World of Warships

Around the 14 minute mark he goes into the uses for AP and HE ammo. He's talking about taking on battleships, but it's still good info.

AP vs HE is entirely dependent on what you're driving and what you're shooting at.

For BB, unless you're shooting a DD, shoot AP.

For CA/CL, shoot HE at BB & CV, AP at everything else.

DDs can shoot HE at everything.

If I sell a ship and buy it back later does it lose all of the upgrades, XP and captain xp on it?

If you put that Captain into your reserve, you can put him back in charge when you rebuy the ship and he'll have all his skills. Alternatively, if you move him to another boat and retrain him for that boat, you can always send him back when you rebuy. He'll need retraining again, but once he's been re-retrained he won't have any of his perks missing.

I believe the ship stuff is gone though. You sold it with the ship.

Internet went out, leading to a double post. So here's a picture of a Kuma and a Derpboat.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/OmcUwzU.jpg)

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/pUP2gss.jpg)

That would explain why I got 9000 credits for my Erie despite the base cost of the ship being zero (for tier 1)

But I still don't quite get how captains work. So I accrue XP with a captain and he levels up his skills. At what point do I get the chance to put him in reserve? What do I lose from retraining a captain and what restrictions if any are there for what ship I can put him on?

I really wish the game had more of a tutorial or even a test drive mode with dummy targets like Warthunder does. My account levelled up and it basically said "You have captains now! Good luck!" without really telling me anything about what they did.

If you sell a boat, the Captain goes straight into the reserve, unless you've no room, in which case he just gets retired. So be careful there.

Reserve Captains keep all their perks - like the warning when you've been spotted and the increased speed repair crew, etc. You can assign him to a new boat, but he'll need to train for the new command, which he does just by sailing, as normal, until you've earned enough XP for him to know what he's doing. He magically forgets how to Captain his old tub.

After assigning a Captain to a new ship, you must click the "Begin Retraining" button under his portrait. While he is training, all of his perks are orange and I believe they work at half efficiency. Once he's trained all his skills work as normal.

Retraining can be 100% instantaneous if you're prepared to spend gold on it. Or you can insta-train to halfway by spending silver.

I tend to use the Umikaze, Yubari, St. Louis and Cleveland to train new Captains, because they earn XP fast with multiple torp hits/premier boat boost/shell spam and then once I have them with a level four perk, I assign them to the boat I actually want them in and retrain.

To clarify that last part - I will permanently run a St. Louis, for example, training the Captain up to at least four perks. Then when I buy a new higher tier boat, I'll put that Captain in charge of it and retrain him, then bring the fresh new Captain into the St. Louis, instead of into the higher tier vessel.

Okay I get how it works now. How many perks can a single captain get before you max him out?

All of them. But each subsequent one takes more XP, so I tend to train vertically, rather than picking a lot of level ones to start off with.

That makes sense, some of the skills are ship class specific like aircraft buffs for carriers. I expect that if you keep pumping XP into the same captain he should max out all relevant skills long before you reach tier 10 ships.

Tamren wrote:

If I sell a ship and buy it back later does it lose all of the upgrades, XP and captain xp on it?

Modules are sold for silver. Upgrades are demounted for gold or destroyed. XP stays for both the ship and captain, unless you get rid of the captain.

Also, it's not that he forgets, he's just de-certified, same as in the actual navy.

AnimeJ wrote:

Upgrades are demounted for gold or destroyed.

You can also sell upgrades for silver. Or at least you could in CBT. I haven't tried in OBT. You just have to find the right button when you try to sell a ship with upgrades on it. The demount option has a drop down where you can change the option to sell for silver.

I presume demounted upgrades can be remounted later for free, but I may just be adorably optimistic.

Edit : Just checked, you can indeed still sell the upgrades :

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/H64G5o5.jpg)

Good to know.

Man this guy doesn't pull any punches.

http://www.pcgamesn.com/world-of-war...

At least the commenters have taken it well.

Tamren wrote:

Man this guy doesn't pull any punches.

http://www.pcgamesn.com/world-of-war...

Yikes, that article really leaves a bad taste. I understand he was going for a bit of comedy but it comes off just wrong.

In regards to US DDs, you really want to use islands to hide your approach, if you want to use your torpedoes. Islands + heat of a battle + approaching from the direction he is not shooting in, this should allow you to score some point blank torpedo hits. But IMO US DDs are not designed to hunt BBs and cruisers. Their first target is enemy DDs, especially the IJN ones, which are alsmot defenseless against you, especially at higher tiers.

I probably love DDs the most in this game. It's hard to play them well though and, most likely, you won't see big damage numbers at the end of the fight but, very often, your contribution will be crucial to the team's win. The way I see it, to simplify a bit, you main goal as a DD player is to survive the first half of the fight and yet be somewhat useful during it. Once there are less enemies on the board, it's easier to keep track of them to avoid or attack them and it's easier to find holes in their defense and sneak in for a cap or to set up an ambush.

Playing as DDs definitely keeps you on your toes.

As for AP vs. HE. Personally, I use a few kinda rules and it's been working for me:
- If I am in a DD, I always shoot HE. Unless I am shooting point blank into another DD, then I use AP.
- In other ships, I use HE for long distance shots (since it's harder to target the citadel) and switch to AP when it gets closer and I can hit the citadel more reliably (~6 km). Unless I am playing a cruiser with small caliber guns (140-152 mm) against some fat high tier BB, then I just use HE always.

Hedinn wrote:

In regards to US DDs, you really want to use islands to hide your approach

Playing as DDs definitely keeps you on your toes.

Every now and then everything comes together and you say to yourself "Is... is that a gap? That looks like a gap."

I was about to go hide in the islands, as per for my USN DD, when I noticed a heavy push on our left and with the usual numbers who like to run those islands I figured there'd be a small gap right up the middle.

I started using the US DDs as a fast gunnery platform and I'm doing much better now. The guns are good and reliable but the torpedoes are pretty much an afterthought until you get to the very highest tiers. Japanese DDs are essentially the opposite.

Tamren wrote:

Japanese DDs are essentially the opposite.

Yup.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/47xFdND.jpg)

Got the tier 3 IJN destroyer. The torpedoes lost a little bit of range but it's guns can now reach out to 9km instead of 6.5.

Lot of really dumb interface quirks. I've been killed countless times trying to torpedo people because the designated target doesn't always switch to the guy I'm trying to torpedo. The "lock target" button is RMB which does NOT do what it says. The button that actually selects the target under your crosshair is X. RMB pans the camera without causing your guns to turn.

I tried rebinding my consumable keys to Z, X and C. Don't bind anything to C! If you put an expendable like say, engine boost on C key it does nothing at all. You can hit the button, the interface will register the keypress but the boost won't function.
IMAGE(http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/619592742066422743/386004D3816E77D8CD418007513B73A3F13B0F7E/)

Tamren wrote:

Lot of really dumb interface quirks. I've been killed countless times trying to torpedo people because the designated target doesn't always switch to the guy I'm trying to torpedo.

Yeah, I mean, I realize it's a beta, but guys ... the keys don't do what you say they do. Took me a bit to figure out the interface. I'm basically hopeless - far too aggressive - but it's fun.

Tamren wrote:

Lot of really dumb interface quirks. I've been killed countless times trying to torpedo people because the designated target doesn't always switch to the guy I'm trying to torpedo. The "lock target" button is RMB which does NOT do what it says. The button that actually selects the target under your crosshair is X. RMB pans the camera without causing your guns to turn.

Even when you use 'X' it's sometimes not really clear which target your actually tracking, especially when there's several enemy ships in a small area or when there's multiple ships in your direct line of sight. That's just made harder by the funky camera angle they use when you're using torpedos.

You'd think they'd make it very easy to switch targets while in torpedo mode *and* to maneuver because you're going to be doing both at the same time.

For maneuvering, you can use the map to set up an autopilot route which should help some on that end, or at least it does with bigger ships.

Does the autopilot go in straight lines or does it route around stuff?

Doing a bit better in my US DDs, having a hell of a time with my SoCal BB though. The battleship just doesn't seem any good, AP doesn't do jack, HE doesn't seem to to as much damage as it should, and the accuracy is HORRIBLE. This has been my experience so far:

1. Fire a perfectly aimed salvo of shells and watch them splash all around the target.
2. Fire a whole HE salvo at a St Louis, hit it once for 500 damage. Louis fires back, hits me with one shell, 850 damage. What the hell?
3. Fire a point blank HE salvo into a destroyer, hit at least 3 times, only do half of the destroyer's health.
4. Aim point blank at enemy cruiser 500m away, targeting reticule gets stuck and can't depress any further, fire all shots over the target's head. And yet when I zoom out the problem goes away.

IMAGE(http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/626348207712760204/FC480A43C6113E3187457E4C011298133832B1BF/)

It'll route around islands and such, but you can add multiple points to your route. Pretty sure it was shift+click to do that.

Aetius wrote:
Tamren wrote:

Lot of really dumb interface quirks. I've been killed countless times trying to torpedo people because the designated target doesn't always switch to the guy I'm trying to torpedo.

Yeah, I mean, I realize it's a beta, but guys ... the keys don't do what you say they do. Took me a bit to figure out the interface. I'm basically hopeless - far too aggressive - but it's fun. :)

Not sure what you guys mean, I've never had any problems like that. But then again, the last time I looked at the controls screen was like 3 months ago.

The game has its quirks but it's fun as hell, I just wish I had more time to play.

Oh and I think someone accidentally added an extra zero to the end of upgrade prices when moving into open beta. 3 mil, 4 mil - that's just crazy.

Tamren wrote:

1. Fire a perfectly aimed salvo of shells and watch them splash all around the target.

I swear some of the Japanese gunners are drunk. The Kawachi can fire an eight gun salvo, and you need them because when you shoot there are just shells just all over the place - hundreds of meters apart, from the same turret.

I had a match last night in my Wickes (t3 us dd?) I managed to sail all the way around the map, and ambush the two carriers that were sitting right next to each other. Took the first down with mostly toropedos, then started doing HE citadel hits on the second while the torps reloaded.

The secondary batteries finally took me out, and about 20 seconds later the fires and flooding finally took him out. It cleared the skies for my team, and victory came not long after that.

Aetius wrote:
Tamren wrote:

1. Fire a perfectly aimed salvo of shells and watch them splash all around the target.

I swear some of the Japanese gunners are drunk. The Kawachi can fire an eight gun salvo, and you need them because when you shoot there are just shells just all over the place - hundreds of meters apart, from the same turret.

Pretty sure all BB fire at "max range" (anything from 2/3 to max) suffer from a significant amount of dispersion. Ripple-fire (sequential vs. full salvo) is slightly more accurate, from what I've seen on Twitch or YouTube.

Aetius wrote:
Tamren wrote:

1. Fire a perfectly aimed salvo of shells and watch them splash all around the target.

I swear some of the Japanese gunners are drunk. The Kawachi can fire an eight gun salvo, and you need them because when you shoot there are just shells just all over the place - hundreds of meters apart, from the same turret.

I think that some of this might be a level of realism baked into the code. The Japanese were fairly bad gunners with poor fire control systems. Their torps on the other hand were excellent. The US torps were bad and are pretty bad in the game while their gunnery is much better.