Characters / World Of Warships France

Warships attributed to the French Navy (Marine Nationale) in World of Warships.

France was announced as the eighth faction in World of Warships, with the first ship being the tier 6 premium battleship Dunkerque. The French Heavy Cruiser line was realeased in April 2017. The French battleship line was released in February 2018. The French destroyer line was released in August of 2019. The release of Large Cruiser line is scheduled on mid-2022.

The French tree as a whole can be described as combining More Dakka and Ludicrous Speed at the expense of almost everything else. Their high-tier cruisers and destroyers feature Main Battery Reload Booster, while battleships mount four-guns turrets. Most of their ships has their already-high base speed enhanced by an Engine Boost, allowing them to flank an enemy or help struggling allies. They pay for it with high visibility and relative fragility, that mostly leaves them the role of mid-range fire support.

Researchable ships

French Destroyers

French destroyers really live up to their name - most of them are actually Сontre-torpilleurs, designed to destroy enemy torpedo ships.

• Acrofatic: They feature both high speeds and large size, being designed to fight cruisers. Their engine boost consumable also has a larger top speed increase than other nation's destroyers.
• BFG: They have the second-largest weapons for destroyers at thier tier, capping out at 139mm guns, just short of alternate German Destroyers' 150mm guns.
• Highly-Visible Ninja: They suffer from some of the worst surface detection ranges.
• More Dakka: Higher tier ships get access to Main Battery Reload Booster, greatly increasing their damage output for a short time.
• Long-Range Fighter: They feature guns with good range and good AP performance.

Enseigne Gabolde

Tier II French Destroyer. Enseigne Gabolde initially was the third ship of Enseigne Roux-class, laid down in 1914, but the WWI forced France to halt the construction. The ship was redesigned and completed after the war as more powerful Super Prototype. Later she was used as a platform for testing new weapons, and was decommissioned in 1938.

Fusilier

Tier III French Destroyer. This project was developed in 1920 as a new type of destroyers. In the end, it was never built, and its design served as a basis for Bourrasque-class destroyers.

Bourrasque

Tier IV French Destroyer. Bourrasque-class destroyers were built in 1923-1928 as the first post-WWI destroyer class in the French Navy. Nine ships of the class were lost during WWII, while the surviving three were decommissioned in 1949-1950. The design was also reused for the Polish Wicher-class destroyers.

Jaguar

Tier V French Destroyer. Jaguar was the lead ship of Chacal class of destroyer leaders, built in 1922-1927. Out of six ships two were sunk shortly into WWII, one scuttled in Toulon by Vichy France during German occupation, and one more ran aground in 1943. The remaining two ships were captured by Germany, and given to Italy. After Italian Armictice one of them was scuttled, but the last one escaped to Free France, and served until 1955.

• Lightning Bruiser: She has the highest HP for destroyers in her tier, powerful guns, and fast, long range torpedoes. Her speed is also quite good. This is mitigated by her poor maneuverability and turret traverse speed.
• Theme Naming: All ships of the class were named after predators.

Guépard

Tier VI French Destroyer. Guépard-class was an evolution of Chacal-class, built in 1927-1931. All six ships were lost in WWII.

• More Dakka: All French mainline destroyers from this point onwards get access to the Main Battery Reload Booster.

Vauquelin

Tier VII French Destroyer. Further evolution of Guépard-class, Vauquelin-class ships were built in 1930-1934. One ship of the class was lost in 1940, and the remaining five were left in the Vichy France Navy. One more ship was lost to British aircraft, and the rest were scuttled in 1942 to avoid their capture by the Germans.

Le Fantasque

Tier VIII French Destroyer. Le Fantasque-class, built in 1931-1936, was meant to counter Italian Condottieri-class light cruisers. All six ships of the class were used by Vichy France, and one of them was heavily damaged and later destroyed, before French colonies decided to join Free France. One more ship was scuttled in Toulon in 1942, and the remaining four survived the war and served until 1957-1963.

Mogador

Tier IX French Destroyer. A continuation of Le Fantasque's design, Mogador-class carried heavier weaponry, consisting of four dual guns in enclosed mounts. Two ships of the class were built in 1934-1939, and four more were cancelled. Both ships served in Vichy France Navy, and were later scuttled in Toulon in 1942.

• More Dakka: She gets 8 guns, while retaining Main Battery Reload Booster.

Kléber

Tier X French Destroyer. A stronger, larger version of Mogador, Kléber-class destroyers were ordered in May 1939, but none were laid down before the start of the war. After the Fall of France all orders were cancelled

• Ludicrous Speed: Among the fastest ships in the game with 55.2 kts top speed with Engine Boost and Sierra Mike signal flag active.

French Cruisers - Heavy Cruisers

In General:

• Fragile Speedster: most of them have little if any armor, and are pretty fast.
• Nitro Boost: The mid-high tier French Cruisers get access to the Engine Boost consumable, normally only found on destroyers. This gives them some pretty impressive straight line speed. Their version gets 15% more speed compared to the normal 10%.
• Glass Cannon: French Cruisers follow the Sniper playstyle, being armed with high damage guns but having poor reload times, and their pitifully weak armor means they will get killed quickly if someone so much as looks at them funny.
• More Dakka: While they have a perfectly normal amount of guns and normally even have poor reload on average, starting at t6 they get a consumable that gives them a short duration reload boost. This boost combined with their high speed makes them extremely effective in an ambush.

Bougainville

Tier I French Cruiser. Bougainville was the lead ship of her class of eight avisos (sloops), built in 1929-1939. Three ships of the class survived the war, and served until 1959. Bougainville herself was fatally damaged by her sistership Savorgnan de Brazza during Battle of Gabon in 1940.

• Starter Equipment: One of the ships that everyone gets from the start of the game.

Jurien de la Gravière

Tier II French Cruiser. She was the last protected cruiser built by France, laid down in 1897 and completed in 1903. She fought in WWI, but saw little action, and eventually was broken up in 1922.

• BFG: Its 165mm guns are the largest fitted to a tier 2 cruiser.

Friant

Tier III French Cruiser. So-called Project 171 was developed after WWI to fill the vacant role of light forces in the French Navy. The project was never realized, but it served as basis for later Duguay-Trouin-class cruisers.

• Glass Cannon: Has worse armor than British cruisers. Yes, really.
• Macross Missile Massacre: Gets 6 torpedoes per side, and can rapidly shift the hull to fire both sides. This gives it an impressive 12 torpedo salvo at tier 3.
• Short-Range Long-Range Weapon: Oddly enough, the Friant is restricted to attacking at mid-range due to poor muzzle velocity.

Duguay-Trouin

Tier IV French Cruiser. The first major warships in the world built afer WWI, Duguay-Trouin-class cruisers were a series of three ships, built in 1922-1927. In WWII one of the ships joined Free France, another fought on Vichy France side and was sunk by Americans, and the last one was interned and was later used only as a barracks ship.

• Achilles' Heel: Facing your bow or stern to the enemy to minimize your cross-section is incredibly counter-intuitive as doing this will allow incoming plunging fire to hit the magazine.
• Glass Cannon: Has worse armor than British cruisers. Yes, really.
• Power Up Let Down: Gains only 3 knots of speed, doesn't reload its guns any faster, and the armor is just as bad as on the tier 3.

Émile Bertin

Tier V French Cruiser. The sole ship of her class, Émile Bertin was built in 1931-1935 to act as a destroyer flotilla leader. During WWII the cruiser evacuated French gold to an island in the Atlantic, and spent next two years here, until Germany occupied Vichy France. She then joined Allies, and served until 1961.

• Fragile Speedster: Can reach 39 knots without having the speed boost the later ships in the line get. However, she has less armor than the same-tier American destroyer USS'Nicholas. Ironically, this works to her advantage: citadel penetrations are rare because most AP shells will go through one side and out the other for an overpenetration before triggering the shell's fuse.
• Meaningful Name: Louis Émile-Bertin, a renowned early 20th century French naval engineer and the namesake of this ship, advocated for a fleet of light-yet-powerfully-armed-ships over a fleet of battleships. This lightly armored, yet heavily armed and fast cruiser perfectly embodies his desires.

La Galissonnière

Tier VI French Cruiser. The evolution of Émile Bertin's design, six La Galissonnière-class cruisers were built in 1931-1933. All ships of the class survived the Fall of France, but three of them were later scuttled in Toulon in 1942, after Germany tried to seize them. The remaining ships were stationed in Africa, where they joined Free France and remained in service until 1969.

• Lightning Bruiser: By French standards. It's the first ship in the line to have anything resembling armor.

Algérie

Tier VII French Cruiser. The sole ship of her class, Algérie was built in 1931-1934. She was a completely new design, built in responce to Italian Zara-class. The ship didn't saw any major action neither before nor after Fall off France, and was blown up by her crew in Toulon in 1942.

• Lightning Bruiser: Quite unusually for the French. She is the only tier seven cruiser with anything close to proper armor and is the fastest of them with her speed boost going. Don't expect to fight BBs solo though.

Charles Martel

Tier VIII French Cruiser of the Heavy Cruiser line. Project C5A3 was a 1938 preliminary design of a new-generation heavy cruiser. Compared to her predecessor, Algérie (which had index C4), C5A3 was slightly larger and had different main armament.

• Fragile Speedster: While her armor is nothing to write home about, with the speed flag she's capable of reaching 41 knots! This makes her faster than many destroyers, and is quite capable of keeping up or even outpacing them, making her very capable at hunting them down.

Saint-Louis

Tier IX French Cruiser of the Heavy Cruiser line. Further evolution of C5 design, authorised in 1940. However, the Fall of France stopped these plans, and the design was never revisited.

• One-Steve Limit: Averted. Has nothing to do with the US tier 3 cruiser.

Henri IV

Tier X French Cruiser of the Heavy Cruiser line. A 'logical continuation' of C5 designs, this ship was made up by developers. While keeping overall structure of previous Tiers, she packs bigger guns and has higher speed.

• Artistic License – History: Henri IV is yet another fictional Tier X cruiser, that has no basis in reality.
• BFG Has the second-largest guns fitted to a cruiser, save the Graf Spee and the supercruisers.
• Fragile Speedster: Even without her speed boost she is incredibly fast for a cruiser, but her armor is practically non existent.
• Glass Cannon: Almost no armor for a tier X ship, with only the fore and aft citadel + the turrets being armored.

Condé

French Super-Cruiser of the Heavy Cruiser line. Her main difference from the previous Tier is quad-gun turrets.

• More Dakka: With alternate firing mode she can shoot two salvos with improved accuracy and HE penetration, but must reload for a longer time. Now combine this with Main Battery Reload Booster…

French Cruisers - Large Cruisers

A line of French Large Cruiser consists of "cruiser killers", closely related to Dunkerque-class battlecruisers. Like their Heavy sisters, they mount both Engine Boost and Main Battery Reload Booster. They are set to be introduced in mid-2022.

• Achilles' Heel: Like Dutch cruisers before them, they have lengthened fire time.
• Alternate History: Tiers IX and X of this line, like most other high-tier French ships, have US-produced AA guns, meaning that they were not only built, but escaped to Allies, and were not destroyed in Operation Catapult or captured by Germany/Vichy France.
• Theme Naming: Thay are all named after major port cities.

Cherbourg

Tier VIII French Cruiser of the Large Cruiser line.

Brest

Tier IX French Cruiser of the Large Cruiser line.

• BFG: The line once again sets the record for the largest researchable cruiser guns. Starting with Tier IX they get 330mm guns.

Marseille

Tier X French Cruiser of the Large Cruiser line.

• Power Up Letdown: Sure, she has one more gun over Brest, but she can use only six of them while bow-tanking, while Brest can use all eight.

French Battleships

In General:

• Lightning Bruiser: Boast the highest speeds of any battleship, and from Richelieu on, carry the Engine Boost consumable, making them the quickest battleships in the game.
• More Dakka: Sacrifices gun caliber in order to have more, faster firing small guns.

Turrene

Tier III French Battleship. A project that directly succeeded older pre-dreadnoughts, and possessed unified main battery, presented to the Superior Naval Council in 1908. The project had three versions, all of which were rejected, but served as the basis for later Courbet-class. The in-game version is a combination of "A" and "B" variants.

Courbet

Tier IV French Battleship. The first series of French dreadnoughts, built in 1910-1914. France was slow to build their own dreadnoughts, and as the result, Courbet-class was designed to surpass other nations' battleships. All four ships of the class served in WWII, but saw little action. One ship was lost in 1922 after hitting a rock, and one more was hulked in 1936. The other two escaped to Britain, and saw no further action.

Bretagne

Tier V French Battleship. Bretagne was the second class of French dreadnoughts, built in 1912-1916. Completed halfway into WWI, they saw little action, and were put into reserve.

• Early-Bird Cameo: Players could obtain Bretagne through Richelieu from a mission unlocked via a container one update before the French battleships' proper introduction.

Normandie

Tier VI French Battleship

• Acceptable Breaks from Reality / Artistic License – History: Normandie was designed and laid down with a 21 knot top speed and a rearward facing middle turret in mind. Its doubtful a modernization could increase the speed this much without sacrificing its middle turret. However if built historically Normandie would be utter garbage in game.
• Lightning Bruiser: Boasts some of the most effective armor at its tier combined with the top speed among Battleships in its tier (combined with Dunkerque).

Lyon

Tier VII French Battleship

• Anti-Air: Starting with Lyon, French battleships get very good anti-air. Lyon herself does however concentrate this in a rather small number of mounts.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory: People getting Lyon out of a loot crate got quite the advantageous ship before her proper debut.
• Death of a Thousand Cuts: Mounts more guns to a broadside than any other ship in the game but they are small for a BB of her tier. Unlike most example the thousand cuts (technically sixteen) come all at once.
• More Dakka: Lyon is practically made of guns. Sixteen main battery guns backed up by twenty four secondaries and a powerful AA battery.
• One-Steve Limit: Downplayed. She has a very similar name to tier IX British Battleship Lion. Unlike Saint Louis example in Cruiser section, it's a bit more of a prblem, since these two ships may met in a random battle.

Richelieu

Tier VIII French Battleship

• Achilles' Heel: Richelieu and subsequent designs use are covered in a 32mm layer of armor everywhere but the turrets. While layers of armor under this are quite effective at preventing citadel penetrations, It leaves the ships quite vulnerable to HE spam.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory: Those lucky enough to get a Richelieu mission out of a crate have managed to bypass the majority of the French BB line and could theoretically simply buy Alsace the day the rest of the line was released without having to use gold for free XP.
• Bling-Bling-BANG!: Her "Maid of Orleans" camo covers her in a fair amount of gilt. This includes her guns naturally.
• Nitro Boost: Richelieu and subsequent ships get access to the speed boost consumable.
• Wearing a Flag on Your Head: Her "Republican" camo scheme covers her in red, white, and blue banners and a lot of other patriotic ornamentation.

Alsace

Tier IX French Battleship.

• More Dakka: Mounts twelve guns, the most at its tier. Players using Jean-Jaques Honere and adrenaline rush can also achieve a faster reload than any of her peers as she takes damage.

Republique

Tier X French Battleship. She's basically an upscaled version of Gascogne-class, designed by developers to serve as the top of the French Battleship line.

• Master of None: Aside from for being (temporarily via Nitro Boost) faster and having the best standard AA^note In practice, the Montana will still beat her in AA since American battleships don't have to sacrifice accuracy for AA. she is pretty mediocre. Despite a significantly faster reload than her peers, her low number of guns mean she has a lower DPM than any other tier X BB. She also combines this with pathetic armor vulnerable to HE pens and long range citadel hits.
• One-Steve Limit: A bizarre example. She was called France during tests, but was renamed to avoid confusion with France, the faction, as a whole.
• Power Up Let Down: She trades the rather impressive Alpha (bow-tanking Alpha in Richelieu's case) of the previous French battleships and trades it for slightly better DPM tier for tier with eight rapid fire guns. Most French BB players would have preferred a version of Alsace with more or bigger guns instead so they could still assassinate unaware ships (or if Republique had the current 8 431mm guns but in the same layout as Richelieu), but instead Republique has the worst Alpha at its tier.
  • However, after Alsace was nerfed, people are starting to appreciate Republique more. Her guns are insane, for one; they are very accurate and have the highest muzzle pen in the game. She might not have a raw alpha or raw DPM to match her peers, but her guns are so reliable that she effectively is competitive.

Patrie

French Super-Battleship. She is a variation on theme of the Alsace-class, but with larger guns.

• Limit Break: Her Combat Instructions, that can be activated after several salvos of adjustment fire, improve her main battery fire rate and speed of the ship.

Premium ships

French Premium Destroyers

Cyclone

• Smoke Out: She's one of only two French destroyers that has a smokescreen consumable. Le Terrible and the French tech tree destroyers do not have this consumable.

Siroco

French promo premium Tier V destroyer.

• More Dakka: The lowest tier Ship with access to the Main Battery Reload Booster.

Aigle

• Smoke Out: As with Cyclone, she gets a smokescreen consumable. However, Cyclone was a limited-time scenario ship for the Operation Dynamo event, while Aigle is a premium ship that can also be used in PvP matches.

Le Terrible

A French contre-torpilleur (large destroyer) belonging to the Le Fantasque class, large and very fast destroyers more akin to light cruisers (which is what Le Terrible was classified as when serving with the Allies after 1942). Le Terrible in particular reached a speed of 45 knots, becoming the fastest destroyer ever built.In-game, Le Terrible takes the form of an enormous destroyer with breath-taking speed and massive guns, but no smoke generator.

• Irony: Le Terrible's name is often a source of jokes from people who think the ship is awful, even after a huge buffing that was desperately needed to change it from something that was completely useless to something that at least had some competitive parity.
• Kill It with Fire: One her redeeming features is a base fire chance of ten percent. That's the same as Daring and you don't need to use IFHE (which reduces fire chance) on Le Terrible.
• Lightning Bruiser: La Terrible is the fastest ship in the game with its engine boost running. Its also has a fairly stout hp pool for A t8 DD and can temporarily boost its DPM as high a Hargumo.

Marceau

French Tier X destroyer.

French Premium Cruisers

De Grasse

Tier VI Premium French Cruiser

• Bribing Your Way to Victory: Downplayed example. While not an overpowered ship, De Grasse is an improvement La Galissonnière in terms of firepower (both gun and torpedo) and speed without really sacrificing anything in return, despite them both being at the same tier.
• Lightning Bruiser: Again by cruiser standards.
• Jack of All Stats: her strength is in her versatility. She boasts neither the best DPM, raw survivability, or AA but she is adequate in all of these aspects.

French Premium Battleships

Dunkerque

Tier VI Premium French Battleship

• Fragile Speedster: As usual for French ships. Dunkerque was more of a battlecruiser than a battleship, with lighter guns and lighter armor than many ships of her tier. Against broadside fire she melts quickly, though she can reject a staggering amount of fire outright when bows-on.

Strasbourg

French promo premium Tier VII battleship

• More Dakka: She's essentially the Dunkerque a tier higher and slightly improved armor. In exchange, she gets the Main Battery Reload Boost consumable.

Gascogne

Gascogne is a premium tier eight battleship. Gascogne was going to be a the fourth Richelieu class battleship. Unlike her sisters, she had one turret placed in the rear giving her a more conventional layout. She was cancelled due to the fall of France, though talks were already underway of cancelling the two final Richelieu class ships in favor of building the more powerful Alsace class.

• Bling-Bling-BANG!: Shares Richelieu's gilded "Maid of Orleans" camo pattern.
• Master of None: She not better than other ships in anything but speed (where she is tied by Richelieu) and has some faults of her own like her AA and armor. Shes not a particularly glaring example though and falls just short of being a Jack of All Stats.
• Wearing a Flag on Your Head: She also shares Richelieu's patriotic "Republican" camo.

Jean Bart

The second Richelieu class battleship built, Jean Bart was the last battleship to be used by a European navy. In game Jean Bart boasts a version of the main battery reload booster. Used properly, she can brutally punish battleships or cruisers for exposing their broadsides.

• Anti-Air: She has a post war AA suit featuring all large caliber AA guns not unlike Worcester. This means she carries all her AA DPM on her farthest damage circle.
• Glass Cannon: The least durable BB at her tier but can devastate anything that gives her a broadside.
• Point Defenseless: Interesting variant, Jean Bart has some of the most devastating long and range medium AA in the game but has no short range at all. To compensate for this her medium can fire much closer than other vessels of her type but she still won't hurt dive bombers that have started an attack run.