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Post by swedewolf on Aug 15, 2019 14:23:17 GMT -6
I read/heard somewhere that early on and especially with the legacy fleet, just use HE to higher the chabce of torching the ops ships. Is this true game wize.
secondly: are there any bonus with more firecontrolls on a designed ship or is it just cosmetic?
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Post by rimbecano on Aug 15, 2019 14:36:18 GMT -6
There is no bonus from having more fire control positions, but having multiple provides redundancy if one is destroyed in combat.
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Post by JagdFlanker on Aug 15, 2019 15:51:05 GMT -6
doesn't hurt to have your secondaries at 100% HE for the game - early game it might help since ai secondaries are often unarmoured and exposed which is ideal for HE, and once AA comes in it uses HE
i recently started giving my main guns 100% AP since i figure that's their true job - might make shore bombardment missions a bit harder though
i give my B/BB/BC 3 fire control positions, CV/CA/CL 2 positions, and DDs 1 position
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Post by ulzgoroth on Aug 15, 2019 16:55:35 GMT -6
doesn't hurt to have your secondaries at 100% HE for the game - early game it might help since ai secondaries are often unarmoured and exposed which is ideal for HE, and once AA comes in it uses HE i recently started giving my main guns 100% AP since i figure that's their true job - might make shore bombardment missions a bit harder though i give my B/BB/BC 3 fire control positions, CV/CA/CL 2 positions, and DDs 1 position 100% HE is fine for fighting destroyers and may be fine for fighting battleships and battlecruisers (depending on your secondary power and their armor). It's almost certainly less than the ideal load against light cruisers, or against heavy cruisers if you have strong secondaries.
Very early in the game with secondaries that can't penetrate most heavy cruisers and no really dangerous anti-capital weapons on light cruisers, using all-HE loads is probably fine.
I think shore bombardment actually prefers AP rounds in the game.
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Post by rimbecano on Aug 15, 2019 18:02:23 GMT -6
i recently started giving my main guns 100% AP since i figure that's their true job - might make shore bombardment missions a bit harder though That will be suboptimal when engaging lighter ships, such as if one of your BCs intercepts an enemy CL raider, or if a fleeing enemy is using destroyers to stand you off. For shore bombardment, it all depends on if the target is fortified, or a soft target in the open. I don't know which of those bombardment targets in-game are supposed to represent. |
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Post by JagdFlanker on Aug 15, 2019 18:21:35 GMT -6
i recently started giving my main guns 100% AP since i figure that's their true job - might make shore bombardment missions a bit harder though That will be suboptimal when engaging lighter ships, such as if one of your BCs intercepts an enemy CL raider, or if a fleeing enemy is using destroyers to stand you off. For shore bombardment, it all depends on if the target is fortified, or a soft target in the open. I don't know which of those bombardment targets in-game are supposed to represent. i auto resolve all raider battles - i build my ships fast and well armed so they usually win, tie or withdraw
i have enough secondaries where if the enemy gets close enough they'l feel it, otherwise the priority for mains is killing enemy capital ships - that's where the VPs are
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Post by aeson on Aug 15, 2019 18:54:13 GMT -6
For shore bombardment, it all depends on if the target is fortified, or a soft target in the open. I don't know which of those bombardment targets in-game are supposed to represent. The template file for the generic bombardment target indicates a half inch of vertical and no horizontal armor, so I'd be inclined to say it represents a soft target.
Coastal batteries: 4", 5", 6", 7": 4"/2" bunker + 2"/1" on the guns. 8", 9": 5"/2" bunker + 2"/1" on the guns. 10": 6"/2" bunker + 2"/1" on the guns. 11", 12": 8"/2" bunker + 2"/1" on the guns. Turreted 12", 13", 14": 16"/5" bunker + 15"/5" on the gun turrets.
Airbases and airship bases have 2"/1" on the main guns but no other armor.
Debatable; once you have Directors or maybe even Central Firing, the effective range of typical CA/B/BC/BB main battery guns starts to significantly exceed the effective range of 5" or 6" guns - all the more so if your ships lack secondary directors, since then the secondary battery is assumed to be under local control - and getting in close enough for 6" or lighter AP to be effective becomes unnecessary (and, in view of the increasing range and power of torpedoes in the same period, probably undesirable). If you're using 4" secondary guns, AP probably wasn't going to penetrate any reasonable level of armor protection at any reasonable engagement range anyways.
There's also that all early-game CLs are protected cruisers, and given the typical listed armor thicknesses probably the only thing on them that 5" or 6" AP should really be effective against are the turrets and conning tower - the rest of the ship should either be more or less unarmored or protected by a sloping armor deck that's too thick for it to be likely that a light AP shell would penetrate it at reasonable engagement ranges.
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Post by swedewolf on Aug 15, 2019 23:47:28 GMT -6
Thanx guys
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Post by aardvark on Aug 16, 2019 11:03:37 GMT -6
I know that at Tsushima the Japanese used HE with incendiary properties. This had the effect of pretty much destroying the Russian ships superstructures, funnels, light batteries, and killing most of the deck crews. Even the paint on the ships hulls caught fire. In 1905 this was a pretty good tactic given that, except at very close range (and possibly not even then) a 12" AP shell wouldn't penetrate the turret or belt armor, but an HE shell would blow large holes in the unarmored steel of the superstructures. There are accounts of ships fully ablaze, with no funnels or masts remaining.
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Post by ulzgoroth on Aug 16, 2019 13:59:16 GMT -6
Debatable; once you have Directors or maybe even Central Firing, the effective range of typical CA/B/BC/BB main battery guns starts to significantly exceed the effective range of 5" or 6" guns - all the more so if your ships lack secondary directors, since then the secondary battery is assumed to be under local control - and getting in close enough for 6" or lighter AP to be effective becomes unnecessary (and, in view of the increasing range and power of torpedoes in the same period, probably undesirable). If you're using 4" secondary guns, AP probably wasn't going to penetrate any reasonable level of armor protection at any reasonable engagement range anyways. There's also that all early-game CLs are protected cruisers, and given the typical listed armor thicknesses probably the only thing on them that 5" or 6" AP should really be effective against are the turrets and conning tower - the rest of the ship should either be more or less unarmored or protected by a sloping armor deck that's too thick for it to be likely that a light AP shell would penetrate it at reasonable engagement ranges.
If you're not going into range of your secondaries, it doesn't matter what you loaded them with. I see lots of protected cruisers with 1.5 or 2" belt armor, and more than 2.5 is relatively rare. Even start-of-game 6" AP can penetrate that at substantial range. Not sure about 1900 5". (Legacy fleet being legacy fleet, you may also find your secondary battery is bigger, or in bizarre cases smaller. My current game has a legacy cruiser that came with a 2" secondary battery.) |
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Post by aeson on Aug 16, 2019 16:19:27 GMT -6
I see lots of protected cruisers with 1.5 or 2" belt armor, and more than 2.5 is relatively rare. Even start-of-game 6" AP can penetrate that at substantial range. Not sure about 1900 5". (Legacy fleet being legacy fleet, you may also find your secondary battery is bigger, or in bizarre cases smaller. My current game has a legacy cruiser that came with a 2" secondary battery.) 'Belt' armor on a protected cruiser represents the sloping outer portion of the armor deck, not an actual armor belt.
Your secondaries can be within range without being within effective range, especially when your main battery has a good fire control system and your secondary battery has nothing.
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Post by ulzgoroth on Aug 16, 2019 19:23:59 GMT -6
I see lots of protected cruisers with 1.5 or 2" belt armor, and more than 2.5 is relatively rare. Even start-of-game 6" AP can penetrate that at substantial range. Not sure about 1900 5". (Legacy fleet being legacy fleet, you may also find your secondary battery is bigger, or in bizarre cases smaller. My current game has a legacy cruiser that came with a 2" secondary battery.) 'Belt' armor on a protected cruiser represents the sloping outer portion of the armor deck, not an actual armor belt. Not sure what your point is. Are you suggesting that they get more than 2" protection against belt hits out of the 2" belt? Your secondaries can be within range without being within effective range, especially when your main battery has a good fire control system and your secondary battery has nothing. In which case it continues to not matter what they are loaded with. |
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Post by aeson on Aug 16, 2019 20:32:35 GMT -6
Not sure what your point is. Are you suggesting that they get more than 2" protection against belt hits out of the 2" belt? The point is that "belt" armor on a protected cruiser should more closely approximate horizontal than vertical protection. |
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Post by ulzgoroth on Aug 17, 2019 10:15:06 GMT -6
Not sure what your point is. Are you suggesting that they get more than 2" protection against belt hits out of the 2" belt? The point is that "belt" armor on a protected cruiser should more closely approximate horizontal than vertical protection. I don't think practice demonstrates the near-immunity to early-game belt hits that that would imply. |
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Post by aeson on Aug 17, 2019 12:11:34 GMT -6
The point is that "belt" armor on a protected cruiser should more closely approximate horizontal than vertical protection. I don't think practice demonstrates the near-immunity to early-game belt hits that that would imply. There's ambiguity in the game as to whether B/BE/D/DE/T/TT represents where a hit occurred or what a hit struck. For example: This ship is a protected cruiser with no turret face (T), turret top (TT), belt extended (BE), or deck extended (DE) armor, and as it is a protected cruiser it should not have a proper armor belt. There are 15 hits against T, 3 hits against TT, 12 hits against B, and 11 hits against BE in the logs, if I've counted correctly.
Given that hits 'struck' T, TT, and BE when the ship has no T, TT, or BE armor, are the hits that reportedly struck B actually hitting B, or are they hitting locations where there would normally be hitting belt armor if the ship had an actual armor belt?
Also, the notional penetration of CL Phaeton's 5" guns exceeds 2" under 7,000 yards and 2.6" at 5,000 yards, and HE shells should notionally have very little ability to penetrate armor. In light of this, it is interesting that there is a 5" AP hit at 3842 yards which failed to penetrate the belt over the Engine Room. It is also interested that there were six hits against Hull B (3" HE @ 3045 yards, 10:27; 5" AP @ 3068, 11:21; 5" AP @ 2343 yards, 11:28; 5" HE @ 1207 yards, 11:58; 3" HE @ 1370 yards, 12:01; 5" HE @ 1267 yards, 12:43), all of which - even the two 3" HE hits - penetrated, but of six Engine Room B hits (5" HE @ 5419 yards, 09:49; 5" AP @ 3842 yards, 10:10; 5" AP @ 2819 yards, 10:32; 5" HE @ 2333 yards, 11:47; 3" HE @ 1207 yards, 11:58; 5" HE @ 3088 yards, 12:16), only the 5" AP @ 2819 yards penetrated.
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