Strategy: Thoughts on the Colorado from the high seas of World of Warships

I’m not a great World of Warships player.  It’s been a month of playing and my statistics in battleships is mediocre at best.  That being said, I am enjoying myself immensely.

The recently-released battleship MMO has been in beta since earlier this year, and it already has a multitude of fans.

Much lamentation has been spewed on the forums about the Colorado, the Tier VII Battleship in the United States battleship line.  Most say it’s terrible.

I wasn’t sure. Maybe they weren’t playing it right. Maybe I could master the ship no one else could.

At first, I did okay with the Colorado. I even had a nice three kill game, and I narrowly missed a chance at a fourth kill.

I began to feel the criticism heaped upon the poor Colorado was unfounded.  Gun dispersion was not very good, but when those 16” guns hit something, they hit it hard.  It was slow to turn, but it had all the defense a guy could want.  It was slow, but you just had to be patient and pick the right time and place to engage.

I thought I could work with these limitations.

But how wrong I was.

The Colorado sucks.

After a handful of solid games, things took a decided turn for the worse.

The Colorado’s limitations aren’t shared by the Nagato, the Japanese’s Tier VII battleship. The Nagato is faster, hits harder, has more accuracy and it’s more maneuverable. That ship can hold it’s own.

The more I played the Colorado, the more I was being matched against higher tiered enemies.  God help me if I faced a high-Tier Iowa or a Montana-class battleship.  I needed a cigarette and a blindfold in matches like that.  I was simply executed.

I know what you’re saying:  “Stop the hyperbole, Steve!  It’s not that bad!”

Oh but it is my friends.  It is and I have PROOF courtesy of Warshipstats.com!

Behold the fruits of my labor!  Pay particular attention to the bottom two.  See anything disconcerting there?  Let’s discuss shall we?

• Battles – Granted I have played the New Mexico almost three times more than the “Colorado” but I think 49 battles is a big enough sample size to discuss the failings of the ship in question.
• Win Rate – I moved to a higher tier ship and all of a sudden I’m 10 points worse than I was prior. Even starting out in the South Carolina, which is terrible, and I was brand new to the game, I still won more games than I did in the Colorado.
• XP & Avg. Dmg. – These stats should improve as I advance in Tier. Statistically speaking it has happened in every ship I played, except the Colorado.
• Kill/Death – In the New Mexico I kill 1.67 ships for every death. In the Colorado I kill .63 ships for every time I die!  I only sucked worse in the South Carolina.
• Ship Kill Rate & Plane Kill Rate – Amount of each killed on avg. in battle. Ships drops like a lead weight and planes sky rockets.  That great AA?  Nope, because this ship, at its Tier is so vulnerable, Carriers single it out for special attention.  I was, in every battle, constantly under air attack.  Did I kill planes?  Yes I did.  Did I win battles?  No I did not.
• Survival Rate – Again nearly a 10 point drop. Something is very wrong here.

By any statistical measure aside from Plane Kill Rate, the Colorado, for me, is a terrible Battleship.  Given all the online lamentation about it I would assume I’m not alone and this is not an isolated sentiment.

What do you think of the Colorado? What about World of Warships?

Let’s talk in the comments.