[Col. Fishguts]

Thanks for the tips, it sounds similar to the Gnevny style.
But now that I have all the upgrades and have suffered through the 50% captain, I had actually some good games with it.
It still doesn't seem like much of an upgrade over Gnevny, while facing tougher opponents.

Dat Kiev though! Good to know that she'll be worth the grind, let us know how she fares.

[Gray]

I've finally managed to acquire the ship I always wanted since starting the US BB line: The Iowa.

Now to figure out how to be actually good with it.

Well, following advise is based on my experience with the Iowa.
The grind to the Montana was rather short as it brings boatloads of money and credits which reduces the grind significantly.
The premium camo helps too and looks pretty stylish.

I play her like a big cruiser, constantly moving, changing speed and heading.
Don't make the mistake of tanking against BBs of same tier and higher.
While you can use this tactic against lower tier BBs, higher tier BBs will pen your front. Cruisers will burn you down and the superstructure of the Iowa is a big shoot me sign.
Not to mention, that if a sneaky DD manages to flank you, you will eat fish.

Use the Iowas speed and (relatively) good mobilty to weave between shots and bring your rear turret to bear.
Try to stay at around 15km after the initial exchange of long range shots.
Iowa and the Montana are exceptional Cruiser killers, so focus those first.
After the recent buff to their sigma, they punish broadsides and it doesn't matter what ship it is.
The last game i had in the Iowa was a citadel fest, sank a Yamato in three salvos.

[crizza]

Is it just me or is the "Großer Kurfürst" based on the H-41?
Very H-class battleship was designed with two guns per turret and yet, she has three per turret...

[StarSlayer]

I recall seeing some mention of a triple turret design that was commissioned by the Russians being used for this ship.

[crizza]

Why would the Soviets commision turrets for german battleship design/concept studies?

[StarSlayer]

Why would the Soviets commision turrets for german battleship design/concept studies?

From what I understand preliminary sketches for a 40.6 cm triple turret were part of the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement (1940).  The developers made the logic leap that since the studies existed and they were made by the Germans they could be slapped on one of the H series hulls.

[crizza]

Ah, well, this is utterly new for me, since I only read about the H-class ships being planned with twin turrets, as ze germans were the only ones planning such things...
Well, more firepower, fine by me.

On a side note:

The cyclone on Sea of Fortune netted me a surpise kill:
Moved between two island to take B, I knew there was a DD somewhere and since I expected him to move through the islands as well, to take... uh... C I guess, I had HE loaded.
So that Fletcher appeared in front of me and tried desperatly to turn and torp, but the moment he started to turn I blasted him at a range of 800m... point blank with my Iowa, his comment made my day "Sir, a new set of pants if you please"

[The E]

This will do, Iowa, this will do.

[Spoon]

I like Iowa's too

[StarSlayer]

Well we're bottom tier Nagato, its time to Onna-bugeisha up.





That's my girl.



Props to the Cans, they were in the thick all match sowing havoc.

[Admiral MS]

I wish I had the Iowa instead of my stock North Carolina that gets dumped into Tier 10 matches way too often. Actually doing a Citadel on a Yamato or Montana happens like once in a month. Also I always end up doing melee duels against Tirpitzes (or whatever the plural of that thing is) who at least show their broadside for glorious damage while trying to torpedo me (and often end up missing them anyway). Or having short range duels with whatever flavor of Tier 9-10 IJN or US DD decides to show up and thinks I will shoot that cruiser 12 km away instead of wasting my AP on them. Overpenetration damage on a DD gives more XP and money than on a CA... Now if it could turn like a Colorado and shared its 39% torpedo damage reduction instead of a mere 19% that might work out better.

Well, I like my Colorado and just couldn't sell it, or remove my only US captain close to 15 points from it.

I like Iowa's too

What kind of stuff do you feed your pilots for this damage?

[The E]

I wish I had the Iowa instead of my stock North Carolina that gets dumped into Tier 10 matches way too often. Actually doing a Citadel on a Yamato or Montana happens like once in a month. Also I always end up doing melee duels against Tirpitzes (or whatever the plural of that thing is) who at least show their broadside for glorious damage while trying to torpedo me (and often end up missing them anyway). Or having short range duels with whatever flavor of Tier 9-10 IJN or US DD decides to show up and thinks I will shoot that cruiser 12 km away instead of wasting my AP on them. Overpenetration damage on a DD gives more XP and money than on a CA... Now if it could turn like a Colorado and shared its 39% torpedo damage reduction instead of a mere 19% that might work out better.

Well, I like my Colorado and just couldn't sell it, or remove my only US captain close to 15 points from it.

Stock North Carolina is a pain, especially when you get crapped on by the matchmaking. Not only do you have to deal with guns that do not follow the same ballistics profile as the other US guns, you're also stuck in a ship that has relatively low health combined with a low top speed that wants to go into brawling matches with other ships. Your best bet in this ship is to exploit angling at all times; your rear turret will not be doing much damage, but at least you'll have a chance to get into range of the enemy (well, into ranges where you can hit people, anyway).

[Spoon]

What kind of stuff do you feed your pilots for this damage?

Battleships

[crizza]

I wish I had the Iowa instead of my stock North Carolina that gets dumped into Tier 10 matches way too often. Actually doing a Citadel on a Yamato or Montana happens like once in a month. Also I always end up doing melee duels against Tirpitzes (or whatever the plural of that thing is) who at least show their broadside for glorious damage while trying to torpedo me (and often end up missing them anyway). Or having short range duels with whatever flavor of Tier 9-10 IJN or US DD decides to show up and thinks I will shoot that cruiser 12 km away instead of wasting my AP on them. Overpenetration damage on a DD gives more XP and money than on a CA... Now if it could turn like a Colorado and shared its 39% torpedo damage reduction instead of a mere 19% that might work out better.

Well, I like my Colorado and just couldn't sell it, or remove my only US captain close to 15 points from it.

Stock North Carolina is a pain, especially when you get crapped on by the matchmaking. Not only do you have to deal with guns that do not follow the same ballistics profile as the other US guns, you're also stuck in a ship that has relatively low health combined with a low top speed that wants to go into brawling matches with other ships. Your best bet in this ship is to exploit angling at all times; your rear turret will not be doing much damage, but at least you'll have a chance to get into range of the enemy (well, into ranges where you can hit people, anyway).

I skipped stock NC with a ****load of free xp, but as with my Iowa, I never researched the range upgrade

[Admiral MS]

What kind of stuff do you feed your pilots for this damage?

Battleships

I don't know what to say. Guess your pilots are badasses not matter what you give them to chew on

Stock North Carolina is a pain, especially when you get crapped on by the matchmaking. Not only do you have to deal with guns that do not follow the same ballistics profile as the other US guns, you're also stuck in a ship that has relatively low health combined with a low top speed that wants to go into brawling matches with other ships. Your best bet in this ship is to exploit angling at all times; your rear turret will not be doing much damage, but at least you'll have a chance to get into range of the enemy (well, into ranges where you can hit people, anyway).

I skipped stock NC with a ****load of free xp, but as with my Iowa, I never researched the range upgrade

I also won't research it as the gunnery module already adds more range than needed. I mean I rarely hit anything past 20 km distance - even a BB can evade shots at 15+ seconds flight time. One way or another I'll have many more matches with the NC until I can get my hands on the Iowa. It could be worse, my results with the NC are ok and I'm pretty good at anticipating torpedo attacks and generally fighting DDs (having played IJN DDs a lot in high tier matches until they got nerfed).

So what do you think is the best tier 5 skill to take with a US BB? Just concealment like for all the other ships?

[crizza]

Concealment, I'm angry with myself that I got that exoensive gun upgrade instead of the concealment upgrade.
Had an enemy Iowa firing concealed from 12.8km range... took me completly by surprise, as I had just fired a broadside at a Roon 12.9km away -.-

[Rodo]

This thing's got secondaries. It's ridiculous

[The E]

well, at least I think it wasn't my fault.

[StarSlayer]

Scharners just dropped on NA.  While I did pick one up I will probably skipper my Nagato during the new ship bubble in order to farm damage and bounce 11" shells.

[Col. Fishguts]

Scharners just dropped on NA.  While I did pick one up I will probably skipper my Nagato during the new ship bubble in order to farm damage and bounce 11" shells.

How? You free-XPd straight up to Tier7?