Dirty trick in Killer Whale!

[HMS_Swiftsure_08]

If your team don't act quick enough in operation Killer Whale, you will often find the subtask "don't let enemy reinforcement into the base" failed due to a freaking Kolberg entering the base. And due to the high RoF of Kolberg's 105mm, cruisers especially Cleveland and both French T6, will suffer some serious damage fighting it. And the subtask involving killing four ships require you to kill a Kaiser which is very durable and hard to kill.

A dirty trick goes like this. Take a Adm.Graf Spee with your team. Graf Spee only follows the main fleet when cleaning up the first few forts. After that Spee breaks free from the fleet and sit at the up right corner (if you don't use rotation minimap) where Kolberg and Kaiser will spawn. Spee then clean up both forts there and wait until Kolberg come out and use guns to finish her. Spee has a distinctive advantage in this task, she has 19mm standard hull thickness instead of 16mm for most T6 cruisers, making her hull immune to 105mm HE. After finishing Kolberg, Spee continues to wait until Kaiser spawn. A combined attack using 283mm AP and torps can quickly send Kaiser to the bottom of the sea.

 

Another tip if you hate Kolberg: use Budyonny instead of Cleveland as your 6" machine gun in the main fleet. Budyonny has 19mm mid section side making her more protected against 105mm HE than Cleveland.

[Big_Black_Hawk]

Here's another dirty trick:If your team run fast enough(When enemy reinforcements come you'll about to leave the haven)the enemy reinforcements will not enter haven at all!Instead they come to chase you

[LonerPrime]

Weird, I never faced issues with the Koleberg or the Kaiser.

For example:

If I am in my CV, I focus on the enemy CVs with all my planes- except one, leaving one of my TBs circling the northern zone away from the range of the fort AA. Once Kolberg comes closer, he eats a few tops while the team member(s) become eager to finish whatever HP is left of it. Since it always turns to dodge the torps, Kolberg ends up eating a good amount of broadside damage. Kaiser on the other hand sneaks from outside the Northern bend(unless it detects a player near it's spawn. Then it will come from the inside chasing the player.) Either way, at this point it's a toss up. Players generally gun for the finish line so 7 out of 10 games of mine end with one secondary unfinished.

If I'm in my Cruiser, I go straight North after sinking the Hosho in the harbor. The moment you engage the Kolberg continue sailing towards it because, unfortunately, the AI is programmed to make a u-turn and try to kite after a certain distance has been closed between it and you, but it does so too late. At this point, if I'm in my Aoba, I slam a couple of cit hits during the turn or if in my Budy then start multiple fires. From this point on, the strategy changes. Do not continue towards North if it has been a while since Kolberg's spawn. Chances are Kaiser will spawn while you're still midway. At the point it's best to turn around and focus starting fires on Kaiser while kiting. If you continue to push in, the Kaiser will turn away from you and you might eat quite a bit of close range shots; maybe an unfortunate citadel here and there since Kaiser doesn't fire all it's guns together. You have a very small window to show broadside and let the torps off without endangering yourself. Not to mention the 2 forts that fire HE and can start fires at the wrong time not to mention become deadly accurate at short range. Rushing is not worth it in this scenario so turn around and lure the Kaiser to give chase instead.

                               Alternatively, if you were quick to get to Kolsberg in time, rush north, slam AP shells into the 2 forts and then unleash the torps the moment Kaiser spawns. Then stay there and fire on other targets waiting for the third spawn of the German cruiser. Same drill. Slam it with torps or hit the broadside with AP for citadels. Kill it fast or you will eat torps soon. Then get the hell out of dodge and sail straight for the evac point because you now have another German BB that spawned close to your location.

 

That's it. Unless your team is complete potato(mine are somewhat semi-baked) you shouldn't have the Northern issue. Another strategy involves a BB camping the area where the team starts initially. It sits close to the spawn of the enemy CVz and in that scenario, the Kolberg does something interestingly different. It will abandon it's approach from the North and instead come from the outside since AIs are programmed to target fat BBs first. Though, I only saw it happen once in randoms. Very weird game that was and we somehow managed to win even though our New Mexico was sitting at the spawn point from start to end without lending any damage support. But he killed the CVs and DDs so he was strategizing in his own way I guess.

[LordTyphoon]

This is no trick. 

 

Standard PvE strategy. 

 

Sorry to burst your bubble. 

[HMS_Swiftsure_08]

9 minutes ago, LordTyphoon said:

This is no trick. 

 

Standard PvE strategy. 

 

Sorry to burst your bubble. 

But why none of my teammates ever use this trick! They all do stuff super slow and get only 3 or 4 stars

[Storm_Raiser]

4 hours ago, _Halcyon said:

But why none of my teammates ever use this trick! They all do stuff super slow and get only 3 or 4 stars

 

Because Teamwork is a dirty word on this server ... along with support and defend.

[S4pp3R]

We always send a CL up top to clear forts in the event of a top evac.

 

Any type of mop up crew on the top spawn works if you are good enough. Hell I've done it in Fuso and even Ryujo and in the latter case the fleet focuses the CVs down on the way top.

 

If you group up with 6 friends, she's easy to get 4+

[Dire_Venom]

No one else botherd with the kaiser so I just torped him at 4k onmw to the extraction :3

Quite a fun mission, I still don't understand how the forsts work though. I dont even get hit markers when shooting AP at them but I do tons of damage when shotting HE:?

[Aeek]

Just rammed and sunk the 1st CV before I saw it, with my Bayern; then nailed the escort. We all lived. 5*.

Forts, depends on your ship. Bayern AP shreds forts.