Scharnhorst... being told how to play over and over

[Francois424]

Hey all, funny story, for 2 days now, I keep getting told to shoot AP (and nothing but) in the Scharnhorst.

 

Yet unless getting taken out really soon in the match I regularly pull out 75-100k matches... and scoring 1st or top three,

I found that quite funny.

 

Any of you have stories on how to play while outplaying the whole team ?

( PS: HE + Fire still OP as heck... and it works really well with Scharny ! )

 

See you guys around and Nice week-end !

 

EDIT: latest game (love that boat, even if less forgiving than my WarSpite)

Spoiler

 

 

[Stratego89]

Anyone who tells you to only shoot AP in the scharnhorst has clearly never played her and never seen anything about her. Those guns are worthless loading AP unless they have a perfect broadside cruiser, or the same on a very close battleship to shoot at with it.

[RearAdmiralButts]

pssst.....hey you ride the Shiny Horse like a cruiser. 

 

[ChaosDrill]

Anyone who tells you to only shoot AP in the scharnhorst has clearly never played her and never seen anything about her. Those guns are worthless loading AP unless they have a perfect broadside cruiser, or the same on a very close battleship to shoot at with it.

Lwm says "SHOOT AP WHEN IN BB"

[Viper069]

I use HE at range and AP once I'm somewhat closer.  To hell with what everyone else thinks.  If you're shooting AP exclusively, you're playing it wrong.

 

[goldeagle1123]

I almost never use Scharnhorsts AP. It's quite frankly, trash. HE spam for days.

[Wowzery]

I have to agree, I switch often in the Scharnhorst between AP and HE unlike other BBs.  The Scharnhorst is the only BB I would have no problem going full HE on.

[shootieboats]

Maybe if people stopped sitting 18km away "because it's a BB", other people wouldn't have to ask them if they plan on being useful at all during the match. =(

[TurboT]

I have had good games in the Scharn shooting only AP and good games shooting only HE.  HE is similarly trollish as sometimes it does 5k + fire a salvo and other times it just breaks an AA gun.  I've really only had two bad games in that ship, both times I was picked on by a CV.   If you watch your angles and brawl smartly you will continually be the best ship on the water no matter the ammo you chose to fire.

[El_Judarino]

 

 

HE is good, AP is good, Torps are good, Secondaries are good.

 

Scharnhorst is good

[goldeagle1123]

HE is good, AP is good, Torps are good, Secondaries are good.

 

Scharnhorst is good.

 

Um wrong. She's not bad ship, but her HE is trash when compared to other tier 7 BBs, and her AP is laughable. Don't just spout off nonsense like that because you had a good game.

[Czevak]

It's completely situational.

[Francois424]

If a BB repairs fire then eats torps, it's good for points as well

[Nuk_]

I personally don't use HE, but I can understand why people do. I always seem to get good damage rolls using her AP.

[LittleWhiteMouse]

I personally don't use HE, but I can understand why people do. I always seem to get good damage rolls using her AP.

 

I don't use it often, but there are times when it can yield surprising amounts of damage.  For example, if you're in a duel with an enemy Battleship that hasn't taken any fire from any cruisers, then an accurate salvo of HE to her superstructure can yield an enormous one time hit (and won't thereafter because of damage saturation). 

[Stratego89]

Lwm says "SHOOT AP WHEN IN BB"

 

Yes, when in a BB. Scharnhorst guns can hardly be considered "BB guns". And that's what  matters in that statement. Guns. One rule cannot apply to everything. If it could this game would be boring as all hell.

[Punisher_One]

 

 

HE is good, AP is good, Torps are good, Secondaries are good.

 

Scharnhorst is good

 

Wow. Nice shooting. 

[Mizzerys_Fate]

What! No citadels!

You are obviously do it way wrong.

You rush in, supporting the destroyers.

Shooting nothing but ap, whilst adding to torpedo spam.

Turn around, before capping, and run away til reloaded torps. Rinse repeat until dead...

 

Note: I do not have Tripitz, my highest ship is tier 8.

           My 1st 4 games on release night, with my

          "Shiney Horse" resulted in 4 #2 on team.

......

So I love her, she can flex & snipe. She can push or flank.

She can brawl. She does it all, but her dance partner leading the steps, determines if she rises or sinks.

 

Btw, 16k AP salvo on Nagato from 15 km...upper belt broadside, she is a beauty. 

 

[LittleWhiteMouse]

 

Yes, when in a BB. Scharnhorst guns can hardly be considered "BB guns". And that's what  matters in that statement. Guns. One rule cannot apply to everything. If it could this game would be boring as all hell.

 

Don't mind Kyogre.  He's misquoting me.  I see he's getting a little more desperate in his attempts to discredit the Community Contributors out there.

You should vary your ammunition choices.  Just be aware that sometimes HE is ... well, it's not good.  To understand why you have to look a little closer at the damage saturation mechanics.

 

There are three multipliers to your shell damage when they strike a target:

• Citadel hit:  1x multiplier.
• Penetrating hit:  0.33x multiplier.
• Over Penetrating hit:  0.1x multiplier
• Saturated Penetrating hit:  0.165x multiplier.

 

An area of the ship that has been saturated with damage appears blackened.  It takes a reduced amount of damage from penetrating hits to that location.  These locations are:  The ship's prow, the ship's stern and its superstructure.  It doesn't take very much damage to cause an area to become saturated.  This is why your opening volleys against an enemy with HE might hit for a TON of damage but all of the follow ups seem lackluster by comparison.  Usually it only takes one or two good volleys to saturate the superstructure of a Battleship, for example.

 

But let's get out our calculators and look at some math.  We'll use the Nagato, Colorado and Scharnhorst's guns to show why sometimes it's just better to sling AP in the Sharnhorst than switching to HE.  But only sometimes.

 

• Colorado's guns:  12,400 & 5,700
• Nagato's guns:  12,600 & 6,500
• Scharnhorst's guns:  7,600 & 3,200.

 

Now let's plug those numbers in.  We get the following:

 

• Colorado:  AP Overpen = 1,240, HE Pen = 1,881, Saturated HE Pen = 941.
• Nagato:  AP Overpen = 1,260, HE Pen = 2,145, Saturated HE Pen = 1,073
• Scharnhorst:  AP Overpen = 760, HE Pen = 1,056, Saturated HE Pen = 528

 

You can see that in all three cases, an AP round's over penetration damage exceeds that of saturated HE damage.  Does that mean you should always fire AP?  Well, no.  Reality is always more complicated than theory crafting.  HE, of course, has the chance to start fires.  The explosive blast radius can also be rather nice for helping disable modules.  If I see an enemy Battleship blow their Damage Control Party and they're angled to me, I'm quite likely to reach for an HE salvo to try and reignite those blazes and farm some easy damage before switching back to AP.  Against ships I know I cannot penetrate reliably -- again, I will reach for HE.  Small bits of damage are better than no damage, after all.

[Stratego89]

 

Don't mind Kyogre.  He's misquoting me.  I see he's getting a little more desperate in his attempts to discredit the Community Contributors out there.

You should vary your ammunition choices.  Just be aware that sometimes HE is ... well, it's not good.  To understand why you have to look a little closer at the damage saturation mechanics.

 

There are three multipliers to your shell damage when they strike a target:

• Citadel hit:  1x multiplier.
• Penetrating hit:  0.33x multiplier.
• Over Penetrating hit:  0.1x multiplier
• Saturated Penetrating hit:  0.165x multiplier.

 

An area of the ship that has been saturated with damage appears blackened.  It takes a reduced amount of damage from penetrating hits to that location.  These locations are:  The ship's prow, the ship's stern and its superstructure.  It doesn't take very much damage to cause an area to become saturated.  This is why your opening volleys against an enemy with HE might hit for a TON of damage but all of the follow ups seem lackluster by comparison.  Usually it only takes one or two good volleys to saturate the superstructure of a Battleship, for example.

 

But let's get out our calculators and look at some math.  We'll use the Nagato, Colorado and Scharnhorst's guns to show why sometimes it's just better to sling AP in the Sharnhorst than switching to HE.  But only sometimes.

 

• Colorado's guns:  12,400 & 5,700
• Nagato's guns:  12,600 & 6,500
• Scharnhorst's guns:  7,600 & 3,200.

 

Now let's plug those numbers in.  We get the following:

 

• Colorado:  AP Overpen = 1,240, HE Pen = 1,881, Saturated HE Pen = 941.
• Nagato:  AP Overpen = 1,260, HE Pen = 2,145, Saturated HE Pen = 1,073
• Scharnhorst:  AP Overpen = 760, HE Pen = 1,056, Saturated HE Pen = 528

 

You can see that in all three cases, an AP round's over penetration damage exceeds that of saturated HE damage.  Does that mean you should always fire AP?  Well, no.  Reality is always more complicated than theory crafting.  HE, of course, has the chance to start fires.  The explosive blast radius can also be rather nice for helping disable modules.  If I see an enemy Battleship blow their Damage Control Party and they're angled to me, I'm quite likely to reach for an HE salvo to try and reignite those blazes and farm some easy damage before switching back to AP.  Against ships I know I cannot penetrate reliably -- again, I will reach for HE.  Small bits of damage are better than no damage, after all.

 

Typical LWM, saving the day with numbers and thorough explanations.

 

And believe me, i've seen some of the stuff he's said in other places, including to me iirc. I don't really trust much of what comes from his profile on these forums. Along with several others who have been quite... uh... "enthusiastic" about believing they're right about things that straight up are not true.

 

Thanks for taking the time to explain all that btw. It's nice to know the exact multipliers, on top of those for damage sections of the ship. I actually didn't even know that was a mechanic until a couple months ago.

[A_FIELD_MARSHAL]

 

Don't mind Kyogre.  He's misquoting me.  I see he's getting a little more desperate in his attempts to discredit the Community Contributors out there.

You should vary your ammunition choices.  Just be aware that sometimes HE is ... well, it's not good.  To understand why you have to look a little closer at the damage saturation mechanics.

 

There are three multipliers to your shell damage when they strike a target:

• Citadel hit:  1x multiplier.
• Penetrating hit:  0.33x multiplier.
• Over Penetrating hit:  0.1x multiplier
• Saturated Penetrating hit:  0.165x multiplier.

 

An area of the ship that has been saturated with damage appears blackened.  It takes a reduced amount of damage from penetrating hits to that location.  These locations are:  The ship's prow, the ship's stern and its superstructure.  It doesn't take very much damage to cause an area to become saturated.  This is why your opening volleys against an enemy with HE might hit for a TON of damage but all of the follow ups seem lackluster by comparison.  Usually it only takes one or two good volleys to saturate the superstructure of a Battleship, for example.

 

But let's get out our calculators and look at some math.  We'll use the Nagato, Colorado and Scharnhorst's guns to show why sometimes it's just better to sling AP in the Sharnhorst than switching to HE.  But only sometimes.

 

• Colorado's guns:  12,400 & 5,700
• Nagato's guns:  12,600 & 6,500
• Scharnhorst's guns:  7,600 & 3,200.

 

Now let's plug those numbers in.  We get the following:

 

• Colorado:  AP Overpen = 1,240, HE Pen = 1,881, Saturated HE Pen = 941.
• Nagato:  AP Overpen = 1,260, HE Pen = 2,145, Saturated HE Pen = 1,073
• Scharnhorst:  AP Overpen = 760, HE Pen = 1,056, Saturated HE Pen = 528

 

You can see that in all three cases, an AP round's over penetration damage exceeds that of saturated HE damage.  Does that mean you should always fire AP?  Well, no.  Reality is always more complicated than theory crafting.  HE, of course, has the chance to start fires.  The explosive blast radius can also be rather nice for helping disable modules.  If I see an enemy Battleship blow their Damage Control Party and they're angled to me, I'm quite likely to reach for an HE salvo to try and reignite those blazes and farm some easy damage before switching back to AP.  Against ships I know I cannot penetrate reliably -- again, I will reach for HE.  Small bits of damage are better than no damage, after all.

 

Is there saturation with AP damage?

[Magic_Fighting_Tuna]

I only shoot AP in my Scharnhorst, I won't be caught dead firing HE for the life of me. HE has its abundant uses but its not a necessity for survival and doing damage. When it comes to ammo its a personal preference.

[IronWolfV]

Hey all, funny story, for 2 days now, I keep getting told to shoot AP (and nothing but) in the Scharnhorst.

 

Yet unless getting taken out really soon in the match I regularly pull out 75-100k matches... and scoring 1st or top three,

I found that quite funny.

 

Any of you have stories on how to play while outplaying the whole team ?

( PS: HE + Fire still OP as heck... and it works really well with Scharny ! )

 

See you guys around and Nice week-end !

 

EDIT: latest game (love that boat, even if less forgiving than my WarSpite)

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

It's mostly like a cruiser. Flat broadside AP away, against something angled, better off firing HE, especially against an Angled BB like a Colorado.  That beautiful fire chance plus reload..

BURN BABY BURN!

[stickdeath1980]

Anyone who tells you to only shoot AP in the scharnhorst has clearly never played her and never seen anything about her. Those guns are worthless loading AP unless they have a perfect broadside cruiser, or the same on a very close battleship to shoot at with it.

 

i've had tier 5 perfect boardside 740 damage 6 hits lol

[King_Zacarias]

 

Um wrong. She's not bad ship, but her HE is trash when compared to other tier 7 BBs, and her AP is laughable. Don't just spout off nonsense like that because you had a good game.

 

Because she has 11in guns, if only she has a 20 second reload to compensate, OH WAIT SHE DOES

She has better DPM then every BB within 2 tiers of her.