Abandoned grinds: which ships can you simply not get to work for you (that you thought were going to be great)?

[Ensign Cthulhu]

For me it's Dutch cruisers and Russian battleships. Almost every time I take them out, I wonder why I bother. Results are almost never good, and I've gotten tired of telling myself the next one will be better.

I ground to the Haarlem because I had a permacamo/permabonus for her and it seemed a shame not to get her and fit it, but there the grind has stopped and I have no interest in continuing. Part of the problem here is that I'm mostly a co-op main and the bots are clued in to where the bombs are going to drop as soon as I designate the target area, so they have a very high evasion rate. The rest of the armament is balanced around the bombs being useful, so... you guess the rest. (The DD, Tromp, is not as much of a problem because she at least has torpedoes and the bombs seem to drop with less lag time, making hits on bots somewhat easier.)

Russian Battleships... well, I don't really know what I'm doing wrong here, but their reach is super-short and their reload is relatively long - hell, there are cruisers that outrange some Russian BBs. Sinop is supposed to be death and destruction, but never in my hands. Again, I got as far as Vladivostok because I scored a permacamo (including econ stuff) for her during the release event, but that's where it stops. 

 

Russian carriers used to be on this list, but I've watched some videos and I think I'm getting the hang of those now. Once more, Pobeda's in my port because of the permacamo, but the Serov grind was full of gamer words. The key seems to be learning to lead with the rockets, which is difficult because the machine-gun time is so long, but when you see a salvo connect properly you realize WHY it's so long. Pobeda goes back on the grind list as soon as I've unlocked the Essex, which should be sometime in August at the current, slow co-op rate.

Italian destroyers are also a bit of a bugbear, but the last few times I took the Cuniberti out I started to get the hang of it. Right now I'm reserving judgement.

As for submarines - they have their own problems in co-op, mostly related to the battles being a kill frenzy and not having enough time to finish kills before high-DPM surface ships storm in and take the food out of your mouth. Right now I'm prepared to say that this one is definitely on me and that practice will make it better, but they're very much on the no-rush-to-finish list. I have the Sturdy in rotation for the hell of it (she'll be finished sometime in 2025 at current rates of progress), but on the whole there are other things I want to get done first.

 

Edited May 3 by Ensign Cthulhu

[Admiral_Karasu]

IIRC, with the Russian BB's you are supposed to get very close if you want to hit anything.

[Project45_Opytny]

Dutch cruisers. I have been feeling that the entire idea of basing their central gameplay on a summoned off-map asset (and nerf the ships themselves to balance those "Air Force liaison officers" aboard) outrageous if not straight affronting.

Japanese light cruisers. Struggling to find a niche till now.

 

For "controlled" T7 environment like Ranked, Sinop's unchallenged advantage has been somewhat eroded by some newcomers. Like Renown 44.

[Wolfswetpaws]

I feel that in-game events and missions can influence the choice of which ship(s) I'll sail, and in which battle mode I'll sail them.

That said, Dutch cruisers were not impressing me with their performance or flavor until I watched some of @ArIskandir's youtube videos which demonstrated their "trolling" abilities, including using their AA to "troll" airplanes.
While I'm beginning to gain some appreciation for their flavor, they're not a high priority on my line-grinding efforts.

Typical British battleships' slow turret rotation left a sour impression upon me which has lasted for a few years. 
Thus they're not a high priority for me to grind.
The battlecruisers have made a more favorable impression, though.  But in-game missions and other criteria have prevented them from becoming prioritized.

Russian battleships.
I don't hate them.  But I'm not their biggest fan, either.  Some seem to work better than others, for me.
Again, they're not my highest priority.

Submarines?
I've been willing to sail them in random battles and have been playing submarines since the first Halloween introduction event and the earliest days of "testing" done on the Public Test Server.
So, it shouldn't surprise anyone that I've got the German, British and US tech-tree lines ground to Tier-10 and I have a few premium/special submarines, too.

It's good to be in the Warships Collector's Cub.
Among the niceties is "having the right tool for the job" on most occasions because I have a large and diverse fleet of ships.
The downside is that some tech-tree lines may progress slowly while I'm being distracted or influenced by other phenomena.

[Itwastuesday]

Hum. I suppose I expected American and Soviet CA to be great, but I didn't like them much save for Petro. Especially Buffalo sucked. Otherwise the ones that sucked I expected to suck. Like I didn't expect spähkreuzer or italian bb or jinan line and so on to do anything? Though I'd sooner play italian BB line these days than some others. 

I think the ships I hated the most were KGV, Monarch, GJ, Pobeda, every chinese cruiser and every pan-a cruiser. 

I quite liked Haarlem. It has a heal! And some armor. Johan not so much, T9 cruisers have a heal anyway. I can see how Haarlem might suck in PvE though.  

I didn't really like soviet battleships, but they're quite good indubitably. 

Subs I just fxp:d. Too boring. 

[OldSchoolGaming_Youtube]

Italian DDs = After grinding the AMAZING cruiser line with Venezia at the top Ididnt eve ntry to grind past the free T7 efter I seen how meeh the line is.

Montana and Vermont = Not really a US BB guy. Grinded to Ohio mostly because I was boored but cant imagine playing either of these T10s when I have ships like Thunderer, St.Vincent, Ohio, Schleiffen, Illinois, what would be the point? But I do like to farm these 2 when I play whatever other ship!   

Yodo = Why bother, never play Zao or Yoshino.

Edited May 3 by OldSchoolGaming_Youtube

[Ensign Cthulhu]

23 minutes ago, Itwastuesday said:

Subs I just fxp:d. Too boring. 

Me stopping a grind means I've made a conscious decision that it doesn't bother me if a particular T10 ship (or some of its predecessors) never appears in my port. Some people are collectors and they just have to have everything, even if it means FXP-ing it. If that's you, so be it. 😎

1 minute ago, OldSchoolGaming_Youtube said:

Grinded to Ohio mostly because I was boored but cant imagine playing either of these T10s when I have ships like Thunderer, St.Vincent, Ohio,

Ground to Ohio, eh? Typo alert!

Which of the tech-tree T10s did you actually mean, Montana or Vermont? 

[aleksi111]

13 minutes ago, OldSchoolGaming_Youtube said:

Italian DDs

Yeah, I concur with this

IMO just plain bad and not seeing the point to get beyond T5

• Ammunition selection is debatable
• Engine Boost utility is highly questionable with the short action & long cooldown
• Torpedoes that don't reliably stop even Cruisers

[OldSchoolGaming_Youtube]

15 minutes ago, Ensign Cthulhu said:

Me stopping a grind means I've made a conscious decision that it doesn't bother me if a particular T10 ship (or some of its predecessors) never appears in my port. Some people are collectors and they just have to have everything, even if it means FXP-ing it. If that's you, so be it. 😎

Ground to Ohio, eh? Typo alert!

Which of the tech-tree T10s did you actually mean, Montana or Vermont? 

Yeah my bad, I ment the Iowa, dont think I even have the first in the Vermont branch.

[Justin_Simpleton]

Nebraska.  I had a good time with it in testing but when I got my own, yuck!  I'm not trying to work up that line.  When I first went up the German BB line it was torture, especially having to grind the FDG twice to obtain the GK and Preussen. So, it was the first line I reset.  I like the line now (except for the FDG). 

[ArIskandir]

1 hour ago, Ensign Cthulhu said:

Part of the problem here is that I'm mostly a co-op main

That's a big big part of the problem. Many ships only truly shine on PvP environments, many are not suited for the frenzy feeding pool of Coop. 

All the lines you mention are more PvP oriented, Dutch Cruisers are excellent support/escort units and excel at providing AA to their allies and enduring amounts of damage that would sink other cruisers. They are more of long distance runners so their advantages get lost in the short term format of Coop. 

Russian BBs are quirky and their role has been much eroded by newer releases like the German BCs. The low RoF and limited DPM potential makes them unappealing for Coop. On PvP they are supposed to be quite durable, with Kutznetzov giving them an edge to surviving situations other BBs wouldn't. Tbh, I don't like the line very much but at least they are (or were) more reliable hitters than Italian BBs. 

Subs as we have said many times before are pure PvP creatures, they don't make sense in Coop. 

Italian DDs are weird in the way their gameplay for T9-T10 is the polar opposite from the gameplay at T8 and below. Probably the "greatest treason" happening within any TT line and it's a damned shame because the line is insanely fun to play up to T8. 

[Nevermore135]

6 hours ago, Project45_Opytny said:

Dutch cruisers. I have been feeling that the entire idea of basing their central gameplay on a summoned off-map asset (and nerf the ships themselves to balance those "Air Force liaison officers" aboard) outrageous if not straight affronting.

I found the tier VIII and IX ships very frustrating to play. You get the primary drawbacks of CB play (60s fires, increased dispersion) without the primary benefit (large guns). I pushed through JdW the first time Assymetric battles came around and haven’t looked back once. 

6 hours ago, Project45_Opytny said:

Japanese light cruisers. Struggling to find a niche till now.

Tier V and VI, with their centerline torpedo launchers, are OK. Omono at tier VII has 155mm guns, which have a crucial advantage of 26mm base HE pen over other CLs at the tier. Grinding the tier VIII is suffering, though.

5 hours ago, Justin_Simpleton said:

Nebraska.  I had a good time with it in testing but when I got my own, yuck!  I'm not trying to work up that line.  When I first went up the German BB line it was torture, especially having to grind the FDG twice to obtain the GK and Preussen. So, it was the first line I reset.  I like the line now (except for the FDG). 

Delaware is IMO the highlight of the US hybrid BB line. Unlike Nebraska, which gives up an entire turret relative to NC (6 guns with no way to buff dispersion is rough) and is covered in 32mm plating, Delaware has only one less barrel than Iowa and has a 38mm armored flight deck.

A long time back I found the secret to FdG was to run a standard BB main battery/survivability build and abuse the silly reload on 16” guns. After the commander rework German BBs aren’t very good secondary platforms (they needed to be nerfed to make way for the German CCs), but FdG has always been the worst-equipped ship in the line for such a build.

Edited May 3 by Nevermore135

[ArIskandir]

1 hour ago, Project45_Opytny said:

Dutch cruisers. I have been feeling that the entire idea of basing their central gameplay on a summoned off-map asset (and nerf the ships themselves to balance those "Air Force liaison officers" aboard) outrageous if not straight affronting.

Why is it so affronting? ... it's just another type of AoE armament with middling Time-to-target, a weird mid way between guns and torpedoes. I don't see anything too outrageous about it. 

 

10 minutes ago, Nevermore135 said:

I found the tier VIII and IX ships very frustrating to play. You get the primary drawbacks of CB play (60 fires, increased dispersion) without the primary benefit (large guns). I pushed through JdW the first time Assymetric battles came around and haven’t looked back once. 

They are extremelly durable ships, I think they don't have 60 second fires (on my replays I'm on 48 secs but I'm not sure if I have skill/equipment reduction). I loved both Harleem and JdW, they are not great damage dealers but they sure can take a beating and keep fighting. Their concealment is amazing and they know the forbidden art of invisi-firing. They are weird but they can be very flexible to play, and very entertaining. Imo it's one of the funniest Cruiser lines to play.

 

[MidnightPhoenix07]

Sadly, I can’t include my two main abandoned grinds anymore, because I’ve finally unabandoned them — Italian BBs (specifically Caracciolo) and US slowpokes (at Kansas). They’re still the record holders for abandoned grinds by time for me, though. Minnesota might slow that grind down a bit though, but it’ll get done eventually.

So besides carriers and subs, both of which I’ve played but don’t really enjoy and have never really put much effort into grinding lines, I guess I need a new abandoned grind.

Japanese light cruisers. I’ve had Omono since early access, and have still never played a battle in any of them since then. I can make them work; I did make them work during testing. But I didn’t enjoy playing them, and most of the time there’s another ship I’d rather use to fill their role at any given tier. 

[mashed68]

I stopped the Italian BB line at tier 8 before the buffs, but picked it back up and finished after them.

American light cruisers- I just am not a light cruiser kind of player. 

Pan Asian cruisers- boring. I can only take a game or two of them once in a while. 

British battlecruisers- I'd just rather play the German versions....

[Nevermore135]

36 minutes ago, ArIskandir said:

They are extremelly durable ships, I think they don't have 60 second fires (on my replays I'm on 48 secs but I'm not sure if I have skill/equipment reduction).

They have the same 60s base fire duration found on all CBs except Graf Spee instead of the 30s you would expect on a cruiser with their gun caliber. Even Napoli (which has larger 10” guns) has standard cruiser burn times.

The only reason the tier VIII and IX have CB characteristics (fire duration and dispersion) is because WG decided they didn’t want to implement the big change in the line at tier X (which is a proper CB with 11” guns and the advantages such large artillery entails). There is nothing else about the ships themselves to justify those decisions. As solid as GL is at tier X, it would have been better if the devs used a “standard” CA design instead for the line so they didn’t need to cripple Haarlem and JdW to adhere to their design philosophy (having lines “defined” by tier VIII). A 1047 design could have been easily implemented as a tier X premium or even a mid-tier BB.

As someone who has played VS (a slightly up-armored Haarlem at tier IX without the aforementioned CB handicaps), I can tell you it is a much more comfortable and enjoyable experience than either of the aforementioned tech tree ships, even with the less useful airstrikes. The WIP tier X cruiser is cut from the same cloth and is looking to be the same.

Edited May 3 by Nevermore135

[Frostbow]

2 hours ago, Ensign Cthulhu said:

Part of the problem here is that I'm mostly a co-op main

You are correct. Grinding ships in the feeding frenzy that is Co-op can be grossly inefficient for certain lines, and there are significantly better modes to do the grind.

• Dutch cruisers need a reasonable amount of time to be able to use their gimmick. One cannot just press W and hope to use airstrikes on bots that have been programmed by WG to die as soon as possible. Moreover, bots do not use islands to their advantage, limiting the effect and potency of Dutch Airstrikes. 
• Russian battleships on the other hand also need time to position and make their presence felt. While they are certainly durable, they are generally inefficient in Co-op, unless it is just you as the lone human in the team.

I am not saying the grind should not be done Co-op. I am a Co-op player also, and I have fully researched Tier X ships with the majority of the grind done in Co-op. The mode has its uses, but we all know it is limited. I am saying there will certainly come a time when one needs to go out there and battle it out against real players to be able to fully enjoy the ships we have.

Outside of Co-op is where ships can truly shine, and that is where the real fun begins. 

[Asym]

4 hours ago, Ensign Cthulhu said:

For me it's Dutch cruisers and Russian battleships.

et at...

As the title says:  Abandon the Grind.  I 100% agree.  After 6 years of playing (or so....) I have just about everything I could ever need....

If I were new, I would grind "one DD one CA or one BB nations line and purchase whatever else I "must have" to play the modes I consider my main attraction....

The rest really, other than for Snow Flakes, are superfluous... 

Really, I only actually play, at most 12 ships.......

[Ensign Cthulhu]

1 minute ago, Asym said:

As the title says:  Abandon the Grind.  I 100% agree.  After 6 years of playing (or so....) I have just about everything I could ever need....

That's not what we're talking about. The discussion here is about ships and lines we hoped we would like, decided to grind, and then had trouble making work for us to the point where they have been set aside. 

[Asym]

1 minute ago, Ensign Cthulhu said:

That's not what we're talking about. The discussion here is about ships and lines we hoped we would like, decided to grind, and then had trouble making work for us to the point where they have been set aside. 

And, as an informed player, I agree and listen to what you and others says "sucks...."  And, would NEVER waste my time !

Thanks.........

[OldSchoolGaming_Youtube]

1 hour ago, mashed68 said:

I stopped the Italian BB line at tier 8 before the buffs, but picked it back up and finished after them.

American light cruisers- I just am not a light cruiser kind of player. 

Pan Asian cruisers- boring. I can only take a game or two of them once in a while. 

British battlecruisers- I'd just rather play the German versions....

Jinan and St.Vincent is actually quite OP and fun to play. Jinan with the buffed range is kinda Wooster in smoke but without radar and those 4 racks of DWT can devastate a flank. St.Vincent is by many considered the strongest T10 BB since it has Conq Zombie heal Thunderer AP and fire chance and spood beast.

[HogHammer]

As far as the ships, I simply cannot get to work for me would be (1) any sub and (2) I'm embarrassed to say, is the Vermont.

Subs I have little interest so I can understand why, but Vermont is just a different beast.  I just cannot get the hang of it.

Really anything else I enjoy playing.

[Ensign Cthulhu]

15 minutes ago, OldSchoolGaming_Youtube said:

St.Vincent is by many considered the strongest T10 BB

And we all know where that led in competitive modes:

Duncan, her watered-down (historical, barely-a-few-plates-cut-before-treaty-cancellation) T9 variant, was probably the most fun I've ever had grinding a Tier 9 battleship.

[Ensign Cthulhu]

5 minutes ago, HogHammer said:

Subs I have little interest so I can understand why,

Yeah, but that's more like "Well, I'm not mad-keen but I guess I'd better give them a try to see what they're like and get the submariner's perspective".  At least you're not in a situation where you waited years for something that was long, hard and full of seamen, only to find that using it left you with a bad taste in your mouth and everyone else feeling more than a little salty. 

This post is so going to get edited, isn't it? 😛

[Verblonde]

I'm usually reasonably good at determining whether a ship will be any good or not from the basic equipment, armament etc. so it's been a while since I've been actually surprised by something being bad e.g. even before submarines, I usually played cruisers in PvE, and it was pretty obvious that the Dutch weren't going to be much fun in Coop.

What's more usual - for me - is for many folk to say that something blows goats, only for me to rather enjoy it; a good recent example was the IJN CLs, which I've really enjoyed playing against bots.

I usually end up completing most lines, only by using free xp if it's something I'm not gelling with. The main exceptions so far have been several of the CV lines, plus a couple of the submarine lines...