Source
r/WorldOfWarships•
Lord-Prometheus

Torpedo or gun build for Östergötland/Halland?

Question

Title for the most part. I'll be brief as I don't have a lot to say besides that.

I've been having good fun in Swedish DDs but most of it comes from using my guns. However my average damage in all of them is really low, because I've been frustrated with the torpedoes at basically every tier. I miss what feels like 80% of my shots completely and I can't fathom how I am so bad with them. (tips for this are appreciated too, but I've heard and accepted a lot of basic ones like don't use narrow spread etc)

This caused me to wonder lately, having recently acquired Östergötland, if I should just give up on trying to do torpedoboating since I'm woeful at it and if gunboat build is actually viable.

Posted Jun 1, 2020, 4:41 AM UTC

327
Pecos_Bill91•

100% the torps

10
Lord-PrometheusOP•

Alright, well, got any tips for how to make that work?

I went full torpedo build in Oland. My winrate is 68% but my average damage is slightly above 32k. I missed 80% or more of the torpedoes I fired

2
Pecos_Bill91•

Same as Oland. Take the torp reload captain skill, and the torp upgrades. You are going to need pm to offset the damage increase on the torps. The problem is that from Skåne up to Oster you have the same dismal gun range and you literally will never be a better gun boat than most of the other boats with the except the IJN torp line. Focus on landing torps don't be afraid of the narrow spread. And keep them on cool down. If you run out of things to torpedo take a cap. Avoid British,and French DDs they will always beat you. And whatever you do stay unspotted the best you can.

1
Lord-PrometheusOP•

Take the torp reload captain skill, and the torp upgrades.

Already had it on Oland, and I have mounted all of those on Ostergotland.

You are going to need pm to offset the damage increase on the torps.

Don't have PM nor do I plan on taking it. Going to get SI and BFT as my last 6pts (already have PT/LS/SE/CE/TAE)

Focus on landing torps don't be afraid of the narrow spread.

I can barely hit anything with the normal spread, let alone the narrow, which actually increases the chances a slight change in course or speed of the opponent will result on a wasted salvo.

Tips for actually landing torpedoes is appreciated, as that's what I was asking for.

-1
Pecos_Bill91•

Who are you prioritizing? In my experience the Pan EU dds have the easiest time hitting anything. Just remember that upon spotting torps most people will turn into or away from torpedoes your second salvo should almost always be behind the white guide track. On the narrow spread I try for a sreads-width in usually. Try not to flick to your guns around when you are firing torpedoes as it my tip off that you have just fired them. If someone is proving a dodgey type that's when I switch to the wider spread. I use the minimap to gauge their heading. Certain cruisers I don't usually bother with namely the Italian CAs.

6
madmanrambler•

Narrow launch is your friend, the point of multiple launchers is to spread the salvos out so a minor course correction still hits someone. When you fire a wide spread all you're doing is giving them more space so their mistake doesn't kill them, and you improve chances for someone to skate by without taking any damage. There's no great advice besides 'practice' and work out how fast your torpedoes go, while understanding what causes course adjustments. Enemy maneuvering to get behind an island? Gonna throw off torp salvos. Enemy turning because they were presenting broadside and they saw a bb? Gonna throw off the salvo. Enemy spotting you? It really should throw off the salvo but hey, some people suck.

1
MintMrChrisMrChris_CJ•

For Halland I build full torps, I considered guns but the playstyle doesn't really suit imo and those torps are fucking meme worthy once you start to troll with them

For one, at T10, a DD without smoke is a recipe for big oof (you ain't French either), ships like Venezia sailing around, just picking a fight with every DD you come across is extremely dangerous even with a heal, at T9 I felt I could get away with it more because blessed MM but I still did not actively DD hunt with the Oster. Its one of the reasons why the 10.4km gun range is so useful because it can aid a bit in getting undetected. If there is a CV in game as well, you don't really want to draw attention, despite what people say about the AA, which is impressive yes, a CV can still strike you if he wants and its VERY easy to strip your AA mounts, got to abuse the hell out of the air detection which gunboating doesn't help.

The guns also while impressive, have some quirks. For one, there is the obvious 2 turrets which can be awkward (especially if one gets disabled) and I don't know if the Swedes drink alot but fuck me do the shells seem to go everywhere, when some Gearing is kiting away from me and somehow my shells are landing either side of its fat ass, you really notice the wonky dispersion at times. There is some minor stuff, like the inability of the forward gun to depress when bow in and general gun angles, but not really important.

I treat the ship like a torp boat, akin to a Shima, just with powerful gunboating ability to back it up.

I run a standard DD build with RPF for that reason (and SI for extra heal), since I am not really trying to hunt DDs, but if they run into me then I can fight them. RPF also comes in handy for RPF/pre torping areas, the number of times I have pre torped DDs at caps then you can dive in and finish them with guns...

I do sometimes use the widespread but more often for hail mary volleys or situations like flooding a smoke etc, the narrow spreads are so good but as with torping it is always extremely situational, if you are in close to a target narrow spreads can be devastating (also good for maintaining tighter spread over much longer distance as well) but they are still easy to completely avoid by accident.

5
sinmppa•

The guns are very situational, you can rarely farm anyone and you dont want to be drawn into a prolonged gunfight. That is only because you dont have smoke, the guns them selves are good and you will win most 1v1 against dds anyways. Torpedo build is therefore the better pick imo. And btw i use almost exclusively narrow spread and get very consistent hits

2
Lord-PrometheusOP•

How exactly are you securing regular hits?

It seems like everything I shoot torpedoes at has magical precognition and turns just a little and then everything misses.

1
sinmppa•

Get a little closer and try to predict their movements. Even completely random torps hit often when fired at predictable directions where there might be a dd. RPF is a must have too and you want to throw in some torpedos every time you see an enemy smoke. Narrow spreads to smokes are almost impossible dodge.

5
Lord-PrometheusOP•

Okay.

Not sure where I'm supposed to fit RPF in. TAE, SE, and SI are must haves, which only leaves three points left

0
sinmppa•

SI is nice to have but I think RPF is more usefull.

3
nToxikRoyal Canadian Moosen Navy eh!•

RPF works really well on Halland. You don't need TAE.

PM-LS-SE-CE-SI-AR-RPF

1
ugiresunlu•

Keep your attack range as close as your concealment provides and always attack to full broadside of targets. Well this tactic depends on high situational control so always check minimap and keep an eye on escorting cruisers.

1
Spedwards:au: Representing Aus on NA :au:•

Before Halland was released, I built Ostergotland as a gun boat using my Friesland captain. I rallied up over 600k exp in a week due to how much fun it was.

For Halland however, torp build.

1
Lord-PrometheusOP•

What in your mind makes Ostergotland well suited to being a gunboat, but not Halland, when the latter on paper is better suited to it, with higher HP and better guns?

1
tejanaqkilicaPre Alpha Tester•

They're not worth it because you can't disengage and that will get you killed. At tier 9 depending on the MM you might get away with it. At tier X you will melt quickly.

I mean, if the red team isn't one of those mashed potatoes team.

2
DerGoldeneFalke•

I have my Halland built for both torps and guns. I just keep situational awareness so that I have an escape option when I engage an enemy DD. With SI, Halland can heal back nearly 15k health, so with good damage mitigation you can really hurt enemy DDs.

1
renhanxue•

I use this build - pretty much just torp DPM focused. I don't run RPF myself, but if you have problems with situational awareness and get jumped a lot it can be a good pick. AR is very strong on these ships because of the heal, you can safely stay at partial HP for much longer than on other DD's, and at 50% HP it's both TAE and BFT for only 2 points.

Torpedoboats will always be less consistent than gunboats, that's just in their nature. Even if you do everything right you can still get unlucky and miss a lot. That said it's much easier to be a torpboat in the Östergötland and Halland than in the lower tiers, just because you launch more torps at a time. You should definitely be using the narrow spread almost 100% of the time, because if you launch wide spread your damage output is garbage because the damage per torp is so low. Other than that I don't really have any magical tricks to get them to work, it's basically just about trying to identify straight-lining battleships or smoked-up Smolensks or whatever and then launching on them. Closer is better as always. I have higher damage per game in the Halland than in the Gearing so they're working for me.

The guns on both the Östergötland and on the Halland are actually very good and should not be ignored. They're hard to use safely, but with SI, SE and the heal flag you have a pretty huge HP pool so you can afford to trade some of it to start fires on BB's that you've flooded or getting into fights with other DD's. You can win duels with most other DD's except Darings and Harugumos, but don't overcommit - you want to be able to disengage and heal.

1
cantforgetthistime•

Just because your torps go 16km doesn't mean you have to aim at targets that far out.

Also don't be afraid to use wide spread, narrow is super narrow and easy to miss

1
Lord-PrometheusOP•

That’s generally what I’ve been doing, I try to aim at targets that are like 10km or under

1