Primauguet
Contents
Description
French light cruiser Primauguet was commissioned in April 1927 as the third vessel of the Duguay-Trouin class and spent her early career on long voyages between French colonial possessions. As WW2 arrived, she was moved to patrolling the Atlantic Ocean, and later re-based to the Caribbean. After the French surrender in 1940, she operated in the Vichy French Navy against the Free French, until being sent for a refit in Casablanca. When the US attacked the port, Primauguet sortied with the Vichy destroyers against the battleship USS Massachusetts and supporting forces. Despite her refit not being completed and enemy having a huge advantage in firepower, she engaged enemy vessels with all her guns, until being heavily damaged and forced into beaching to avoid sinking. She burned out and was struck off as a total loss.
Introduced in Update "La Royale" along with the first release of the researchable French tech tree, she is a capable but poorly armoured light cruiser. Her main upsides are the sustained damage output and excellent torpedoes, while her downsides include the lacking protection and anti-air armament. She's best used against enemy destroyers and some of the light cruisers, while she will suffer greatly if forced to duel with enemy heavy cruisers or battleships. She also should avoid coastal vessels, as her large size and lacking support weapons will make her a relatively easy target to the motor torpedo boats. The namesake of her class is available as a premium vessel - Duguay-Trouin.
General info
Survivability and armour
The ship has a significant advantage in terms of survivability due to the size of its crew, with 578 sailors it is one of the largest at the BR. The ammunition racks are located deep below the waterline and are protected by additional plating, which makes ammunition explosions very unlikely to occur. Moreover, the turrets and ammo elevators are equipped with 30 mm armour, which can reduce fragmentation damage caused by near-misses.
The ship's large size also serves as a form of protection as its hull is divided into 9 sections, a feature typically found on heavy cruisers, reducing damage from both torpedoes and bombs.
However, like other ships in its BR, the Primauguet does not have armour that can directly stop high-calibre SAP or HE shells. Typically for light cruisers it is also unable to withstand damage from multiple enemy warships.
Mobility
The mobility can be described in one word: average. The rudder turn speed varies between 5.4 seconds (not upgraded) to 4.05 seconds (aced crew with maximum leadership), which is somewhat slower than most of the light cruisers of the BR when not upgraded, but the same as all the competitors when fully aced. Guns can easily keep up with the turn rate thanks to their high horizontal targeting speed.
| Mobility Characteristics | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Game Mode | Upgrade Status | Maximum Speed (km/h) | |
| Forward | Reverse | ||
| AB | |||
| Upgraded | 71 | 34 | |
| RB/SB | |||
| Upgraded | 61 | 29 | |
Modifications and economy
| Seakeeping | Unsinkability | Firepower | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Armament
Primary armament
Four twin turrets provide one of the highest damage outputs in the BR, comparable only with some of the US destroyers. While the low rate of fire can be an issue under some circumstances, the size of the explosive filler in both HE and SAP shells more than make up for it. The gun comes equipped with three types of shells:
- M1924 HE - large explosive filler, contact fuse, best against soft-skinned targets and external modules on the enemy warships
- M1924 SAP - good explosive filler, best against lightly-armoured targets, will dive into the ship to reach the internal modules
- M1924 HE-BF - smallest explosive filler of the three, base fuse, particularly good when hitting a highly angled target, will dive deeper into the ship bellows than SAP, but also is more prone to over-penetration and has less of a penetrative capability against a parallel target
The ship lacks any dedicated anti-air shells or AP shells that could penetrate heavy armour.
| 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 | ||
| M1924 HE | HE | 51 | 51 | 51 | 51 | 51 | 51 |
| M1924 HE-BF | HE | 87 | 78 | 64 | 53 | 45 | 34 |
| M1924 SAP | SAPBC | 142 | 126 | 104 | 87 | 73 | 55 |
| 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% | ||||||||||
| M1924 HE | HE | 864 | 59 | 0 | 0.1 | 6.16 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| M1924 HE-BF | HE | 870 | 56.5 | 0.015 | 7 | 2.9 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| M1924 SAP | SAPBC | 870 | 56.5 | 0.01 | 7 | 3.67 | 48° | 63° | 71° | |||
Secondary armament
Having just two 75 mm secondary guns per side, equipped with an HE shells with contact fuse, secondary armament shouldn't be relied upon. They reload every 4 seconds, which is insufficient for easy dealing with manoeuvring torpedo boats.
Mounts have an ability to engage targets up to 85° vertical guidance, which would make them perfect against high altitude bombers, but this is severely limited by the lack of HE-TF or HE-VT shells. In effect, the gunfire has primarily a psychological effect against enemy aircraft, as the probability of directly hitting at ranges where 75 mm would provide an additional protection is negligible.
| 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 | ||
| OEA Mle 1925 | HE | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| HE-TF OEA Mle 1925 | HE-TF | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| 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% | ||||||||||
| OEA Mle 1925 | HE | 850 | 5.93 | 0 | 0.1 | 450 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
| HE-TF OEA Mle 1925 | HE-TF | 850 | 5.93 | 0 | 0.1 | 450 | 79° | 80° | 81° | |||
Anti-aircraft armament
The armament of six twin 13.2 mm is rather underwhelming, only able to automatically intercept targets within 2 km range, and lacking the stopping power that widely-used 20 mm guns have. They are sub-par in their performance against aircraft and coastal vessels alike.
Additional armament
Divided between two triple-launchers on each side, there are six torpedoes boasting an impressively wide firing angle (over 110°). This excellent firing angle, significantly enhances their role as a surprise weapon. This is further enhanced by the fact that each of the launchers carries a full reload, for a total of 24 torpedoes onboard. The torpedoes themselves offer a great combination of speed and range, complemented by a substantial warhead. As a result, they prove effective for both short-range engagements and long-range area denial.
Scout plane
Located aft is a catapult with one Gourdou-Leseurre GL.832HY scout plane which provides unique offensive and defensive abilities, expanding tactical options. Ship-launched scout planes fly just like regular tree units but lack munition choices and cockpit views. The GL.832HY is a mid-1930s design so was a simple 2-seater with a single defensive machine gun turret and no bombs. It does have the scout plane ability to cap zones and lay down smoke cover (up to 3 times). Captains will be wise to remember to utilise the aircraft and consider when best to use it, for example, to cap a point early or late in the match, to create a smoke screen to stymie enemy bombardment and repair, to attack enemy units directly, or perhaps something completely new!
Note: Because the catapult is directly behind the rear turret the aircraft would block the guns, it will not be visible until you launch it.
Usage in battles
Primauguet is a very effective cruiser in its BR and lower, but has little means of responding against heavy cruisers from higher BRs. It's a gun-centric ship that can output a significant amount of damage even with the HE shells, but where it shines is the damage output from SAP shells compared to similar shells from other vessels.
The ship is best used for pushing enemy points, out-ranging enemy destroyers and picking off problematic, but lightly-armoured, targets. What it should avoid are direct exchanges of fire with the enemy heavy cruisers, unless they can be caught within torpedo spread, as well as enemy coastal vessels - in particular motor torpedo boats.
Pros and cons
Pros:
- Very good damage output from the main guns
- Good survivability with very well protected ammo racks
- Very good torpedoes
Cons:
- Very limited armour protection
- Very limited capability to deal with a heavily-armoured target due to the lack of AP shells
- Lack of HE-TF or HE-VT shells
- Ineffective anti-air cover
History
Describe the history of the creation and combat usage of the ship in more detail than in the introduction. If the historical reference turns out to be too long, take it to a separate article, taking a link to the article about the ship and adding a block "/History" (example: https://wiki.warthunder.com/(Ship-name)/History) and add a link to it here using the main template. Be sure to reference text and sources by using <ref></ref>, as well as adding them at the end of the article with <references />. This section may also include the ship's dev blog entry (if applicable) and the in-game encyclopedia description (under === In-game description ===, also if applicable).
Media
- Skins
See also
- Related development
External links
- [Wikipedia] French cruiser Primauguet (1924)
- [Wikipedia] Duguay-Trouin-class cruiser
- [uboat.net] FR Primauguet of the French Navy - French Light cruiser of the Duguay-Trouin class - Allied Warships of WWII
- [Navypedia] DUGUAY TROUIN light cruisers (1926)
| Arsenal de Brest | |
|---|---|
| Avisos | |
| Arras-class | Arras |
| Light Cruisers | |
| Duguay-Trouin-class | Duguay-Trouin · Primauguet |
| Heavy Cruisers | |
| Suffren-class | Colbert · Dupleix |
| Battleships | |
| Bretagne-class | Bretagne |
| Dunkerque-class | Dunkerque |
| France light cruisers | |
|---|---|
| Duguay-Trouin-class | Duguay-Trouin · Primauguet |
| Jeanne d'Arc* | |
| Emile Bertin* | |
| * Unique ship | |
