I'm on the C. Colombo grind, got a few Qs

[Jakeshuffle]

C. Colombo dispersion being what it is at base of 251, is it going to be as rough as I imagine at anything more than 12km? I'm on the Andrea Doria, just in co-op for now, and she's fun, I get the appeal of SAP for sure, but the Colombo confuses me. I thought the Secondaries would have better penetration and could be built into but is that not the case with Colombo? Does she try to do both what Lauria and Verdi do but badly at both?

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

I'm on the Caracciolo...for me the appeal of the line is the hull maneuverability and the relatively decent armor.

The guns are absolutely troll...sometimes of you, sometimes of the enemy team...and the secondaries are nothing to improve.

But that rudder shift, mhwa! That SAP when it hits what I want it to hit...it's excellent.

[BOBTHEBALL]

2 hours ago, Jakeshuffle said:

C. Colombo dispersion being what it is at base of 251, is it going to be as rough as I imagine at anything more than 12km? I'm on the Andrea Doria, just in co-op for now, and she's fun, I get the appeal of SAP for sure, but the Colombo confuses me. I thought the Secondaries would have better penetration and could be built into but is that not the case with Colombo? Does she try to do both what Lauria and Verdi do but badly at both?

Let me say this, Colombo is still shrouded in the "Ew not very accurate, will hardly deal damage". My experience has been FAR FAR from it. It's an amazing ship with such great punching power. I had one much with constant 20k salvos with the SAP, it's such a toxic and fun ammo type to use. If you aim at a broadside or someone not angled properly they will eat eat eat damage for breakfast. Also your AP pen is great and you get a lovely smog.

 

 

I have many more of these to show, that was just one match alone. For me at least she's been consistently amazing to play and punches very very hard.

(I have more clips if anyone wants to see them)

[Itwastuesday]

Colombo is a great aggressive ship now, your guns function well enough on the ranges you go to. For me the buff to rear turret firing angles was what made it good, no longer you eat a ton of damage if you use them. 

 

edit : I'll also say it's very worthwhile in that no other TT battleship plays quite the same. 

Edited June 20 by Itwastuesday

[Nevermore135]

Italian battleships are pretty polarizing. Players tend to either love them or hate them.

Tech tree Italian BBs were given main battery SAP shells, and as a result their gunnery parameters were nerfed pretty heavily as a result (although some players will jokingly call it the “GC tax”). The ships tend to have long reload for their caliber/number of guns compared to other ships at their tier, and many have poor sigma combined with the French/Italian/European BB dispersion model, which is inferior to the “standard” US/UK/German model at all ranges. The lower and higher tier ships in the line can make up for the poor accuracy with shell volume (C. Columbo, for example, has sixteen guns) and at tier IX and X the reload upgrade becomes available in slot 6.

IMO the tier VI is the highlight of the line. I’ve unlocked every battleship line to tier X, and the Italian battleship line grind was the least pleasant (and one of the most frustrating lines period). This impression comes even after finishing the tier VIII and all of the tier IX grind in Airship Escort where I could force engagements at ranges where the dispersion was less frustrating.

Edited June 20 by Nevermore135

[mashed68]

Dispersion is bad. 16 guns is good. It evens out. 

[Jakeshuffle]

I'm glad I asked! The Fun Factor(TM) was there for me in the T6 so I'll explore more of the line but I don't feel like I NEED to finish it thankfully. I appreciate everyone's feedback!

[MBT808]

I’d say the SAP is decent early on but gets worse as you press on. The caliber struggles against BBs that are well armoured, 381mm SAP just doesn’t have quite enough pen. It’s great for punishing cruisers and thin skinned BBs but generally you want to be firing AP most of the time due to how inconsistent the guns are. If you only get three hits out of an entire salvo, it’s better that those hits are AP. Since you may get a citadel which will do way more in the long run than a SAP pen.

This is partly why Marco Polo is better than the tech line ships, the 406mm SAP gets over 100mm pen threshold that is more usable against heavily armoured BBs. 27mm overmatch on the AP is a nice plus too. In the case of SAP, quality is absolutely better than quantity objectively.

[MBT808]

18 hours ago, Jakeshuffle said:

I thought the Secondaries would have better penetration and could be built into but is that not the case with Colombo? Does she try to do both what Lauria and Verdi do but badly at both?

Technically, the only secondary focused ship for Italy is Napoli. None of the BBs get any sort of enhanced range or dispersion like German or American BBs(or the IJN/RN 150mm casemates).

The only thing the BBs get is SAP shells for their secondaries on the premium/special ships. The tech line ships get nothing at all.

[Jakeshuffle]

1 hour ago, MBT808 said:

The only thing the BBs get is SAP shells for their secondaries on the premium/special ships. The tech line ships get nothing at all.

Well I guess I can't have it all now can I!

[BOBTHEBALL]

4 hours ago, MBT808 said:

generally you want to be firing AP most of the time due to how inconsistent the guns are. If you only get three hits out of an entire salvo, it’s better that those hits are AP. Since you may get a citadel which will do way more in the long run than a SAP pen.

No not at all, your main ammo type is SAP. You switch to AP when you can confirm citadels. Like for example a broadside Yoshino. I've noticed as well this is how Flamu plays his Colombo and he dislikes it. Maybe if he tried shooting more SAP and less AP he'd enjoy hitting everything for 20k a pop.

 

[BOBTHEBALL]

7 hours ago, Jakeshuffle said:

I'm glad I asked! The Fun Factor(TM) was there for me in the T6 so I'll explore more of the line but I don't feel like I NEED to finish it thankfully. I appreciate everyone's feedback!

Colombo is definetly the highlight of the line. I played Venetto in airship and it was not that bad after buffs. SAP still claps and you get a tanky hull with great AP pen. Lepanto while not as amazing as Colombo it is still great, although you need to give tons of broadside to get the last gun off.

[Itwastuesday]

7 hours ago, BOBTHEBALL said:

No not at all, your main ammo type is SAP. You switch to AP when you can confirm citadels. Like for example a broadside Yoshino. I've noticed as well this is how Flamu plays his Colombo and he dislikes it. Maybe if he tried shooting more SAP and less AP he'd enjoy hitting everything for 20k a pop.

 

Another divisive topic I suppose. I shoot like 1 or 2 sap salvos a game. People show a lot of broadside to brexit and italian battleships perhaps because they assume you always use non-ap. I've tried to focus on ammunition choice but after the initial minutes of a game I just always shoot AP.

Like yesterday a Pay2Rico shows broadside as the first target I see. I thought about shooting SAP since that ship is notoriously difficult to citadel but instinctively I just shot anyway, and the lottery machine that is 16 AP shells gave me 2 cits and around 30k damage into him. 

Edited June 21 by Itwastuesday