An Ideal Time to Upgrade Ship Level?

First of all, it's so sad that people take an Infamy hit just for upgrading to a new tier of ship. The way they implemented ship tier into the matchmaking algorithm was the wrong fix for the problem...

But since it's a thing, and because the every-two-week season reset is also a thing, then you're correct -- you don't want the double-whammy all at once, or you might risk hitting "tanker" status, which apparently = Max Infamy of all time - 800. ...which is another design decision gone wrong.......... but enough of these digressions.........

You asked when is the best time, so here it is:

1. As @CaffeinatedChris said, don't even think about it unless you have good gear to put in the new slots.
2. Wait until you're on a high-cycle of Infamy. Meaning, if you generally oscillate between 2200-2600, wait for a good streak to put you on the high end of that range (like 2500+).
3. And then ideally, if you're on a high streak and think you can maintain it until you're 6-8 days into a given season, that would be ideal because it spaces out the negative influences as far apart as you can.

Prioriy is 1 > 2 > 3.

Good luck!

 

Definately check that u have the right gear, sometimes it is better to stay at a lower mk for a little bit lower so u get ready. I remeber going from 2000 on mk4 fixer to 1200 on mk5 fixer cause I didnt have a third green item ready. Don't make the same mistake.

 

A soon as you can. The people that succeed in life are the ones that rise to the challenge, not the ones that search near and far for poor excuses for their lack of progress. Be a winner!

 

You want to live in a nice house? Buy one now!
You want to drive a fancy car? Buy one now!
You want great kids one day? Get her pregnant now!

Don't worry about all the credit debt you just racked up....
Don't worry that you're only 19, and not ready to be a good parent (or spouse)...
Not being informed or prepared is just a "poor excuse"...
You should just "rise to the challenge"!
Then you'll be a success!......... right?

....No, Kit, I think there are plenty of decision throughout life where gathering and analyzing information, properly weighing pros/cons, framing your perspective towards your goals, and making intelligent decisions on the best path forward is a better way to go than your suggestion.

 

Wouldnt a more fair analogy be;
Want a payraise? Accept the promotion.

Rather than; Dont accept the promotion because you're afraid you cant handle the increased responsability.
---
The myth that the game becomes drastically harder if you increase your mk is vastly overexaggerated.
1. Your own strength increases.
2. Infamy is a much larger part of matchmaking than mk.
3. As matchmaking still balances infamy across teams you might be facing more ships of a higher mk, but there is no noticeable difficulty difference between facing a mk3 and a mk4 if they have equal infamy.

To op: Dont let them scare you off, man Up to the challenge and upgrade. No sense in postponing your progress.

 

I'm all about being brave to face challenges, and believing in yourself. It's basically my life story...
But the OP wasn't saying he didn't want to avoid upgrading because he was scared... (and I haven't seen anyone else tell him not to do it either)
He specifically asked if there was a way to time his ship upgrade to mitigate the downsides...
And there most certainly is a way to carefully and intelligently select an "optimal" time for upgrading -- which I think my first post accurately explained.

 

The rule of thumb I use is to upgrade when you start seeing half your boats in your matchups at the higher level, and your equipment feels sufficient. What that is exactly I don't know. I waited a while to go from MK5 to MK6, where the minimum recommended is T4 Rare, and I did that when I had mostly MK6's in my battles and at least half T5 Rare. However that wasn't enough, I'm still lower infamy than I achieved with MK5. It's the irony of the game that running a better boat reduces your infamy... for a time anyway.

Spinners71 has it right... matchmaking by boat level is not ideal and neither is the 800 penalty drop. While there's merit to doing both, neither address the root cause of why those were done.
Boat Level: people were bitching about OP opponents. OK then your infamy should drop and their infamy should rise, and you won't ever see them again. Second root cause: players can have boats ranging from MK1-7, meaning it is both possible to man an MK2 in Nightmare or bring out your MK7 at 500 infamy after running your MK2 for a while. Level all boats at once and that single infamy number finally makes sense.
800 infamy drop: It was created to punish seal clubbers. Why do seal clubbers exist? Because it's more profitable to win weaker matches than stronger ones.

 

Specifically, what worked for me was to observe the average sort of gear I would be facing at that new higher mark and make sure mine was up to snuff before I upgraded. For me, with the upgrade from M4 to M5, I had pegged roughly rare-40 although I didn't particularly care about the tesla bolt so that's still R11. But I figured that if I upgrade I'm going to be fighting more of those same boats so I might as well observe what they were carrying and make sure I was geared up.

I still dropped some infamy after the upgrade but I attribute that more to the total change in play style from the M4 to M5. The swap from bandages to shield was a big deal.