Final Review: British Tier X Freemium Cruiser Plymouth

With the release of Update 0.9.9, Plymouth is now available for the price of 27 000 Steel. Is she worth it? How is she doing compared to Minotaur? Here is my opinion about it.

First things first though, history time! History is important boys and girls.

The Historical Background

The Plymouth is based on an early design of the Edinburgh sub-class of light cruisers.

The Edinburgh-class was the last variation of the Town-class light cruisers from the Royal Navy. These ships were designed under the terms of the London Naval Treaty. This treaty limited the displacement of light cruisers to 10 000 tons and their main armament to 155 mm guns.

The Town-class was the answer to the American’s Brooklyn-class and Japanese Mogami-class light cruisers. As designed, these ships had a 9 000 tons displacement and were armed with twelve 152 mm guns in four triple turrets.
Compared to the previous ships, the design of the Edinburgh sub-class was calling for a main battery of sixteen 152 mm guns in four quadruple turrets. The ships were made longer to accommodate such main armament. However, due to the difficulty of designing such turret, the idea was abandoned and instead, they received an improved version of the triple turrets from previous sub-classes.

If you want to learn more about the Town-class, here is a video from Drachinifel about it:

The Good and the Bad

The Good

• 16 guns broadside
• British light cruiser AP shells
• British light cruiser acceleration
• Combination of British cruiser smoke and 9 km radar
• Good concealment
• Tight turning radius
• Low citadel that can make it hard to hit for enemy ships
• Raised belt around the engines that will allow you to bounce AP shells from battleships

The Bad

• HORRIBLE Firing angles
• Low base range
• Low HP pool (still higher than Zao)
• 16 mm bow and stern plating as well as 19 mm casemate
• Standard cruiser Repair Party
• Low base speed
• Worst anti-air of all tier X cruisers

The camouflage

The permanent camouflage of the Plymouth provides the classic bonuses for tier X ships:

• -3% to surface detectability range
• +4% to maximum dispersion of shells fired by the enemy at your ship
• -50% to the cost of the ship’s post-battle service
• +20% credits earned in the battle
• +100% to experience earned in the battle

Modules

Hull	Engine	Gun Fire Control System	Main battery	Torpedoes
Plymouth	Propulsion: 80 000 hp	Mk X mod. 1	152 mm/50 Mk XXIII	533 mm Mk IXM

General Characteristics and playstyle

GeneralConsumables

Tier	X
Health	41 000 HP
Torpedo Damage Reduction	4 %
Displacement	15 548 tons
Main Armament
Maximum Firing Range	15.300 km
152 mm/50 Mk XXIII102 mm/45 QF Mk XIX	4 x 4 152 mm
Secondary Armament
Maximum Firing Range	6.000 km
102 mm/45 QF Mk XIX	6 x 2 102 mm
Torpedo Armament
Maximum Firing Range	10.000 km
533 mm QR Mk II	2 x 4 533 mm
Maximum speed	31.5 knots
Turning Circle Radius	680 m
Rudder Shift Time	10.1 s
Surface Detectability	11.7 km
Air Detectability	7.16 km
Detectability After Firing Main Guns in Smoke	5.5 km

Slot 1	Slot 2	Slot 3	Slot 4	Slot 5
Damage Control Party Work time: 5 s Cooldown: 60 s	Repair Party Number of charges: 3 Work time: 28 s Cooldown: 80 s HP regeneration: 0.5%/s	Hydroacoustic Search Number of charges: 3 Work time: 100 s Cooldown: 120 s Torpedo spotting range: 3.5 km Ship spotting range: 5.0 km	Smoke Generator Number of charges: 3 Work time: 15 s Cooldown: 160 s Smoke radius: 600 m Smoke duration: 113 s	Surveillance Radar Number of charges: 3 Work time: 40 s Cooldown: 120 s Ship spotting range: 9.0 km

The playstyle of the Plymouth isn’t much different from the one you would have to adopt with a Belfast or with the British light cruisers as a whole.

You use her concealment and set of consumables to be as close as possible to the objective and to your destroyers and support them with your AP and radar to ruin the day of anything that gets in range. However, unlike the Minotaur, the Plymouth isn’t a DPM machine and while her damage output isn’t bad, it’s not crazy good either.

Also, for those who are familiar with the firing angles of the Großer Kurfürst, tell yourself that the firing angles of the Plymouth are even worse so you REALLY don’t want to come face to face with another British light cruiser, US or Soviet heavy cruiser. It really isn’t a pleasant encounter.

Main Battery

Main Battery

4 x 4 152 mm/50 Mk XXIII
Maximum Firing Range	15.300 km
Reloading Time	6.5 s
180 Degree Turn Time	22.5 s
Optimal firing angles at the front	44°
Optimal firing angles at the rear	47°
Sigma	2.05 sigma
Maximum Dispersion	139 m
Shells
Type of Projectile	AP – 152 mm AP 6crh Mk IV
Alpha Damage	3 100 HP
Projectile Speed	841 m/s
Air Drag	0.33
Projectile Mass	50.8 kg
Projectile Krupp	2 609
Projectile Detonator	0.005 s
Detonator threshold	12 mm
Ricochet Angles	60° – 75°

Just like (almost) all British light cruisers, the Plymouth is characterized by the lack of a second type of ammunition, being only able to fire AP shells at the enemy.

The AP on the Plymouth is the same as on the Edinburgh. In action, the difference with the AP shells of the Minotaur is neglectable. As I said earlier though, compared to the Minotaur, you don’t have nearly as much DPM due to the much longer reload. You do have a very good alpha strike potential though.

While she is very effective at slapping DDs hard and at farming damage on battleships, with cruisers, you will have to be careful. Due to her terrible firing angles, if you bring all guns to bear, enemy cruisers will be able to get citadels on you and it’s especially brutal when fighting a U.S. or Soviet heavy cruiser. You literally cannot afford to use all 4 turrets against these if they are targeting you. Of course, here, I’m talking about a scenario where you aren’t shooting while unspotted in your smoke.

Secondary Armament

Secondaries

6 x 2 102 mm/45 QF Mk XIX
Maximum Firing Range	6.000 km
Reloading Time	3.0 s
Sigma	1.00 sigma
Shells
Type of Projectile	HE – 127 mm HE Mk41
Alpha Damage	1 500 HP
Damage	310 HP
HE penetration	17 mm
Explosion Size	0.3
Chance to Cause Fire	6 %
Projectile Speed	811 m/s
Air Drag	0.33
Projectile Mass	15.88 kg

Decoration/10.

Torpedo Armament

The torpedoes of the Plymouth, while they are a nice addition, won’t be as powerful as on the Minotaur. The reason for it is simple, she only has 4 torpedoes per side. This means that she won’t really be able to pull the same kind of aggressive action as Minotaur with her 8 torpedoes on each side that allow her to demolish battleships as she likes.

4 torpedoes on each side are still nothing to ignore and when needed, they will be a useful tool against enemy battleships or cruisers coming at you.

Anti-air Armament

The anti-air on that ship is simply horrible for a tier X cruiser. Carriers, may they be tier VIII or X will be able to chain drop the Plymouth without any sort of issue.

Only 4 flak clouds, weak long-range DPS, decent mid-range DPS at best and then the close-range DPS that will certainly not save you. Combine this anti-air with her weak armor and lack of a super-heal and you get a ship that REALLY doesn’t want to meet carriers.

The armor

As gamemodels3d decided to improve their armor viewer, I thought that I might try something a bit new and more compact than the usual wall of text. Feel free to tell me what you think about it in the comments.

General armor protection

Middle section’s front and rear armor protection (including the citadel athwartship)

Citadel’s side and horizontal armor protection

Turrets’ Armor protection

As you can see, the armor protection of the Plymouth is nothing great. The additional 3 mm of casemate protection she gets compared to Minotaur will only save her from getting overmatched by Henri, Cheshire, Drake or Goliath. The real advantage that Plymouth has over Minotaur is that her citadel isn’t nearly as high and she will sometimes be able to get away with just overpenetrations when giving broadside to enemy battleships or supercruisers. Don’t push your luck though and always be careful about how angled you are against enemy ships shooting AP.

For the horizontal protection, you really want to be careful because that 51 mm middle deck will be perfect to trigger the fuses of AP bombs.

Final Opinion

Overall, despite her drawbacks such as terrible firing angles, lack of DPM compared to Minotaur or weak armor, the Plymouth is still a respectable ship. She is more support-oriented due to her consumable set and excels at demolishing destroyers., with the combination of her smoke, radar, low concealment and 16 guns.

Now… considering her price and the other ships available, I would personally give her a low priority. Stalingrad, Bourgogne, Franklin D. Roosevelt are all much more interesting and powerful in my opinion.

Recommended build

During the testing of the Plymouth, I used the following captain build and upgrades:

Captain build:

• Priority Target (or Incoming Fire Alert): Very important skill to know if a ship has the intention to shoot you (or already did) and as such, react accordingly.
• Adrenaline Rush: The more damage you take, the faster you will be able to fire your guns.
• Superintendent: A prime choice, especially on a ship with 5 different consumables, including a Smoke, Radar and a Repair Party.
• Concealment Expert: Just like all the other RN light cruisers, Plymouth relies on her concealment. With the upgrade, you can get the concealment down to 9.19 km, giving destroyers only 190 m to react to you appearing in front of them. Unless they are already stern in and ready to move forward, they have no way to evade your radar.
• Radio Location: When hunting destroyers, it’s better to already have a rough idea of where they might be. It’s also useful to not get caught pants down by a cruiser that might have been able to sneak up on you
• Survivability Expert: With the second-lowest HP pool of all tier X standard cruisers (so not counting Smolensk, Colbert or the soon to be Austin) and considering the weak armor, the ship will certainly not spit on a bit more HP.
• Jack of all Trades: With a total of 5 consumables, Plymouth is definitely getting value out of a shorter cooldown on them. Now, if you want to use something else, feel free but the other choices aren’t great. Last Stand is useless as you will pretty much never lose your engines or rudder unless it’s from a torpedo hit or a citadel. Smoke Screen Expert isn’t useful either since the British cruiser smokes are from the start larger than the others.

Upgrades:

• Main Armaments Modification 1: There is literally nothing else worth taking in this slot. You want to keep your armaments working.
• Surveillance Radar Modification 1:  Longer radar duration for more destroyers hammering (or whatever will get caught in your radar).
•  Aiming System Modification 1: Even though you have 16 guns, every shell count so an improved dispersion is definitely worth having. On top of that, the turret traverse is more than fast enough.
•  Steering Gears Modification 1: Fires will basically never be an issue on this ship so it’s better to have a faster rudder shift to dodge shots or torpedoes.
• Concealment System Modification 1: As I said earlier, stealth is key on the Royal Navy light cruisers.
• Main Battery Modification 3: Yes, you only have a 15.3 km range but you have the concealment and you have a smoke to create a cover when needed. Additional range, you will never need it if you play properly. However, a faster reload for a better damage output is more than appreciated.

This concludes my review of the Plymouth. Thank you for reading this article!
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Have a good one and see you soon!

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Yuzorah

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