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INTRODUCTION I know there have been posts in the past about adding the Lexington-class CC into the game. However, the latest I have seen was in 2016. There may be an a more recent one that I missed, but I really wanted to write this and get it off of my chest. Also, this is more of a love letter to folks at Wargaming who have created a game that, for most of my life, I wished had existed. It’s hard to find good plane fun Naval games these days. So hats off to Wargaming for making one. Also, if I made an error, I apologize and be sure to kindly let me know. SHORT BACKSTORY OF THE SHIP Alrighty then, my ship suggestion. You can probably tell by the title what I have in mind, that being the Lexington-class battlecruisers of the United States Navy. In brief, these were supposed to be the USN’s first trip down the path of the battlecruiser. However, the Washington Naval Treaty prevented this and they were cancelled before completion, save for two, Lexington and Saratoga. The two ships would be converted into the first fleet carriers oof the USN and the rest is history. The Saratoga can be played in game as a Tier 8 carrier of the USN CV line. And yes, it is actually the Saratoga, she’s just called the Lexington because that’s the class name. WHY I AM WRITING THIS I have always been fascinated by what ifs and alternate timelines, probably because I grew up with lots of Star Trek in my house, but one that has always caught my attention is the Lexington-class battlecruiser. They were to be fast with little armor and a powerful main battery and secondary battery. I know I’m not alone when I say that I would really like to see this ship in World of Warships as a premium ship, or a member of a USN CC, or battlecruiser, line NAME AND TEIR In older posts about the Lexington battlecruiser for WoWS, a few things always pop up. Namely, what should it be called and what tier should it be at? So below are my suggestions for these two problems. Name: Lexington CC Tier: T7 For the name I went with Lexington CC as that’s really what it is. It’s the Lexington but in its battlecruiser, or CC, form. The CC comes from the designation that USN battlecruisers would have been given had they’d been completed as such. Note: BC is not an official mnemonic designation. As for the tier, I went with T7 for multiple reasons that I Hope will become apparent as I talk about my various ideas. STATS (BEFORE CANCELLATION) Bellow are some basic stats of the original design and layout of the Lexington CC as she was being constructed with at the time of her cancellation in 1922. Armament: 8x 16”/50 main guns in 4 twin turrets 14x 6”/53 secondary guns in 4 single open mounts and 10 single mount casemates around her superstructure. 8x 21in torpedo tubes. 4 below the waterline on the bow and two above on the stern. 8x 3”/50 AA guns in single mounts across the ship. Speed: 35kts Armor: Main Belt- 7in tapering to 5in at the bow and stern Deck- 2.5in with 4.5 over the magazines Turret Face- 11in Turret Sides and Back- 6in Turret Roof- 5in Barbettes- 9in Conning Tower- 12in POSSIBLE DESIGN 1 (1920s) My first idea for Lexington CC’s existence in WoWS is simply have her as she was designed to be. Nothing more and nothing less. Of course this is the least fun and honestly my least favorite option as it doesn’t present anything new and interesting with the ship. Also, there are some glaring weaknesses with this design. Since some things aren’t necessarily good or bad, I made a neutral section. WHAT’S DIFFERENT FROM THE ORIGINAL DESIGN? In short, nothing. It’s the same ship. GOODS, NEUTRALS, AND BADS Good: Speed- She’s fast. Damn fast for a 45,000 ton warship of the 1920s. Armament- She’s got some heavy guns. Her secondaries are not bad either. The 6”/53 gun was used aboard the Omaha-class scout cruiser as its main armament. So, these should have some range to them to keep cruisers and destroyers away from her thin armor. I will simply ignore the torpedoes as submerged fixed mounted torpedoes do not seem exist in the game. Acceleration: Being outfitted with a turboelectric drive system, the Lexingtons, both CC and CV, could get up and go quickly, both forward and in reverse. Neutral: Accuracy- Her accuracy would not be bad as she would have had some of the best fire control systems the USN had at that time. Then again, it wouldn’t be great with the lack of radar assisted range finding and targeting. View Range: She has “meh” view range due to older optics and again, no radar. Bad: Armor- Anyone could see this from a mile away. Maneuverability- Being such a long ship would make her sluggish. Not Yamato levels of sluggish, probably a little less responsive than Hood. Poorly Protected Engines- Because half of her boilers are unprotected by the citadel it would be easy to disable her engines, if you can hit her, which shouldn’t be too hard. She is big. Detection: Because she’s such a large ship, she would have a relatively high detection range. Torpedo Protection: She’s a ship from the 1920s, a time when torpedoes hadn’t yet reached their full potential and where not as powerful as they would become. Anti-Air: With only eight 3”/50s for AA defense, she’s not going to be able to protect herself well from enemy aircraft. Combine this with her weak torpedoes protection and sluggish response, she’s an XP punching bag for carriers if she’s alone. POSSIBLE DESIGN 2 (1941-A) This one is the one I most often think about when I imagine seeing Lexington CC in the game and the one I hope to see in game in the end. WHAT’S DIFFERENT FROM THE ORIGINAL DESIGN? It’s a theoretical design that shows Lexington CC having been refitted in the 1930s and modernized along the same lines as the battleships of the USN. Subtractions: -8x 3”/50 AA Guns -8x 21in torpedo tubes -4x 6”/53 Open mounts -2kts in speed Additions: +10x 5”/25 AA Guns in single mounts +24x 1.1”/75 AA Guns in 6 Quad Mounts +22x .50 M2 BMG water cooled AA guns +Catapult Scout Plane GOODS, NEUTRALS, AND BADS Goods Speed: Even though she’s lost 2 kts, she’s still fast at 33kts. Armament- She still carries her main Battery. Her secondaries have been trimmed by 4 from 14 to 10, but they can still defend her close in. Acceleration: As mentioned earlier, being outfitted with a turboelectric drive system, the Lexingtons, both CC and CV, could get up and go quickly, both forward and in reverse. Accuracy: With the inclusion of radar, her accuracy would increase, making her decent at long range. Scout Plane: Increases effective range of the guns. Neutral: Improved AA- Although her AA has vastly improved, it will still struggle against higher tier aircraft carriers. At least she’s no longer a give me. View Range: While her view range would be better with the addition of radar, she would still struggle to see targets outside the max range of her guns, but with the assistance of friendly ships spotting ahead, she could see them. Torpedo Protection: With the addition of torpedo bulges along her hull, Lexington CC is no longer as severely vulnerable against torpedoes, but is still susceptible to major damage from the most powerful torpedoes. Bad: Armor- It’s still thin. Maneuverability- Being such a long ship would make her sluggish. However, with the slight reduction in speed, she is more responsive, but still not good. Poorly Protected Engines- Because half of her boilers are unprotected by the citadel, it would be easy to disable her engines, if you can hit her, which shouldn’t be too hard. She is big. Also, the armor is still thin. Detection: Because she’s such a large ship, she would have a relatively high detection range. POSSIBLE DESIGN 3 (1941-B) This one is the same as the 1941-A design except she has more armor, is a little slower, and a little more maneuverable. WHAT’S DIFFERENT FROM THE ORIGINAL DESIGN? It’s a theoretical design that shows Lexington CC having been refitted in the 1930s and modernized along the same lines as the battleships of the USN. Subtractions: -8x 3”/50 AA Guns -8x 21in torpedo tubes -4x 6”/53 Open mounts -5kts in speed Additions: +10x 5”/25 AA Guns in single mounts +24x 1.1”/75 AA Guns in 6 Quad Mounts +22x .50 M2 BMG water cooled AA guns +Catapult Scout Plane +3 Inches of Belt Armor GOODS, NEUTRALS, AND BADS Goods Armament- She still carries her main Battery. Her secondaries have been trimmed by 4 from 14 to 10, but they can still defend her close in. Acceleration: As mentioned earlier, being outfitted with a turboelectric drive system, the Lexingtons, both CC and CV, could get up and go quickly, both forward and in reverse. Accuracy: With the inclusion of radar, her accuracy would increase, making her decent at long range. Scout Plane: Increases effective range of the guns. Neutral: Speed: With 5kts gone, she drops to 30kts which takes away a lot of makes the ship so impressive. Not a bad speed, but certainly not as good as it could be. Improved AA- Although her AA has vastly improved, it will still struggle against higher tier aircraft carriers. At least she’s no longer a give me. View Range: While her view range would be better with the addition of radar, she would still struggle to see targets outside the max range of her guns, but with the assistance of friendly ships spotting ahead, she could see them. Torpedo Protection: With the addition of torpedo bulges along her hull, Lexington CC is no longer as severely vulnerable against torpedoes, but is still susceptible to major damage from the most powerful torpedoes. Armor- With an added 3 inches of armor to the belt, the Lexington CC now has 10 inches of armor tapering to 7-8 at her bow and stern. Marginally Better Protected Engines- Because of the increased armor, her engines are not as easy to take out, however it is still a problem Bad: Maneuverability- Being such a long ship would make her sluggish. However, with a greater reduction in speed, she is even more responsive, and is ok-ish but still bad-ish. Detection: Because she’s such a large ship, she would have a relatively high detection range. TYPE OF PLAY STYLE With the type of ship she is and her relative lack of armor and high speed, she’s not a brawler and would probably be better as a sniper, a really fast sniper. She could also support cruisers by assisting in taking out other cruisers. Oddly enough this is basically what the ship was meant to do in the USN. Lead scouting forces and bring heavy weight fire power to a cruiser fight. So she’d be good at kiting behind cruisers and slamming on cruisers and the occasional battleships and then speeding away before they can respond effectively. MY OPINIONS So, as you can imagine, I’m not a huge fan of the first design. Especially if it’s supposed to be T7 and I honestly feel that it should be a T6. However, some people gasp when that’s mentioned. Apparently putting a light skinned meh gunned fast battlecruiser at T6 will break the game. Not sure how that would happen, but everyone is entitled to their own opinions. Anyhow, that’s where I stand on the first design. If it’s added into the game, great! I’ll still love the Lady Lex. As for the second design, I already mentioned that I find it the most appealing. It keeps the thin armor that Lexington CC is infamously known for, but in doing so, it keeps her play style up. This combined with her relatively still high speed of 32kts would make a decent battlecruiser at T7 alongside H.M.S. Hood. Her maneuverability wouldn’t be great, but it wouldn’t be terrible. Her guns would be accurate enough to rain Hell from long range. This one is a good fit for T7 Now, for the final design. It is what it is. It’s the second design but with more armor, a lower speed, and is more maneuverable. I’m honestly indifferent about it. I would say it could be a T8, but that AA and still relatively thin armor and reduced speed of 30kts would make it a pain. Especially if she had to see T10 and T9s every game. MUST HAVES In my opinion there are somethings that the Lexington CC needs to have if she is going to be a playable, enjoyable, and viable ship to play. Most of these things are to compensate for her lack of armor. She must have good guns. They are going to need to hit hard, hit far, and be accurate enough to not force the Lexington CC into close in engagements where her armor is weaker than it already is. Secondly, she must be fast. The whole purpose of her lack of armor was so she would be fast. Not that it really needed to be said, but there. She’s going to need a large HP pool. This, as with her speed and guns is because of her lack of armor. Also, she’s a big ship with lots of room for lots of HP. Good Consumables. This is kind of a give me, but I’ll mention it anyways. She’s going to need to good consumables. This (cue broken record) is because of her lack of armor. This last one is a maybe, but I encourage it. Secondaries with good range. These are not the typical 5”/51, 5”/25, or 5”/38 secondaries of the USN battleships and cruisers, no these are 6”/53s. These are the exact same guns that the Omaha-class scout cruisers are armed with. In fact when the Lexingtons were cancelled, their 6” secondaries were used for the guns of the Omahas. So yeah, these should have some rang and Lexington CC is going to need them to have range because of her weak armor. Those are my must haves. As you can probably tell, her biggest weakness is her armor. Plain and simple. CONCLUSION Well, this wraps up this ship suggestion of mine. Thanks for trudging your way through my poorly structured paragraphs. I hope you enjoyed reading this or at the very least were humored by it. Either way, have a wonderful day and see you on the high seas. Disclaimer: Any mention of radar in this post is not a reference to the radar consumable. It’s just a real world reason as to why view range and accuracy gets better. P.S. Wargaming, if you do read this, I beg of you to please, for the love of all those who appreciate naval history, do not give this ship a strange made up camouflage pattern. Giver her that beautiful “Neutrality Grey” or Navy Grey and don’t cover her in rust. I think she would look stunning in such a beautiful clean paint job and equally clean hull.

Well, the model has arrived and the photos are in from SD Model Makers. She is 30” long, so just under 1:350 scale. Something like 1:34896 or whatever. For those of you who don’t know, the Lexington -class aircraft carrier, or CV, was originally supposed to be a battlecruiser, or CC. The model is is being built in a configuration that suggests what she might have looked like as a CC in USN service in early 1941. ARMAMENT: x8 16”/50 main guns. x10 6”/53 secondary guns. x10 5”/25 heavy AA guns. x6 1.1”/75 “Chicago Piano” medium AA guns. x19 Water cooled M2 .50 caliber BMG light AA guns. Enjoy! P.S. This is an article I made a while back about having this ship added into WoWS. Check it out if you like the Lady Lex.

Well, the preliminary photos are in from SD Model Makers. Some additions and alterations still need to be done, but she is coming along nicely. She is 30” long, so just under 1:350 scale. Something like 1:34896 or whatever. For those of you who don’t know, the Lexington -class aircraft carrier, or CV, was originally supposed to be a battlecruiser, or CC. The model is is being built in a configuration that suggests what she might have looked like as a CC in USN service in early 1941. ARMAMENT: x8 16”/50 main guns. x10 6”/53 secondary guns. x10 5”/25 heavy AA guns. x6 1.1”/75 “Chicago Piano” medium AA guns. x19 Water cooled M2 .50 caliber BMG light AA guns. Enjoy!