GoldPile

Have you been playing the Balao? The German variant gets down to 5.4km surfaced, better than most DDs at T6. Also have you checked to make sure you’re not transitioning from operating depth to periscope or hovering in a depth between those 2 levels?

Back in the day the concept of icebreaker bows were a foreign concept as well. I’m not sure how well it would pan out if they tried it again today with some cruisers being able to facetank 460s unless all icebreakers were gutted. Then you got premiums that would still retain theirs so it would just be a hard nerf for tech tree ships. I have a different theory on why it was so unpopular, citadels. If they were to attempt it again and gut bow armor from all high tiers down to 25mm then all BB citadels needs to be lowered and moved internally. In exchange for being forced into more broadside play you also are less prone to citadels which translates into better healing and less overall damage taken. When the nerf was tested on Yamato it was so unpopular because that thing eats cits up the side and was a very unflexible ship for most people (awful turret traverse). Then you got the question on what to do with cruiser icebreakers. Anyway just my 2 cents.

Don’t forget the casual unicums, there are dozens of us I tell you... dozens!

I’ve been thinking if flak shoots down a lot of planes while recalling, does flak armor reduce plane loss on return?

Do you enjoy dodging Halland torps? Get ready because now you'll be dodging homing Halland torps.

Missouri seems to have a certain magic property that gets the stealth nerf claims out. I don't think I've seen any ship get as much stealth nerf dispersion conspiracies than MO.

That’s pretty normal behavior, one should not blindly sail straight while detected for extended periods of time. I mean sure it can be fun dropping a full load into an inattentive BB but once you start fighting decent players they will start doing more preemptive dodging. Especially if they haven’t fired for awhile and are now suddenly lit, that’s basically a DD around me alarm.

It’s funny when you bring up stat comparisons of Yamato vs Musashi as mine show similar results. I’m an avid Yamato enjoyer, one of my OG BBs that’s big and historical. They now have basically the same amount of battles in terms of sample size, which I believe are significant enough. Musashi has a slightly higher win rate, average damage, average frags, significantly worse planes destroyed, and lower PR than Yamato (lol). Colorado vs Musashi is basically a meme at this point.

To me it’s more of a frontline tank enabler that lets you survive under sustained HE spam, if the enemy doesn’t try to aim for the bow or stern then you’ll be under one fire for most of the engagement. If you’re kiting for example you probably see less use as you’re probably not wanting to get spammed to death. It’s also a nice middle finger to Thunderers that shatter HE on GK’s belt and set one fire. So YMMV is correct if you have good fire management or if the play style does not necessitate FP. But for players who think, “wow I keep burning to death fires are [edited]”, then I highly recommend FP (and more survivability skills in general), it’s a good universal skill.

Ironically Musashi AA is better than the RTS CV days. It can actually shoot down a few planes. I found horrible AA to be a funny balancing factor to move a Yamato down 1 tier as Yamato herself has garbage AA. What makes her deadly is not that she faces T7s as any T9 BB can do that. It’s that she’s extra dangerous in T10.

People should really take FP more.

An articulate and well thought out rebuttal, absolutely devastated.

I’ll be frank with my personal assessment and probably rank your overall as average, maybe slightly below, based on the stats you provided. First thing I noticed is that your average damage is on the low side. This is class dependent as those damage numbers would be considered very good on most DDs. But as a high tier BB I would say a good goal to strive for is to do as much damage as your max HP (or close to it). Are you finding targets? How early are you dying? How often are you bouncing or overpenning? Are you tanking and retreating when appropriate? Are you missing a lot? Diagnose your performance objectively and think, what could you have done differently. Did you position yourself in a good spot? How could you have aimed better? Many things come to mind. Without a replay we cannot see exactly what you’re doing wrong but if you want some tips for getting better by yourself: 1. Always play with alt mode enabled - Full. It’s in your settings on the control tab. You will see exact HP numbers, ship names, and most importantly the time to target on your shells. No more guessing how many seconds to aim ahead, it’s right there. 2. Enable ship names on the mini-map. Knowing where and who your enemies are is important. 3. Press Z to enter shell cam while shells are in flight. Now you see with full clarity how your shells are dispersing and where they fly off to. I don’t see this mentioned very often but this is one way I gradually improved my aim. It eliminates any depth perception shenanigans that you may encounter. 4. Maybe more of an anti-tip, citadels are not the end all be all especially against good BB players. Blindly following the mantra of “aim at the waterline” is a good way to bounce your shots or miss completely if your target decides to WASD at range (or even just angle). 5. Avoid dying, not because of repair costs (you pay full regardless) but because a dead ship deals no damage. I win more games just by staying alive and finding opportunities, plus you’re not handing the enemy team free points. In regards to your performance differences, remember that tech tree ships have a stock grind and you probably played them before you were more experienced. With Hizen right out the gate you’re fully kitted with a high level captain I assume.

3x Shimakaze and Old Islands of Ice were quite an experience. I wouldn’t mind dropping the detection on the Shimakaze 20km torps in today’s environment.