Battles of the Austro-Hungarians

[boomboomf22]

So I had a great battle as AH the other day, and I figured I might put it up here.  I wrote it up in a sort of nationalistic newspaper esq style.

[director]

Very nice - enjoyed the story, the graphics and the account. That Richelieu looks mean - you did well against such opposition!

[boomboomf22]

Mar 10, 2017 22:16:23 GMT -6 director said:

Very nice - enjoyed the story, the graphics and the account. That Richelieu looks mean - you did well against such opposition!

Thank you !!! This is my first ever attempt at this sort of thing.  Between procrastination and school work it took my 3 days to get this up.  I was fortunate in that they were stuck at 18kts and I was going 21 so I could control the range and allow my gunnery training to win out over the AI's inability to sail in a straight line... also help the Monarch has 7.5" of BE armor.  Of course I followed it up with a battle I won't be posting where I lost one of my 2 BCs to progressive flooding from 3 13" hits to its torpedo flat.

[boomboomf22]

It also helped the French 13" guns are still -2 quality. I absolutely love the Monarch, mostly for the derpyness that is 10" casemate mounts... How would that even work, cause isn't a casemate basically a hole in the side the gun sticks out of, with a swivel mount and some kind of gunshield?

[garrisonchisholm]

Not precisely. Others will no-doubt have more complete answers than I, but a Casement is essentially a "turret" in the side of a ship. The gun mounting and floor (correct me if I am wrong oldpop2000 !) rotates behind a static curved piece of armor with what amounts to a barrel "slot", depending upon the architecture of the ship. The only advantage for a full turret is a greater field of fire and typically greater elevation available of the mount producing greater range.

Wikipedia does not offer as much detail as I would like; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casemate

-and all my books seem to imply that of course the reader would know exactly what a ship-born casement was composed of lol. Ah well, the danger of amateurs with the enthusiasm of professionals. If I am wrong, someone will correct me.

[boomboomf22]

Okay, so 10" casemates are viable, but still sound cumbersome, just not to the degree I thought. Question tho: from pictures I have seen the loading apparatus seems bolted to the floor, would that rotate with the gun or would the gun have to be moved back into some sort of loading position? The picture I remember most had the loading track bolted straight to the ammo hoist built into the back of the compartment

[director]

Casemates probably were not useful beyond 8" guns because of the width of the ship versus the length of the gun inside the casemate, but the game permits it and that's all we need to worry about. The biggest casemated gun I can think of was the 8" in the side of the German armored cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Anyone know of one bigger?

A casemate is basically a hole (gunport) in the armored side of the ship; originally it was a gunport in the side of a fortress wall. Some had armored port-covers (watertight for bad weather because casemates were often low enough to have to worry about seawater slopping in if the waves were up) or an armored shield attached to the gun. Some of the shields were fitted to the sides of the opening so that there was no opening at the edge for shells or splinters to come through.

A casemate can offer some advantages - potentially more room than a turret, a smaller amount of armor (since most of the crew are protected by the ship's side and only the opening needs to be covered) and less weight of equipment (moving a gun versus a turret). Disadvantages: restricted arc of fire (turreted guns can cover more area, hence fewer guns and crew needed for same rate of fire), can't be used in a seaway (turrets are usually mounted higher) and less protection for ammo (casemated guns might have a single ammo elevator for multiple mounts, with crew carrying rounds to nearby guns).

A casemate is a holdover from the wooden or early ironclad ships with broadside armament, and just as those ships moved to turrets for efficiency so eventually did the secondary armament migrate to turrets.

This (link) shows casemates on Retvizan - the gun can only poke through one of three holes.
I think this is Mikasa (link). The lower gun covers apparently hinged open to give the guns room to train (and an opening for shells and fragements to come in); the upper guns clearly have a rounded shield that pivots with the gun. Those lower guns would have been hard to serve in a seaway.

[Airy W]

Mar 11, 2017 18:05:10 GMT -6 director said:

Casemates probably were not useful beyond 8" guns because of the width of the ship versus the length of the gun inside the casemate, but the game permits it and that's all we need to worry about. The biggest casemated gun I can think of was the 8" in the side of the German armored cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Anyone know of one bigger?

I dont know enough to answer that question but I would ask if pre-modern artillery count? If you go back into the 19th century very large casement guns would be found all over the place, they just wouldn't have the mounts like a 20th century casement and they would be short low velocity guns.

[boomboomf22]

Fine, so AH has come up with a really beamy semi-dread to fit the mounts and breaches into the ship around machinery spaces and magazines

[Airy W]

I am pretty sure that the casement guns are going to be above all the machinery spaces and magazines. You want those down at the waterline in the citadel where the belt protects them.

[boomboomf22]

Mar 11, 2017 18:47:32 GMT -6 Airy W said:

I am pretty sure that the casement guns are going to be above all the machinery spaces and magazines. You want those down at the waterline in the citadel where the belt protects them.

True but who knows, this is an Austrian ship we are talking about

[oldpop2000]

Mar 11, 2017 11:18:34 GMT -6 garrisonchisholm said:

Not precisely. Others will no-doubt have more complete answers than I, but a Casement is essentially a "turret" in the side of a ship. The gun mounting and floor (correct me if I am wrong oldpop2000 !) rotates behind a static curved piece of armor with what amounts to a barrel "slot", depending upon the architecture of the ship. The only advantage for a full turret is a greater field of fire and typically greater elevation available of the mount producing greater range.

Wikipedia does not offer as much detail as I would like; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casemate

-and all my books seem to imply that of course the reader would know exactly what a ship-born casement was composed of lol. Ah well, the danger of amateurs with the enthusiasm of professionals. If I am wrong, someone will correct me.

Sorry, I missed the question. A casemate is really just an armored room below the main deck. The guns are limited in elevation and azimuth, plus being close to the water line tend to be wet and almost useless in high seas. In many instances, the upper protective deck had to be reduced in thickness to allow for the casemate.

[HolyDragoon]

Mar 11, 2017 18:05:10 GMT -6 director said:

Casemates probably were not useful beyond 8" guns because of the width of the ship versus the length of the gun inside the casemate, but the game permits it and that's all we need to worry about. The biggest casemated gun I can think of was the 8" in the side of the German armored cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Anyone know of one bigger?

Ah, would this one count? (Warning, the page is in Portuguese). Might not be a casemate as I understand it, though...


www.areamilitar.net/DIRECTORIO/NAV.aspx?nn=51

[boomboomf22]

I would suppose yes based on the internal gun mount pictured. Do 10" gun casemate found. Of course quite older mounting than my semi-dread but ehhh counts

[director]

Yes, that is a casemated gun. I wouldn't count it as a modern ship or gun, though.