Yamato (Kantai Collection)

"1st of the Yamato-class battleships, Yamato. Heading forth!"

- Yamato

Yamato (大和?), named after the ancient Japanese Yamato Province, was the lead ship of the Yamato class of battleships that served with the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II. She and her sister ship, Musashi, were the heaviest and most powerfully armed battleships ever constructed, displacing 72,800 tonnes at full load and armed with nine 46 cm (18.1 inch) main guns. Neither ship survived the war.

Laid down in 1937 and formally commissioned a week after the Pearl Harbor attack in late 1941, Yamato was designed to counter the numerically superior battleship fleet of the United States, Japan's main rival in the Pacific. Throughout 1942 she served as the flagship of the Japanese Combined Fleet, and in June 1942 Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto directed the fleet from her bridge during the Battle of Midway, a disastrous defeat for Japan. Musashi took over as the Combined Fleet flagship in early 1943, and Yamato spent the rest of the year, and much of 1944, moving between the major Japanese naval bases of Truk and Kure in response to American threats. Although she was present at the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June 1944, Yamato played no part in the battle.

The only time she fired her main guns at enemy surface targets was in October 1944, when she was sent to engage American forces invading the Philippines during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. The Japanese were unaware that Admiral Halsey's entire massive fast carrier task force with battleships had been successfully lured away by a feint. Left behind was only a slow escort carrier task force armed against ground forces with no hope of protecting vulnerable troop transports from the Yamato. But as the American light ships resembled larger cruisers and carriers, the Japanese believed they were fighting the main fleet. The massive guns of Yamato would not be turned against battleships, but in the Battle off Samar would instead be a seemingly mismatched showdown against the industrial production of small and inexpensive light ships and carriers. Nevertheless desperate sailors and aviators delivered accurate 5 in shellfire and torpedoes from ships as small as destroyer escorts. These attacks wrought enough havoc on the Japanese surface force to turn them back, but only after inflicting losses comparable in ships and men to the Battle of Midway.

During 1944, the balance of naval power in the Pacific decisively turned against Japan and, by early 1945, the Japanese fleet was much depleted and critically short of fuel stocks in the home islands, limiting its usefulness. In April 1945, in a desperate attempt to slow the Allied advance, Yamato was dispatched on a one way voyage to Okinawa, where it was intended that she should protect the island from invasion and fight until destroyed. The task force was spotted south of Kyushu by US submarines and aircraft, and on 7 April 1945 she was sunk by American carrier-based bombers and torpedo bombers with the loss of most of her crew.

Appearance
Depicted as having long brown hair in a ponytail with multiple cherry blossoms in her hair, and often carrying an oriental umbrella with a shaft based on the battleship's distinctive mast.

Trivia

 * 2013 August event special map E-4 completion reward
 * Requires 2.5 times more fuel compared to Nagato class battleships
 * Was cynically referred as "Yamato Hotel", a hotel located in Dalian China during WW2 time, as she never took part in any major battle pre-1944 due to her high consumption and her status as IJN's flagship. Referred the same in-game as for same reason.
 * Yamato's remodel art features a 'Hirihoukenten (非理法権天)' kneesock (originally a flag). It reflects one of the old philosophy in feudal Japan where foolishness (非) is not above sensibility (理), sensibility is not above law (法), law is not above authority (権), and authority is not above divinity (天). As the emperor was treated as a divine figure in imperial Japan it has a meaning of "no men can oppose the (divine) emperor". A slogan adopted by the Imperial Japanese navy, this flag was hung on Yamato on her final voyage towards Okinawa.
 * Sunk 7 April 1945 north of Okinawa