|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 8, 2020 14:42:27 GMT -6
I haven't done it since I switched to playing RTW2 but I used to build early CA and all forward gun BC with Protected armor schemes, especially when playing Italy or Japan. The reduction in weight allowed me to build fair numbers of fast small BC with solid armor thicknesses where they had it. I got good service out of them. I may need to experiment with such designs again in RTW2. Experimenting with ship designs and tactics is fun and vital to learn how to attain good cost per performance. You must adapt your combat tactics to the types of ships that you have designed. Your designs must be economically sound to allow for you to build a sufficient number of ships. Nice work, keep this thread informed. Update: Here is an armored cruiser to examine based on your thoughts.
|
|
|
Post by polygon on Jun 8, 2020 17:49:34 GMT -6
I think a CA would fare poorly in the early game with protected cruiser armor. The primary source of damage before ~1910 is fire and superstructure damage, not flooding (unless you get torpedoed). Protected cruiser configuration does a very poor job (logically so!) at protecting the superstructure. If I wanted to save weight using an alternative armor scheme I would prefer flat deck on top, because the extra protection against belt penetration given by the sloped deck scheme is irrelevant when your primary targets have very low pen (early game CLs and CAs).
|
|
|
Post by jorsonner on Jun 8, 2020 19:49:25 GMT -6
Thoughts on this ship? Is it too big for its time period or otherwise inefficient? I kind of just wanted the largest ship possible. Intended role is to be a big shield for carriers and take on enemy battleships at range. In this campaign I'm the United States in 1934 and haven't run into a war I couldn't handle since 1904. Very large fleet and normal research.
|
|
|
Post by polygon on Jun 8, 2020 20:45:44 GMT -6
Thoughts on this ship? Is it too big for its time period or otherwise inefficient? I kind of just wanted the largest ship possible. Intended role is to be a big shield for carriers and take on enemy battleships at range. In this campaign I'm the United States in 1934 and haven't run into a war I couldn't handle since 1904. Very large fleet and normal research. If you're late game America you can do whatever strikes your fancy, and you'll have ten of them for every one you face I think it's underarmored for it's size. For 60,000t I'd use at minimum 14" of armor, with the sloped belt checkbox. Losing that much ship to a 13 or 14" gun would really, really suck. If you could get the 5" of deck armor I'd go for that too. If you have reliable quad turrets I'd change to an ABY quad 16" configuration (or even 15" if you have quality 1) to save weight. Swap the tertiary battery for more DP secondaries. The smaller set of DP guns gets a 30%(?) debuff. If you have 5" DP guns I'd use those, on a ship that size, 24 is not unreasonable. Otherwise I like it. It will be absolutely abhorrently expensive, but for late game America that's fine. For any smaller power I'd only keep a couple ships that size and build a bunch of cheaper Alaskas.
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 8, 2020 21:02:19 GMT -6
I think I would assess where you are going to fight most of your battles, and is this ship really necessary to perform its missions. The US will probably have three theatres of war:
1. Pacific
2. Atlantic
3. Caribbean
If it involves itself with another nation in a treaty, then the Med, North Sea, Baltic might also be theaters that it will have to fight in.
Who will be its primary opponents? Japan, France, Great Britain are the most likely. Germany, Russia and least of all, Italy.
You have to assess the ships missions based on the above.
Now, as to the ship itself. Well, you assessment drives the building of the ship. Geostrategy always drive requirements which drives specifications. It been that way since the Greeks and Egyptians. It hasn't changed.
So, what would I do? Well, eliminate the 3 inch guns and torpedo mounts, along with the after main gun superfiring gun. Increase the rounds per gun for the main armament and if possibly increase the gun caliber for the secondaries to 6 inch dual purpose if possible.
I agree with Polygon, click on Magazine Box and inclined Belt.
Keep in mind that you are now in the Age of aircraft and carriers. Your turret armor is too thick, as is the armor on your secondaries. Try to get more speed for this ship because your carriers are going get faster, possibly up to 34 knots and this ship will need to be faster to maintain cohesion within the carrier task force.
Those are my ideas, but test your ship and see how it does in Fleet Exercises against carriers. Good luck
|
|
|
Post by polygon on Jun 8, 2020 22:22:04 GMT -6
I think I would assess where you are going to fight most of your battles, and is this ship really necessary to perform its missions. The US will probably have three theatres of war: 1. Pacific 2. Atlantic 3. Caribbean If it involves itself with another nation in a treaty, then the Med, North Sea, Baltic might also be theaters that it will have to fight in. Who will be its primary opponents? Japan, France, Great Britain are the most likely. Germany, Russia and least of all, Italy. You have to assess the ships missions based on the above. Now, as to the ship itself. Well, you assessment drives the building of the ship. Geostrategy always drive requirements which drives specifications. It been that way since the Greeks and Egyptians. It hasn't changed. So, what would I do? Well, eliminate the 3 inch guns and torpedo mounts, along with the after main gun superfiring gun. Increase the rounds per gun for the main armament and if possibly increase the gun caliber for the secondaries to 6 inch dual purpose if possible. I agree with Polygon, click on Magazine Box and inclined Belt. Keep in mind that you are now in the Age of aircraft and carriers. Your turret armor is too thick, as is the armor on your secondaries. Try to get more speed for this ship because your carriers are going get faster, possibly up to 34 knots and this ship will need to be faster to maintain cohesion within the carrier task force. Those are my ideas, but test your ship and see how it does in Fleet Exercises against carriers. Good luck Don't click magazine box! It halves your armor except for over the magazine. Sure, you can use it to get 18" belt and 6" deck over the magazine or something equally silly, but that means your machinery spaces will only be protected by 9" of belt and 3" of deck armor. Wholly inadequate. I would take a 14" non-magazine-box ship over an 18" magazine box ship any day.
|
|
|
Post by aeson on Jun 8, 2020 23:01:45 GMT -6
Thoughts on this ship? Is it too big for its time period or otherwise inefficient? I kind of just wanted the largest ship possible. Intended role is to be a big shield for carriers and take on enemy battleships at range. In this campaign I'm the United States in 1934 and haven't run into a war I couldn't handle since 1904. Very large fleet and normal research. The AA armament - in particular the heavy AA armament - strikes me as rather light, especially considering that one of the intended roles is stated to be carrier escort. I would recommend dropping the secondary armor from 5" to ~2" - five inches of armor is probably at best marginal against typical heavy cruiser armaments at engagement ranges reasonable for the cruiser and certainly won't faze the kinds of bombs that I'd want to drop on a 60,000t capital ship or a peer opponent's main battery at any range - and use the tonnage recovered to increase the number of guns to 24; if necessary, eliminate the tertiary battery to do it, because I doubt if a dozen unarmored 3" guns are really any more resilient against battle damage than a dozen 4" guns in twin mounts with full splinter protection would be, and a dozen 4" DP guns on top of the dozen you already have is probably a third more HAA factor than your current setup even if you have to drop the entire tertiary battery to get there. I would also recommend finding the tonnage for the fourth AA director and probably enough LAA/MAA guns to fill out the remaining AA positions - probably drop a floatplane, since I'm guessing you probably have four or five on the ship.
Speaking of floatplanes, I'd strongly consider getting a second catapult if you're carrying more than two or three.
As to other aspects of the design, I would probably drop the fourth 16" turret in exchange for heavier armor - a ship this expensive would be quite painful to lose even as late-game USA with a lot of victorious wars behind it boosting the budget to even greater heights than normal - and maybe an extra knot if you need it to remain classified as a battlecruiser, and I'd probably ditch the torpedo reloads because about the only practical reason to carry torpedoes on something like this is so that you can have the torpedo range circle visible with it selected during battle scenarios.
6" guns are a terrible choice for a ship's sole heavy anti-aircraft armament within the game; non-autoloading 6" DP offers less HAA factor per gun than non-autoloading 3" DP and autoloading 6" DP offers about as much HAA factor per gun as autoloading 3" DP or non-autoloading 5" DP while having easily the highest tonnage cost of any DP-capable gun. The only reason to take 6" DP guns over 4" or 5" DP guns is if you want the greater anti-surface capability of the 6" guns, but that's far more a concern for CLs and maybe CAs than for 60,000-ton battlecruisers with a dozen 16" guns in the main battery - especially since the surface targets that such a ship's secondary battery is mostly there to defend against are destroyers, and 5" guns are probably at least as good as 6" guns against destroyers at pretty much any stage of the game.
|
|
geroj
Junior Member
Posts: 76
|
Post by geroj on Jun 9, 2020 3:01:54 GMT -6
I agree for huge 60k t battleship its lightly armored and with light AA. I dont really see a point of large ship with 4.5" deck, BC with something like 5" deck should stay under 40 000t
|
|
|
Post by rimbecano on Jun 9, 2020 8:48:50 GMT -6
View AttachmentThoughts on this ship? Is it too big for its time period or otherwise inefficient? I kind of just wanted the largest ship possible. Intended role is to be a big shield for carriers and take on enemy battleships at range. In this campaign I'm the United States in 1934 and haven't run into a war I couldn't handle since 1904. Very large fleet and normal research. My advice: 1) In contrast to oldpop, I'm going to say that the turrets aren't heavily armored enough. Past the early game, I make sure that the turret face armor on any capital ship is at least 1" more than the caliber of the main guns, and I really try for 2" unless I'm really squeezed for weight. OTOH, the game often asks if I really want to armor the main turrets that heavily, but turret fires are instant death for a ship, I'm generally inclined to sacrifice other things to make sure the turrets are over-protected. The turrets should certainly not be armored to *less* than the caliber of the main guns in the 1930s. The turret tops also are a bit thin, but given how much horizontal armor weighs, maybe not quite so bad. 2) The belt is thin for my taste, though the Iowa class had the same thickness (the Iowas' belts were inclined, though). I tend to think that the Iowas were dangerously battlecruisery in their horizontal protection scheme (and the game classifies an Iowa build as a BC), but it was never put to the test against heavy guns, and the Washington treaty had resulted in a world full of much less dangerous battleships than the Iowas would otherwise have been facing (except for the Yamatos). The AI in game tends not to build ships beyond 16" guns and 50-ish kton, so you'll probably get away with it, but even fit 16" guns it's a bit light for the 1930s, and if the AI took full advantage of not being treaty restricted, it really would be. 3) The deck is quite thin for this late in the game (the Iowas had 7"), and the turret tops are less thick than is optimal, although the fact that the game's vertical penetration tables saturate at 30,000 yd makes the latter less dangerous than it would be IRL. 4) The secondary battery should be 20-24 4" or 5" DP guns. There should only be a tertiary battery past the early game if you've filled the secondary battery to the 24-gun maximum and still want more heavy AA. 5) The armor on the secondary guns is excessive. I've never lost a ship with 2" of armor on 6" secondary guns to secondary flash fire, not a ship with 4" secondaries even with unarmored guns. Historically, the 5"/38 mounts on the Iowas had 2" of armor. 6) All the AA positions should be filled at this point in the game. You probably should have 4 AA directors. 7) I'm fine with the torpedoes you have, but the historical USN didn't tend to mount them on anything heavier than a destroyer, and many players don't put torps on capital ships. Historically, the Japanese lost several heavy cruisers to damage from torpedo tubes being hit, though arguably this had as much to do with the use of pure oxygen in the Long Lance as anything. In game, I haven't found it to be a huge concern. 8) Given that your 16" guns are Q0, I might consider fewer guns of heavier caliber, depending what qualities you have available in the 17" plus range. With the rolloff there is in gun effectiveness beyond 16", I'd probably go with 16" Q1 unless I had something like an 18" Q1 or 20" Q0, but for 16" Q0, you might want to look at the penetration tables for any 17"+ guns that you have and see if they fit your tactical style better than 16". 9) Magazine box has been suggested, and might be viable if you went with the maximum belt thickness of 20", and an inclined belt. It would make your machinery somewhat more vulnerable (though maybe not a whole lot more than it is now: 10" inclined isn't that much worse than 12" non-inclined), but ships with machinery damage can often still be extracted safely. Still, I value high tactical speed too much to be entirely comfortable with the idea. I'd rather have something like 14" inclined with no magazine box. Keep in mind that whatever deck thickness you selected would also be halved.
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 9, 2020 9:23:44 GMT -6
Thoughts on this ship? Is it too big for its time period or otherwise inefficient? I kind of just wanted the largest ship possible. Intended role is to be a big shield for carriers and take on enemy battleships at range. In this campaign I'm the United States in 1934 and haven't run into a war I couldn't handle since 1904. Very large fleet and normal research. My last thoughts. I believe that you should build one of these ships as designed. After completion, then run some fleet exercise with this ship against battleships, cruisers, destroyers and carriers. This is how actual navies test except they don't build the ship until the Naval War Colleges have tested the design or designs. Try it and let us all know how it works. To All: Let's all start using the fleet exercises and develop a testing philosophy to help design ships. It might a barrel of fun, IMHO.
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 9, 2020 14:30:12 GMT -6
I just ran two fleet exercises in my Japan game circa 1906. You can only run one per year. In the first, it was two Japanese armored cruisers, identical, against each other. The friendly armored cruiser was sunk with fifteen hits while only managing five hits. In the second exercise it was the same class of armored cruiser against two Japanese light cruisers and the result was nothing. No hits, nothing. Interesting but not much information to use. I will be playing it more today.
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 9, 2020 15:22:11 GMT -6
I played a another Fleet Exercise, this time in my 1900 Germany game. Two Armored Cruisers, same class versus one battleship. While the Armored Cruisers got the most points because of hits on the BB's superstructure, it was inconsequential. More to come.
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 9, 2020 15:45:29 GMT -6
I just discovered something interesting. I have a game as Germany which ended in 1956. But I can still use the ships and play a Fleet Exercise. I just played a Battle Cruiser versus a heavy cruiser and the BC sank the Heavy Cruiser. So, We could keep these games and use them to play exercise. Now if we could just add some ship.
|
|
|
Post by jorsonner on Jun 9, 2020 21:04:36 GMT -6
I just ran a exercise fleet battle with my new large battlecruiser design from earlier and learned some interesting things. The most interesting thing was that rimbecano was right about there not being enough turret armor. My older but still large battleship was able to take out two of its turrets by the end of their battle. The fleets were the BC and two CAs with DD escort vs an older BB, two CAs, and DD escort. Both sides also had CVLs with DD escort but the planes didn't do much in this engagement for either side. The battle took place at relatively close range and there were many penetrations on the BE and DE of the BC, but that was what makes this an experimental design and there was not much pen to the belt. The older BB, however was beaten pretty badly with the main guns of the BC and was finished off with torps from the DDs. It is my opinion that the BC won because it was more accurate than its opponent, not because it was better armored and larger. More testing is needed, but it is also worth mentioning that despite beating the BB, the BC did end up taking almost half flotation damage in the engagement. Below are the two designs. The BC is from 1934 and the BB is mostly unchanged from 1926 and about to be refit. P.S. I'm new to the game and trying to improve so constructive criticism is welcome
|
|
|
Post by oldpop2000 on Jun 10, 2020 9:55:32 GMT -6
I just ran a exercise fleet battle with my new large battlecruiser design from earlier and learned some interesting things. The most interesting thing was that rimbecano was right about there not being enough turret armor. My older but still large battleship was able to take out two of its turrets by the end of their battle. The fleets were the BC and two CAs with DD escort vs an older BB, two CAs, and DD escort. Both sides also had CVLs with DD escort but the planes didn't do much in this engagement for either side. The battle took place at relatively close range and there were many penetrations on the BE and DE of the BC, but that was what makes this an experimental design and there was not much pen to the belt. The older BB, however was beaten pretty badly with the main guns of the BC and was finished off with torps from the DDs. It is my opinion that the BC won because it was more accurate than its opponent, not because it was better armored and larger. More testing is needed, but it is also worth mentioning that despite beating the BB, the BC did end up taking almost half flotation damage in the engagement. Below are the two designs. The BC is from 1934 and the BB is mostly unchanged from 1926 and about to be refit. P.S. I'm new to the game and trying to improve so constructive criticism is welcome I think the direction you are headed is good, but remember to change your tactics because naval battles are won more by tactics than the thickness of the armor. In testing, do it in small stages. In other words, start the exercise, but then as the ships fire at each other, stop and look at the results based on the direction and orientation of the ships. Nice work. I am now in a game with Germany and I am going to run an exercise when I get to the next year. I am going to try to use the functions to stop the game at critical points.
|
|