World of Warships

[Borgholio]

Pity that the starting tiers are around the Great War period. I would have loved to see some 1890's battleships/protected cruisers.

Actually the St Louis class was build in 1905 and was a protected cruiser class. It was the same general design as the ships built 10 years prior. I also find those first steel warships to be a thing of beauty, like an antique car.

[Skywalker_T-65]

While Premium, there is also Aurora which is 1900 vintage. It's kind of the same as St. Louis though...more maneuverable, but slightly slower with the same amount of guns (IIRC) but they aren't as fast firing.

EDIT: Oh, and Mikasa is currently being tested before it's put into the game.

[Covenant]

Cruisers are probably the most noob-friendly to start with thanks to their huge flexibility. Other classes are rather one-trick ponies with massive advantages and disadvantages.
Then again, it's pretty easy to try everything out as it doesn't take a lot of money and XP to try all the low tier ships.

It hasn't yet, that's for certain. I enjoy how fast I can advance. Everyone's getting wiped when beta ends though, yeah? I see the option to buy premium currency or get a gold ship, but everything gets wiped when beta ends I assume.

[Jub]

Cruisers are probably the most noob-friendly to start with thanks to their huge flexibility. Other classes are rather one-trick ponies with massive advantages and disadvantages.
Then again, it's pretty easy to try everything out as it doesn't take a lot of money and XP to try all the low tier ships.

It hasn't yet, that's for certain. I enjoy how fast I can advance. Everyone's getting wiped when beta ends though, yeah? I see the option to buy premium currency or get a gold ship, but everything gets wiped when beta ends I assume.

Nope, the wipes have already happened and everything that you do here stays.

[Covenant]

Nope, the wipes have already happened and everything that you do here stays.

Really? That's impressive. I really appreciate them letting me get half-decent vessels without spending days and days of grind trying to build them up. World of Tanks felt extremely grindy, but I'm sitting on a comfortable 75% win rate at the newb tier (which I presume is pretty normal, anyone who can aim an arcing weapon should do well in the trainee tiers) and easily skilled up to the very fun St. Louis before I got baffled as to which direction to go.

[AniThyng]

Much as I enjoy the game I suspect if there was a wipe I'd quit...

[darthkommandant]

I got the Kongo. Can't wait for the engine and hull upgrades and my captain to refresh his skills for the ship.

Edit I found out I suck at cruisers ATM. I found the tier 3 Japanese cruiser very grindy for instance. Strangely I did however enjoy Myogi though.

[atg]

Strangely I did however enjoy Myogi though.

I found the Myogi great once the hull upgrade has been researched. Quite a fun ship.

[darthkommandant]

Same here it's a shame I sold her.

[Anacronian]

I got the Kongo. Can't wait for the engine and hull upgrades and my captain to refresh his skills for the ship.

Edit I found out I suck at cruisers ATM. I found the tier 3 Japanese cruiser very grindy for instance. Strangely I did however enjoy Myogi though.

I personally think the Kongo is the best ship for the it's tier in the game - it's fast maneuverable, Great armor, Good base range and accurate (with the accuracy upgrade).

I've had the majority of my fun/good BB games in the Kongo (even though I have an Iowa and a Yamato).

[Skywalker_T-65]

I've heard great things about the Kongo. Might need to start grinding free XP in the Murmansk so I can jump ahead to it- even if Myogi is decent enough I have little desire to grind up through two more low-tier BBs.

[Borgholio]

Just got into the Phoenix. I like how it's a good 10kt faster than the St Louis. I miss the huge broadside, but the guns seem more powerful and have an extra 2km range so that's nice. The torpedo tubes are useless though. Only see them coming in handy when getting close to an expecting target.

[wautd]

Destroyers are a funny thing. Most of the times I do very poorly with them, while other matches make me feel like I'm the Grim Reaper, ninja-killing ships left and right with torpedo-spam. I have no mediocre games with this class of ships.

[Covenant]

Just got into the Phoenix. I like how it's a good 10kt faster than the St Louis. I miss the huge broadside, but the guns seem more powerful and have an extra 2km range so that's nice. The torpedo tubes are useless though. Only see them coming in handy when getting close to an expecting target.

I went from winning nearly every game with the St. Louis and having a total of 80% win rate to going down to 60% just trying to win with the Phoenix out. This this feels like a piece of junk by comparison, to me, because it's speed comes with the immense downside of no guns and the two torpedoes are nearly incapable of hitting anything outside point blank. I just got the first hull upgrade so we'll see how that goes.

Maybe I'm meant to play battleships.

[Borgholio]

I'm giving the Phoenix a chance because when fully upgraded it has a good number of guns, and they do inflict more damage and have greater range and are more accurate than those on the St Louis. I tend to enjoy battleship combat more because it's harder to get one-shot splattered when you have more HP, but the speed and maneuverability of destroyers and cruisers is fun too!

[Covenant]

I like the middle ground "utility hero" role of cruisers but the Phoenix is a mess. Maybe once it's upgraded it'll be better but the pain of going from a maxed St. Louis to a stock crap Phoenix (with a rather low artillery score) is just obnoxious. But that's kinda the glory and folly of these games... you go from an elite version of one ship to the basic garbage version of the next as you go up in ranks and timeline. It's frustrating but I do not know how "fun" it would be to be on a track of consistent improvement from day 1. The fun of getting a new set of guns is a real benefit to the model, though it's obviously one that is less "fun" to play and more of a "grind towards fun" thing when you get stuck in a shit tier/hull.

I do wish there was, like, some way to match US vs IJN rather than mixing because I think it'd be interesting to see how the differing naval priorities play out in competition.

[Borgholio]

I do wish there was, like, some way to match US vs IJN rather than mixing because I think it'd be interesting to see how the differing naval priorities play out in competition.

I think it would be fun to go one step further and have scenarios that mirror real life fleet combats as accurate as possible. For instance, a US vs Japanese fleet battle with the same terrain and ship compliments as the battle of Surigao Strait, where your goal is to do better (or avoid doing worse) than the real life fleets did. Or how about a simulated battle of Jutland? That would be amazing.

[Elheru Aran]

Historic matches, IIRC, are something that Wargaming is going to largely avoid other than making similar maps. They want to avoid controversy such as, for example, say a 'Sink the Bismarck' mission... there's no way to do that historically correct without being ridiculously one-sided or using a massive map.

The problem is how to actually simulate the battle rather than a plain fleet encounter. I suppose it could be done by posting a time and sign-up sheet (xx ships US, xx ships IJN, certain tier ships required), and then once the sheet was filled, issuing fairly specific orders to each side (IJN pass through Suriago Strait, USN stop them, keep the Yamato afloat, whatever).

Jutland on the other hand is doable (although not historically correct with the ships they've got right now). It fits the parameters of the game reasonably well-- a range of fairly similar ships, fairly close in number, facing each other.

[Thanas]

Jutland would not really be different than the Ocean map though.

[Elheru Aran]

Jutland would not really be different than the Ocean map though.

Granted, yeah. The main distinction might be starting the British and German ships in formation with orders to sail in line until the foe is sighted, and then after that to try and maintain formation rather than all the players striking out separately. Basically, historic battles would require a fairly different play style-- trying to accomplish group goals rather than playing individually.

[Thanas]

Yeah, good luck with that. As POTBS proved, players hate nothing more than steaming in straight lines and coordinating. I mean, the way on Ocean to win is to run together as one force centered around the BBs. Guess how many people (especially cruisers) actually do that?

[Elheru Aran]

Indeed. Running a historic game might work best if you required it to more experienced players. Perhaps their new 'rank' system with the stars or whatever could have something to do with that. Get 2 stars, you can play one historic game per session, lose a star if you fail to follow enough orders during the historic game?

Although in all fairness steaming in straight lines is a great way to get salvos walked up and down your ship...

[Vendetta]

I like the middle ground "utility hero" role of cruisers but the Phoenix is a mess. Maybe once it's upgraded it'll be better but the pain of going from a maxed St. Louis to a stock crap Phoenix (with a rather low artillery score) is just obnoxious.

The stock Phoenix is a little anaemic, but it's still only tier 4 and upgrades are super cheap, and before long it has a respectable number of guns and fantastic range and speed.

Once upgraded you can do sterling work in it, and basically farm damage and wins at will in a way you probably can't in the St. Louis (because it's slower and can't fight as safely)

Historical battles might appear as PvE battles, I doubt they'll appear as PvP because they'd have the same problem they did in tanks, nobody wants to play the low tier shitwagons in the battle, they all want to play the big dogs.

[Covenant]

I'd accept them as PvE "challenge" maps, especially if they were linked to a training or badge-earning mechanism. Being able to recreate the Battle of Samar and send forces to harass the Yamato group with just your crappy escort carriers would certainly be a challenge. Call the mission scenario "The World Wonders"

[Venator]

My internet has been so bad I'm changing ISPs, but I managed to get in a hilarious game in my St. Louis last night (despite ping occasionally spiking to an indicated 129,000+).

I headed for C on a Domination map and scored a couple of hits on enemy cruisers in passing, but passed between islands so I didn't get much incoming or outgoing fire. Most of both teams were at A, and our two T4 carriers were getting shut down by the enemy (T4 and T5). Once I cleared the islands, shockingly, there were no enemies in sight so I steamed at a heady 22 knots for the enemy rear line - and shredding a carrier with only one torpedo hit suffered.

After that I farmed damage off an AFK New York until I left gun range - sadly we won on points before I found the other carrier.