To WASA or not to WASA

[Old Crusty]

   I built a Wasa and unboxed it against AI. For me I find that it falls short of what I expected. It is sorely under crewed in battle. Once you start firing broadsides there is just not enough crew to reload the guns and they reload sporadically.

   I would love to hear from experienced players the best use and build for the Wasa.

   I have been in a couple PvP actions in the Wasa but were inconclusive because the raiders were just running. I did exchange fire with Enemy player Bellona and quickly decided that would be a loss one on one.

[Old Crusty]

17 minutes ago, Wraith said:

It's a lesson in micromanaging your crew, and/or making some concessions with your mods and build/cannon choice. That said, there's not much reason to ever choose a Wasa over a Bellona in the current meta.

I thought as much. Makes it a waste of my hard earned PvP marks. Thanks for your response.

[Malachi]

O tempora, o metas... Aye, Wasa is just a shadow of her glorious former self. 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Just now, Malachi said:

O tempora, o metas... Aye, Wasa is just a shadow of her glorious former self. 

So the #antimetaleague should make her ship of the week soon ?

( honestly never sailed her outside of the Test Server we had when she had her debut )

[Malachi]

Nah, she had her time in the spotlight. What about Inger or Wappen? 😛

 

[Hethwill, the Red Duke]

Always liked the Wapen.

Haven't spent enough time on the Inger, always come up against... adversities in the OW which end in a GG... o7... blublublub..

[Rabman]

11 minutes ago, Louis Garneray said:

I'm doing my best to have the Indefatigable on the list.

Traitor! You should be in Hermoines like us.

[Old Crusty]

40 minutes ago, Malachi said:

Nah, she had her time in the spotlight. What about Inger or Wappen? 😛

 

Difference is that Wasa is not craftable and the others are.

[Sir Texas Sir]

1 hour ago, Wraith said:

It's a lesson in micromanaging your crew, and/or making some concessions with your mods and build/cannon choice. That said, there's not much reason to ever choose a Wasa over a Bellona in the current meta.

This was always the key even back when she was OP as a 4th rate.  The problem is she's not a bad ship right now and would do some things better than a Wasa like chasing down ships with all her chasers, but she's not the brawler she use to be against other ships without support.  She really needs a way to get her without PvP marks. I would actually use her more on the one account I open her if it wasn't for the PvP mark value.  Just like the LVG Refit I have it open on one char and would use her more on others if she didn't cost PvP marks.  Would be nice if they had us an option to buy the BP and make the permits cost a reduced PvP mark for it and I bet you we will see a lot more of them. I would pay 50-100 PvP marks for the BP and than 5 per permit or even 10.

@admin have we thought of other ways to allow folks to get Wasa, L'Herm and LVG Refits?  

As for the LVG refit and any refits in the future I honestly think they should take a ship and than refit it.  Like I have an LGV I craftered or campture.  I want to refit it into an LVG REFIT.  So I buy the permit and turn it in with the ship to have it refitted as the new LGV Refit.  The refit permit would cost less than the whole ship on it's own.  We also need an Indianman refit in game too.  Half the cargo but a bit more firepower/crew.

13 minutes ago, Old Crusty said:

Difference is that Wasa is not craftable and the others are.

There should be a rare chance to get the BP for all ships in game and have them craftable unless they are special gift ships or rare prizes.  I would love some epic type mission with a price to have the special BP in it.  Every one that finishes gets the prize (not the stupid one chest split between 6 guys like epics are now).

[William Death]

Only reason to sail her nowadays is if you want the 6 bow chasers and 4 stern chasers. Or to work into a PB fleet. Those bow chasers are lovely, by the way. But otherwise, Bellona, Ingermanland, or Wapen will serve you better for OW hunting, depending on what you want to do with it. 

Poor Wasa (can't believe I said that after it was OP for so long) just has a hard time fitting in, what with being expensive, a sailing profile that is nothing to write home about, mediocre thickness and HP...

Now if it was craftable, you might see it a bit more often when the Bellona fleets go sailing for some seals to club: it makes a great chase ship and has just enough toughness to support the heavier Bellonas. Honestly though, given all the stats nerfs it has had, we could drop it back down to a 4th rate so it could use the better books, but keep the BR as-is (balance the BR of the other 4th rates though, they are all way too high). 

 

Anyways, its nice to sail if you outfit it properly (teak/wo or teak/teak for general use and fir/fir or similar for a solo speedy hunter) with speed, repair, and turning mods.

Crew is a non-issue. It rarely is an issue to a good player on any ship as long as you have enough to man 30-50% sails and 50-75% of one broadside. So basically, as long as you have over ~300+ on the Wasa, you're fine. Just manage your reload and fire only the cannons that will do damage. She will punish you for missing shots or bouncing broadsides off your enemy, so make sure you're taking the time to think about what cannons you should fire and what ones will not do anything at the moment. Don't shoot just because a ship is next to you if your shots won't pen to do damage (angled). 

Agility is there, so engaging a 2nd or 3rd rate alone is certainly possible, but you have little room for slip ups with the low HP and thickness. It doesn't help that you're stuck using the same low-bonus 1-3 rate books that your larger enemy is too. 

When fighting with it, make use of the high caliber cannons to pound your enemy from range. Run carronades on top since they have about the same effective range as 32 carronades do on the kind of ships you'll be engaging. And its only a handful of them anyways so you'll likely have them turned off most of the time.

[Sir Loorkon]

The WASA in her current state whould be an excellent DLC ship. She is not OP 😉.

[sveno]

Wappen for the win! There is no ship i feel saver in, when in PvP.
Disclaimer: it IS a great ship for brawling minded people.
All mediums top deck empty, back 68 carros, front long 6 or 4s.
Teak/Wo, mod on turnrate, sailspeed, rudder speed, repair, thickness maybe mast thickness mod.

Wasa/Bellona
Well, the Wasa is still good, weaker then the Bello but better sailing Profile.
I suggest running the Wasa all mediums or at least bottom deck medium, saves a lot of crew.
Often when i PvP gankers with my Wappen or Endy, then Bellos are not reaching me, Wasas do.
Hope that this speed meta on Bellos get fixed soon, its not that fun battling groups of those because "they can".

o7

Edited August 21, 2018 by sveno

[Dibbler (Retired)]

38 minutes ago, Sir Loorkon said:

The WASA in her current state whould be an excellent DLC ship. She is not OP 😉.

 

They should make her a 6th rate. 😂

[Guest]

You can always use Light Carriages to reduce the crew required to man the guns on your ship. I find doing this on the Wasa and Bellona allow you to reload a full broadside at once unless you have some crew damage.

Wasa sucks compared to the Bellona, its only cool factor is that it's chasers are epic.

[HachiRoku]

 

2 minutes ago, Flinch said:

Wasa sucks compared to the Bellona, its only cool factor is that it's chasers are epic.

I don't sail wasas but those chasers are deadly in the right hands. Those chasers are one of the reasons the wasa is that good. 

On this topic. Most ships that are undercrewed have pretty big guns for their sizes. If you are playing vs ai trying using 2 decks of 24 pounders or maybe even 24s and 18s. Not much difference damage wise and you have the option of light carriages to. Great mod. Experiment more and try different gun setups. 

[Old Crusty]

I appreciate the responses and insights gentlemen. Thank you.

[Malachi]

But keep in mind that you should sail a ship YOU like and really want to sail, disregarding the current meta. Theres always a way to compensate (well, more or less) certain weaknesses of your favourite ship. My love will always La Renommée, no matter how competitive that ship is.

[Guest]

[DELETED]

Edited August 29, 2018 by Guest

[Urchin]

5 hours ago, Wraith said:

That was the conclusion I've come to as well.  It's sad, there seems to be fewer and fewer reasons to sail anything other than L'Ocean/Santi depending on your play style, Bellona in various builds depending on your play style, and Herc/L'Rekt depending on what you're doing with them tweaked for speed, boarding or tankiness, etc... at least in the OW. Port battles might require something slightly different for BR filling, but rarely.

It would be fascinating to see the percentages of ships in battles over the last six months.

DLC ships are too good, are redeemable too easily and need a longer cool down period.  Why they are all you see now OW hunting or camping ports, solo or in pairs. Pointless to use anything else. 

[Barbancourt]

2 hours ago, Malachi said:

But keep in mind that you should sail a ship YOU like and really want to sail, disregarding the current meta. Theres always a way to compensate (well, more or less) certain weaknesses of your favourite ship. My love will always La Renommée, no matter how competitive that ship is.

I had to give up the Renommee with the new physics model.    It gets pushed around by the wind too much, and I lost my last Renommee when it got pushed unexpectedly far in reverse while turning through the wind, causing its rudder to get stuck in the bottom and tipping it over on its side.  (even though the game displayed some feet of water between my keel and the bottom 😕 )

[Barbancourt]

5 hours ago, Banished Privateer said:

Ingers and Wapens are the Elite Spanish 15.5 knots meta ships

I wish there was a comprehensive guide to application of mods/knowledge/builds and the "meta" of builds - I have no idea what you're referring to, or why a lot of other ships or mods suddenly boom or wane in popularity...or for that matter why I get curbstomped so badly all the time.  🤔

[William Death]

1 hour ago, Barbancourt (rownd) said:

I wish there was a comprehensive guide to application of mods/knowledge/builds and the "meta" of builds - I have no idea what you're referring to, or why a lot of other ships or mods suddenly boom or wane in popularity...or for that matter why I get curbstomped so badly all the time.

Speed is #1 for most types of OW PvP. Those who have it, want more of it, those who don't have it, get sunk. A lot. Like...a whole lot because they can't choose their engagements when a faster ship wants to fight. Its all fine and dandy if you're in a tank ship and the fast ships come to brawl with you, but what happens when they completely overwhelm you with numbers or bring ships that are both fast and tough? All the turning, thickness, HP, reload, and repair mods in the game can't save you then. Only speed can save you from a watery grave.

Refer to a sailing profile chart, such as Jodgi's chart here: https://sites.google.com/view/speedtrials/all-chart 

Anything with a profile that favors the 120-180* angles (like Renommee, L'Hermione, Indefatigable, Ingermanland, Wapen, Bellona, Agamemnon, etc.) will excel when paired with an Elite Spanish Rig refit (buffs downwind speed).   Similarly, anything with a strong upwind profile (Requin, Lynx, Privateer, Prince, etc.) will see large benefits when paired with Elite Pirate Rig refit. 

Beyond those two mods, stacking other permanent and 1-3 skillbook slots with speed is pretty standard. Whatever slots you have left go to repair or boarding or reload.

Some ships get introduced way overpowered (Wasa, Requin, Hercules), some get buffed that way (*fondly recalls the times of first rates having 11-12kn base speed, oh for the wonderful few weeks I had running around in a 15kn Victory!*), and some get nerfed to near uselessness (Pavel, Victory, Wasa...).

It can be a challenge to stay abreast of all the changes. Especially when Admin slips a little line into the patch notes like: "some ship stats changed for balance" or something like that...

 

Anyways, maybe that'll help a little bit.

 

[Barbancourt]

26 minutes ago, William Death said:

Anything with a profile that favors the 120-180* angles (like Renommee, L'Hermione, Indefatigable, Ingermanland, Wapen, Bellona, Agamemnon, etc.) will excel when paired with an Elite Spanish Rig refit (buffs downwind speed).  

 

Well, how does it combine with the other mods/knowledges/refits?  Does Rig Refit stack with Copper Plating or Crooked Hull or Good Hope Refit or Optimized Ballast?  How much is the turning penalty offset by a Katherine or rudder or yard turning mods?  How much max speed is good enough before you go from fir/fir build to teak, sabicu or WO planking?  Which ships are really benefiting the most from any of these combinations?  Maybe going whole-hog on turning mods in some other ship will give you even more combat flexibility?  There's a whole combo of stuff going on, which is why I'd like a guide to cut to the heart of it.

I've never seen Elite Spanish Rig in the wild, though.  (haven't seen Copper Plating in over a year)  I'm just a dirty pleb with Gazelles and Cotton Sails...

Edited August 22, 2018 by Barbancourt (rownd)

[RedNeckMilkMan]

8 hours ago, William Death said:

Only reason to sail her nowadays is if you want the 6 bow chasers and 4 stern chasers. Or to work into a PB fleet. Those bow chasers are lovely, by the way. But otherwise, Bellona, Ingermanland, or Wapen will serve you better for OW hunting, depending on what you want to do with it. 

Poor Wasa (can't believe I said that after it was OP for so long) just has a hard time fitting in, what with being expensive, a sailing profile that is nothing to write home about, mediocre thickness and HP...

Now if it was craftable, you might see it a bit more often when the Bellona fleets go sailing for some seals to club: it makes a great chase ship and has just enough toughness to support the heavier Bellonas. Honestly though, given all the stats nerfs it has had, we could drop it back down to a 4th rate so it could use the better books, but keep the BR as-is (balance the BR of the other 4th rates though, they are all way too high). 

 

Anyways, its nice to sail if you outfit it properly (teak/wo or teak/teak for general use and fir/fir or similar for a solo speedy hunter) with speed, repair, and turning mods.

Crew is a non-issue. It rarely is an issue to a good player on any ship as long as you have enough to man 30-50% sails and 50-75% of one broadside. So basically, as long as you have over ~300+ on the Wasa, you're fine. Just manage your reload and fire only the cannons that will do damage. She will punish you for missing shots or bouncing broadsides off your enemy, so make sure you're taking the time to think about what cannons you should fire and what ones will not do anything at the moment. Don't shoot just because a ship is next to you if your shots won't pen to do damage (angled). 

Agility is there, so engaging a 2nd or 3rd rate alone is certainly possible, but you have little room for slip ups with the low HP and thickness. It doesn't help that you're stuck using the same low-bonus 1-3 rate books that your larger enemy is too. 

When fighting with it, make use of the high caliber cannons to pound your enemy from range. Run carronades on top since they have about the same effective range as 32 carronades do on the kind of ships you'll be engaging. And its only a handful of them anyways so you'll likely have them turned off most of the time.

She is just so slow compared to the bellona. I still love her the other day I was sitting on the stern of a Ocean firing grape from the bow guns and killing 100+ crew. It was so satisfying. 

I think the wasa could use a little love. 

[William Death]

1 minute ago, Barbancourt (rownd) said:

Well, how does it combine with the other mods/knowledges/refits?  Does Rig Refit stack with Copper Plating or Crooked Hull or Good Hope Refit or Optimized Ballast?  How much is the turning penalty offset by a Katherine or rudder or yard turning mods?  How much max speed is good enough before you go from fir/fir build to teak, sabicu or WO planking?  Which ships are really benefiting the most from any of these combinations?  There's a whole combo of stuff going on, which is why I'd like a guide to cut to the heart of it.

I've never seen Elite Spanish Rig in the wild, though.  (haven't seen Copper Plating in over a year)  I'm just a dirty pleb with Gazelles and Cotton Sails...

First, reference these numbers when you think about a ship build:

Caps for bonuses (Ink or Admin posted this a while back): 

Turning Speed - 25%

Sail HP - 30%

Armor HP - 30%

Hull thickness - 30%

Gun Reload - 30%

Gun dispersion (both horizontal and vertical) - 40%

Speed - 15.5 knots

 

With the hard facts out of the way...I'd say the rest of the answers to your questions will vary by who you ask...different ways to outfit a ship for different playstyles. I'll give you "my" answers:

You can only mount one type of rig refits (pirate rig, spanish rig, bovenwinds, french rig). Copper plating and other speed mods will stack normally. Optimized ballast is good if you're going to run two speed books, but if using only one, use light carriages instead.   

Turning mods for "ship turn speed" simply add or subtract percentages. A +X% is good (turn sharper) a -X% is bad (turn less sharply) some wood types affect turning and some modules do as well.

The mods that affect the yard turn speed make manual sailing easier. They have uses, but they're more of a niche area/duelist's mod.

How much speed? Depends on where you're going and who you're fighting I guess. Most agree that 13kn is about the slowest you can be and stand a chance of making it back to port alive when you go out hunting. 13.5+ is normally what I aim for. Some ships can hit the speed cap at 15.5 if modded correctly.

Sadly, gazelle has been nerfed and its not worth running. The negative it brings (increased crew requirement for sailing) makes it so. Cotton sails really isn't too good either since it weakens sails, but I suppose there are worse mods out there.

 

Ship builds: most PvP hunting builds (ones that can do 13.5+) actually don't have to be fir/fir. The combat system is so mod-dependent that teak/wo, teak/teak, and even live oak/white oak (on smaller ships) can hit those speeds when stacking copper + navy hull + bovenwinds + art of shiphandling + speed trim + light carriages. Fir/fir is mainly used when players don't have access to those good mods, so they have to make a lighter ship to reach similar speeds. Also, some more "pro" players will occasionally use a fir/fir so that they can have a high speed without using sail force modifiers. 

Avoid Sabicu, Oak, or Caguarian anything (its a shame that we have 3 useless wood types in NA [don't fall into the trap that so many players do: "but its almost as good as ___" NO! "almost" is never good enough--there is no substitute for proper shipbuilds]),

Also, avoid White Oak frames (pointless when teak/wo/elephant is nearly as much HP, but thicker, faster, and turns better too); mahogany is best left alone as well, unless you have a very specific combination in mind (very very limited use for teak/mahogany, mahogany/teak, and mahogany/fir).

Stick with the standards: Teak/WO brawler/general PvP, LO/WO heavy PB brawler, Teak/Teak general PvP, and Teak/Cedar or Fir/Fir for fast PvP.

 

In short, if you want a good PvP ship that is reasonably fast, capable, and won't break the bank when it sinks (everything you need can usually be bought at La Tortue):

1. Pick any 5th rate you really like and get your hands on a teak/teak or teak/cedar version. Lean toward teak/cedar if its a larger frigate and you don't have many speed mods. Teak/Teak Renommee or Belle Poule is a very viable build for this sort of thing, but you lack the bow chasers so you need to be close to ensure the auto-control perk keeps your enemy in battle.
2. Buy a Navy Hull Refit. I'd argue this is one of the best speed mods in the game because its cheap (10 PvP marks are easy to earn or to buy for gold), and it is a strong bonus to speed with no negatives.
3. Equip a basic carpentry tools or northern carpenters (you probably have one or the other already, but they're not too expensive either).
4. Now comes time for you to make a choice: french rig refit to make it harder to demast you, or something else for speed (bovenwinds, copper plating, crooked hull). I would recommend using one of those two types of mods, not straying to reload, turn rate, or hull thickness mods for the permanent slots until you feel comfortable handling the ship set up this way.
5. Use long cannons. Mediums are next to useless. There are a few crazy captains sailing around and having success with medium guns in PvP, but they really are tricky to use: they bounce so easily and are very inaccurate at range. Every time I try to use them in PvP, I regret it. Carronades are great for your top gundeck. 4pdrs for bow chasers (fast reload to keep the enemy tagged) if you only have 2 guns there; but if you have 4 or 6 chasers in the bow, use the biggest caliber long gun you can equip. Biggest long guns you can equip in the stern (laser accurate chainshot throwers).
6. Equip your best shipknowledge for speed. Recommend light carriages, optimized ballast, and anything else you may have that increases speed.
7. Equip the remaining knowledge slots for repair and maybe consider a boarding mod like barricades or marines, or go for repair and cannon reload. 
8. Make sure captain perks are properly set: determined defender, fleet control 1, double charge, double shot, plus the carpenter one (can't remember the name). I think thats all the slots. If you must drop one, make it fleet control or one of the shot types. Carpenter and determined defender are pretty much mandatory.

[note that this is not a "cheap" build for the casual player...its more a "real" PvP build to get one's feet wet...if you are looking for the cheapest way to get a disposable PvP boat, capture an AI that'll already have guns equipped and sail it till the wheels fall off ]

Treat that ship carefully, run if you can't handle the fight, and don't get too upset when it eventually sinks. Once it does sink, consider going to a lighter build. Keep trying lighter builds until you hit fir/fir or find the spot where you don't feel comfortable hunting with it (too squishy).

I'd say don't invest any super good mods or any vast amounts of gold into an OW PvP ship until you find what you like and get very comfortable with that ship. Then go all out.