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Post by vonfriedman on May 3, 2017 8:42:09 GMT -6
Which of the two fleets was to the leeward side? Since I'm going to start exactly the same campaign on the British side, I'm a little worried. If I think also about the unfortunate tendency of British warships to explode ....
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Post by director on May 3, 2017 9:26:17 GMT -6
The situation seems to have been that the RN units most exposed to heavy fighting - Beatty's battlecruisers - spent little or no time on gunnery training while Jellicoe's battle squadrons did. Jellicoe also spoke to Beatty about the latter's emphasis on gunnery speed, telling him it was being carried to excess. The fastest shooters in the BC squadron were Indefatigable and Queen Mary - make of that what you will.
So overall the British hit percentages were substantially lowered by the BC squadron's poor shooting. I've seen the figures .03 (RN) and .05 (HSF) tossed around but can't now substantiate them - still, it feels about right. The battle squadrons under Jellicoe seem to have shot substantially better but that is undoubtedly affected by environmental conditions and by position - crossing the German T.
Technologically, the two nations used different systems for range-finding and shot correction, and without going into details the result was the Germans tended to shoot well at the outset and see accuracy decline while the British tended to shoot poorly at first and see accuracy improve. Unfortunately for the RN, Jutland tended to be broken into short bursts of activity and Beatty (and his captains) so mismanaged Dogger Bank as to turn it into a dog-pile on one ship.
Jellicoe had a lot of faults, but attempting to bring the fleet gunnery up to a high mark wasn't one of them.
Tactically, in your action the German battlecruisers could have fled north, but operationally and strategically they could not. The German ships were not built with extended steaming in mind, so while they and the British had roughly comparable steaming ranges, as a practical matter if the British could get between them and their base they could stay there as long or longer than the Germans could remain at sea. If I were the German admiral in that situation I would not have been confident that I could move far enough (and fast enough) north to break contact, loop west and south without being found and then find the route home uncovered. The real question is why the battlecruisers were caught up against the coast in the first place; it is the equivalent of an army's having its back to an unbridged and unfordable river - perfectly fine until and unless something goes wrong and then a recipe for disaster.
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Post by cv10 on May 3, 2017 10:32:20 GMT -6
Which of the two fleets was to the leeward side? Since I'm going to start exactly the same campaign on the British side, I'm a little worried. If I think also about the unfortunate tendency of British warships to explode .... I think that the Germans were on the leeward side, but I'm not sure. The big thing in terms of ships exploding, is that your battlecruisers should be used strictly for scouting and attacking enemy cruiser groups. Do not try to us them against the German battle-line or their battlecruisers. The German battlecruisers have better armor (their belts are as thick as some of my older dreadnoughts) and will be at a decided advantage should yours meet theirs. Most of the time I have had ships explode, its been because I tried to use battlecruisers in a fleet action.
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Post by vonfriedman on May 3, 2017 12:44:56 GMT -6
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2017 8:59:09 GMT -6
The situation seems to have been that the RN units most exposed to heavy fighting - Beatty's battlecruisers - spent little or no time on gunnery training while Jellicoe's battle squadrons did. Jellicoe also spoke to Beatty about the latter's emphasis on gunnery speed, telling him it was being carried to excess. The fastest shooters in the BC squadron were Indefatigable and Queen Mary - make of that what you will. So overall the British hit percentages were substantially lowered by the BC squadron's poor shooting. I've seen the figures .03 (RN) and .05 (HSF) tossed around but can't now substantiate them - still, it feels about right. The battle squadrons under Jellicoe seem to have shot substantially better but that is undoubtedly affected by environmental conditions and by position - crossing the German T. Technologically, the two nations used different systems for range-finding and shot correction, and without going into details the result was the Germans tended to shoot well at the outset and see accuracy decline while the British tended to shoot poorly at first and see accuracy improve. Unfortunately for the RN, Jutland tended to be broken into short bursts of activity and Beatty (and his captains) so mismanaged Dogger Bank as to turn it into a dog-pile on one ship. Jellicoe had a lot of faults, but attempting to bring the fleet gunnery up to a high mark wasn't one of them. thnx, now that u mentioned i do remember reading about that. i suppose i'll have to read about the gunnery system sometime. how the hell do you shoot gradually worse? that's like counter logic. but then, i reckon naval gunnery is high math..
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Post by vonfriedman on May 4, 2017 14:13:01 GMT -6
I suppose that the liners of the large caliber naval guns tend to wear out, in a so long fire engagement. This fact, coupled with the smoke and the deterioration of the visibility conditions, could justify a gradual worsening of gunnery precision.
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Post by archelaos on May 4, 2017 14:38:04 GMT -6
thnx, now that u mentioned i do remember reading about that. i suppose i'll have to read about the gunnery system sometime. how the hell do you shoot gradually worse? that's like counter logic. but then, i reckon naval gunnery is high math.. I read somewhere that german optics were state of the art, and the design of FC systems allowed very precise measurement of distance but this also made them damage prone - constant shock of firing and receiving hits was simply decalibrating German FCs. On the other hand British systems were not so precise, but this made them more dependable, so in prolonged fight they were naturally firing better with every salvo.
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Post by director on May 4, 2017 14:54:27 GMT -6
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Post by cv10 on May 4, 2017 20:18:39 GMT -6
Turn Three (Sept. 1st, 1914)Planning
Since a good number of my dreadnoughts are going to under repair for the next month or so, I'm rather limited in what operations I can run. Right now, the bulk of the Fleet will be conducting training drills to build up crew quality. I'm going to need really good crews if I intend to beat the Germans. My battlecruisers are getting close to a level of crew skill where I will be comfortable deploying them.
Until the dreadnoughts return from the yards, I will be making use of my light forces to poke Harry Hun's eye. For this turn, I will be running an mine-laying operation in the North Sea, with two of my mine-layer cruisers being activated to lay a field around Oyster Ground. I think that this is a possible area where the Germans could sail through to attack the East Coast, should they try to do so. However, I am also activating a light cruiser group attached to the Grand Fleet, along with screening destroyers. These ships will help cover the mine-layers, and then sweep the Helgoland Bight, looking for any German light forces. Even sinking a few minesweepers will be worth the effort, particularly if it forces the AI to cancel its plans to try and respond to my ships. Also, here is a list of the German ships damaged or sunk at the Battle of Horn's Reef. I seem to have done a number on their scout force, as in addition to the three battlecruisers, I also knocked their light cruisers about (regret that none were sunk).
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Post by cv10 on May 4, 2017 20:43:22 GMT -6
Also, these are the profiles on the German battlecruisers sunk at the Battle of Horn's Reef. They have pretty good armor for battlecruisers, as my best armored battlcruisers only have 9 inch belts, and a lot of them have 6 inch belts. For Comparative purposes, here are the specs. of some of the early British Dreadnoughts. The thing that I think most pertinent is that the German battlecruisers have equal belt armor to my early dreadnoughts, and the Seydlitz actually had more (I think she required a torpedo to sink her). Finally, below are the specs. for the dreadnoughts I lost at Horn's Reef. The biggest regret that I have is not that I lost two dreadnoughts, but that they were two of the better ones that I had at this time. Their loss stings a bit more. I would gladly have lost HMS Temeraire and HMS Vanguard to sink the German battlecruisers, and I still think that I came out on top, but the loss of these two fine ships makes the battle a bit more bitter.
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Post by konstantinua00 on May 5, 2017 9:05:18 GMT -6
pictures of first chapters are "no longer exist or available" can you fix it? how does that happen? should we trust imgur after that?
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Post by cv10 on May 5, 2017 10:06:16 GMT -6
pictures of first chapters are "no longer exist or available" can you fix it? how does that happen? should we trust imgur after that? konstantinua00 welcome to the aar! I just checked, and I'm still able to see them on the first page. Can anyone else not see them? Has anyone run into this problem before? Update: I just fiddled with the Album settings that I have been organizing the pictures into. I had the one for the first turn accidentally set to "Secret", so that might have done it. I have set it to "hidden" which should enable you to see the pictures in it, at least I think it should. Do I need to set it to "public" for the rest of you to see the pictures?
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Post by bcoopactual on May 5, 2017 10:19:22 GMT -6
The first page looks like this to me right now.
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Post by cv10 on May 5, 2017 10:31:19 GMT -6
The first page looks like this to me right now. I just changed the Albums to public. I then logged out of both imgur and the forum accounts and looked at the thread as a visitor. I can see the pictures, however if other people still can't, I redo the BB codes. it could be that my organization of them it albums flummoxed the original codes. Are all of the picutres affected, or just those from the first section?
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Post by archelaos on May 5, 2017 14:24:25 GMT -6
The first page looks like this to me right now. I just changed the Albums to public. I then logged out of both imgur and the forum accounts and looked at the thread as a visitor. I can see the pictures, however if other people still can't, I redo the BB codes. it could be that my organization of them it albums flummoxed the original codes. Are all of the picutres affected, or just those from the first section? Pics are still broken. AFAIK moving pictures between albums break links, at least in photoshop.
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