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Post by MateDow on Feb 27, 2019 0:20:54 GMT -6
I too am enjoying following this.
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Post by cwemyss on Feb 27, 2019 7:27:03 GMT -6
I'm glad you guys are enjoying it! I'm not a writer by training or trade, and this is my first shot at a "story" AAR.
From a narrative standpoint, things pick up greatly in the last third of 1901, into 1902. From a real life standpoint, i just need to find time to write it.
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Post by cwemyss on Feb 28, 2019 21:56:16 GMT -6
10 December 1901 - Brest “A toast, mon Amiral,” said Robert Tanqueray, “To our new project.” Bettancourt and Marchand raised their glasses with the Marine Nationale’s Chief Engineer, acknowledging the accomplishments of recent months. There had been advances in many areas but they had just seen the most revolutionary, touring Bassin Quatre of the Brest shipyard, where four coastal submarines of a new design were starting to take shape. “So tell me,” asked Marchand, “What finally drove the decision to start building these contraptions.” “Do you remember the look on Fabron’s face in the fall exercises, when the Gusave Zede hit his beloved Richelieu with a torpedo?” asked Tanqueray. “Yes, that was part of it,” allowed Bettancourt. “It also helped that you could finally keep one of your machines submerged for more than a few hours. And they rarely catch fire any more.” Tanqueray smiled a bit ruefully and tipped his glass again. “Touche. Since you won’t put any new surface ships into production, I had to do something to keep busy.” “Give me something noticeably better to build, and I’ll gladly order it,” shot back Bettancourt. The three men were all in good cheer, as it truly had been a good year. Two new 600-ton destroyers were nearing completion and they appeared to have gotten ahead of the rest of the world in submarine construction. The politicos were happy with the pace of construction as well, with 13 cruisers of various classes under construction at both Brest and Toulon. The Ministre de Marine was still grumbling about ship deployments, now finally understanding that the Italian navy was as big a threat as Germany’s. Relationships with both nations were tense, and it was a coin flip which would come to blows first. Italy had taken exception to an increased French Army presence in the Horn of Africa, and Italian agents had been caught in October attempting to gather details of the new coastal batteries at Djibouti. Dealings with Germany had taken a surprising turn in November after Tanqueray and Bettancourt had turned away an eccentric professor claiming a spurious breakthrough in gun propellant. That scientist had turned out to be a distant relation of the notoriously thin-skinned Kaiser, who had reacted with his typical bombast and lack of forethought. Other than the looming threat of war, Bettancourt’s biggest nagging concern was the leadership of the Flotte de Mediterranee. Capitane Sandherr’s spy network, after stumbling a year ago, had recently delivered a great many things. Among plans for an unimposing Italian light cruiser and technical details of the new German 7.7-cm gun, the intelligence head had included a dossier on Amiral Fabron. The batard had a much-too-cozy relationship with all manner of shady characters, including a couple newspaper editors. There were also some questionable financial dealings, possibly even a heavy gambling debt with Les Beaux Voyous in Marseille, but nothing solid enough to make a decisive move. While Bettancourt would dearly like to replace Fabron, without concrete evidence it would be very difficult politically. If truth be told, while the more junior leadership in the Mediterranean was showing a lot of promise there was no one yet ready to step into the role. Fabron was insolent, possibly a security risk, and just a razor’s width from insubordinate, but Bettancourt would bide his time a little longer.
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 1, 2019 9:32:48 GMT -6
2 February 1902 – Col du Petit Saint-Bernard Caporal Rouge slapped his gloved hands together, cursing the cold wind sweeping down the pass and biting through his overcoat. He hunched lower in his jacket and looked up the road, extending three kilometers to the head of the Col du Petit Saint-Bernard. Visibility was terrible, with blowing snow and fading daylight. His squad’s orders were to patrol the road, which crossed the pass at the border with Italy then dropped into the Valle d’Aosta. The road had been reported impassable by a more ambitious troop last week, and finding more than three meters of snow at this altitude he had adjusted their orders to an extent. Right now the other eight men with him were huddled inside a roadside shed, warmed by a meager fire. Rouge never heard the shot, just felt an immense punch as the 200-grain bullet passed through his chest. His squadmates heard the report and tumbled out of the shack in a chaotic gaggle, pulling on winter gear. They were cut down almost as quickly. With the French border squad eliminated, the 2nd Battalion Pinerolo of the 4th Alpini Regiment collectively rose from their positions in the snow and continued down the mountain pass. The three battalions of the regiment were to fan out after reaching Bourg-Saint-Maurice then press on to Albertville and ultimately Chambery. Another regiment was crossing over the pass from Sestriere to secure Grenoble, closing the south flank of the operation to retake Savoia.
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 1, 2019 12:21:28 GMT -6
7 February 1902 – Toulon Amiral Bettancourt put aside a sheaf of papers as Capitane Tremblay came into the room. With the onset of hostilities with Italy, Bettancourt had shifted his headquarters to the Mediterranean base and it was a frenzy of semi-controlled activity. “The lines to Paris and Brest are finally up and running reliably,” Tremblay reported, “The British are letting us use their network so even if our overseas cables are cut we’ll able to maintain communication with Asia and Africa. The wireless system is still unstable, but Tanqueray has some thoughts about putting equipment on board our flagships.” “Very good,” said Bettancourt. “So the winter assault was brave, and certainly unexpected, but it looks like the wretched mountain weather has helped where the Army failed. Italian troops made decent headway at first but the snow cut off their supplies and they’ve been pushed back to within a couple dozen kilometers of the border. Along the coast they moved faster, but haven’t reached Monte Carlo and the Army finally has it’s act together. Our cruisers have also been butchering them on the coast road whenever they make an appearance.” “Excellent news, sir,” responded Tremblay. “Get these to the Operations branch,” said Bettancourt, handing Tremblay a set of orders. “I’m banking on Germany staying on the sidelines so that I can move the bulk of Marchand’s fleet to the Mediterranean. I’m also shifting a lot of the Asian Squadron to the Indian Ocean, I’d really like to cut off Eritrea and ideally pry it out of Italian hands.” “Right away, mon Amiral,” said Tremblay. Tremblay exited the office, and entering on his heels was Contre-Amiral Tanqueray. ”What do you need from my branch?” the good-natured engineer opened. “Right now, just keep things on track,” responded Bettancourt. “You’ve done good work, but I don’t want to start building any new designs right now. If we can get the cruisers launched, get the submarines in the water, and beef up our coastal patrols, I think we’ll be in good shape. And of course, keep the discoveries coming,” Bettancourt added as an afterthought “Is the fleet getting the new shells?” asked Tanqueray. “Yes, the factories are turning out picric acid shells around the clock,” answered Bettancourt. “I’m sure we’ll see them in action before too long.”
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 1, 2019 22:33:55 GMT -6
13 February 1902 35N15E – Central Mediterranean 0920 Local, Light Rain, Strong Gale Contre-Amiral Guillaume Lejeune leaned on the binnacle, bracing against the motion of his flagship, CL Le Havre. CL Sfax followed through the massive seas, just 500 meters behind, and three Destroyers were fighting to maintain position to starboard. The smaller ships were occasionally disappearing from view, occluded by the passage of 7-10 meter swells, and the cruisers were themselves struggling to shoulder aside waves breaking over the bow. His Light Cruiser squadron was detached from Amiral Fabron’s flagship, CA De Grasse, which was undoubtedly suffering through the same conditions 30 nautical miles to the west-northwest. Fabron’s main body boasted two Armored Cruisers, two Light Cruisers, and two Destroyers. The force had been deployed from Toulon four days ago to cut off a convoy, supposedly intending to bring troops and supplies from Taranto to set up a presence in neutral Ottoman-controlled Tripoli. The fleet had been on-station about 30 hours, and the weather had been decent until early this morning when a towering gale set in. Lejeune’s force had just completed a turn to the north when a spotter called out a contact, barely visible through the waves, blowing rain, and spray. It was followed by another, both tentatively identified as destroyers, scarcely over 1000 meters off the port bow and closing. Le Havre heeled hard to starboard as her captain ordered radical maneuvers to guard against the threat of torpedoes, and both sides opened fire. Le Havre’s lookouts called more contacts; two more destroyers close aboard; several large ships a few thousand meters to the north presumed to be the desired troop convoy; and a potential cruiser in between groups. As the Italian cruiser turned directly away from the French force, Lejeune ordered his own cruiser squadron to pursue, moving the Destroyers to the port side to assault their Italian counterparts. Through luck, skill, or purely by dint of the weather, in a few minutes Lejeune’s force was between the Italian cruiser and the convoy he was supposed to be protecting. Lejeune ordered his destroyers to focus on the convoy and light escorts; his cruisers began exchanging fire with the Italian, now identified as a Cagliari-class of 5500 tons and carrying eight 6-inch guns. Conditions improved slightly, with the wind shifting a couple points west and letting up a few knots. A massive gout of spray rose next to one of the Italian destroyers, followed a few minutes later by the same marking the demise of a convoy transport. In both cases the sea swallowed what was left of the ship in a matter of seconds. As the Italian cruiser faded into the mist to the northeast, Lejeune reluctantly ordered a turn to the west to continue pressuring the convoy. Sinking a brigade of Italian troops took precedence over pursuing a lone light cruiser. The conditions made for an exhausting slow-motion dance, the French ships maintaining some cohesion and turning to the south and then east to circle the Italian convoy. After an hour of close action in heavy seas Lejeune’s force had reported at least two transports sunk, with several others damaged and likely to sink in the heavy seas. While he would like to stay and continue savaging the Italian ships, he also had no contact with any Italian warship and knew they were lurking in the mist. With no desire to lose a cruiser to an unlucky torpedo engagement, and the main objective accomplished, he ordered the flotilla to form up and proceeded to the east-southeast with the intention of breaking contact. Within a few minutes his lookouts spotted another contact to the southeast. Signals and counter-signals were exchanged and it turned out to be the destroyer Yatagan, assigned to the main body but separated from her intended position by 20 or more miles. As Yatagan plowed north through the seas to rejoin her formation, Lejeune’s force saw her come under fire from unknown forces. He turned to assist and in a short time was running parallel to the Cagliari and exchanging fire. All three light cruisers began to outrun their destroyer escorts, who closed to engage one another in a furious independent action. A running battle to the northeast developed, with the two French cruisers staying just outside torpedo range from their Italian equal, and the destroyers lagging behind as they fought both each other and the elements. Lejeune suspected that the Italian was attempting to make a dash for Taranto or Siracusa. His ships, though starting to run low on ammunition, were largely undamaged. His flagship had shrugged off a few hits early in the action, but was very capable of continuing. Sfax hadn’t reported taking a single hit, and the destroyers were in remarkably good shape as well. Lejeune was determined to pursue and by mid-afternoon as the weather improved greatly, his force had slowed the Cagliari and effectively cut her off from home. By 1600 the Italian cruiser was burning; at 1625 it had slowed enough that the French destroyers could close to torpedo range, and they did so enthusiastically. The coup de grace delivered just before twilight, Lejeune re-formed his flotilla and disengaged. In his after-action report, Lejeune commended the officers and crews of his entire force for maintaining good order, for excellent employment of their torpedo armament, and for solid gunnery, all in spite of genuinely terrible conditions.
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 1, 2019 22:38:33 GMT -6
And with that... I'm caught up with all the game-play I did before vacation. Time to crank out a few more turns and see where this leads.
I don't think I'll be documenting every cruiser action, whether the game calls it a "Major Victory" or not. This was the first time I've written up an RTW battle, I wanted to get a feel for the flow. Plus the horrendous weather actually made it a bit more interesting than the average mid-morning convoy intercept.
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 2, 2019 0:36:03 GMT -6
OK... time for some input from the crowd. I've developed Medium Wing Turrets (10" max) and I'm thinking of designing a new CA class as a stepping stone to battlecruisers.
Current first-line CA is the Montcalm... I have five of them and one more 5 months from completion. I've held off laying down any more CA's because... well... they're CA's. They'll be obsolete before too long. Montcalms build for $57M overall, $2.37M/month.
What I'm considering is this:
Another knot of speed, a bit better protection, and most important... 4 more guns, and set up for future refit with cross-deck firing.
Thoughts? I'm also considering waiting until I get 3x centerline turrets or I can fit larger wing batteries. Either way I could ship 11 or 12" guns... both sizes are currently -1 quality, but won't be forever.
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Post by noshurviverse on Mar 2, 2019 2:06:23 GMT -6
Perhaps a uniform 2" deck to prevent splinter damage from slowing you down in the event the DE takes the hit? I also don't know if 4" of TT armor is strictly necessary.
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Post by aeson on Mar 2, 2019 2:33:19 GMT -6
I don't think it'd necessarily be bad to build a CA like that, but I feel like it's a bit extravagant for fighting the kinds of CAs that the computer usually builds in the predreadnought era, and even with eight 10" guns on the broadside I'd be a bit leery of fighting a true battlecruiser with it. If it's still early 1902, it'll probably give you around two years of cruiser supremacy - until the first true battlecruisers enter service - but I don't really think you need an ~18,000t CA to accomplish that and I don't think it'll hold up to true battlecruisers much better than the Montcalms will. That said, unless you're expecting to get the third centerline turret or main battery wing turrets soon, it's probably about as good of a cruiser-type capital ship as you can build for a while, and I don't really see any glaring weaknesses in the fleet lineup you presented in your preceding post that strongly suggest an alternative construction plan to me.
As a side note, I don't think that it's a good idea to build a ship like this expecting to extend its service life by upgunning and improving the engines in a rebuild; I feel like that's likely to be quite expensive, and I don't think that a ship like this is likely to be valuable enough to be worth it.
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Post by boomboomf22 on Mar 2, 2019 11:52:58 GMT -6
I would say that if you want to build a CA like that you want to thin the D to 2" and TT to either 2 or 2.5". My reasoning is that if the things shooting at you can pen that thickness of deck armor at max range (ie plunging) then they can probably catch a 24kt AC. I would suggest either using the freed up weight to decrease size of the ship or increase its speed.
Additionally the armor could probably get away with being a bit thinner on the turrets and belt as the same issue with regards to armoring of deck apply. Unless it is intended as a stand in for a BC (which any ship armed with CA guns will have issues doing) then 7.5" and 8" respecitivly seems a bit much on a ship that can only make 24kts.
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 2, 2019 13:30:15 GMT -6
All good arguments. I think im just jonesing for BCs. :-)
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Post by cwemyss on Mar 2, 2019 20:36:54 GMT -6
Along the lines of 'in for a penny... ', I'm not sure if it's revolutionary for 1902, or suicidal for 1908. I fear it would get obliterated when it inevitably gets thrown into a fleet action against real BB/BC's, but at least it's got legit capital ship guns.
What I really need to do is hit 'next turn' and get on with my life.
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Post by aeson on Mar 3, 2019 0:19:38 GMT -6
If you're looking for a cruiser hunter, I'd probably slightly favor something more along the lines of the 4x2x10" CA initially proposed; you probably won't really need the penetrative power of the 12" gun against cruiser armor, your fire control probably isn't yet good enough to give the 12" guns a practical range advantage over 10" guns, and the greater volume of fire from six or eight 10" guns will probably be more effective against CAs and CLs than the fewer but heavier hits from four 12" guns. That might change once dreadnought battlecruisers enter the picture, but unless the computer draws up some of its weaker early dreadnought battlecruiser designs (hello there 4x2x12" AHIY with a 6" belt and only 24-25 knots design speed) or builds some Tsukuba-types of its own it's probably not going to be that much better off against a battlecruiser than the 10" CA would have been. What makes a Tsukuba-type such as this more interesting to me is its greater potential to act as a fast battleship; what you've proposed is essentially a first-class battleship for the period, except that it's capable of 25 knots instead of 18-19. 1902 is probably early enough that it won't quite be immediately rendered obsolete by the dreadnought revolution - it should commission around the same time as the first generation of dreadnoughts are starting to be laid down - and between being armored as well as a first-class battleship and being designed for 25 knots it'll probably be just about capable of surviving duels with first- or maybe second-generation dreadnought battlecruisers. If your own first-generation dreadnought battlecruisers hit 26 rather than 27 knots, it's also fast enough not to be too much of an impediment operationally, though that doesn't mean you should design your first-generation dreadnought battlecruisers for 26 knots if 27 knots is practical.
Overall, my feeling on the Tsukuba-type armored cruiser/battlecruiser is fairly similar to my feeling on the 10" CA - it's a bit extravagant for hunting the computer's CAs, and it probably won't look much better after the dreadnought revolution than a less expensive ship would. I will say that if you want to play around with a Tsukuba-type battlecruiser this is probably about as good an opportunity to do so as you're likely to ever get; 1902 should be early enough to get it into service as or before the first dreadnoughts are being laid down, and the design you came up with is about as fast as the first historical battlecruisers (~25kn for Von der Tann; ~26kn for Invincible, Indefatigable, and Moltke) and should be enough to at least draw out most engagements against the game's first- and maybe second-generation battlecruisers long enough to get into port or escape into darkness as night or foul weather closes in while still retaining armor about as heavy as that of a first-class battleship of the period, which should make it fairly capable of surviving encounters with proper battlecruisers into probably the early 1910s.
I might consider reducing the armor protection on the 6" secondary battery to 2". By the time this ship commissions, 3" armor probably won't defend the secondary guns against anything heavier than 6" gunfire at practical engagement ranges, and it might fail even against that. Might not change the cost of the ship enough to matter and might not free up enough tonnage to do anything particularly useful, but on the other hand I doubt if the extra armor on the secondary guns will do anything particularly useful, either.
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Post by dorn on Mar 3, 2019 6:04:00 GMT -6
If you are looking for armored cruiser I will think what should be ships role.
Relating to the roles they can be different demands: 1. fight actual armored cruisers - I do not think that it is likely as all your actual armored cruisers are able to do so 2. fight actual armored cruisers and battleships 3. fight actual armored cruisers and future large fast ships
1. if this is what your are seeking than the way is a better improvement over Moltcam class 2. this could be tough but in this case I would suggest 23 knots max, may be even 22 knots and use all available space for armor (covering all ship, not only citadel) and as much 10" guns as possible. In this case you would have advantage at certain distance. 3. this is most ambition task as you need fast ship. You design has several inconstencies as I can see. Your 8x10" guns would be less potent than potential 11-13" guns of foreign desing so fighting at long distance is not an option. But your configuration of armor is totally focused on long range gun duels, it does not give me sence. So I recommend just opposite, lowering your deck armor sig
I tried to design your proposal in my game and I am short of 100 tons as I am in 11/1900. But I propose something like that, designing it in your game will be a little cheaper.
They have some weaknesses however most important is that they have some strong points that can enable them to confront enemy heavy units.
note: I found out that speed difference about 1-2 knots is not enough to force fighting distance.
The disadvantage of these ships are that as 2nd ratio battlecruisers would be common these ships would be completely absolute. However it is true for any armored cruiser.
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