Today I got to see the Glorious Nikolia I

[Abo89]

Not even sure if that's how you spell it, but anyway I'm glad this sucker was on my team. To watch him kill a South Carolina in one shot that had 80% of its health, then a DD and then another BB.... I want one. 

[Destroyer_Zeka]

Not sure what makes it so "glorious." If I had a dollar for every time I've rekt one of those I'd be a rich man. 

[Seraphil]

It's not THAT amazing.  A strong ship certainly, but you can honestly pull a lot of the same stunts with a Wyoming or a Kaiser.  One point to consider is a lot of Nikolai players bought her in the short time she was on sale two years ago, so they have experience under their belt as well.

[Peacemaker100]

4 minutes ago, Abo89 said:

Not even sure if that's how you spell it, but anyway I'm glad this sucker was on my team. To watch him kill a South Carolina in one shot that had 80% of its health, then a DD and then another BB.... I want one. 

 

I dunno.  I kinda wrecked one in my Wyoming.

[Abo89]

Just now, Seraphil said:

It's not THAT amazing.  A strong ship certainly, but you can honestly pull a lot of the same stunts with a Wyoming or a Kaiser.  One point to consider is a lot of Nikolai players bought her in the short time she was on sale two years ago, so they have experience under their belt as well.

I don't have a tone of games in the Wyoming, but I never deleted another BB at 80% or more health, no matter what tier. I also do pretty well in the Wyoming in general. You just font have enough guns to do that.

[Abo89]

1 minute ago, Peacemaker100 said:

 

I dunno.  I kinda wrecked one in my Wyoming.

It's def a class cannon but 12 gun broadside of massive guns are nothing the ignore. 

[DerKrampus]

What makes the Nikolai so tough is the fact that she can bow tank whilst bringing 9 guns to bear.  Their layout allows it to show only minimal side in doing so.

On a related note, the Nelson/Rodney will likely play similarly, oddly enough.  Their #3 turret is forward-facing, unlike the Izumo's rear-facing one.  

[Seraphil]

4 minutes ago, Abo89 said:

I don't have a tone of games in the Wyoming, but I never deleted another BB at 80% or more health, no matter what tier. I also do pretty well in the Wyoming in general. You just font have enough guns to do that.

Wyoming and Nikolai have the same number of guns, just 6x2 vs. 4x3.

[Abo89]

Just now, Seraphil said:

Wyoming and Nikolai have the same number of guns, just 6x2 vs. 4x3.

Yea but Wyoming has way lighter rounds and does 3600 less damage. I'm just saying out of all the games I've played and watched I've never seen a Wyoming do what this ship did. To top it off the SC was angled a good bit.

[HazeGrayUnderway]

The shot grouping on Imp.Nik.I is leagues the best in the tier ffor all the BBs there.  DerKrampus also brought up other points of this ship that make her stand out so well.  The ship is so good, that in the old MM when Tier IV could still fight Tier VI, she held up well.

 

The ship has 2 weaknesses:  Good DD players with torps and Carriers.  Cruisers and Battleships she simply chews up.  Provided you maximize Imp.Nik.I's unique presentation of firepower and angling, she'll be quite strong.

[Goodwood_Alpha]

Nikolai also has a 36-second reload, virtually useless AA, and her turrets are a bit on the rusty side, plus as Mouse rightly points out, her premium camouflage is color-coded for your benefit: don't shoot at the darkest blue, but try to land on the lighter blue and white areas for epic normal pens. She's also a bit pokey and her secondaries are slow to reload (10 seconds).

Basically, she's a second-line battleship that's incredibly accurate, tougher to light on fire and is superb at bow-tanking for her tier. But the things that make her shine so bright are also things that actually take a good measure of skill to take advantage of to their fullest.

tl;dr: She's not going to turn a potato into a unicum.

[_hat_]

Cheer up, Abo. Come Christmas, they might sell the secret Santa crates again. A lot of folks got them from the crates last year.

[Abo89]

10 minutes ago, _hat_ said:

Cheer up, Abo. Come Christmas, they might sell the secret Santa crates again. A lot of folks got them from the crates last year.

[Kapitan_Wuff]

Strong armor for bow tanking and good angles on her first three turrets. But not as OP as people like to claim. The guns are not so special, sounds like they just got really lucky to take that ship out in a single salvo.

[Unabletony]

Take this replay from Jingles:

While not OP, it can in the hands of a very, very good player. Her vertical dispersion is almost virtually none existent (she does still have it), but it's so minimal, and that's why most shots land.

[centarina]

I am not afraid of one in my zuchini  :D

[Zero_Kelvin]

Eh, Nikolai is sub-par to me. Have never really seen it as anything remarkable.

[Mizzerys_Fate]

I got mine in a $3 Santa crate.

[NashW8]

The last two I've seen didn't last long. They weren't exactly expertly driven either.

[VTAdmiral]

I make it a point to feed a fist-full of torpedoes to every red Nikolai I see. The people that tend to play them are the most smug, self-absorbed pricks I've ever encountered. It's immensely satisfying to sink them in my Fujin.

[Komrade_Rylo]

Ark beta is better than Nikolai since she got access to the -11% to dispersion mod. Plus she has more range, 16.7km vs Nikolai's meh 14.1km range.

[AnatolyDyatlovDidNothing]

4 hours ago, BlueMistPvP said:

Not sure what makes it so "glorious." If I had a dollar for every time I've rekt one of those I'd be a rich man. 

If i had a dollar for everyone i've wrecked in my Nikolai i'd be 10 times richer still. 

[Wolcott]

Regardless of Nikolai's drawbacks, they're still not enough to convince WG to sell it again. Even if it did appear in the premium shop in future it would probably be some extravagant bundle à la Pz IIJ.

[ARandomClaymore]

7 hours ago, _hat_ said:

Cheer up, Abo. Come Christmas, they might sell the secret Santa crates again. A lot of folks got them from the crates last year.

That's how I acquired mine and so many more premium ships for such little $$$. Fun ship. Hate the reload time...haha

[SniperAurora]

I got it for $1 from the santa crates lol