My top picks for tier 7 ranked! And why

[Elluvon]

16 minutes ago, Tricericon said:

So, what are the best Tier 9 radar cruisers? I had mentally penciled in Alaska for that spot, but that was all by reputation.

Honestly, Buffalo is pretty damn strong. Fast reloading 203s, decent armor when angled, and the tools to deal with both cruisers and destroyers equally. A couple seasons ago I pretty much exclusively played Buffalo and did pretty well. 

[BOBTHEBALL]

25 minutes ago, Tricericon said:

So, what are the best Tier 9 radar cruisers? I had mentally penciled in Alaska for that spot, but that was all by reputation.

If you want a cruiser that has the combo of great radar + guns that are able to kill DDs really easily then no doubt it's Donskoi. However Donskoi is quite bad at doing anything else. Buffalo is an ok choice because she has actual DPM however her guns will struggle to hit DDs at range (Same problem Alaska has). If you're tired of DDs running around then go a DD hunting cruiser build on your Donskoi and you can easily kill the DDs with her. 

Tier 9 cruisers a genuinely like the worst in-game, premium and tech tree. We call some tier 9 cruisers great because compared to the others at the tier they're way way better.

[ArIskandir]

33 minutes ago, BOBTHEBALL said:

A good HE spamming cruiser will farm the Alaska down incredibly easily. Especially something with a MBRB. Bayard believe it or not could slap Alaska around incredibly easily.

Against a Cruiser is much easier to disengage by going dark. Whatever Cruiser meeting Alaska at facespotting range risks having a very Bad day. It's easier to set more favorable trades. A DD otoh can farm You at 12km and there's nothing You can do about it.

[ArIskandir]

37 minutes ago, Tricericon said:

So, what are the best Tier 9 radar cruisers? I had mentally penciled in Alaska for that spot, but that was all by reputation.

Tbh  I would run a T8, Chappy or Baltimore. Stealth Radar ftw. 

[BOBTHEBALL]

16 minutes ago, ArIskandir said:

Tbh  I would run a T8, Chappy or Baltimore. Stealth Radar ftw. 

I'd rate Chapayev over Baltimore but yeah they're both good choices as well.

[BOBTHEBALL]

19 minutes ago, ArIskandir said:

Against a Cruiser is much easier to disengage by going dark. Whatever Cruiser meeting Alaska at facespotting range risks having a very Bad day. It's easier to set more favorable trades. A DD otoh can farm You at 12km and there's nothing You can do about it.

I mean it really depends on the cruiser and on the DD. Also most likely the DD will just get slapped by the team.

[ArIskandir]

8 minutes ago, BOBTHEBALL said:

I mean it really depends on the cruiser and on the DD. Also most likely the DD will just get slapped by the team.

I was assuming 1-on-1 scenarios, with teams involved things change and any Radar, even Alaska's is quite valuable. 

[BOBTHEBALL]

9 minutes ago, ArIskandir said:

I was assuming 1-on-1 scenarios, with teams involved things change and any Radar, even Alaska's is quite valuable. 

Well we are talking about ranked afterall.

[mashed68]

Alaskas were never designed to counter DD's. Saying that just because she has radar is like saying Missouri is designed to counter DD's. 

[Unlooky]

On 5/20/2024 at 3:39 PM, mashed68 said:

Heinrich has been one of my favorite ships in the game. Shes excellent. 

For the current ranked season I'm mostly the Scharnhorst 43, WV44, Toulon and Weimar. I just reset the german BC line and don't have heinrich yet lol. 

I was just grinding ranked for the BB kills holy hell this ship is busted

[Itwastuesday]

6 hours ago, ArIskandir said:

Not so sure mate, when a Radar Cruiser is food for the things it is supposed to counter (as in DDs)... she's fine against other Cruisers and BBs, but a good gunboat DD will farm her without too much trouble. 

Eh, I don'y share that expectation. Cruisers counter nothing except sometimes other cruisers. 

[mashed68]

2 hours ago, Unlooky said:

I was just grinding ranked for the BB kills holy hell this ship is busted

ItS oNlY bAyRn GuNs 

Edited May 29 by mashed68

[ArIskandir]

15 hours ago, mashed68 said:

Alaskas were never designed to counter DD's. Saying that just because she has radar is like saying Missouri is designed to counter DD's. 

 

11 hours ago, Itwastuesday said:

Eh, I don'y share that expectation. Cruisers counter nothing except sometimes other cruisers. 

I'm fairly sure most of us here know hunting DDs is not Alaska's prime role, but the point is you need to consider why you bring a Cruiser to a match mode where it's guaranteed 3 out of 6 ships will be BBs. Do you really need an extra 'light' BB?
Most of the time with Cruisers in ranked you look for the flexibility to 'cover all the bases', to support your DDs and hunt the enemiy's, farm the BBs and go toe-to-toe against other Cruisers. Alaska lacks the full flexibility package. 

[Itwastuesday]

17 minutes ago, ArIskandir said:

 

I'm fairly sure most of us here know hunting DDs is not Alaska's prime role, but the point is you need to consider why you bring a Cruiser to a match mode where it's guaranteed 3 out of 6 ships will be BBs. Do you really need an extra 'light' BB?
Most of the time with Cruisers in ranked you look for the flexibility to 'cover all the bases', to support your DDs and hunt the enemiy's, farm the BBs and go toe-to-toe against other Cruisers. Alaska lacks the full flexibility package. 

Mostly because it's not an Ibuki in your team that automatically explodes and does jack squat. Otherwise no reason. Without class for class matchmaking I wouldn't bring cruisers into anything. 

[Scrubby_McScrub]

Gotta rant here. Tier 7 ranked sucks. Ranked should only be for tiers 8 through 10. I was 1 freakin star away from getting to Silver in the qualifying on Tuesday and here comes the AFK Pommern who didn't start playing for more than 10 minutes into the battle. Otherwise, it would have been an easy win. So, I'm really ranting about 2 things. 1) Miserable tier 7 ranked gameplay where ships are less interesting and not enough of them compared to higher tiers and 2) Why the hell can't WG start disqualifying battles if there is an AFK player? It's not like he loaded in 30 seconds late. It was over 10 minutes! Just program it to either end the battle or don't take stars away from the losing team with the AFK player. 

[YouSatInGum]

On 5/28/2024 at 5:51 PM, BOBTHEBALL said:

If you want a cruiser that has the combo of great radar + guns that are able to kill DDs really easily then no doubt it's Donskoi. However Donskoi is quite bad at doing anything else. Buffalo is an ok choice because she has actual DPM however her guns will struggle to hit DDs at range (Same problem Alaska has). If you're tired of DDs running around then go a DD hunting cruiser build on your Donskoi and you can easily kill the DDs with her. 

Tier 9 cruisers a genuinely like the worst in-game, premium and tech tree. We call some tier 9 cruisers great because compared to the others at the tier they're way way better.

Exactly.

In general T9 cruisers are pretty much dog shit. 

For nearly all lines, the step up to T10 is more like a power upgrade of 2 or 3 tiers. 

For example.... if you are playing the nose in island humping game then DM/Salem has about double the DPM over Buffalo.

 

So for all of WG's effort is trying to tell us that balancing is based of lots of data, this power jump from T9 to T10 is a perfect example of how there's enough gas there to keep Russia lights on through the winter or least until vodka runs out and they have to go back to work.

 

 

[YouSatInGum]

On 5/28/2024 at 6:19 PM, BOBTHEBALL said:

I'd rate Chapayev over Baltimore but yeah they're both good choices as well.

Same Same.

 

Especially as bottom tier.  Last T8/9 CB season Chapy was nearly mandatory....Balti was more rare and was hard to keep alive since it wasn't really kiter.

[VedranSeawolf359]

is strange but I preform better with Prinz Eitel Friedrich than Prinz Heinrich

[Tricericon]

41 minutes ago, VedranSeawolf359 said:

is strange but I preform better with Prinz Eitel Friedrich than Prinz Heinrich

Prince Freddy is "interpreted" as a battleship rather than a battlecruiser, giving her much better plating than her sister or Prince Henry. She has reduced offensive potential and lacks hydro but tanks better. She may just be a better fit for your style.

[Ducky_shot]

Mahan is the best DD at the tier. Haida has some advantages, but its smoke holds it back. Mahan can just bully other DD's and more importantly, can support the team better with its smoke, but we're talking bronze, what' support to most people stuck in it? Sure Mahan's concealment sucks a bit, but again, this is bronze, DD's start shooting at you for stupid reasons.

[BOBTHEBALL]

3 hours ago, Ducky_shot said:

Mahan is the best DD at the tier. Haida has some advantages, but its smoke holds it back. Mahan can just bully other DD's and more importantly, can support the team better with its smoke, but we're talking bronze, what' support to most people stuck in it? Sure Mahan's concealment sucks a bit, but again, this is bronze, DD's start shooting at you for stupid reasons.

Erm, what the sigma? 🤓

You can't be serious rn

[ArIskandir]

1 hour ago, BOBTHEBALL said:

Erm, what the sigma? 🤓

You can't be serious rn

The Ducky loves DPM... QuackBang!

[whiplash]

As a cruiser player boise is my goto pick for tier7 ranked, bronze was over pretty quickly.

[Project45_Opytny]

On 6/1/2024 at 11:22 PM, Tricericon said:

Prince Freddy is "interpreted" as a battleship rather than a battlecruiser, giving her much better plating than her sister or Prince Henry. She has reduced offensive potential and lacks hydro but tanks better. She may just be a better fit for your style.

At Tiers 6 and 7 there aren't that much pronounced difference between Prinz Eitel Friedrich and Mackensen/Prinz Heinrich other than researchable battlecruisers are also vulnerable to IFHE-less non-German 6 inch HE. Overmatch resistance is the same for 25mm and 26mm plating. And that's before Prinz Heinrich's overmatch advantage thanks to her 15 inch guns.

[Nevermore135]

1 hour ago, Project45_Opytny said:

And that's before Prinz Heinrich's overmatch advantage thanks to her 15 inch guns.

This advantage cannot be oversold in a limited tier 6/7 environment, especially when one considers that mid tier cruisers also typically have 25mm deck armor amidships. While I’ll play the occasional match in a smaller-gunned BB for fun, my general rule of thumb in mid-tier Ranked is that if I’m serious about advancing I don’t take a battleship that doesn’t have at least 15” guns.

Just having overmatch makes PH’s guns fairly potent, despite them being otherwise pretty lackluster for tier VII (they are the same guns as Bayern, which are only “ok” at tier VI, largely by virtue of overmatch). In fact, the Bronze Ranked environment is pretty much perfectly suited for PH, because most of the ship’s major drawbacks that hold her back in other modes simply aren’t relevant because she is always top tier and facing small teams:

1) Her tier VI shells really start to struggle when up-tiered, as they don’t have much going for them outside of 25/26mm overmatch.

2) The MM and limited engagement ranges makes the incredibly awkward gap between her secondary range and concealment largely irrelevant. This is standard for tier VII BBs, but it’s especially problematic for PH because so much of her kit is tailored towards secondary brawling.

3) Her unimpressive speed for a battlecruiser (28 knots is decent, but not great) isn’t really a problem when you don’t have to worry about proper tier VIII-IX BBs that can go 30+ knots.

4) She doesn’t need to take IFHE to bump her 105mm secondaries up to 32mm of penetration, so she can achieve both universally effective DPM and fire-starting ability.

With all this going on, it’s no surprise Prinz Heinrich is such a dominant battleship in this meta.

Edited June 5 by Nevermore135