Mechwarrior Online Explained & Reviewed... the Noob/Beginner Friendly Version.

Hi everyone,

As promised I am here to do a early week review now I am feeling better. I said  was going to have a second look at MechWarrior Online having played it for a while now and have a better idea of how the game works. Following on from the information I gave you with my last MechWarrior post I had progressed through my cadet period and bought my first Mech, The King Crab. Since this point I have been working on bolstering my Mechs arsenal to help get a more rounded opinion of the game as a new player. I found it pretty confusing at first to get my head round so thought I would put this together this week to help new players or you if your interested getting into the swing of things.

The game has 4 different tiers of Mechs ranging from a small light to a hulking assault. Each Mech presents different challenges mostly based firstly on its classification but also on how the Mech is configured. I realise this is quite vague so let me explain. Assaults are like walking armoured battle monsters, they are built to take hits but dish out the hurt where lights are skittish skirmishers that are lightning fast but carry only a small amount of weaponry. In a straight up gun fight a assault would almost certainly win but when you consider the manoeuvrability of a light compared to how fast a assault is capable of moving or turning, it incredibly hard to get those guns to bare. Weaponry placement can give definitive advantages where most weaponry are rendered useless in certain environment conditions.

WolfHound Light Mech

Zeus Assault Mech

Mediums are what bridge the gap between lights and heavies. They are fast versatile platforms and have a higher tonnage limit than lights but sacrifice the speed for better armour and armaments. Heavy Mechs are the glass cannons of MechWarrior, being able to bring a large array of weaponry to the front whilst maintain the relative fragility of a medium. Heavy Mechs lose a bit moremobility compared a medium to sport this extra weaponry. Assaults are armour and bristling with guns, slow but powerful they are easily separated from a fast moving group. Given support and a oppertunity to bring their firepower to the fight they are unrivaled in power output.  This is my very crude analogy of what you can expect from the classes but there are Mechs that are more half way houses between classes what accommodate to variation within classes.

Armour in MechWarrior is life. The more you have the more hits you can take, pretty self explanatory. The Mech itself is split into 11 segments (left/right arms, left/right legs, left/right torso, back left/right torso, central core, back central core and the head) Each Mech has an limit of how much armour can be assigned to each segment of the Mech meaning that the enemy has to work through that armour to reach your internals. When this happens internals can be damaged, destroyed or even blown completely off.

Paper Doll Damage Meter

In game your current Mech condition is represented by a paper doll of your Mech at the bottom left of your screen. As you take fire the paper doll changes colour based on the condition or the segment that has taken hits. As you can see from the image above, the paper doll has each segment on the front and back highlighted with a block colour. Each one of these segments then has a outer layer or line running around it. The outer layer represents your armour on that segment while the inner block represents the internal condition. As you take damage the armour will take damage first on the outer layer changing first from yellow to orange, then to red.  Eventually after enough fire the outer armour will disappear from the paper doll meaning that the armour has been stripped from that segment exposing the soft and juicy internals to be picked at by enemy fire. if that segment continues to take fire it too will change colour similar to how the armour did but instead on the internal block. When the internal block goes red and then disappears that segment is then destroyed along with anything that was inside it. If that happens to be your engine, your power source, then that means a very dead Mech.

The game lives and dies on its ability to allow players to customise there Mechs. A player can have relative freedom to place what ever weapon they want in a Mech variant as long as there are hard points, tonnage and critical space to spare. A player can choose the go with the biggest weapon their Mech will allow them to take but they have to balance this fire power with other factors. How much heat will it generate verses the overall cooling for your Mech, how heavy this weapon is in compared to how much tonnage can take or whether it is better have smaller weapons paired with a bigger engine. On top of these considerations the placement of the weapon upon the Mech contributed to how you will be using your weapon as well as your robot in combat.

Each different Mech has pros and cons that you have to aware of when playing MechWarrior Online. For example, the Hunchback Mech has the ability to house large weapons in its right shoulder. This shoulder position means the weapons are high mounted on the Mech which is ideal for peeking over ridges. The cons are that people can see where your weapons are mounted on your Mech and will generally gun for that right shoulder in an effort to destroy it. Once the right torso is destroyed it will take all its weapons with it including the right arm attached. Most Hunchbacks are able to carry weapons in the left arm and head but having that right torso destroyed really dents your fire power potential. 

Hunchback Mech

When playing a Hunchback knowing where your weapons are placed allows you to play accordingly. Your Mech is separated into 11 parts as I described earlier and having all your weapons in your right torso means you know the exact area to protect against incoming fire. turning away from the incoming fire to protect your right side means you can use your left side of your mech effectively as a shield. This will mean that your left side will take all the damage meant for your right keeping you in the fight for longer. This is called torso twisting. It is good practice to do this technique even if you aren't trying to protect a certain area as this spreads the damage across more segments of the mech. Not allowing any one segment to take focused damage means it won't present such an obvious weak spot if people have you targeted.

Once you have progressed past your cadet period and have between 8-11 million credits you will have enough to finally buy your first mech and move away from the trial mechs. This enables your to start customising your weaponry and general build of your mech to suit your play style. When Building your Mech in your Mechbay you have a large choice to customise your Mech. This can be quite daunting at first as you are presented by quite a complex load out screen. The load out screen is where you put everything into your mech that will aid you in combat, whether this is armour, your engine, heat management or weaponry this all happens here. You will be trying to find that balance of manageability, survivability and also set up that suits your play style so its needless to say you will be spending a fair amount of time here.

Mech builds start either by loading up your weaponry then using the remaining tonnage for an engine or fitting the engine first with the speed you like to travel at and then creating a weapon arrangement. All mechs have critical components such as the engine and cockpit, that it cannot operate without. The engine will always have space assigned in the central torso and the cockpit will always be in the head. If either of the segments containing the critical components are destroyed you will be out of the match.

The engine within a mech presents the player with a choice. Engines come in 2 variant types, these are standard engines or XL engines. Each variant has pros and cons so its best to understand what these are before choosing what to do with. Standard engines are heavy, are situated only in the Central Torso and tend to be considerably cheaper in comparison to XL Variants. XL Engines are more expensive but they are considerable lighter, weighing half the amount of standard engines. This weight save will allow you to take more weaponry or take a better class of engine for faster movement but at the cost of survivability. An XL Engine not only takes up the Central torso but also 3 spaces in both the left and right torso. This means that if your left, right or central torso is destroyed you will be dead out of the match. The standard engine Mech has the ability to lose both its left and right torso and still be able to survive and fight with just its central torso intact. To take a XL engine you are knowingly making yourself more vulnerable to free up extra tonnage.

Some Mechs are what people in Mechwarrior like to call XL Friendly. This can mean that with some mechs it is very easy to protect your side torso by turning your torso and allowing the arms to shield the damage . A good example of this is the Wolverine Mech which has arms that when turning the mech to its side over the whole side and central torso. In some mechs however they live or die by their speed advantage so taking a XL is made mandatory by that. Some mechs choosing an XL just isn't a option as its too easy to single out side torso areas but this is something you will be deciding for yourself when building your mech.

Heat is a major part of MechWarrior and is a big consideration when in the load out screen so I will take some time to explain this mechanic here a little before moving further. Firing any weapon will always create a certain amount of heat. A Mech in combat will be able to fire and move as long as it maintains within its safe margin of heat. 

Once a Mech goes beyond its operational heat capacity, it will shut down to avoid damage to its internal components. Needless to say this can create a significant problem for you if in the heat of battle you shut down right in front of your opposing team. A shut down static mech normal takes huge amounts of damage in the time it takes to become operational again. Heat can be manage in a number of ways. First and foremost is firing within your means as not to generate too much heat in combat scenario, although this is very easy to forget in the heat of combat. Other ways to maintain a heat level is to put heat sinks into your mech internal structure slots. This increases your maximum heat capacity the Mech can handle as well as your heat dispensation over time. Heatsinks take up considerable interal structure (a single slot for standard heatsinks and three slots for a double heatsink) space as well as tonnage (1 Ton per heat sink) as a direct trade for heat management. Another not so obvious way is to put a bigger engine in your mech. Bigger engines have higher heat capacities than smaller engines so not only have a speed advantage but a heat advantage as well. Heat shut downs can be over ridden but pushing the heat boundary past 100% will most often destroy your mech.

A fun but not really efficient build as you tend to kill yourself more often than the enemy will kill you

Weapons such as Energy are the biggest heat generators where Ballistic Weapons tend to be the lowest as a general rule. Ballistic weapons, as a draw back, need ammo and tend to be heavier than energy weapons. Ammo can also be destroyed and blow up if critically damaged. Energy Weapons normally require you to stack as many heat sinks as possible and still leave your mech more prone to shutting down due to heat. This is all a part of balancing your build to best suit the battlefield

Heat of a level also plays a part in this game as well as environmental effects such as water. Playing on a lava planet means A higher ambient temperature in the atmosphere which in turn effects your cooling performance. This can also be reversely shown when fighting on cold planets the ambient temperature helps your mechs cooling efficiency. Heat sinks also work better if your mech is standing in water, so firing weapons whilst in water grants extra cooling bonuses. 

Above is the Load out screen for my Hunchback 4P. This is a variant that sports only energy weaponry so I have tried to get good balance between speed, fire power, weapon range and protection. Each part of the mech in the load out screen is laid out in different blocks here so you can see how the maximum armour, space and hard points are available for each part. Being a Hunchback there is a lot of fire power focus in the right torso and with this particular variant there are 6 energy slots in it. There are also 1 energy weapon hard points in both arms and one in the head.When setting up my build I wanted to take advantage of the high mounted hard points in the right shoulder to quickly poke over ridge lines with my main armament whilst showing only a small portion of my mech to return fire. Rather than use all my available hard points with weapons I decided to go with fewer heavier weapons that have a longer range. This puts me in into a long range harasser role where I can use my range and speed to relocate and maintain fire on distracted enemies. 

I have another medium that I can do another comparison with called the crab medium Mech. This is a fairly new Mech just released into the game with the same tonnage as the Hunchback. It plays very differently to the Hunchback mainly due to the weapon positioning but also the design of the mech.

My Crab 27R

The Crab Mech lends to have most of its weaponry places in its arms and lower torso which you can see in comparison to its body are quite low slung. To be able to use this in a ridge fight I would have to come right over a ridge, exposing a large percentage of my mech to be able to fire my weapons. In the Hunchback its weaponry is located high in its shoulder, so its more suited to the ridge style combat than this Crab Mech. To counteract this I have put a very large XL engine in it to allow it to move faster about the battlefield. Moving fast makes your hard to hit and gives the enemy a smaller window to hit you when poking round corners or over ridges to fire. This is all down to the incredible speed of the Mech. Being fast also means you can get out of bad situations where perhaps an slower Mechs just wouldn't be able to. I built this mech more as a skirmisher to support bigger mechs. Having the Speed to get in and out, delivering a punch with its medium to close range weapons works very well in conjunction with its weapon placement. Both the Hunchback and Crab have similar weapon load outs but due to the style of the mech and its design I have choose to build them with different styles of combat in mind. 

My Crab 27R Build

There is always more than one variant of the same type of Mech. Each variant will either have a different choice of weapon types it can equip or allow weapons to be attached in different places. Some Variants also give specific advantages over others such as information gathering (electronic warfare), Jump jets and speed boosts. For example you have seen my Hunchback 4P variant but below is my Hunchback Gridiron. The variant focuses mainly on ballistic weapons where most build have a powerful Gauss Rifle equip or a big AC 20 stuffed tightly into its right shoulder. I preferred a faster firing DPS weapon load out for suppression which works well with how I play. For this I loaded dual Ultra AC 5's. This mech is not the fastest of mediums but has a powerful punch is given the ability to go to work on an enemy. You will notice that due to the Ballistic nature of this build my mech does not need as many heat sinks but requires tonnage  and space to fit ammunition for my ultra AC 5 cannons. Missile weaponry works in a likewise fashion to Ballistic weaponry where you have to allocate ammo space and weight for your mech. Missile weaponry is very powerful when used right but requires locks to fire some weaponry effectively or to be within brawling distance to be within range. Missiles also suffer from having a minimum range for LRM's or very short maximum range for SRM's so it something to keep in mind if you are looking to stack missile weapons. My gird Iron has space for missiles in its left shoulder but I opted to go for a ballistic heavy build. I thought I could use my left shoulder and arm more like a shield to incoming fire whilst laying down fire with my right. 

 

My Hunchback Gridiron

My Hunchback Gridiron Loadout

Electronic Warfare in MechWarrior is slowly becoming more important to the game. Whether this is giving you a speedy readout on your adversary mech to know where to shoot or to be able to provide locks for allies to fire missiles at your targeted enemy it is a very under rated contributor to the flow if this game. MechWarrior is currently going through a complete rebalance where a larger focus is being put on this so I feel that this really needs some explanation for a new player coming into MechWarrior online. 

When fighting in MechWarrior you become accustom to pressing 'R' in order to target an enemy mech. Doing this allows you to lock on with missile weapons and, given some time, see the weapon load out of the enemy Mech as well and also see its current condition of its paper doll segments.

Above you can see an Enemy Centurion that I have targeted. A hollow red triangle appears above the Mechs at first when it is in line of sight and within my sensor range. When targeted the triangle turns to a solid. The mechs read out appears shortly after a full lock at the top right of my screen. This will shows me its load out and condition of the mech represented by its own paper doll. In this case the Centurion has 2 medium lasers, 1 LRM (long range missile) and an AC 10. The AC 10 is written in red meaning it has been destroyed in the right arm whilst the others are written in yellow. I can also see that the right arm has been stripped of its armour and the internals structure of that arm has taken damage. Locking onto an enemy like this provides the rest of your team to be able to target him without gaining line of sight. This is useful for missle carrying Mechs as they will not need to see him to acquire a lock for their LRM's (long range missles).

Electronic Warfare provides information for players and is a major factor of how I would further attack this mech. Without this read out of the mech I wouldn't have been able to tell that the arm weapon was destroyed and due to it smoking I would have probably wasted time and ammo trying to take that arm off the centurion when I could have been focusing fire on other parts of the mech. 

ECM is the most common form of electronic warfare. This stops an enemy mech showing up on your sensors, denying lock ons for missile baring mechs and detailed readouts on mech conditions. The ECM is a very powerful tool in allowing flanking moves as more players are solely reliant on the hollow red triangle pop up to spot enemies when their mechs enter their mechs sensor range. In an age of crappy repetitive first person shooters you would think the general gaming community would be better at spotting other mechs without the aid of sensors but in my experience that just isn't so. 

A trollish if not funny way of using ECM to great effect.

ECM can be countered with a number of different modules or sensor equipment. A Beagle Active Probe speeds up your targeting time reducing the time taken to get a target mechs condition and load out information It also counters ECM with its range. Seismic sensors detects vibrations within 180m of a stationary mech and displays them on your mini map as red blips. This enables you to react to threat that haven't been spotted , such as ECM mechs, or to get an idea of how many mechs may be over a ridge line before you poke over it. 

All mechs have a range at where enemy sensors will display you on their screen with a hollow red triangle above your head. Light Mechs have the shortest range of detection where Assualt Mechs have the longest. Staying at long range to scout the enemy will act like having a ECM where you won't show up on sensors and can observe their movements to inform your team. You are still visible to anyone who is scouring the horizon for mech like silhouettes but you are less likely to be immediately spotted like if you were within sensor range and not covered by ECM.

At this point I have covered most of the core game play aspects so I will start with my general opinion on how the game is in its current state. I won't have covered everything but if you are serious about playing the game you will probably figure these intricacies by playing yourself. The game is going through a complete rebalance to address some issues that have cropped up with the addition of Mechs from different parts of the Mech Universe, Power creep of Mechs and more importantly the introduction of Clan Mechs. It's safe to say that most of these issues will be known by the dev team and are currently been worked on to correct but doesn't stop players using these advantages to their fullest. 

Before I delve into the in-discrepancies of the game, which when it comes to being critical about games is frankly to easy to do. I want to sing some of its praises first as I think this game deserves it. This game has an amazing rich history which from just playing this game and interacting with some of the community makes me want to explore. The people that play it are one of the best Multiplayer communities I have ever been a part of. Anyone that has played World of Tanks, World of Warcraft or any First Person Shooter games knows how horrible and toxic online communities can be. I haven't found Mechwarrior Online to be like this at all and to my surprise most people are willing to talk like human beings and give advice to new players. NoGutsNoGalaxy (NGNG) is a group supported by Piranha Games (PGI) that are specifically there to engage with the community by being a bridge between the devs and gamer. The do alot of work with the Mechwarrior community in general and have a couple of community managers that work at PGI that front the NGNG site in their own time.

The game itself if very fun and has a solid grounding that can only get better. I grew up with Mech Games playing Armoured Core but completely Missed Mechwarrior in my bid to satisfy my big robot appetite but better late than never I got myself involved in this Title. The customisation of how you load your mech makes this game great. It gives a player choices to effect their battle experience. This customisation creates a sort of divergent game play aspect set aside from the core battle experience. It is easy to balance and tweak your builds trying to find the perfect blend of heat management, speed, weaponry, information warfare and armour for hours on end. I regularly play a match which fives me a moment to reflect whether I should have taken all that ammo or invested in more cooling after shutting down and having my brains blown out whilst futilely bashing the heat shut-down override button. However grim that that sounds this aids the customisation as I can go back and reassign space and tonnage until I get a build that works for me.

The ability to assign your individual weapons into weapons groups allows you to fire weapons mounted on your weapons either all at once or sequentially. This helps the player to assign top mounted weapons to a button for ridge peaking or weapons on the right and left assigned to buttons so you can poke around corners and fire all your weapons that won't be obscured by the cover you are using. This is very driven towards players with more than 2 buttons on their mouse and does alienate people without. I don't have a gaming mouse that would work with this so have had to suffer the delights of mashing difficultly placed keyboard buttons to get some weapons to work but this is my problem of finding the keyboard hot key arrangement that works for me rather than the game. The ability to do this however gives the player more customisation to their game play style. ballistics are so much more satisfying to fire sequentially due to their suppressive nature and everyone that seems to get hit by them goes on the torso twisting offensive to spread the damage. Energy weapons also become much easier to manage heat when firing singularly or in manageable groups.

The art style and design of the Mechs is gritty and satisfying. I mentioned before that I liked their design as they are conservative and believable. Designs of imaginary Mechs tend to have their centre of mass so far offset is would need a special propping up device or just serve a vastly over sized paperweight with exaggerated spike like wings. Not that I mind that kind of design style as I do enjoy watching Gundam after all but its refreshing to see a military approach to design of something fantasy rather than going balls to the wall over the top with twinkling gadgets,wizardry and frankly unbelievable additions to the machine.

Gundam Wing Zero

I do have some problems with the game and here beings my rants with the bad points. As for light Mechs there isn't much incentive to pilot them. Lights and Assaults by community vote the hardest Mechs to be in. Where Assaults can be generally more forgiving with their more robust armour Lights your are punished if you make a mistake. As a Light you forgo the ability to hold bristling heavy weaponry and large amouts of armour to be fast. To scout and harass the enemy but on the flip side there is no incentive to do this. You are not rewarded enough for scouting or just generally doing your as a light.

My next issue is with Clan Mechs. when you set up a game that sets a standard of expectation then bring something into the game that overwrites that with better mechs but still expect other mechs to adhere to the old standards you set, most people would call that unfair. This is where Clan Mechs sit in the world of Mech Warrior Online. These Mechs were not in the original release but were brought out to bring the game in line with the invading clans mechs of the Mech Warrior Universe. These mechs were vastly superior to Inner Sphere Mechs, the ones currently in the game, being better in almost every way. As a story telling line of small numbers of superior weapons subduing less equip adversary's which eventually fight back lends to gripping story line telling. This however does not lend to fair game play when you introduce superior mechs into the match making. I won't go into the vast details of where the all advantages lie but I will outline some of the most prominent.

Clan Omni pods allow you to interchange parts of the mech which dictate what weaponry that can be mounted in that segment of the mech. This means you can choose the best possible load out for any mech to work with your build unlike inner sphere mechs that have to work around them. XL Engines in Clans do not kill you or have any disadvantages if you lose one of your left or right torsos, you have to lose both to be killed. This means that there really isn't a disadvantage to taking XL Engines in a clan leaving them more tonnage to carry bigger weaponry. This in essence forces Inner sphere mechs to take XL engines to stay competitive. Inner sphere mechs are supposed to be more tanky but XL engine loading obviously reduces your survivability more in inner sphere than in a Clan Mech. Mechwarrior Online does have a large array of mechs but I feel that with certain Mech introductions they have made some mechs redundant.

Ghost heat is also a issue I have with the game as well being that isn't not really very well presented to the player. This was a effort to curb players stacking multiples of the same weaponry by creating extra heat generation but shooting multiples of the same weapon. This however made players look for what they call 'Meta Builds' which is the best possible load out for a given mech. After a while of playing this game you see many of the same mechs in most games and this is because players are running to these high damage Meta Builds to stomp on players that are not. This is not to say a non meta build isn't effective as anything with a weapon can be effective if used right but this is players exploiting gaps in the system to get advantages over others. I'm not saying this is wrong, its completely legal in game but this is a clear indication that players have found a exploit to get a edge in the game.

These Issues I have with the game are in the stages of being rebalanced by Piranha Games so won't be a persistent problem in the future. That the development team is devoted to creating a better game by revising its core systems of a expansive game shows its dedication to creating a good game. Despite the draw backs of releasing mechs that have essentially caused problems in the game I still find this game incredibly fun. I like that it is very team focused and working alongside other rewards you more with dominating in random matches. The games pace is not balls to the wall fast so gives you time to really think about your actions before you do them. I love this games divergent game play that comes from thinking about mechs and their design. You are actively looking to fill a role when designing your mech and I have had endless hours looking at arrangements for my variants. This game as a base has a promising base and with the incoming additions that are proposed, may be one to closely follow.

Thats all for this review... I'm sure your all thinking it was a bit longer than normal but that's to make up for my crappy immune system denying me my early week post last week. Till later this week, take care and I will see you back here for my Tiger update (now to do enough work on it in 2 days to write about....yes I am crap with time scaling).

World of Warships New Premium The Tirpitz Battleship, The Efficient German

Hi all and welcome back for another Ship review for World of Warships!

The Incredible Opening Trailer for World of Warships

This week I will be featuring the new German Addition to World of Warships the Tirpitz. There has been a lot of hype leading up to this ships release along side the German tech tree. Now this ship has had little over a week to bed into the game, I though this would be a perfect time to give a little on the ships history development and express my opinions on the ship in game.

The Tirpitz didn't have a very exciting service history but the lengths that the British went to to destroy the Tirpitz from its construction to its sinking were extraordinary and are definitely worth of some mention (or alot as this is my longest post to date).

Shore Shot of the Finished Tirpitz

The Tirpitz began its life as a small cog in the wheel of what was known as 'Plan Z' that was developed by Erich Raeder throughout 1938. After World War 1 and the following restrictions laid down by the 'Treaty of Versailles' made sure that German Naval power was extremely limited as to avoid something simular to WW1 to ever happen again. 'Plan Z' was essentially a naval power development program whose goal was to re-equip the German Navy with enough power to challenge the British Navy.

Within the founding design of Plan Z The Bizmark and the Tirpitz were just the start to this grand design to rebuild the German naval fleet. Proceed these ships were plans to build larger more aggressive battleships that the world have never known before. These were the H Class battleships.  These designs only existed in blueprints but they were set to dwarf all known designs of battleship ever conceived, even the mighty Japanese battleship Yamato. The largest of the H designs was the H44 that would have weighed a estimated 155,000 tonnes, been 400 meters long and house eight gigantic 508mm guns.

The Gigantic H44 Design Battleship

The Tirpitz was laid down in 1936 and launched in 1941. At the time of her launch she was 25% bigger than what the Treaty of Versailles allowed. After wartime modifications she was the heaviest battleship ever built by a European Navy. The ship at the time of her launch was impressively armoured and equip for war. She was fast being able to reach speeds of almost 40mph and was able to fire her projectiles over 20 miles. To the British having already faced off with the Bizmark knew the threat that the Tirpitz posed to a Island nation of Britain. The sinking of HMS Hood stood testament to that. A ship like the Tirpitz having the ability to strike with high speed with big guns,  if left unmolested or allowed to break out into the Atlantic Ocean could reek havoc in the shipping lanes. These lanes were the lifeline that supplied the UK with enough food and materials to not be starved into surrender. Churchill saw the Tirpitz as one the biggest threats to the UK and was determined to disrupt or destroy the Battleship at all costs.

The Tirpitz 

March the 28th 1942 saw one of the boldest operations in the British offensive to disrupt the Tirpitz. The mission was simple, knock out the only dock large enough to repair or service a ship of that size in sailing range of the Atlantic Ocean. By destroying this base it would effectively limit the operation area of which the Tirpitz could be a threat to Britain in. 600 British Commandos moved towards the Harbour against a defending force of over 6000 troops disguised as a German flotilla. This was inevitably going to be a one way trip for many of the troops with the odds so heavily stacked against them and no way of being able to retreat. The flotilla ruse worked in allowing the Commandos entrance to the harbour where they beginning their attack. In the Action the Campbeltown Destroyer I42 rammed the dry dock of the Saint-Nazaire harbour allowing the commando's landing quick landing onto the dock but disabling the ship. After the intense fighting between the Germans and British Commandos the fighting came to an end by either the capturing killing or capturing of British troops. The Campbeltown sat firmly in the in the wall of the dry dock harbour and the German forces boarder to search the ship. After the all clear was given the german troops settled down to celebrate their victory.

The Campbletown Wedged Firmly into the Harbour Wall

The search of the Campbeltown was not thorough enough and missed the large amounts of explosives hidden deep within her hull. Just before noon 4 tonnes of high explosives erupted in a massive mushroom cloud, sowing panic and either killing or wounding over 200 German solders near the ship. The explosion had completely destroyed the dry dock rendering the harbours ability to be able to be a base for the Tirpitz's intended battles in the Atlantic.

Following this set back and a few further unsuccessful brutish air attacks the Tirpitz was ordered to Kaafiord in Norway to put her out of reach from any British Air attack launched from within the UK. The ships new position was ideally situated to strike at convoys travelling between Britain and Russia, something the Russians sorely needed to stay open to aid their fight against the German. The Brits decided to take a new approach at tackling the German menace that had thus far avoided any serious damage from numerous air raids. The decision was made for a more stealthier approach, a under water strike with manned vessels.

Following Britains first failed operation using submersible torpedoes called 'chariots' to attach explosive charges to the Tirpitz hull, a new operation was initiated using Midget subs or X Craft. The Tirpitz by this point was defended a vast array of field guns, machine gun nests and torpedo nets in a bay that gave the defenders a natural fortress.

Torpedo Nets Can Be Seen from Aerial Shots.

When the Operation was in progress and the subs were approaching the mission area only 2 of the 3 X Craft launched made it to strike the Tirpitz.  After the 2 X Craft snook into the bay behind a smaller patrol vessel the crews found themselves behind the Torpedo nets and with the Tirpitz clearly in sight. Explosives were successfully attached to the Tirptiz's hull before the crews allowed themselves be captured. The proceeding detonations caused crippling damage to the ships infrastructure, buckling the hull of the ship. The turbines had been destroyed in the blast and the the rudder was severely damaged. Not only did this mean a lengthy period of repair work following the X Craft attack, it was a huge moral set back for her crew. For a ship that many hoped would be at the forefront of glory and German supremacy she had so far only fired her guns in anger once at shore targets.

A Midget Sub or X Craft Sub

Following this attack Churchill ordered a huge air attack on the Tirpitz on the 3rd of April 1944 with 41 new Barracuda dive bombers with Corsair escort to which little effect was done. Churchill was at wits end. Every attack sent failed to deliver the decisive blow he craved to secure waters around Britain. Churchill turned to Barnes Wallice, the infamous inventor of the bouncing bomb, for a final solution the would end danger imposed by the Tirpitz. Barnes Wallace's response to this challenge was the invention of the impressive but truly terrifying 'Tall Boy' Bomb.

The Tall Boy was 20 ft long and weighed in at about 12,000 lb (5443 Kg). The blast craters left in testing were up to 100 ft wide and 35 ft deep, a purely destructive weapon perfect for destroying any target it would hit. Churchill called on the infamous 617 squadron to carry out this risky precision bombing exercise on the Tirpitz. This squadron had already made a name for itself after successfully carrying out the famous bouncing bomb run that destroyed the dams in Germany's Ruhr Valley.

The Famous Bouncing Bomb

On the first bombing attempt 27 Lancaster Bombers from the 617 had to travel to a remote Russian Air Base to be within striking distance of the Tirpitz in Norway and await clear weather. When the operation was green lit and the 617 squadron was  approach the bay where the Tirpitz was sleeping, the defensive smoke generators were activated in response to the incoming air attack. The smoke released had almost covered the Tirpitz and the bay in smoke making bombing the Tirpitz even more difficult. The Tall boy was extremely expensive so the crews were told only to drop the bomb if they thought it could hit the intended target. Many of the 27 Lancaster bombers didn't drop their payload but from the ones that did one tall boy hit its mark near the bow of the ship. The blast was huge leaving a mangled gaping hole where the bomb had struck. This hit had rendered the ship more or less useless as a sea vessel due to the extensive structural damage sustained and the decision was made to move the ship to a a static location where she could act as floating artillery.

The Tirpitz was moved to Tromso and was placed in shallow waters to act as a floating artillery platform. Special bed on the bay were constructed so that if the ship was to take on water and sink she would just rest on the bottom and still be able to fight. This move to Tromso was a vital mistake put her within striking distance of Lancaster bombers launched from the UK. On near perfect conditions on 12th of November 1944 the 617 squadron set out again. The Luffwafer air base set up near the Tirpitz to defend her in the event of a air attack scrambled in response to the incoming attack but went to the wrong location leaving the Bomber a clear attack run to hit the Tirpitz.

Tall Boys Explode Around the Tirpitz During the Attack

29 Tallboy's were dropped and the ship took 2 direct hits and one near miss. Several of the Tallboys hit close enough to disrupt the sea bed and the sand bank specifically built to cushion the Tirpitz in the even that she was to sink. The first hit struck the deck between turrets Anton and Bruno but failed to explode. The second hit amid ships between the catapult and  funnel ripping open a huge hole and causing massive damage to the ship. The blast had ripped a hole from the side of the ship to the bottom; an entire section of belt armour had been obliterated by the blast.  The third seemed to have struck to the port side of Turret Caesar blasting more holes below the water line. The ferocious bombing cause the ship gradually list to port. As the list increase further and approached 45 degrees and as the ship looked as if she would stabilise, the Turret Caeser detonated blasting the turret roof and parts 25 meters into the air that landed back into the water ontop of a group of men swimming to safety. The damage sustained had exceeded the threshold that the mighty Tirpitz could handle in a final explosive show of fury, the once monstrous beast rolled over capsizing in surrender.

The Hull of the Tirpitz after Her Capsizing

Over 5 years the ship was attacked over 40 times and never got to achieve the glorious nature she was built for. The dogged determination and grit of the British had finally made the ship succumb. The Tirpitz's service to the German nation never more strategic than that of actual battle, tying up available ships that would have otherwise been used else where to defend British interests. Churchill's main concern was worried that she may interfere with the D Day landings due to her location in Norway. In the end, like most of the biggest Battleships of the second world war, the ship succumbed to relentless air attack. 

Wow that was a bit of a mouthful but this ship is definitely worth the time it took to rustle up the history on this ship. It cause a real headache for the British Navy and Air force and even though its service history in the was lacking a heroic battle. The plans to sink her couldn't have been more interesting to read so I Just couldn't miss them out in telling the story of the Tirpitz.

So down to the Business of talking about how this ship performs in World of Warship. What are my initial thoughts on this ship? The Tirpitz can boast that it is the best well rounded ship I have played to date in World of Warships. All being said this ship is on sale for little over £40 and in my opinion that is way too much regardless of how good this ship is.

Since leaving the Closed Beta battleships have just not been that fun for me. Shooting the Guns mostly rely on praying to RNGesus to grace you with his light whilst suffering splicing shot after splicing shot. This is made worse when trying to shoot ships at close range and your shots miss by a fricking mile. This is a problem that will largely now have been fixed in the new patch (wargaming are massively boosting Battleship accuracy for ranges under 3km) but still when you have a very slow reload time and miss all your shots, your pretty much waiting to die by horrible torpedo death. This has made many battleship captains as far back from the fight to counteract the close range 'Armageddon' cause by the nimble destroyer in close quarters. The ensuing passive play style is, in my opinion, on of the main contributing factors why most matches end up in draws in World of Drawships current state.

I have had some serious fun in the Tirpitz and I put this down to the fact this ship reacts more like a heavy cruiser than a battleship whilst still maintain arsenal and armour. Her 15'' guns are relatively quick firing of 2.3 rounds per minute and have a good turret rotation time at  36 seconds for 180 degrees. This highlights the first main strength that its a good close range brawler against other battleships and cruisers. The Amagi has a turret rotation speed with its top hull of 42 seconds per 180 degrees and the North Carolina has a Turret rotation speed of 45 seconds. Having this speed in acquiring your targets allows you to keep your guns pointed at a target at close range against even destroyers and also gives you the ability to switch between targets at range without waiting for your turrets to turn. This allows the Tirpitz to be more flexible and fire more shells down range than any other battleship close to its tier.

World of Warships, the Tirpitz

The Tirpitz does however have 15'' guns over her equal tiered 16'' gunned Japanese and American battleships. This is a obvious disadvantage when it comes to initial alpha damage output from impacting shots, however there are advantages to having a smaller gun size. The Tirpitzs has a vastly superior fire rate and the rounds have less chance of over penetrating lighter armoured cruisers like the Pensacola. This enables harder hitting shots to targets that may be harder to damage effectively. This combined with decent turret rotation makes these ship a joy rather than a fight to get the most out of them

The dispersion of the shots fired on paper doesn't look very good. 280 meters dispersion at maximum range is pretty bad when you consider the Amagi's 128 meter or the North Carolina's 270 meter dispersion. This dispersion is really off set by that its inaccuracy is as maximum range of its guns. The Tirpitz can fire up to 21.4 km, so when your at normal combat ranges of 15km - 10 km you can assume that the dispersion will be roughly half that which is more than good enough to get hits on any salvo being let off.

I predict this is probably what's going to characterise the German Battleships over the other nations ships having smaller sized fast firing guns. German ships in the second world war had smaller sized guns compared to other nations ships so may lead to this being uniform for the ships to be implemented in the near future (until you consider what ships they wanted to build through Plan Z that could make their way into the line up in the German Tech Tree). I think World of Warships will probably end up implementing the German nations ships as being well rounded DPS ships. Its still hard to see what Wargaming has planned for the nations characteristics until we get at least one more nation to see an average of stat's to compare against to really make that kind of assumption.

Stat Comparisons

The Tirpitz in battleship terms has the ability to manoeuvre pretty well. The ships rudder response speed is extremely fast (for a battleship) to help react quickly to incoming fire or torpedoes. At 21 seconds for pretty damn good for a battleship rudder shift time considering when the Amagi has 25.6 second and the North Carolina has 28.6 seconds respectively.  The turning circle radius is a little disappointing however at 850m (or could be very average but we won't know until another nation is added to see where it sits in nation characteristics) but again this is offset more or less by the ships rudder speed enabling you to get a full lock faster than any other battleship of your tier. 

One advantage this ship has many people talking about it are the addition of torpedoes to a Battleship. This is unique to the battleship class its only the Tirptiz that has them thus far. On both sides of the ship she has a single quadruple torpedo launcher. These Torpedoes do lack in size over the Japanese torpedoes but they are fast (64 knots) and have a 6km range. This makes them incredibly hard to dodge at close range and adds a very potent sting to ships that like to hero run on battleships to sink them (if all the torps hit its almost 55k damage potential).

The biggest weakness of the Tirpitz is its AA potential. This is a battleship that really needs to have cruiser escort to survive any large scale air attack by the enemy. This ship did survive over 40 air raids before her eventual demise at the hands of the 617 squadron so I think this has been a little harsh on balanced in my opinion but its something you will have to adapt to when taking this ship out.

The Swept Lines of This Ship Are Gorgeous

As far as my over all view of the Tirpitz, I really like this ship and will be eagerly awaiting the German line of ships and what they will have to offer. If its more of this it looks like I will be liking them a lot more than the other nations ships. The higher dpm off sets the accuracy of the guns by sheer volume of fire in battleship terms and the turret rotation speed is much more enjoyable diverse play than other battleships. The torpedoes give a nice edge in close quarters but only to be used as a last resort other than a main armament. I have fallen for the noval trap having knowledge of Torps in a battleship and motoring ahead to try use them. As fun as it is to destroy other ships it will end up pushing you too far forward to be able to dodge incoming fire and ultimately lead to a premature death. The armour on the Tirptiz is pretty awesome and with some angling you will cause serious problems for ships firing AP as may will jsut bounce harlessly off. Combine angling with your rudder speed when facing incoming fire and you will be a hard nut to crack when you decide to make a stand. Any CV captain with any sense will single you out as a priority target if he has the sense/chance to hit you. The AA its good enough for self defence against a few planes but a determined attack will really cause you headaches if not a quick trip back to you port. The ships ability to adapt because of its versatile nature makes it a real power house. Its a great ship and a good money earner for in game credits. I think the pricing for many people will be a big deal breaker when thinking about getting this ship. I do love this the ship but still think its very over priced for what it is. In hind sight of just buying this ship to review and experiencing it, I could have just bought a new game for what it cost to get this ship, however I don't regret my purchase the Tirpitz as it has to be played to be understood.

One of My Many Average Games but Shows the Ships Money Making Potential of This Ship

Thats all for this week. I hoped this provided some insite before looking at looking to buy this expensive ship. I will catch you back here for a tiger styled update later on in the week. Till then late care and have fun. 

Imperial Japanese Furutaka

Hi all and welcome back for another ship review.

This weeks ship of focus will be the tier 5 Japanese Furutaka. This is the first cruiser in the game to have 203 mm guns. This 'up gunning' changes how this ship should be played coming from the previous tiers Kuma and Tenryu Class Cruisers.

The Furutaka was the first generation of the Japanese navy's high speed heavy cruisers. With the development of the American Omaha (also in World of Warships) and the British Hawkins class scout cruiser the development of a cruiser capable of dealing with this new threat was needed. Following the earlier experiments from the Yubari cruiser, (See my previous ship review on the Yubari for more info) the lessons learnt from that ship were transferred into the design of the Furutaka. The Furutaka was laid down in the 5th of December 1922 and launched on the 25th of February 1925. Upon her initial commissioning in 1926 she was assigned to the 5th cruiser division until 1931 where the Furutaka was placed in reserve fleet. She underwent significant refits during the 1930's where she was fitted with more fire power and defensive armaments.The Furutaka was fitted with a plane catapult which solved the much complained about problem of having to lower planes into the water before they took off (not particularity handy in an engagement).

Her final refit in 1937 saw the Furutaka received her trademark 201 mm guns that we see in World of Warships (203mm in World of Warships but I'm not going to deliberate over 2mm... they are still big guns for a cruiser), new oil fired boilers and the extra addition of new 'Long Lance' torpedo tube mountings.

Entering WW2 the Furutaka was involved in the invasion of  Guam which happened at about the time of the Attack of Pearl Harbour.  After the successful occupation of Guam and the following attempt at capturing Wake Island which had failed, the Furutaka was assigned to cruiser division 6 where the Japanese successfully mounted a second attack and occupied Wake island on the 22nd of December 1942.

The Furutaka was involved in the Battle of the Coral Sea where she was tasked with the escort of the light carrier Shoho. Following a 2 day attack which started on the 7th of May 1942, the US Carriers USS Yorktown and Lexington succeeded in sinking the Shoho and severely damaged the Shokaku carrier. After the attack Furutaka was tasked with escorting the battered surviving Shokaku carrier to Truk for repairs.

August 1942 in the Battle of Savo Island, the Furutaka took part in an successful attack against an enemy fleet. Under the cover of darkness with flares dropped by spotter planes to silhouette the enemy ships,  the Furutaka accompanied by the cruisers Chokai, Kako, Kinugsasa, Tenryu, Yubari and Destroyer a Yunagi, attacked by firing multiple shells and torpedoes. The resulting battle ended with the Heavy Cruisers USS Astoria, Quincy, Vincennes and HMAS Canberra being sunk. Heavy Cruiser USS Chicago and destroyers Ralph Tabot and Patterson being damaged. On the Japanese side a total of only 6 shell hits were received.

The Furutaka's conflict in the Battle of Cape Esperance (also known as the second batle of savo island) was to be her last after an attacking American fleet successfully managed to cross the fleet containing the Furutaka's 'T'. In the confussion of the Attack the Japanese fleet thought they were under friendly fire and began a 180 degree turn. The Aoba was heavily damaged as the ship exposed her sides in the turn.

The Furutaka fell out of the line of battle to engage Salt Lake City only to find herself coming under fire from the destroyer USS Duncan. After numerous shell hits the Furutaka was put out of action, where she was later to be hit by a Torpedo. Combined with up to 90 shell hits her storage of Type 93 Long Lance Torpedoes seated in her mid decks finally went up from the resulting fires. The Furutaka sank stern first with the loss of 33 and 110 counted as missing. 514 survivors were rescued by 3 passing destroyers. 115 were captured by the American fleet.

In World of warships the Furutaka is a tier 5 cruiser. I have found this a ship that has some draw backs that many players (including myself) have found challenging to grasp. The Japanese get their big caliber 203mm guns on the Furutaka and upwards. Due to this up gunning the Furutaka subsequently suffers from a rate of fire loss which in turn results in a big damage per minute disadvantage against the American nations cruisers . The lack of rounds per minute and slow turning of the turrets mean this is not a brawling ship and seats more in a support ship role. Given the opportunity to put down fire on the enemy the guns can really show its superior caliber. Taking fire and manoeuvring to avoid the shells causes this ship its main problems as I will explain as go through comparing this ship to its alike tiers.

First we will start with the Furutaka's good points. For a Cruiser the Furutaka has a decent health pool and has a good Torpedo armament for a cruiser. The Guns are very punchy and have good burst potential if using cover to your advantage between shots. As the guns are of larger caliber they do more reliable damage against armoured targets so have more chance of citadel hits. As a Japanese Cruiser you have a better concealment rating than your american cruiser equivalents but at 12.2 km this is no destroyer. She has a good top speed too so will be normally up alongside the destroyers in the initial engagement. Unfortunately that's really all this ship has when looking at it on paper.

This ship was oringinally designed to specifically destroy Phoenix/Omaha Cruisers but its horrible turret rotation speed and rate of fire of the guns that really let this ship down in World of Warships. The Omaha (Tier 5 American cruiser) in a straight up gun duel can put out over double the amount of damage per minute than the Furutaka with its guns alone (assuming all shots fired are AP and hit citidels the Furutaka has a DPM of 98700 and the Omaha has a DPM of 213280). Even the Phoenix Cruiser vastly out damages the Furutaka in a one on one duel where in lies the first major weakness of this ship. It just can't dish out the damage when its needed to so leaves you in a arisen of trying to dictate the engagements.

This is the First ship I have looked at and feel it needs a decent buff to make it competitive. Being a Japanese ship with such low  rate of fire you would have thought that the turret speed may be ok to compensate... Nope, its 45 secs for 180 degrees turret rotation... like a battleship (face palm). The Omaha has a 24 second 180 degree turret rotation speed. I could carry on with this but you know where I'm going with this... Bigger in this instance definitely isn't better. The Furutaka does however have a secondary armament that can support up to a spectacular range of 4 km. This short range really isn't going to help you in any instance unless you have a destroyer trying to suicide run you.

The main guns slow rotation speed makes you have to straighten out in dangerous situations to get guns on target. where the ship doesn't really have the armour to take prolonged punishment its definitely a risk business. This makes you an easy target for enemy gunners and in my opinion is the single worst thing about this ship.

Due to turret number 4 due to being next to the plane catapult, it has a limited firing arc. In most situations won't be able to fire that turret at what ever your aiming at as you should be angling your armour against fire to maximum the ships armour potential and make yourself a smaller target.

This isn't the most manoeuvrable of cruisers, having quite a large turning circle and slower rudder shift speed for a cruiser. Its not terrible or unworkable when it comes to dodging incoming fire or torpedoes but its still not up to the American cruisers standard. The manoeuvrability mixed with the ships decent speed working fairly well when getting out of dangerous situations however but doesn't have such a superior speed advantage where you could run away from other cruisers. The speed is good enough to chase most fleeing destroyers down so that's definitely a plus for the Furutaka

This really looked to be a terrible ship to play when as I am working my way along the Japanese Cruiser line again. It has some very horribly noticeable weaknesses that are by no means hard to miss. Surprise however when I played in this ship it didn't completely suck. Knowing its blatant weaknesses and playing this ship as a burst damage support ship seems to suit the Furutaka's characteristics of play.

You will not be brawling in this ship as you won't rotate your turrets fast enough to keep up with throwing the ship about and targets circling you.  The guns are reliable in that they do decent damage consistently upon hitting their target. She does seem to be better armoured than the american tier 5 light cruiser and does benefit from angling the armour from incoming cruiser/destroyer caliber AP shells. Getting into engagements where you can work as a team and sit behind close range specialist brawlers. Keeping attention away from you whilst dishing out damage with the bigger guns is the way to use this ship. Going alone against other ship will get you focused down quickly and it can be frustrating knowing you are getting your ass handed to you by rapid firing lower tiered ships spamming HE shells.

Don't get me wrong I don't think this is a horrific ship but I don't think its great either. The Furutaka is one of the biggest missed opportunities for Wargaming World of Warship team to make a really fun ship and all it would take is a slight buff of turret rotation speed and fire rate. I can deal with the manoeuvrability being worse but giving half the amount of damage to an equal Tier is pretty bad balancing in my opinion. Its not impossible to do well if you correctly position your ship in battle but in most instances this is very situational and won't always work out in your favour. With HE being so effective against armour in the Open Beta it negates a lot of this ships big gun caliber advantages. it will be interesting to see if any changes come in to effect that may make this a more competitive ship

That's all for this weeks review I look forward to seeing you back here for my Tiger Update later in the Week.

USS St.Louis, The Keeper of Guns and Future Seal Clubbing.

Welcome back for another ship review on my Blog. Things over the last 2 weeks have been a little crazy with Berlin and also with going south to Lands End (in Cornwall, UK) on a last minute trip. Needless to say I haven't had a huge amount of time for gaming these past 2 weeks but what I have saved for this week is a ridiculously good tier 3 Cruiser that throughout the closed beta I had a fair amount of fun playing.

All the way through the closed beta, every player that I talked to loved this ship and many came to the conclusion that they would be keeping a harbour slot ready for it when the open beta went live. This ship is of course the USS St. Louis. When fully upgraded this little power house sports 14 rapid firing guns that would give butterflies to even the hardiest of American redneck's. The St. Louis is equipped with ample amount of armour so can be a real pain in the ass to kill without taking large amounts of damage in return.

To see just how typically American this ship is you only have to look down the length of its port and starboard sides to see multiple barrels poking their way out of the hull. This ship pretty much sets the standard for all American cruisers to come. Where the focus of Japanese cruisers is a mixture of guns and Torpedoes the American cruisers do away with any distractions and focus on high DPM Guns.

The St. Louis and The Cleveland are pretty much indicative of this characteristic in the lower tier game play and demand respect from all opposing players that encounter them. Needless to say that these 2 cruisers will be common place in all good captains harbours in World of Warships as they are so much fun to play.

Historically in real life the USS St. Louis (C-20) had a pretty unremarkable service history. The St. Louis was launched in 1907 after sea trials to the Pacific Fleet. During her design phase the consensus was made for improvements on the existing Columbia class cruiser design to which she would be based upon. The decision was made up the armour her hull in comparison to other Columbia class cruisers, increasing her displacement from 6000 tons to 9700 Tons. This made the St. Louis a fully fledged protected Cruiser. With all the extra armour that was fitted to the cruiser and in a bid to save weight, the St. Louis was fitted with 6 inch guns rather than the standard 8 inch. A larger power plant was also needed in the ship to counteract the extra weight from the added armour. 

Throughout the St. Louis's service life there was only one point of note but this didn't really involve the ship but more the crew that manned her. On the 4th of Feb 1917 the crew stopped the scuttling of a interned German Sloop Geier by boarding with an armed party. The Geier was captured before her planned scuttling and ended up serving the United states under the new name of the Schurz. The St. Louis was mostly consigned to transporting goods and convoy escorts other than this singular event. The St. Louis was eventually decommissioned and scrapped in 1930.

In World of Warships this is a stonkingly good tier 3 cruiser. This ship is literally crapping guns with fourteen 152 mm guns with a secondary armament of eighteen 76.2 mm guns. On a tier 3 Cruiser this ship even can hold its own against battleships of equal tiers. Having so many rapid firing guns makes this ship a real threat for destroyers and other cruisers. The St. Louis has almost 30K of hit points and is very heavily armoured for a cruiser. This means you can weather a fair old chunk of punishment before going down swinging. When compared to the Japanese T3 Cruiser you can really see this amplified when the Tenryu has a mere 17.7 K HP. 

Having 6 guns on both the port and starboard sides of the ship and one rotating turret in both the fore and aft of the ship. This means with additional 2 guns that can rotate 180 degrees on the deck you can have a maximum potential 8 guns on target when firing a full broad side. Due to the positioning of the guns facing directly outwards from the ship you won't have to wait for your turrets to turn when changing directions. You will always have some guns on target if you get surprised by the enemy or if you have to switch targets.

With all these great advantages there has to be some disadvantages that stem from its historical design choices that favoured many guns and large amounts of armour. All this extra weight ladened on a cruiser makes the St. Louis suffers most in its speed and rudder shift time. Torpedoes will be your biggest nightmare as the St. Louis drives very similar to a skip and doesn't respond well to sudden threats. The gun range isn't great either at 10km, presenting the danger that many ships can use their speed and range to keep you at a distance where by shoot you without you being able to respond in kind. Not many players will be wise enough to realise this at tier 3 and will generally close to shorter ranges where they can actually hit you. This will be playing into your hands and the strengths of your ship especially if they close into your secondary range adding to your ginormous gun array. 

One thing to note with the St. Louis is it doesn't have a great concealment range so being careful with your approach using some cover in the initial stages of the match is best advised. Most Battleship captains will always choose to shoot at a cruiser they know they can get big numbers of damage from over another opposing well armoured battleship.

In conclusion with this ship, the key to your success in this ship is to simply keep the guns singing. You have lots of them so use your main strength as much as you can. This is a strong cruiser for its tier but its still a cruiser and charging into to many enemies will normally get you focused down even if you can put up a fight. When facing off against torpedo baring ships try to predict when they will be firing their torpedoes and start your evasive turns early. The speed and rudder shift time are terrible on this ship but the turning circle is good. Reacting early in these dangerous situations will help you survive. Doing aggressive manoeuvres in other ships tends to leave you having to turn turrets around to defend yourself but with the gun arrangement in the St. Louis you can fire continuously and cause your enemy to retreat under a withering hail of fire.

The characteristics of captaining the St. Louis feels very similar to the HMS Warspite with her fairly slow speed, good armour, slow rudder shift time and good turning circle. Not to mention they both have fantastic armaments. If you find yourself getting on with the St. Louis I would highly recommend looking at the Warspite. As you can see below you can get great results from the Warspite once captained properly.

Until later in the week take care and I'll see you back here soon.