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Post by seawolf on Jul 19, 2020 18:15:28 GMT -6
Currently it seems to max out around 26,000 yards, which works well for WWI era combat. Would it be possible to add an option or modify this range by somewhere around 25% in the 20s or 30s so that ships can see each other at longer range, simulating enhanced optics and the increasing size of ships. For example, two Iowa class can see each other at up to 36 km Edit: The correct visual sighting distance for an Iowa class is 31.5 km or 34,500 yards
Basically, in game clear weather conditions correspond with historical cloudy weather conditions, and clear conditions should be between 30,000 and 34,000 yards, not between 25,000 and 27,000 yards
Some optical spotting distances from WWII actions (The point at which ships were identified or fired upon)
Sinking of Glorious-28,600 yards
Cape Spartivento-30,000 yards
Denmark Strait-29,500 yards
Battle off Samar-33,900 yards(Yamato supposedly scored a hit on her third salvo from beyond this range, around 35,000 yards)
Engagement between Kido Butai and USS Edsall-30,000 yards
And here is radar max ranges
Suriago Strait-42,000 yards
North Cape-45,500 yards
And some other fun tidbits
Using aerial spotting, the standard battleships could hit targets with 14" guns at around 33,000 yards!
Iowa scored a near miss using radar gunnery at 39,000 yards
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berte
Full Member
BANNED
Posts: 109
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Post by berte on Jul 19, 2020 19:33:24 GMT -6
So you're a flat Earther, huh?
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 19, 2020 20:40:15 GMT -6
Currently it seems to max out around 26,000 yards, which works well for WWI era combat. Would it be possible to add an option or modify this range by somewhere around 25% in the 20s or 30s so that ships can see each other at longer range, simulating enhanced optics and the increasing size of ships. For example, two Iowa class can see each other at up to 36 km Well, the masts of the Iowa's were 174 feet from the waterline, So for 174 feet, where distance is equal to the square root of 2 time radius of the earth times the height of the mast that would be about 25.9986 km or 16 miles. You are close.
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Post by rimbecano on Jul 19, 2020 23:03:04 GMT -6
Currently it seems to max out around 26,000 yards, which works well for WWI era combat. Would it be possible to add an option or modify this range by somewhere around 25% in the 20s or 30s so that ships can see each other at longer range, simulating enhanced optics and the increasing size of ships. For example, two Iowa class can see each other at up to 36 km Well, the masts of the Iowa's were 174 feet from the waterline, So for 174 feet, where distance is equal to the square root of 2 time radius of the earth times the height of the mast that would be about 25.9986 km or 16 miles. You are close. Your both wrong, actually. His figure of 36 km is correct for the distance from the masthead of one ship to the horizon, but the distance at which two Iowas could (in theory) spot each other is double that, so he was in fact off by a factor of two. The calculation for horizon distance is sqrt((r_earth + h_mast)^2 - (r_earth)^2). We then double that for the mast-to-mast visibility. Now, in reality, the tip-top of the mast would not be enough to make the ship visible (unless it were nighttime and the mast top were carrying a light, which is unlikely for a ship in a war zone), so you'd have to be somewhat closer. Now, in the early game, with coal fired ships, funnel smoke might be visible well beyond the mast-to-mast range, but in the late game, funnel smoke won't be as dark, so it's less likely to be spotted at any great range.
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Post by seawolf on Jul 20, 2020 0:30:19 GMT -6
So you're a flat Earther, huh ? In all seriousness I’m just using a calculator for horizon distance, which is arriving at 36km for two Iowa class
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 20, 2020 7:29:34 GMT -6
Well, the masts of the Iowa's were 174 feet from the waterline, So for 174 feet, where distance is equal to the square root of 2 time radius of the earth times the height of the mast that would be about 25.9986 km or 16 miles. You are close. Your both wrong, actually. His figure of 36 km is correct for the distance from the masthead of one ship to the horizon, but the distance at which two Iowas could (in theory) spot each other is double that, so he was in fact off by a factor of two. The calculation for horizon distance is sqrt((r_earth + h_mast)^2 - (r_earth)^2). We then double that for the mast-to-mast visibility. Now, in reality, the tip-top of the mast would not be enough to make the ship visible (unless it were nighttime and the mast top were carrying a light, which is unlikely for a ship in a war zone), so you'd have to be somewhat closer. Now, in the early game, with coal fired ships, funnel smoke might be visible well beyond the mast-to-mast range, but in the late game, funnel smoke won't be as dark, so it's less likely to be spotted at any great range. The SG radar could spot a battleship at 22 nautical miles so it probably spotted other Iowa class ship long before visual range. She could see low-altitude bombers at 15 nautical miles and destroyers at the same range. The set had IFF but it might have been used more for aircraft than ships.
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Post by seawolf on Jul 20, 2020 12:21:29 GMT -6
Your both wrong, actually. His figure of 36 km is correct for the distance from the masthead of one ship to the horizon, but the distance at which two Iowas could (in theory) spot each other is double that, so he was in fact off by a factor of two. The calculation for horizon distance is sqrt((r_earth + h_mast)^2 - (r_earth)^2). We then double that for the mast-to-mast visibility. Now, in reality, the tip-top of the mast would not be enough to make the ship visible (unless it were nighttime and the mast top were carrying a light, which is unlikely for a ship in a war zone), so you'd have to be somewhat closer. Now, in the early game, with coal fired ships, funnel smoke might be visible well beyond the mast-to-mast range, but in the late game, funnel smoke won't be as dark, so it's less likely to be spotted at any great range. The SG radar could spot a battleship at 22 nautical miles so it probably spotted other Iowa class ship long before visual range. She could see low-altitude bombers at 15 nautical miles and destroyers at the same range. The set had IFF but it might have been used more for aircraft than ships. The problem in game is that the radar allows spotting, but in daytime your ships won't fire on those targets until within visible range for whatever reason. So the 27,000 yards max still applies, even if your radar could pick the enemy up at 44,000 yards
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 20, 2020 16:12:43 GMT -6
The SG radar could spot a battleship at 22 nautical miles so it probably spotted other Iowa class ship long before visual range. She could see low-altitude bombers at 15 nautical miles and destroyers at the same range. The set had IFF but it might have been used more for aircraft than ships. The problem in game is that the radar allows spotting, but in daytime your ships won't fire on those targets until within visible range for whatever reason. So the 27,000 yards max still applies, even if your radar could pick the enemy up at 44,000 yards Well, waiting for visual sighting isn't really a bad idea. It was considered better in real history to contact another ship with radar, prepare, but wait until she was verified by visual means. In most cases that was by a float plane or carrier based scout bomber. I can see this as being realistic enough. But over time, this should change as the navy becomes more trusting of radar and IFF works a little more reliably. With the advent of SIF in IFF, meetings became more electromagnetic and more trusted. Worked well with aircraft trust me. When the navies got transmitters and receivers for IFF, especially aircraft, then visual sightings weren't as necessary.
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Post by seawolf on Jul 20, 2020 16:36:30 GMT -6
The problem in game is that the radar allows spotting, but in daytime your ships won't fire on those targets until within visible range for whatever reason. So the 27,000 yards max still applies, even if your radar could pick the enemy up at 44,000 yards Well, waiting for visual sighting isn't really a bad idea. It was considered better in real history to contact another ship with radar, prepare, but wait until she was verified by visual means. In most cases that was by a float plane or carrier based scout bomber. I can see this as being realistic enough. But over time, this should change as the navy becomes more trusting of radar and IFF works a little more reliably. With the advent of SIF in IFF, meetings became more electromagnetic and more trusted. Worked well with aircraft trust me. When the navies got transmitters and receivers for IFF, especially aircraft, then visual sightings weren't as necessary. The problem is still the in game visual sighting distance though. The Iowa class have a mast height of 52.3m, which means two of them can see each other at 36.5km, or 39,916 yards. Thats almost 50% more than in-game sighting distance. Arbitrarily restricting visual sighting to such short ranges screws up the flow of engagements, given that guns range much further
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Post by oldpop2000 on Jul 20, 2020 16:50:44 GMT -6
Well, waiting for visual sighting isn't really a bad idea. It was considered better in real history to contact another ship with radar, prepare, but wait until she was verified by visual means. In most cases that was by a float plane or carrier based scout bomber. I can see this as being realistic enough. But over time, this should change as the navy becomes more trusting of radar and IFF works a little more reliably. With the advent of SIF in IFF, meetings became more electromagnetic and more trusted. Worked well with aircraft trust me. When the navies got transmitters and receivers for IFF, especially aircraft, then visual sightings weren't as necessary. The problem is still the in game visual sighting distance though. The Iowa class have a mast height of 52.3m, which means two of them can see each other at 36.5km, or 39,916 yards. Thats almost 50% more than in-game sighting distance. Arbitrarily restricting visual sighting to such short ranges screws up the flow of engagements, given that guns range much further Well, then the game needs to be more flexible. I don't know, you can change and make everything perfect.
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Post by seawolf on Jul 20, 2020 16:55:18 GMT -6
The problem is still the in game visual sighting distance though. The Iowa class have a mast height of 52.3m, which means two of them can see each other at 36.5km, or 39,916 yards. Thats almost 50% more than in-game sighting distance. Arbitrarily restricting visual sighting to such short ranges screws up the flow of engagements, given that guns range much further Well, then the game needs to be more flexible. I don't know, you can change and make everything perfect. Oh, I would have modded it like I did the speed tables, but its hardcoded so only the devs can make changes, hence why I posted it here
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Post by rimbecano on Jul 20, 2020 17:36:59 GMT -6
Well, waiting for visual sighting isn't really a bad idea. It was considered better in real history to contact another ship with radar, prepare, but wait until she was verified by visual means. In most cases that was by a float plane or carrier based scout bomber. I can see this as being realistic enough. But over time, this should change as the navy becomes more trusting of radar and IFF works a little more reliably. With the advent of SIF in IFF, meetings became more electromagnetic and more trusted. Worked well with aircraft trust me. When the navies got transmitters and receivers for IFF, especially aircraft, then visual sightings weren't as necessary. The problem is still the in game visual sighting distance though. The Iowa class have a mast height of 52.3m, which means two of them can see each other at 36.5km, or 39,916 yards. Thats almost 50% more than in-game sighting distance. Arbitrarily restricting visual sighting to such short ranges screws up the flow of engagements, given that guns range much further They're going to spot each other at more than 36 km, because 36 km is the distance to spot an object at zero height. Ideally, the distance for two identical ships to spot each other will be twice the horizon distance from one ship's mast. However, just the top of a ship's mast will be very hard to see at that distance, so sighting distance might be more like mast top to funnel top, depending somewhat on the robustness of a given ship's mast (which, in the case of the Iowas, will tend to favor early detection). By the time the two ships are within 30kyd of each other, they will be in full view of one another, at least as far as line of sight is concerned. However, there is the additional consideration that even in decently good weather, atmospheric conditions may not allow sighting at such ranges. 10 mile visibility will look like a clear day to any layman, but will limit sighting ranges to ~18000 yards.
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akd
Full Member
Posts: 126
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Post by akd on Jul 20, 2020 19:08:52 GMT -6
There were not significant technological developments during this era when it comes to visually acquiring targets. The lookout (http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ref/Lookouts/index.html) with a pair of binoculars remained the primary means of finding enemy ships visually.
Also, the highest visual spotting position is not likely to be the very tip-top of the mast height. I'm just eyeballing it, but looking at scale drawings, it seems the top spotting position on the Iowa (BB-43) in 1943 is not any higher than that on the Maine (BB-10) in 1911 with cage masts. Might even be a bit lower. I don't see a good reason to significantly increase the visual spotting radius as the timeline progresses.
Another issue is that a ship would need to be above the horizon to target effectively, and since main gun range often exceeds the horizon, showing ships that are at the very limit of possible visual acquisition (mast top to mast top) and that are within gun range, but aren't really within a range at which they can be targeted with those guns could be confusing. Same issue with funnel smoke, which in clear conditions should be visible even further (but again gives warning of a possible enemy, not a target which can be engaged). These types of visual acquisitions might better be handled with some sort of spotting report giving a bearing from a ship.
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Post by seawolf on Jul 21, 2020 2:44:15 GMT -6
There were not significant technological developments during this era when it comes to visually acquiring targets. The lookout (http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/ref/Lookouts/index.html) with a pair of binoculars remained the primary means of finding enemy ships visually. Also, the highest visual spotting position is not likely to be the very tip-top of the mast height. I'm just eyeballing it, but looking at scale drawings, it seems the top spotting position on the Iowa (BB-43) in 1943 is not any higher than that on the Maine (BB-10) in 1911 with lattice masts. Might even be a bit lower. I don't see a good reason to significantly increase the visual spotting radius as the timeline progresses. Another issue is that a ship would need to be above the horizon to target effectively, and since main gun range often exceeds the horizon, showing ships that are the very limit of possible visual acquisition (mast top to mast top) and that are within gun range, but aren't really within a range at which they can be targeted with those guns could be confusing. Same issue with funnel smoke, which in clear conditions should be visible even further (but again gives warning of a possible enemy, not a target which can be engaged). These types of visual acquisitions might better be handled with some sort of spotting report giving a bearing from a ship. Well given funnel smoke or radar acquisition, they might actually be using optical range-finding at those long ranges
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Post by director on Jul 21, 2020 8:21:48 GMT -6
I haven't looked up the circular probability error for an Iowa's guns, but - given other gunnery from WW2 - you'd be wasting shells and killing fish while praying for the golden BB of a hit. Until or unless you use spotting aircraft or get some sort of fins and guidance package to make a 16" projectile 'smart', being able to reach that far doesn't mean you can hit a target - even something 800 feet long - because of error, wind, inability to spot and too long a flight-time to make correction meaningful.
I'm a great believer in gunnery, gunnery control systems and radar... I just think you're over the limits of what the system can reasonably do and over the limits of ammunition stowage. If you fire your stocks dry trying to land a couple of hits, you'll need the Iowa's speed to disengage.
So... I do think the game should let you do it. Maybe there should be a naval 'Doctrine' checklist for things like that. If the game doesn't permit, protecting the inexperienced player from a serious mistake is a likely reason. You, being quite experienced, should be able to do as you like - I'm just stating reasons why I wouldn't, if I could.
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