Hello, blue player here (I have 56% wr and around 4k battles in this game) here is my review of the game, I'll be making some comparison to WOT - another Wargaming game just to show some similarity and different about 2 games
-the core gameplay: this game is much more strategic than wot in a way that 1 player can make a lot of impact on the game, but at the same time 1 lone player can not at all hold off too many enemy at one like in wot does, let me elaborate the latter sentiment first:
+if 2 enemies are aiming at you, you start kite away while trying ditch a little bit of dmg out,
+if 3 enemies aiming at you, run, stop shooting if you can go un-spotted even
--> hence this is called corward meta, and it works fabulously well. Unlike wot where your tank can bounce hit without taking and dmg, here you ship fold really fast under concentrate fire. So everybody all try to avoid taking dmg, some even turn their tail in the first sign of danger even when they are using the toughest ship in the game and that player may or may not contribute for a landslide defeat to his team if the enemy manage to take out his higher-firepower teammates first. This kind of 9-3 and zero point insta lost is called blowout games (equivilant of wot's turbo game) happens a lot bc a player in an important ship just decided to take the wrong turn in the early game. But when the coward meta works, it is may become a great gaming experience for the players involve:
+either one team decide to push the flank and secure the cap and try to take out the high-value target like destroyers, subs while the other team try to take them out 1 by 1
+and there will be that 1 player who have a great time gaming by stopping the enemies and deal lot of dmg. Be that a battleship player from the other flank who cause the enemies broadside when they push, a torpedo destroyer who got lot of sussesful torp salvo or a cruiser who annoying the enemy so much they have to turn back and abandon the push
--> these longer, draw out games do happen and it is quite a nice gaming experience for those who make it
-the class playstyle has a lot of variety too (both in a good and bad way exist) :
+battleship(BB): bigg gun that can slap the living crap out of any broadside ship when they not careful/unaware of you. A battleship can slap hard across the map and etablish strong map control presence: 15km within a bb is very dangerous while sub 10km can be like kill zone of sort. So yeah you can guess the team have better bb player who can push and get a good position to punish people tend to be the winning team
+cruiser(CA/CL): lot diversity in this class, some ship can only play at the backline at fire support (CL/ light cruiser) while some other can be played like a jack of all trade or even like a pocket battleship that can heavily punish other people mistake.
+destroyer (DD): MISERY, it used to be very "fun and engaging" but over the years WG has killed it many time over and over again. Nowaday your average exprience playing destroyer would be:
Click the battle button
Pray that you gonna get a good match up again enemies' ships
Get into battle, first few minute contest the cap and try to outplay enemies' destroyers
If win the cap or sussecfully kill enemies destroyer and their team can't retake the cap: Good job Well done
If not: noob dds
Say that you win again the enemies' dds, now what
You pray again that enemies' CV and subs have not set their eye on you
You play carefully again enemies' radar cruiser if you are a torp boat or try to farm some dmg if you are a
gun boat
You go for the other flank's cap .... And just that gameplay loop rinse and repeat.
Sometime (many even) you died within 5minute bc enemies' radar ship hard commit to kill you (which is fair I dont mind) or enemies' aircraft carrier and subs just decide that you have to be dead and there are nothing you can counter them with (which is utterly ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥). WG brilliant CV rework and the addition of subs to the game have killed the DDs gameplay for most people unfortunately. It used to be fun but now it feels so helpless and so frustrating.
+Aircraft carrier (CV): the strongest class in the game (in a good way in the past) is also the biggest pain in the ass in other pp eyes, It used to be extremely hard to play and equaly rewarding. Now they can just throw all their plane in the slaughter house and the planes will spawn back later on, they can call out a group of plane out of thin air to keep enemy spotted even. Totally unfair for anyone who play again them and the only way to counter them is planes too (oh how irony). This class is the equivalent of SPG in wot, absolute kill joy for whoever they set their eyes on.
+Subs: just a better torp destroyer in many way, and they are little way of counter them without hard commit and very likely die while doing that. They can easily show up to somebody side to ambush them and then submerged, get away without taking and punishment, something no destroyer can do.
--> So yeah 5 classes but 2 class are kinda cancer to play again. Kinda ♥♥♥♥
-Another thing is the current way how the games play out nowaday when blow out games happen very often because of bad player get match up in 1 team and the other team are not at bad at them. Or how some ship nowaday can just spawn out sqadron of plane out of thin air. Yeah the game shifting direction to more plane with no counter play whatsoever, punish people who make good use of the map to get cover from getting cross fire - let them eat planes instead. You who read up to this point can probably realize now
-Last thing: the grind and the enconomy.
+Sad news that WG kinda botched the good grinding experience too which I dont see many people talk about (or it's just me). You can grind up 1 line fully within like 25-30 games in the past. Now you can't because they change how much xp boost one can stack upon each other. But it is still a lot better than wot grind which take hundreds of games just for 1 line.
+The economy in this game tho is kinda great not gonna lie. Not premium consumable (this game used to have), no premium shells like in wot and the overall battle reward is always positive in credits income so no worry that you goona run out of credits playing bad.
-->So yeah the grind and the enconomy is kinda good, no lie. Only minor complain that WG sometimes overestimate the playerbase's jobless-ness: they expect us to play the game 12 hours a day during christmas 1 year to get the pueto rico for example. But if you just playing the game daily and can cope with the (sometimes) bad games that happen nowadays, this game is pretty decent for casual and non-spending player.
And why I have only 1 hours on this game on Steam: I use the WG laucher
