Help with 14 point Gneisenau captains skills?

[orangeandblue]

So my captain finally got to 14 points for my Gneisenau. Current set up is 1) Endurance 2) Expert Marksman and then I wanted to emphasize the secondaries and AA so I went 3) BFT and 4) AFT. That leaves me with 4 points to distribute either somewhere else or I could go with Manual Fire Control for Secondaries or Manual Fire Control for AA - or distribute the points elsewhere? Just wondering what the general consensus is? For modifications I have have Main Armament Mod 1, Aiming System Mod 1, Damage Control Mod 1 and Steering Gears Mod 2. Would I need to swap out for AA or secondaries mod if I went with Manual Fire Control for either secondaries or AA? I'm sure that would maximize those benefits of the ship, just wondering 1) Should I? and 2) If so which one? 3) If not - suggestions? Thanks.

[ValkyrWarframe]

I take Priority Target, Expert Marksman, Superintendent, Advanced Firing Training, and Manual Control of Secondaries on my fourteen point captain.

[OgreMkV]

A secondary build almost must have Manual Control of Secondaries. It's a huge benefit. In ranked, almost 25% of my kills are from secondaries. So, yeah, you need that to make it a good secondary build.

My Captain is a little more than 14 points and I'm trying to figure out my next skill, but I have...
Priority Target
Expert Marksman

Adrenaline Rush
Basic Firing Training
Manual Secondaries
Advanced Firing Training

With the secondary flag and both fire flags, I can can tag a DD, then ignore it and focus on another ship while my secondaries do the work. 

[DeadManxDan]

Not a fan of the manual secondaries, I tend to like some survivabilty and adrenaline rush but with 4 point skills man AA might be pretty nice. 

[OgreMkV]

I will say that even without Manual AA, the Gneiss is a brutal AA platform. 

[orangeandblue]

Thanks all. I'll play around with it some and see what I like best. I love blowing enemy aircraft out of the sky and tagging a DD and then targeting main guns on something else also sounds interesting. 

[thatGcat]

been tinkering around with the captain skills myself(admittedly with only a sad 12 pt commander).BFT is the norm for such a build, for my build though, I decided to go with superintendent over BFT. with an extra heal I get regular fireproof ribbons (and a couple dreadnoughts). AFT is a must in my opinion, bc I secondary specd Gneis, boosting the secondary range to 8km is wonderful. 

[GrafClausVonStauffenberg]

How exactly does manual secondary fire control operate?  Do you simply tag a target and let em at it?

[macktkau2]

You have to do a CTRL+Click on a ship/it's healthpool/name area, and the guns fire at it automatically from then. You do need to ensure you don't forget to click/change targets when required.

[Nevermore135]

Secondary builds below tier 8 are questionable, because you can only get the secondary range on Gneisenau and Scharnhorst out to 8km, vs. the 11km+ you see on higher tier ships.

That being said, depending on your goal, I would recommend the following at 14 pts+ on Gneisenau:

Secondary build: PT, AR, SI, FP, AFT. Pick up manual secondaries at 18pts, and then PM at 19. With the lower range of your secondaries, I feel that FP is a better initial investment on the tier VII German BBs - on Bismarck it is more viable to take AFT then manual secondaries at 10 and 14 pts, respectively. PM protects your torpedo tubes and allows you to take the secondary module in slot 1 instead of the main armaments mod. EM is not needed starting with Gneisneau, the turret traverse is good for the rest of the ships in the line. I don’t run BFT on any of my secondary builds. IMO the 10% boost to DPM isn’t worth 3 points and you are better off investing in survivability skills instead to keep your secondaries (as well as your main battery) firing longer. I would run auxilary armaments 1, damage control 1, auxiliary  armaments 1, and damage control 2 modules.

Survival build: PT, AR, SI, FP, CE, JoaT, PM, and EM. This is a pretty standard BB build, with EM being left until last because it’s not nearly as important as it is on other BB lines. You could also swap out PM and either JoaT or EM for BoS, but I don’t find that skill to really be worth the 3 points and don’t run it on most of my ships. For modules, I would run main armaments 1, aiming systems 1, and both damage control modules. Vigilance is also a possibility as you don’t have hydro at tier VII.

[Navalpride33]

14 pts on a Gen...

I suggest FP on top of the secondary build.