Kerch (destroyer)

This page is about the premium Russian destroyer Kerch. For the Soviet light cruiser, see Kerch (cruiser).

Kerch

Kerch

Description

The Fidonisy-class, Kerch, 1917 is a premium rank Soviet destroyer with a battle rating of (AB), (RB), and (SB). It was introduced in Update "New Power".

General info

Survivability and armour

As with other destroyers, Kerch is barely armoured. Several drawbacks from its primitive design including unprotected main and secondary guns as well as uncovered engines hamper its protection. Thus, it relies on its relatively small size and crew count to survive.

Mobility

The mobility of the destroyer Kerch is not that good compared to its contemporaries, but at least it's quite manoeuvrable.

Mobility Characteristics
Game Mode	Upgrade Status	Maximum Speed (km/h)		Turn Time (s)	Turn Radius (m)
		Forward	Reverse
AB	Stock	___	___
	Upgraded
RB/SB	Stock	___	___
	Upgraded

Armament

Primary armament

Kerch has 4 x 102 mm cannons as the main weapon. These guns have decent firepower and fire rate but are far from the best brawling weapons. The greatest advantage of these guns is the high accuracy which they have. As such, Kerch should be played as a sniper destroyer more so than a close-range brawler. The accuracy of these guns at long range far surpasses the other equivalent destroyers of other nations and can be used to shell enemies from far range with impunity from more inaccurate enemy fire.

Kerch also has the option of loading a unique shrapnel shell. While it is quite effective against any destroyer it might face due to increased fragmentation damage, it cannot set the enemy on fire (thus near useless against any destroyers that utilise anti-fragmentation armour), as well as cannot hull break any lightly-armoured PT boats (its greatest threats) it hits due to the shell over-penetrating and dealing little to no damage at all.

Another point worth mentioning is the fact that the arrangement of the guns is not exactly the best, with a single gun at the front and the 3 others all at the back. This means that you can only use a single gun against a target directly in front of you.

Secondary armament

The main difference between Kerch and the Frunze is that it's using two 40 mm Pom-Pom autocannons instead of a terrible 76 mm and 45 mm as secondary armaments. Despite only featured two single mounts at the aft and stern, these guns are quite reliable for AA defense due to wide coverage, and it's able to fend off PT boats at close distance.

Anti-aircraft armament

Anti-air armaments of Kerch consisted of two severely outdated 7.62 mm Maxim machine guns that are pretty much useless except for spooking inbound aircraft to dodge relatively harmless shots and get into the range of your Pom-Pom guns.

Additional armament

Although Kerch has three more torpedo tubes than the Frunze, it utilizes incredibly weak torpedoes with only 100 kg of warhead (less than half of Frunze's). Thus requiring more than one hit to destroy enemy ships. Other than that, its range is also awfully short at only 3 kilometers, thus it cannot attack enemy over longer distances.

Usage in battles

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Pros and cons

Pros:

• Main cannons are very accurate
• Relatively high crew count for reserve ship
• Quite fast and easy to control
• Small superstructure allows it to take lesser crew loss when being hit by small-calibre guns
• Two Pom-Pom autocannons is useful for fending off aircrafts and PT boats

Cons:

• Non-existent armour protection
• Gun crew is unprotected, even small-calibre machine guns can take them out
• No access to usual HEF shells, instead using a shrapnel shell that cannot set the enemy ship on fire and is useless against PT boats
• Horrible torpedoes with tiny warhead and short range
• AA armament is essentially useless

History

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Media

Skins

• Skins and camouflages for the Kerch (destroyer) from live.warthunder.com.

See also

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External links

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Black Sea Shipyard (Черноморский судостроительный завод)
Destroyers
Derzkiy-class	Frunze
Fidonisy-class	Kerch
Project 1	Moskva
Light Cruisers
Project 26	Voroshilov
Project 68A	Mikhail Kutuzov

USSR destroyers
	Imperial Russia
Derzky-class	Frunze
Fidonisy-class	Kerch
	Soviet Union
Pr. 1	Leningrad · Moskva
Pr. 45	Opytny
Pr. 7	Besposhchadny · Ryany
Pr. 7U	Soobrazitelny · Stroyny
Pr. 20	Tashkent
Pr. 30	Ognevoy
Pr. 30-bis	Smelyi · Bezuprechny
Pr. 41	Neustrashimy
Pr. 56	Spokoinyy · Blagorodnyy · Bravy
Trophies	Romania
Regele Ferdinand-class	Letuchiy

USSR premium ships
Motor torpedo boats	G-5 (ShVAK) · Pr.123K (A-10bis)
Motor gun boats	TKA-412 · Pr.183 BM-21 · Ya-5M
Motor torpedo gun boats	MPK Pr.12412P
Armoured gun boats	MBK-161 early · MBK pr.186 (MK 85) · Pr.1124 MLRS · Pr.1204
Sub-chasers	MPK Pr.122bis
Frigates	Rosomacha
Destroyers	Kerch · Ryany · Leningrad · Stroyny · Smelyi · Neustrashimy · Blagorodnyy
Light cruisers	Murmansk · Kerch · Zheleznyakov
Battleships	Marat