The Cruiser & I

[mr3awsome]

Hello everyone.

Today we will be discussing some of the errors that the Devs have made during the game’s development so far.

The major topics of discussion are:

- Cleveland

- Myōkō

- RUDE Cruisers

- British Cruiser

 

 

Cleveland:

 

Probably the oldest complaint in the game is the Cleveland’s tier.

Historically speaking, she is superior to her successor, Pensacola, in almost every way.

	Cleveland	Pensacola
Belt	127mm	64mm
Deck	51mm	25mm
Magazines	120mm (Box)	102mm belt
Barbettes	152mm	19mm
Turrets	152mm/76mm/32mm/76mm	64mm/25mm/19mm/51mm

  [The values for turrets are face/sides/rear/roof respectively.]

 

Cleveland is clearly chunkier, displacing more than her rival as well, giving her more HP.

	Cleveland	Pensacola
Muzzle velocity	762mps (2,500fps)	853mps (2,800fps)
Shell weight	59kg (130lb)	118kg (260lb)
Rate of Fire	10	4
Number of guns	12	10
Turret traverse speed	10°/s	3.5°/s

Whilst Pensacola's guns are punchier and have flatter arcs, their traverse is somewhat mediocre, with only an average fire rate for guns of that size. 

 

   Cleveland’s secondary battery is another area where it is ahead. Six of the well used US 5”/38 twin turrets against 8 of its predecessor, the 5”/25.

   Pensacola has a stronger light battery, trading 6 twin 20mm Oerlikons for 9 single 20mm Oerlikons and 2 Quadruple Bofors.

Speed is the same.

   Therefore it is clear than Cleveland should be a higher tier than Pensacola.

Given that Pensacola should be a good fit at tier VII, this means that Cleveland should be tier VIII. The Devs themselves have said as much, however at this point Cleveland is regarding as a semi-myth.

  

Myōkō:

 

A more recently problem has been the Myōkō. Some time ago this was the tier VIII Japanese heavy cruiser, with the Mogami as the tier VII. However, they were swapped, which put Myōkō back against her peer, Pensacola, and the estimated tier of other first generation new cruiser designs such as Suffren, Trento and Kent. Myōkō retained her ahistorical elite hull. This is where the issue lies.

    Being rebuilt twice, Myōkō has an edge on all of her peers. In her present elite form she keeps her as fitted speed, despite gaining in the region of 2000t at deep load. As well as this, she also keeps all four sets of torpedo launchers, whereas in reality she lost two for extra light AA guns.

   What this means, ultimately, is that Myōkō is a cause of power creep, in an area that is rather delicate as it is. Thus, I would suggest the following might be a better arrangement.

 

20cm/50 3rd Year Type No.1		Hull A		Type 8 No.2		Type 7 Mod 1		130,000 SHP
▼		▼
20.3cm/50 3rd Year Type No.2		Hull B	->	Type 90 Mod.1
		▼
		Hull C

 

Hull A (As built):

Main Battery: 5 x 2 20cm/50 3rd Year Type No.1 

Secondary Battery: 6 x 1 12cm/45 10th Year Type 

AA Battery: 6 x 1 12cm/45 10th Year Type

                   2 x 1 7.7mm MG

Torpedo Battery: 4 x 3 61cm Fixed Deck Mounts

 

Hull B (1st Rebuild):

Main Battery: 5 x 2 20cm/50 3rd Year Type No.1 

Secondary Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

AA Battery: 4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

                   2 x 4 13.2mm/76 Type 93 

                   2 x 1 7.7mm MG

Torpedo Battery: 2 x 4 61cm Traversible Mounts

 

Hull C (2nd Rebuild):

Main Battery: 5 x 2 20cm/50 3rd Year Type No.1 

Secondary Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

AA Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

                    4 x 2 25mm/60 Type 93

                    2 x 2 13.2mm/76 Type 93 

Torpedo Battery: 4 x 4 61cm Traversible Mounts

 

As the Devs love money, and consequently easy premiums, the 2^nd Refit Myōkōs after their wartime modifications would be a tier VIII premium or two, one with an AA spec and the other with the full torpedo complement with Type 93 torpedoes. 

 

Haguro:

Hull: As Myōkō C

Main Battery: 5 x 2 20.3cm/50 3rd Year Type No.2 

Secondary Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

AA Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

                    4 x 3 25mm/60 Type 93

                    8 x 2 25mm/60 Type 93

                    24 x 1 25mm/60 Type 93

Torpedo Battery: 2 x 4 61cm Traversible Mounts

                            Type 93 Torpedoes Mod.2

Interesting Consumable: Defensive Fire

 

Nachi:

Hull: As Myōkō C

Main Battery: 5 x 2 20.3cm/50 3rd Year Type No.2 

Secondary Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

AA Battery:  4 x 2 12.7cm/40 Type 89

                    8 x 2 25mm/60 Type 93

                    8 x 1 25mm/60 Type 93

Torpedo Battery: 4 x 4 61cm Traversible Mounts

                            Type 93 Torpedoes Mod.2

Interesting Consumable: Torpedo Reloader

 

RUDE Cruisers:

 

The Russian and Deutsch Cruisers are grouped together because they fit into the same bracket. And this is the Power-Creep bracket. A well known phenomenon to any long serving World of Tanks player. It was recognised that tier VI/VII could be an area of creep quite early on, given the large number of US Heavy Cruisers of relatively similar capability and pubbies wanting to just stack them just one after another for the US cruiser line.

   Nobody suspected the eventual suspects, however.

 

Kirov was always one of the favourites for the Russian tier V cruiser slot. Despite being modern for its tier, historically it had a number of issues that [edited]those advantages. The two main ones are the design of the turret and the relatively weak armour. The best cruisers at tier V have a 76mm belt, whilst Kirov has a 50mm belt. The turret is the larger factor. In the single and twin mounts the 180mm used on Kirov achieved 5 rounds a minute. In Kirov’s turrets, they only achieved 2. This was because the guns were so closely spaced that the crew couldn’t load them effectively. This is not a feature unique to Kirov, the 4” triples found on the Repulse & Courageous classes also suffered from that.

   This should be enough to keep them from being too overbearing, and can always be tweaked up a little if it proved a little too restrictive.

 

To smooth the progression, Molotov would be the tier VI regular, with the increase in armour being accompanied by an increase the rate of fire. Buddy itself would become a premium, trading one turret for more armour compared to Schors, which would remain as the tier VII, as it’s a good bridge between Kirov et al and the Chappy.

  

The German equivalent is the rather large jump in capability between the Konigsberg (ii)/Dresden class cruiser and the Konigsberg (iii) class cruiser at tiers IV & V respectively. A more gradual progression would feature the Emden (1925) as she was designed.

 

Emden A:

 

 

The major improvement over Karlsruhe is the disposions of the guns, with four twin mounts rather than eight singles. The torpedo armament is double the number of tubes, going from four to eight.

 

Emden B:

Simple upgrade, gaining an extra 88mm single, upgrading the torpedoes to the 533mm G7a and a close range armament upgrade of 6 20mm/65 C/38s.

 

Emden C:

 

 

A slight Frankenstein mixture, combining the planned and actual refits. The main battery would become as shown above as would the secondary battery layout, but the guns would be the 10.5cm guns that Emden historically received rather than the single 8.8cms. The light AA suite also improves.

 

This would bump Konigsberg & Nurnberg up a tier each. Whilst this may seem a little extreme, it can work, given the high rate of fire of the German 15cm/60 guns. (10 & 12 respectively).

 

British Cruisers:

 

The above went relatively undetected at first, until the announcement for British cruisers came. Which caused people to start worrying a bit, because, particularly in the case of Leander, people thought it should be the tier V, rather than the tier VI. However, as WG had started gathering data for the line before the RUDE cruisers came out, before their power creep was a known thing.

    So then we had all the hassle of the Devs finding out that they’d been power creeped. Rather than changing the line, which would cause a delay on an already delayed nation, they decided to pimp them out with consumables and gimmicks. Without the cases noted above, this wouldn’t be necessary.

 

Also, the Weymouth has the wrong guns. In the game she carries the BL 6”/45 Mk VII, using the pre WWI charge for a velocity of 773mps. Historically she carried the BL 6”/50 Mk XI, with an MV of 895mps. However, WG still claim that the mount is correct, that being the Pedestal Mk VI, despite that mount only being used for the Mk BL 6”/50 Mk XI. This seems a bit pointless.

 

Summary:

 

Tier	USN A	USN B	IJN	VMF	HSF/KM	RN A	RN B
II	Chester	-	Chikuma	Novik	Dresden	Active	Weymouth
III	St Louis	-	Tenryuu	Bogatyr	Kolberg	Caledon	Birmingham
IV	"Phoenix"	-	Kuma	Svietlana	Karlsruhe	Danae	"Atlantic Cruiser"
V	Omaha	-	Furutaka	Kirov	Emden	Emerald	Hawkins
VI	"Preliminary Brooklyn"	"Proto-Pensacola"	Aoba	Molotov	Konigsberg	Leander	York
VII	Pensacola	Brooklyn	Myōkō	"Schors"	Nurnberg	Fiji	Kent
VIII	New Orleans	Cleveland	Mogami	Chapayev	Admiral Hipper	Edinburgh	"A Paper Ship"
IX	Baltimore	Worcester	Ibuki	"Dmitry Donskoi"	'Roon'	"Neptune"	"A Paper Ship"
X	Des Moines	-	"Zao"	"Moskva"	'Hindenburg'	"Minotaur"	"A Paper Ship"

"Name" = Paper Ship

'Name' = WG fantasy

So there we have it.

 

Do you agree?

Am I talking complete faeces?

Is there anything that you would suggest as an alternative?

 

 

 

Footnote:

 

At this point, changing Cleveland is the only immediately viable option, as all the others require substantial changes to the game, which the Devs are unlikely to do. 

 

Disclaimer: This is only my opinion, not The Law. 

[Lorenzo_Ruiz]

Putting the Northampton or any other cruiser into that slot makes more sense than keeping the Cleveland there.

[crzyhawk]

I would reverse the proto-brooklyn and Proto-Pensacola.  Also, I would be careful at t6.  Running the numbers of an 8 gun Pensacola, the ship is strictly inferior to Aoba to DPM in gun form.  A 9 gun ship is inferior to Aoba in HE spam, but superior in AP spam.  That does not factor in that Aoba has torps to spam.  No torps on /only/ the USN line means that the USN ship should be clearly superior as a pure gunship.  Frankly, while I used to oppose the idea because "ten guns" as if that actually means something, I would move Pensacola to T6 as a premium, and Northampton as the tree ship.  Performance numbers put her squarely in the t6 camp, large alpha (surpassed by Graf Spee for the record) be damned.

 

I dont think Nurnburg can survive at t7.  she can't perform at t6 now, bumping her up would require insane levels of buffing.

[mr3awsome]

I would reverse the proto-brooklyn and Proto-Pensacola.  Also, I would be careful at t6.  Running the numbers of an 8 gun Pensacola, the ship is strictly inferior to Aoba to DPM in gun form.  A 9 gun ship is inferior to Aoba in HE spam, but superior in AP spam.  That does not factor in that Aoba has torps to spam.  No torps on /only/ the USN line means that the USN ship should be clearly superior as a pure gunship.  Frankly, while I used to oppose the idea because "ten guns" as if that actually means something, I would move Pensacola to T6 as a premium, and Northampton as the tree ship.  Performance numbers put her squarely in the t6 camp, large alpha (surpassed by Graf Spee for the record) be damned.

 

I dont think Nurnburg can survive at t7.  she can't perform at t6 now, bumping her up would require insane levels of buffing.

 

The ideal case, in my opinion, has Aoba running 4 rpm, so I'm disinclined to put an 8 gun ship there (apart from Duquesne, which has its own issues). 

I think using the 7 gun ship could work, and make a change from the 6 gun Aoba & York. 

 

Given the current situation and how WG seems willing to disregard pretty much anything (see Weymouth), what you suggest is eminently possible. 

 

[ryuukei8569]

The biggest problem with USN CA's though isnt the mid tier cruisers. While yes, USN mid tier cruisers have issues, the biggest problem lies with the high tiers, specifically, Baltimore and New Orleans. in NO's case, her problem is that she doesn't have enough real advantages to be a real Tier 8, especially in the AA Department. The 5'38 secondaries are really whats needed at T8 those 25's just don't cut it at that tier. NO doesn't have the DPM to compete with fellow T8 cruisers and doesn't have anything other than meh shell arcs, and lacks the torpedoes of all her competitors. Really the only solution is replacing NO altogether with either Wichita or a Baltimore with the hull heal removed.

 

Pensacola's problem has little to do with power creep, first and foremost her biggest problem is the gigantic detection range. Really Pensacola and NO should be Tiermates, with Pensacola being squishier but with greater DPM, while NO is a bit tougher but lower DPM. So Pensacola can be fixed with a decreased detection range and a slight reload buff.

 

Balimore is the other problem. With her historical reload she does not have anywhere near the firepower to be one Tier below Des Moines. Ideally a T9 needs to have about 75% of the firepower of the T10, and Baltimore has an abysmal 46%. She is too weak to be one tier below DM. So Baltimore either needs to be dropped a tier and replaced with Buffalo (which would never compete at T10 as is), or she needs to receive a truly insane reload buff. And the AA of the other T9 cruisers except the British one needs to be nerfed.

 

Also it is worth noting, no way in hell should Nurnburg and Konigsburg move up a tier. Neither of these ships are doing that well at all, Sever wide Nurnburgs winrate is 49%, that's not very good. If anything the cruisers in the weak lines should be buffed to be at the level of the stronger ones, rather than nerfing the stronger ones, seeing that as a whole cruisers tend to struggle a bit more than Battleships or Destroyers. and Honestly Karlshrue should just be replaced with Emden because that thing is a piece of crap. In fact Im not even sure why you are suggesting this change anyway, given that German cruisers except for Roon, Konigsburg and Dresdin, are all doing rather poorly. And of these three, only Dresdin is performing spectacularly, Roon and Konigsburg are both just doing rather average. Most German cruisers are pretty poor performers so nerfs or moving up tiers is the last thing they need.

[mofton]

I agree with crzyhawk on Nurnburg at T7, she struggles at T6 although I personally think she's a strong ship with some great points.

 

Your USN cruiser logic I think holds, leaving aside what T6 choice you'd go for. I'd prefer a minimum of paper.

 

There are 2 options to improve things -

1) Retrospectively change things, if we say USN was planned anyway then we need to - add Emden, modify a non-premium Molotov, discard Budyonny, discard Yorck

2) Power up going forwards, - up tier some future French/Italian CL which haven't been built or modeled yet and may never make it in, add Arethusa

 

One is easier than the other.

 

My preference -

RN: Weymouth - Caledon - Danae - Arethusa - Leander (nerf) - Fiji - Edinburgh - Neptune - Minotaur

KM: Dresden - Kolberg - Karlsruhe - Konigsberg/Nurnburg - Nurnburg - Yorck - Adm. Hipper - Roon - Hindenburg

VMF: As yours

IJN: As is

USN: As yours

 

I'm in the opinion that we kind of have to live with this, if it shafts some possible T6 French/Italian cruisers from inclusion, then unfortunately tough. It's not worth making wholesale changes to accommodate them.

 

Putting in Arethusa at T5 (with premium opportunity for Pan-Asia) and re-using turrets, rangefinders and features from Leander seems a low-resource fix to the most glaring RN weakness and still adds a modern ship at T5 to counter some others. Emerald with 10km torpedoes as bonkers T5 premium cruiser experiment might work as a premium despite being T5 and frankly awful at the moment. Leander's overperforming so some kind of nerf (or just less consumable buff) would work, maybe play with the smoke/heal.

 

Powering down Myoko makes Yorck more competitive and allows a decent range of T7 CA, Myoko will still be on top but Yorck, Pensacola (buff, new hull, consider AP change or cue-balling ROF increase), Trento and Kent (and Suffren?) would all be within a reasonable power bracket. One ship's always going to be top, but if the power range is acceptable that's ok. Yorck should therefore be the T7. T6 is sticky as Nurnburg's not performing well but some kind of buff. T5 Konigsberg's very good but could be made to work. The step Koni-Nurn is pretty short, it could be widened somehow, reduce Koni ROF to 7.5, think about reverting 360' turrets. There's scope to make minimal changes.

 

On the VMF I'd consider either nerfing Budyonny in fire chance/HE damage or doing as you suggest and bringing in a non-premium Molotov, though that will need to be handled carefully with the premium out there and already doing incredibly well. If you make the line Molotov weaker than the premium you have p2win. If you make it as good you're not really nerfing the VMF T6 as Prem-molotov is even better than Budy.

 

Nice post - hopefully the devs do something about it before potential MN CL next year...

 

Merry Christmas.