Help with DD?

[Sglare]

HI, I am a new player. I just got the langley and have been playing around a bit. I've watched a lot of youtube videos already, learned how to do the manual drops etc all the fundamental things. I don't have much trouble hitting enemy ships - except for dds. Am I just ultra bad or is this a full troll experience? I can't ever seem to hit a DD, and if they are hunting me it really sucks. I just came out of a game where I did a manual torp drop on top of one, and instead of just beating the spread or turning like most do, he literally just flipped and OUTRAN them lengthwise - is this a joke? wtham I supposed to do. Thanks for any help to a new cv driver

 

[tortelloni]

It's just really really hard to hit a DD, especially if the DD is good. It's intended to be that way though. Each and every ship and every ship line has to have a counter for the game to continue to exist. If DD's could be countered by CV easily you would have an "I Win" button Except then matches would never happen or the matchmaker would be changed and it would be 15 CV vs 15 CV.

 

Heck, I hate CV's, so much so I only play DD's except maybe a couple matches per week/month just to avoid being ez xp for others. May be a reason so many matches feature DD's is more and more players get fed up with being prey and swap to predator.

 

Good luck though. Look forward to seeing you in game

[Sglare]

Ah ok, thanks for the info

[BelgaraththeSorcerer]

DD's are really hard to hit as a carrier with only of set of attack planes, generally you have to make them commit to a turn without actually attacking so that they cant dodge due to their rudder being turned.... In a langley it will be very hard as most DD's o as fast or faster than the torps from your planes, you just have to be lucky and drop a very good set of torps at a enemy who cant maneuver.... It will get easier once you get Dive Bombers that can knock out the DD's steering/engine 

[Lunarrise]

With differences in rudder shift time and turning radius, some destroyers are easier to hit than others, but it still requires a degree of luck and skill to do regardless. Dive bomber squadrons that become available on later ships are a preferred option for hitting destroyers, their high explosive bombs stand a good chance of starting fires and knocking out engines, as well as being harder for destroyers to dodge.

 

In the mean time, I know the Langley is slow and shouldn't be in the fight, but try to at least stay within firing range of some of your teammates at the back of the line. They can help you deal with destroyers. This may also make it easier to successfully hit destroyers with your torpedoes. If they are forced to split their focus between trying to shoot you and avoiding fire from your teammates, they make a mistake and fail to notice an incoming torpedo bomber squadron in time. I am a fairly good destroyer player but still new, and I admit I have made this mistake before. And as hard as it is to hit destroyers with air-dropped torpedoes, at least they don't take many hits to sink.

[Sglare]

In general it really seems like torp drops need a move speed buff increase, not just because of DDs.. With the minimum arming range, a driver paying attention can often avoid most if not all of the torps. Usually land 1-2 torps of the spread, which isn't all that much damage considering the time investment. Then fly all the way back etc, it's really a lot of downtime for such little reward

[Camo68]

At your level the panes are not really good enough to reliably target DDs. As lunarrise said you need to work with your team and rely on them, particularly CAs, to counter DDs. You counter CVs/BBs which frees up CAs to act etc.

 

At higher levels this mechanic changes in your favour, when you get to Essex & Midway it is almost impossible to dodge well aimed torps.

[Sglare]

I guess I need to keep practicing then, because even on a crusier I usually only hit 1-2 torps if they are paying attention and take evasive actions. Which just seems really lackluster into their hp pool considering all the time to fly back and forth

[_Zergling]

Its much harder for USN cvs to torp dds because they only get 1 TB squad until tier IX. IJN is much easier because you can torp from behind to keep the DD going in one direction, them torp perpendicular to your previous torps to catch the dd in a cross pattern. 

 

My advice as a fellow USN cv player is to fake a drop by flying towards the DD to make it oversteer. most dds dodge TBs by anticipating where they come from and steer accordingly. If you do it right then you will catch the DD out with his rudder all the way to one direction, then you can just fly to his other side and drop. It gets a lot easier once you get higher tier TBs because they get a lot faster allowing you to outmaneuver dds.