Bogue (post 02/17/2016 patch) - viable squads?

[old_radagast]

With the Langley getting a free (admittedly weak) Dive Bomber squadron this patch, the Bogue almost seems like a step down from it now - one less squad in the air by default, and two heavily skewed advanced squad options - one for air superiority, the other pure strike. But strike loses to air superiority, and air superiority loses to, well... the other guy having ships that basically can't be hurt by your fighters. Admittedly, the step up in dive bombing capabilities is nice, when dive bombers work...

 

So, what do you folks do with your Bogue's to make them relevant in a match? Just curious - thanks!

[SireneRacker]

With the Langley getting a free (admittedly weak) Dive Bomber squadron this patch, the Bogue almost seems like a step down from it now - one less squad in the air by default, and two heavily skewed advanced squad options - one for air superiority, the other pure strike. But strike loses to air superiority, and air superiority loses to, well... the other guy having ships that basically can't be hurt by your fighters. Admittedly, the step up in dive bombing capabilities is nice, when dive bombers work...

 

So, what do you folks do with your Bogue's to make them relevant in a match? Just curious - thanks!

 

I prefer the fighter-heavy loadot but only because of what I think about Carriers. I want a Carrier to achieve air-superiority and after that maybe go aggressive.

[barbeerian]

Stick with the stock loadout of 1/1/0 it's the most versatile. Your fighters are strong enough to outplay a 2/0/1 Bogue if you're smart. Bait them into friendly AA, and make good use of strafe. Make sure to keep your TBs safe and only strike when you can find opportunities where they won't get intercepted coming or going (until you've bled their fighter squadrons down). It's surprisingly easy to bleed down their plane count since they have to split their reinforcements between three squads. Once they're down on planes you can start really racking up the damage, something the 2/0/1 can't do if/when it clears the skies.

 

VS another stock loadout Bogue it just comes down to who can outplay the other since you can both strike and have equal air defense capability.

VS a strike Bogue you'll be laughing. Your fighters pretty much get to eat his squads with impunity as long as you don't get cocky and try intercepting his TBs overtop of an enemy Cleveland or something. Since they can't intercept your TBs you get to pick and choose the 'perfect' target for every run and get free damage.

VS a Zuiho your fighters are much stronger and you have a larger supply of them. He can still outplay you but if you stay sharp you'll quickly drain his fighters and then be able to intercept his strikes while sending your TBs out unchallenged.

[old_radagast]

Thanks for the thoughts - could a moderator please move my thread here to the American Carrier section? I apologize for cluttering up the general discussion forum. I admit I didn't even look for other forums when I did a Google search to get here.

 

It's funny and sad: with the dive bomber addition to the Langley, it feels like a whole new ship since even the weak dive bombers give it extra board presence (2 strikers instead of 1, more damage applied in a short amount of time, etc.) - looks like the Bogue is a straight downgrade in every meaningful way, with a weaker default loadout (less board presence, even if the planes are better) and two screwy "advanced" loadouts that are both, arguably, weaker. Not a much of a way to encourage people to keep grinding American CV's - getting from tier 5 to tier 6 is brutal if you play casually and have a lot of ships you enjoy playing, so I'll be stuck in the Bogue for a while - though nerfing American ships, CV's in particular, seems to be the theme lately, sadly. Oh, well.

[giovybez]

Langley bombers are useless. I've been playing all morning and I've yet to get a single hit with them. Even a full squadron dropping on a stationary BB resulted in 0 hits. I got frustrated let it auto drop a few times... 0 hits. I've decided to use them as decoys from here on out.

[Numbah18]

The Bogue was already a step down from the Langley in most was. You have less secondary coverage, You have a smaller reserve, You are easier to spot, and almost everyone can out run you or hit you from far away. Only thing the Bogue really has over the Langley is it's AA which can actually be pretty effective.

I did have a fairly good time going with the default loadout though.

[old_radagast]

Langley bombers are useless. I've been playing all morning and I've yet to get a single hit with them. Even a full squadron dropping on a stationary BB resulted in 0 hits. I got frustrated let it auto drop a few times... 0 hits. I've decided to use them as decoys from here on out.

 

Huh... that's odd... I freely admit I had zero experience in Dive Bombers until they added them to the Langley, and while damage output is low (only a 250 lb bomb), I've had no problems hitting things, including blowing away an enemy destroyer, hitting a full-speed Hosho, etc. Note that I'm not saying this to criticize you or "brag about my skills" because I don't consider myself anything but "decent" at this game - I'm honestly wondering what the difference is that we're seeing? Random numbers giving you a harder time for some reason? Server desync based upon the ping of the dive bomber player vs. the ping of the target resulting in planes diving bombing where the target was? Not sure... seems odd... In all honesty, if you keep seeing zero hits, I'd report it as a possible bug - missing stationary targets regularly on auto-drop doesn't seem right at all.

 

As for the Bogue, yeah, it's just going to be disappointing now since the stock loadout has less "presence" since it can only put out one strike squad at a time, and both of the "upgrades" are heavily skewed resulting in rock-paper-scissors games that are lost at match start. Gah, if they just gave the Bogue a basic 1/1/1 loadout, it would be perfectly playable. No idea why they are fine with killing player interest in American CV's so early, though they admittedly don't seem to like CV's or American ships much.

[Capitan_Incognito]

The Bogue could rule the skies in ways the Langley couldn't. Even with your 6 fighters to the Japanese 4, that just means he can tie up your one squad and use his other 3 squads to bomb people. The 2 fighter squad Bogue doesn't run into that issue.