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Post by chris19delta on Jan 6, 2018 22:43:02 GMT -6
I decided to try a high/low mix of cruisers instead of only building 8000 tonners and have been playing around with very small light cruisers and noticed some odd ship design mechanics between 2100 (actually starting at 2000, but you cant build 2000 ton cruisers)and 3200 tons, provided you keep speed below certain thresholds, dependant on tech level 22 knots with 1899 tech for example. You can build the same ship in terms of guns/armor at 2100 tons that you can at 3200 for 1/2 to 2/3 the cost. It gets really odd at displacements between 2200 and 3100. Ships of these displacements are significantly less efficient with hull and machinery taking up a higher % of total displacement.
In combat the 2100 ton CLs seem to perform as well as the AI's 3000+ ton ships for raiding/trade protection duties, however as they are unable to ship submerged tubes they are unsuitable for fleet service until you get above water tubes.
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Post by aeson on Jan 7, 2018 0:25:31 GMT -6
however as they are unable to ship submerged tubes they are unsuitable for fleet service until you get above water tubes. Torpedo tubes, while useful, aren't really necessary for a light fleet scout or light fleet escort, and destroyers generally make for better torpedo platforms than cruisers anyways - if nothing else, destroyers are cheaper (and thus more disposable) and usually faster than cruisers are. Plus, by the stage of the game where you can build CLs with above-water torpedo tubes you can probably build 1100-1500t DDs, which can fulfill just about any fleet role requiring torpedoes about as well as a 2100t CL can and will probably be faster and carry about as good of a gun armament as a contemporary 2100t CL (possibly better, if the 2100t CL is more than minimally armored), and do so at a lower cost, so I'd be inclined to say that the window of usefulness for a 2100t fleet CL has already largely passed by the time it becomes possible to stick above-water torpedo tubes on CLs. |
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Post by oaktree on Jan 7, 2018 12:37:05 GMT -6
I decided to try a high/low mix of cruisers instead of only building 8000 tonners and have been playing around with very small light cruisers and noticed some odd ship design mechanics between 2100 (actually starting at 2000, but you cant build 2000 ton cruisers)and 3200 tons, provided you keep speed below certain thresholds, dependant on tech level 22 knots with 1899 tech for example. You can build the same ship in terms of guns/armor at 2100 tons that you can at 3200 for 1/2 to 2/3 the cost. It gets really odd at displacements between 2200 and 3100. Ships of these displacements are significantly less efficient with hull and machinery taking up a higher % of total displacement. In combat the 2100 ton CLs seem to perform as well as the AI's 3000+ ton ships for raiding/trade protection duties, however as they are unable to ship submerged tubes they are unsuitable for fleet service until you get above water tubes. In recent reading* one factor that was bothering British design of cruisers was that as they tried to build smaller/cheaper light cruisers in the 20s-30s while keeping up with speed, AAA, armor, and even carrying aircraft they were producing ship designs that were very cramped for crew accommodations and facing issues with fitting everything in that they wanted. And at one point topside space was starting to drive minimum size to some degree. * - D K Brown's _Nelson to Vanguard_ and Friedman's _British Cruisers_. Between them they give an nice piece of insight toward's late-game RTW design issues. And will probably help with RTW2 even more since the issues of AAA, carrying aircraft, and eventually mounting radar come into play. |
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Post by chris19delta on Jan 8, 2018 8:43:48 GMT -6
however as they are unable to ship submerged tubes they are unsuitable for fleet service until you get above water tubes. Torpedo tubes, while useful, aren't really necessary for a light fleet scout or light fleet escort, and destroyers generally make for better torpedo platforms than cruisers anyways - if nothing else, destroyers are cheaper (and thus more disposable) and usually faster than cruisers are. Plus, by the stage of the game where you can build CLs with above-water torpedo tubes you can probably build 1100-1500t DDs, which can fulfill just about any fleet role requiring torpedoes about as well as a 2100t CL can and will probably be faster and carry about as good of a gun armament as a contemporary 2100t CL (possibly better, if the 2100t CL is more than minimally armored), and do so at a lower cost, so I'd be inclined to say that the window of usefulness for a 2100t fleet CL has already largely passed by the time it becomes possible to stick above-water torpedo tubes on CLs. Based on this playthrough (currently early 1920s), there never is a window of usefulness for fleet ops for these ships. At no point have I been able to build a 2100 ton CL with sufficient speed to effectively screen my battlefleet. That being said I am happy with their performance (and cost) on foreign stations. |
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Post by aeson on Jan 8, 2018 11:18:24 GMT -6
Based on this playthrough (currently early 1920s), there never is a window of usefulness for fleet ops for these ships. At no point have I been able to build a 2100 ton CL with sufficient speed to effectively screen my battlefleet. That being said I am happy with their performance (and cost) on foreign stations. Some examples of 2100t CLs you can make in 1899 for your legacy fleet:  As technology improves, you can design newer versions of these to keep the design speed in line with that of larger contemporary cruisers, such as on these 2100t CLs designed in a 1915 Great Britain save:  All of these are fast enough and armed well enough for service as light fleet scouts and light fleet escorts at the point in the game where they were designed. The only thing that most of them leave to be desired is armor, but on the other hand they're also only 2100t cruisers; armoring them better isn't going to help all that much. |
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Post by chris19delta on Jan 8, 2018 11:36:41 GMT -6
Looks like the main difference between your ships and mine was I was including a 1" deck which appears to have been costing me ~ 3 knots. I know the 1" deck won't provide that much protection, but I'm always reluctant to build ships w/o an armored deck when it's at all possible.
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Post by aeson on Jan 8, 2018 12:03:20 GMT -6
Looks like the main difference between your ships and mine was I was including a 1" deck which appears to have been costing me ~ 3 knots. I know the 1" deck won't provide that much protection, but I'm always reluctant to build ships w/o an armored deck when it's at all possible. Depending on your technology, you might be able to make ships roughly comparable to those but with armored decks. For example, this:  was designed in the same save game as the other 1915 example CLs I made. Depending on which of the examples you compare it to, it loses a bit of its armament and either some speed or some range, but it's still adequately armed for service as a light fleet escort or light fleet scout. Personally, though, I don't feel that 2100t cruisers are big enough for armor to really help them all that much. |
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Post by rimbecano on Jan 8, 2018 15:54:51 GMT -6
Man, those things are practically destroyers! Indeed, in a recent game, I built classes of 1500 ton destroyers toward the end that I think could take that last design on.
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Post by aeson on Jan 8, 2018 17:40:38 GMT -6
Man, those things are practically destroyers! Indeed, in a recent game, I built classes of 1500 ton destroyers toward the end that I think could take that last design on. Yeah, I agree that the window in which ultralight CLs like the examples I posted are useful, or at least cost-effective, in the light fleet escort role is pretty much over by the time big, well-armed DDs become generally available. They might remain useful as light fleet scouts longer, but light fleet scouts tend to become light fleet escorts once the opposing battle lines find one another and there's no guarantee that the computer will actually use your scout cruisers as scouts. They'll never go out of style as low-cost non-AMC light surface raiders, though as submarines tend to supplant surface raiders at around the same time that big, well-armed DDs become available, that might not really help keep ultralight CLs very relevant. |
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Post by Airy W on Jan 8, 2018 19:21:48 GMT -6
If you are gonna CL cheese, CL cheese all the way:  ^ designed in 1906 but with enough speed to still be somewhat useful through 1925. They really only would stop being useful when the enemy starts deploying destroyers with superimposed double mounts. |
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Post by aeson on Jan 8, 2018 20:04:04 GMT -6
If you are gonna CL cheese, CL cheese all the way: ^ designed in 1906 but with enough speed to still be somewhat useful through 1925. They really only would stop being useful when the enemy starts deploying destroyers with superimposed double mounts. If we're talking about CL cheese, I'd suggest something like this:  1904 4x8"+6x4" 25kn 2100t CL. |
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Post by dorn on Jan 9, 2018 2:13:08 GMT -6
If you are gonna CL cheese, CL cheese all the way: ^ designed in 1906 but with enough speed to still be somewhat useful through 1925. They really only would stop being useful when the enemy starts deploying destroyers with superimposed double mounts. If we're talking about CL cheese, I'd suggest something like this: 1904 4x8"+6x4" 25kn 2100t CL. I am just playing with different type CLs designed as part of legacy fleet. Small (2100 tons), heavily armed, low armored and slow (18 knots). Saving space from beiing slow and less armored they can be long range and have high firepower. I find them quite usefull for long time. They are used in colonies as raiders where no heavy ships than CL are supposed to be met. Speed is not issue due to their heavy and large number of guns can defend well. And as they are slow new CLs of speed 25-29 knots are not the issue so they are getting old quite nicely. They can be useful with some risk as riders in Europe as usual you meet only CLs intercepting riders in Europe, especially against nation which do not use large CLs (with a lot of 6" guns). But you need to be prepared that if you do not damage enemy cruiser enough before disengaging you are not able to catch him. However I do not expect from riders to be cruiser killer. I find out that this type of riders are usually useful longer than riders built for speed as at the beginning in 1900 it is practically impossible to build cruiser so fast that this cruiser speed superiority remains for long time. |
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Post by chris19delta on Jan 9, 2018 6:57:54 GMT -6
Man, those things are practically destroyers! Indeed, in a recent game, I built classes of 1500 ton destroyers toward the end that I think could take that last design on. Yeah, I agree that the window in which ultralight CLs like the examples I posted are useful, or at least cost-effective, in the light fleet escort role is pretty much over by the time big, well-armed DDs become generally available. They might remain useful as light fleet scouts longer, but light fleet scouts tend to become light fleet escorts once the opposing battle lines find one another and there's no guarantee that the computer will actually use your scout cruisers as scouts. They'll never go out of style as low-cost non-AMC light surface raiders, though as submarines tend to supplant surface raiders at around the same time that big, well-armed DDs become available, that might not really help keep ultralight CLs very relevant. I'll agree 100%, late game DDs are a more efficient option. You can build a 1500 ton DD with the same armament as a 2100 ton (or 3200 ton, the odd design behavior seems to exist all game) cruiser of the same tech level for cheaper. The funny thing is the 2100 ton cruiser in my current playthrough actually evolved for historic reasons. I was trying to design ships to budget having about 1.4 million left of legacy fleet $ and needed more CL hulls and two tiny cruisers costing ~700,000 a piece seemed the most efficient use of the available funds, and not appearing to be useless early game I decided to explore the concept and see what they would mature into. |
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Post by Airy W on Jan 9, 2018 9:48:15 GMT -6
If you are gonna CL cheese, CL cheese all the way: ^ designed in 1906 but with enough speed to still be somewhat useful through 1925. They really only would stop being useful when the enemy starts deploying destroyers with superimposed double mounts. If we're talking about CL cheese, I'd suggest something like this: 1904 4x8"+6x4" 25kn 2100t CL. 8 inch guns in double turrets are far more likely to cause a flash fire then 6 inch guns in shields. |
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Post by dorn on Jan 9, 2018 10:21:35 GMT -6
I would suggest something like this:  4x8" guns on 2100 - quite deadly. Or this:  7x6" broadside with 3" belt and 1" deck armor. This cruiser can face any CL until till double turrets on CL are available. aeson Just question. How good are the flotillas leaders in China AAR? I have never build them so early till double turrets on DD available. Can they partially replace small cruisers so early? I am just thinking enlarge them with long range and try to use them as riders. |
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