Javelin is the final one of the three starter destroyers for EN servers hailing from the royal navy. She may be the liveliest group; the real question comes down to how she fares with her fellow starter friends. Can she stand at the top of the chain? Well, let’s dive right in, shall we?
Stat
Stat-wise, Javelin feels a bit strange to me; her firepower is better than Ayanami but nowhere near the strength of Z23 or even Laffey. Likewise, her torpedo stat is better than both Z23 and Laffey but nowhere near the threat of Ayanami. To top it off, her reload is better than Z23 but slower than Ayanami. Javelin is like Laffey with the generalist design, but she is a step two down from her in the damage department. Her barrage is probably a saving grace in this, as it’s reliable and covers a vast area.
In her DPS game, we could see that she does have a specialization as she holds the highest evasion of the four starters. I want to believe that she has the best evasion of the game, but at the same time, Cygnet exists. Honestly, I’d say it comes down to how the skills proc in battle.
Javelin Retrofit
Her base skill, javelin raid, could boost her high evasion further by up to 60%. Just like any other starters, this comes with a 5% proc chance. When she is retrofitted, she boosts her evasion and minor bumps in a few different areas. The evasion boost helps her, but then again, Cygnet exists.
Skills
She has an assault mode which is just like all the other three skills. After the barrage of shells and torpedoes, she gains a 30% boost to her torpedo stat for five seconds; her torpedoes are better than most of her other stats is probably the best thing that she could receive outside of an evasion boost.
She’s a pretty good torpedo stat, and her barrage is also pretty good, but there’s plenty of IJN destroyers that can easily do better in terms of torpedo stat, and there are also three starters.
Evasion
Javelin shines in her evasion because her high evasion allows her to dodge most of the attacks, no matter how good a fleet is, as soon as they face her in exercises. Someone will probably wish that she would sink.
She is worth retrofitting, but I’d recommend doing the other three starter destroyers first beforehand, and after that, she is worth it as her stat line is still better than a lot of the other DD’s.
Javelin Mob or Boss Fleet
Regarding mob or boss fleets, her evasion can help her keep alive from enemy attacks being constant. Her low health pool can be risky, but healing from Unicorn can make things a lot less stressful on you. It can also help to bring Illustrious along as well to help keep her alive.
She doesn’t have the greatest DPS plating entirely in her favor, social struggle to output damage in some cases but her barrage will help when it activates. With boss fleets, she could help with staying alive. She’ll be flexible in her attacks to dish out some damage, but her primary role will be to stay alive long enough for the backline to take off the flagship. Just remember that the boss probably can still hit Javelin so that that manual play might be better with her.
She may be designed like Laffey with a generalist set up, but unfortunately, her stat line doesn’t do her too much justice. Sadly, she is the weakest of the four starter destroyers. Her retrofit does save her a bit with her great stats, but it feels like they still built her heavily on evasion, which is not a bad thing. Still, if there is something she’s number one at, it’s her cheerful personality that she has.
Summary
- Build like Laffey but weaker.
- Retrofit helps some stats but focuses on Evasion/Torpedo
- Evasion isn’t a bad trait to heavily spec about
- Not bad, but not that powerful too
