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In the late nineteen-teens, the USN conducted an exercise where one force of dreadnought battleships (BLUE) would try to prevent two forces of pre-dreadnoughts (RED) from linking up. BLUE failed to not only to prevent the forces of RED from linking up, but even from finding RED within the search area. The cause of this was heavy weather and the effects it had on the destroyer force which BLUE used to try and find RED. It was realized that while destroyers could outrun any other ship during calm weather, this was not the during rougher sea states. During the exercise, the destroyers only managed around 9 kts, where even the older pre-dreadnoughts, with their lower freeboards, could easily maintain 15 kts. It was also observed during an earlier exercise that in even rougher seas, the destroyers had to leave the search area for fear of floundering (something that would be seen in action in WWII). The obvious solution to this was to use larger ships for scouting. The ships developed during the design study were initially designed with either ten 6-inch guns or four 12-inch guns, with later designs even being given 14 or 16-inch guns and most were designed for a speed of 35 kts. While no ships were built from these designs, they did lay the foundation for the Omaha-Class. Sticking to the USN naming convention for cruisers, these ships are named for US cities. Aside from the Albuquerque, which is the start of this left turn on the USN cruiser branch, the ships are named after towns that have Court House in their name, as I am sure that they, and the line as a whole, will be judged harshly. As a line, these ships will be fast, all sharing the same speed of 35 kts. The Tier VI-VIII ships also have no belt armor, as they were designed to be completely unarmored. The Battle Scouts, that is the scouts with Battleship main armament, could be classified in two ways during the 1919 study: the first by armament (2x2 12", 2x1 14", 2x2 14", and 2x2 16") and the second being by armor (none, 4" belt, and 8" belt). The 'Court House' Classes are drawn from this portion of the study, where Design 115 was from a bit earlier. As these ships were designed to fulfill the function of destroyers, I have largely given them destroyer consumables, like American Destroyer smoke and a slightly upgraded Engine Boost. The ships were equipped to carry spotting aircraft, which is reflected in their consumables, and the Heavy Repair Party is used because these ships will eat a lot of citadel damage, especially at tiers VI-VIII. Note: The full displacement of these ships is derived from the weight charts, by calculating the various stores that are listed at 2/3rd, multiplying them by 1.5, and then adding up the other weights. They do not reflect the proposed modernization that I have given them and the health in parenthesis is what the health would be using this approximate full displacement, which could assist in balancing. Tier VI Battle Scout 115 Albuquerque-Class Displacement: 12,600t normal (13,956t full, approx.) Health:33,600 (36,250) Armor Torpedo Protection: 4.0% Plating: 16mm Main Belt: 16mm Main Deck: 16mm Barbettes: 152mm Turret Face: 25mm Citadel Bulkhead: 25mm Citadel Athwartship: 25mm Citadel Roof: 25mm Length: 720’ (219.46m) Beam: 59’ (17.98m) Speed: 35.0 kts E.H.P.: 62,500 (approx between 93,750 and 125,000 SHP) Rudder Shift: 8.0s Turning Circle: 710m Detectability By Air/Sea: 6.6km/12.2km Main Armament 2x2 305mm/50 Mk.7 in a turret Reload: 30.0s Range: 14.3 km Turret 180º: 30.0s Dispersion: 116m Horizontal/64m Vertical @ 12.0km Sigma: 2.0σ 1 – 305mm HE Max Damage: 4,200 Fire Chance: 22.0% Shell Pen: 51mm Muzzle Velocity: 884 m/s 2 – 305mm AP Max Damage: 8,300 Muzzle Velocity: 884 m/s Secondary Armament 7x1 152mm/50 Mk.8 on a Mk.10 mount Reload: 10.0s Max Damage: 2,100 Fire Chance: 7.0% Penetration: 25mm Range: 5.0km Muzzle Velocity: 853 m/s Anti-Aircraft Armament 4x1 76mm/50 Mk.22 on a single mount Medium Range AA Continuous Damage: 21 Range: 3.5km Consumables R – Damage Control Party (5s Duration; 60s Cooldown) T – Heavy Repair Party (2.0%/sec; 50% Health; 33% Citadel; 20s Duration; 80s Cooldown) Y – Smoke Generator (0.45km radius; 30s Duration; 118s Dispersion; 160s Cooldown) U – Engine Boost (+12.5% Speed; 120s Duration; 120s Cooldown) I – Spotting Aircraft Tier VII Battle Scout 118 Appomattox Court House-Class Displacement: 14,350 (~15,752) Health: 37,000 Armor Torpedo Protection: 4.0% Plating: 13mm Main Belt: 16mm Upper Belt: 16mm Main Deck: 16mm Barbettes: 25mm Turret Face: 25mm Turret Sides: 25mm Turret Rear: 25mm Turret Roof: 25mm Citadel Bulkhead: 25mm Citadel Athwartship: 25mm Citadel Roof: 25mm Length: 720’ (219.46m) Beam: 69’ (21.03m) Speed: 35.0 kts E.H.P.: 62,500 (approx between 93,750 and 125,000 SHP) Rudder Shift: 8.2s Turning Circle: 720m Detectability By Air/Sea: 7.0km/12.8km Main Armament 2x2 305mm/45 Mk.5 in a turret Reload: 30.0s Range: 15.6km Turret 180º: 30.0s Dispersion: 116m Horizontal/64m Vertical @ 12.0km Sigma: 2.0σ 1 – 305mm HE Max Damage: 4,100 Fire Chance: 20.0% Shell Pen: 51mm Muzzle Velocity: 823 m/s 2 – 305mm AP Max Damage: 8,100 Muzzle Velocity: 823m/s Secondary Armament 7x1 127mm/25 Mk.19 on a Mk.19 mount Reload: 4.5s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 9.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 5.6km Muzzle Velocity: 657 m/s Anti-Aircraft Armament 7x1 127mm/25 Mk.19 on a Mk.19 mount 6x4 40mm/56 Bofors on a Mk.2 mount 20x2 20mm/70 Oerlikon on a Mk.24 mount Long Range AA Flak Burst: 74 Flak Damage: 1,330 Continuous Damage: 74 Range: 4.8 km Medium Range AA Continuous Damage: 175 Range: 3.5 km Short Range AA Continuous Damage: 300 Range: 2.0 km Consumables R – Damage Control Party (5s Duration; 60s Cooldown) T – Heavy Repair Party (2.0%/sec; 50% Health; 33% Citadel; 20s Duration; 80s Cooldown) Y – Smoke Generator (0.45km radius; 30s Duration; 121s Dispersion; 160s Cooldown) U – Engine Boost (+12.5% Speed; 120s Duration; 120s Cooldown) I – Spotting Aircraft Tier VIII Battle Scout 124 Charlotte Court House-Class Displacement: 15,500t normal (19,875t full, approx.) Health: 39,200 (47,500) Armor Torpedo Protection: 4.0% Plating: 16mm Main Belt: 25mm Upper Belt: 25mm Main Deck: 25mm Barbettes: 27mm Turret Face: 25mm Turret Sides: 25mm Turret Rear: 25mm Turret Roof: 25mm Citadel Bulkhead: 27mm Citadel Athwartship: 27mm Citadel Roof: 27mm Length: 760’ (231.65m) Beam: 71’ (21.64m) Speed: 35.0 kts E.H.P.: 64,000 (approx between 96,000 and 128,000 SHP) Rudder Shift: 8.6s Turning Circle: 710m Detectability By Air/Sea: 7.0km/12.8km Main Armament 2x2 356mm/45 Mk 8 in a turret Reload: 30.0s Range: 14.3 km Turret 180º: 30.0s Dispersion: 116m Horizontal/64m Vertical @ 12.0km Sigma: 2.0σ 1 – 356mm HE/HC Mk22 Max Damage: 5,000 Fire Chance: 30.0% Shell Pen: 59mm Muzzle Velocity: 834 m/s 2 – 356mm AP Mk16 Max Damage: 10,300 Muzzle Velocity: 792 m/s Secondary Armament 7x1 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.30 mod.0 mount Reload: 3.0s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 5.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 6.6km Muzzle Velocity: 792 m/s Anti-Aircraft Armament 7x1 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.30 mod.0 mount 6x4 40mm/56 Bofors on a Mk.2 mount 20x2 20mm/70 Oerlikon on a Mk.24 mount Long Range AA Flak Burst: 5 Flak Damage: 1,540 Continuous Damage: 100 Range: 5.8km Medium Range AA Continuous Damage: 200 Range: 3.5km Short Range AA Continuous Damage: 200 Range: 2.0km Consumables R – Damage Control Party (5s Duration; 60s Cooldown) T – Repair Party (2.0%/sec; 50% Health; 33% Citadel; 20s Duration; 80s Cooldown) Y – Smoke Generator (0.45km radius; 30s Duration; 124s Dispersion; 160s Cooldown) U – Engine Boost (+12.5% Speed; 120s Duration; 120s Cooldown) I – Spotting Aircraft Tier IX Battle Scout 125 King and Queen Court House-Class Displacement: 19,500t normal (21,671 full, approx.) Health: 46,800 (51,000) Armor Torpedo Protection: 7% Plating: 16mm Main Belt: 102mm Upper Belt: 25mm Main Deck: 25mm Barbettes: 38mm Turret Face: 38mm Turret Sides: 25mm Turret Rear: 25mm Turret Roof: 25mm Citadel Bulkhead: 25mm Citadel Athwartship: 25mm Citadel Roof: 38mm Length: 760’ (219.46m) Beam: 77’ (23.47m) Speed: 35.0 kts E.H.P.: 76,500 (approx. between 114,750 and 153,000 SHP) Rudder Shift: 8.8s Turning Circle: 740m Detectability By Air/Sea: 7.0km/12.8km Main Armament 2x2 356mm/50 Mk.11 in a turret Reload: 25.0s Range: 16.5km Turret 180º: 30.0s Dispersion: 116m Horizontal/64m Vertical @ 12.0km Sigma: 2.05σ 1 – 356mm HC/HE Mk22 mod 1 Max Damage: 4,750 Fire Chance: 22.0% Shell Pen: 59mm Muzzle Velocity: 861m/s 2 – 356mm AP Mk16 mod 1 Max Damage: 9,500 Muzzle Velocity: 823m/s Secondary Armament 6x1 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.30 mod.0 mount Reload: 3.0s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 5.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 6.6km Muzzle Velocity: 792m/s 3x2 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.32 mount Reload: 6.0s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 5.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 6.6km Muzzle Velocity: 792m/s Anti-Aircraft Armament 6x1 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.30 mod.0 mount 3x2 127mm/38 Mk.12 on a Mk.32 mount 12x4 40mm/56 Bofors on a Mk.2 mount 25x2 20mm/70 Oerlikon on a Mk.24 mount Long Range AA Flak Burst: 5 Flak Damage: 1,610 Continuous Damage: 100 Range: 5.8km Medium Range AA Continuous Damage: 350 Range: 3.5km Short Range AA Continuous Damage: 300 Range: 2.0km Consumables R – Damage Control Party (5s Duration; 60s Cooldown) T – Repair Party (2.0%/sec; 50% Health; 50% Citadel; 20s Duration; 80s Cooldown) Y – Smoke Generator (0.45km radius; 30s Duration; 127s Dispersion; 160s Cooldown) U – Engine Boost (+12.5% Speed; 120s Duration; 120s Cooldown) I – Spotting Aircraft Tier X Battle Scout 131 Washington Court House-Class Displacement: 20,500t normal (22,320t full, approx.) Health: 48,750 (52,200) Armor Torpedo Protection: 7% Plating: 16mm Main Belt: 102mm Upper Belt: 25mm Main Deck: 25mm Barbettes: 38mm Turret Face: 38mm Turret Sides: 25mm Turret Rear: 25mm Turret Roof: 25mm Citadel Bulkhead: 25mm Citadel Athwartship: 25mm Citadel Roof: 38mm Length: 760’ (219.46m) Beam: 77’ (23.47m) Speed: 35.0 kts E.H.P.: 76,500 (approx. between 114,750 and 153,000 SHP) Rudder Shift: 9.2s Turning Circle: 720m Detectability By Air/Sea: 7.0km/12.8km Main Armament 2x2 406mm/50 Mk.2 in a turret Reload: 25.0s Range: 16.5km Turret 180º: 30.0s Dispersion: 116m Horizontal/64m Vertical @ 12.0km Sigma: 2.05σ 1 – 406mm HE/HC Max Damage: 5,700 Fire Chance: 36.0% Shell Pen: 68mm Muzzle Velocity: 853m/s 2 – 406mm AP Mark 3 Max Damage: 12,600 Muzzle Velocity: 853m/s Secondary Armament 6x1 127mm/54 Mk.16 on a Mk.39 mount Reload: 4.0s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 9.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 7.3km Muzzle Velocity: 808m/s 3x2 127mm/64 Mk.16 on a Mk.41 mount Reload: 6.0s Max Damage: 1,800 Fire Chance: 9.0% Penetration: 21mm Range: 7.3km Muzzle Velocity: 808m/s Anti-Aircraft Armament 6x1 127mm/54 Mk.16 on a Mk.39 mount 3x2 127mm/64 Mk.16 on a Mk.41 mount 12x2 76.2mm/50 Mk.22 on Mk.33 mount 25x2 20mm/70 Oerlikon on a Mk.24 mount Long Range AA Flak Burst: 7 Flak Damage: 1,680 Continuous Damage: 150 Range: 6.0km Medium Range AA Continuous Damage: 475 Range: 4.0km Short Range AA Continuous Damage: 300 Range: 2.0km Consumables R – Damage Control Party (5s Duration; 60s Cooldown) T – Repair Party (2.0%/sec; 50% Health; 50% Citadel; 20s Duration; 80s Cooldown) Y – Smoke Generator (0.45km radius; 30s Duration; 127s Dispersion; 160s Cooldown) U – Engine Boost (+12.5% Speed; 120s Duration; 120s Cooldown) I – Spotting Aircraft

Here is my suggestion for what an actual USN CV line with both Attack and a Support line could look like (including the Alternative Attack line). I'm still wondering what could go in the TX slot for the Support line since the US didn't produce that much heavier designs (that I know of) to fill that TX support line gap. Any suggestions would be appreciated!

DDG(X) Article by USNI News

I posted earlier a similar topic focusing on British CLAAs, now it is time for the American ones. Player 40902nd made a similar topic, but I tried to give a smoother progression to the line like avoiding aircraft facilites on board, while using one more comissioned ship compared to his proposal. Also I recommend you guys to take a look. https://forum.worldofwarships.com/topic/241880-proposal-usn-anti-aircraft-light-cruiser-line-redux/?tab=comments#comment-5518675 If you are familiar with Atlanta the gameplay would be similar, but to make the line different from the premium versions while not creating a cancerous gameplay experience for the receiving end, my suggestion would not give them reload booster, radar or smoke and instead give the tiers VI and VII a standard heal, while the tiers VIII-X a heal similar to Salem to compensate their low HP at higher tiers. That means a more shellfish gameplay, moving away from the utility the premium versions offer. Tier VI: scheme 1A - 1936, I didn’t find the source or similar designs, so for this one take a look at the other topic I posted in the intro. Tier VII: USS San Diego CL-53 (Atlanta-class) - 8340 tons full load - 32.5 knots, famous! Very important! (8x2) 5in/38 Mark 12; (4x4) 40mm Bofors; (13) 20mm Oerlikon; (4x2) 533mm torpedoes; Tier VIII: USS Juneau CL-119 (Juneau-class) - 8450 tons full load - 32.5 knots (6x2) 5in/38 Mark 12; (These can be balanced at tier VIII with a higher RoF to compensate the reduced amount of weapons and less of them not in superfiring positions); (7x2) 3in AA guns; Doesnt have depth charges like the Atlanta-class, ironically making her better to deal with submerged submarines, since she can call aircraft to strike instead of rushing the target; Tier IX: S-511-23 “8100 Ton 5” Cruiser Design study DP Design study - 9950 tons full load - 33.5 knots, Sejong from the Pan-Asia faction is a similar design in-game (8x2) 5in/54; Smaller AA guns not mentioned; (4x2) 533mm torpedoes; Tier X: CL-154 - 11950 tons full load - 34.5 knots, sister from Austin in-game (6x2) or (8x2) 5in/54 autoloading; (6x2) or (8x2) 3in AA guns; Tier IX premium: S-511-36 “6” AA cruiser scheme “C” - 4 twin turrets - 14400 tons full load - 33 knots (4x2) 6in/47 DP guns; Smaller AA guns not mentioned; Source for S-511-23 and S-511-36: https://www.history.navy.mil/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/s-file/S-511-23.html https://www.history.navy.mil/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/s-file/S-511-36.html I was looking for “Atlanta-prototypes” or possible AA coversions for the Omaha-class as AA cruisers, in a similar way the British did with their WWI cruiser designs, unfortunatelly I couldnt find any relevant information.

Massachusetts she is not. The following is a review of the tier V American premium battleship Oklahoma. This ship was kindly provided to me by Wargaming for review purposes; I did not have to pay for her. To the best of my knowledge, the statistics discussed in this article are accurate as of patch 0.9.10. Please be aware that her performance may change in the future. Unfortunately for Oklahoma, Texas exists. In nearly every respect, Texas is the better state ship. Oklahoma doesn't clone Texas' performance but gives you the choice of a "more different" alternative that dittos Texas' game-play with some style changes. Specifically, Oklahoma is an attempt to provide Massachusetts-style game-play at tier V, with improved secondaries though this comes at the expense of her reload times and horrible (HORRIBLE) AP shell performance. Quick Summary: A slow-firing American standard-type battleship with crappy AP shells but improved range, heals and secondaries. PROS Good main battery range of 17.13km (19.87km with APRM1) Secondaries are long ranged (5.5km) with improved dispersion. Small surface detection range of 13.52km. Improved Repair Party which heals back 18.48% of her health per charge instead of 14%. CONS Soft-skinned externally, with most of the ship covered by only 19mm worth of steel. Painfully long reload time of 40 seconds on her main battery,. Horrible AP penetration. Like seriously. Lacklustre AA defence. Sluggish and slow. Overview Skill Floor: Simple / CASUAL / Challenging / Difficult Skill Ceiling: Low / MODERATE / High / Difficult Battleships at tier V and below don't have it easy. They play on claustrophobic maps. CVs abound as do seal-clubbing torpedo destroyers. Furthermore, every single battleship can overmatch the bows of every other battleship (barring Gangut & Pyotr Belikiy), so you can't simply nose in and face-tank. The good news is that it's relatively easy to score some big numbers as everyone can reliably damage everyone else. Their primary prey, the plethora of light and scout cruisers, are made of citadels so Devastating Strike medals are commonplace and help offset the constant barrage of tier IV planes and constant waterboarding from torpedo-soup. And that's the joys when they're top tier! When bottom tier, they are outclassed so hilariously that the map size alone is enough to ruin their experience. So... yeah. Tier V battleships aren't in a good place. Inexperienced players can manage, but there's a lot of unpleasantness to watch out for. For veterans, Oklahoma offers nothing that Texas doesn't already, and Texas scales better with player skill with her dispersed armour values. Options Oklahoma doesn't have anything out of the ordinary beyond her Repair Party. Consumables Her Damage Control Party is typical for American battleships. It has a 20 second rather than a 15 second active period common to battleships from most other nations. It has unlimited charges and an 80 second reset timer. Her Repair Party is also an American battleship version, though this version doesn't tend to appear on premium battleships. It has four charges base and an 80 second reset timer. It queues up 10% of citadel damage, 50% of penetration damage and 100% of everything else. It heals back up to 0.66% of her health every second for 28 seconds instead of the usual 0.5% found on most battleships. Finally, Oklahoma has a Spotting Aircraft. It provides a 20% bonus to her range for 100 seconds. It starts with four charges and a 240 second reset timer. Upgrades There are pretty much two builds to consider with Oklahoma: Choose between either increasing her main battery gun range with Artillery Plotting Room Modification 1 or emphasizing the strength of her secondaries Secondary Battery Modification 1. Captain Skills You're again making a choice between two different builds. The first is the boring ol' battleship build where you focus on mitigating fire damage. Or you can build for her secondaries. With Manual Fire Control for Secondary Armament having the efficacy wall at tier VII+, it's not worth taking. Veterans will recognize this build as being analogous for a classic Warspite build. This is a lot more interesting, in my opinion, even if it's less effective overall. The graphic on the left is the default battleship build. The one on the right is chock-full of pluck and awesome. Pick your favourite tier 1 skill (in green) and then hoover up all of the yellow circles. Camouflage Oklahoma has two camouflage options. The first is her standard Type 9 camouflage. They're simply cosmetic swaps of one another. They both provide: 3% reduction to surface detection. 4% increase to enemy dispersion. 10% reduction to service costs. 50% increase to experience gains. The alternative dark-blue on her Type 9 camo is nice and striking, but it's the military camouflage I like the most. Gotta love that checkered funnel!d Firepower Main Battery: Ten 356mm/45 rifles in an A-B-X-Y superfiring configuration with three-gun turrets for A & Y mounts and two-gun turrets in B & X. Secondary Battery: Ten 127mm/51 single guns in casemate mounts and eight 127mm/25 singles in open mounts mounted a deck higher. Main Battery In the spirit of not spending forever writing this, I'm going to cut right to the chase. There are two stupidly-huge flaws with Oklahoma's main battery guns. The first is pretty obvious -- they say it right on the tin: Oklahoma has a 40 second reload. That's terrible. It seriously hurts her damage output and it's just plain not-fun to have to wait so long in between trigger pulls. Admittedly, this isn't that much longer than the already painful 34.3s reload on USS Texas, but I hate that reload too and this is worse. If this were Oklahoma's only main gunnery flaw, maybe I could overlook it if this paid for a bunch of other fun stuff, but the ride doesn't end there. She has horrible HORRIBLE AP penetration values for a battleship. Oklahoma makes use of the old-timey, not-in-the-game-anymore stock New York AP shells. These are so terrible she cannot best battleship belt armour outside of 10km engagement distances -- and even then, there will be some battleships she can't best until she gets even closer. You must aim for weak points which, with battleship dispersion, is tricky. So not only are you dealing with a very long wait between shots, but when you're finally reloaded, there may not be anything worth shooting at because of how poorly her AP rounds perform. It's tempting just to spam HE, but USN battleship HE shells are pretty terrible. In short: Her main battery gunnery sucks moose-balls. It's a disaster to use against other battleships. Stick to picking on cruisers unless you have no other choice. Oklahoma's AP penetration of her released version (patch 9.10) is buttacular. This runs contrary to how it performed during the last leg of testing (patch 9.9). See my rant below with the In Closing section about this. Have a quick DPM graphic. Oklahoma wins no prizes here. American battleships aren't particularly good fire setters. Oklahoma's fire arcs are decent. Her gun rotation rate of 3º/s is pretty terrible, though. Secondary Battery Ostensibly the woes of her main battery armament are counteracted by her secondaries. Ostensibly. Sure enough, if you can get Oklahoma in close enough to activate her secondaries, her opponents are going to have a bad time. Oklahoma has the same improved secondary dispersion as found Massachusetts and Georgia. What's not as well known is that this is the same secondary dispersion as found on all large calibre secondary gun batteries, such as the 152mm on Kongo and Warspite. I don't say this to nay-say Oklahoma's secondary performance, but rather to illustrate that one element isn't so rare at this tier, as a lot of the casemate weapons of tier V battleships are larger calibre. This said, what is out of the ordinary is Oklahoma's range. With a base reach of 5.5km, between upgrades, skills and signals, it can be extended out to 8.32km which is very impressive for her tier. It's a shame Oklahoma isn't faster because you're only bringing those into range if the enemy comes to you. I found the volume of fire coming from her secondary batteries to be a bit wanting. Her longer-barrelled 127mm/51 guns in the lower casemates have a 7 second reload compared to the 4.5 seconds of the upper-deck 127mm/25s. On top of this longer reload, they also have a worse fire-chance per shell, so it's the shorter-barrelled weapons which are really carrying the weight when it comes to shell volume. At least her forward fire angles are generous with six guns being able to open up at targets as little as 10º off her bow, with a maximum broadside of 9 guns from 40º off her bow to 108º. These are not good weapons for kiting, as towards her rear-quarter she is typically stuck with only three weapons firing. Overall, I rate Oklahoma's secondary weapons as "nice to have" but not game-changers. They're definitely more powerful against lower-tiered targets where their 21mm of penetration can hurt everything they come across. I again lament that Manual Fire Control for Secondary Armament's efficacy is tied to tiering, because super-accurate secondaries could have been a game changer for Oklahoma. While a 30% buff is alright, it's a big point sink -- points that could be much better spent on fire mitigation and concealment. Oh well. VERDICT: Her secondaries are nice. Her main battery guns are anything but. That reload sucks. That AP penetration sucks more. Defence Hit Points: 48,200 Min Bow & Deck Armour: 19mm extremities, 25mm upper hull & 19mm deck Maximum Citadel Protection: 25mm anti-torpedo bulge + 343mm belt + 51mm citadel wall. Torpedo Damage Reduction: 18% I was going to make an armour profile graphic, but it's pretty uninformative. She's a standard-type battleship (one of the first) so she doesn't have a dispersed armour scheme with interesting bits like extended waterline belts or what have you. Oklahoma's extremities and deck are all 19mm thick. Her belt is completely covered by her 25mm anti-torpedo bulges and this armour value extends up to that aforementioned 19mm deck amidships. Thus, barring her 13mm superstructure, everything you can shoot at on Oklahoma is either 19mm or 25mm, which is all kinds of squish. The downsides to this layout is having that 19mm armour almost everywhere. It can be overmatched by any battleship caliber AP shell you come across, to say nothing of allowing HE penetrations from even destroyer-calibre rounds. In this regard, she's hardly unique. New York and Texas suffer from similar problems, even with their dispersed armour scheme, but it's only found on the American battleships at this tier. All of the other battleships have at least some amidships deck armour values that are higher, allowing them to ricochet and shatter AP and HE shells respectively. Thus, Oklahoma takes a lot more incidental damage than her contemporaries. To compensate she has access to the improved Repair Party of American tech-tree battleships. This heals up to 18.48% of her hit point pool per charge instead of the usual 14% of most Repair Parties. In theory, this gives her a larger effective health pool if properly managed. The catch, of course, is that she has to survive long enough to make use of all of those healing charges for this to off-set her fragility. Her citadel is at least reasonably protected. It sits at the waterline with turtleback sloped sides. The 51mm of the turtleback and citadel walls stacks nicely with her 343mm belt giving her some healthy protection. Her citadel roof is 38mm thick so it can't be overmatched. Oklahoma will take citadel hits if you expose her sides but overall the protection isn't bad. Overall, Oklahoma'a durability is alright. It's not fun to take damage from everything being thrown at you but at least she's given something to compensate for it. Viribus Unitis is a standard unit of measurement for battleship health. VERDICT: You're a piñata with a soft outer-skin but decent citadel protection. Manage your heals carefully and be careful of exposing your sides. Agility Top Speed: 19.7 knots Turning Radius: 610m Rudder Shift Time: 13.4 seconds 4/4 Engine Speed Rate of Turn: 3.7º/s at 14.7 knots It's rare to see such an obvious and clear loser like this. This is downright embarrassing. Oklahoma manages to simultaneously be the slowest and the least agile of any of the tier V battleships. That's a pretty damning rap sheet right there but it gets worse. She lacks any kind of energy preservation. While New York was also stripped of her own improved energy retention in patch 0.9.6, Texas still maintains hers. This means that under any kind of manoeuvres, Texas is the fastest of the three, holding onto a minimum of 18.7 knots while New York flounders at 15.9 knots and Oklahoma wallows with 14.7. And you'll be putting her through manoeuvres often, if not to throw off the aim of your opponents then to try and counteract her horrible turret traverse. The 3º/s rotation speed of her guns often needs help and you'll be sore tempted to accelerate acquiring a target by swinging the ship's butt about. This has the net effect of further slowing down Oklahoma's average speed. The 19.7 knots you see on the tin is more like a constant 18.5 knots in practice as you're seldom going in a straight line long enough to take advantage of it, even when redeploying. Just to add insult to injury, even a slug-lord like Oklahoma can still out-turn her turrets unless you stack on Expert Marksman at a minimum -- Main Battery Modification 2 does not provide enough of a bonus to mitigate this disparity. For a ship reliant on making her secondaries count, it's not just her lack of speed that's disappointing, but her lack of energy retention too. She's not just slow, she's consistently slow -- unable to catch a break. The only way to make her secondaries work for her is to either corner someone when the opportunity presents itself on one of those smaller, low-tier maps or hope someone brings their ship into range for you. VERDICT: I cry everytime. Anti-Aircraft Defence Flak Bursts: 3 explosions for 1190 damage per blast at 3.5km to 4.8km. Long Ranged (up to 4.8km): 95dps at 75% accuracy Medium Ranged (up to 3.0km): 21dps at 75% accuracy Short Ranged (up to 1.5km): 84dps at 70% accuracy Aircraft carriers are omnipresent within Oklahoma's matchmaking. It is not uncommon to face two carriers -- and sometimes two tier VI carriers at that, so anti-aircraft defence is more important for ships at this tier than any other. I'm sorry to say that Oklahoma doesn't have good AA firepower by any measure. She has neither the damage-per-minute, range or consumables to truly be a threat to aircraft. She has about as much sustained DPS as König but with worse range brackets and one fewer flak bursts. This means you're going to get dunked on. A lot. In my test games, even a Langley to perform two drops with the same squadron of torpedo bombers -- and that's with my ship being pristine AND having my AA boosted with Basic Fire Training and focus-fire. Yes, I ended up shooting down a few planes. Yes, this will probably unsustainable for the carrier in the long run. No, that's not going to save you. VERDICT: Not good enough to matter. Sigh. With Oklahoma's uniform 19mm thick deck armour, she's exceedingly vulnerable to rockets and the bomblets dropped by Hermes and Ark Royal. Refrigerator Base/Minimum Surface Detection: 13.52km / 11.8km Base/Minimum Air Detection Range: 10.25km/9.23km Detection Range When Firing in Smoke: 7.12km Maximum Firing Range: Between 17.13km and 23.84km Oklahoma has better-than-average concealment for a tier V battleship. It's not god-tier by any means. It's not like Viribus Unitis where she can manage a 10km and change detection range. Still, make sure you use and abuse this concealment whenever you need to, especially in the later stages of the game when destroyers are thinned out. This can help you set up ambushing shots on cruisers or simply give you more time to come about or let a key consumable come off cool-down in order to save your ship when you're on low health. If Oklahoma had more speed, this trait would have more value, allowing her to flex unseen and pop up in places people do not expect. VERDICT: Nice to have but not game changing. Final Evaluation I'm glad you can earn this one for free. I don't like Oklahoma. Her gunnery is frustrating. Her agility is frustrating. She wasn't a fun experience for me. I hate waiting on her stupidly long reload. I hate having to wait even longer for a proper target to appear because my stupid AP shells can't reliably penetrate other battleships. I hate how stupidly sluggish her gun traverse is. I hate how slow she is. Hate. Hate. Hate. Sure, you can have some alright games in her, especially when she's top-tier. And in Co-Op, you don't have to worry about her AP penetration or struggling to bring her secondaries into range as the bots will oblige you by driving in close. In those two aspects, she's perfectly reasonable. But taken as a whole? Blech. Skip this one. Do not pay cash-moneys for her. That's my hot take, anyway. But lemme step away from quotable crap and elaborate further. I love American standard-type battleships. I love how they look. I love their history. And for the first few years of World of Warships' life, I loved how they played. New Mexico was my bae for a time. Lert and I had a great time playing our Arizona bricks side by side. I didn't mind Colorado, though she was my least favourite of the early three. I was disappointed when West Virginia appeared not in her late-war rebuild but in her 1941 state, adding my own voice to those dissenting Wargaming's choice to use her as a stock-Colorado instead of a phoenix that rose from the flames of Pearl Harbour and kicked so much butt at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. While West Virginia 1941 was at least a reasonably powerful ship, the offerings since then have not been. California was a disaster. She's been relegated to being one of the least memorable ships of 2020. Oklahoma is destined for similar ignominy. Her secondaries are meant to be fun, but there are so few opportunities to use them decisively. Had Oklahoma the old-style American battleship energy retention of yesteryear, it might be a different story. Like with West Virginia and California, Wargaming missed the opportunity to make a truly interesting vessel. Oh well. In Closing Before I conclude this review, I feel I need to speak to some of the challenges faced preparing these articles. My aim is to be as accurate as possible. While I don't feel that any of my fellow content creators would go out of their way to present false information, sometimes Wargaming makes it difficult for us to be accurate. The Community Contributors were told on October 22nd that Oklahoma had been finalized and that we were free to begin creating content which could be published on October 27th. I began work on the written portion of this review over the weekend of the 24th and 25th. Part of my process is to cross-reference the statistics of the current test-ship to the development blog's list of changes. Sometimes stuff gets changed at the last minute. Sometimes announced changes don't go through at all. Without clarification from Wargaming, it's impossible to know what the final product will look like. I've been burned by making assumptions here and I've learned to get specifics from Wargaming directly. In Oklahoma's case, the test-ship I had access to and was being asked to make content for was not what was going to be released. We were being asked to make content based on a ship whose performance was changing significantly post-launch. In Oklahoma's case, it was her Krupp rating -- a statistic which directly affects AP penetration values, which was being dropped by a whopping 40%. The 0.9.9 version of Oklahoma had better AP performance than any other tier V 356mm armed battleship. She could blow out the citadel of a Colorado at 16km. The launched version has the worst by far -- so bad she can't pull the same trick until she's within 5km of Colorado. This is a big deal! It completely changes how the ship feels to play. I didn't like Oklahoma's test version -- she was slow with a slow reload, but at least her main battery guns had some punch to them. Now I spoke to Wargaming about this and they were very open in acknowledging that the disparity between test-ship performance and release-ship performance is very much a serious issue when it comes to Community Contributors producing content about a ship. Steps are being taken to help mitigate any misinformation coming out in the future (how well this pans out will have to be seen). HOWEVER, the point I am making is that it's very important that when you're making buying (or time investment) decisions in regards to a premium vessel, check out multiple sources before pulling the trigger. This discrepancy was found in time for my review, but what about the other Community Contributors? More importantly, what did I miss? I'm not perfect. I don't have a team of fact-checkers dedicated to helping me spot things. I coordinate and collaborate with the other Community Contributors to try and find stuff like this but stuff will inevitably fall through the cracks. Please, please, PLEASE make sure you check out multiple reviews before you make a decision. You can always message me here or via Discord (AprilWhiteMouse#0536) if you have any questions about ship performance. If I don't know something, I will admit to as much and we can go find the missing information together. Thank you for reading, and thank you to my patrons on Patreon for supporting the production of these reviews.

It's no secret that the USN battleship line split was a disappointment to many. Not simply because of the performance of the ships (though there's certainly that too in the eyes of many players, at least prior to the T10) but also because it was only 3 ships and failed to add the many actually-built US Navy BB classes that remain unrepresented in WOWS. There's also the fact that a line that revolves around slow BBs just isn't for everybody. So here's my proposal to solve both those problems. For those who have a need for speed, there's the battlecruiser and fast battleship line. And to flesh out the slow BB line, I have revisions to both it and the standard line. I'm also suggesting that some names be changed, because I greatly dislike the fact that Kansas and Minnesota (which are not in fact paper ships) weren't given their real names South Dakota and Indiana. Because of this I've used the name Kansas for a paper ships and renamed the SoDak Kansas to Indiana. Minnesota remains as is because I'm replacing her current SoDak hull with a slightly larger paper ship. I would also suggest that the premium Florida's name be changed since the real Florida will be part my proposal. Though if WG doesn't want to do that, it could simply be Florida '11 or Utah for the Florida class BB and any other pair of state names for my paper ships. I also want to globally buff the American 127mm/38 twin secondaries from the ridiculously slow 6 second reload (a gun crew that slow would be getting hell from the XO at the very least) to the same 4 sec as Massachusetts and Georgia. Though not the enhanced accuracy; those 2 should remain special for secondary build purposes. If those ships weren't already quite strong I'd suggest buffing their secondaries to 3 sec reload. I'll start out with the fast line since it's (almost) entirely new, while a bunch of the standard and slow lines will be ships we already have. The common elements of this line consumable-wise is that they'll get regular Repair Party rather than the enhanced version of the standard BB line, and starting at T5 they'll get Engine Boost. Tier IV: USS Chesapeake Wyoming-equivalent battlecruiser Chesapeake is as the design description implies essentially a battlecruiser counterpart to Wyoming. She brings us into the line somewhat gradually, because her speed is (while not bad) is not as fast as the other T4 battlecruisers Myōgi and Moltke, and her 203mm belt armor is actually thicker than the next several ships. (That said she won't have much internal plating between that belt and the citadel. And since the armor scheme is based on Wyoming the 152mm upper belt will be just barely above the waterline. So even if you don't get citadeled you'll eat a ton of pens.) She's also the closest to the British concept of a battlecruiser, in that she's the direct counterpart to a battleship and gets her speed by losing some armor and a gun turret relative to that equivalent BB.. Tier V: USS President 1915 Preliminary Design No.145 President is is early in the design lineage that led to the Lexington class battlecruisers. While her predecessor eased you into the squishiness of the battlecruiser, she leaps right into it by having only a 127mm belt and a top speed of 30 knots. She also upgrades to 4x2 356mm/45 guns. The paper stats would suggest she's just a worse version of Kongō (which can make the same speed with equivalent armament while having a 203mm belt), this is where the core consumable of the fast line comes into play: Engine Boost. She gets the regular destroyer version rather than the longer duration and shorter cooldown version of Georgia, but that will change later in the line. Tier VI: USS Cumberland 1916 Preliminary Design No.169 Cumberland is the design that was originally chosen for Lexington, but US entry into World War I meant construction never started, and the design was comprehensively reworked afterward. This iteration is armed with 10x 356mm/50 with triple turrets superfiring over twins, an unusual layout (normally when there's mixed turrets, the heavier ones are at deck level and the lighter ones superfiring) that's shared by the T6 heavy cruiser Pensacola. She's also the fastest ship in the line and even without the Engine Boost activated she's the fastest "battleship" in the game at 35 knots. But she pays for this in lack of armor. Not only does she have only 127mm belt armor, her citadel is enormous. Worse yet, there are sections of it (directly below the 3 centerline funnels) where the boiler rooms extend above the belt armor and thus have only 26mm hull plating between the boiler room walls (whose thickness I'd guess would only be 19mm) and the air. IRL the US Navy clearly dodged a bullet by not building these things. In WOWS? Well she's a T6 BB that can exceed 40 knots (by using a Sierra Mike, Engine Boost and the Brisk commander skill). That's almost as hilarious as her terrible armor scheme and her 7 (count 'em) funnels. If those exposed boiler rooms are too much of a problem, well boiler technology was improving rapidly in this era. A refit that removes those upper boiler rooms yet maintains the same horsepower would be very easy if she was refitted even as soon as the mid 1920s, let alone the 1930s. In other words WG could just not model those as part of the citadel; they've done far less realistic things on other ships. Tier VII: USS Constitution Lexington class battlecruiser Constitution is the actual Lexington class battlecruiser. Constellation's sister ship, but without the 1940s style refit that WG gave her. As such she'd have only minor changes from the real life design, replacing the majority of the open-mouth 152mm secondaries with 127mm/25 AA guns, adding light AA in the copious empty deck space and adding a 26mm torpedo bulge. The belt is now 178mm and angled at 12°. Speed drops to 33.5 knots, but now you get the 180 second duration, 90 second cooldown version of Engine Boost. And most importantly, unlike Constellation she won't have lazy copy-pasted Colorado turrets and guns. She'll have the proper 406mm/50 Mark 2 guns. However they'll be firing a relatively lightweight shell (957.1kg) which many years ago was Colorado's stock shell. Not even the dowtiered premium West Virginia '41 has that shell. (Which is too bad in the sense that I can't go to gamemodels3d.com and look up the Krupp value of a shell that's no longer in the game files.) The krupp value can be set at whatever it needs to be for those relatively lighter shells to be a viable BB armament. But on the plus side you get a very high muzzle velocity of 853m/s. Tier VIII: USS America Battle Cruiser 1919 Scheme B In order to distinguish the T8 ship from Constellation in more than just the consumable loadout, I went with one of the other late designs from the Lexington preliminaries for America. She has the same guns (although designated 406mm/50 Mark 3; IRL the only difference between Marks 2 and 3 was the construction method) as Constitution but now fires the same 1016kg shells as Colorado and Constellation. In the longer-barrel gun this gives her a 820m/s muzzle velocity. The belt armor is 229mm rather than 178mm. Tier IX: USS Iowa Not much that needs explaining here. The fast line is Iowa's natural home, and there are no true battlecruisers designed by the US Navy post-1922. Her only changes will be losing the enhanced heal and gaining Engine Boost. Yes, she'll keep her 32mm plating. Oh and add 3x1 20mm Oerlikon on top of the B turret of the stock hull. More for aesthetic purposes than for an AA buff. Tier X: USS New Hampshire BB-65 Scheme 8 While as I said there were no more USN battlecruiser designs after 1922, New Hampshire comes close. She's essentially a battlecruiser version of Montana, keeping the same armor and speed as Iowa while having the same armament as Montana. What does it take to achieve this? A ship that's enormous with a powerplant that's frankly ludicrous. This ship is a whopping 320m long at the waterline (and therefore about 328.3m overall, based on having the same bow and stern design as Iowa). By comparison WG has told us that Großer Kurfürst is 313.3m overall. And to get up to 33 knots on that hull she has 6 shafts (no longer will the ridiculous Kearsarge be the only 6-shaft ship in WOWS) turned by engines producing 320,000 horsepower. For gameplay purposes she's pretty much just a faster less armored Montana. Though that gigantic length means a long citadel and she's a large target in general, and the detection by air gets into "visible from the moon" range. Next up we have the standard BB line. In terms of new ships it'll actually be getting more than the slow line, but that's because I'm moving 3 ships in the standard line now over to the slow line. This being USN battleships though, both lines will be slow until we get to T8. Though to differentiate them I'll give the standard line improved acceleration and lose less speed in a turn. Like the British CLs, but nowhere near as extreme as their magic rudders that let you gain speed in a turn. The reason I chose the specific ships I did to switch over to the slow line is to maintain the theme of the 3 ships Wargaming already added to the slow line: more guns of equal or higher caliber than the standard line, while the standard line reload faster and get better accuracy. Tier III: USS South Carolina Though on the subject of speed, I would buff SC's to 20.5 knots, which she actually achieved on trials. Tier IV: USS Florida Essentially like Wyoming but with 1 less turret. In exchange for the reduced firepower you get better firing angles (particularly the forward angles) and more importantly better accuracy. Tier V: USS Kansas BB-36 Scheme A The first paper ship of the standard line is essentially an 8 gun version of the Nevada class. I didn't put Nevada herself here because her armor is so much better than New York that they're just not equivalent. We've already seen with Oklahoma what it takes to put a Nevada class in T5, and it ain't pretty. Kansas will have 28 second reload and high accuracy to make up for her low gun count. Well that and a refit that gives her B hull 28mm torpedo bulges that give good torpedo damage reduction and also can't be overmatched 381mm AP shells. Tier VI: USS Nevada Nevada will be in her post Pearl Harbor refit which is very similar to Tennessee. Being a tier lower she won't get 35mm torpedo bulges but she will get 32mm. Her 30 second reload won't entirely make up for having only 10 guns at this tier, but again she'll have excellent accuracy. Tier VII: USS Colorado The biggest change to Colorado is that the above (representing Maryland in 1945) will either become a C hull or just replace her current B hull. Honestly I'd kinda prefer to rename her Maryland (fun fact: Colorado was completed 2 years after Maryland despite being the "lead ship") and rename the West Virginia '41 premium to Colorado. But WG isn't likely to do that. At any rate, this gives her better AA and secondaries. Tier VIII: USS North Carolina Nothing particular changes other than the line's flavor of improved acceleration and rudder. Tier IX: USS Maine BB-65 Scheme G Unfortunately I can't find a sketch of this one anywhere. It's an early Montana preliminary design that's in the same size range as Iowa. Basically a slow Iowa with a 391mm belt. Tier X: USS Montana Nothing particular changes other than the line's flavor of improved acceleration and rudder. And now the slow line. The core flavor remains the same, more guns of at least the same caliber with less accuracy and slower reload. Tier III: USS Delaware Delaware is very similar to the standard line T4 Florida, but at T3 she'll have 3 major handicaps. First is reduced accuracy. Second is much worse firing angles for the Y turret. you'll have to be really careful when bringing all 10 guns to bear. Most important is 37 second reload. If you think this is too strong for T3 then Knyaz Suvorov says hi. Though I'd rate Delaware as the least important ship to include, she still is a real ship and thus I put her here. Tier IV: USS Wyoming Nothing changes. Tier V: USS New York Nothing changes. I would've remove the buff she got not long ago to her reload just to keep the "flavor" of slower reload, but her performance is bad enough that nerfs wouldn't be justified. Tier VI: USS New Mexico Only change is adding the above (USS Idaho with 10x1 127mm/38 secondaries; the only use of 5"/38 single turrets on a battleship) as a C hull. Tier VII: USS North Dakota 1917 Preliminary Design No.164 Pretty simple, North Dakota is a 10-gun Colorado. Turret layout is the same as Nevada. Because of the extra barrels she gets saddled with a 37.5 sec reload and less accuracy, and also the older shells that don't perform as well. Tier VIII: USS Indiana The ship we currently know as Kansas. But she'll be getting some buffs. The current totally fictional guns get removed in favor of the 406mm/50 Mark 2. This will be the same gun as on Constitution and the reload will be buffed to 38.5 seconds. Tier IX: USS Minnesota February 1919 Preliminary Design for a Fast Battleship Minnesota gets reworked into a slightly longer ship. "Fast" Battleship is relative, this design was intended to reach only 25 knots. And since she's in a post Pearl Harbor style refit along with me altering the design to retain the 343mm belt of the 1920 SoDak she'll be a bit slower than that. She'll get the same 406mm/50 Mark 3 as America and a reload of 37.5 seconds. Tier X: USS Vermont Minimal changes than buffing speed to 25 knots, the actual design speed of the Tillman IV-2 she's based on. She'll still be by far the slowest in tier, but less painfully so. Possibly add 1 more 127mm/38 turret per side. Or possibly replace replace the 127mm turrets with the twin 152 mm/47 DP Mark 16 of Worcester. But Vermont isn't outright terrible like her slow-line predecessors; the 457mm guns hit hard enough to make up for her shortcomings. General notes: The names of the battlecruisers came from prominent age of sail US Navy warships, as that had been the intended naming theme with the Lexington class CCs. While I was hoping WG would change Congress's name to a territory before it was released (it's a CB, not a CC) I left it out anyway. For the pair of Montana preliminaries I used the names of the 3rd and 4th ships of the class (2nd ship was Ohio which is already in use). Since United States has now been used for the US supercarrier, I changed the T8 CC to America. Since I was constraining myself to the theme WG already established for the slow line (more guns of at least same caliber as the main line's same tier BB) I sadly didn't have a place for Pennsylvania and Tennessee. But since their sister ships are already in the game I considered all the other Standard Type and pre-Standard BB classes that aren't implemented in any form a higher priority anyway. I didn't list AA values or basic dispersion values because I don't have a clue how WG derives either of those. Concealment, turning circle and rudder shift values were just taking a wild guess on the basis of other ships in the game with similar hull sizes, and firing range was whatever seemed like a good idea at the time. The AA armaments were again based on what other same-tier American BBs get (and real-life AA for the real ships). I actually started out trying to make a USN BB split years ago, before the CV rework (back when AA values were simple), and made adjustments in my free time in response to other ships WG has added. Originally my 2nd BB line idea (I'd yet to make any effort at all at a battlecruiser and fast BB line) didn't actually have any coherent theme, it was just a grab bag of the ship classes that weren't in the main line. So as much as I think WG botched the slow BB line, at least they forced me to do something coherent. And here's a chart summarizing the 3 lines: CC/Fast BB line Standard BB line Slow BB line 3 South Carolina Delaware 4 Chesapeake (Wyoming equivalent CC) Florida Wyoming 5 President (1915 Preliminary No.145) Kansas (BB-36 Scheme A) New York 6 Cumberland (1916 Preliminary No.169) Nevada New Mexico (with Idaho as the C hull) 7 Constitution (Lexington as designed) Colorado (with Maryland as the B hull) North Dakota (1917 Preliminary No.164) 8 America (Battle Cruiser Scheme B) North Carolina Indiana (1920 SoDak) 9 Iowa Maine (BB-65 Scheme G) Minnesota (Feb 1919 Preliminary Design) 10 New Hampshire (BB-65 Scheme 8) Montana Vermont I think that's everything. I guess at some point I'll need to do this for Commonwealth CA and DD lines, too.

Here we go! This is a complete rework of my previous USN CB Line, this time starting from tier 5. The only ship to not be reworked is the Tier 10, USS Guam. Tier V USS Memphis Last of the Big Armored Cruisers, the Tennessee-Class were the largest and most powerful class of armored cruisers built by the USN. The four ships of the class were initially named after states, but were named after cities in those states in the 1920s, when they were reclassified as heavy cruisers to free up those names for battleships. The ship, as presented stock, is based off of the Memphis (ex-Tennessee) as she was commissioned. In this configuration, she’ll mostly play as a battleship, except with fewer guns and weaker armor, those with subsequent upgrades, she will start playing close to a battlecruiser or supercruiser. The most visible change, of course, would be the Hull B upgrade, which would reduce the funnels for 4 to 3 and change the bow from a ram bow to a flared bow similar in design to the one found on the Lexington-Class Battlecruiser (modeled in-game as Constellation). It would also eliminate the lower 6” casemates and 3” sponsons, while adding some of those 6” guns as open mounts on the upper decks. It would also add in at least some anti-air in the form of 5”/25 and .50 cal guns. While I’d want the funnel change to be reserved for the engine change, I do not know of any ships that have such a feature. Speaking of engines, it was found that they could install a power plant similar to that found on USS Ranger into the 3 remaining ships of the class without having to reshaft the ships, which would give the ships (USS Memphis having earlier being destroyed by a tsunami) a speed of 26 knts. This was never carried out. As part of the various modernization plans, where was discussion of replacing her aging twin 10”/40 main battery with newer triple 8”/55 guns, which I believe would appear similar to the B and X turrets of the Pensacola. Tier VI “Reciprocal Cruiser” USS New York City [Picture Not Available] A follow-up design to the Tennessee-Class, this ship was proposed by the Naval War College and was favored for a time, before losing out in favor of the battlecruiser. The idea of the “Reciprocal Cruiser” was to trade armament for speed, as opposed to the battlecruiser, which traded armor for speed. This cruiser was supposed to be powerful enough to fight through a screening element and survivable enough to comeback to report what intelligence was gathered. At this moment, I have been having difficulty getting hard numbers for this ship, but what is known is that it would have been similar in size to the Tennessee, but would trade the latter’s 6-inch battery for heavier armor and 12-inch guns. For armor, I looked to period USN battleships and used their upper belt for the main belt and the casemate armor for the upper belt, while the deck armor was kept the same (meaning a vulnerability to plunging fire). The turret armor is off of the USS Connecticut (1906), which also used the same guns. The speed is based off of the fact that the USN wanted ships 20% faster that battleships to handle this role (this was shortly after the battlecruiser won out over the reciprocal cruiser, but they were two different ways to do the same job, so I thought it appropriate). The upgrade from Hull A to Hull B will follow the same idea as the previous class, with a more modern bow being added, as well as sacrificing the lower casemates and sponsons, which would be wet, anyway, for better compartmentalization. Tier VII Heavy Cruiser Scheme 3 USS Sacramento One of the designs leading up to the Alaska, this scheme was rejected, as it was seen as "unbalanced". That is, this design was meant to stand up only against 8" gun fire, and not 12" guns. I feel that the Sacramento would be a good transition from the Armored Cruisers to the Large Cruisers, without being too over powered. She introduces the three turret layout and the speed, while missing the overall heavy armor of the preceding ships. Tier VIII CA2-E USS Samoa While at first glance, the Samoa might look like a Congress with one less gun, but the Samoa follows the armor profile of the actual CA2-E, meaning that the main deck is 51mm, as opposed to the 38mm of Congress. Overall protection from bombs should be the same, as the main deck is thicker, the armored deck is thinner. This is will give some protection from HE spammers. Tier IX CA2-G USS Philippines While the CA2-G lacks a barrel when compared to the Alaska, she makes up for this in armor. The turret layout has a 3-gun turret fore and aft, with the two-gun turret superfiring over the forward turret. Tier X USS Guam Instead of trying to pare down the Alaska to a Tier 9, it seemed easier to push her up to Tier 10. Increased reload, better range, better turret rotation, and increased health are some of the things that have been improved. CA2-H would be a more consistent choice with the line, but the Guam was a 'Real Steel' ship and so I chose her. Premium Tier VIII “Improved Wichita” armed with 12” guns USS Madison [Picture Not Available] The “Improved Wichita” would eventually become the Baltimore-Class. There was discussion on what it would take to equip this ship with 12” guns. Mostly this entailed increasing the length by some 6 feet in order to make room for the ammunition. She should handle much like the standard Wichita, for the most part, just with bigger guns.

Just saw this tidbit of news on the ole MSN news tab on the Windows 10 toolbar. 11 years for an LCS ship! Pretty good run for a video game title (looking at you, World of Tanks), but for a naval ship worth so much darn money? Yikes! I know there's the thought that less ships, less men = more cost efficient, better bang for the buck navy, but the LCS program seems to be anything but IMO. I'm still of the mind that a moderate cost platform where several units can be put out, albeit with sizeable crews, is still not a bad way to go. While ships and other high dollar platforms tend to be built for possible future engagements and/or deterrents to possible engagements, to me it seems like there's still room for building more smaller traditional ships that maybe don't have the cutting edge stealth, etc., technology, but are serviceable for the actual day to day business of the USN and built for 2-3 decades. Of course that means crew to man them and all the cost that comes with more service members, i.e, medical, veteran services, etc., but maybe that means more experience at the helm of a ship rather than a desk. Anyway, just seems to me that the LCS are a pretty substantial waste. Here's the article as an FYI: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/uss-independence-is-taking-an-early-retirement-after-just-11-years-in-service/ar-AAMYQZH?ocid=uxbndlbing If you've any opinions, for or against or who cares, let's have 'em!

I am a huge fan of the super cruiser playstyle. I have been since the Admiral Graf Spee came into the game, and I have enjoyed the playstyle that the other super-cruisers have had to offer. Some, I'll admit, are harder to love than others (looking at you, Azuma), but I do like them all, none-the-less. Therefore, I have taken it upon my self to do research and see if it was possible to bring a tech tree line of super-cruisers into the game. Here, I present the USN Larger Cruisers. My next project will be the KM Panzerschiffes, which I am currently sources for. Tier VIII Heavy Cruiser Scheme 4-A “Convertible” (Alaska Preliminary Design) USS Montgomery Perhaps my favorite design in this line, the Montgomery is based off of Scheme 4 in a series of designs that lead to the creation of the Alaska-Class large cruisers. At this time, the USN is trying to decide if a 12” gun cruiser was viable or even needed. One of the ideas was to build 8” gun cruisers that could later be converted into 12” gun cruisers if/when it was needed. This is one of the designs used to investigate the feasibility of this. Turrets A, B, and Y sit on barbettes designed for twin 12” turrets, while turret X sits on a much smaller inverted conical barbette, which is common for triple 8” turrets. When installing the 12” turrets in-game, the X barbette will be deleted, allowing for the Y turret to freely rotate 360 degrees. While the Montgomery has the 12" guns, for health and fire duration it is a cruiser. Tier IX 12” Gun Cruiser Study CA2-A USS Samoa One of the CA2 series of designs that would yield the Alaska-Class. Samoa is named for one of the canceled Alaska-Class, and is an attempt to make an actual Tier 9 Alaska, instead of the Tier 9.5 that that ship currently is. Samoa has super-cruiser health and fire duration. Tier X USS Guam Instead of trying to pare down the Alaska to a Tier 9, it seemed easier to push her up to Tier 10. Increased reload, better range, better turret rotation, and increased health are some of the things that have been improved. The idea is to make a balanced tier 10 Alaska, without being too strong or too weak. Premium Tier VI-VII Heavy Cruiser Scheme 3 USS Sacramento Similar to Scheme 4, but with the 12" guns mounted, when using the super-cruiser formula, the Sacramento's health drops considerably. Because of this, I think she would make a good Tier 6 or 7, depending on balance of consumables. She'd be roughly analogous so Graf Spee in terms of both health and dpm, but with slightly larger guns. With the Mk.7 12" guns, she'd have the same AP DPM that Graf Spee, but better HE. She'd also be more accurate, but lack the torpedoes of the Spee. Since Radar is rare at Tier 7, I figured I'd force the play into a tough choice of either Radar or Repair party. As Sacramento uses the super-cruiser health formula, she also burns like one. Tier VIII “Improved Wichita” armed with 12” guns USS Madison [Picture Not Available] The “Improved Wichita” would eventually become the Baltimore-Class. There was discussion on what it would take to equip this ship with 12” guns. Mostly this entailed increasing the length by some 6 feet in order to make room for the ammunition. She should handle much like the standard Wichita, for the most part, just with bigger guns. Madison uses cruiser health and fire duration. Tier IX CA2H USS Phillipines Where the Samoa is a faster, more lightly armored Alaska, the Philippines is a slower, more heavily armored one. CA2-H featured deep torpedo defenses, fashioned in the same style as USN Battleships, as well as thick armor. While I do not have deck plans of her, I believe she would look similar to the other CA2 designs, and a cross-section can be seen above. Possible Tier VI or VII Premium In 1929, when the details of the Deutschland-Class became available, there was a proposal to rearm USN CA with twin 10”/50 in place of their triple 8”/55 turrets. To reflect this in game, a Northampton, Portland, or (more probably) New Orleans could get a turret swap. The new turret should fit on the old barbettes, meaning little new modeling would need to be done. The biggest mystery at the moment, and the reason I haven’t drawn up stats for such a ship yet is that I cannot find any additional information about these guns. While they were not made, there was preliminary design work that was done, as these theoretical guns were used as stand-ins for the Deutschland’s guns while preparing the CA2’s Immunity Zone calculations. I have tried approximating these guns by up-scaling 8” ammo (Mark 8 and Mark 9) and down-scaling 12” ammo (Mark 12 and Mark 13). All designations are made up by me, as I have just about zero information on this weapon. 254”/50 Mark 4 Ammo: 254mm HC Mk.9 Max Damage: 3,050 Fire Chance: 16% Shell Pen: 42mm Muzzle Velocity: 808m/s 254mm HC Mk.13 Max Damage: 4,250 Fire Chance: 24% Shell Pen: 42mm Muzzle Velocity: 808m/s 254mm AP Mk.8 Max Damage: 5,500 Muzzle Velocity: 762m/s 254mm AP Mk.12 Max Damage: 8,150 Muzzle Velocity: 762m/s There is also mention of a study for a 15,000t cruiser with either six 11”/50 or 12”/50 guns, though I have not been able to find any more information on these, and I down even less work was done on the 11” guns than on the 10”. Thank you taking the time to read this and feel free to ask question or critique my choices. I enjoy the discussion about as much as doing the research for these ships (which I do, or else I wouldn't do it).

While the Atlanta is not generally my cut of tea, I know that a lot of people enjoy playing her and Flint. As I am currently working on USN Large Cruisers (spoiler alert), I felt it would would be nice to make their polar opposites, the Anti-Air Cruisers. The line will start at tier 6, branching off of the engine of the Omaha-Class. I was not entirely satisfied with my previous USN CLAA line, and I am using this as a chance to make up for that. With additional information now at my disposal, I am able to make this line more like how I originally envisioned it, with a split into 5”/54 and 6”/47 DP armed guns, while still trying to keep that authentic Atlanta feel. These ships, despite being CLAA, have fairly poor inner AA auras. What they excel at is flak, and at higher tiers, boosting the AA of their allies. This makes them better for protecting other ships with their larger numbers of flak bursts at a further distance from themselves than most ships are able to do. This is particularly evident in the 6” line, that can cast it’s long range aura out to 6.9km. A note about the naming: I used a random US city generator to pick which cities to name these cruisers after, and then checked them against a list of USN Cruisers, so there shouldn’t be any naming conflicts. Pros: +Lots of Flak for their tier +Rapid Fire guns +Air-Search Radar +USN DD Smoke +Decent Torpedoes +Below Water Magazine Cons: -Poor Concealment -Floaty Shells -Next to No Armor -Poor Concealment -No Surveillance Radar -Relatively Poor Medium and Short AA Auras Tier VI Scheme IA, 1936 Arlington-Class One of the designs from the Light Cruiser Studies of the mid-1930, this design came about because the Navy wanted a light cruiser to work with the destroyer force. The requirements were rather vague, with the first round trying to mount a usable mix of 6” and 5” guns, preferable all dual-purpose, on as small a ship as possible. Later designs, of which this is a part, decided to go with uniform dual-purpose guns of either 5” or 6”. Tier VII Oakland-Class The namesake of the Oakland sub-class. While I had originally designed to go with the Juneau II-Class, I settled on the Oakland sub-class after finding the design that I based the Arlington-Class on, despite the Oaklands being already represented by the Flint. This is because I felt that it would tie the line together better, as she was armed with torpedoes and had a different (and weaker) AA armament, which, again, helped tie in with the rest of the line. 5”/54 DP Cruiser Line The 5”/54 Mk.16, mated to the excellent Mk.41 DP turret defines this line of ships just as the 5”/38 Mk.12 guns in the Mk.29 DP turret defined the Atlanta and her half-sisters. While the later gun produced floaty shells that took their time reaching their targets, the new projectiles out of this newer gun, with it’s higher muzzle speed, produces a much more level flight, cutting out much of the hang time. Also, these shells hit harder, round-for-round, and advancements in design allow for higher rates of fire. To assist in their survival, these ships are given a Specialized Repair Team consumable to stretch their limited life farther. Specialized Repair Teams Heal Rate: 2.0%/s HP Restored: 50% Citadel Restored: 33% Duration: 20s Cooldown: 80s Charges: 3 American Cruiser Smoke Radius: 0.45km Emission Time: 30s Dispersion: 104s Cooldown: 160 Charges: 3 American Tech-Tree Destroyer Defensive Fire – Anti-Air Duration: 40s Effect: +100% Continuous Damage, all ranges. Damage from flak bursts is Quadrupled. Cooldown: 80s Charges: 4 Air Search Radar Duration: 30s Effect: All allies within 6km have their AA continuous damage hit chance set to 100%. All enemy planes within (Tier 8: 15km; Tier 9: 20km; Tier 10: 25km) are spotted. Cool Down: 90s Charges: 3 Tier VIII 5”/54 Cal. D.P. Cruiser – Design Study “A” Jersey City-Class Essentially, this was an Atlanta hull, fitted with the new 5”/54 guns in the twin turrets that had been developed and ordered for the Montana-Class battleships. Ultimately, this design, as well as the others in it’s series, weren’t ordered, and instead a new run of Atlantas were. Tier IX 7500 Ton Cruiser Orlando-Class A smaller version of the 8100t CLD that sits as the crowning jewel of this line, the Orlando was designed without torpedoes or depth charges as weight saving measures. A fantasy Hull B can reintroduce those into this design to help unify the line. Tier X CLD, 8100 Ton 5” Cruiser (Double Purpose) Colorado Springs-Class Basically, an enlarged Atlanta, the Colorado Springs is a high DPM fire breather. This is the finished CLD design. 6”/47 DP Cruiser Line A split from the 5” gun-armed Atlanta style ships, these try to replicate that play style while using the larger 6” DP developed by the USN. Compared to the 5”/54 ships, these are larger, but with fewer turrets and no torpedoes. In return, these ships don’t suffer from as severe of a health handicap and the 5”/54s, and so receive less in the way of consumables to keep them alive, like having a normal Repair Party, for one, and lacking smoke, for another. American Tech-Tree Destroyer Defensive Fire – Anti-Air Duration: 40s Effect: +100% Continuous Damage, all ranges. Damage from flak bursts is Quadrupled. Cooldown: 80s Charges: 4 Air Search Radar Duration: 30s Effect: All allies within 6km have their AA continuous damage hit chance set to 100%. All enemy planes within (Tier 8: 15km; Tier 9: 20km; Tier 10: 25km) are spotted. Cool Down: 90s Charges: 3 Tier VIII 6” A.A. Cruiser Scheme “C” - 4 Twin Turrets Tampa-Class A preliminary design for the Worcester-Class armed with 4 twin 6” turrets. While, the ship only has 8 guns, it still has a tremendous DPM. With Armor Piercing, the Tampa ranks 3rd out of all Tier 8 Light Cruisers, behind the Cleveland and Mainz. With High Explosive, the Tampa takes the top spot. Note: Jersey City beats the Tampa out in both category. Tier IX 6” A.A. Cruiser Scheme “D” – 5 Twin Turrets Scottsdale-Class Another preliminary design for Worcester, this one mounts 5 turrets and mounts it’s aviation facilities amidships. Scottsdale, again, ranks high with both AP and HE, losing out only to Seattle and Neptune (in AP DPM, obviously), so long as you don’t count Orlando. Tier X 6” A.A. Cruiser Scheme F – 6 Twin Turrets (Revised of 30 Dec `42) Anaheim-Class Yet another Worcester preliminary design, and part of the same design series as the others, Anaheim ties with Worcester in terms of DPM, which is not surprising as they use the same guns. While she is armed similarly, the Anaheim can be told apart at a glance. Her turrets are placed such that they are super-firing over each other, meaning that all the forward or rear turrets can be brought to bare while nose in, though this really only works with 8” guns or smaller, as her 16mm plating has an overmatch threshold of 229mm. While Anaheim can (barely) deflect Russian 220mm, anything 9.1-inches or larger, the British 234mm or French and Dutch 240mm guns can punch through. In terms of DPM numbers, Anaheim falls behind other top tier Light Cruisers, losing to the Minotaur, Smolensk, and Colbert.

Pretty straight forward: Had to yank my NC Captain to move to USN CL line. I don't drive NC enough to want to grind another Captain for her. I have 19 point DM and Monty Captains ready, which T8 USN premium BB should I get to replace NC? What sucks is that NC is the better ship, right?

Poopin' rainbows. Quick Summary: A fragile anti-aircraft cruiser with radar and armed with sixteen 127mm rifles and short-ranged torpedoes. Patch and Date Written: 0.6.1. February 3rd, 2017 Cost: 9,000 doubloons. Closest in-Game Contemporary Flint, Tier 7 USN Cruiser Degree of Similarity: Clone / Sister-Ship / Related Class / Similar Role / Unique Flint is an Oakland-subclass of the Atlanta-class cruiser, so it stands to reason that the two ships would be very similar. Flint has an upgraded medium-range anti-aircraft suite. She loses out on the two wing turrets found on Atlanta giving her a maximum of a twelve-gun broadside. Flint's superiority is very firmly set by her torpedoes which have a reach out to 9.2km. Lastly, the two ships trade out their third consumable, with Flint having a USN Smoke Generator instead of Atlanta's Radar. PROs Armed with sixteen, rapid fire 127mm rifles in eight turrets dispensing up to168 rounds per minute from a fourteen gun broadside. Turret traverse is blinding-quick at 25º per second. Able to fire over intervening terrain quite easily. Her main battery customizes incredibly with the 0.6.0 Captain Skills. Her torpedoes are very fast and very hard hitting for a cruiser of her tier. Powerful anti-aircraft armament, with unlimited charges of her Defensive Fire consumable. With a full AA-upgrade build, she has some of the best AA-power in the game, tier for tier. She has access to the USN Radar consumable. CONs Tiny hit point pool of 27,500hp. Her machine-spaces citadel sits over the waterline and has a maximum of 89mm of protection. Her bows are overmatched by 203mm guns or larger. Her turrets get temporarily disabled easily. Painfully short ranged at 11.1km stock. Very poor ballistics, with shells being launched into low orbit even at modest ranges. Poor penetration values on her AP and HE shells. She struggles to do damage to tier 8+ Battleships. Torpedoes are pathetically short ranged at 4.5km. Large surface detection range of 11.0km. My last review of Atlanta was over a year ago and there have been some rather significant changes to the game in that time. Atlanta has been graced by some better fortunes, including one direct buff and many smaller, indirect buffs caused by differences in new mechanics and systems. This time last year, she was an overspecialized oddity, unable to perform in the manner players wanted and expected her to perform. She remained a favourite to eccentrics and experts and downright punitive to novice players. Atlanta's fame (or infamy) has waned considerably over the year. She is no longer commonly available, having been removed as a permanent fixture from the online store. She is also gone from the in-game tech-tree where she could be bought with doubloons. Though far from rare, it is likely that as the game matures she may become a more uncommon sight. This said, her game play style has been diluted somewhat by the inclusion of USS Flint, an Oakland-subclass of the Atlanta-class cruiser. Flint shares many characteristics with Atlanta but with the benefits of better torpedoes and a smoke generator -- two fixes for the Atlanta-class many fans of her were clamouring for. We received different fixes for Atlanta instead of questionable effectiveness. This does raise the question if Atlanta is now worth purchasing for those who do not have her, especially given her limited availability. Hopefully this review will address said concerns. Atlanta subscribes to the original Wargaming design for premium vessels in World of Warships, where candidates were to be selected from ships that didn't fit in the tech tree. These "weird" vessels included ships like Kitakami and Tone. Options Atlanta's Defensive Fire is special. Unlike other ships, she has unlimited charges of this consumable. Its other characteristics, including reset timer, duration and intensity remain the same. Atlanta is also one of the few tier 7 ships with Radar. This has an 8.49km range, 25s duration and two or three minute reset timer depending if you took the premium version or not. Consumables: Damage Control Party Defensive Fire or Hydroacoustic Search Radar Module Upgrades: Four slots, standard USN Cruiser options.Premium Camouflage: Tier 6+ Standard. This provides 50% bonus experience gains, 3% reduction in surface detection and 4% reduction in enemy accuracy Firepower Main Battery: Sixteen 127mm rifles in 8x2 turrets with an A-B-C-P-Q-X-Y-Z arrangement. A-B-C and X-Y-Z are superfiring, with all three turrets capable of shooting unobstructed directly forward or aft respectively. P and Q are wing turrets mounted just ahead of X-turret and behind the torpedo launchers. This gives the ship a fourteen gun broadside. Torpedo Armament: Eight tubes between 2x4 launchers. One is mounted to each side of the ship behind the rear funnel. Let's start with Atlanta's torpedoes; they are terrible. While individually hard hitting at 16,663 damage per and fast at 65 knots they are pathetically short ranged at 4.5km. This limits their utility to ambush scenarios and acts of desperation. In order to properly make use of Atlanta's torpedoes, your opponent has to have made a serious mistake. In such scenarios, a broadside of all four fish will be catastrophic and your opponent deserves the punishment these can dish out for being so horribly out of position. In close range brawls with enemy cruisers, a broadside of her AP shells is often more reliably devastating than her torpedoes. That's really all that needs to be said about these weapons. Main Battery Atlanta has arguably the most entertaining main battery armament in the game. There are few guns as interesting as the USN 127mm/38 rifles in World of Warships. They are not without their controversies either. With 0.6.0 they received a significant buff in regards to how they interact with select Captain Skills and the variety of builds centered around improving these weapons is diverse. But let's start with looking at their raw performance before we worry about how we can modify them. Common Captain Skills taken by Atlanta players to buff their Main Battery. Few ships benefit so greatly from Captain Skills as the Atlanta. From left to right: Basic Fire Training, Advanced Fire Training, Demolition Expert, Inertia Fuse for HE Shells, Adrenaline Rush and Expert Marksman. Not all of these skills should be considered optimal or even necessary. The 127mm/38 rifles found on Atlanta are similar to, but not an exact match to the weapons found on the USN Destroyers. They fire the same shells, with the same relative range, ballistic qualities, alpha strike, penetration values and fire chance to her line's destroyers. However, Atlanta doesn't enjoy the same rate of fire found on vessels like Mahan, Farragut or Sims. Farragut, at tier 6, fires 15 rounds per minute -- a value matched by Mahan at tier 7. Sims gets this volume of fire as high as 18.2 rounds per minute while Atlanta has to make do with 12. For those wondering, this isn't historical and has been reduced for balance reasons. Atlanta may appear to have the equivalent broadside to three USN Destroyers combined, once you factor in her reload time, this works out closer to two. And this brings us to our first two Captain Skills. Rate of Fire Atlanta reloads every 5s giving her fourteen gun broadside a potential rate of fire of 168 rounds per minute. There are two ways to increase this. As a destroyer-caliber weapon, Atlanta enjoys full benefits of Basic Fire Training which drops her reload down to 4.5s and increases her rate of fire up to just over 186rpm. As if that weren't enough, you can also take Adrenaline Rush which increases her rate of fire as your ship takes damage. At half health, this drops Atlanta's reload by another half second, increasing it to 210rpm. Let's look at some real-world examples. Assuming penetrating hits from her HE shells (594 damage per), a full 14 gun volley (8,316 damage per) yields the following. Against saturated areas, the damage will be half this. At 168rpm: 99,792 damage. At 186rpm: 110,494 damage. At 210rpm: 124,740 damage. This is contingent on being able to land hits with that level of accuracy and penetrate vulnerable areas. Like all guns, Atlanta's rifles are exceedingly dangerous up close. Landing with ten or more shells per volley is easy enough inside of 7km ranges. However, even veteran Atlanta players only land between 29% and 35% of their hits overall which much of the accuracy disparity coming from her poor ballistic qualities at range. Range and Ballistics One of Atlanta's biggest weaknesses is her lack of reach relative to her surface detection. Stock, Atlanta's guns can theoretically hit targets up to 11.1km away while she's detected from the surface from 11.0km. This 100m buffer for such a fragile ship forces her to be placed in harms way anytime she pulls the trigger. Taking the skill, Advanced Fire Training extends her reach up to 13.3km. Between camouflage and skills, it's possible to get her surface detection down to 9.4km. In theory, this opens the tiniest of stealth fire windows (less than 100m) but in all practical sense, Atlanta cannot engage targets and stay hidden without the use of cover. This is further compounded by the appalling ballistic qualities of her shells. At her maximum range, her shells are taking a full second per kilometer of distance traveled. This leads to horrible lead times. Depending on game resolution, some players may be prevented from using the maximum zoom when ranging their shells as their targets will be well off screen. This can make targeting specific sections of ships very difficult This is a necessary skill when facing off against heavily armored targets which her HE shells can struggle to damage.Penetration and Fire Atlanta has one of the lowest average damage per game values of any tier 7 cruiser. Stock, Atlanta's high explosive shells can penetrate a maximum of 20mm of armour. Aside from destroyers and some light cruisers, her shells just don't have the penetration power to directly affect vessels short of their superstructures. So while her guns may murder a destroyer with some alacrity, when facing against cruisers and battleships, Atlanta was often on her back foot. Atlanta's AP shells can be truly monstrous when properly applied. However, their penetration values due to their low muzzle velocity and poor ballistics arcs prevents them from being used efficiently outside of 7km ranges. Inside this distance, Atlanta is more than capable of blowing out the citadel of heavy cruisers or hammering the upper hull or extremities of a Battleship with her AP shells and wracking up enormous damage totals quickly. It's not uncommon for Atlanta to deliver seven to ten citadel hits against a broadside cruiser inside of knife fighting range. This can deal a whopping 29,400 AP damage if you can land 14 out of 14 shells as citadel hits. For this reason, Atlanta's torpedoes are often forgotten in the heat of a brawl as her AP can be more than sufficient to put down an enemy cruiser. Outside of this range or against even slightly angled targets, her AP performance becomes quite anemic. For this reason, the ship has often lived and died by her high explosive shells. In the past, this forced Atlanta Captains to rely on the fire potential of her weapons to inflict damage against larger capital ships. As a flamethrower, she was quite good at this in theory but in practice, this was never sufficient. Her individual shells have a poor base fire chance at 5% per hit. Demolition Expert can nudge this number up to 7%. However, this plugs into a larger formula: [Fire Resistance Coefficient x ( 1 - [Damage Control Modification 1 - [Fire Prevention ) x ( [Projectile Base Fire Chance + [Demolition Expert + [signals - [inertial Fuse for HE Shells) = Fire Chance Fire Resistance Coefficients vary, from 0.8668 for a stock tier 5 to 0.5671 for a fully upgraded tier 9 vessel. This makes the chances of stacking fires much easier against lower tiered targets than higher tiered, which is ironic given that Atlanta can often deal more damage directly to lower tiered targets than needing fires to prop up her damage totals. Here are some real world examples: Atlanta with Demolition Expert facing an upgraded Kongo with Damage Control Modification 1 (0.8335) x [1-(0.05) - (0) x [(0.05) + (0.02) + (0) - (0) = 5.54% per shell Atlanta with Demolition Expert facing an upgraded Iowa with Damage Control Modification 1 and Fire Prevention (0.5671) x [1-(0.05) - (0.1) x [(0.05) + (0.02) + (0) - (0) = 3.37% per shell Combine this with Basic Fire Training on the Atlanta (186rpm) and a 30% accuracy and you're looking at 3.1 fires per minute against the Kongo and 1.9 fires per minute against the Iowa. Based on these numbers, an Atlanta should be able to easily stack a fire or two past Kongo's Damage Control Party and disengage. Against an Iowa or similar tier 9 Battleship, it's questionable whether any fires will stick at all if the target Captain manages their consumable properly. Dueling with either Battleship for longer than a minute greatly increases the changes of reprisals from the now-annoyed battleship from which Atlanta is unlikely to survive, so it's important to stack fires in a limited time frame and disappear. Without the ability to do damage quickly to larger targets and her own poor survivability when such ships elect to shoot back, it's perhaps no wonder that Atlanta's average damage has been so low. There is a ray of sunshine, however. Inertial Fuse for HE Shells All light cruisers have benefited massively from this skill and it has been a real game changer. For Atlanta, this increases her HE penetration from 20mm to 27mm allowing her to now damage the extremities of tier 6 and 7 battleships and all cruisers within her matchmaking spread. With this skill, now Atlanta can drop those theoretical 8,314 damage, 14 penetrating hit HE volleys against most of her opponents. Only tier 8+ Battleships retain an immunity to her shells with the exception of their superstructures. This skill isn't without its trade-offs, however. It's an expensive investment for one, requiring the sacrifice of one or more beneficial Captain Skills. In addition, it damages her already poor base fire chance by a whole 3%. It's this latter trade off which can really hurt as her (in)effectiveness against tier 8+ Battleships plummets even further. Let's look at our Iowa example again. Atlanta with Demolition Expert and Inertial Fuse for HE Shells facing an upgraded Iowa with Damage Control Modification 1 and Fire Prevention (0.5671) x [1-(0.05) - (0.1) x [(0.05) + (0.02) + (0) - (0.03) = 1.92% per shell And if you can no longer afford Demolition Expert: Atlanta with Inertial Fuse for HE Shells facing an upgraded Iowa with Damage Control Modification 1 and Fire Prevention (0.5671) x [1-(0.05) - (0.1) x [(0.05) + (0) + (0) - (0.03) = 0.96% per shell Once again, assuming Atlanta is using Basic Fire Training and attaining 30% accuracy, this works out to 1.1 fires per minute with Demolition Expert and 0.5 fires per minute without. So it becomes a question of a trade off. Inertial Fuse for HE Shells greatly increases Atlanta's lethality against same tier or lower tiered battleships but worsens her performance against those found at tiers 8 and 9. Conclusions: Few ships have their performance defined so significantly by Captain Skills as Atlanta. With her torpedoes being a mere afterthought, how a player customizes and elects to use Atlanta's main batteries will largely define their level of success with this ship. There is no build that is optimal against all targets and some that are superfluous or even damaging to Atlanta's damage output depending on the ship type engaged. A player must decide well in advance what kinds of ships she wishes to specialize against and build her Atlanta accordingly. One of Atlanta's more infamous traits is the awful shell flight times. At maximum range (13.3km) it's possible to begin firing a fourth volley volley before the first has hit the target. This makes lead times downright punitive and adjusting fire difficult. Maneuverability Top Speed: 32.5 knots Turning Radius: 610m Rudder Shift Time: 8.4s Atlanta's top speed of 32.5 knots isn't particularly exciting. It's sufficient for her task as an escort cruiser, but she doesn't have the speed necessary to challenge evasive destroyers. Perhaps more pressingly, she is also lacking in sufficient speed to outrun fast Battleships that may seek to engage her, such as Bismarck, Tirpitz, Scharnhorst, Gneisenau or Iowa and she has no chance of outpacing Soviet and Japanese cruisers. So while not slow or inflexible, some care needs to be taken when planning Atlanta's course lest she find herself out of position or over extended. This is a problem common to all USN Cruisers. Ship rotation times from starting at maximum speed and rudder hard over. Each ship was run through the course five times (except Flint and Atlanta which were run for ten to confirm their similarities) and the average taken. Deceleration is the time taken for a ship to reach it's lowest speed in a turn. The two most important factors for determining ship rotation speed is the radius of her turn combined with the average speed while turning. Smaller turning circles and higher average speed will result in faster rotation rates. The tier 7 and tier 8 American cruisers are all very similar to one another in their performance, but Atlanta and her sister, Flint, are hands down the most agile of all of the mid tier USN Cruisers with between a 0.5s and 1.0s advantage in turning 90º. Atlanta's handling is almost identical to other vessels found in the American cruiser line. This similarity between mid-tier USN Cruisers makes for easy skill transference from one ship to the next. If you can torpedo beat in a New Orleans, you'll find Atlanta answer similarly to her rudder. Atlanta's turrets have no difficulties tracking targets, even with her rudder hard over. They traverse at a rate of 25º per second compared to the 6.3º per second she turns at full speed, allowing Atlanta to quickly acquire targets and engage new threats from one side of the ship to the other even while under heavy maneuvers. This makes the Captain Skill, Expert Marksman, much less valuable for Atlanta than on other USN Cruisers. Atlanta is rather agile and can be a real bothersome target for destroyers. Durability Hit Points: 27,500 Citadel Protection: 89mm of belt armour Min Bow & Deck Armour: 13mm Torpedo Damage Reduction: None. Over the last year, Atlanta has enjoyed a considerable buff to her turret durability. Patch 5.5 from April 26th, 2016, all small caliber weapons had their hit points increased as much as 2.6 times what they had been. Prior to this, Atlanta's turrets had 1,500 hit points each while she now enjoys 4,000 hit points per. Previously, it was a rare occurrence for Atlanta to survive a battle without losing some of her main battery. Now it's rather uncommon for Atlanta to permanently lose any of her weapons. However, much of what was previously said about Atlanta's durability still holds true. Atlanta is one of the worst protected cruisers in the game, making her truly a glass cannon. She has a pittance when it comes to her hit point total. Her armour layout is laughable with 89mm of belt armour. Her large citadel has a section that sits above the surface running beneath the twin superstructures, from the bridge to the wing turrets. Her bow has only 13mm worth of protection, making it possible to overmatch it with 180mm guns found on the Kirov, Molotov and Dmitri Donskoi, never mind the larger caliber guns found on heavy cruisers and battleships. There are few HE shells not capable of landing penetrating damage on Atlanta, no matter where they strike her. In short, an exposed Atlanta is very likely to become a dead Atlanta. It's imperative to make use of her concealment and agility to stay alive. Hug islands and use them to block incoming fire. Concealment & Camouflage Surface Detection Range: 11.0 km Air Detection Range: 6.4 km Minimum Surface Detection Range: 9.4km Concealment Penalty while Firing: +3.8km (vs 11.1km gun range) For such a fragile and short ranged vessel, Atlanta is shackled with an enormous surface detection range. She is utterly incapable of engaging enemy targets with her torpedoes without giving her position away. It's only when either her main battery range or her concealment is upgraded that she can ambush surface targets with her guns. Even with a full investment into concealment and range modifiers, Atlanta cannot stealth-fire from open water and remains dependent upon friendly smoke or island cover to stay concealed. At best, Atlanta can get her surface detection range down to 9.4km which is still punitive for a ship of her size and range. She's unable to sneak up on destroyers and, unlike HMS Belfast, her surface detection range exceeds that of her radar, giving destroyers time enough to begin evading before Atlanta can light them up with her consumable. It is worth mentioning that Atlanta, with her radar consumable, can make better use of borrowed smoke clouds than some other ships. When divisioned with smoke-laying vessels, Atlanta can help provide eyes for herself and allies while remaining obscured within the smoke clouds. Though her radar has a very short duration, this can tip the balance in some engagements to let this fragile vessel exploit concealment mechanics within the game to her advantage and decide the local fight. Anti-Aircraft DefenseAA Battery Calibers: 127mm / 28mm / 20mmAA Umbrella Ranges: 5.0km / 3.1km / 2.0kmAA DPS per Aura: 121 / 27 / 29 Atlanta used to have the best anti-aircraft armament at tier 7 without contest She has been partially eclipsed by her sister ship, Flint, which has a modernized suite of weapons which replaces Atlanta's 28mm 'Chicago Piano' mounts with the famous (and more reliable and powerful) 40mm Bofors. This gives Flint a better punch at medium to close range while Atlanta dominates at a distance. When combined with Captain Skills and module upgrades, Atlanta competes very well with her sister. The image below breaks down how Atlanta's anti-aircraft power can be modified. * Bonuses are multiplicative, not additive. Note that all DPS values are approximate with some weird rounding occurring (which is why the tool-tip in port is weird when you begin stacking bonuses). This table can be used to calculate partial bonus stacks. For example, a 127mm mount (121dps) with Basic Fire Training (x1.2) Priority Target (x1.1) and Defensive Fire (x3) bonuses would generate an average of 479dps. The maximum output of Atlanta in an optimal situation would be a combined total of 1,215dps. Fully specialized and in an optimal situation, Atlanta puts out 1054 / 118 / 42 dps (a combined total of 1,215 dps) at ranges of 7.2km / 5.0km / 2.9km. Flint manages a combined total of 793 / 392 / 62 dps (a total of 1,247dps) at the same range intervals. No other ships at her tier come close to Atlanta as her sister-ship. With Atlanta's anti-aircraft firepower focused on her 127mm rifles and their 7.2km range, she makes a much better anti-aircraft escort over Flint and bests just about any other cruiser in the game, tier for tier. Atlanta's anti-aircraft advantages do not stop with just raw damage. Her aerial detection range is only 6.4km. If she keeps gun silent and switches off her AA guns, she can ambush incoming aircraft squadrons by sailing into their path to intercept them. By keeping her AA guns silent up until they're all in range, she gives the CV player no warning of her presence and can devastate a concentrated attack wave before the CV player can react. In addition, her and her sister Flint are the only ships in the game with unlimited charges of their Defensive Fire consumable. Specialized in this role, Atlanta becomes a 7.2km no-fly zone which any CV player is fool to test, no matter what their tier. But don't kid yourself. Without this specialization, without Defensive Fire specifically, you're only going to damage attack craft waves, not rout them. Any carrier wishing to delete you will be more than capable of doing so. In her element and unconcerned. Overall ImpressionsSkill Floor: Simple / Casual / Challenging / DifficultSkill Ceiling: Low / Moderate / High / Extreme Atlanta is not a friendly ship for beginners. Her weapons are too short ranged with a very temperamental damage output. Her surface detection range is too large and she has no easy-escape tools. She is far too fragile to account for any mistakes. While it's terribly fun to hold down your left mouse button and poop out rainbows of 127mm high explosive rounds, the efficacy of doing so is highly suspect at best. You can't deal damage quickly with Atlanta unless you get in close and without proper forethought, that will simply get you killed before accomplishing anything of note. The influence a well played Atlanta can have on a game is telling, but it depends entirely upon her Captain / Consumable / Module build. She's a good support ship, however the decision on how to support your team will largely dictate the spheres of influence you can perform. When Atlanta is caught out of position (which, let's admit, occurs almost continually in this ship), her ability to affect the outcome of the match falls away to nothing. Mouse's Summary: One of the oldest premiums in the game. She's also one of the most unforgiving ships in the game. The recent buffs were nice... sort of. I wanted Atlanta to get what Flint has. Despite all of her troubles, Atlanta is a riot to play. What a difference a year makes. Here's the long list of changes that occurred directly or indirectly to Atlanta between February 2016 and 2017. Her main battery durability was buffed, increasing her hit points 2.6 times. She no longer loses her turrets constantly (HOORAY!). The Situational Awareness skill was given out for free. Her AP shell normalization was changed from 8º to 10º. This means that if her shells strike at a 10º angle to the flat broadside of a ship, her shells will treat it as 0º and calculate as if they had struck flush. She received Radar. The new Matchmaker system places her at top tier very frequently. The Captain Skill changes have benefited Atlanta greatly, with easier access to quality of life improving skills like Concealment Expert and the introduction of Inertial Fuse for HE Shells. In addition, many players can't easily afford fire-mitigation skills like they used to. Atlanta has seen both feast and famine. During Closed Beta, when AP shells were dominant, she was as powerful as she has ever been. The changes to AP and HE shells nerfed her considerably, but she still had a lot of functionality with asymmetrical carrier Matchmaking and how common carriers were during Open Beta. There was almost always need for an AA escort and Atlanta filled that role nicely. Once deployment symmetry became a thing when the game was released in September of 2015, Atlanta's popularity began to severely wane. Now in 2017, it's the increase in smoke generators, specifically those of the British Cruisers, that have breathed new life into USS Atlanta. She has a purpose now -- an ability that's always welcome when there's an enemy that needs digging out. It's sad to say, but she gets more use out of that than she does her Defensive Fire consumable. Inertia Fuse for HE Shells has restored some of the bite Atlanta once enjoyed back in Closed Beta. While her upgraded HE shells don't have quite the same ubiquity as AP did back in the day, the average damage that Atlanta is dealing out has been on the rise in the last six months. Looking at a two-week snapshot of her performance ranks her 6th overall for damage output among tier 7 cruisers. It's still not a good performance, but it's definitely better than has been for the last year. Atlanta isn't back to her glory days from Closed Beta. Would I Recommend? Atlanta is a weird ship. She's not something you invest in because you think she's good. You do it because you want something unique. While it is possible to earn an equivalent through Ranked Battles in the form of USS Flint, Atlanta's analogue is likely to be out of reach for much of the player base. For Random Battle Grinding Atlanta isn't going to make it easy on you to earn rewards like High Caliber, Confederate or Kraken Unleashed. While she or any premium will earn a fair amount of experience and credits, Atlanta is difficult to make perform to make such numbers consistent. There are definitely better investments. So no. For Competitive Gaming No. There are much better ships to bring in a competitive environment than Atlanta. She's too fragile and if caught out of position, she has no get-out-of-jail cards to play. For Collectors Yes. They saw lots of action early in WWII and enjoyed success and tragedy (Google the Sullivan brothers and have tissues handy). For Fun Factor Very yes on toast. Her guns are hilarious. Staying near islands is imperative for the longevity of your Atlanta. Use it to set up attacks and cover your escape. Atlanta is not an easy ship to play. She's not like the British Cruisers or premiums like Mikhail Kutuzov or Flint where you can pop an easy smoke consumable and trump any attempts to engage you. Outfitting Atlanta Atlanta can be one of the most complicated premium ships to equip in the game presently. It's important to decide on a role for your Atlanta first. From there you may select Captain Skills and equip consumables which best support the role that you've decided upon. Modules: All of my builds for Atlanta include the same module choices. Main Armaments Modification 1, AA Guns Modification 2, Damage Control Modification 1, Steering Gears Modification 2. There's some pretty simple reasons for this. In slot 1, you can take Magazine Modification 1 if you're really paranoid about detonations. If you're intending to take Atlanta into a competitive environment, this choice should be moot as you should be using Juliet Charlie signals instead to mitigate detonations. Personally, detonations don't bother me. Atlanta does pop a little bit more than other cruisers, so keep that in mind. In slot 2, you may be wondering about the viability of Aiming Systems Modification 1. Skip it. At maximum range, and by that I mean 13.3km from Advanced Fire Training, ASM1 provides an eight meter dispersion reduction. Yep. That's it. Eight whole meters. It's 6.9m at 11.1km. Whoo. Exciting! Take the AA mod. You'll get more use out of it. All of the choices in slot 3 are terrible for the Atlanta. Take what you want. In slot 4, Propulsion Modification 2 is also a fair choice. However, Steering Gears Modification 2 will shave almost half a second off of a 90º turn going at full speed. Core Skills: Despite the 0.6.0 Captain Skill overhaul making several builds viable, there remain some skills that are optimal for Atlanta. They re included in all of the builds below. Your tier 1 skill for Atlanta should be Priority Target. Knowing when you're targeted and when you're not will save your ship and allow you to pull off some rather audacious feats. None of the other tier 1 skills is as useful. At tier 3, Basic Fire Training is the second essential. This increases your main battery rate of fire by 10% and your AA dps by 20%. Few ships gain so much as Atlanta from this skill. Bombardment Build This build focuses upon doing damage to larger ships -- specifically cruisers and tier 6 and 7 battleships. The idea is to keep her guns singing as often as possible and to use intervening terrain to keep safe. Because you're expected to be shooting almost non-stop, stealth abilities are less of priority. This build, grace of taking skills which improve her gunnery, also makes a passable anti-aircraft cruiser but this isn't our focus. Consumables: Damage Control Party II, Defensive Fire II, Surveillance Radar II Captain Skills: This build is all about maximizing the performance of your guns against these targets. Basic Fire Training and Adrenaline Rush increase your rate of fire. Inertia Fuse for HE Shells allows you to land damaging hits against the plethora of 25mm armoured sections found on ships of your chosen targets. Demolition Expert helps mitigate some of the lost fire-potential. Variant: Swap Inertia Fuse for HE Shells for Concealment Expert. This changes the build from doing direct damage to relying on fire damage to affect your targets. This will generally result in increased survivability but you'll pay for it with lower damage totals. Destroyer Hunter The idea here is to sneak up as close as possible to destroyers and annihilate them at close range. She's built for stealth. This ship is rather vanilla when it comes to the performance of her weapons against larger targets, but such is the price you pay for being a specialized hunter. Keep your anti-aircraft guns disabled until you absolutely need them. Consumables: Damage Control Party II, Hydroacoustic Search II, Surveillance Radar II Captain Skills: The first thing that should stand out is that this will keep your Atlanta shorter ranged than other builds. This will also impair her anti-aircraft power somewhat. Radio Location is used to assist with finding the little blighters. Concealment Expert is used to reduce the range at which you're spotted to give destroyers less time to react. In addition, you will have to go gun silent to evade return fire from larger capital ships. Superintendent provides an additional charge of your Radar and Hydroacoustic Search consumables. You'll use Radio Location to home in on the destroyers until you're spotted. If haven't uncovered the destroyer within 20 seconds of being lit, activate your Radar to light the destroyer and be ready to evade any return fire. Last Stand is there to help keep you alive when your rudder gets shot out as you try to evade. The destroyers will shoot back and they always seem to hit your rudder and set you repeatedly on fire. The last thing you want to be doing is spinning in circles. Anti-Aircraft Escort As the name suggests, this build focuses on protecting friendly ships from air attack. This is hardly an optimal build in the current Random Battle meta -- carriers are not as commonplace as they once were. However, few can argue against Atlanta's efficiency as an AA-platform with this build. Consumables: Damage Control Party II, Defensive Fire II, Surveillance Radar II Captain Skills: Everything pushes towards increasing Atlanta's AA range and DPS. Basic Fire Training and Manual Fire Control for AA Armament boost your DPS directly while Advanced Fire Training provides the range. Concealment Expert provides some survivability while also helping prevent you from being spotted early by surface ships. This can allow you to better intercept an inbound bomber stream and ambush them. Jack of All Trades is used to reduce the reset timer of your Defensive Fire consumable so that it will always be ready when the next attack wave comes in.

Just as I predicted while playing the Minnesota last patch, having 12 457s is totally worth the slow speed & reload, in my opinion. I run the Artillery Plotting Room for slot 6, the dispersion is TASTY!!! I set a new record for myself on my 5th match, 8 destroyed ships in one match. What do you guys think about the Vermont?? Enjoying it, or not? I like it so far. The sluggishness can be an issue at times.

I am a great fan of the Super-Cruisers in game, especially the American cruisers Alaska and Puerto Rico. Before you, I humbly submit a proposal for a branch split from the American Heavy Cruiser line, starting from Tier VII. Names of the tier VII & VIII ships are randomly generated and checked with a list of USN Cruisers from WWII to avoid repeats. Pros: +Big Guns +Large Health Pools Cons: -Large Size -Poor Concealment The line is initially entered by researching the FCS for the New Orleans, and is a same-tier side-hop, similar to how the Battleship and Destroyer lines branch off. Tier VII Heavy Cruiser Study, Scheme 2 (Alaska Preliminary Design) USS Arlington Displacement: 15,750t Health Points: ~34,250-39,200 Length: 700ft at waterline Beam: 72ft Speed: ~32-34 kts Belt: ~6-inches (152mm) Main Armament 4x3 8"/55 Mk 15 (w/o super-heavy shells) AP: 4,600 dmg HE: 2,800 dmg, 14% Fire Chance -Longer Reload and Turret traverse than New Orleans, worse dispersion Secondary Armament 6x2 5"/38 (127mm) Additional AA Guns Consumables Damage Control Party Defensive AA Fire -or- Hydroacoustic Search Scheme 2 was the smallest of the Alaska-Class premils. She's about 20% larger than the New Orleans-Class and represents the player's first forays into the Large Cruisers of the USN. While similar to the CA-B, which is the Baltimore-Class in-game, she still a different ship. Without the Super-Heavy AP and certain balancing choices, she should be able to feel like her own ship. Her inclusion is by no means mandatory, though she is meant as a transitional ship. She represents the difference between the traditional USN CA line and the Large Cruiser, in that they get bigger, quicker. Tier VIII Heavy Cruiser Scheme 4-A "Convertible" (Alaska Preliminary Design) USS Montgomery Displacement: 17,500 Health Points: ~37,500-42,500 Length: 710 ft at Waterline Beam: 74.5 ft Speed: 33.1 kts Belt: ~7.5-inches (190.5 mm) Main Armament 4x3 8"/55 (w/ super-heavy shells, 203mm) AP: 5,000 dmg HE: 2,800 dmg, 14% Fire Chance Upgradeable: 3x2 12"/50 Mk 8 (305mm) AP: 8,900 dmg HE: 4,300 dmg, 27% Fire Chance Secondary Armament 6x2 5"/38 Additional AA Consumables Damage Control Party Repair Party Defensive AA Fire -or- Hydroacoustic Search Radar This is probably the most interesting ships in the line for me, as there are two ways to play her, depending on which gun you choose. If you stick with the stock 8", she'll play like a traditional USN CA, just bigger. She should have similar DPM to Baltimore, but she should still edge her traditional cousin out just slightly. Something around a 15 second reload, more or less, though I am always willing to change this. To avoid completely overshadowing the Baltimore, this ship will be more sluggish on the helm, slightly slower start/stop and a wider turning circle, coupled with a slower turret traverse and some other factors, which will hopefully make the Baltimore feel better closer in, though the exact details would need to be done in play-testing. The neat trick with this this ship is that there are 2 ways to play her. The second way is unlocked with her upgraded guns, switching from four turrets, each armed with three 8-inch guns to three turrets, armed with dual 12". These guns are the same found on Alaska, just with less of them. The arrangement is still AB-X, like on the Alaska, just with one barrel less per turret. The cost of mounting these guns will be a loss of DPM. Potential damage per salvo drops from 60,000 to 53,400, which might be enough justification to keep the reload the same, but if the ship performs too well, the reload can be increased to 20 seconds. These guns should allow for this ship to hit harder, but there should still be merit to taking the 8-inch guns, leading to a diversity of gameplay within the same ship. -Premium- Tier VIII Heavy Cruiser Scheme 3 (Alaska Preliminary Design) USS Akron Displacement: 17,500 Health Points: ~37,500-42,500 Length: 710 ft at Waterline Beam: 74 ft Speed: 32 kts Belt: ~7-inches (177.8mm) Main Armament 3x2 12"/50 Mk 8 (305mm) AP: 8,900 dmg HE: 4,300 dmg, 27% Fire Chance Secondary Armament 6x2 5"/38 Additional AA Consumables Damage Control Party Repair Party Defensive AA Fire -or- Hydroacoustic Search Radar This is much like her tech tree counterpart, but without the convertible feature, she is just a straight 12-inch gun cruiser. A possibility is to give her a gimmick, like removing Radar for smoke or something, but she is largely there as a trainer for this line of ships and as for something to buy to support the game. She should be slightly worse than a fully upgraded Montgomery. Tier IX 12" Gun Cruiser Study CA2-A USS Samoa Displacement: 25,600 Health Points: ~49,300-57,500 Length: 800 ft Beam: 85.1 ft Speed: 33.5 kts Belt: ~7-inches (177.8mm) Main Armament 3x3 12"/50 Mk 8 (305mm) AP: 8,900 dmg HE: 4,300 dmg, 27% Fire Chance Secondary Armament 6x2 5"/38 4x4 1.1"/70 Mk 1 AA Numerous 20mm Consumables Damage Control Party Repair Party Defensive AA Fire -or- Hydroacoustic Search Radar -or- Catapult Fighter -or- Spotter Aircraft Bad news first: This ship is inferior to Alaska. This, however, is not only by design, but desired, as Alaska is more of a Tier 9.5, while this ship can be properly balanced for Tier 9. She has less HP and armor, but she still has the same hard-hitting 12" guns (reloads adjustable for balance), and her AA has taken quite a bit of a hit to her med-range AA, having only 4 quad 1.1" instead of the 14 quad 40mm Bofors of Alaska, but that can be fixed with a Hull B, if need be. All-in-all, she should be a nice ship for the tier, without the hang-ups that nerfing a premium like Alaska could bring. Tier X USS Guam [Insert Alaska Here] Displacement: 34,803 Health Points: 60,800 Length: 808.5 ft Beam: 91 ft Speed: 33 kts Belt: 9-inches (228.6mm) Main Armament 3x3 12"/50 Mk 8 (305mm) AP: 8,900 dmg HE: 4,300 dmg, 27% Fire Chance Secondary Armament 6x2 5"/38 (127mm) 14x4 40mm Bofors 34x1 20mm Oerlikans Consumables Damage Control Party Defensive AA Fire -or- Hydroacoustic Search Radar -or- Catapult Fighter -or- Spotter Aircraft Alaska, but better. That is how this ship should be described. Slightly faster guns that are slightly more accurate, among other things to make up the .5 tier difference between Guam and Alaska. A possibility is to give her a 'what-if' weapons overhaul, replacing her 40mm bofors with the twin 3" mounts seen on Worcester and Des Moines. She won't have the raw tankiness of Puerto Rico, but she shouldn't, she is a different ship. Where Puerto Rico, with her 12 guns and BB dispersion, relies on weight of fire to hit targets, Guam can more comfortably rely on her Cruiser dispersion to achieve hits. Below are now defunct stats, preserved for reference sake. Next on my list are: USN Battleship Cruisers USN Secondary-Focused Battleships USN Anti-Aircraft Cruisers USN Battle Scouts RN Battlecruisers KM Battlecruisers KM Panzerskiffe Redux (Again) Prelim Investigations: (Don't expect anything to come of these, they are more to see if I can get enough information to build these) USN Torpedo Destroyers USN Hybrids IJN Battlecruisers IJN Secondary Battleships IJN Light Cruisers RN Alt. Destroyers KM Light Cruisers

Hi all, I wish you all a happy new year! Are you a fan of HE spam? Are you afraid of them? Do you know how to encounter them? If you don't, then join them! Tier 9 Premium US Cruiser USS Fargo CL-106 Ship Length - 610 feet Beam - 66 feet Draft - 25 feet speed - 32.5 knots Hit points - between 39,000 - 49,000 Main Battery Four 150mm triple-barrelled guns Rate of Fire - 10 rounds per minute Reload Time - 6 seconds Firing Range - 18.29km Maximum HE shell Damage - 3,400 Maximum AP shell Damage - 8,200 Secondary Armament Six 130mm double-barrelled guns Firing Range - 5km Rate of Fire - 15 rounds per minute Reload Time - 4 seconds Maximum HE Shell Damage - 2,100 AA Defence Four 150mm triple-barrelled guns Average Damage per second - between 90 - 95 Firing Range - 6km Four quad 40mm Bofors Average damage per second - 270 Firing Range - 3.51km Six double 40mm Bofors Average Damage per Second - 135 Firing Range - 3.51km ten 20mm Oerlikon Average Damage per Second - 83 Firing Range - 2.01km Maneuverability Rudder Shift Time - between 7 to 9 seconds Speed - 32.5 knots Concealment Detectability by Sea - between 9 to 11km Detectability by Air - between 7 - 8km Aircraft Complement 4 Floatplanes Possible Consumables Damage Control Party Enhanced AA Fire Hydroacoustic Search/ Fighter Surveillance Radar/ Spotting Aircraft Repair Party

Hello all, If WG wants to add a Tier 6 Premium Normal Aircraft Carrier for US Navy, USS Wasp would be a good idea. Ship Length - 225.9 meters ~ 226 meters Beam - 33.2 meters Draft - 6.1 meters Speed - 29.5 knots Cost - same as Ark Royal and Erich Loewenhardt (6,300 doubloons) Secondary Armament Eight 127mm guns Firing Range - 4.5km Rate of Fire - 13.33 shots/minute Reload Time - 4.5s HE shell - 127mm HE/HC Mk36 (Same as Ranger) Maximum HE shell Damage - 1,800 AA Defence 1 sixteen 28mm AA guns Average damage per second - between 24 - 34 Firing range - 3 - 4km AA Defence 2 twenty-four 12.7mm Browning Average damage per second - between 90 - 120 Firing Range - 1.2km Maneuverability Top Speed - 29.5 knots Turning radius... Rudder Shift time... Concealment Detectability by Sea Ranger - 14.22km Wasp - 14 - 15km Detectability by Air Ranger - 10.66km Wasp - 11 - 12km Aircraft Compliment Rocket Aircraft - F4U Corsair Rockets in payload - 8 Damage - 2,000 Fire chance - 7% Cruise speed - 130 - 150 Hit Point - 1460 Squadron size - 6, 3 per attack run/ 2 per attack run (Tell me what you rather) Number of Aircraft on deck - 9 Aircraft restoration time - 45 - 60 seconds Torpedo Bombers - TBF Avenger Torpedos in payload - 1 Range - 2.5km Damage - 6,467 Flooding chance - 52% Cruising speed - 110 - 130 Hit points - 1,800 Squadron size - 8, 2 per attack run Number of Aircraft on deck - 12 Aircraft restoration time - 50 - 65 seconds Dive Bombers - SBD Dauntless Bombs in payload - 1 Bomb type - AP(according to Enterprise, If a light cv is added, bomb type would be HE) Maximum damage - 8,000 - 10,000 Cruising speed - 90 - 110 Hit points - 1,890 Squadron Size - 6, 3 per attack run Number of Aircraft on deck - 9 Restoration time - 40 - 55 seconds

Finished playing and grinding the Pensacola, was fun, and now I've got the New Orleans and I think I'm doing very poorly with it, I always find myself in T9 matches where I'm very vulnerable with my 25mm armor so I get discouraged to even play it. I've watched videos on how to play the New Orleans and I'm still trying to comprehend them, so while I'm finding help on how to get out of probably my most hated ship right now, how do I play it?

Thanks in large part to @Shrayes_Bhagavatula and his recent (And frankly well done) German BB split proposal, I have been thinking about Battlecruisers once again and how such lines or line splits would shape up in the game. In particular, Sharayes' 'Raider Line' of German Battleships, at least IMO, would potentially pair well with earlier, true BC's to create not just a split but a true 2nd line of battleships to unlock for Germany. His top tier conclusions meant that one would only need to backfill down to tier III in order to complete a line, and since there are more than enough ship classes from the era to do so, a BC-->fast/ commerce raiding BB line suddenly becomes very attainable... at least in theory of course. But today, I'd like to start my suggestion with a different nation to backfill BCs with; the US. As we know, there will be an imminent split at tier 8 for the USN Battleship tree, and like many of you I was shocked and a bit disappointed when the ships were announced and shown off a few months ago. "This isn't at all what I wanted!" I exclaimed! "Where's the Nevada, the Tennessee, the real SoDak? Where's our awesome secondary focused, brawling BBs!?!?" Instead what we got was the original South Dakota, a rebuilt, pretend-to-be-a-Montana South Dakota, and one of the freakin' Tillman proposals! Not to say that such ships didn't have their fans prior to the announcement, they most certainly did! Even I'll freely admit I was hoping to see the OG SoDak come into the game at some point as a premium or, something. However, as I calmed down and started to think about it more, it's actually kind of brilliant on WG's part. We have always had a very nice, well put together tech line for the US BBs from a chronological standpoint. Starting from the first Dreadnought, to the standards, to the post 1930 era Fast BBs all the way up to the aborted Montana, it's a very well defined line! And now, we're going to be given a choice: what was versus what might have been. The simple fact is that the 1920 South Dakota-class was the next in line to be built after the Colorado-class and very nearly were, if not for that contemptable piece of paper known as the Washington Naval Treaty. Now, say what you will about the new ships, and they very well could end up being crap as many of the doomsayers are proclaiming, but there's no denial that these new "Super Standards" as I call them, will not only create a more interesting chronological line but also a more significant gameplay choice: continue with the slow, methodical playstyle of the standards or go with fast, maneuverable BBs? And therein lies the brilliance... So if you made it this far, congratulations! If you're looking for the TL:DR well here's your question: 'What the hell does all that have to do with American Battlecrusiers TW?' So glad you asked! Despite the fact that the USN fast BBs make chronological sense in the techline, it got me thinking; can it be extended and make sense gameplay wise? This is where the BC's come in. Since we already have existing tier VIII-X ships, we simply need to backfill the rest of the line as far as it can go. And how far does the BC line for the US go? Lets theorycraft! Starting off at tier VII, we have the most obvious ship to place in our hypothetical American BC line: The Lexington-class: As we all know, the Lexington and Saratoga were rebuilt as CV's so I would go with the name Constellation for this class in the techline. The main feature of these ships are that they are basically the ultimate glass cannons. Roughly the same size and maneuverability as HMS Hood (though slightly faster), Connie would also feature similar armament to Colorado, with 8x2 16" guns though these are the 50cal versions that were also to be used on the original SoDaks (nee: Kansas) Her main drawback is that this thing, other than being huge has only 7"(!) of main belt armor. That's only slightly better than a Baltimore and compared to Hood is equivalent to only her upper belt, whereas her main belt is 12". So yeah, you want to talk about easy broadside citadels, Russian BBs eat your hearts out! And it's this frankly jarring achilles heel that have some saying is the reason the Connie will never show up in the game, she's simply to fragile to to balance properly. But I argue she could be balanced, especially given a hypothetical refit that WG would certainly give her anyway, could make her perfectly competitive at tier VII, playing more like... a long range heavy cruiser rather than a true BB. Now at this point, many people would say "yeah, that'll work. Branch her off from the New Mexico and call it a day!" But Wait! we can still go further down the line! Just like a archeological expedition, we just need to dig a little deeper and get to tier VI where we find: Welcome to the original Lexington-class designs. The drawings you see above are the ships as they had been designed by 1916, only for the design parameters to change the following year into the ships that actually got laid down in 1920. Instead of 8x2 16" guns she was to be fitted with 10 14"/50 guns in a superfiring arrangement of 3 over 2, like the Pensacola-class CA. And just like her contemporary at tier VI, her armor is devastatingly thin at only 5" at the belt. Let me repeat that: FIVE. INCHES. It's the same armor thickness as the New Orleans at tier VII, in a ship four times it's size. Now, this does mean that she has an insane top speed of 35(!) knots, but even so. This is a ship of yuuuuge extremes. And just like her big sister a tier higher would likely mean the ship wouldn't play like a BB at all, more like a giant CA with 20% less firepower than the New Mexico. Oh gods I hear you say, make it stop! Surely there can't be more! Oh but there is... digging a little deeper still, we find: This ship was the culmination of a design study that had begun around 1911-12 in response to the IJN Kongo and in many ways was exactly that, an American rebuttal design meant to offer similar capabilities. And as you can see, this ship is rather... reasonable in design when compared to the insanity that becomes the Lexington-class project. Main armament was only 8x2 14" guns, these likely would have been the 45cal ones since they were just coming online at the time, so again about 20% less firepower than it's contemporary BB at tier V, the New York-class. They also feature... reasonable-ish armor protection as well, with a 10" armor belt as seen above. Overall, this ship is entirely sensible compared to what comes next. But is there anything that comes before? Can we go even deeper? Yes, yes we can. This drawing is based on a series of general requirements that had been drawn up by the Naval Design Bureau from about 1909 to design a battlecruiser, using the Wyoming-class as a base. 6 different design sketches were submitted and the end result was what you see above. Congress was never interested in authorizing any money to the Navy to build such ships, only changing their tune when the Kongo-class was revealed to the world. The main armament would be the same 12"/50 guns as on the Wyomings for those wondering. At this point we've pretty much hit rock bottom. I could continue this even further with Armored Cruisers, which were the true precursors to the battlecruiser but as there are no AC's in WoWs yet, that's a story that'll have to wait for another time. Hopefully soon... ;) Congratulations! You made it through the entire rant! I hope you found this interesting and as always, I welcome your feedback and suggestions!

Anchorage!

The title gets across the gist of it. As I'd imagine a lot of you know, the two most widely used and effective AA guns mounted on American ships during WWII were the 40mm Bofors and the 20mm Oerlikon. I'd also imagine that a lot of you know that those were Swedish and Swiss guns, respectively, purchased by and built for the U.S. military. The question I have is this: Why go to foreign designs? I'd imagine that it wasn't cheap for the States to get their hands on these designs, and that money possibly could have been used to improve the U.S.' existing AA designs or to come up with new ones entirely. Likewise, selling weapons to the Allies must have presented a terrible risk to neutral Sweden and Switzerland. By 1941 both countries were completely surrounded by Axis territory (since Finland joined the Axis when Operation Barbarossa began), and the pretense of stopping the selling of weapons to their enemies would have presented a golden opportunity for Germany and Italy to invade. However, since I know I'm not even close to the most well-versed history buff here, I now turn over the mic to those among you who are: Why did the United States purchase Swiss and Swedish AA guns and their designs as opposed to trying to improve on/create their own? Thanks in advance to anyone who answers my question. Sincerely, 1Sherman.

Got frustrated playing my Gearing in Ranked, so I decided to revisit an old friend. She only has a 10 point captain these days, but she plays as tough as I remember. The game wasn't easy; I had to work hard and keep my head on a swivel, but the results speak for themselves. The Clemson is still a powerful ship at her tier. It was nice to get a little affirmation that I'm not a complete potato player So, if you're feeling a bit frustrated this weekend, try going back to your roots. The Clemson, the Nicholas, the Farragut are all great ships, even with the CVs lurking about. Try getting reacquainted with an old friend.

In the newsfeed today, WOWs is featuring the Kidd. I love this little ship, but she's not an easy ship to be good in and with the current meta, you can't just sail into caps thinking that you're going to bully any other dd out. RED DDs BRING FRIENDS, usually of the cruiser variety and often with radar or hydro. From the newsfeed, " VIII Kidd is a U.S. destroyer that can pose a real threat to Key Areas and is ideal for short-range knife fights with enemy counterparts". So, how often this weekend are we going to watch new KIdd drivers sail into caps to pick a fight with dds only to get crossfired by the cruisers that they didn't see? Heal and smoke aren't enough to make up for stupid. The worst part of this is that these players will have payed $40 for a premium USN dd that has a steep learning curve and when they don't do well, they will trash her name......and they will break my heart. She is a REAL museum ship (usskidd.com) if anyone wants to visit her. Watching multiple Kidds die in the first 5 minutes of battle over the weekend is not going to be fun. I think that I need a virtual hug.

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.

Brief History: Despite the limits of the Washington Naval Treaty, in early 1936 the USN found itself with 15,000t remaining to build another aircraft carrier. The new Yorktown Class carriers came in at just under 20,000t, so the USN sought to squeeze a comparable air group onto a ship that had 25% less displacement. Wasp was launched in April 1939 and was commissioned a year later. She began her career patrolling the Atlantic, and later joined Force 'W' of the Home Fleet to aid in the transportation of RAF units to the besieged Island of Malta. After the losses at the Coral Sea and Midway, Wasp suddenly found herself at the front lines in the Pacific Theater supporting the invasion of Guadalcanal. Wasp took three out of six torpedoes launched from I-19 on the 15th of September, 1942, leaving her engulfed in fire and gradually losing speed. She was abandoned within 40 minutes and scuttled hours later. Wasp was rediscovered by RV Petrel in January 2019, laying upright on the sea floor at 14,000ft. Armor Layout: (educated guesses here, not an expert on warship armor) 6-120mm (belt 120mm, deck 25mm, hull is a mix of 16mm and 19mm) Survivability: (launched with no torpedo protection; so either non at all or very little) Hit Points: 44,500 Torpedo Protection Damage Reduction: 0% Aircraft: (I choose her final air group from July 1942 - September 1942) Attack Aircraft: F4F Wildcat Torpedo Bombers: TBF Avenger Dive Bombers: SBD Dauntless (AP please?) Artillery: Secondary Armament: 8x1 127mm/38 Mk24 AA Defense: AA Guns 24x1 12.7mm Browning M2 mod. 2 AA Guns 4x4 28mm/75 Mk2 mod. 2 AA Guns 8x1 127mm/38 Mk24 Maneuverability: Speed: 29.5 kts Turning Circle: 1 km Rudder Shift: 15 seconds Concealment: Detectability Range by Sea: 14.0km Detectability Range by Air: 10.0km Why Wargaming should make it: The Yorktown class model is already in-game in the form of Enterprise, so the modeling for Wasp is mostly done already save the downsizing that would be required. All you need to do is tweak my balancing decisions a bit (or a lot...) and you are GOLD Wargaming, GOLD! Thanks for reading!

For some reason the post in my signature related to this same ship was deleted, not sure why. So this is a re-post of the original build. I created this ship over a period of two weeks from start-to-finish, including the digital design process, all the way back in early 2018. Once the build was complete, I took the finished model to New York City on a trip of mine and photographed it next to the larger LEGO model that they have there made by Ed Diment. It is still alive today, sitting in a water base on my display desk, waiting for the time she will be needed in combat again. Without further ado, I present to you the USS Intrepid in 1:600th scale. USS Intrepid, "The Fighting I" 1943 configuration Type: Essex Class Aircraft Carrier Commissioned: August 16th, 1943 Decommissioned: March 15h, 1974 Re-Commisoned/refitted to attack carrier: CVA-11 (October 1st, 1952) Struck: February 23rd, 1982 Fate: Museum ship currently berthed on the Hudson River in the United States.