How to use the Langley in random battles

[Ruthless4u]

New CV user ( Langley, upgraded hull but no other upgrades)

I do average ( I think lol) in co op but in random I'm getting my posterior handed to me. No captain skills yet but I would rather random battle than grind co op.

 

Any advice for a noob? Had several groans in text  my last random battle with it when the team realized I'm a new CV player, would like to surprise my team in a good way.

[gmrbull]

Dogfighting expert would be a good captain skill to start with. There are some oddities with the fighter tiers at low tier cvs. Hosho I think has t5 fighters. 

 

Noob rules for CV to live by.

1. If you spot a dd try and keep him spotted until he smokes.

2. Learn what ships to avoid. (Texas is a huge threat to you)  also a solo ship is a juicy target. A group of ships is a bad idea. Patience is a virtue with low hangar numbers.

3. With auto drops and an American cv. A torp strike on most cruisers is doomed to fail unless the guy on the other end total potato.  Hit bbs

4. It’s all about damage over time. When you get a flood that’s usually an auto damage con. Wait 15-20 seconds then follow up with the dive bombers and watch the damage rack up.

5. It’s not about stats. Play the objective and try to protect your team as best you can and you will win. Agree on a flank wor a cap you with your team to dominate and focus your efforts there

6. Get your ship as close to the fight as you can without being detected to maximize time over target for your planes.

 

[Umikami]

Use it as a meat shield, it's finest hour!

[Ruthless4u]

6 hours ago, gmrbull said:

Dogfighting expert would be a good captain skill to start with. There are some oddities with the fighter tiers at low tier cvs. Hosho I think has t5 fighters. 

 

Noob rules for CV to live by.

1. If you spot a dd try and keep him spotted until he smokes.

2. Learn what ships to avoid. (Texas is a huge threat to you)  also a solo ship is a juicy target. A group of ships is a bad idea. Patience is a virtue with low hangar numbers.

3. With auto drops and an American cv. A torp strike on most cruisers is doomed to fail unless the guy on the other end total potato.  Hit bbs

4. It’s all about damage over time. When you get a flood that’s usually an auto damage con. Wait 15-20 seconds then follow up with the dive bombers and watch the damage rack up.

5. It’s not about stats. Play the objective and try to protect your team as best you can and you will win. Agree on a flank wor a cap you with your team to dominate and focus your efforts there

6. Get your ship as close to the fight as you can without being detected to maximize time over target for your planes.

 

Thanks for the advice

 

I found in my 2 random matches that my fighters are getting torn apart. Is it worth upgrading my fighters or should I save my XP on progress to the bouge?

 

Also, how much damage should I be doing in co op matches, I think my average is between 25-30k. Not sure if that's where I should be damage wise or if I need massive improvement.

[Taylor3006]

6 minutes ago, Ruthless4u said:

Thanks for the advice

 

I found in my 2 random matches that my fighters are getting torn apart. Is it worth upgrading my fighters or should I save my XP on progress to the bouge?

 

Also, how much damage should I be doing in co op matches, I think my average is between 25-30k. Not sure if that's where I should be damage wise or if I need massive improvement.

You need upgraded fighters, fly the AA signal, and IMHO, have at least a 10 point captain with appropriate captain skills, a 12 is much better, to make the Langley work well. Also you must lock down enemy fighters early and over friendly AA to have much a chance. If you lose the fighter war, you will lose your ability to contribute to the team. Spotting DDs is important work but is second only to killing all enemy fighters and then taking out enemy attack planes.

Personally I would max out Langley first and grind the captain as far as you can before going to Bogue. It isn't how fast you get the next ship, it is more important to have a skilled captain to put in the next ship in the line. Master tier 4 first then go on.

I am a crap player in most ships but I do really well in Langley and pretty good with Bogue.

[gmrbull]

To double down on what Taylor said. Try and engage the enemy fighters on your terms and over your fleet so the friendly AA can help with the fight. Upgrade all of your modules on the Langley before heading to the bogue and make sure you have a solid understanding of what a good cv player should be doing.  In the bogue you will see tier 7 mm so don’t be in a rush to get there until you are ready.  

My high game in the Langley was 130k damage, but this involved some seriously good rng with fires and flooding.  I think if you can average between 30 and 50k while winning over 50% you are doing great.

[MrSparkle]

Don't engage enemy fighters over enemy ships. That's about the best advice I can give. When the Langley lost manual drops it lost its teeth. You aren't actually learning how to CV when you don't have manual drops. I think that's why I'm seeing Independence players auto dropping and strafing friendly planes out of the sky.

[Ruthless4u]

1 hour ago, MrSparkle said:

Don't engage enemy fighters over enemy ships. That's about the best advice I can give. When the Langley lost manual drops it lost its teeth. You aren't actually learning how to CV when you don't have manual drops. I think that's why I'm seeing Independence players auto dropping and strafing friendly planes out of the sky.

That's one thing that bugs me. Grinding 2 tiers and then have to relearn everything once I hit tier 6.

Its made me tempted to buy a premium carrier just to actually learn how to play them. But a noob in a higher tier premium is not good for anyone involved.

They really need the U.S.S Wolverine as a premium trainer at tier 5 lol.

[manon45]

Langley and Bogue are probably the 2 easiest CV's to dominate with as they just have so much raw firepower in their fighters they swat the other CV's planes out of the air and take complete air superiority, a Hosho stands no chance against a competent player in a langley and a zuiho stands no chance against a bogue just keep bullying them and dont ever give them a chance to retake the skies.

[Numbah18]

To added a bit of my own advice keep an eye on your mini-map. When Playing the Langley and the Bogue it is VERY IMPORTANT that you know where every single enemy and allied ship is or was. You can turn on show previous locations from the gear above your mini-map. Try to stay with your team and be the first to turn around if it looks like your line is breaking. If you have 4 of your fighters against 4 IJN fighters you have a decent chance of losing that fight unless you have some decent AA support.

[Taylor3006]

9 hours ago, manon45 said:

Langley and Bogue are probably the 2 easiest CV's to dominate with as they just have so much raw firepower in their fighters they swat the other CV's planes out of the air and take complete air superiority, a Hosho stands no chance against a competent player in a langley and a zuiho stands no chance against a bogue just keep bullying them and dont ever give them a chance to retake the skies.

In a straight one on one the IJN captain has almost no chance of winning the air war at low tiers. Bogue runs into the problem of having to fight tier 6 ships at times and this is a problem. I always end up in a match where the enemy fleet has one or two Clevelands and they just massacre your aircraft if you are not paying attention. 

[manon45]

1 minute ago, Taylor3006 said:

In a straight one on one the IJN captain has almost no chance of winning the air war at low tiers. Bogue runs into the problem of having to fight tier 6 ships at times and this is a problem. I always end up in a match where the enemy fleet has one or two Clevelands and they just massacre your aircraft if you are not paying attention. 

I was purely talking about the CV vs CV game, never at any point should someone think that their planes are safe just because the enemy CV runs out.

[Taylor3006]

4 minutes ago, manon45 said:

I was purely talking about the CV vs CV game, never at any point should someone think that their planes are safe just because the enemy CV runs out.

I agree with you totally, was just expounding a bit on Bogue play is all. 

[alexbond45]

On 1/16/2018 at 9:29 PM, Ruthless4u said:

New CV user ( Langley, upgraded hull but no other upgrades)

I do average ( I think lol) in co op but in random I'm getting my posterior handed to me. No captain skills yet but I would rather random battle than grind co op.

 

Any advice for a noob? Had several groans in text  my last random battle with it when the team realized I'm a new CV player, would like to surprise my team in a good way.

IJN player here

 

first, ALWAYS UPGRADE YOUR FIGHTERS ASAP! If you enter a random battle with downtiered fighters you are in for a hellish time. This is true for ALL CVs REGARDLESS. 

Next, if you are facing a Langley you have to try to engage his fighter over friendly AA. Because the other Langley is new try to see if you can lure his fighter with your Bombers, then rip his fighter apart. Don't engage over DD AA because DDs don't have good AA. Mouse over ships in pre-game and look for those with the highest AA Value. Those will help decide the fighter battle.

When facing a Hosho, just straight-up out-muscle his fighter squadron. You will lose over enemy AA, but otherwise having more planes always wins in a fighter battle where you click/tag another squadron.

[Ruthless4u]

Tried another random, my Langley and a hosho vs another Langley and hosho

 

Did better, ravaged some fighter squadrons but the green hosho player did not communicate so it made it rough. End of the day lost most of my fighters but kept my TBs and DBs mostly intact. Ended up losing the match, 60k dmg with one kill( DBs got him after I sank) 20 planes shot down. Not stellar by any stretch but I'm slowly improving. IIRC 4 match in randoms with it.

 

Thanks for the advice guys it's helping a lot.

[OR56]

On 1/17/2018 at 11:23 AM, manon45 said:

Langley and Bogue are probably the 2 easiest CV's to dominate with as they just have so much raw firepower in their fighters they swat the other CV's planes out of the air and take complete air superiority, a Hosho stands no chance against a competent player in a langley and a zuiho stands no chance against a bogue just keep bullying them and dont ever give them a chance to retake the skies.

I have been wondering, the fighters just seem to fly around the carrier and don’t go and engage planes out in the battlefield, how do you use the fighters, they just auto take off as soon as I’m spotted and do nothing unless I’m approached by enemy planes, and then they only fly about 3 or 4 kilometers away before returning to circle the carrier.

[Wolfswetpaws]

41 minutes ago, OR56 said:

I have been wondering, the fighters just seem to fly around the carrier and don’t go and engage planes out in the battlefield, how do you use the fighters, they just auto take off as soon as I’m spotted and do nothing unless I’m approached by enemy planes, and then they only fly about 3 or 4 kilometers away before returning to circle the carrier.

Most of the posts in this topic are from 2018.
Several changes have happened in the game since then, and some of them affected Aircraft Carrier game-play.

I left some information for you in the other topic that you created.