Bretagne has different ranges for AP & HE

[Manic_Wombat 248]

Bretagne - the new t5 French BB - is the first ship (that I know of) to have different ranges for different ammo: 18.1km for HE and 16.1 for AP.

I'm wondering if this is deliberate or a bug?

In all other ways though Bretagne is utterly "meh" but Richelieu is fun.

[Vitellius9 11]

What's their niche?  Fast and squishy with high dpm low caliber?

[Manic_Wombat 248]

Bretagne doesn't really have a niche. It's slow and utterly average.

Tier 7 Lyon is a quad barrelled shotgun.

Tier 8 Richelieu is a fast battlecruiser.

[MaxL_1023 1,295]

It is a bug - they are fixing it in 7.1.1 as far as I know. It is a gun elevation issue or something weird like that. 

[Crossfader 1,142]

9 hours ago, Manic_Wombat said:

 

Tier 8 Richelieu is a fast battlecruiser ship

they have about 42% of standard displacement in armor, more of less the same as Bismarck/Iowa

[Madner Kami 405]

9 hours ago, Crossfader said:

they have about 42% of standard displacement in armor, more of less the same as Bismarck/Iowa

Bismarck and Iowa were not traditional battleships anymore though, they were "fast battleships", a "sort of hybrid" between battleships and battlecruisers (though battlecruiser is a rather non-all-composing word in the first place, just look at the differences in building-philosophy between german and english battlecruisers). "Sort of hybrid" is mostly down to technological advance though, which allowed the battleship-concept to be just about as fast as a battlecruiser would be.

And while the technical differentiation between BC and BB is really watered down at that point, it stands to reason to differentiate by occupation. Bismarck was not a ship designed to fight in a fleet battle. It was an oversized commerce raider (something very symptomatic of german building at the time in general: "Why build three Hippers, when you can have a Bismarck instead?") intended to outtank and outgun what it can't outrun and outrun what can outtank and outgun it. The Dunkerques and the Richelieus were similarly focused designs (although Treaty-limitations played a role there as well, otherwise Richelieu in particular would be a much more clearer fleet battleship). They were designed to hunt Graf Spees and Bismarcks and thus needed speed and survivability, rather than needing the largest guns.