piritskenyer

Low chance? Good.

Well, the gun has the best in calibre class AP damage, with higher pen that gun would probably be too powerful.

How dare you say it has the lowest penetration! It is a german gun and therefore MUST be the best in its class! Any other assumption is just preposterous! German guns are the best, everyone knows that! /s

Hiya mate, Well, first off, you must realise that low tier USNBB's are probably one of the worsely powercreeped of all the lower tier BB's. They severely lack in speed and so once you are committed, there is almost no turning back. And that leads us to point 1): Pick a flank as best you can and stick with it. You'll either push through the opposition, grinding them up, or you'll have to act as a delaying/blocking force while another flank (hopefully) pushes the enemy. In such an eventuality, you best try to turn away and put up a running defence, as that will minimise your exposure to enemy torpedoes and gunfire and extend your own life and thus your usefulness. When you find yourself on a flank where no enemies are present, be very worried and take a close look at your map. Generally one of two things can be happening: The enemy has formed a lemmingtrain and is pushing through (or about to push through) your other flank, or The enemy hasn't yet arrived to the party on the flank you are occupying. In any case, there are two possible courses of action for you to take: Continue steaming towards the enemy cap Turn towards your other flank in a way that you can cover your own cap or even possibly turn back into it The decision will depend on how well the other flank is holding and how deep are you in your move. If you are 3/4 to your way to the enemy cap and the other flank is holding, push into the enemy cap. That will relieve pressure off the other flank and you'll be able to deal with the returning units in order of arrival. If the flank looks iffy and you are halfway between the two, make for your own cap, etc. Lots of possible scenarios. You'll need to pay close attention to the map. Point 2): Don't sail alone if you can possibly help it. You are too slow to outrun an enemy... well, an enemy whatever that isn't another USNBB. Cruisers and DD's will make short work of you if they find you isolated. Since teamwork is seldom a thing in randoms on low tiers, the responsibility to sail with allies is entirely yours. Now, this is up to and including T7. At and above T8, the ships change drastically. You go from the slowest BB's to comfy - fastest-in-game - good. Those ships are much more flexible, and play way differently, but I won't really go into detail on those right now, mostly because I'm tired and because my experience with them is limited. Anyway, happy sailing mate!

Yeah, using the A hull and A hull only (bcs concealment was tied to the hull, not the gun), Mogami's SF window was 1.7km, which was okay, but that was the only saving grace for an optherwise crippled ship. I kept to the guns because the ship was so bad with the 8" option that the only viable form of use was to SF. Now she's been buffed to acceptable levels, but now the 155 is actually fun to use. They fire a salvo and then vanish. In 20 seconds. Because that is the duration of all gunfire blooms. That is 20 seconds for you to lay your (presumably pre-aimed) guns on target and fire. Yeah, that are good concealment BB's, but a DD or a CL can do so much more concealment wise. What you need (and seem to lack or at least fail to at least partially comprehend) is trigger discipline. To be able to shut your guns up for 20 seconds. And then, I guarantee you that with the same skillset, you'll be able to outspot a same-tier BB in a CL or much more, in a DD. No magic there. Although I do agree that there are some BB's that can achieve better concealment than higher tier CL's. Your reload in an Algerie is 12 seconds. That gives you 8 seconds of first salvo advantage before he disappears and then you have to wait only 12 seconds to try and set him on fire again. If he burns, he's more visible. You did not pursue him, and let him heal. That is a rather common mistake people make, and much more costly if the opponent can heal. Not going to criticise you too harshly, because I don't know the exact tactical situation, but you + a Nagato could (should) have made short work of a GC. That thing is famous for its gun handling, not it's durability. The gun bloom has nothing to do with stealthfire (well, it does, but not in this case). If you, in your cruiser, ceased fire for 20 seconds, your detection range would drop as well, and you would fade out from enemy sight. The fact that his reload happens to be longer than the bloom time is a fact of life. Defavourable, but not gamebreaking per se. Also, one thing I wanted to mention earlier: I hope most of you guys realise that the detection changes (where gun bloom now goes up to your firing range instead of by [range in mm x 300] was an indirect buff to a lot of ships, including all BB's. BB's used to have higher gun bloom than what they usually have now, being detected beyond their gunrange.

Yeah, they are doing fine. Want to know about a ship that did okay after the B/AFT and EM nerf and did terribly after the taking away of SF and before buffs? Mogami. A ship that did moderately well before the taking away of SF and now is generally regarded as poor? Ibuki. You can find examples of everything and its opposite if you look in the right place, but the point isn't just the individual performance of one ship or another, but how the mechanic effected the meta. And the meta was that a BB wandering off alone was dead meat and much more severely than now. BB's get away with much worse stuff these days generally. And that is what makes them appealing to a lot of people.

It was annoying, and unplanned. Bad? Hardly. Getting stealthfire below T8 became impossible after the changes to B/AFT and EM, at which point the dedicated sealclubbers let go of it and it became okay. Before the B/AFT changes regular CL's could outfit in such a way that BB's below T8 would have no chance, and that was unfair. Did that need to go away? Yes, it did. Did it go away? Yes, it did. At and above T8, a lot of cruisers depended on SF for survivability, especially since a BB only needs to get lucky once to delete a cruiser. Stealthfire was in most cases balanced at each tiers in a way that a silent BB with the regular concealment build couldn't be stealthfired at by a cruiser. A silent BB being detected by a cruiser couldn;t be stealthfired at by said cruiser. The whole thing was even to a certain degree rather beneficial ifd you ask me, because it promoted spotting. How did it promote spotting? Well, if you're being stealthfired, you need someone to go forward for you to uncover the thing SF'ing you, and trough proper positioning there wouldn't be a free opportunity for enemy ships to OWSF. Anyway, I went on quite in a rambly way, only to say that, no, despite originally being a mistake on the dev's part (a bug if you will, although I'd argue that it doesn't qualify), it was a useful mechanic that helped other classes combat BB's. Smokefire was another such thing that was being a mere annoyance (for me when I drove a BB) and was also whined into disappearance, because apparently BB's have to have it overly easy.

If you can't counter a SF ship in a fast BB, I got bad news for you son, You got 99 problems, but a ship ain't one. What ship were you in? Btw, that Klingon cloaking technology is called concealment expert and is a widely popular choice for all ship classes but carriers (and mostly even for them). If you didn't have shots ready to counterfire at him when he was engaging you, or didn't chase him if he was alone, then I can't really tell you anything that could possibly help you. I see BSG, I press like.

I was waiting for that. Patiently waiting.

No, it's more like a situation summary of the reasons why the situation is what it is. Why even comment then? That is very true. I didn't consider that. PS: after reading your article I feel a bit guilty for proposing HMS Vanguard.

Excellent writeup mate! One thing I would say, though is that imo it's the skill floor that is way lower than a BB, rather than the skill ceiling. Not that skill ceiling is *that* high, but a good BB player can do much more in terms of match influence than a bad one, while even an average player can rack up tons of damage. Most cruisers and DD's have much higher skill floors and much bigger variety (as you stated), and in my opinion, that is what makes people go for BB's. In short, I agree. PS: I'll stilk take my cruisers over my BB's, because I'm weird like that.

Now unless I'm very much mistaken, Kronshtadt was laid down while still planned to be completed with 3x3x 305mm guns, but once they realised that delivery was impossible at the given deadline, they bought the 380mm turrets from the germans and modified the design to accomodate the guns (including increasing the ring diametres). The guns and turrets were never delivered, and the ship was never completed, so I guess the point I'm trying to make is that it is absolutely [edited]useless to complain about historical accuracy or the playerbase's attachment to historical accuracy when we have two alternatives of which neither were completed.

Read the gun stats and compare them to Warspite's

Aaaaaand I don't think I'll get a chance to get her for free. My PC is gonna be repaired on warranty, but I'm not gonna have it for somne time, and I'll miss the missions. Bugger.

Thanks for clearing that up mate. I did know splash could knock modules (steering mainly I think), didn't know it could set fires as well.

Can you even set a fire by hitting the belt? I may be mistaken, but all fire setting zones are on the topside (on and above the deck) of ships, aren't they? EDIT: I'm saying this purely based on memory, where I remember damaging ships with HE through their thinner upper belt, but don't remember ever setting a fire in a case like that.

Okay, so what i knew about the citadel, was rather close to reality. Also, I already changed the heal and DCP to the exact same Warspite has. I think that while Blake would be a tad gimmicky, she could hack it in T7 (even in T8 with a bit of a stretch) due to the sheer volume of fire she can put out. Of course she'd need the usual RNCL heal and smoke to be viable, and perhaps even the unique ability to spam HE [insert evil laughter], but I think she could manage. Especially AA would be interesting given the DP nature of the main battery and the 3" AA guns.

Just that little push was enough to make up my un-madeup mind there, so DCP and RP it is. I think Vanguard could be relatively tanky, but not thanks to her armour OR hitpoints, but rather thanks to a combination of both. I think that realised in this way she'd be excellent at bringing in Dreadnought awards after prolonged battles where she uses up all her heals. Know what I mean? Bow tanking would be a possibility against all but Yammy thanks to her bow plating, but it would be rather counterproductive in terms of firepower. You probably couldn't get away with the same stunts as with Bismarck or Tirpitz, sure, but that's their niche. One thing that I like about the ship is that the belt apparently extends forward and back past the fore and aft citadel bulkheads (that are 305mm-thick themselves). That in effect means that you should have a section of belt in the plating, making it better at angling, and the 305mm citadel bulkheads also mean you can effectively angle against even a Yamato, should you need to. Yeah, I thought RNBB's would have their heals along Warspite's lines, but instead they were given a resurrection tool. Disclaimer: I should also add, that I haven't yet come across detailed armour profiles (only sectional drawings), so I cannot confirm the claim about the belt, I have only seen written mentions of that.

Do you mean Warspite DCP and RP? Or only the DCP? I for one am tempted at giving Vanguard Warspite's consumables, as that wouldn't make her particularly gimmicky, but would provide continuty with Warspite. You know what? I'll cheat and do that. Not like it's a "real" gimmick anymore anyway...

I was actually considering the 0.6%/sec heal of Warspite, but I'm not convinced it is needed, due to best in tier HP. I don't know what the citadel placement was on the ship, but I suspect thhe top would be slightly out of the water. @Trainspite can you advise?

Don't worry mate, I'm pretty sure we'll see her in game eventually as well. I'd like to have this ship as well, she'd go just fine with Vanguard (bundle? Wink-wink).

Range can be increased no problem, especially since we are talking about a ship that doesn't have aircraft (spotting or otherwise). 18,5 seemed to be rather average when I drafted this, but thinking about it, you may be on to something here. [range increase to 20,5 noted] Do you have any source to this? Earlier I have been disappointed by shells where I [foolishly] derived alpha from MV (and pen), so until you provide me with sometghing on that, I'm gonna take that with a grain of salt [nothing personal]. I ripped the numbers directly from HMS Conqueror, adjusting for the number of barrels. I'm following WG logic there, not to worry! Yeah, well, I used the HP calculation formula of Battleship Hitpoints: 10988 + (tonnage X 1.1769) when calculating the HP for Vanguard, and at 52250, the exact value was 72481,025. I decided to round it down to 400 because that seemed high enough as-is. The shell damage is rounded up because even with the higher shell damage, she's lagging behind Bismarck's and Tirpitz's theoretical DPM. Sigma is sub-2 (only just) because of the dispersion issues caused by the use of supercharge. 1,95 is still darn good IMO, not as 360-noscope as Warspite's, but nearly. The 2% heal does't seem to be workable for me here. Afterall, we're talking about the highest-HP BB on T8 (unless I missed something), and that alone should give her a rather healthy repair at the 0.5% rate. I tried to make a point of not having gimmicks on this ships and for a reason: I want to give the RN a "classical" BB in the sense that people can return to the roots of BB play, without sacrificing the Royal Navy experience. RN BB's in reality were very much about being able to slug it out and dish it out, something not really represented in game IMO. The maneuverability stats were directly lifted from Lion by transforming Lion's stats up to the longer hull of Vanguard (take Lion's length, divide by Vanguard's length, you got the ratio for the stats. Except rudder shift, where I just gave a value that seemed appropriate). Concealment-wise she is worse than Monarch, but hey, that's her only real drawback to the other ship, innit?

You're not the only one to notice and report that, but that's all I can say...

Alright, so here's the deal: I was scouring wikipedia at work, and I stumbled upon French BB's. I didn't really have the time to put in the hours required for anything resembling an internet-research (ie making reasoned assumptions based on logic, the old Mk I. eyeball and the available, often contradictory information), but what I gathered generally points towards the French using smaller calibre but high(er)-penetration main armament. All that I'm about to write down is from wiki, so it may be inaccurate (although I'll try to get into sources as we go along), and so I invite all of you guys to comment and add to it if you know your stuff. Right, let's start: Tier III Okay, we start off on a bad foot here: The French simply don't seem to have an all-big-gun BB armed with the right number of 12" guns. We either have a fairly RNG-dependent option, or one that would be probably overpowered at that level. Courbet-class Main armament: 6x2x 305mm (12")/45 Mle 1906 guns Secondary armament: 22x 138mm /55 Mle 1910 guns 4x 47mm Hotchkiss guns Armour: 30-300mm Belt: 270mm Speed: 21kts Weapon layout Now what we have here is a ship that has the same broadside as the Ishizuchi. Not only that, but she also has a great big pack of secondary artillery, capable of setting anyone alight quite reliably by the sheer volume of fire alone. She can of course be balanced to have a reduced rate of fire, or slow turret turn times, but I don't think it'll matter that much if someone knows what he's doing in a BB. She could also be a Tier IV premium BB in case she doesn'T get chosen. Tier IV For this tier, I would suggest the Bretagne-class. I was also considering the Normandie-class, but I decided to go with the Bretagne for two reasons: The Bretagne-class was actually realised, while the Normandie was not, And the Normandie-class would, in my opinion, have too much firepower for the tier: armed with 4x3 340mm guns she would have the most powerful broadside of any Tier 4 ship, while the 5x2 340mm guns of the Bretagne-class would sit just right at the tier. Right then, the Bretagne-class: Main armament: 5x2x 340mm (13,4")/45 Mle 1902 guns Secondary armament: As built 22x 138mm/55 Mle 1910 guns 4x 47mm Hotchkiss guns After 1935: 14x 138mm/55 Mle 1910 guns 8x 75mm/50 Mle 1922 guns (DP) Armour: 40-340mm Belt: 270mm Speed: 20kts Weapon layout I think she would sit right well between the Wyoming (12x 12") and the Myogi (6x14") in terms of firepower, whilst in speed she'd be on the slow side (like pretty much everyone in that period). AA would only appear on the B hull, and even then it wouldn't be anything significant (I'm guessing some MG's would be present to complement the 75mm guns, but that's all). Tier V For this tier, I suggest either the Normandie-class Normandie class (planned) Main armament: 3x4x 340mm/45 Mle 1912 guns Secondary armament: 24x 138mm/55 Mle 1910 guns 6x 47mm Hotchkiss guns Armour: 40(?)-340mm Belt: 300mm Speed: 21kts I guess she could have some sort of upgrade to her AA at the expense of some secondary guns, something like the Bretagne-class got. But that's for my next post, since now I have to go. Kudos to Poster_2015 and Historynerd for their input

Weird indeed. I never took the time to check those stats. What I can tell you however is that Frech ships seem to have a very high pen ingame. I'm talking about citadeling a NewMex with Dunkek at 17km range high pen. I cannot tell you about my own personal experience on the other ships unfortunately, as ST NDA is in effect, but yeah, those CC long range citadels man. The data is on my side, and facts are stubborn things, so I don't care about wehraboos! What are they gonna do with me anyway? Try to bore me to sleep with their wehraboo BS? Vanguard F yeah! I was thinking of an alpha in the region of 11.8k, but I wouldn't at all be surprised if it remained at 11.4k. Afterall, based on pen alone, the French 330mm/50 should be punching at around 10-10.5k, but there we are with 9.8k. Odd thing about Monarch indeed. Not really sensible either, as Hood only retained the Mk XIIIa because of the handling equipment not being able to handle the longer 6 crh shells. One might think that if a new weapon was designed then the handling equipment that goes with it would be designed around the new, bigger shell (also with room for even longer shells, you know, just in case). Vanguard would sure as hell use the Mk XXIIb, as that's the only AP shell she ever carried. Putting the supercharges on her would be a bit of a liberty taken, because despite having been made able to use them (and at any elevation, as opposed to earlier mountings), she was never issued them. Also, I was wondering wether the muzzle velocity would be 785 or 804, but that question was quickly answered in the footnotes where it clearly states that while the mountings might have been from older BC's, the guns themselves were issued from the reserve of spares and thus would be new (with the new gun velocity of 804). Anyway, we should open a new thread for this, as this is a clear sidetrack.