RN Leone
| This page is about the Italian destroyer RN Leone. For the other Leone-class destroyer, see RN Tigre. |
Contents
Description
The RN Leone was the first of the Leone-class destroyers, laid down 23 November 1921, launched 1 October, completed and put into service on 11 July 1924. She was at first placed in the Divisione Leggera dell'Armata Navale, and then in the Divisione da Battaglia where it carried out the training of the crew. With the entry into service of the sisters RN Tigre and RN Pantera, the Gruppo Autonomo Esporatori Leggeri was formed. The RN Leone in its operative history continued to make training and navigation missions, until the beginning of the Ethiopian War where it participated escort and attack missions on the coast of Ethiopia. During the Second World War, it made a few missions in which it had to defend the Italian colonies, but in 1940 the situation was precipitating very fast and it had to abandon the Italian colonies. On 1st April 1941 at 00:30, the RN Leone collided with a reef not marked on the charts, creating a gash in the hull and a fire in boiler room 4, the RN Tigre and RN Pantera in the meantime began to rescue the crew of the RN Leone. The ship was unrecoverable and was scuttled.
Introduced in Update "Direct Hit", Leone-class, RN Leone, 1938 is a premium Italian destroyer. Being a WWI design, she is very lacklustre when compared to other ships of the same battle rating. The main armament is also unique in that the ship has access to APHE rounds unlike any other destroyer armed with calibres smaller than 150 mm. However, the rate of fire of 7 rounds per minute is lower than contemporaries. The magazines of the ship are located above the waterline right under the turrets, making it very vulnerable to fatal detonation. The anti- air armament is mediocre, composed by only two 40 mm pom-poms. Her torpedoes are quite fast with average payload but very limited range of 4 km which make their use very situational.
General info
Survivability and armour
The RN Leone has no armour whatsoever other than 12 mm plating partially protecting her main gun mounts.
Her bow main gun ammunition magazine is partially exposed above the waterline. This makes it more vulnerable to penetrating hits, which will detonate the ammunition magazine with immediately fatal results. The stern magazine is below the waterline, and thus less vulnerable.
The Leone has a crew of 206 men, which is slightly smaller than that of the preceding RN Corazziere.
Mobility
The Leone is somewhat slower than her immediate predecessor, Corazziere, and also has poorer handling and acceleration characteristics due to her greater length and bulk, although they are still acceptable.
| Mobility Characteristics | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Game Mode | Upgrade Status | Maximum Speed (km/h) | Turn Time (s) | Turn Radius (m) | |
| Forward | Reverse | ||||
| AB | Stock | 57 | 25 | ~122.18 | ~216.07 |
| Upgraded | 77 | 34 | ___ | ___ | |
| RB/SB | |||||
| Upgraded | 63 | 28 | ___ | ___ | |
Modifications and economy
| Seakeeping | Unsinkability | Firepower | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Armament
Primary armament
The Leone has a heavy gun armament (for a destroyer) of eight 120/45 Canet-Schneider-Armstrong Mod. 1918/19 main guns. These fire the same shells as the 120/45 OTO Mod. 1926 guns on the Italian reserve destroyer Turbine and have generally identical performance to them as well. They are distributed in four twin mounts, one in the bow, one in the stern, and the other two amidships. Three of these mounts have unlimited traverse, but the one sited between the funnels cannot be traversed fully because of the fore funnel blocking the guns. The guns have a fairly low rate of fire of only 7 rounds/minute maximum with an aced crew.
The 120 mm guns fire HE, HE-DF, and APHE shells. The HE (and identical HE-DF) shells have a large filler for a 120 mm shell at 2.39 kg of TNT, which is significantly more than those of the newer 120 mm HE shells used by the Dardo and Corazziere and even the larger 135 mm HE shells of the Comandante Margottini, Attilio Regolo, and Etna. However, her APHE has less filler than the APHE on those other ships. HE-DF explodes at the range set by the rangefinder, primarily for anti-aircraft usage, but the limited gun elevation makes the main guns quite hard to use in the anti-aircraft role.
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | |||||
| 1,000 m | 2,500 m | 5,000 m | 7,500 m | 10,000 m | 15,000 m | ||
| HE Dirompente | HE | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 |
| APBC Perforante | APHE | 154 | 121 | 81 | 56 | 41 | 35 |
| HE-TF Contro-aerea | HE-TF | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 | 29 |
| Shell details | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (s) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (kg) |
Ricochet | |||||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | ||||||||||
| HE Dirompente | HE | 850 | 22.11 | 0 | 0.1 | 2.39 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| APBC Perforante | APHE | 850 | 23.15 | 0.025 | 6 | 1.16 | 47° | 60° | 65° | |||
| HE-TF Contro-aerea | HE-TF | 850 | 22.11 | 0 | 0.1 | 2.39 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
Secondary armament
The secondary armament on the RN Leone consists of two single 40mm turrets with HE-FT (Timed Explosive Projectile), these two 40mm cannons are not very effective at long and medium ranges, but at short ranges they manage to cause a lot of damage to enemy aircraft, in particular try not to use these cannons on enemy ships because they do not cause any significant damage, compared to the RN Tigre of the same class it does not have the 76mm which are very useful against small ships and long ranges for anti-aircraft role
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | |||||
| 10 m | 100 m | 500 m | 1,000 m | 1,500 m | 2,000 m | ||
| HE-F | HEF* | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| Shell details | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (g) |
Ricochet | |||||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | ||||||||||
| HE-F | HEF* | 610 | 0.9 | 0 | 0.1 | 55 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
Anti-aircraft armament
The anti-aircraft armament consists of two twin 13.2mm Breda Model 31 turrets, thanks to their rate of fire and reload time, these machine guns are very useful against short and medium-range air targets as well as coastal ships.
Additional armament
The additional armament on the RN Leone consists of two twin torpedo launchers containing the S.I. 250/533.4X7.5 Type A (533 mm) torpedoes with a decent explosive and destructive power, without torpedo mode the torpedo can reach a distance of 4 km at 76 km/h while with torpedo mode it can reach 12 km with a speed of 48 km/h, the best tactic with torpedoes is always to launch them at the right moments when either there are obstacles that the enemy ship cannot easily pass through while in the case of battles without obstacles you need a little luck.
Usage in battles
The RN Leone sacrifices torpedo armament for heavier main gun armament. With a large salvo of eight fairly powerful HE shells, she can deal a substantial amount of damage to opposing destroyers with a single salvo. However, the low rate of fire of the main guns also mean that she cannot really compete in a prolonged duel against fast-firing destroyers (particular the American ones with 5"/38 main guns), and despite her larger size she actually has a smaller crew count than the RN Corazziere and RN Comandante Margottini. Furthermore, her partially exposed bow ammunition magazine is a dangerous weakness, especially in close range fights.
Her torpedo armament is very poor, with only four fairly underwhelming 533 mm torpedoes that are not particularly fast and that have a very short range of only 4 km without the torpedo mode installed. It is worth considering not bringing them at all, especially since they are a potential hazard if hit by enemy fire.
It is also worth noting that the RN Leone has better firing angles towards the stern of the ship than towards the bow. Angling towards the enemy in such a way that the ship fires towards the stern is worth considering, especially since this also exposes the bow ammunition magazine less.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Large number of main guns
- Large main gun HE shell explosive filler
- Large field-of-fire towards the stern of the ship
- Reasonable penetration and filler for the APHE shell
Cons:
- Low main gun rate of fire
- Inadequate anti-aircraft armament
- Only four torpedoes with a very short range without torpedo mode installed
- Above-waterline bow ammunition magazine
History
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Media
- Skins
See also
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- reference to the series of the ship;
- links to approximate analogues of other nations and research trees.
External links
Paste links to sources and external resources, such as:
- topic on the official game forum;
- other literature.
| Ansaldo | |
|---|---|
| Corvettes | |
| Gabbiano-class | RN Gabbiano · Folaga |
| Destroyers | |
| Leone-class | RN Leone · RN Tigre |
| Light Cruisers | |
| Condottieri-class | RN Bartolomeo Colleoni · RN Raimondo Montecuccoli · RN Eugenio di Savoia |
| Heavy Cruisers | |
| Trento-class | RN Bolzano |
| Battleships | |
| Conte di Cavour-class | Novorossiysk* |
| *RN Giulio Cesare before war reparation to the USSR | |
| Italy destroyers | |
|---|---|
| Regia Marina | |
| Aquila-class | RN Aquila |
| Leone-class | RN Leone · RN Tigre |
| Turbine-class | RN Aquilone · RN Turbine |
| Navigatori-class | RN Da Verazzano |
| Dardo-class | RN Dardo |
| Soldati-class | RN Aviere · RN Corazziere · RN Geniere |
| Comandanti Medaglie d'Oro-class | RN Comandante Margottini |
| Marina Militare | |
| Fante-class* | Geniere |
| Indomito-class | Impetuoso |
| * Modified Fletcher-class destroyers | |
