Does anyone actually enjoy playing encounter and conquest battle types in naval? I have been getting placed in these battle types with only destroyers lately. It’s kind of frustrating for me as I usually spend half an hour playing ground assault to try and earn an SL booster to use in naval battles and these battle modes have no points to cap. Just curious how everyone else feels about these battle types.
The big, single cap zone?
99.99% of the time. No. They suck.
0.01% they can be fine ish on the map with islands. But I feel are too assymetrical for them to be fun
I don’t remember the names of these types of battle but if I remember correctly, Encounter is the one with AI convoy and I’m pretty okay with that, at least if you survive the hell that is spawning in and moving out of the spawn zone.
And I think Conquest would be that one in mostly open waters with one cap, then yeah that one is pretty bad. The way to make it less annoying is to wait for everyone else to spawn in and attract attention before you spawn yourself in. Otherwise the most fun I have with this is just be goofy and spawn in a speedboat and zip around the outskirts of the cap zone to sneak up on some unsuspecting bluewater ship and torp or depth charge them. Did this once to an HMS Hood and it was gleeful in an otherwise boring game mode.
Encounter ‘convoy escort/attack’ used to be a nice change of pace when it was primarily ~4.7+ that allowed large DDs and CLs to shine. Recently I’ve had a lot of 4.0 or even 3.7 matches with full uptiers and you seem to spend an age simply closing the gap to a decent gun range, all the time under fire from any bigger opponents. Now they suck, doubly so when spawned at the furthest most open start point (unless in a Japanese torpedo thrower!).
The fully open water BB Jutland style slogging matches are usually one side affairs. You can scan the (first 3) ships of players lineups before start and so often it’s obvious who has the winning hand by the amount of full 7.0s vs the side with only one per top player. Plus there’s usually PR 206s or Japanese PT15 or Shimakaze who simply spam torpedos for 20+ minutes - it’s a valid playstyle but rather defeats the purpose of CA/BB centric maps that have few if any land masses.
For both types I now find myself contemplating jumping out before spawn, or joining the one death quitter brigade, because they lack variation and fun engagement.
Prior to 2.01 I absolutely enjoyed them both with Sub 4.7 vessels yet nowadays it’s rare to see them at 4.7, But above that & nowadays I only enjoy them with Battle/Armoured/Large Light Cruisers & or with an up BR’ed MTB for zigzagging through gunfire while dropping torps & arty.
I enjoy the different challenges of both - and also have cheap PT boats in my lineup for when DD’s are not suitable right now
The big circle maps work quite well, especially for torpedoes.
The AI convoy maps are neat too, again especially with torpedoes.
Thanks for the feedback everyone!