Battlecarrier

Battlecarriers are hybrid ships that are part battleship and part aircraft carrier, combining the former's protection and firepower with the latter's ability to launch and recover aircraft.

History: Though a few different navies have proposed the concept of a Battlecarrier, only the Imperial Japanese Navy during WWII launched and used them. They launched two in the middle of the war--the IJN Ise and the IJN Hyuga--both were converted from full-on battleships by removing the rear gun turrets and building elevated flight decks over the aft part of the ship. However, their actual performance in combat proved substantially less than hoped and the concept was written off as unworkable due to the inability of the ship to fire artillery and launch aircraft together. Further, the ships' inability to recover aircraft directly onto its deck meant it could only carry lower performance seaplanes and stop to hoist them back onto the ship.

Modern naval history has shown remarkably similar concepts tried by the Russian navy in Kiev class carrier. Kiev combines cruiser and carrier feature and capable to perform anti-aircraft, anti-submarine and surface warfare. Kiev is heavily armed with offensive missiles on the bow instead of big gun artillery and a flight deck over the remaining 2/3 of the hull. Further, in the Soviet Navy this class of ships is specifically designated as a heavy aviation cruiser rather than as aircraft carrier.

Ingame: These are the last type of ship that can be accessed through tech advancement in all three entries of the Naval Ops series. Though superficially useful, the lack of aircraft punch and saturation of air defense weapons throughout the game will render the aircraft aspect near useless and cost you more money at the end of every mission as you continually buy more planes to replace the ones you lost. That said, certain hulls in the games will allow you to place a full complement of battleship artillery, both front and rear. This will allow you to have the full punch of big gun artillery along with the added damage dealing and air defense from loaded aircraft.

Strategy: The best hull for a battlecarrier build in WSG and WSG2 is the X-Battlecarrier hull, which can be attained as a reward for completing certain missions. It holds up to 20 aircraft and the deck allows for rear-mounted artillery, allowing you to double your big gun firepower. That said, the hull does not have as high of tonnage capacity as similar sized battleship hulls, so you'll likely have to use smaller main guns or thinner armor.