Battle Ritual

No, this is not some tribal dance to taunt your enemies and rally your team spirit. It is, however, what you do the instant a battle start. There is a certain routine that players should follow to effectively control his ship before the first engagement.

For battleships the routine is this:

1. Prepare your scout
2. Line all your guns
3. Proceed travelling towards the battles line direction.
4. Look at team compositions

Practice this routine, embed it in your mind so it becomes habitual. I don't use numbered bullet points but this list needed it. The most important point is to get your scout ready. Your scout is the first thing that will detect the enemy and allow you to discern their plans.

Being prepared in advance of the first engagement is key. That scout will alert you to any rushing destroyers / light cruiser torp ships (usually a kuma or kitakami). It will reveal the enemy's composition in the direction you intend to be going. Take particular note of submarines, and battleships.

So much happens before that first salvo is fired and when it is let loose it informs everybody that you're ready for battle. When you hit your opponents first it shows that you are paying attention. You will probably scare your enemy off but you will gain control of the flow of battle. Which is exactly what you want.

That first scout reveals so much. Even if it gets shot down ( but try not let this happen, control it properly), you will know roughly what the enemy is up to. You will also know that they pay attention to scouts and use their anti aircraft guns too.

How do players launch their scouts so quickly?

The scout should always be the first thing you get ready. By default scouts are preselected, but press F1 anyway to select them, as it's good to get into this habit. Follow this up by pressing Shift+Up Arrow, followed by ' ( the key with the @ symbol on).

These are the default keys to select and fuel your scout. It's 100 times faster than using the mouse to ready up a scout. ( takes about 1 second )

Get that scout ready first,  you should do this before moving your ship or guns!

(Side note: even in fleet games, harbour assaults and 98.9% of general matches my scout will pop out first. only a handful of players ever beat my launch time, only when I wasn't paying attention. Be ready to ready-up your scout in the loading screen)

When the scout is ready press F1 to make sure the plane is selected and then press '  to launch.

Step #2

While your scout is fuelling, you have a few seconds to aim your guns and move off in the direction of battle.

You will also be able to take a glimpse at the teams by pressing ` (the button the the left of number 1 key)

When the scout is ready press F1 to make sure the plane is selected, especially after you have aimed your gun groups and moved your ship around. Once the plane is selected press '  to launch. This is the fastest and most efficient way in the game to ready and launch your scout.

# Tip:   Watch for incoming enemy scouts and be ready to snipe them. Most players forget to lower their scouts height and only fly them in a straight line at the beginning. Blasting their scout blinds them and gives you the advantage. (even before they come into your aa range, train your guns to fire on them)

When you are doing all of the above without thinking, you are prepared in the most effective way for battle. You set off in a much stronger stance, a step ahead, even. You can then start catching unprepared battleships off-guard and will be a more serious threat early on in the battle.

Discovering how the opposing team is composed is very important. You will know who their flagship is at what ship he's in, where he's going. You want to take stock of how many tier 9 - 11 ships there are, as these will be the biggest threats. Targets of opportunity such as weaker tiers and lonely ships.

Once all these factors are added together you become a strong player. Able to use that knowledge and ability to hurt the enemy.

New Ships - Major Update

Next weeks' update on Wednesday 27th May will include either some or all of the large ship update promised by team NF.

To view a full list of new ships click here.

Some very promising looking ships will be included across all of the ship classes and tiers. Along with some important tier X ships to fill the large xp gaps between tier IX and XI (9 & 11) and a host of remodelled ship variants will also be added to provide more variety an replay value to the game so far.

There will also be some nifty experience alterations and conversions of ship exp to free exp for those who will come up short of their dream ship before the patch goes live, so don't worry you will all be catered for.

Finally this will be a small glimpse at what we have in store for when other nations come along. Hopefully this will be much further down the line after fleet wars have been added and the current ship pool refined and patched to make things run smoothly.

'Item-up' Your Battleship

As the title suggest you have a maximum of 6 item slots on every ship you own and once you unlock them, you may feel obliged to purchase items continually to improve how your ship plays.

Each ship you will want to equip with slightly different items to boost a key advantage that ship has over others. For a battleship you obviously won't be loading up on torpedo items. However if you are looking for a well balanced ship then check out the first setup.

For all ships you will always want the boiler upgrade. For light and heavy cruisers you will be better served by reload rather than accuracy items.

Armour is best kept for battleships and CA's

Balanced Battleship Setup

It is my firm belief that you should always have the boiler item on your battleship. This can have the effect of increasing your speed and off-setting the speed reduction of all the other items you equip.

Bear in mind that if you are a non-premium player. The boiler item will only afford you +5% speed. Which means if you equip five other items that do -2% to speed you will always be running at -5% speed when using all six item slots.

For non-premium players a good balance setup is:

1x boiler   +5% speed

1x repair   +50dp/s

2x acc/reload items

The logic here is that overall you will have only lost -1% speed for gaining repair and accuracy or reload ability.

Alternatives are to forego the repair, reload/accuracy for armour or a mixture of any of them. But to only have 3 other items used beyond the boiler so that you loss of speed is fractional.

If you are not too bothered about losing some speed or having more repair, then go for any mixture of armour and weapon enhancements you desire.

For premium players the premium items are much more helpful. They are effectively twice as good for their advantages and half as bad in the downsides when compared to the non-premium equivalents.

The boiler item is a must and grants your ship a healthy +10% speed bonus. Couple with the fact that all other premium items affect your ship speed by -1% each you will always be up by +5% speed with a full compliment of 6 premium items.

Armoured Setups (AW BB/CA)

The logic here is to focus on armouring up your ship with 5 armour slots + the standard boiler upgrade.

For non-premium players you can have the boiler upgrade + 2  armour stacks before you lose any speed. If you don't mind losing a knot or two then you can go for filling the other 5 stacks with armour.

Bear in mind that all tier V armour stacks except bulkhead (never use bulkhead anyway) reduce ship speed by 1.8% each 

For premium users you will use the boiler upgrade for +10%, but will lose 9% of that speed if you then load up the rest of your 5 item slots with armour stacks. Which is a pretty good balance.

Speed Setups

For a speed focused setup you will only be using the boiler enhancement item to gain the +5% or +10% speed advantage.

Speed setups are great for all ships. They can really assist already quick ships ( destroyers and light cruisers), or speed up inherently slower ships (like ss, carriers and battleships [particularly the fast tier XI ones])

Plus they are also a cheap alternative, because you will only be spending credit or gold on 1 item per purchase instead of 6.

Armour only setups

If you want to have 6 stacks of armour on your ship then this setup is just for you. Actually this can be an effective setup for the majority of matchmaking games because most engagements take place at mid and close range. And most players are in the frame of mind to close down on you.

Try this setup in a tier 5-8 BB and you will have bunches of fun especially with the higher dps using secondary guns.

However, players will quickly learn that their shells are not doing much damage to you and switch to Armour Piercing. You will be extremely slow. Bear this in mind if the map is very open. Also you may be susceptible to torpedo attacks from subs or dive bombers, there will always be some weakness you have.

If you intend on getting very close to the enemy team a good strategy is to have more belt armour. maybe 4 stacks of belt with 2 stacks of bulge to counter destroyers and submarines. Again you are exposed to high angle shells and dive bombers.

Or you could go for an all round 2/2/2 bulge belt deck setup. The better options seem to be focus on what range you are going to engage. If its med-long range take deck armour and some bulge,  if its low-angle range, then more belt and bulge.

Automatic Aiming Control

In Navyfield 2 automatic aiming is the preferred firing method because of:

1. The fast paced nature of the game. 
2. The spread of shells. 
3. Less effort wasted.

Navyfield 2 is fast paced, much like blitzkrieg battles in Navyfield 1. You simply don't have time to manually aim 2 sets of guns on your target because they move too fast. Couple that with the fact that....

...shell spread gets worse the further away you fire, this is exacerbated when overheating and turning your ship. Most engagements will be in close to mid range. Auto aim helps you to switch targets quickly and fire two or three different weapon banks effectively. Maximising your damage output.

 Manual aiming requires a lot more effort overall, for little improvement on accuracy and therefore damage and dps. Imagine then trying to do that on 2 or 3 weapon groups constantly for 10 minutes. Yea, best stick to auto if I were you. 

Navyfield 2 is built around automatic aiming. But it has its downsides. You are not able to effectively AA scouts at certain heights and you get slightly less accuracy at all ranges than manual aiming does.

So really it's a trade-off between better dps and less effort involved, for slightly less accuracy and the ability to effectively AA scouts that are controlled properly.

The choice is yours, but as the game is now, use auto aim.

That's the why, now for the how.

Auto aiming boils down to a bit of a spam click affair. But you still need to think about what you are doing so that you firing cycles are efficient, so once a salvo is loaded you are ready to fire. And when you actually fire that you've maximised the damage you can do.

It begins once you choose to engage a target and fire for the first time. You start a cycle of reloading and firing that you need to manage.

You will also learn to use the 'E' key and in some cases the 'C' key for improved accuracy on smaller targets, or in 1 vs 1 situations.

#Part 1 - Leading a target

It goes without saying to lead your target the further away they are. Ships travel extremely quickly. 

 #TIP   Aim about a full ship length ahead of a battleship travelling at full speed. (when medium to long range)

#Part 2 - Adjust guns

Allow your guns time to adjust their angle. Be patient. You don't want to over/under shoot if you fire before the guns set themselves.

If you are firing a full salvo, just before hitting the spacebar press the 'E' key to converge your guns. This makes for improved accuracy.

#Part 3 - Evasion

In between a reload cycle take evasive action. By this, I mean press the 'G' key to flick back to your ship and change course towards or away from your target. Doing this achieves two things:

• It forces your opponent to adjust their aim. (travelling in a straight line makes you an easy target)
• It reduces your ship's profile so that fewer shells hit you ( this in turn keeps your DP up so you can stay in the fight longer)

Make sure you line up your guns and ship to your target before the reload is complete. Learn to time it correctly so you can fire immediately once reloaded.

Once you nail the cycle of fire, evade, realign, you will be doing more damage while taking less during the course of battle.

Actually you will become proficient to the point where you can cycle through 2 or 3 gun sets to fire at your target ship and AA any scout planes looming overhead.

Battleship Gameplay Tactics

General Info

Battleship are the 'big-stick' damage dealers in Navyfield 2.

Being large and heavy makes them slow, however battleships have high DP and are tougher to destroy.

Being large targets means that battleships need to be aware of other battleships, aerial bombers, submarines and nearby destroyers who want to launch torpedoes at them.

How to use a Battleship (BB)

In an ideal situation (one where scouting is good and you can see your main guns score a hit) a BB should be looking to do damage to other BB's. [maybe CA/CL depending on the situation]

Multiple BB's on a team form a line to the opposing team. This line is to cover each other and to deny access to your CV's. Your CV is the team lifeline, providing protection and sight. Ultimately they gain you victory.

Engagement Tips

As with most ships, battleships should remain in motion at all times. Generally travelling in a line, but evading where necessary.

In early BB's ( teir IV + V's) players should remain grouped together with their team. Sinking stray enemies. And using team light/vision to shoot at opponents.

Later teir BB's can provide scouting for themselves allowing them the freedom to engage in BB to BB battles.

TIP: Always keep moving at maximum speed.

Battleships should always keep on the move. Especially when on the receiving end of an attack.

TIP: Retreat from the battle line when attacked by multiple battleships, or when you can't see the enemy.

TIP: Change speed and direction to throw off BB's targeting you.

Occassionally turning into or away from your opponent means they have to readjust their aim. But so do you.

In tier IV + V BB's, use auto aim and get used to hosing down your target with Main guns at max range. Use secondary guns if you know they are blind. If a DD appears close-by scouting your position, take this DD out quickly as it becomes a major threat to you.

Tier V bb's have one of the best ratios of DPS and are relatively small in size, making them very efficient at medium ranges. Use this to your advantage.

Remember: at-level the guns will make your shells inaccurate at longer range, especially if you have only 120% max morale instead of a fully boosted morale at 200%

Scouting

When your BB can equip a scout plane, do so immediately and practice with it.

A scout will give you vision over where you are shooting. This is a crucial point because without light (vision) you are vulnerable.

With the correct scouting you can anticipate enemy movement. It also reduces the chance of receiving surprise attacks.

Scout enemy planes.

Scouts also allow you to determine enemy plane movement. This is important, because it gives you insight into your enemy's ideas. Also you can see bomber squadrons from CV's. And all CV's will bomb their favourite targets: Battleships.

A bombing CV will be gunning for a big juicy battleship that isn't paying attention. Why? because CV's can get more damage and more rewards from BB's. And let's face it you would do the same, BB's are big easy targets.

Watch for fighter planes, as they can blast your scout out of the sky. Reducing you to having no light, no visibility and back into that nasty vulnerable state again.

TIP: Keep an eye on enemy scout plane locations to determine if you are able to get within range of other BB's without being spotted.

This is another crucial skill to develope. Determining the right time to "go for it" means you can successfully engage a target without getting shot at. Which is totally satisfying when executed correctly.

Late Game - Stalemates

Eventually when both teams are balanced and filled with experienced players, you will find a stalemate happens.

In these scenarios you can do two things:

Destroy all enemy scouts until they have none left, attacking them when they are blind.

Engage in a line battle at max range and try to goad the enemy towards you, picking them off one by one.

Usually a mix of the two is best because you get damage points while reducing the enemy's offensive capability.

Above all learn to be patient. A BB's fight is never quick and easy. It's a war of attrition with the most patient and level-headed player coming out victorious.

Manual Aiming

Although I mentioned using auto aim for the start, do not neglect Manual aiming completely. Give it a go to prepare yourself for the late tier BB's, where hitting all your shells on a target is even more vital, and can really make the difference.

View a more detailed look at Manual Aiming