Bogatyr in a sexy black dress.

Quick Summary: A stock Bogatyr-class protected cruiser.

Patch and Date Written: 0.6.0 – January 25th, 2017

Closest in-Game Contemporary Bogatyr, Tier 3 Russian Protected Cruiser

Degree of Similarity: Clone / Sister-Ship / Related Class / Similar Role / Unique The Oleg is a stock Bogatyr-class. Lert and I will go on at length about the difference between the ships, so I’ll keep it short here. I was sorely tempted to compare her instead to the Aurora. The Pallada-class is very similar in play style in World of Warships and short of an obvious difference in speed, it would be difficult to really set them apart in terms of performance.

PROs

The Oleg is very soft skinned leading to many over penetrating hits from battleship-caliber, armour piercing shells.

More hit points than the fully upgraded Bogatyr.

Fast for a protected cruiser at 24.0 knots.

Good HE performance, with 2,100 alpha strike per shell and 8% base fire chance.

Great handling, with a tighter turning circle than her sister ship at 450m.

Very easy to understand and with a very low skill floor.

CONs

Low DPM for a tier 3 cruiser with her 8-gun broadside and 9s reload.

Agonizingly slow turret rotation made all of the more noticeable by her small turning circle. Guns will often slide off the target in a high speed turn.

Her top speed, while perfectly adequate when top tier is severely lacking when she faces tier 4 ships.

Short of the turrets, the entire ship has no more than 13mm of external armour plating. Much of it has 6mm. This makes her take high explosive penetrations from any size of shell that strikes her.

A small portion of the citadel is raised well over the waterline (found just beneath the two large lifeboats behind the last funnel). This portion has less sloping than the rest of the citadel.

Her AP shells are downright forgettable with poor penetration and requiring very short range engagements to be effective.

No anti-aircraft firepower whatsoever.

If you ascended the Russian cruiser line, you’ve already played the Oleg. It’s disappointing to say, but there it is. The Oleg is a stock Bogatyr with a few tweaks to her stat line. They can be summarized by the following. The Oleg:

Has more hit points.

Has a slightly smaller turning circle.

Has sexy black camouflage. Good and we’re done. Review over. Goodnight everybody! Huh? What do you mean that’s not good enough!? Ugh! Fine!

I’ve asked Lert to once again join me in this review to provide his views. Lert has more experience in the Bogatyr than anyone else I know and he’s certain a better hand at it than I am. He’ll even deliberately up-tier his cruiser to face bigger opponents like the good ol’ days. Apparently baby seals aren’t enough to sate his appetite anymore. I totally approve of this behaviour.

The Lertbox Hello and welcome to another Lertbox. This time we’re discussing the russian tier 3 Bogatyr class cruiser Oleg. Is it worth your money? Is it worth being in this game at all? For this Lertbox I will comparing her to Bogatyr, St Louis and Aurora. I feel these are very representative of the protected cruiser gameplay at the tier.

(He better make this review good cause I dunno how many times I can repeat myself in saying this is a stock Bogatyr and be expected to be entertaining!)



Doing the dance. The Oleg cannot win by rate of fire alone. Learn to WASD early and often with your cruisers. It will serve you well.

Options No surprises here. Low tier cruisers aren’t terribly complicated. Consumables: Damage Control Party Module Upgrades: Two slots, standard cruiser options.

Premium Camouflage: Tier 2 to 5 Standard. This provides 30% bonus experience gains, 3% reduction in surface detection and 4% reduction in enemy accuracy. The Oleg’s camouflage is pretty sexy looking.

Firepower

Primary Battery: Twelve 152mm rifles. Eight guns are mounted in casemates along the flanks of the ships, four to each side. The remaining four are divided into two, two-gun turrets on the bow and stern.

Secondary Battery: Twelve 75mm rifles, with six down each side of the ship in casemates.

Expert Marksman, the tier 2 Captain Skill, is almost a must. Let’s start with what was almost a deal breaker for me: The Oleg has horrible gun handling. It takes 30s to rotate her guns 180º. This is so slow that in a turn, your guns will slide off your target every single time. This is so slow that you’re unable to shift fire from one side of the ship to another quickly because it will take so long for the guns to acquire their target. Yes, even the casemate guns bolted to the sides of the ship which can only face on side will take too long to rotate onto your target. This is so slow that you’ll be using the rudder to line your guns up. It’s that bad., the tier 2 Captain Skill, is almost a must. The Oleg has less main battery firepower than the Aurora despite having the same broadside of eight 152mm/45 Canet guns. This disparity comes from a difference in rate of fire. The Pallada-class cruisers reload in 8.6s while the Bogatyr-class cruisers reload in 9.0s. This places the Oleg third from the bottom in terms of HE DPM among the tier 3 cruisers.

140,000 – Bogatyr (B-Hull) 152mm

126,667 – Bogatyr (B-Hull) 130mm with Basic Fire Training

126,000 – St.Louis

118,800 – Kolberg with Basic Fire Training

117,209 – Aurora

114,000 – Bogatyr (B-Hull) 130mm

112,000 – Oleg

108,000 – Kolberg

96,000 – Tenryu

But let’s be clear here — she’s not that far behind the Bogatyr with 130mm before Captain Skills. The 2,000 DPM between them is the difference of 1 extra hit from the Oleg’s 152mm rifles. In the real world with shot dispersion, the Oleg’s damage is going to compare very closely with the Bogatyr until Basic Fire Training is added. To this end, the Oleg won’t feel that far behind ships like the Aurora or an upgraded Kolberg.

The Oleg’s main battery is supplemented by twelve 75mm secondary guns. However, like most low-tier vessels, her secondaries are hamstrung by painfully short range — in this case, a mere 2.5km. Their small caliber isn’t too much of an issue against anything short of a Battleship. While it’s possible to engage targets with these guns, it’s never going to end well unless you already have the upper hand by a significant margin.

Overall, the Oleg’s firepower is pretty average with nothing really spectacular about it. She has only a modest a 10.8km range, her AP performance is hamstrung by poor ballistics and she can’t out muscle any of her contemporaries in terms of raw damage. This might be acceptable if the Oleg had other abilities to supplement her firepower but as you’ll see in subsequent sections, these advantages fail to materialize. While her guns are completely capable of doing damage and performing, the Oleg does not win any recognition for what she brings to the table as a gunship.

Rivals: Versus the Bogatyr Against a bone stock Bogatyr you actually stand a chance in an Oleg. Similar range, similar broadside with the same guns, similar reload, similar speed, same armor profile but more hit-points. It’s when the Bogatyr starts upgrading though that Oleg is left choking in the dust. The B hull gives Bogatyr a heavier broadside, the FCS gives the tech tree ship better range and the 130mm guns give her a better fire chance. Plus, if the Bogatyr player has the 130mm guns mounted and AFT researched, he can keep you at arm’s length without ever allowing you a chance to shoot back. The best (and only) way to handle a Bogatyr is when the latter is distracted. Get your fire in, while he’s concentrating on other things. Try not to be the easy target, because he outguns and out-ranges you.



The Oleg, doing what she does best: Providing supporting firepower into an engagement from the second line. She doesn’t have the DPM, armour or hit point total to trade blows effectively.