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F126A Niedersachsen Class

From 2028 onwards, the Federal German Navy will replace its old F123 frigates with newer, larger warships. Previously developed under the project name "MKS 180", the F126s will be the largest warships Germany has built since the Second World War. With a displacement of well over 10 000 tons, they will in fact be larger than many modern destroyers.

Through mission modules, these new ships are intended to be able to fullfill a wide range of tasks. Similar to the F125, these ships will also be able to stay at sea for extended times, with crews rotating on and off the ship without it needing to ever leave the operations area. With all these features, the ships are supposed to provide an efficient and somewhat cost saving way to take on peacetime missions.

As with many German ships of the recent years, this optimization towards solving low and medium threat missions has left quite a bit to be desired in its symmetric warfare capabilities. In comparison to other ships in its weight class like the Arleigh Burke Flight III or the 052D, the F126's 16 VLS cells and 8 Naval Strike Missiles seem nothing but neglegible.
While this has left some theorizing that the F126 was planned in a way that would allow easy retrofit to a more heavily armed wartime variant, no official confirmation has been given as of yet.

Specifications:
Length: 162.9 m
Beam: 24.4 m
Height: 42.1 m

Armament:
1 Oto Leonardo 127mm naval gun
2 MLG 27mm machine cannons
1 Goalkeeper 30mm CIWS
1 RIM-116 RAM CIWS
40 SM-6 VLAA missiles in VLS
8 * 4 ESSM VLAA missiles in VLS
32 RGM-158 LRASM anti ship missiles in VLS
24 RGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles, 16 in VLS and 2 * 4 armored box launchers
2 * 4 RGM-84 Harpoon anti ship missiles in canister launchers
2 * 3 324mm lightweight torpedo launchers

So as you probably noticed, I took some artistic liberty™ in improving the ship's armament and radar suite to fit more into what you would expect to see on a warship of this size. I didn't want it to be too over the top or ridiculously armed, instead still plausible and somewhat realistic, but definitely noticeable. That's also why I decided to name my variant the "F126A" class instead of just titling it by the base variant's name. I hope all water cannon enjoyers out there can forgive me for this ;)

Have fun with her!
(also omg vanilla Goalkeeper is finally a thing yay :o)