Limit breaks provide a substantial boost in power to your ships by increasing their stats and unlocking certain features. However, limit breaks do not spread power evenly, and certain ships will gain more from limit breaks than others. Many of these perks can also be found as perks for remodels, especially when modernisation alters the ship's base class.
For any given limit break, a ship will gain one or two perks and a boost to weapon efficiency.
- Full Barrage I and II - All vanguard ships (with the exception of collab event units) gain a barrage at first limit break, and upgrade that barrage at third limit break. Barrage damage statistics generally depend on the class of the ship, with some ships having unique barrages.
- Main Gun Mount - Main gun mount increases equip a ship with a ghost copy of whatever piece of equipment is in their main gun slot. These duplicate guns share all stats with the original copy, with the exception of any direct stats boosts. Most Eagle Union cruisers and select vanguard ships from other factions will gain main gun +1 at second limit break. Most battleships will gain main gun +1 at both first and third limit break, for a total of 3 gun mounts. However, some battleships only gain main gun +1 once.
- Preloaded Salvo - A relatively rare perk currently only found on French backliners, this perk causes the relevant ship's guns to be loaded at the start of combat, allowing for an instant strike.
- Preloaded Torpedo - Found on nearly every ship equipped with torpedoes, this perk causes the relevant ship's torpedoes to be loaded at the start of combat, allowing for an instant strike.
- Max Torpedo Capacity (Vanguard) - Increases the number of torpedo strikes a relevant ship can store at one time.
- Max Torpedo Capacity (Submarine) - Functions identically to increased main gun mounts on a vanguard ship, but with the relevant submarine's equipped submarine torpedoes.
- Number of X Planes - Increases the number of relevant planes launched per airstrike. Increases to fighters, dive bombers, and torpedo bombers will only affect relevant slots, while all planes will affect all slots on the relevant carrier. Will not impact no. planes launched from any relevant ship's auxiliary weapon slot (see below). Airstrike cooldown is based on the average of all planes launched, not all planes equipped, which means two carriers with the same reload stat and equipment slots, but different plane counts from limit breaks will have different reload speeds.
- Hangar Capacity - Increases the number of airstrikes a relevant ship can store at one time.
- Anti-Air Gun Mount - Similar in concept to main gun mounts, but functions slightly differently due to anti-air combat following different rules than surface combat. Anti-air damage is summed up from all guns that fire, but anti-air range and reload speed are based on the average of all AA guns in your fleet, similar to how airstrike cooldown is calculated.
- Aux Weapon Increase - Functions similarly to increased main gun mounts, but with whatever is equipped in the auxiliary weapon slot. For the most part, this will increase the number of auxiliary gun mounts for backline units. For ships that equip planes in their auxiliary weapon slot, such as battleship-carriers, it will increase the number of relevant planes launched per airstrike.
- Weapon Type Adjustments - Some ships will have their available weapon types for a given slot adjusted. Generally more common as a remodel perk than a limit break perk.
- No. Emergency Repairs - Only found on repair ships. When loading into a map, a fleet with a repair ship will spawn with X emergency repair kits. Any unused repair kits granted by a repair ship will be lost if the repair ship sinks.
- Fleet Ammo Capacity - Increases the ammo capacity of a fleet with a repair ship. Will not stack. Unlike emergency repairs, this bonus is not lost if the repair ship sinks.
As limit breaks increase fuel consumption, rationing limit breaks early game is well-advised, which begs the question who should you limit break? In terms of raw power increases, the strongest limit break perks are typically going to be main gun and plane increases, followed by preloaded strikes. Other limit break perks are going to be more utility focused rather than providing direct damage increases.
In general, your early game priorities should be limit breaking any active-use battleship once for the first increased main gun mount. Similarly, USN cruisers should be limit broken twice for their main gun mount. Other nations' cruisers can be left at low limit break levels for extended periods of time. Destroyers, similarly, can also be left at low limit break levels, but due to their generally strong torpedoes, limit breaking them twice for preloaded torpedoes can provide a substantial increase in fleet clearing capabilities.
There are more variables involved in deciding when to limit break carriers. If we assume equal performance between all three types of planes, for any standard carrier who can equip one of each type of plane, your first limit break will be a +33% increase in limit break relative to the previous limit break stage, second limit break will be +25%, and final limit break will be +60%. However, the different plane types don't have comparable performance, especially early game fighters, many of which don't have bombs and therefore can't deal surface damage. Additionally, there are non-standard carriers who don't have one slot for each type of plane, and light carriers who only have two plane slots total. Given that all planes +1 is generally the highest increase in carrier throughput, carriers will generally have the highest gain the most from their final limit break and leaving them at low limit break levels early game is typically fine.