Another commentary for the upcoming ranked season, dividing each T7 ship into 4 different categories, Top tier, Good tier, Competitive Tier and Not recommended. You can find a more concise list in the pinned comment below.
Total cash grab on the part of Wargaming. I've been getting more and more pissed off at how random battles are being dominated by pay2win ships. The first match I see where there's an all premium team I'll immediately hit Alt+F4 and the game will be gone from my PC before the battle can end.
Thanks for putting them up and the opinions, I was debating moving my cpt to the Nagato or doing solely Blyska so this helps me know I'm not a complete potato haha o7
Flamu, the Scharnhorst's guns are wonderful firestarters with battleship range. All you have to do to appreciate the guns is to forget that euphoric BB feeling of big numbers popping up.
First of all Myoko fire control is 15.6 km, not 19.9. Secondly dispersion for Scharnhorst guns is not much worse than Myoko guns at equivalent range. Thirdly Scharnhorst guns have higher fire chance. Overall Scharnhorst starts 5.4 fires per minute and Myoko starts 7.3 given perfect shell delivery. It starts the most fires of any T7 BB. Also they pen way more than Myoko shells do, so their actual delivery of alpha damage is way higher.
daftrhetoric Yes Scharnhorst dispersion is fucking awful compared to Myoko's. The only thing they have in common is the sigma value, otherwise Myoko beats out the Scharnhorst in horizontal dispersion by a mile just like any cruiser does any BB. 5.4 vs 7.3 fires per minute IF both ships hit all shells, but Scharn will hit significantly less so the actual value lies closer to 3.5-4.
well WG needs something to live from...I dont see a problem buying a premium ship if you enjoy this game..I would rather buy a ship than AAA game I will never enjoy more than WoWs
Actually gotten citadel hits on both Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. It was a surprise for me since I'd never citadeled any German BB before. The first time it happened I was being chased in my Nagato by a Gneisenau who was bow on to me. I think a shell I fired penetrated the deck armour on the bow and hit the citadel there or perhaps overmatched the bow armour. The second time was with a Scharnhorst. Again it was in my Nagato, but I nailed him while he was broadside on so I'm not sure which shell of the many I hit that actually reached his citadel. So yes it is quite rare, but it's apparently possible to citadel a Tier VII German BB.
Thanks Lord for Tier7 Ranked. Tier 8 we would have had to deal with all the IFHE Kutuzovs.... I am happy - My Scharnhorst, Belfast, Leningrad and Shira are ready and this is going to be a good season :)
Excellent, my only two Tier 7's, the Scharnhorst and Blyskawica, are among the top picks...probably will stick more to Scharn as I still need to learn a lot in the Blys, especially like when to use smoke for anyone but myself
You know, I have been in a argument with several people, who think the Nagato doesnt stand a Chance against the Scharn twins. Glad to see someone who agrees with my point of view.
So do the Flint and the Belfast have contemporary counterparts in 2019? I find your Best ships in Ranked some of your most informative videos that are short and concise. Doing the different Tiers is awesome for those who are still working our way through the lower tiers. Thank you for all your hard work. Saves a lot of us wasted free xp in research.
Maas has exactly same concealment than Blyska (6.8km), Leningrad and Sims. Also torps in the commentary were the stock ones. I don't say it will shine and I will probably use mainly Blyska, but just to be fair - it has the best torps from all gunboats and with the same concealment and sonar it can be very strong in smoked caps. We will see how many Belfasts and Atlantas with radar will spoil life of DD captains.
What should I prioritize on the Blys, CE or AFT? Sadly I haven't been playying her much, as I thought ranked was tier 8 (before the announcement 2 weeks ago) and I was leveling my IJN cpts LOL
I highly disagree with the Indianapolis being bad for ranked battles. I assume that we will see many Belfasts during this season and Indianapolis is one of the cruisers to perfectly counter it with the extremely powerful APs and the potent AA. Otherwise the Indianapolis isn't that good but still a strong ship against DDs and cruisers.
Flamu acm1pt Flamu, your vids are so good these days... I bet you will see a lot "rebalancing" stuff after this season and hopefully that includes the removal of RPF
LMAO in ranked, you would be so lucky to get close enough, ie, 9km to the Belfast in order to radar him in Smoke... you'll be dead from 12km until you get to 8.9km to use your radar. Crap ship IMO.
Flamu can you do something like this for all the ships in the game, or at least the lines you've played? it would be cool to know which are good and which to skip
Hey Flamu, think you can make a video of the recommended builds for ranked season 6? while your 0.6 builds for premiums probably still apply, for the non premiums your videos are mostly geared towards tier 10 and not tier 7. So wondering if you would change anything.
One important part about picking a ship to play is that it has to be a ship you're comfortable playing. For instance, I'm far better with the sneaky _Shiratsuyu_ gameplay over the Russian gunboat playstyle (which is why that's the one DD line I've not done), so _Shiratsuyu_ fits me better. Then again, I don't have those premiums anyway. Also, one detail about _Myoko_, the regular version is better than the ARP ones, because of camo.
I've been playing Colorado for a bit now in ranked and I am surprised by how well I am doing... I've gotten some great kills on Nagatos and such and the Colorado can really give the team a boost with drawing attention away, absorbing torpedos and giving AA cover
Have a question about Commander skills.........Do you change the skills on youre Commanders on the diffrent ships because it's ranked battle and not random ?
I played about 20 ranked games on SEA now and I feel Atlanta is so underappreciated. WG actually began selling the Belfast again during ranked and lots of noobs simply bought it and took it into ranked thinking they will be so powerful. And to a certain extent it is, since many Belfasts is nightmare for any BB player, especially for Nagato and Colorado, since their 25mm armor is paper against 152mm IFHE. So what happened is that ranked is filled with CA(L) (I'll just refer to them all as CA for convenience) with very few BBs and DDs. This makes the Atlanta super strong. HE does so much damage against CAs and DDs, and your rate of fire and radar hard counters any smoke play. Against BBs Atlanta is actually equally good. Side by side, Atlanta is so much thinner than any other CA. In fact, its width is more similar to a DD than to a CA. Therefore most AP overpens it and does negligible damage. Added to this, Atlanta doesn't have citadel under its turrets, so it can actually use the edge of an island to shoot with half of its turrets while spotted. Any AP shots will do normal penetration damage at worst and overpen damage in most cases. Finally USN arcs become an advantage in ranked, since Atlanta can still fire over islands at extremely close ranges. Whereas Belfast has to come out to the open, smoke, and shoot, risking being radared and taking torpedoes, Atlanta can use almost any island as cover because of the high shell arcs. This takes away the danger of torpedoes and radar completely. Although positioning in Atlanta is more difficult than in Belfast due to the lack of smoke, once in an optimal position, the Atlanta is actually more effective than Belfast. Atlanta is not nearly as strong in random battle, as locking down one cap zone is usually not enough to secure a win, and teammates have a tendency of dying for no reason. Added to this Atlanta can't really do long range sniping. However in ranked none of those is an issue. Even better, there is so much cover in ranked (surprisingly) as WG chose many island filled small maps, and there are so many smoke ships at tier 7. When battles happen at close range all the time, Atlanta is a monster. Therefore personally, I think Atlanta should be in the good tier at worst, and possibly even considered a top tier.
Good stuff to know, it's just a shame that no amount of appropriate ships or skilled players will save you if your DDs are clueless and won't spot. That's been my problem for the last few matches, except the ones where I play DD and the rest of the ships won't stay in the smokes Iay for them, nor shoot at targets being spotted XD
I don't have any T7 premiums so I'll have to make do. I'll probably use a mix of the T7s that I have, like Myoko, Pensacola, York, Gneis, Shirayatsu, and Kiev. I play well in all those ships (except for the gnies for some reason) so I'm not too worried. Also, I made rank 4 in the 4th season so I'm pretty confident.
Yo Flamu. Overall I agree and after a while i'm following you I trust you but You watched at this in a really competitive way this time, may not only competitive but also "playng in a team way" IMO. Is it really so above Rank 5? Keep up with this great job m8
You say Ranger is not recommended, I say challenge accepted. But I can agree and would rather take any of the other 2 if I had decided to buy a Saipan and haven't sold the Hiryu. Funny thing is that I rushed for the Shokaku because I could not participate in the last season too much due to the lack of T8 ships, and I have no credits to buy back the Hiryu, but at least I have a Ranger :)
Really lookin forward to ranked videos, allthough its random players, teamplay and tactics is higher than random! love ur vids, but its just more fun if opponents aint random battle potatoes 95% of the time
I wouldn't put the Akatsuki in the "not recommended" list. As you said, in the current meta where everyone hides in smoke, you can easily get your kill with the 3x3 spread, the torps in general are awesome and the guns aren't too bad, actually I think they hit quite hard and the arcs are beautiful, it's just the reload that hurts its performance (the turret traverse can be upgraded). At longer to long ranges I guess it can match a Mahan or a Sims because of their floaty arcs, especially when they are surprised that you actually use your guns without hesitation. Also, I've found the Akatsuki quite difficult to hit and the HP pool sufficient. Its sheer presence might make any BB reconsider pushing...
lol i usually end out chasing down the enemy DDs in my Scharn because the teams cruisers are too focused on getting stuck in to actually play their roles, same with allied DDs.
I think the Pensacola will do just fine with the buff. 10km Detection and 203 mm Sledgehammers that are accurate. The AP is great too. I do fine in her in Random Battles with her nimble profile and decent rudder shift and the concealment buff only helps more with that. I don't need to worry about getting out spotted as the Flint is a pretty rare ship, Atlantas can be dealt with quickly and Belfasts have paper armour. Some good positioning and WASD hacks are all you need. The Akatsuki is also pretty competitive with a fully upgraded captain and the second lowest concealment in the tier. The Shiratsuyu may have TRB but it can only be used once or twice in battle and the torpedo reload is longer in general. The Akatsuki has great torps that go fast and hit hard and have a consistent reload as well. Plus it gives you the versatility of three triple tubes which let you weed out smoke campers or delete them.
You should probably revisit the Yorck. IFHE makes the HE spam that much more potent on it. The gun angles are actually better than that of Myoko. It's also more maneuverable than Myoko. I think it can be quite competitive.
I could differ on the IJN DDs: Shiratsuyu is not so far different than an Akatsuki. They can stay in the same league: A bit less concealement (without flag but with skin and cpt skill concealment is 5.6 vs 6.4) is well traded with 1\3 faster reload torp. Surelly Shira can drop 16 torps "every now and then", but the 3x3 and faster reload of Akatsuki could give more versatility and more "pressure" to enemies...
So we have 2 BBs, 2 CVs, 4 CL (5 with Flint but if you see a Flint user you can only hope he did not die often enough to get one and your chances to win the match rise drasticly) & 4 DDs to pick from. Could be worse. Chat will be fun when people bring their "bad" ships to RB.
I'd say you underestimate secondary builds with German BBs. The Gneisenau has slightly bigger guns then the Scharn and doesn't bounce angled CAs as bad as it's sister often does. You can get it's secondaries to fire up to 7.6km range and since it's tier 7 it benefits greatly from the MSC skill. I think it's right up there with the Scharn as a good pick. Also if dealing with angled BBs you can just spam HE while you close within torp range.
I'm surprised to see the Nagato being better than the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. It looks as if we'll be getting back the old T7 ranked meta for BB's this season. I'll still be using my Scharnhorst, because I really enjoy playing it. :-)
I love my Scharnhorst in Ranked battles. I usually throw on my concrete vest, rope as many people by the ankles as I can and then jump in the ocean. 3 kills, 150k dmg GG
David Racek I'd rate Gneisenau the same as Nagato. But in the hands of a skilled captain, Nagato is far better. Angle and you can bounce anything but 406mm/410mm shells. Gneisenau will be a very popular pick and so will Scharnhorst so the Nagato doesn't really face much of a threat against them if the captain is good at angling and Nagato shells are basically the same as Amagi shells just two barrels less and the Torpedo protection is great as well. 65k HP is also brilliant in a competitive mode. Overall a great all rounder. Gneisenaus may be more forgiving but are easy to counter for a good captain.
sorry to say that but my atlanta can burn you before 3 salvos on me and 6 shells on 12 to 10 km for me is easy to dodge, in counterpart nagato is hell the nagato ap is sooo good as colorado, they do me sometimes 12 to 15 k, without citadel effect but you can buff your nagato with heap and use the japanese he damage in cirscuntances!!!! i will say nagato will be the besy ship in tier 7 with the ricght captain skills and player skill
The Akatsuki is underrated. With the right skill set and tactics it is a very good ship. It's not ment to fight DDs, it's a torp boat. That doesn't mean you can ignore it's guns though. The Akatsuki can rip apartment braodside cruisers with it's AP. HE spam BBs to death with the new HEAP skill. It is a nice versatile ship. One of the best ship in my port and I do very well with it.
I'd say that the Kiev and the Schors while they are the weakest of their class they have an advantage in that they don't have to deal with the smoke radar torp fiasco that's going to be going on in mid. They are effective at range as well as drawing attention away from key assets. It isn't so much a direct advantage but to those who know how to be annoying and a good shot while minimizing their disadvantages these are indeed good ships. Not to say I disagree in that they aren't top tier ships but I don't think they were judged appropriately on their strengths when played well but rather in general against their constituents.
Cyanide7662 lol yeah basically. Playing around that bumfuckery is going to decide battles. Radar, hydro, and torp soup is one way to go about it but so is range as it doesn't have to worry about any of those things. It also counters US ships with their lofty shells. My argument here is that there's more than one way to skin a cat and if you just threw these ships at their competition they would lose but if they're used to their strengths they can be viable. Keeping BBs on fire at range and shooting at you keeps a lot of pressure off your other cruisers and allows them to carry. The Keiv does something similar with belfasts / Atlantas / flints trying to shoot you instead of your BBs / other DDs. Both of them do well against angled BBs with their range, fire rate, and fire chance. Makes me really wish I had a Leningrad as it can do both depending on the situation.
The Saipan has the advantage of being a really good DD hunter. Dead DDs in ranked are an important factor. Also the 3 fighters are perfect for air superiority and spotting constantly the enemy
Well if nagato had its belt streched compleatly over the front magazines + aft magazines then it would actuall values - even if it has its real 289mm magazine armor its still not covered by belt like it was in real Nagato :) - but then again Nagato had front/rear more armored then Bismarck/Tirpizt class and it would be full tier 8 so... And @Flamu Gneis and Scharn can be citadelled - from over 14km range while they broadside or from 3,5-7km range while they are forward angled on you in 35-45deg under frontal turret by Nagato's shells ! (the same range/angle work in Yamato citadelling a Currywurst) it requires training and RNG not to fuck you up, but they can be citadelled
In a one on one, sure. But what about LITERALLY EVERY OTHER SHIP THAT SUDDENLY SEES YOU? The maass has the concealment of a BB when it's firing (that too, a bb specced for concealment)
Ranked gonna be infested with premiums especially saipan, blys and belfast. Assuming its a 7v7, it won't be a surprise to see 1 saipan, 2scharn, 3 belfast and 1 blys in a team
1st priority is against fire, then aircraft You can angle your amor or dodge to reduce dmg from shells or torp but you are too slow and big to dodge the aircraft, so you must shoot them down as much as you can. fire is a common problem, try to minimise the chance and faster fire distingush
***** Well. That sucks as Ive pretty much built it around maxing out the secondaries to 7 kilometers and made it a Destroyer/Cruiser hunter. Chunk them down with the main battery and then have the secondaries finish the job... Its not very effective but it gets the job done. Sort of. Against German battleships it sucks.
I feel so sad for all the Indianapolis owner..... ...oh fuck, I completly forgot - I have one in my port since ages..... "The not even average one at no special section!"
Looking at the selection of ships for rank season, the feeling that EU region, and RU region playing different games. And the real proof of that chose ships for rank games. And this is interesting
Well TOP for us (i mean top league) CV only Hiryu coz Saipan good but his 9 lvl plane lose dogfight, next BS Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, Nagato is prety good but with new 4 point perk for CA (Inertia Fuse) make them very strong. Nagato lose tons of HP from tip and has a weak broadside. СA its Belfast (RLS) Fiji (can recovery HP) and Myoko. DD Sims(mahan) (nice long smoke) Shiratsuyu ( 16 torpedoes in the smoke). Leningrad, Blyskawica, Kiev nice DD but they have short smoke, large radius of the glare. Season Jul in the High League have been mainly from DD Mahan( Sims) smoke/smoke/smoke and CA Myoko. And rarely Nagato
I do not really see big differences in your list and I can see people choose Scharnhorst and Gneisenau above Nagato because of the armor and close quarters combat potential but Nagato has the bigger guns Nagato and colorado will have to make the difference at the beginning and middle of the game in the time that there are still sufficient vessels to smoke them up and stop the Germans from closing in
5 out of 7 ships in the top tier are premium ships, 2 out of 5 ships on good tier are premium ships, all but one on the not recommended ships are non premium ships. This is getting silly WG. I don't like on where this is going. I'll be so pissed if clan wars in the future involves T7 ships. In WOT, most premium tanks are not recommended in Clan wars or team battles, but in WOWS, its a different story. Where the fuck in the WG commitment of not making a "pay to win" in this game???? Btw I'm ranting like this since I am pissed with the unfairness of pay to win in games like this. I have Belfast, Saipan, Leningrad and Blyskawica. I know how strong they are in normal games and sometimes I feel bad for people getting trolled hard by those ships (especially Saipan and Belfast)
don't underestimate the Colorado. Sharn angling? no problem. smash the superstructure for a 12k volley. Belfast spotted? delete. see that Blys running away at 13km? salvo out. there goes half his health. incoming planes? more like incoming gnats. anything that gets within that bofors belt is toast. HE spam? no problem. just heal back half the ship's health in one go. torps? this thing turns better than cruisers. downsides? slow. so people have to wait a bit for their demise. big deal. *Colorado is not for everyone, and not recommended for any but the most seasoned Colorado players. Colorado can and will cause an increased sodium content for both teams involved. Please see a doctor if you experience salt overload, as this can be fatal to those with short tempers. Restrictions may apply.
"In epicenter where spotting enemy DD's and killing them is so important" - Can you make a video repeating this like for a hour? People really need to learn this!
As said, disclaimer. But I do think the Akatsuki can do good. I've had mine run vs both Sims and others with no issues and torp based. 3 volleys with 1 on constant roll reload from stealth. beast.
gneisenau and graf spee to name another you have shown a hatred for both and with about 100 battles on each I have win rates in the 60% range in random on each. Phenomenal survival rates and kill rates and extreme damage on both. They both play like battle cruisers and it apparently is the class I was meant to play but doesn't exist. The gneisenau will be my main ranked ship I do have the jap cruisers in t 7 but I want to win. Moving up to bismark my stats went to crap I do better in all in the gneisenau just love brawling. I suck with torpedoes but having that threat is so powerful. Just veering toward a nagato under 6 km range and I will dictate his turn as he has no choice but to turn to flee for fear of the torps. I don't even need to use them just the threat is enough to make ships expose their broadsides. I expect to crack rank 5 and hopefully see rank 1 this time. The last time the NC had me stuck in rank 9 and 10 at that point I couldn't advance kind of a helpless feeling as your brutally hunted by unseen dds.
nice listing flamu i almost agree with everything except with the sims in my opinion its a really weak ship 4 guns, shitty torps and moderate concealment. maybe i am missing something can u tell me why u suggest the sims?
The Sims has the best maneuverability by far out of all the DDs available. The 4 guns fire quick and turn extremely fast, this makes it excellent at knife fighting combined with its godly agility. Defensive AA and the American smokes provide great utility and even without a carrier in the game, defensive AA allows you to instantly shoot down pesky scout planes. The torpedoes are garbage in the speed and damage department but they are underestimated because they have the least detection for its tier, you can also launch 8 of them and the reload is favorable making them good for area denial. In expert hands the Sims can defeat any other DD in CQC gunfights with its DPM and slipperiness, the key is getting close and making it uncomfortable for your adversary to turn all of their guns on you. If you evade well and keep the engagement at close range the other DD has to either take evasive action (limiting gun performance) or eat your superior DPM with your fast firing and quick traversing guns while you bob and weave like a boss, minimizing the damage you take. Abuse the slower turret traverse of your enemy and fire your water mines while distracting them, you will be surprised how often they hit. I have every T7 DD and I will be using Sims>Błyskawica>Leningrad in that order of preference. This is my opinion as a main destroyer player, take from it what you will.
I see... i knew there is something if Flamu says its a good DD for Ranked Season 6. Thank you for your interesting post :). Quite a lot of text man you wrote there. But it throws a whole new light on the Sims. BTW do you wanna add me in WoWs? My nick is Straw_Kawaii there. Best regs
it is really dependent, akatsuki beat both mahan and shiratsuyuu front on, if it is a BB heavy game, or IJN DD heavy game, akatsuki beat them all. For none prem DD, akatsuki is definitely up there on the top. But this is a P2W season, so expecting the number of prem ship in a game, akatsuki is definitely not recommended. Also akatsuki produce more torp in water than shiratsuyuu, shiratsuyuu produce 8 every 4 torp reload, but akatsuki produce 9 every 3 torp reload, the leverage is 1:3 comparing to 1:2. And the torp reload module only useful when you see a great smoke blob.
Well a Scharnhorst will always be able to remove almost 50% of your HP instantly with Torps + German 2ndaries (Using my Bismarck captain on my Scharn, 7.6km range). I can't remember the last time I lost a brawling match in my Scharn, even being the lower tier in it doesn't matter. Torps you can't miss with unless you're mentally challenged + great 2ndaries let's it go toe to toe with anything... Anything that lets a good Scharn get close will get punished for it.
Akatsuki versus Shiratsuru - Detection and torp reload that has like a 4 minute cool down, yea I will live without 7 torps for a few seconds. Akatsuki has a lower detection than Sims and is only bested by Shiratsuru that I see but Akatsuki has better RoF and faster torp reloads, I believe, than Shiratsuru. Don't have a Lenny or Blyskawica but I'm sure I wouldn't bother with either (not a wallet warrior) but my point is Akazuki is a fair fight to Shiratsuru. The only thing that treats it is itself. They are both very capable ships if you know their limitations (Just tossing this out there for the guys who don't have premiums) Akatsuki is my go to ship and I happened to win a Sims so that is second in line
