Which Ship? Bretagne or Conte di Cavour

Hey all.
I have traded for my first sea-worthy vessel, so I am finally going to hit the water in July! Yay! She is a neat little ship that was scratch-built by one of our club's members. It has given me the inspiration to TRY another scratch-build. The first one didn't go so well, so I am hoping this one will go better. Anyway, I am torn on what to build. I want to do a class 4 dreadnought, but I can't decide. I have it narrowed down to a Conte di Cavour class or a Bretagne class. The Cavour is a pretty ship, but is a bit larger (not a good thing in this case) and is not as unique as the Bretagne. However, the Bretagne is slower and looks to be a lot harder to build because of the armor belt and the casemates. Those frighten me to no end. However, I have not seen a Bretagne on the water before, and that is really tempting.
What would you guys suggest? Do I go with the easier, faster, prettier boat, or the slower, unique, boat with more hard area? Are casemates as scary as I tought? Which would be a better battling boat?
Any thoughts or ideas welcome.
Thanks!
Capt. OCD

 

I would do the Bretagne, depending on your format, Stringers look scary, but with the proper guidance they are not as bad as one can make them seem. The casements take a little longer to plan out, but in the end it makes a harder ship to get damage on. When given the choice between one of a kind or one that is prevalent, I always go with the one which is least likely to be observed on the water. I think one of the Bitondo brothers were building a Bretagne at one time, maybe they can help you with rib sections? The little Italian is a really neat boat in Treaty, not sure about fastgun, Big gun it has some potential.

 

I agree with Tugboat. Plus, it is harder to find more authoritative plans than those available for Bretagne. Just make sure to do the as built version. The refits just look odd.

 

Thanks for the replies. Sorry, forgot to mention format; it will be fast-gun (MWCI). It will definately be the as-built version. That crazy tripod thingy they added later is just... odd. If I do Bretagne, anyone have some good tutorials on how to do casemates?

 

Tugboat did them on his Edger Quinet.

http://rcnavalcombat.com/Forum/tabid/58/afv/topic/aff/566/aft/441667/afpg/13/Default.aspx

Hope this helps,
Beaver

 

So, after working on Bretagne for a little while, all I can say is that it is NOT for the new builder. Holy crap! The plans are, of course, great, but trying to plan it out is difficult. The subdeck has several sections where it goes into casemates at odd angles. I actually think Courbet would be an easier build, now that I am looking at it. However, easier is a relative term. It looks like the Conte di Cavour is the ship I will do for my first battleship build.