Need advice on this Dark Hoppy Ale recipe

[slyjeremybrewer]

I'm trying to clone a beer I just tried called " Dark Hoppy Ale " from Beer Here Brewery.If you haven't had it, it's a fantastic beer, kind of an IPA and Stout fused together. Full Mash..... it calls for Marris Otter malt, smoked malt, and some British specialty malts. My problem is that I've never done a stout so I'm really unsure how much smoked malt to use. Beer Smith says up to 100% in the batch, but that just doesn't seem to make sense to me. Also, I have no idea what would be considered a " British Specialty Malt "

 

[crager013]

I am still a spec. grain/extract brewer but 100% smoked malt sounds like WAY too much. I just made a smoked porter with a recipe I devised on Hopville that was:

malt & fermentables
% LB OZ Malt or Fermentable ppg °L
73% 6 0 Dark Dry Malt Extract 45 18 ~
18% 1 8 Smoked American Two-row 34 5 ~
6% 0 8 Black (Patent) Malt 25 500 ~
2% 0 2 dark crystal 34 85 ~
2% 0 2 Chocolate Malt 34 475

 

[slyjeremybrewer]

how strong was the smoke flavor? Bold and up front, or more of an underlying background flavor?