Rename the tier 8 British Heavy Cruiser

[theonlymaverick]

The name Albemarle has ONLY ever been used against one "modern" warship, the Duncan Class battleship of 1906 vintage;  and never a cruiser.  It feels like a crime against British ship naming conventions to continue with the name Albemarle.

 

Either:

 

- Name it after a county

- Name it after a colony

- Name it after a town

- Revert its name to Bedford

 

Edit: Additional possible

- Name it after a British Admiral (see comments)

[peoplescavalry]

Town

[theonlymaverick]

24 minutes ago, peoplescavalry said:

Town

Any suggestions?

 

Towns were traditionally light cruisers, though I added them here because anything in that list is better than "Albemarle" 

[DrMechano]

Well we could call it HMS Croydon >.> or HMS Street...the two places I've lived in so far but that's just me. I personally didn't see what was wrong with Bedford.

[theonlymaverick]

1 minute ago, DrMechano said:

I personally didn't see what was wrong with Bedford.

Me neither, Bedford was fine; I have no idea what prompted the change.

[fumtu]

1 hour ago, theonlymaverick said:

The name Albemarle has ONLY ever been used against one "modern" warship, the Duncan Class battleship of 1906 vintage;  and never a cruiser.  It feels like a crime against British ship naming conventions to continue with the name Albemarle.

 

Either:

 

- Name it after a county

- Name it after a colony

- Name it after a town

- Revert its name to Bedford

 

 

Why? If I'm not wrong T8 is based on the 1941 program's 8in cruisers which would be given "Admiral" names. So naming it upon county, colony or town would be wrong especially as there are already real County, Crown Colony and Town class cruisers.  

 

Maybe Albemarle is not the best choice but also naming it after one of your suggestions doesn't sound right either. 

[jss78]

If it has to be a town, how about HMS Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch?

[fumtu]

5 minutes ago, jss78 said:

If it has to be a town, how about HMS Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch?

 

Only after we get HMNZS Taumatawhakatangi­hangakoauauotamatea­turipukakapikimaunga­horonukupokaiwhen­uakitanatahu

[theonlymaverick]

20 minutes ago, fumtu said:

 

Why? If I'm not wrong T8 is based on the 1941 program's 8in cruisers which would be given "Admiral" names. So naming it upon county, colony or town would be wrong especially as there are already real County, Crown Colony and Town class cruisers.  

 

Maybe Albemarle is not the best choice but also naming it after one of your suggestions doesn't sound right either. 

 

That is fine, but Albemarle was not a British admiral he was a politician from the 17th Century; the suggestions that I am making are based upon real ships (both Heavy and Light cruisers) and are consistent with the naming conventions of the Royal Navy over the years.

 

--> HMS Hawke maybe?

 

I would be more than happy to take your suggestion and add Admiral names to the list of possibles, the reasoning for leaving them out was because I didn't think it was suitable to be using British admirals for a class of heavy cruiser, especially after HMS Hood.

[MrFingers]

I still vote for HMS Birkenhead.

[Blixies]

HMS Gluedish would be my suggestion. I suspect it might not be historically accurate though.

[theonlymaverick]

15 minutes ago, Blixies said:

HMS Gluedish would be my suggestion. I suspect it might not be historically accurate though.

Jingles would be so proud 

[22cm]

Patay. 

[illy]

1 hour ago, MrFingers said:

I still vote for HMS Birkenhead.

i was thinking along the lines of HMS Twatt or HMS Bell End, i think the pleasant Yorkshire place of Wetwang might be a name too far 

[iFax]

Collingwood, Nelson is in the game,  why not add his trusted friend?

[Daemon_Blackfyre]

That isn't following the RN naming conventions though... They only reuse names once those ships/classes have been retired. The new Heavy Cruisers in question were meant to be WW2 vintage and contemporary to:

County class - ships named after counties
Town-class - ships named after towns (there was another one of these immediately preceding WW1 as well, though as they were retired long before the late 30's ones were launched it was okay)
Crown colony class - ships named after colonies

So we can't name them any of those.
Most of the 30's era light cruisers are named after Greek characters (mythical or not).

Battleships get the names of admirals too so "Drake" is questionable (but i do like it) and I think it refers to the first class armored cruiser (ship and class) of 1901. I think as an homage to the fact that these are new heavy cruisers, reusing names of old armored cruisers that aren't in use in 1944/45 is the best way to go. So from the list (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cruiser_classes_of_the_Royal_Navy#Heavy_cruisers) I'd say some of the standout names would be:

Warrior (Technically was a British/Canadian Colossus-class light carrier about the time, but we don't have that class in game)
Black Prince (A Dido class, but again we don't have that... yet)

(Achilles would be cool but was also a Leander class)

Leviathan was another Drake-class but sounds much cooler than "Goliath", she was a unfinished Majestic-class carrier of 1945 so not actually in service.

Cressy After the battle of Crecy (presumably the spelling was too french for a RN warship!)

Argonaut Another Dido (whoever got to name the Dido's used up a lot of cool names...)

Myrmidon (Not an armoured, but a protected cruiser but sounds cool and is in theme with "Argonaut"). Was a WW2 destroyer BUT loaned to the Polish and sunk shortly after, before these ships would have been launched.

Andromeda If the Russians can have a fictional ship named after a rocket, why not name a class after a Galaxy ;)

Hawke A cancelled Tiger-class, but sounds quite similar to Hawkins (the tier 5).

 

Not armoured cruisers but some other cool names that could be reused:

 

Voyager A destroyer in the Australian Navy

Eclipse Another destroyer name. Sunk mid-war.

Isis Destroyer sunk in 1944. Technically the name of an Egyptian god. But who doesn't want to blow s*** up?

Prometheus Nothing in the 20th century but a cool name.

Challenger Been 8 of those, the 1858 one was pretty famous for mapping most of the world's oceans, the challenger deep was named after her.

Enterprise Would have been good if nothing but to stick it to the Americans, but she was an Emerald-class till 1946.

 

And then there are a couple that are not really reused names but people of special mention:

Boudica / Boudicea There was a Boadicea (because the RN can't spell Boudica) WoWs is a bit lacking in girl's names for ships other than Queen Liz. #Woke (Fair enough, there weren't many lady admirals or Queens in history...).

Smith/Sidney/Sidney Smith Take your pick, granted it's not very catchy, but this guy's awesome! He saved Sweden from the Russians and was knighted by their King (and much later made an Admiral of the RN) but more importantly gave Napoleon more grief than did either Nelson or Wellington. But has never had a ship named after him for all his efforts.

I think my top 3 would be:
Tier 8 - Warrior

Tier 9 - Drake (unchanged)

Tier 10 - Leviathan (but with a changed bridge, the one in-game looks jolly awful!)

[RigorMortis76]

Hms Tikka Masala.

 

Typical British and multicultural political correct, its a sure win win.

[Trainspite]

18 hours ago, Daemon_Blackfyre said:

~snip~

 

Renaming Bedford to Albemarle was one of the only good changes made to the RN CAs, and it is a historical one at that. If my boundless historically based whinging at WG is good for anything, at least it did something. It certainly isn't a crime to use one of the correct names.

 

New RN Heavy Cruisers from 1940-1943 were to be named after Admirals. The proposed names were Benbow, Effingham, Blake and Hawke. The latter two aren't confirmed, but likely candidates based on their use on later CLs. In May 1941 Benbow was renamed to Albemarle and Effingham to Cornwallis by the new ships names committee, and approved by King George VI. All development of new CAs basically stops after 1942/1943, so Hawke and Blake reappear as planned CLs of the Minotaur (1943) class. Shipbucket user 'smurf' also mentions that one might have been Bellerophon, but that might be a hangover from pre-1940 when the larger 21,500t cruisers were still being considered (they were dropped by mid-1940 IIRC). Bedford was previously used as a County-class name in the Monmouth-class armoured cruisers (opposed to it's Admiral usage before that), and hence wasn't correct for a new 1940 RN CA.

 

Source: George Moore in Warship 1997. Repeated again by Norman Friedman in British Cruisers; two world wars and after. 

 

Of course this doesn't change the fact that Albmarle in game is an abomination, a fictional/fake ship created by cloning the hull of Neptune (a 1944 design), and ramming it together with some specifications from the January 1940 15,500t CA design. In many ways it is not worthy of the historical name bestowed upon it.

 

This also means that the fake brother of Albemarle, Cheshire also has an inappropriate name. Again, it would be an Admiral name, and to avoid using one of the historically proposed names, I suggest renaming Cheshire to Russell or Montagu, Admiral names previously used on pre-dreadnoughts.

 

I proposed the name 'Drake' for a large new build 1939/1940 RN CA a few years back, as one of the most famous British (or English) sailors, Drake is certainly an appropriate name in keeping with the Admiral theme but not getting in the way. Goliath seemingly comes from the pre-war thinking that would have seen a new Bellerophon, but Goliath in game is also a fake ship that WG mangled from the source material, so I care not for it, only that it doesn't get in the way too much.

 

[invicta2012]

3 hours ago, Trainspite said:

This also means that the fake brother of Albemarle, Cheshire also has an inappropriate name.

It's perfectly appropriate. Cheshire is the home of Britain's largest salt mine.  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-35322992

 

[MadBadDave]

On 12/19/2019 at 11:21 AM, theonlymaverick said:

The name Albemarle has ONLY ever been used against one "modern" warship, the Duncan Class battleship of 1906 vintage;  and never a cruiser.  It feels like a crime against British ship naming conventions to continue with the name Albemarle.

 

Either:

 

- Name it after a county

- Name it after a colony

- Name it after a town

- Revert its name to Bedford

 

Edit: Additional possible

- Name it after a British Admiral (see comments)

I totally agree it’s like calling the Smolensk the SlowSmurf,

Devonshire, London,Cheshire, Surrey wtf has albemarle got to do with towns, cities, counties and anything to do with the Royal Navy, as far as paper ship goes it would be nice if WG polled names.

[250swb]

Why should towns and counties get all the glory and not villages? So I vote for HMS Wetwang, or HMS Twatt.

[JapLance]

HMS Toothless would be quite appropriate for the Albemarle, since its AP can't dent a T9 armour.

[humpty_1]

HMS Stokie    hehe.

[Sons_of_Horus]

HMS Ben Dover

[iFax]

On 12/19/2019 at 12:25 PM, jss78 said:

If it has to be a town, how about HMS Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch?

Nah, the last "h" wont fit unless they extend the length of the ship by ten feet...