Karl Marx
Contents
Description
Originally laid down at the No. 820 shipyard in Kaliningrad, USSR on 24 March, 1954. The Tur was the eleventh of the Pr. 50 (Riga-class) frigates built for the Soviet Navy. After just two years of service with the Red navy, she would be sold to the German Democratic Republic, who renamed her Karl Marx in honor of the German father of communism. Karl Marx would serve uneventfully until 1971 when she was decommissioned and sold for scrap.
Introduced in Update "Wind of Change" as the first German coastal squadron vehicle in the game. The Karl Marx is identical to her sister ship the Yenot in the Soviet tree. Being a frigate, the Karl Marx primarily excels at taking out coastal vessel at range thanks to her 100 mm cannons with reasonable rate of fire. Although only having a HE shell at disposal, the Karl Marx is still capable to hold on her own against destroyers at range, though she can still be easily overwhelmed if her weak turrets are disabled. Thus, unless you are pushing for a coastal area, it is better to stay behind the friendly destroyers to shield yourself from enemy fire.
General info
Survivability and armour
Although the hull of the Karl Marx is virtually unarmoured, she can still take quite a fair bit of punishments from destroyers due to spread out crew compartments. However, she can still be overwhelmed with a repeated hits on the engine or the turrets.
Mobility
In Realistic, the mobility of the Karl Marx is rather unimpressive. With 55 km/h top speed, she would often be leave behind by friendly destroyers. Though this also allowed you to stay at a safer distance while your ally is taking a blunt of the enemy's fire instead.
In Arcade, the Karl Marx receives a substantial speed boost that allows her to quickly close the distance. This allowed her to perform in brawling duties to some extent, especially since she can now get to the coastal area faster.
| Mobility Characteristics | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Game Mode | Upgrade Status | Maximum Speed (km/h) | |
| Forward | Reverse | ||
| AB | |||
| Upgraded | 77 | 27 | |
| RB/SB | |||
| Upgraded | 55 | 20 | |
Modifications and economy
| Seakeeping | Unsinkability | Firepower | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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|
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Armament
Primary armament
Provide information about the characteristics of the primary armament. Evaluate their efficacy in battle based on their reload speed, ballistics and the capacity of their shells. Add a link to the main article about the weapon: {{main|Weapon name (calibre)}}. Broadly describe the ammunition available for the primary armament, and provide recommendations on how to use it and which ammunition to choose.
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | |||||
| 100 m | 1,000 m | 2,000 m | 3,000 m | 4,000 m | 5,000 m | ||
| F-56 HE | HE | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 |
| ZS-56 HE | HE-TF | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 | 24 |
| ZS-56R HE-VT | HE-VT | 16 | 16 | 16 | 16 | 16 | 16 |
| Shell details | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (kg) |
Ricochet | |||||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | ||||||||||
| F-56 HE | HE | 900 | 15.8 | 0 | 0.1 | 1.93 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| ZS-56 HE | HE-TF | 900 | 15.6 | 0 | 0.1 | 1.93 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| Proximity-fused shell details | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Arming distance (m) |
Trigger radius (m) |
Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (kg) |
Ricochet | |||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | ||||||||||
| ZS-56R HE-VT | HE-VT | 900 | 15.9 | 0 | 0.1 | 270 | 15 | 1.23 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |
Secondary armament
Some ships are fitted with weapons of various calibres. Secondary armaments are defined as weapons chosen with the control Select secondary weapon. Evaluate the secondary armaments and give advice on how to use them. Describe the ammunition available for the secondary armament. Provide recommendations on how to use them and which ammunition to choose. Remember that any anti-air armament, even heavy calibre weapons, belong in the next section. If there is no secondary armament, remove this section.
- Universal: HEF-T · AP-T · HEF-T · HEF-T · AP-T
- 37 mm HE clips: HEF-T · HEF-T · HEF-T · HEF-T · AP-T
- 37 mm AP clips: AP-T · AP-T · AP-T · AP-T · HEF-T
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | ||||||
| 10 m | 100 m | 500 m | 1,000 m | 1,500 m | 2,000 m | ||
| HEF-T | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | |
| AP-T | 79 | 76 | 63 | 51 | 41 | 32 | |
| Shell details | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive mass (TNT equivalent) (g) |
Ricochet | ||||||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | ||||||||||
| HEF-T | 880 | 0.72 | 0 | 0.1 | 56.98 | 79° | 80° | 81° | ||||
| AP-T | 880 | 0.76 | - | - | - | 47° | 60° | 65° | ||||
Additional armament
Describe the available additional armaments of the ship: depth charges, mines, torpedoes. Talk about their positions, available ammunition and launch features such as dead zones of torpedoes. If there is no additional armament, remove this section.
Usage in battles
Compared to other frigates, the Karl Marx has better firepower than most with the exception of late Japanese and British frigates. The biggest downside this ship faces is the reload time. Most frigates such as SKRs and the Köln-class will outgun the Karl Marx.
The Karl Marx is best played at a range farther than most frigates. This will give the ship better time to respond to threats and keep it away from heavy enemy fire, almost like a mini-destroyer. Like many frigates, focus on small targets such as boats, then frigates, then destroyers. Do not rely heavily on AA as much as other ships such as the Köln as it traverses terribly and has no HE-VT shells. Instead, use any HE-VT or time-fused shells in advance.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Great firepower against coastal targets
- Good gun handling, the main turrets are fully traversable
- Has access to HE-VT shells on main armament
- Has access to air search and tracking radar
- Spread out compartment, reasonably survivable even against destroyers
Cons:
- Only has HE shell available, resulting into mediocre damage output against destroyers
- Weak turrets that will get disabled very often
- Horrendous traverse speed on dual 37 mm AA
- Can be easily overwhelmed by other frigates with autoloaders, as they can disable all of your main guns before you can fight back
History
Originally, the DDR (GDR) wanted to create its own "frigate" and build it in East Germany. In September 1952, Schiffsbautechnik in Wolgast began the development of "Projekt 10 Falke" (Hawk). However, the Project was canceled in 1955 in favour for Soviet imports. From 1956 until 1959, the Volksmarine received four ships of the Riga-class (Project 50) that were taken from the Baltic Fleet. Some problems emerged at the beginning of the training, simply because many signs were still in Russian and not in German.
On January 16th 1961, the ships were given the names: Karl Marx, Ernst Thäleman, Friedrich Engels and Karl Liebknecht, after well-known German socialists.
They were intended to combat sea and air targets, to hunt submarines, to provide escort, but also to support landing operations. In 1965/66, they conducted reconnaissance missions off the Norwegian coast and in the English Channel. The Karl Marx became particularly famous for her storm voyage in October 1967, as she survived one of the strongest hurricanes in the Baltic Sea since 1801, only slightly damaged thanks to the masterful efforts of the crew.
The ships were decommissioned from 1968 to 1977. Their successor was the Koni class (Project 1159).
Trivia
Strictly speaking, the East German Navy never had frigates. The term was rarely used in the Volksmarine. Instead, in an allusion to the Russian classification, it was classified as "Küstenschutzschiff" (KSS) which can be translated to "Coastal protection ship".
Media
Excellent additions to the article would be video guides, screenshots from the game, and photos.
See also
Links to articles on the War Thunder Wiki that you think will be useful for the reader, for example:
- 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.
| Yantar Baltic Shipyard (Прибалтийский судостроительный завод «Янтарь») | |
|---|---|
| Frigates | |
| Project 50 | Yenot · Rosomacha · Karl Marx* |
| Project 35 | SKR-7 |
| *Tur in East German service | |
| Germany frigates | |
|---|---|
|
Kriegsmarine |
| K-class | K2 |
|
Bundesmarine |
| Köln-class | Köln · Lübeck |
|
Volksmarine |
| Pr. 50 | Karl Marx |
| Squadron ships | |
|---|---|
| Germany | Karl Marx |
| USSR | SKR-7 |
| Britain | HMS Liverpool |
| Japan | IJN Shimakaze |
