Battlecruisers

[Ruckdog]

Just posted a proposed design for a DW battlecruiser on the blog. I would love to know what you think of it .

[CPTPromotable]

Hey there Ruck. I already voiced my.opinion on the Spartan forum, but let's foster some discussion on this forum! I like what you have done here, but my thought is possibly adjusting the dr/cr up a little and the hp down. Or even! that different nations take different approaches to their battlecruisers. The British, seeing FSA armor and Blazing Sun resilience in their cruisers, decide to incorporate that into their design for a battlecruiser, giving it a 5/7 but only having 6.hull points. The FSA, on the other hand, content with their armor, leave it at cruiser/gunship level of 5/6 with 8 hull points, but have to downgrade to a pair of gunship turrets as their primary armament. There are a fair amount of permutations you could use to have each battlecruiser really give its parent faction something unique.

[MadDrB]

I like the concept of a large class ship model with a speed of anything more than 6" movement per activation.  And dropping the hull points makes sense, to me, in game terms; I find that after a large ship in my fleet has taken 6 points in hull damage then the main guns are hardly effective after dropping 6 dice from each attack.

From a objective perspective, however, shouldn't a battlecruiser, with the lack of the heavier battleship armor, actually have a lower CR rating while maybe a higher DR?  I'm wondering how a model with only 6 HP but a DR/CR of 6/7 would play on the table....

[MadDrB]

For the Japanese, I like the idea of a large ship but with a narrow beam--almost as big as the battleship but with a single barrel hull like the cruisers.  I'm looking at modelling 2 cruisers stern-to-stern so it effectively creates a double-ended ship.  I suppose a pair of gunships would work perfectly toward this end.

Whatever happened to those double-ended ships from the early ironclad era anyway?  The kind of ship which effectively had a bow on each end with side wheels and could travel at the same speed in either direction.  But, just imagine, a large ship which could come to an All Stop at the end of one turn and then be moving at full speed ahead AWAY from the enemy after the following turn.

[Ruckdog]

So, as you guys probably saw, I posted two example ships on the blog, trying to take to heart some of the comments that you guys have been making. Here is the link to the post:

http://www.manbattlestations.com/blog/2012/08/14/dw-battlecruisers-part-2/

MadDrB, I am intrigued by your idea of a double-ended cruiser, though I think that the FSA (due to their paddle wheel propulsion) would probably be a better fit for the concept than the EotBS Also, a narrower beam would be a good feature for any BC design, since a high length-to-beam ratio is always a desirable trait for speed. Plus, it would help distinguish BC models from the battleships a bit more.

[MadDrB]

Battlecruisers are here!

The Prussians have the Konigsberg BC with 2 turrets facing foreward, and the British have a similar BC named the Lord Hood.

The Blazing Sun are getting another medium gyro, and I'll take a pair of those over a BC any day of the week.  But, still, it's cool to see Spartan moving in this direction with lightly armored battleships which still carry a big punch.  So far, only the renders have been released, but I imagine we'll see something between a Battleship and a Gunship as far as stats are concerned.  And probably in squadrons of just 1 ship....

[Ruckdog]

Very cool! I'm struck by how similar those two renders are to the concepts I came up with for BCs a while back:

http://www.manbattlestations.com/blog/2012/08/14/dw-battlecruisers-part-2/

I'm curious to see how close I was on getting the stats right...

[Last Rites]

Was talking to Long9 yesterday about battle cruisers. Mine is just about off the painting table, so am thinking of how to use it. Awhile back I took it out for a test run and it got utterly enhialated right off the bat. How are others using thier BC's so far?

[Ruckdog]

I've only been able to get my PE battlecruiser into one game so far. My initial impression is that they will do pretty much what they did historically: Chew up ships of their size or smaller, and get pulverized by heavier battleships and dreadnoughts. In that game, I was able to use my BC to anchor one flank against the enemy's flank. In addition to the BC, I had a squadron of frigates and a squadron of corvettes supporting it. They were up against a squadron of frigates and a squadron of cruisers; around equal in points, but the BC seemed to give me an edge by providing a solid punch to ding the larger targets. Also, for the PE the schlueder on the BC nicely combo'ed with the Tesla turrets on my frigates  .

[Creon]

It really depends on the battlecruiser.  Raj Candas?  Excellent! The Lord Hood?  Abysmal.  They are a good heavy lead medium in my experience, they can fight above their weight, but are a major glass cannon, as heavies should sink them/damage them past effectiveness rather quickly.  I like them in every army except the British, so that should say something.

[Last Rites]

Just looked at the Lord Hood next to the Annapolis. The three turrets don't seem very strong even when linked to each other, and are the only weapons platform. Since both ships cost the same I'm wondering how they balanced the value here. The shield (2) perhaps?

I don't have the stats on it but I'm sure the EoBS Battlecruiser is a monster. High crit levels and flaming everything I'm sure...

[CDR-G]

EoTBS BC
AD per RB:
21-17-13-6. Using two turrets and B/S
DR5CR8
HP 6
Can take shields (2) for free
 8/7 fixed fore torps.