US Scout Cruisers and Battle Scouts branch

[That WoT Player]

Just for a little history: I was going to propose this line on the original forum, but I got a multi-day ban the day before it was announced the forum would be shut down, so fml. Either way, I thought that (if done correctly and with care) that this interesting group of ships would be a good introduction to the game, being real designs and all.

 

I would first like to start with the "gimmick" of this branch (at least initially): this branch of cruisers is armed with actual battleship caliber firepower. Unlike the French super cruisers which have "battleship" guns of 12 and 13 inches (at tier 8 and up), these ships START WITH 12-inch guns at tier 5, the trade off is that those mammoth guns are few in number and aren't the actual primary armament. No, the large caliber guns are an additional armament on a long cool down, similar to torpedoes, and the primary guns you're controlling are the "secondary" guns of 5 and 6-inch caliber; the heavy armaments being available after a somewhat lengthy timer. I'm personally thinking of grouping the large guns behind the combat instructions "funny button" and activating said instruction requires the ship to be moving forwards for an extended period of time (no island humping or reversing), but I'm open to changing the requirements. Fun fact, I came up with this solution when trying to figure out how to make pre-dreadnaughts more engaging. 

 

USS Jacksonville (Tier 5) 

Design No.119 (Scout Cruiser) 

Armament: 

• 2x twin 12-inch/50 Mark 7 guns (40 second reload, AP Mark 15 870lb [8,300 dmg], 12.9km stock range)
• 7x 5-inch/51 Mark 7 guns (6.5 second reload, HE/HC Mark 39 [1,800 dmg, 4.0% fire chance], SAP/Common Mark 15 [2,100 dmg, 30mm penetration], 12.3km stock range) 
• 4x 3-inch/50 Mark 10 AA guns (3.0 km range) 

Hull: 

• 4-inch side armor, 1.5-inch deck armor 
• 35 knots max speed 
• 755 feet long, 74 feet wide 
• 18,200 tons 

 

USS Allentown (Tier 6) 

Design No.125 (Scout Cruiser) 

Armament: 

• 2x twin 14-inch/45 Mark 3 guns 
• 8x 5-inch/51 Mark 7 guns 

Hull: 

• 4-inch side armor, 1.5-inch deck armor 
• 35 knots speed 
• 19,500 tons 

 

USS Eugene (Tier 7) 

Design No.152 (Battle Scout) 

Armament: 

• 2x quad 14-inch/45 Mark 10 guns 
• 12x 6-inch/53 Mark 12 guns

Hull: 

• 6-inch side armor, 2-inch deck armor 
• 35 knots speed 
• 32,000 tons 

 

USS Baton Rouge (Tier 8 )

Design No.141 (Battle Scout) 

Armament: 

• 2x twin 16-inch/45 Mark 1 guns 
• 12x 6-inch/53 Mark 12 guns 

Hull: 

• 6-inch side armor, 2-inch deck armor 
• 35 knots speed
• 27,000 tons 

 

USS Cheyenne (Tier 9) 

Design No.153 (Battle Scout) 

Armament: 

• 2x triple and 1x twin 14-inch/50 Mark 7 guns
• 12x 6-inch/53 Mark 12 guns 

Hull: 

• 8-inch side armor, 2.5-inch deck 
• 35 knots speed 
• 32,000 tons 

Note: It's at this point where the original concept of the player controlling the secondary battery starts to fall apart, and I'm pretty much envisioning that the tier 9 and 10 will control their guns like a normal ship, and the secondaries would become long range like Napoli or the French super cruisers. Yes, I do feel like it's a cop-out, but with more than 2 turrets I can't be certain the play style will hold up. Again, I'm always happy to change these things when discussed. 

 

USS New York City (Tier 10) 

Battlecruiser March 1919

Armament: 

• 4x twin 16-inch/50 Mark 2 guns 
• 14x 6-inch/53 Mark 12 guns 

Hull: 

• 8-inch side armor, 2.5-inch belt 
• 35 knots speed 
• 35,300 tons 

 

 

Unfortunately, I didn't have enough time to place as much detail as I would like (darn real life responsibilities), and I had to rush. I'll re-edit a lot of this to add context when I get back. I apologize for the bare bones nature of this post, and hope I gave enough detail to spark some interest. 

Edited August 21, 2023 by That WoT Player

[Ensign Cthulhu]

It's a weird concept, but I can sort of see how it would work. I agree that by the time you hit Tier 9 you're in battlecruiser territory anyway, with nothing to lose. I can think of other issues, such as how accurate you're going to let them be (Mikasa, for example, is terribly cross-eyed at longer ranges with two twin 12-inch), but I think the concept is sound. 

Personally I'd be in favour of tying the combat instructions to hits or near misses the way the Pan-Am cruisers and some of the superships do. Given the disposition of the "primary secondaries", you would probably have to be actively engaging in order to deploy them anyway, and that would act as sufficient deterrent against hiding and camping. 

Edited August 21, 2023 by Ensign Cthulhu

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

We really need an armored cruiser / large cruiser sub-class for this kind of stuff.

The weird effects of the 1920s naval treaties basically outlawing big cruisers really shows here.

Ships like Alaska are really the follow on from ships like the Tennessee class...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee-class_cruiser

We could, if we wanted to have even more fun...go:

TB -> DE

DD

CL (with CAs as line variants)

ACR -> large cruisers

B -> BB (with fast BB as line variants)

CV (with CVL and CVE as line variants)

That way we wouldn't have to try silly variations like deciding which set of guns to fire.

The problem is this requires a larger game population than we have now.

 

[Nevermore135]

Hmmm… there appears to be a series of common errors in these designs. They are American ships, yet I don’t see any flight decks…

How can we have American ships without flight decks? 🤔

Edited August 21, 2023 by Nevermore135

[AdmiralThunder]

You lost me when I saw 40 sec reload on a Cruiser.

While your proposal might work and add more ships to the game (which WG will need some day) I detest ships with such long reloads. IF these have to be balanced by Vermont like reload times then I have no interest. No one likes to wait (and wait and wait and wait...) for their guns to reload. 

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

8 hours ago, AdmiralThunder said:

You lost me when I saw 40 sec reload on a Cruiser.

While your proposal might work and add more ships to the game (which WG will need some day) I detest ships with such long reloads. IF these have to be balanced by Vermont like reload times then I have no interest. No one likes to wait (and wait and wait and wait...) for their guns to reload. 

Eh...I've found I enjoy Kansas...

...so maybe it's not so bad.

The main guns with the 40 second reload are like secondary guns though, if I read the lower tiers right...which is a bit different. Though I'm not sure how I feel about THAT concept either.

[AdmiralThunder]

4 hours ago, Daniel_Allan_Clark said:

Eh...I've found I enjoy Kansas...

...so maybe it's not so bad.

The main guns with the 40 second reload are like secondary guns though, if I read the lower tiers right...which is a bit different. Though I'm not sure how I feel about THAT concept either.

Kansas, Minnesota, Vermont have 12 guns, twelve BIG guns, that can unload a can of whoopbutt when you hit. I hate waiting that long to shoot but at least I can get decent results from it (if I aim properly of course and RNG doesn't say nope). But 40 sec for just 4-8, 12-16"guns? Yeah, that is a hard pass from me. Too long to wait for so few guns and little damage return.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

39 minutes ago, AdmiralThunder said:

Kansas, Minnesota, Vermont have 12 guns, twelve BIG guns, that can unload a can of whoopbutt when you hit. I hate waiting that long to shoot but at least I can get decent results from it (if I aim properly of course and RNG doesn't say nope). But 40 sec for just 4-8, 12-16"guns? Yeah, that is a hard pass from me. Too long to wait for so few guns and little damage return.

Indeed.

Valid points.

[That WoT Player]

9 hours ago, AdmiralThunder said:

Kansas, Minnesota, Vermont have 12 guns, twelve BIG guns, that can unload a can of whoopbutt when you hit. I hate waiting that long to shoot but at least I can get decent results from it (if I aim properly of course and RNG doesn't say nope). But 40 sec for just 4-8, 12-16"guns? Yeah, that is a hard pass from me. Too long to wait for so few guns and little damage return.

I thought I specified that the big guns were a secondary armament, like using torpedoes, and you would generally be controlling the 5 and 6 inch guns that would typically be classified as “secondary” on other ships. 
 

On 8/21/2023 at 2:16 PM, Ensign Cthulhu said:

I can think of other issues, such as how accurate you're going to let them be (Mikasa, for example, is terribly cross-eyed at longer ranges with two twin 12-inch), but I think the concept is sound. 

Typical cruiser accuracy, just so you can’t blame RNGsus for missing (German BB troubles I would prefer not to replicate). 
 

On 8/21/2023 at 2:16 PM, Ensign Cthulhu said:

Personally I'd be in favour of tying the combat instructions to hits or near misses the way the Pan-Am cruisers and some of the superships do. Given the disposition of the "primary secondaries", you would probably have to be actively engaging in order to deploy them anyway, and that would act as sufficient deterrent against hiding and camping. 

You can still island hump while completing the objective, and I wanted to dissuade that idea entirely.