Nation: Kingdom of Britannia

Famous Named Ship: HMS Sussex

Classification: Albion Class Demi-Dreadnought

Designation: Naval Capital Ship. Squadron Size 1

Kickstarter ‘Admiral of the Fleet’ Backer: Dayve Walsh

When Dayve first contacted us, he had a very clear vision for his ship and his first piece of concept artwork quickly hit our email server! Let’s leave Dayve to sum the ship up in his own words:

“I was so excited to be able to be able to make this ship. I love Dystopian Wars and the background just keeps getting better and better. When the Kickstarter arrived and I saw the Admiral of the Fleet level I thought to myself – Dayve, forget about eating, you need to make your very own DW model!” explains a very animated Dayve Walsh. “Then I emailed Spartan Neil with my idea, talked it over with him and then pretended I was Tony Hart [showing my age there] and it all got started.”

The nextstage was Spartan Mike’s involvement. He talked the Sussex design over with Dayve and came up with a first set of statistics. Once these were agreed upon the model maker gets involved. Dave’s design was so clear cut that we only made only one revision pass to the model before Dayve gave the model his blessing.

“I was gob-smacked they nailed it so fast. I’m no artist, but they took my drawing and slam-dunked it. The time chatting to Spartan Mike was great and he helped me avoid making a ship that was so dumbly overpowered as to be no fun. Neil offered up the idea of a Shield Generator that was ‘first generation’ so could overload and go offline. This really appealed to my mind of the aging hulk.”

In fact, the Sussex not only grew upon Dayve, but it hooked Spartan Neil. “It is pretty hard not to get excited about DW when you get to talking to Dayve Walsh. It may be my game, but his love for the game is fabulous. During my first chat to him about the Sussex I was working on the Bronze Typhoon Campaign Book and I was making notes about then Britannians and Singapore. And I came up with an idea, which I quickly ran past Dayve.”

The idea was to make HMS Sussex part of the background to the campaign, and to the fall of Singapore. Spartan Franco was then dragged in [he’s the author of the Bronze Typhoon book] and a plan was hatched. Soon the Sussex went from Dayve’s brainchild and Blue Peter sketch to a shape-setting model that was to influence not only the Kickstarter, but become part of Britannian naval history and would cause the brand new Royal Canadian Navy to take shape!

Let’s summarise HMS Sussex for you:

• A hulking and aged vessel. Older in design concept than the current naval designs of the Kingdom of Britannia (KoB), this was the first Demi-Dreadnought for the nation. Built from a rugged non-military vessel and heavily modified for war, the core concept behind it being a line breaker. Ploughs into a line of enemy ships, crosses the “T” and unloads a powerful payload of broadside torpedoes and gunnery.
• Layers of segmented ablative armour padding. More pronounced and “featured” than those found in Russia. This is a modified ship and as such has a large amount of ablative plates and modifications to make it more durable for its close quarter action.
• First generation External Shield Generator. One of the first of its kind, whilst bleeding edge technology it needed an air of sophistication and complicated craftsmanship. Built into the hull it carries special rules that mean things don’t always go to plan!
• A staggering Broadside capability! Able to swivel slightly, but only capable of firing in a Broadside Arc, these guns are the “main” armament of the vessel. Huge amounts of attack power out the flanks.
• Behind the prow of the Sussex sits a powerful breach Mortar weapon. Fires in a fixed straight channel. The idea being to bombard the enemy as the Sussex steams in to unleash its crushing Broadside weaponry!
• Under the port and starboard Broadsides are a row of Torpedo tubes, popping out from behind the armour plating that runs along the sides.
• A powerful engine system, now bolstered with Sturginium boosting technology, propels this beast of a vessel.

HMS Sussex will shortly go into our Online Store for pre-order by you all. We hope you like her as much as we do [it’s not possible to like her as much as Dayve, his cup literally floweth over!!] and we’ll keep you updated on more cool models as they are completed for our Admirals of the Fleet.