Pre-Dreadnought Battles

[mycophobia]

This is continuing a discussion that started in the I&I post on the fact that Pre-Dread battle tend to be fairly bland as ships are unable to harm each other via gunfire. I feel its probably best to move the discussion here since it was slightly getting off topic of the AAR thread and we probably get more input here.

Since the original discussion is a bit long I'll just link it here

Adseria
Overall, I think there is a bit of discussion on whether Pre-Dread battles just end up as either entire fleet shoot each other for hours -> nothing happens, and most war winning action ends up being cruiser battles or successful destroyer attacks. Also the fact that main gun caliber on pre-dreads seems irrelevant in most cases. So I think it maybe beneficial to hear what the community as a whole thing think about the pre-dread period battleship actions.

I personally agree that most standard battle line gunfire exchange between pre-dreads tends to go nowhere, but I have had experiences where pre-dread fighting in a short ranged brawl can end up having some effect. I've had several action in my Russian playthrough where I was able to sink, and lost ships to gunfire by basically charging into the enemy battleline. In my war against Germany, I lost 5 and sunk 3 German Bs over 3 fleet battle. Two of My Bs are lost entirely through gunfire penetration on belt edge, and two of the German Bs were at least damaged to the point of being immobilized before finished off with torpedo. 

Thus I think, at least in a high risk, close range brawl, isolated squadron of enemy Bs can be sunk through focused gun fire. Further, poor damage control earlier on meant that even a few BE pen can potentially mess up a pre-dread in the long run through uncontrolled flooding (I've lost a few pre-dread through out several games this way). While a large caliber secondary battery are probably better used to accomplish this early on than large caliber main guns, I do think it give the 11/12 in guns some use on the pre-dreads, since 9-10in may struggle even with BE. 

Not that this would be an ideal strategy for many nations, since the risk of torpedo is likely great compared to the damage that can be done via gunfire, but seeing your ships often have torpedo too I think its usually a way to force a slightly more impactful outcome out of Pre-Dread engagements.

Lastly, I know many here on the forums have discussed the ability of burning down enemy pre-dreads by using large amount of guns firing HE shells, so I am also curious as to how that worked out since its something I never tried it myself.

[ulzgoroth]

I posted a thread about some very early pre-dread warfare I had. Even there, close-ranged battleship duels could indeed have decisive effects. Mostly not by outright sinking a battleship with gunfire, but flooding from BE hits and damage to funnels and uptakes can slow a ship down, making it much more vulnerable to torpedoes and potentially inducing its fleet to leave it isolated.

The larger battleship guns are also valuable for destroying enemy CAs that let you get in range.

I don't think I burned down any enemy ships, nor had any of my own battleships burned out. But I definitely wasn't optimizing for that result. (I did lose a light cruiser that way in a raider interception gone bad.)

[captainloggy]

I tested 13in, 11in and 9in battleships with default ammo selection against the same targets (4v4). After 2.5 hours of fire exchange (sunset) all targets were lightly damaged. HE only wasn't better.

[bobert]

I've always found that I can get a few enemy B's sunk in early battles. I don't bother changing ammo. Mind you that was rtw1 when my whole battle line would come out. Maybe not possible with the 6 maximum B's I always seem to get in rtw2

[Deleted]

Loading HE´s into my main battery always did at least some job done. Remember, HE from 11in or 13in guns can still go through BE armour and if it hits superstructure it has a big chance to cause fires. It also has bigger chance of splinters going through the deck armour. And if the worst happens and you hit the main belt armour with your HE, you may still cause some superstructure damage. HE shells is also the key to the victory of high RoF pre-dreads with 9in main guns. Yes, its possible to win fleet battles with those ships.
But HE is not OP, if you find out that your AP can pen enemy belt armour for at least 5 000 years, you should start using APs and put most HEs out of your main magazines.

[Adseria]

I never really tried using a HE-only loadout (unless you count using the default loadout and running out of AP). I might give it a go, but, given that I pretty much ended up doing that anyway whether I wanted to or not (by running out of AP), I don't see that there'll be much point.

Honestly, I never really considered it at all; in my mind, HE is for un-armoured targets (destroyers, corvettes, lant targets), and AP is for armoured ships, and there was very little overlap; HE won't pen even the lightest of armour, and AP will overpen unarmoured targets, so the only reason you'd use the wrong ammo is if you misidentified the target, or if you ran out of the correct ammo (as I do, on an uncomfortably regular basis).

[ulzgoroth]

Aug 23, 2019 14:36:53 GMT -6 @pavelsvt said:

Loading HE´s into my main battery always did at least some job done. Remember, HE from 11in or 13in guns can still go through BE armour and if it hits superstructure it has a big chance to cause fires. It also has bigger chance of splinters going through the deck armour. And if the worst happens and you hit the main belt armour with your HE, you may still cause some superstructure damage. HE shells is also the key to the victory of high RoF pre-dreads with 9in main guns. Yes, its possible to win fleet battles with those ships.
But HE is not OP, if you find out that your AP can pen enemy belt armour for at least 5 000 years, you should start using APs and put most HEs out of your main magazines.

Is the manual wrong about 2in armor being guaranteed to stop splinters?  It always has done so in my experience. A battleship or armored cruiser with less than 2" deck seems like a very questionable design.

[rimbecano]

While I tend to prioritize AP myself, HE isn't to be underestimated. Even with default loadouts, I have periodically had an enemy ship that wasn't close to sinking by flooding be abandoned and counted sunk due to topside fires.

[cuirasspolisher]

The predreadnought era has never been my favorite part of the game. After too many indecisive battles, I experimented with sneaky tactics to semi-reliably sink enemy ships (at least on Rear Admiral, my usual difficulty). My usual method to sink enemy battleships is to concentrate the fire of multiple divisions on one section of the enemy line, wait for an enemy battleship to fall out of line, and aggressively cut off its retreat with armored cruisers. Then I overwhelm it with my entire force's fire before the enemy force can rescue it (which the AI is strangely reluctant to attempt, even when it's not outnumbered). Done right, this method can bag a battleship or two per engagement. It works best in squadron-size battles; it's hard to pull off the necessary maneuvers in a fleet action. I usually use the standard ammo doctrine, although it should work with an HE loadout as well. The main drawback is risking torpedo hits by engaging so close.

If I can't manage the above tactic, I try to block the enemy cruiser squadron's line of retreat with my battleships and use them as the anvil to my cruiser squadron's hammer.

[swang]

I've never understood this complaint about pre dread battles. I've almost always been able to have the opportunity for a decisive victory (not necessarily achieved, but at some point the opportunity is there.) You have to pick your opportunity to get close and rake them. It's a lot like a sailing battle. Get the speed/turret advantage, start a few fires, then cut back at the right moment, you can do some pretty big damage.

[dorn]

Aug 23, 2019 18:18:44 GMT -6 ulzgoroth said:

Aug 23, 2019 14:36:53 GMT -6 @pavelsvt said:

Loading HE´s into my main battery always did at least some job done. Remember, HE from 11in or 13in guns can still go through BE armour and if it hits superstructure it has a big chance to cause fires. It also has bigger chance of splinters going through the deck armour. And if the worst happens and you hit the main belt armour with your HE, you may still cause some superstructure damage. HE shells is also the key to the victory of high RoF pre-dreads with 9in main guns. Yes, its possible to win fleet battles with those ships.
But HE is not OP, if you find out that your AP can pen enemy belt armour for at least 5 000 years, you should start using APs and put most HEs out of your main magazines.

Is the manual wrong about 2in armor being guaranteed to stop splinters?  It always has done so in my experience. A battleship or armored cruiser with less than 2" deck seems like a very questionable design.

I do not have 2" deck on my armored cruisers, usually 1-1.5". As fights are relatively close chance splinters going through is very low and acceptable. By this way it is possible to save quite a lot of tonnage.
Similar to pre-dreadnoughts and the first dreadnoughts when you save even more.

[stevethecat]

I completely game the pre-dreads. Guns dont especially matter so I use that opportunity to save weight for speed and armour. Fit every submerged torp possible and get close.

Torps probably account for 90%+ of my pre-dread kills.

At least until 1910-ish. Once guns start out doing armour it's a very rapid change back.

[axe99]

I've never had a real issue with pre-dreads, and can sink other ships, but it definitely takes longer, so it can feel not as exciting (particularly coupled with the slower speed of the ships as well). I find it's important to get fairly close in terms of engagement range (can't remember how close - far enough away that torpedo risk is relatively low, but close enough that the guns can hammer away and make enough hits).

I love stevethecat 's approach - very cool way of playing with things, would be interesting to see how two fleets fitted that way would go!

[AiryW]

I rather like the first five years of the game. Battles aren't decisive but it still is very much possible to damage the enemy with gunfire. And I think this leads to an interesting tradeoff when playing in admiral mode since you are stuck with the choice of trying to finish off a wounded ship and trying to chase after a second. I've had times when I've gotten both and times when I've gotten neither.

I think it's important to remember to really crank up the ammo. The game generates designs battleships with as few as 80 rounds sometimes but I generally consider 130 to be on the low side. The extra ammo makes a big difference. And while I do make plenty of 16 kTon ships in 1900, I'm aware that they wont perform that much better then a 13 kTon batteship in 1900. I'm making them that big because they'll adapt a little bit better to new technology. This probably seems disappointing compared to later eras where bumping the size of a ship up by 25% will make a big impact in it's performance right away.

Aug 24, 2019 2:30:46 GMT -6 stevethecat said:

I completely game the pre-dreads. Guns dont especially matter so I use that opportunity to save weight for speed and armour. Fit every submerged torp possible and get close.

I dont think that's super gamey since the torpedo cruiser era wasn't that long before.

[christian]

personally i find pre dreadnaught battles extremely boring because they last so god damn long and you cant pen the enemy
and even if you pen the enemy due to having low explosive research they do nothing for damage

so far best i found was to just make torpedo focused Bs because i have never sunk a single pre dread with gunfire



also recently changed to pure HE which has given me alot of succes as i can now take out the enemies engines




also pre dread battles depend more on who is clad in 2 inch armor than anything else




early dreadnaught battles are really fun but pre dreads i just cannot live with


the gun pen is WAYYYY too low 


main problem i found is gun pen has been significantly nerfed from rtw 1 (likely to prevent turret farms)