Hello all, I wanted to get some opinions regarding my lovely frenchie boats. Dunkerque and Strasbourg were designed and ordered as "Batiment de Ligne" which roughly translated means "Ship of the Line" in french. Richelieu and Jean Bart were both also referred to as "Batiment de Ligne" and were most definitely battleships. At no point did the Marine Nationale (or the Vichy equivalent) refer to the ships as battlecruisers. On Dunkerque, the armor displacement equaled almost 36% of the ship's total displacement. On Strasbourg, which was ordered as a more heavily armored Dunkerque, the armor displacement was closer to 37.2%. This armor percentage was higher than some ships that are easily classified as battleships, including HMS Nelson (34%) The KGV class (35%) even the Yamato class (33.2%). Compared to the US Alaska-class (16.4%) or HMS Hood (33%) or more traditional battlecruisers such as HMS Renown (6in belt armor vs 11.1in Strasbourg). In terms of planned enemies, the Dunkerques were seen as hunters of the German Deutschland-class and the French admiralty viewed them as capable of overmatching the older Italian dreadnought battleships, such as the Andrea Doria class with their 320mm guns and 10in belt armor. I was curious what the general consensus was for why Dunkerque and Strasbourg were classed as Battlecruisers for the IRC shiplist? The boats are generally considered massive lame ducks in our hobby, but as Class 5 (5.5 units for Strasbourg due to her increased tonnage in armor vs Dunkerque) battleships they might be slightly more attractive for potential builders. Discuss?
Are you thinking that a 5 out of control B.B. will be more effective than a 5 out of control BC? Trying to understand the potential impacts
Yes exactly, I need to give the other team more points Kevin. Come on, you should know this by now. We're French.
Good question. My initial instinct was to say it may have been based on Conway's, but while Conway's is a bit vague on the topic, it implies they're normally classed as Battleships. I dug around through my email from a few years back when the shiplist was updated, and it looks pretty much like entries designated on the old shiplist as BCs and still met 'fast battleship' criteria were left as BCs See the below screencap Overall, I would ping the e-board if you want to pursue it.
I'm thinking with the increased rudder sizes recently voted in, these ships should be given another change to battle as is versus trying to reclassify and bump up in units. The larger rudders have made previously bleah ships much more viable from what I have seen.
Will is usually on 5 out of control most of the time so speed doesn't really matter...just need more guns!
With great power comes great liability. Or something like that. I will openly admit that the downside of the decrease in speed will almost definitely be worse than the improvement in firepower and rudder size, but the actual question regarding the logic of the shiplist remains. Yeah, moar guns! (That probably won't work! Perfect!!)
If you want to better define a portion of the rules, I recommend drafting a rule proposal that would clear up whatever the subject is and that would establish your desired outcome. If all the ‘questions’ and ‘discussions’ on the internet about rules were turned into proposals and people were willing to raise concerns and reach a consensus before hand I think everyone would benefit (except those that like to complain I guess)
