El2aZeR

Ah, you've missed out on quite a lot then. I started sometime late 2016 or early 2017, still remember the Fall 2017 event was the first one I actually managed to clear. I still login every day and do my dailies but contemplated quitting many times. The last few events have become increasingly stupid in difficulty and/or gimmicks (e.g. the last event had a new node type that combined subs with invulnerable CVs). Nostalgia is pretty much the only thing keeping me going. But yeah, the people behind KC seem to have little interest in anything outside of Japan. Truly a shame.

One of the main artists for KC even drew two pieces for WoWs. (Spoilered for size. Also jesus that was ~7 years ago, now I feel old. ) I remember this being taken as a sign for a potential collab back then but unfortunately that never materialized.

To be honest it's not the rear firing tubes you should make your decision on but your overall playstyle. Gato is a shotgun boat through and through, both of its torp types are primarily used for this purpose. Thanks to its excessive alpha and nonexistent torp spread shotgunning with Gato is devastatingly effective being able to cripple to near death or outright destroy even BBs in a single full salvo. For that it trades a lot of comfort as you've pointed out. If you like the safety 2501 affords you and/or prefer to play subs more at a distance then Gato is not for you. But if you were already very comfortable with a shotgun playstyle in lower tier subs which Gato more or less mimics then it is more than a worthwhile pickup.

Except leaving cover does not negate the squadron. It simply means that they can no longer take advantage of cover to attack, but that in itself is advantageous as they have dictated enemy positioning. A regular open water attack is also still to the advantage of the CV as a squad that is capable of taking advantage of cover is by no means reliant on it. I'm also unaware of any ship that can drastically change it's position within the 15 seconds or so (assuming average speed) that aircraft can be seen approaching before an attack is started. In relation to the speed of the average aircraft their concealment is excellent. CVs do it far more efficiently and can chase down enemy ships guaranteed. RL does not give you the ability to do that. A 5 minute search time for a CV is greatly exaggerated, it is ironically far more likely for any other class to be unable to find an enemy ship in that timeframe. Irrespective of the capability of other classes to do the same CVs have a severe advantage here. Compared to other ordinance aircraft are far more reliable and thus have the advantage irrespective of their supposed disadvantages in aiming characteristics as the trade is still heavily in favor of CVs. Their ability to spot far outclasses every other class, being supposedly forced to reengage rather than engage immediately is comparable to waiting on your turrets to turn and far superior at that. There are also plenty of squad types that can in fact make first approach attacks even on the stealthiest ships, claiming this supposed restriction applies to all aircraft is false. The ability to trade aircraft, a readily available, regenerating and highly reliable damage source, for enemy HP is one of the greatest strengths CVs possess. It is the primary reason why CVs stand head and shoulder above all other classes when it comes to damage efficiency and flexibility. There is no other class that possesses anything coming even remotely close. It would only be a disadvantage if damage could be near or outright completely denied via input from the targeted ship, but that is currently and in the rework never has been the case. You are once again reducing your viewpoint to only CVs which makes your arguments fundamentally flawed. In comparison to regular surface ship mechanics the restrictions that CVs work with are minuscule trade offs compared to the vast advantages that they are afforded - and thus in the overall picture are no longer restrictions, they are outright advantages. Ironically RTS CVs were far better designed than reworked ones (which doesn't say much given how butchered the current implementation is) but that isn't particularly relevant anymore.

Fair enough. :) Still, if you're willing an experiment you can do is to vary between a full AA build, using only DFAA and not using anything related to AA at all. I can guarantee you from experience that you'll feel no difference between a full AA build and taking only DFAA in practice since flak is where most of your damage to aircraft will be coming from, especially when you play a ship that has little AA DPS like Shchors. And you'll likely rarely miss the presence of DFAA as well since most CV players will fail against regular flak or any of the other skill check built into CV play, resulting in little if any damage dealt regardless. Assuming the enemy CV is not a potato (which to be fair is not gonna be the case often as already pointed out): Cover is a no go, a CV merely has to choose the right squad to negate it at which point it becomes a burden - which CVs can do well in advance of a strike since ships are not nearly as fast as aircraft and thus their positioning becomes predictable. Concealment likewise is up to the CV to negate. Enemy positions can be triangulated using aircraft concealment and basic map awareness (as well as possible mods such as the one which shows the detection status of your allies). That leaves maneuverability which likewise can be negated to a lesser or higher level depending on the squad type. As such mitigation is possible, but complete damage avoidance is typically a subject only to RNG if even that as aircraft are not bound by traditional aiming methods nor positioning. This is different to shells and torpedoes where both sides can make predictions and/or positional plays to negate or score guaranteed damage. No other class than CVs has ordinance that can spot either for example. My point is calling out what other classes can or cannot do as a reason to justify why something should not happen to CVs is a disingenuous argument to make as many aspects of CVs are unique to them only, often to their advantage. If the reason for why CVs should not get negated by DFAA is because there is no such thing against damage types of other classes, then conversely planes should not be controllable, they should not spot and CVs should be forced to play like every other class as well with all corresponding advantages and disadvantages. Since that clearly is not the case, CVs should be treated as the unique minigame they actually are and thus should fall under their own unique game design restrictions - which currently is also not the case as for the most part they instead combine all advantages surface ships possess with the unique ones they enjoy.

Except given that the majority of the plane kills you scored were due to flak, how can you be sure that your investment into AA was actually worthwhile since the enemy CVs would have likely failed against non buffed flak anyway? And likewise how can you be sure that it will hold up against CV players who do not regularly eat flak? This is terrible advice. Not only are you reducing your DPS to a typically negligible amount, depending on the attack angle you're also lessening flak exposure rather than increasing it. The damage output of all other classes can be reduced to 0 using cover, concealment and/or maneuverability. Is that bad game design too or why do CVs need to be an exception?

In terms of top level performance, Malta is in my opinion part of the top T10 CV lineup. Haku dominates in BB/CA heavy matches. Midway takes the edge in DD heavy ones. Malta murders ones that have lots of CLs it can nuke. So it is better than the majority of T10 CVs and draws roughly even with the best ones, being either situationally stronger or weaker than them depending on MM. It is also vastly more forgiving to play than the other aforementioned two. Does that make it overpowered? Up to you to decide.

There was no island on your starboard side. It was long behind you and thus no longer played any part in the engagement. And ironically the way the enemy CV conducted his follow up took far longer than the optimal approach as he needed to build distance to attack you from the rear whereas an attack from the side would've only required continuous turning. Thus the attack angle he chose was not only significantly worse, it prolonged AA exposure as well. Continuous attacks with no loss of long term capability are often possible. Attacking an AA ship twice typically does not even register on losses unless you misplay and get your entire squad wiped by flak. Assuming a typical 2 squad rotation with standard squad sizes and reserves along with a loss rate of 6 planes per squad, loss of capability can mathematically be noticed by the time you fly out your 5th squad which I found to be about right in practice. At that point your target should be dead or at least dying. As for why in this situation the CV didn't attack you, I suggest you ask him. I can only assess that he played poorly, not why he did so.

I can also offer you videos to watch if you'd like, though all of them are fairly dated since I never planned on being a content creator and only uploaded videos for the amusement of a few others I know. https://www.youtube.com/@Inferno083/videos I have explained in detail why attacking ships with "strong AA" is not a big deal at the beginning of the match provided you have the skill to consistently evade flak and get your strikes on target. If you disagree, that's fine. The reasons why people have issues with CVs are varied but can be generally summarized in these few categories. In no particular order: 1. CVs have excessive influence on the match, far more than any other class. This is statistically proven as skilled CV players reach much higher solo WRs than others which trickles down accordingly. In terms of match influence a CV is roughly equivalent to a full surface ship division. 2. Interaction with CVs is primarily a dull numbers game along with a skill check for the CV player, putting the CV player in primary control of the fight. Whether you get hit for substantial damage or not is primarily up to the skill of the CV player, so as a surface ship player you essentially get to do nothing but put over your rudder and then watch as the CV player either fails or succeeds. For most this is boring at best, extremely frustrating at worst. 3. Supposed positional counterplay against CVs typically comes at the cost of overall match influence, as such the team that employs it is more likely to lose and the enemy CV still wins out. It also dumbs down the game into purely trading damage if both teams feel pressured to do it. CVs meanwhile are free of such restrictions, they enforce suboptimal positions on others or potentially make them suffer for not doing so but themselves are able to freely position optimally which is unfair. 4. CVs are seen as a coddled class - which is not without reason given that WG has in the past reverted significant nerfs that brought them closer to being balanced. CVs are also allowed a much bigger margin of error than surface ships, for example they can lose entire squadrons a few times in a row and still have planes to spare while surface ships can get sent back to port for making only one major mistake of similar magnitude. 5. CV play is a minigame that has practically no relations to the core gameplay experience of everything else and is thus deemed unfitting. The CV only really attacked you once at the end and it is an excellent example of the enemy CV failing to capitalize on the limited maneuverability surface ships possess. To illustrate: The enemy CV basically failed by themselves, thus allowing you to evade. If the enemy CV had actually been skilled you would have died even if you had tried turning the other way as plane attack execution would've been faster than your rudder could keep up with. This seems to be the most common reason why a player may have no issues with CVs, that most CV players, like most other players in any other class, are too incompetent to capitalize on what their ship is actually capable of. And while it is valid, it is also purely subjective.

Can't really say, I don't have Aquila. To be entirely honest I see that ship played so rarely that i frequently forget it even exists and I would assume that has a reason.

I spent my f2p doubloons on it that I've accrued over the years. I wouldn't say I regret it but I definitely wouldn't again if I could get a redo. The AP rockets are really funny when you are able to nuke a cruiser out of existence but fall off quickly if that doesn't happen either because the cruisers actually angle or there are simply no cruisers around to nuke. They still tend to do quite decent damage against BBs but nothing that other T8 CVs cannot easily exceed. There are a couple of CVs you can also nuke out of existence, this should be taken advantage of if possible. The torpedo bombers have ok alpha per attack but unfortunately have a gimped squad layout of only 2 attacks, so against any kind of meaningful AA you'll be limited to one full attack. Many other T8 CVs have higher per attack alpha and are able to double up, thus Colossus tends to fall heavily behind. The bombers are typical RN level bombers, thus unfortunately a burden more than anything. The planes are on the slower side but it is bearable, sustain is terrible with low deck reserves and a fairly long regeneration time. It should also be noted that no squad is able to effectively engage DDs. AP rocket hits can score ok if the DD obliges but are otherwise ineffective. Torpedoes can be used but will be inefficient at best. The less is said about the bombers the better. On the ship side Colossus is awfully slow. The armor is terrible with a citadel sticking far up the hull though it is fairly small. Concealment is very good at least. Overall Colossus is on the weaker side as far as solo carry potential is concerned. It lives and dies almost entirely by its AP rockets and those can be fairly easily neutered as is usual with AP rockets in general. I wouldn't recommend getting it unless you really enjoy the thought of occassionally nuking a cruiser or CV out of existence. I have heard it's an excellent CV for operations though.

Frankly this issue should've gotten hotfixed if there has been a fix ready to go all this time.

No, Malta cannot cit any T10 CV. It can however still score quite significant penetration damage. I've seen a screenshot of one bomb drop scoring 30k on a Midway, though in my experience you'll usually do around 15-20k under favorable circumstances.

It does. Most long range AA is largely ineffective, being weaker or equivalent to the total AA output of a Shimakaze. You're essentially saying that putting a Shimakaze between you and enemy planes is somehow going to save you. Sitting at range also severely limits your ability to contribute to a flak screen especially given that most CVs only needs to clear 2-3 walls to conduct an attack to begin with. The CV is in full control over flak spawns and therefore even if saturated to the maximum it can be defeated fairly easily if they're skilled enough. Regardless of the ability of the CV however bunching up still leaves you in a worse position for the overall battle, thus expanding the influence of a CV player. And ironically if the CV player is bad so that bunching up does actually limit them, chances are high it is unnecessary to begin with and only serves to shaft your ability to fight all other players. I like to think I have extensive experience. (most of these are played solo; removed RTS CV stats for the sake of relevance) Feel free to browse. https://wows-numbers.com/player/526953200,El2aZeR/ Stalingrad AA even if boosted by DFAA is nothing special and can be fairly easily penetrated. This is partially because Stalingrad's DFAA only provides a 25% boost in DPS unlike regular DFAA and the base numbers are nothing to write home about beyond the long range aura. I'm not at least in a general sense. What I am saying is that a CV only needs to be half decent to make the plane - HP trade worth it. And that is assuming a trade even took place to begin with. For example lets say you're in a BB and get attacked by a standard 9x3 torpedo bomber squad. You turn into the first attack, eat one or maybe two torps if you're unlucky, then because you're locked in a turn and cannot quickly change it further you eat the second attack in full. For this you've shot down 4 planes out of 9, however because the enemy CV is cycling on a 2 squad basis in reality you've only killed one plane. The trade here is thus 1 plane vs a significant amount of HP loss on your part even if you've maneuvered perfectly, making it favorable for the CV player. And again, with some squadrons it in fact does not matter how you maneuver if the enemy CV is able to abuse their characteristics as they can either follow your turns without loss of accuracy (US DBs are infamous for that) or do not care about an attack angle to begin with (e.g. squads that have circular drop patterns with roughly equal ordinance distribution, Hornet's tactical B-25 squad comes to mind as a premier example). I've only ever coached one player (an experience that pretty much cemented to me that coaching is not my thing). He looks pretty successful to me. It is not an approach I would suggest to inexperienced players by any means as they tend to lack the basic mechanical ability to pull it off, but for advanced players it is a fairly easy way to cruise to a high WR at least in my experience.

Fix it by running Cunningham.