November Update: Under the Black Flag

November 3, 2022

Maintenance times:

Xbox: November 7, 2:00 – 6:00 AM Central / 7:00 – 11:00 AM UTC
PlayStation: November 7, 2:00 – 6:00 AM Central / 7:00 – 11:00 AM UTC

Update size:

Xbox One (S,X) ~3660 MB
Xbox Series S/X ~2800 MB
PS4 ~2752 MB
PS5 ~471 MB
iOS ~1100 MB
Android ~1200 MB

November Update: Under the Black Flag

It's time to sail the fall seas in a quest for battles and treasure! Let's check out what's coming in this seasonal update with a TLDR coming right up:

Tier VIII reinforcements for British and French Tech Tree ships!
Brewing Storm campaign with Japanese Tier VIII Premium destroyer Hayate as a reward
Black Friday coming in hot with new black ships and a variety of deals
YARRR! PIRATE CONTENT
Legendary British destroyer Daring Bureau Project
Four 1-on-1 Ranked seasons
And more, of course!

To obtain the update bonuses—5x Shadow camos and 5x Hunter camos, to be precise—redeem the code RT2OKMX541 at https://wowslegends.com/code-redeemer.

Royal Navy and Marine Nationale Expand to Tier VIII

More Tier VIII ships are coming to your Ports in this update! Specifically, British and French ones—a total of six vessels, one of each type, except carriers. Same as the first batch of Tier VIII ships, these will be available right away for Captains with researched Tier VII ships of the respective branches and sufficient XP on those. In fact, if you have 200,000 Elite XP on a Tier VII ship, the respective newcomer will be unlocked automatically. Full upgrade from scratch will require 300,000 XP.

Here’s a list of the new ships:

Britain

Destroyer Jutland
Cruiser Neptune
Battleship Temeraire

France

Destroyer Mogador
Cruiser Saint Louis
Battleship Alsace

You can look forward to more information on these newcomers in a dedicated article coming very soon.

Brewing Storm Campaign

Loosely reminiscent of Shimakaze, Japanese destroyer Hayate brings a large HP pool and brutal torpedoes, as well as quite a few gunboat characteristics to Tier VIII. She’s quite a firestarter owing to her quick reload and solid chances of ignition upon impact, and her firing angles allow for great kiting if you've already unleashed your devastating torpedo load.

With the traditional framework of 100 milestones in 5 weeks and the catch-up mechanic in place, let's take a look at the prizes that await you along the way.

Rewards you can get without the Admiralty Backing:

50x Common Boosters
8x Shadow camouflages
8x Imperial Japanese Navy camouflages
350,000 Research Points
175,000 Commander XP
550,000 credits
7,500 Global XP
15x Promotion Orders
1x Insignia
1x Commendation
7 days of Premium Account
2x Fall Big Crates
1x Black Friday '21 crate
1x Japanese Commander Crate
1x patch background
1x patch symbol

Value of the rewards without the Admiralty Backing: 15,187 doubloons

Additional rewards you can get with the Admiralty Backing (2,500 doubloons):

50x Rare Boosters
22x Shadow camouflages
22x Imperial Japanese Navy camouflages
1,400,000 Research Points
275,000 Commander XP
2,450,000 credits
37,500 Global XP
30x Promotion Orders
3x Insignia
3x Commendations
750 doubloons
8x Fall Big Crates
2x Black Friday '21 crates
1x commemorative flag
Japanese Tier VIII Premium destroyer Hayate

Total value of the rewards with the Admiralty Backing: 73,250 doubloons

Black Friday 2022

This season, Black Friday discounts will be available throughout the entire update, with additional deals dropping in the Store at later dates. Most importantly, it will feature as many as five new black ships:

Italian Tier III Premium battleship Dante Alighieri B, complete with an alternative SAP shell module and available through a special mission, which is obtainable for credits!
Japanese Tier VIII Premium cruiser Ibuki B with improved accuracy
Italian Tier V Premium cruiser Duca D'Aosta B
German Tier VI Premium destroyer Z-39 B
German Tier VII Premium battleship Bismarck B with upgraded secondary battery (ATBA) range at the expense of main battery range.

Stay tuned for a dedicated article that will offer a detailed look at all things Black Friday on our blog. Be sure to check it out, as three of the five ships have been tangibly changed in their new appearance.

Pirates on the Horizon!

With two dedicated Cap’ns and their rovers under the British and French flags, and more content available—including a special chest—pirates are arrrrrrriving on our seas in force! Save the date, you scallywags—starting from December 1, you can exchange your shiny funds for Cap’ns and boats in the Store. An article covering the content will come just in time, so get your eye(s) peeled! A little hint: These pirates prefer French ships, but they don't always fight for France...

Ranked Duels Are Back!

We know you missed it: 1-on-1 Ranked battles are making a comeback for as many as four seasons in this update! Stay tuned for our blog post with all the details before the first season gets underway on November 10.

Daring Bureau

The largest class of British destroyers arrives at the Legendary Tier! Daring’s HE shells are particularly incendiary, and her torpedoes can be launched individually. Her Sonar can be a lifesaver, and Smoke Generator will facilitate effective in-and-out tactics and provide much-needed emergency concealment. Be wary of her size, however, and watch out for incoming enemy aircraft.

This Project requires you to possess British Tech Tree destroyers Jervis and Lightning to complete certain Segments. The research process can be boosted either with Research Points or doubloons. Please note: This Project is not available in the mobile version.

Balance Changes

This update brings a solid number of changes—both buffs and nerfs—including some of the first changes to the Tier VIII Tech Tree ships, as they have been the center of attention since August. A handful of ship traits have also been changed to provide better clarity on the respective ships' abilities.

PSA: We're starting to call secondary guns "ATBA" (anti-torpedo-boat armament) in more places, so please get used to it!

Japanese Tier VIII cruiser Ibuki

Ibuki is somewhat lacking direct damage, so we're boosting it.

Main battery reload time decreased from 13.7 to 13 s for stock version
Main battery 180° turn time decreased from 30 to 25.7 s
Torpedo launcher reload time decreased from 101 to 95 s for stock version and from 112 to 105 s for upgraded version

Japanese Tier VIII destroyer Yūgumo

Yūgumo is simply not far enough from Kagerō, hence some basic damage improvements.

Torpedo launcher reload time for upgraded torpedoes reduced from 100 to 93 s
HP for stock hull increased from 13,900 to 14,200; for upgraded hull—15,200 to 15,700

German Tier VIII cruiser Roon

We're fairly content with Roon, but she's a bit sluggish in close quarters, so a quicker traverse will improve her chances of tracking any destroyers that get close.

Main battery 180° turn time decreased from 30 to 25.7 s for stock version and from 30 to 20 s for upgraded version

Soviet Tier VIII destroyer Delny

Delny went above and beyond what we expected her to do, hence a nerf is appropriate for her turret traverse and gun reload. However, to sweeten this bitter pill, we're improving the shell damage a tad. The aim is to lower the average damage a pinch and get her to be a little less effective with multiple targets.

Maximum main battery HE shell damage increased from 1,900 to 2,050; maximum AP shell damage increased from 2,600 to 2,850—both for upgraded version
Main battery reload time increased from 4 to 5 s for upgraded version
Main battery 180° turn time increased, from 9 to 13.8 s for stock version, and from 9 to 12 s for upgraded version

Soviet Tier VIII cruiser Dmitri Donskoi

Donskoi fell back further than Roon did and is receiving significant buffs all around. This should aid her survivability and average damage, as well as her utility to the team.

HP for upgraded hull increased from 43,400 to 47,400
Radar consumable duration increased from 20 to 25 s
Sonar consumable stats changed: Duration increased from 96 to 98 s, torpedo detectability increased from 3.1 to 3.3 km, ship detection increased from 4.4 to 4.7 km

French Tier VII battleship Champagne

Champagne found herself lagging behind a few of her peers and proved to be a less popular choice among the French battleships. What we hope to accomplish is to improve her average damage by increasing her survivability and to give her better kit when fighting other BBs head-on. However, situations where HE shells will be an effective choice are still going to be rare, which is understandable. Will Champagne follow Vanguard in number of buffs? Probably not, but let’s see!

HP increased from 52,600 to 57,100
Maximum HE shell damage increased from 6,100 to 6,700

Graf Zeppelin

Well, you knew it! She needs a buff no matter how you look at it, as there are several areas in which she's lacking, especially compared against August von Parseval:

AP bomb damage increased from 7,600 to 7,800
Torpedo speed increased from 45 to 48 kts
Torpedoes now arm quicker: 3.5 s, down from 4 s
ATBA (secondaries!) range increased from 5 to 5.5 km
Her hangar now holds 15 planes instead of 14
Planes have been made more maneuverable

None of the changes are necessarily dramatic, but we believe that, as a package, they should work and make your Zeppelin experience much more fun.

Modernization changes

We’ve been looking at the popularity and usability of our modernizations lately, and this is the first take. Main Battery Mod. 2 was severely lacking, so to make it more attractive, we've removed the tradeoff and buffed the traverse:

Main battery 180° turn time bonus increased from 15 to 20%
Main battery reload time debuff removed

Gun Fire Control System Mod.2 is receiving a substantial buff as well—main battery range bonus increased from 5 to 10%.

These changes are being brought in to increase the build variability and offset the cookie-cutter builds a little. We'll see how it goes and perhaps continue with further mod changes down the line.

This change affects all ships that have this modernization available.

Adjusted ship traits

American Tier VIII battleship Maine

"Tough" changed to "Superior AP Damage"

Japanese Tier VIII battleship Izumo

"Fast" changed to "Superior AP Pen"

German Tier VIII battleship Friedrich der Große

"Ironclad" changed to "Secondary Reach"

Mobile Improvements

Google login

Android players rejoice! Your Google account can now be used for identification purposes, and you can also bind it to your console account in the same way as you did with Facebook!

Ship filter

We've certainly felt the pain of veteran players with huge fleets in their Ports, and we agree that filtering specific ships is of paramount importance! Please note: To "favorite" a ship, you'll need to enter the Upgrades section, hit the ship icon, and add (or remove) it there. This is the solution we’re using for now, but we may improve it later.

Bug Fixes

Rare instances of game crashing in the campaign interface.
Hitbox on one of the islands on Tears of the Desert map was taller than the model suggested. Additionally, some of the buildings let shells pass through them. Both instances have been fixed.
One of the reefs on the Solomon Islands map stopped many a ship, and this will no longer occur.
The description of the “Burn, Baby, Burn” skill now correctly mentions the increase in fire chances for aircraft carriers' secondary batteries (as "ATBA").
Richelieu's torpedo bulge is now correctly visible in the armor viewer.
Paolo Emilio had an incorrect camo in the Store preview window.
(mobile) Fixed overlapping text on Battle Results screen.

Other

Port selection (not available on mobile yet)

It's here! You can now choose whatever Port you like the most and change it whenever you like, too! You can look forward to the arrival of more Ports in the not-so-distant future.

We’re offering you five Ports for starters, complete with their own musical themes:

Fjords
Nagasaki
Marseille
Ocean
Hamburg

Dust those proverbial cameras and choose the perfect lighting for your favorite ships!

Rudder position while in the quick commands menu

This is something you've requested for ages, and we're finally ready to deliver! From this update on, your rudder will hold whenever your switch to the quick commands "pizza." Please note that this is only true for ships and will not work for planes. Also keep in mind that since we don't have fine adjustments of the rudder, even if you turn only slightly and call up the quick commands window, your turn will progress to 100% while you're interacting with quick commands.

TAA on Xbox One/One S

Temporal anti-aliasing is now enabled for the Xbox One/One S consoles in battle. Other consoles previously had this enabled. This provides more stable picture quality and smoother geometry edges for objects.