RainbowFartingUnicorn

Are you doing ranked right now? I can't imagine Napoli would be more than 29,000 steel (if it ends up being steel) on the grounds that the most expensive Tier X cruiser for steel right now is Austin at 29,000 steel, and only the steel battleships and Franklin D. Roosevelt are more expensive for steel. Even if for some crazy reason it was as expensive as Franklin D. Roosevelt, the coupon cost would only be 24,750 steel, which you could get even just finishing a couple sprints of Ranked in Bronze League right now. The way I look at it is, if WG runs the game into the ground where I don't enjoy it anymore, I mean, what good would all those resources do me anyway? Can't do anything with them outside of WOWS.

That's how things usually go for me. Two coupons a year, and I'll accumulate enough resources for two coal ships and one and a half steel ships, so I'll use a coupon for one of the coal ships and the steel ship.

I won with 100M silver. I mean. What else am I gonna do with a quarter billion silver on hand?

If so, maybe destroyers get immunity to detonations, reduced burn/flood time with automatic DCP and fast DCP reload like CVs do? I'm with Ensign on this one, a ship class nerf is really only a nerf to you as a player if you only played that ship class, otherwise it's both a nerf and a buff.

Don't forget the fun factor is really the most important. I have a bunch of ships that are considered OP, but when it boils down to it, if I'm not grinding something in particular, I have a dozen or so ships I fall back to for regular play, some of which are OP, but many are just decent or pretty good. I keep playing them because they're a lot of fun. A lot of people think Bourgogne is a lot of fun. Personally I am waiting on my steel to see if Napoli ends up being a steel ship, but Bourgogne may be my second choice if it isn't, although I don't have Alsace and don't really play my Jean Bart as much as its popularity would warrant.

I think some respondents are missing the OP's exact point, which is that he's crabby about people bringing stock tech tree ships. A generous interpretation of that would mean that they have just unlocked a ship and are grinding its base modules and have not really played the ship much, so their ship stats are suboptimal and they don't really know what they're doing in that specific ship yet. And I mean, if I had my druthers, I'd rather see a Neptune on my team with all modules researched and 1.5M ship XP than one with all the stock modules and 237 ship XP. But I think that's kind of a minor complaint, though, because when I'm playing Ranked, I care a whole lot more about whether the players on my team are any good and whether or not they communicate and make reasonable battle decisions and have some fun while they're doing it than I do about what ship they're in. I've had losses where my team was stacked with ships considered OP in Ranked, and had wins where the ship roster suggested the battle was stacked against us. I'm not saying that a team with three Neptunes is in as good a starting position as one with three Alaskas, I'm just saying the player driving those Neptunes and Alaskas is a greater determinant of the game result than the ship itself.

Druid has realllly comfortable gunnery. Real comfortable. In Ranked I'd worry more about 1 v 1 duels with other DDs angling well, but in Randoms and Grand Battles so far, it's very rare that people do that, because it's much less likely you'll be in a 1 v 1 situation. I stomped a purple clan player in a Vampire II fairly readily. Druid does not need a lot of broadside to start landing full pens, and in a bow-to-bow fight against another DD, she can disable turrets and shell the superstructure, and the red DD has to show some broadside to launch torpedoes. If the red DD stays bow-on, then Druid has a heal and a massive slug of HP plus stupid reload speed. Other DDs with two bow twin turrets have reloads twice as long. Not saying that an opponent DD will never win, some matchups are really slanted against Druid, which has trouble with French destroyers that also have a lot of hit points, hellacious HE DPM, and aggressive torpedo launching angles and speed. But Druid is far from helpless just because somebody takes a sharp angle. You'll often get at least a few broadside full pen hits because your gunnery is so comfortable against other destroyers even out to 10-12 km. So far I'm liking Druid nearly as much as Friesland, which is saying something, as I am coming up on 600 Friesland games and love that ship.

Plymouth is not bad per se, but is very different from Minotaur, which is generally the stronger ship.

Still holding to see what Napoli ends up being released for, myself. Got 370k coal and 35k steel and my resource ship coupon saved.

I play Random as well, although I do prefer Ranked as a mode, but I was mostly referring to Marceau specifically being more enjoyable in Ranked than in Randoms. I have some ships that are the opposites - Druid so far seems like it will be much more fun in Random.

I can't make Kleber work, but the consensus about Marceau is 100% on point for competitive. I have something like a 40% w/r in Marceau in Randoms, and like a 58% w/r in Ranked. That also reflects how much fun I have with her in each mode. Ranked is a lot of fun, Random... less so.

You'll always get free XP and credits faster in ships you do better in, because your credit earnings are directly derived from your damage done, and your FXP is a flat function of your total XP, which is based on your team performance (win/loss) and personal performance. You'll always get better economy from higher-tier ships vs. lower-tier ships because there is more XP available due to higher health pools per team. An exception is that a Tier X tech tree ship with no service cost reduction from camo or flags where you do poorly in the battle may be a net negative in terms of earned credits. You'll always get better economy from premium or special ships vs. tech tree ships because they have service cost reduction and increased XP baked into the ship with the permanent camouflage. If there is a tech tree ship you really enjoy playing, consider investing in the permanent camouflage for it, which will make it equal to a normal premium or special ship. However, after some time playing, you'll likely have more single-use camouflages, which all have substantially better economic bonuses than the permanent ones, than you can conceivably use, so you will likely be able to use improved econ single-use camouflage on all Random, Scenario, Ranked, or Clan battles. So your best earning ships will be the highest-tier premium or special ship that you like and consistently perform well in. Some ships have improved economy in some way or another, like Missouri, and some special camouflages like the Adler or Kobayashi camos give higher-than-average economy to the ship they're on. But having improved economy from the Kobayashi permanent camouflage on Ashitaka is only worth it if you're actually decent in Ashitaka. If you're a lot better in Scharnhorst or Colorado (with equipped camouflage), then your better performance in other ships will likely outweigh the improved economics of the special permanent camouflage on the ship you're not good in. Unless you're only doing PvE, avoid using signals and good camo on ships when playing co-op. The rewards for co-op are much lower than for PvP modes. If you want to do PvE only, use your signals and camo in Operations, where a win will net you similar XP to a Tier V-VII Random Battle win.

1. Understand the detection penalty from gun bloom when firing in the open and when firing in smoke for your ship. Press 'H' to bring up your ship's stealth characteristics so you know how far away you can be without being proximity detected when firing in smoke. 2. If you're going to farm from smoke, then spread your smoke as far as possible and maneuver within the cloud, don't just sit broadside to the most likely direction of incoming fire square in the middle of the cloud. 3. Don't use smoke screens to block the vision of your teammates unless you're also going to spot for them outside of the smoke. 4. Understand the range and duration of the radar ships in the game from Tier VII.

I think it's amazing, I don't even care about super battleships, but it's feast day for torpedo destroyers. I just load up Benham and the 100k+ damage games roll in.

I am really enjoying Druid so far, but it is definitely unique. Vampire II is not really unique per se, it's a Tier X Haida or a Daring with crawling smoke and no repair. Druid is tough and really enjoyable, but the bow-only guns are challenging to work around. You can't farm from your own smoke for very long because you have short-burst smoke. The AA feels weaker than it is. You need to stay mobile. But it's really fun.