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Post by brucesim2003 on Aug 22, 2015 18:47:18 GMT -6
I dunno, maybe I have a tendency to go overboard, but even your Benbow doesn't have enough deck and turret top armour imo. Then again, as I said in another post, none of my late game dreadnoughts has ever lost a turret. You can NEVER have too much armour.
Cheers
Bruce
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hg42
New Member
Posts: 12
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Post by hg42 on Aug 22, 2015 19:35:18 GMT -6
I dunno, maybe I have a tendency to go overboard, but even your Benbow doesn't have enough deck and turret top armour imo. Then again, as I said in another post, none of my late game dreadnoughts has ever lost a turret. You can NEVER have too much armour. Cheers Bruce Sure you can - conceptually, you want to skirt exactly as close as possible to the minimum necessary, since anything beyond that is wasted weight, money etc. What you decide that is will vary depending on time, what the AI ends up building, and (this is the big one, happily or otherwise) how well you grok how the AI will behave - since it likes to close range even in situations where it arguably shouldn't it makes sense to do bare minimum deck / oversized belt designs, since you won't actually be in situations where the extra deck will be useful (and they'd be pretty marginal situations anyway, considering you'll always be skirting around the edges of visibility once you get past 20km or so).
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Post by baggers on Aug 22, 2015 20:59:46 GMT -6
I must say the "GorkaMorka" class isn't a dreadnougth, not even a battleship. It's a real battleCruiser.
In fleet battles, it can engage and make some smoke at extremes ranges, but if the other side has better guns and/or start to target it, his extra-speed allow to flee out of range of the ennemy guns. Distance and speed is armor ^^
That speed allow it to "choice" a medium ship in the ennemy fleet, and try to harass it at range.
The 8" secondaries add extra punch, but also appreciable extra range for the secondaries, that can allow some more hits when quickly run at gun range of a already hurted prey, when chased by the slow dreadnougth.
Usualy, it fight baked by a small number of destroyers (4 or more) that help to make some distraction if I want to flee or "coup de grace" torpedos if I haven't the time to stay for sinking the prey because some dreadnougth will came. (I even have scored one time a 10km torpedo hit on a more modern Battlecruiser that hardly chased the "Gorka" and won't distract itself for an escape maneuver... hey!)
It's "Hit and run" and/or "cat and rat" tactics, someday the cat, someday the rat. (It seem that the AI try very often to chase it, allowing me to flee and drive the main battleship line when some already hurted ennemy ship can't keep pace and slowly gone alone...)
Absolutely not a "line" battleship, and especially not a close-range fighter.
But a good nigth finisher too.
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Post by thecarthaginian on Aug 24, 2015 14:39:21 GMT -6
After a rather short and boring commerce war against Germany, the Confederacy lately acquired East Prussia. Deciding to use it as a support base for our British allies, we stationed a rather respectable force of two protected cruisers (9x1x5", 1"-3" protected deck/3" shield/3" CT, 23 knots) there. Not wanting to strip my fleet of 800t destroyers - which would be like shooting fish in a barrel in the Baltic - I designed a generation of light, fast torpedo boats to cover my cruisers. These little boats FAR outfought their production value... probably being ton-for-ton the best investment that I have made so far. They have severely damaged Russian three capital ships (1 BB - 22,000t, 2 B - 20,500t; 15,000t) which were sank later AND sank another outright (1 B - 15,000t). All this for a loss of only three of their own, a grand total of 1,200t lost. The Confederate Navy officially calls all small torpedo craft 'rams' - a throwback to the days of spar torpedoes - but the papers prefer to call the 'Davids', small, brave warriors taking the fight to the Goliaths of the enemy. EDIT: these little guys lasted all the way to the end of the war with no refits... even wiping out a 6 ship merchant convoy on the last turn of the game.
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Post by ccip on Aug 27, 2015 22:04:11 GMT -6
Just finished my first game all the way to 1950 just to see what it was like, playing as CSA, and I thought I'd show my best of that run! The game's best ship by a long shot - and once again they were fast, well-armed ACs - was a pair Quincy-class cruisers, which spent their very long (1910-1950) careers in Asia, where I'd got a foothold after fighting Japan. There, they fought the Japanese again, and later the Russians, both with great success. They succeeded in absolutely every role a cruiser could perform. They were both prolific raiders; they chased down several enemy cruisers; excelled on coastal raids and even successfully bombarded shore targets. They were present in two fleet battles, once acting as a rear guard with multiple heavy guns concentrating on them as my fleet retreated - and once, Samson even managed to drive off a modern (1920s-technology) BC in the dusk and actually "win" the battle through damage points, helped by the fast fire rate. Great ships! Again, for me they confirmed that expensive ACs like this are a very worthwhile investment and are not made obsolete by BCs as long as you use them smartly. This strange beast was a gamble! An all-or-nothing long range slugger meant to outrun and outgun everything afloat, it was a design that proved itself. The pair of Florida-class ships were by far my most successful large combatant. Together, they were first in the line of fire in the sinking of 2 enemy BCs and 3 BBs, including skewering a French BB point-blank in a night engagement early in their career like so: They had one close call with a Russian squadron (mentioned above, where the Quincy-class had to act as a rear guard to help them retreat after taking heavy damage), but overall, they proved themselves. They worked best in fleet battles while positioned well behind my battleships, lobbing plunging fire from long range while the battlewagons drew fire. Despite the larger caliber (they were the only ships in my game with more than 16" guns), it often seemed like the quad turrets were actually firing faster and scoring more hits even at twice the range of other ships with more turrets and smaller guns. The best battleships proper were these guys, also built as a class of two ships - arguably the best-protected ships in the game, they were built for taking punishment, and did it very well. They made their name making the core of the fleet that beat the Russians in the great battle in the Baltic (2 BCs lost vs. 3 BCs and 2 BBs sunk), although both were interned after the battle due to damage. The champion raiders of my game were the long-range Columbia class, a trio of fairly conventional modern CLs. They spent both of my wars with Russia camped out in European waters, sinking anywhere between 2-5 ships each per month. One was lost during a fleet battle. The best destroyers were of this very modern class - they exceeded their design speed by a whole two knots (at least any attempt to reproduce them resulted in 33kt ships by default), which I think makes them about the best destroyers possible in the whole game - with all the armament on the centerline and no lack of bite. They proved themselves throughout. And the weirdest ship of this playthrough goes to.... No, you're not imagining things - that is not a cruiser, it's a 34-knot destroyer with a 12-gun 5-in broadside (thanks to cross-deck capability) - more firepower than most CLs 3x its size. It was a short-range ship meant for convoy defense in home waters. Unfortunately, it was never battle-tested. Definitely one I'll keep in mind for future reference!
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Post by baggers on Aug 27, 2015 22:17:25 GMT -6
I like your "Quincy" class. Early "battlecruisers" that don't became obsolete at raiding convoy or hunting ligth cruisers are fairly good investisment and have a very long service time after a small mid-game engines/fire control refit. (unless you lost them... they are fragile)
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xpav
New Member
Posts: 5
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Post by xpav on Aug 27, 2015 22:18:09 GMT -6
Playing a succession game on another forum. We are getting a little silly at this point. A legal ship design.
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Post by baggers on Aug 27, 2015 22:23:36 GMT -6
Look like a good firecracker.
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Post by galagagalaxian on Aug 27, 2015 23:04:39 GMT -6
With a twenty-two 15" gun broadside and tissue paper for armor, it'll certainly create a lot of fireworks, one way or another.
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Post by baggers on Aug 27, 2015 23:17:51 GMT -6
5'600 tons of ammo... god!
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Post by baggers on Aug 27, 2015 23:33:01 GMT -6
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xpav
New Member
Posts: 5
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Post by xpav on Aug 30, 2015 9:41:50 GMT -6
Playing a succession game on another forum. We are getting a little silly at this point. A legal ship design. In what will be a surprise to no one, the 2 ships of this class were lost to turret explosions.... after a hit from a light gun.
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Post by thecarthaginian on Sept 2, 2015 9:06:46 GMT -6
Possibly the best ships I have designed since I started playing the game, the Savannah class are 3400 tons of pure pain. Their top speed of 24 knots makes them among the fastest ships I can produce in the beginning of the game, and the armament means that they are adept at both independent action against other protected cruisers and screening actions during fleet battles. They have proven adept raiders and more importantly, their six knot advantage over most early-game battleships makes them very good torpedo attack vessels... the Birmingham (pictured here) shares two battleship kills.
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Post by ccip on Sept 2, 2015 22:45:29 GMT -6
Good 5in cruisers can indeed be mean little ships! You just have to be careful in the way you use them - they have a strong natural foe, and that is the 6in fleet cruiser. But they chew up everything else, and oftentimes the 5in guns' better firing rate can be a real advantage. I try to equip all my scout cruisers with 5in batteries
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Post by thecarthaginian on Sept 2, 2015 22:47:42 GMT -6
Good 5in cruisers can indeed be mean little ships! You just have to be careful in the way you use them - they have a strong natural foe, and that is the 6in fleet cruiser. But they chew up everything else, and oftentimes the 5in guns' better firing rate can be a real advantage. I try to equip all my scout cruisers with 5in batteries Exactly. You just have to get that 2-3 knot 'range control cushion' so you can stay out of the reach of the 6" cruisers more powerful guns. Start running as soon as they are identified, and you can generally get away from them.
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