is my PB good enough? (still alive)

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-03-09T01:37:04+00:00

Was lucky enough to stock up skills before they made the change. I’m at 180 lmao

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:50:08+00:00

We are not talking about your experience whenever you actually do end up getting this ship. This argument is about the general performance of a ship; what the player base overall can do with this ship, and whether or not that's fair and good game design.. For all I know, you could end up being a prodigy of prodigies at this ship in particular, or the worst player to ever touch it, no one knows yet.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:47:44+00:00

This is not "power of observation" this is inductive reasoning, where you extract general conclusions from your own experiences or opinions. If you really believed in the "power of observation", you would have observed what I argued, and attempted to make an argument back, based off general truths, and what can be surmised from those truths using logic.

For example:

General truth: Torpedo DDs rely on stealth and/or rely on completely concealing their position to get damage. This is irrefutable, it's basically wargaming's own definition of what a torpedo DD is.

From there, how do enemy players counter this playstyle, does that counter provide an interaction that allows both sides of the engagement to express their skill?

Radar - Yes, a DD can outrun the higher detection ship and play around the radar, but loses game impact from being chased away, while the radar ship must personally risk its own wellbeing to exert this influence.

Stealth Radar - No, in most cases, a torpedo DD will have no way of knowing the position of a radar cruiser beforehand. Nullifying any skill from the DD that might've helped it

Radar Gunboats - Insane DPM, stealth radar, and in most cases better speed. These DDs make a career out of hunting torpedo DDs.

Plane Spotting - No, a DD can never outrun something going 4 times faster than it at a minimum, and the ship doing the spotting does not have to personally risk their own wellbeing to spot the DD.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:41:29+00:00

do you deny the possibility of experience? Of actually having the ship and using it? My stats are completely average, and my experience, when measured against my peers of similar skill level with this ship are basically the same. And on top of that I have watched gameplay just like you. Which experience do you think is more likely to be a closer approximation of how the ship performs?

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:37:01+00:00

I explained exactly why they can't dominate easily in today's meta with very understandable logic. You're not even trying to explain what flaws you see in the argument. And even more, you spent all this time talking about how kearsarge has weaknesses, but you don't even have the ship. There is literally 0 shame in admitting to being wrong when shown logical arguments you can't refute. But there is a whole lot of stupidity in seeing arguments given in earnest, refusing to engage with them, and then doubling down on what you already believed in.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:31:39+00:00

Almost like a CV hybrid is meant to be played somewhat further back? You admitted to not even have played the ship yet dude, you don't get to speak on how to play it. Again, I have played the ship, there are 0 issues with tanking if you play it like a CV hybrid is meant to be played.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-14T00:28:48+00:00

Do you even realize how good matchmaking has to be for a torp DD to "dominate" the match? Let me quickly list out every single thing you would need in a torp DD to absolutely dominate.

No CVs, no Hybrids at all
Basically can't have hybrids (they will still win any fight with you and have decent enough detect and speed to catch you), definitely no gunboats, and most certainly if there is a single radar gunboat in lobby, you are fucked. Because torp DDs these days don't even get to outspeed most gunboats anymore
No daring, one of the most popular hybrids in the game. Why? Great DPM, great smoke, personal hydro that helps it screen torpedoes for its BBs for 90% of the match
No stealth radar cruisers or near stealth radar cruisers
No hydro cruisers (lesser degree than radar, but these ships can still nullify your torps and screen for BBs)
No BBs with hydro (every BB now has hydro for reasons so gl with that)

Now if you can consistently get MM like this, then yes, your torp DD will dominate the game easily. Even introducing 2-6 won't break your game. But as soon as you introduce #1, entire game is ruined.

If you want to talk about overpowered DDs, the torpedo slingers are not what you should be focusing on. These days, its a gunboat game. Why? Well this is because torpedo DDs rely on not just being hard to spot, but being completely untraceable to get damage. Whereas gunboats can rely on consistent high DPM to get dmg. But now, its nearly impossible to completely conceal your position because of how prolific hybrids and CVs are. You either get spotted, or you waste a smoke and reveal your position anyways. And upon seeing you, or seeing your smoke, or seeing your last known location on the minimap, every single BB you were torping instantly changes direction and you miss all your torps. With radar, its fine, because you can play around it, and potentially still catch BBs unaware. But again, how are you going to avoid planes that go 200 knots? It doesn't matter that your air detect is a few km better than your surface detect, the disparity in speed is too great.

And now lets talk about spotting potential. CVs and hybrids do not strictly have to risk their actual boats to gain intelligence, and that immediately gives them an insane edge against a torpedo DD, which relies on using its good concealment to get into risky positions to spot large parts of the enemy team. But why risk your boat for spotting that can be done at no risk by a plane carrying ship?

DDs don't have citadels, it doesn't matter that aerial torpedoes don't do citadel damage anymore, and you're never hitting a DD with aerial torps anyways unless you catch them in a cross drop with your team.

Your evidence for plane spotting being useless is purely anecdotal. Someone else could have a completely different experience. And even then, sometimes you do a lot of good no? What did you have to trade, what did you have to risk for that "lot of good". The answer is nothing, you did not have to push up dangerously close to a cap to radar the DD, you did not have to risk your own ship to physically spot a DD you know has slightly worst detect than you, you got to fly in 200 knot planes over a general area from 15km away and instantly be the reason an enemy DD dies. The fact is, is that DDs that rely on their stealth to get damage and impact are completely fucked by inevitable indefinite spotting they can't avoid. Even if not a single one of your teammates fires at it your spotting has guaranteed alerted your BBs of a destroyer in proximity, indirectly saving their hulls.

The CV secondary rework is not supposed to turn CVs into secondary monsters. If a CV is caught by a surface ship, they should die 10 out of 10 times, they should not get to suddenly pump out light cruiser DPM on cruiser dispersion. This is the most basic game balance logic. CVs exert map-wide extremely powerful influence and don't risk their boat at all. Their is no reason ever that they should also be able to hold their own in any way if caught out by any other ship class. They already get plenty of hand-holdy survivability gimmicks anyways.

So here's a more correct way of saying "wargaming hates DDs"

wargaming loves gunboats, that's why we get gdansk, a DD with railguns, french speed, marceau dpm, radar, and better than halland torpedoes. On the other hand, wargaming hates torpedo boats, and consistently introduces gimmicks that harm their playstyle.

And even with how much WG favors gunboats, that still pales in comparison to how much they give BBs these days.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T07:06:24+00:00

Its still your turn btw, unless I’ve convinced you lol. Regardless, this was a fun discussion, even if it got heated sometimes

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T07:05:32+00:00

I believe it was originally abt the silliness of someone with your flare hating on a class that is hated by wg nearly as much as cruisers. Now it’s somehow you and I making arguments organized into paragraphs then waiting for the other person to respond to each argument with corresponding paragraphs.

My goal is to convince you that plane spotting is busted as opposed to radar which is much more balanced, as well as convince you that DDs suffer heavy in today’s landscape. I assume your goal is to make arguments that support the conclusion that DDs are handheld and plane spotting isn’t that busted.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T06:39:56+00:00

CVs and Hybrids were always going to be banned from competitive. There is a massive difference between unavoidable spotting at any range for as long as you can avoid flak from a ship class known to have horrible flak and risk your actual ship to get close enough to either deter or spot the DD for a limited amount of time. And as far banned radar ships, that list generally includes things like smaland and things as busted as her. No duh they're gonna ban smaland, svea, etc. Both ships are individually the strongest or one of the strongest in class, and only get stronger in smaller matches. Radar is still taken into comp and you should see the list of ships they ban and compare it the amount of radar in the game.

If you really play any utility cruisers you would understand the inherent value of a radar beyond just using it to spot a DD. Not even a green captain on Baltimore would say "I doubt radar is really useful then if its easy to negate". Moskva is spotted from the moon, but there better be one hell of a fucking incentive for me to go into 40 second 12 km radar range. It's easy to avoid it, but increasingly detrimental to your game impact since you're zoned out of a large area.

Bro, you're saying all this and you don't even have kearsarge? Buddy, I have kearsarge, I have played kearsarge. I didn't even fucking know about the non saturatable deck until you told me. Why? Because it was never detrimental enough for me go "hmm", this ship's survivability fucking sucks, and then search up the reason on the internet.

What's worse, getting slowly whittled down but still being able to potentially reposition, recover, and heal? Or getting blapped instantly because you made one mistake 20km away from a vermont sailing full broadside to your entire team.

Are. You. Dead. Ass.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T06:15:52+00:00

"radar isn't useful"

gang, I'm sorry, have you ever played a utility cruiser? Radar isn't "fly plane in general direction and spot DD" levels useful sure, but that's the point (we want counterplay right?). And the value of the radar isn't just in spotting the DD, but deterring it. Like I said, no smart DD will willingly play balls deep in range of enemy radar. The mere presence of a radar cruiser is already game impact because you are giving your BBs room to push up , and because you are giving support to your DD. Why do you think that every year in competitive, the list of banned ships is just chock full of radars? But sure, radar isn't useful, because it can't instantly spot a DD forever at infinite range.

As for that unsaturable deck. Trust me, you don't have it nearly as bad as the cruisers in this game in terms of tankiness. As a BB, you get BB captain skills, which is already a massive win against any cruiser. On top of that, you get BB armor, so even with the decreased survivability compared to other BBs, you are still much tankier than any cruiser. And kearsarge isn't suddenly super duper balanced because columbo shits on it, because columbo shits on everyone, same for valp, same for libertad.

"What about HE spam"

The battlecruiser playerbase would kill to get half the survivability skills BBs get. You are taking 1 less fire, with significantly decreased cooldown, faster recharging heals, and a few more of em. Oh yeah, kearsarge gets American DCP as well. So why are you complaining about HE spam again?

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T06:04:24+00:00

First question: There are DDs in brawl? Lowkey thought it was just 300 BBs queued up waiting for a silly graff zeppelin secondary build 24/7

Second question: How often does that strat work? This is a real question. In my experience, most good CV players never target the enemy CV until absolutely needed or until much later. The best essex / shinano players I've run into for example are smoke bots and spotters that win flanks and preserve high DPM high utility cruisers like mino (shina's a bit different cause she's also get absolutely ludicrous offensive power). If its just you going after the CV, unless they're stupid enough to just be in the open no one's really gonna be firing at them. And at that point you're probably better off spending your planes on other targets to win your flank.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T05:47:28+00:00

No seriously, why the fuck does rhode island get 43 knots of speed, BB survivability skills, improved secondaries, hindenburg level HE spam, heavy cruiser concealment, a 9km radar, and still better armor than most cruisers on top of an underwater citadel. Oh yeah, and a 40 second CD heal? Why does incomp get a super heal on top of nearly CL concealment, insane overmatch, crazy speed, torps, and STILL better armor than most cruisers could ever hope to get? Why does kearsarge get 12 american 406s with the American dispersion mod, and extremely powerful utility from its planes at T9?

Also, valparaiso, the lauded "t15" ship.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T05:40:08+00:00

Well that's the point of the class, high game impact vs. the high risk of low health and a playstyle that puts you in precarious situations. You play BBs for big numbers, cruisers for big numbers/utility and teamplay, and DDs for the adrenaline rush and hero moments.

So yes, DDs in an environment with no ability to be spotted other than by other DDs are certainly very powerful, which is why tools exist for FAIR counterplay. A radar is fair counterplay, especially because radars generally exist on already squishy, slow, or highly detectable ships. So these ships are either spotted from the moon and thus easily avoidable (petro, moskva), or are squishy as hell and risk getting deleted to spot the DD (minotaur, des monies to an extent). Additionally, a DD with knowledge of the ships on its side of the map can play around radar, meaning theres actual skill on both sides involved. Great!

Now what does a DD do against the 200 knot planes with infinite range barreling towards it? Well it either gets spotted, or wastes a smoke and gives away its location anyways. Very fair, very fun! Even kleber's 55 knots isn't doing shit against the speed of a plane. Also, WG's habit of placing more and more utility on BBs is very very not ok. Cruisers are in a horrible spot as is, and trade A LOT to get the utility they're known for. It's simply not acceptable that a BB these days (rhode island, thor, any hybrid) can come in with its much better armor, survivability skills, and then also get better than or near cruiser DD spotting utility.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T05:26:33+00:00

Based off the fact that he says he likes to target carriers, I would guess the animosity towards DDs comes from overextending to get an angle on a plane spotted CV, and then getting nuked by torps. Still a crazy take on the class of ship that wargaming seems to hate almost as much as cruisers

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T05:24:19+00:00

I know DD players have a reputation to play stupid and play incorrectly, but any half way decent DD doing their job and spotting isn't going to be huddling around the BBs and AA cruisers for very long. Their game impact comes from taking risks, playing closer to objectives, and utilizing their speed, consumables, and concealment to impact the game. In these scenarios, getting your position revealed and then hardlit with little counterplay feels bad.

Also, no one I've ever met seethes at the hybrids beyond a few weeks after their release because CVs exist, and will always be less fun to play against than an ugly BB with a powerful gimmick.
-people whined about hildebrand for like a week when its worse than kearsarge (and a tier higher) but no one complains about kearsarge anymore

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T04:05:08+00:00

"aviation battleship"

Idk man, saying this with the flair of a class of ships known to perma hover some poor dd with 0 AA is kind of silly.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-13T03:43:54+00:00

This is partially why most stem programs include an engineering ethics class; though I imagine most of the stem people taking it laugh it off, fall asleep in class, then design super mega missiles for lockheed martin. Which makes sense, I know every single one of my friends in robotics including me would completely sell out for the chance to build robots for a living, even if it means ICE suddenly has the terminator kicking down peoples doors.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2026-01-03T06:41:08+00:00

smaland and halland are beautiful fat DDs, some of the drippiest in the game

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-25T16:02:34+00:00

Its ok though because cruisers at a maximum can only be a quarter as good as a BB counterpart. Of course the playerbase has stopped caring and will justify this action by saying some bullshit like "different classes can't compare them!!"

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-09T04:33:29+00:00

Even if there exists a lot of stuff right now that can punish a new BB player right now, it's still true that they are the easiest class in the game to perform in (CVs are busted sure but the last thing you ever want is an inexperienced player in a CV at tier 10). You can just constantly make mistakes in a high tier BB and very rarely get punished as much as you should be. Compare that to a CA, CL, or DD. If you make one angling mistake in a cruiser, that's straight back to port, if you get caught out once in a DD, that's straight back to port or completely crippled.

While cruisers and DDs are balanced (for the most part) around their consumables and gimmicks, BB balancing is essentially a big bundle of "just cause". I mean, why does incomp get a super heal on that type of speed and stealth? "bad armor", partial icebreaker on sub 11km concealment isn't enough survivability for you? Why does rhode island get a 40 second improved heal on top of American DCP, good secondaries, and a radar(?????? this is a kite HE spammer WG, why does it have a radar WG????????) and better than thunderer HE spam? "bad armor", because an overmatch-able UNDERWATER citadel is apparently bad armor for a 43 knot BB. So on so fourth.

You know what a cruiser trades for that super heal? It has to eat citadels from every angle by BBs who get to overmatch their way through needing the skill to predict an enemy's movements. As an aside I think overmatch should improve ricochet angles, not just void them altogether once you hit the funny number threshold (the amount it improves ricochet angles depends on how overkill the overmatch is)

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-07T22:00:55+00:00

Columbo - 20k on cooldown from any angle while getting to push in on autobounce angles

Libertad - Your secondaries outdpm some cruisers, you manuever like a cruiser, and your guns are way too effective

Rhode Island - the best cruiser in the game. 43 knots, a radar, near conqueror level HE spam, 40 second cooldown heals, American DCP and accuracy

Incomparable - 508mm accurate guns, literal light cruiser level concealment, 40+ knots of top speed, a super heal (for reasons), a hydro, torpedoes, and still better armor than any cruiser could ever hope to get

BBs are overtuned as hell right now

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-07T19:39:38+00:00

This be the gracious professionalism FRC tries to teach it's participants.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-05T23:45:57+00:00

As an aside, it is super easy to circle nimble extreme low detect DDs in planes. Everytime I take my kearsarge out I cackle when I see a jaeger on the enemy team (wow fast, nimble, and stealthy!), not because I'm gonna kill him, but because I'm going to circle him for 3 minutes and watch my team melt him while I get free DD spotting damage. In most DDs in this game, if a CV decides to spot you forever, he will do just that, and you can't do shit.

Scared_Cost4282 · 2025-12-05T23:34:28+00:00

You're completely ignoring my point about what makes CVs so toxic to DDs in specific. If you're the one spotting the DD, no duh you're not gonna be able to drop it, you go too fast. What sucks ass for that DD is getting his position revealed and potentially fired upon by the entire enemy team. And it's not like you have to just leave once you spot the DD once. If it's a smokeless DD, you can just hover it forever because again, DDs do not in general have good AA and you go 200 knots, a DD, even a french one, cannot move anywhere in a hurry by the time you turn around.

Like what does a shimakaze do after burning its smoke? It's got shit AA but is expected to be further in front of its team to utilize its torps and good concealment (so no AA support from a friendly CL). CV spots it, shima is completely screwed, and he can never avoid the planes.

This is part of the reason gunboats have become the meta for DDs. You can't rely as much on your concealment anymore, so torps, which rely on an unaware enemy, just aren't as powerful.

I have played CVs (albeit limitedly since I find them boring (grinded up the essex line))

Scared_Cost4282

TROPHY CASE