on my Mikasa (with a captain from the Nagato) and I can tell you it its not worth on that ship (despite the fact it has more firepower on it's secondary weapons than it's primary ones) the 15% extra acurracy it's totally worthless (Same as nothing, those guys can't hit an Elephant from 2 metters away) and even worse, you can't fire upon two targets (sometimes I get surrounded and fire on both sides it's very useful).

 

So, it doesn't works on Mikasa (lots of secondaries, short range battles) it would work even less in tier 5 and 6 battleships.

Miksas even with a full secondary build is completely and utterly garbage and is a waste of time, effort and electricity to play 

 

Nice looking ship however...

[LOZFFVII]

3 minutes ago, ollonborre said:

It might seem like you loose half your potential secondaries, but in reality the hit ratio means that manual secondaries increases your overall secondary firepower.

 

Better to have your secondaries really harass and potentially kill one target than having them score the ocassional hit on 2 targets.

Yes, but you lack the flexibility to harrass two or more targets at once.

It's down to personal preference, really.

I don't play BBs, but if I was to play my Bismarck/Tirpitz with any real conviction, I would rather have the flexibility of being able to occasionally hit two destroyers either side of my ship at 11km rather than have to process "is this DD more important to kill than the other?"

[ollonborre]

2 minutes ago, Captain_LOZFFVII said:

Yes, but you lack the flexibility to harrass two or more targets at once.

It's down to personal preference, really.

With good situational awarness in a secondary focused ship manual secondaries are much more flexible since it means you can actually rely on the fact that the target you have selected will take damage and either be forced to turn away or continue with the risk of taking large amounts of damage, while you focus all your primary firepower on a second target.

 

If a third target pops up then you simply need to assess the situation and prioritise by HP or overall danger to you.

 

It is a personal preference sure, but if I went secondary focus on a ship I would never not take manual secondaries for reasons stated above.

 

 

[Sargento_YO]

12 minutes ago, Negativvv said:

Miksas even with a full secondary build is completely and utterly garbage and is a waste of time, effort and electricity to play 

 

Nice looking ship however...

It is, but at least was fun when it could meet tier I ships. But not anymore.

[RUSSIANBlAS]

18 minutes ago, Sargento_YO said:

It is, but at least was fun when it could meet tier I ships. But not anymore.

Hmm your avatar is that rogue Grand Admiral from that old Tie Fighter game no?

 

That was one of the best games ever. Screw all the Rebel ships, Imperials were so much more awesome. Plus no other game in history has anything as epic as being Vader's wing man 

[LOZFFVII]

@ollonborre

I don't play Battleships often, but when I do I do so to switch my brain off.

Partly just as a change of pace and partly just to prove to myself how easy and forgiving they are to play.

Spoiler

 

[HaachamaShipping]

2 hours ago, Murro_the_One said:

ok, so update:

finally got to Bismarck (still retraining captain) and i got both tier4 secondary related skills. these are clear.

 

however i cant make up my mind regarding tier3 captain skills.

Currently i have Vigilance which i plan to use together with taget acquisition to have that spotting bubble big enough so i could potentially avoid the torps going my way. I know i have hydro but not always you are in ideal position to time your consumables to do the objectives on the map like pushing to caps or crossing some dangerous gaps...

 

i believe that german BB should be played on the edge of madness, while you never cross it and play as aggressive as possible around caps bullying everyone out and supporting your team.

Gneisenau was ideal ship for it with 8km secondary range and torps, you could take on anything

 

tier3 options are:

Vigilance, BFT, Superintendent, Demolition expert

 

I think BFT is least attractive because extra 10% dps on secondaries is nothing, only 20% AA buff makes it worth to take

Demolition expert is something i would currently take (together with vigilance) just based on observation: there is lot of , lets call them "players", who put down first fire as soon as they get hit. By playing aggressively i believe thit type of people but  anybody else would be more susceptible to turn and run after blowing damagecon and that is what is the whole plan. 8% and 5% on Bismarck secondaries + flags and DE could do the trick. (in that case i don't need extra heal/hydro charge, if everyone is gone :) )

 

if there is someone with experience with all these skills please share it.

 

 

 

 

I'd say, SI. DE may look nice, but fire chance only matters against BBs, because against most other targets direct damage will be larger. And typically, even against battleships, your main battery is the main weapon, not your secondaries that will hardly ever be enough to finish a battleship. The heal meanwhile can help with pretty much all situations to give sustain and given you'll brawl, getting set on fire happens a lot, so regaining that health is worthwhile. The added hydro is not exactly necessary and if I can afford it, I rather run premium hydro for the reduced CD, not the added charge.

 

If you already have Vigilance, your options actually should list BoS, not Vigilance. BoS is a perk that might be worthwhile too for sustain. I personally never took Vigilance (trusting in hydro and that 3 km detection is enough for me), but went BoS first, as with the close-range brawling style fires are even more of a pain than for your typical BB of other nations and BoS together with the damage con modules (rudder shift is not great, but workable) gives pretty good damage mitigation due to reducing times fires stick, allowing you to let single fires burn with less health lost. Later I add SI for a more balance between secondary aggression and survivability. After all, yes, you may not need a heal if everything around you dies first, but if your ship sinks, your secondaries also won't deal damage.